Cavaliers of Mars takes its inspiration from pulp
fantasy and historical fiction. Some sources are more
romantic, others more exotic, and all thrilling.
Fantasy
The Adventures of Eric John Stark, by Leigh Brackett
Brackett depicts an ancient Mars of crumbling tow-
ers and forgotten horrors beneath the ice. Her hero,
Eric John Stark, is a hardboiled barbarian, a mercenary
who’d make a great Cavaliers protagonist. Brackett’s
Mars often seems haunted, with its strange talismans
and sinister ruins...a feeling appropriate to exploring
the world of Cavaliers of Mars.
All of Stark’s adventures are good inspiration, but
the most influential on this book are “Black Amazon of
Mars” and “The Secret of Sinharat.” Recent editions of
most of the Stark stories are available from Paizo Pub-
lishing.
The Adventures of Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser,
by Fritz Leiber
Leiber’s stories of wandering swordsmen and exotic
metropoles are perfect models for Cavaliers adventures.
Particularly consider some of the lesser-known stories
like “Claws from the Night,” which feature exotic crea-
tures and customs, as well as bizarre cults. “Claws from
the Night” also dwells on the city of Lankhmar’s skyline
of shattered temples, an image very appropriate to Mars.
Also have a look at Adept’s Gambit, an early novella about
strange curses and a journey into the eerie unknown.
The two heroes’ adventures also rely on wry hu-
mor and perverse circumstance, particularly as the se-
ries goes on. In playing roleplaying games, the former
element tends to happen on its own, and the latter is
a good technique to consider when planning your ses-
sions, whether as player or GM.
Lankhmar, as a setting, has been adapted for role-
playing games many times. TSR’s Lankhmar: City of
Adventure, by Bruce Nesmith, Douglas Niles, and Ken
Rolston, is one of the best sandbox-style city books ever
produced for gaming. Mongoose’s Lankhmar and Nehwon
supplements, by Aaron Dembski-Bowden, hew close to
the bleaker tone of the early stories. Finally, Pinnacle’s
Lankhmar line includes a very adaptable book of adven-
tures called Savage Tales of the Thieves’ Guild.
Dictionary of Mu, by Judd Karlman
A supplement for the Sorcerer roleplaying game by
Ron Edwards, Karlman’s epic presents a sweeping vision of
Marr’d, a parched and desolate planet. Dictionary is equal
parts the Hebrew Bible and Robert E. Howard’s Conan,
yet wholly remade by Karlman’s unrestrained imagination.
Here you’ll find witch kings with legions of scheming brides
and grooms, gray aliens plotting their escape from slavery,
and the Damsel Messiah herself, savior of mythic Hy-Brasil.
Dictionary of Mu was another early influence on
Cavaliers of Mars, and by twists and turns of desti-
ny (and Judd’s gracious permission), you’ll find a few
echoes of Marr’d upon our Mars.
The Dying Earth, by Jack Vance
Vance’s first Dying Earth anthology is, with the ex-
ception of the overt sorcery, about exactly the kind of
characters and locations we’d expect from Cavaliers of
Mars, though some of the protagonists aren’t appropri-
ate player characters. His description of the city of Kai-
in in “Turjan of Miir” could readily be Vance or Zodiac.
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 fantasy | Historical Fiction
It was night in white-walled Kaiin, and festival
time. Orange lanterns floated in the air, moving as
the breeze took them. From the balconies dangled
flower chains and cages of blue fireflies. The streets
surged with the wine-flushed populace, costumed in
a multitude of bizarre modes. Here was a Melantine
bargeman, here a warrior of Valdaran’s Green Le-
gion, here another of ancient times wearing one of
the old helmets. In a little cleared space, a garlanded
courtesan of the Kauchique littoral danced the Dance
of the Fourteen Silken Movements to the music of
flutes. In the shadow of a balcony a girl barbarian
of East Almery embraced a man blackened and in
leather harness as a Deodand of the forest. They were
gay, these people of waning Earth, feverishly merry,
for infinite night was close at hand, when the red sun
should finally flicker and go black.
The sequel, The Eyes of the Overworld, follows trav-
eling ne’er-do-well Cugel the Clever, who might make
a diverting antagonist for a Cavaliers game.
The roleplaying game of the same name, from Pel-
grane Press, is also excellent and has a number of sup-
plements that can be raided for your own game.
The Manuscript Found in Saragossa, by Jan Potocki
Retell The Eyes of the Overworld by way of The Turn of
the Screw and you’ll get this picaresque adventure novel,
except that it vastly predates either one. Potocki’s novel
is an exercise in just how tangled together a lot of seem-
ingly-separate adventures can get, the kind of crazy quilt
a Mars full of scoundrels and heroes might actually be.
Perhaps the thing it does best is tell a story about
deeply superstitious characters suffering strange events
without the author making a clear statement on whether
their beliefs have a basis in fact. That’s a strong compo-
nent of Cavaliers of Mars, where you’ll tell the stories of
a superstitious people who may or may not be right.
The Martian Romances of Edgar Rice Burroughs
Burroughs invented planetary romance. A Princess
of Mars and its sequels are an unending parade of thrill-
ing action and encounters with strange beasts. Bur-
roughs’ fantastical creatures are his greatest (though
not only) influence on the present work, conjuring as
they do thoughts of entire unearthly ecosystems.
Zothique, by Clark Ashton Smith
Smith set his most memorable adventures on
Zothique, the last continent in the world’s last age. He
was a poet as well as a fiction writer, and it shows in his
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ornate and exotic language. He’s a great influence for
atmosphere, and originated the idea of the end of the
world as something long, melancholy, and a bit roman-
tic, rather than apocalyptic.
My personal favorite Zothique tale is “Morthylla,”
a love story that blurs the line between hungry ghosts
and living outsiders.
Historical Fiction
Captain Alatriste, by Arturo Pérez-Reverte
Pérez-Reverte’s Madrid is a city of intrigue and gos-
sip, power and violence. It’s a city in a Golden Age...
but, as the narrator notes in Purity of Blood, the com-
mon people see very little of that gold.
The titular Diego Alatriste, hardboiled swashbuck-
ler, is an ideal Cavaliers of Mars protagonist. So is his
enemy, the cruel Italian swordsman Gualterio Malates-
ta. The translated novel and its sequels are full of won-
derful passages like this:
Truces from his adversaries, like periods of pros-
perity, were brief for this singular man, the hobgoblin
of his enemies and the delight of his friends, who one
moment might be mingling with nobles and scholars
and the next scrabbling in his purse for the last mara-
vedi. Changes of fortune... which so loves to change,
and almost never for the better.
As with most of this list, the whole series is worth
reading. After the eponymous first book, have a look at
Purity of Blood and The Cavalier in the Yellow Doublet.
We’ve heard good things about the Spanish role-
playing game based on the series, but haven’t been able
to read it ourselves.
The D’Artagnan Romances, by Alexandre Dumas
The Three Musketeers and The Man in the Iron
Mask are the best-known in this series, but all are
worth reading. Dumas’ characters, while often easy to
cheer for, are rough-edged and often as put upon by
their loyalties as they are uplifted by them. But more
than that, Dumas is on this list because he defined the
villains of the swashbuckler. It’s hard to envision the
genre without its Cardinal Richelieus and Milady de
Winters.
Another Dumas novel featuring Cardinal Riche-
lieu, The Red Sphinx, was recently retranslated into En-
glish by Lawrence Ellsworth.
 APPENDIX C: INSPIRATION

A NOTE ON CONTENT
Much of the media suggested here is older and has politics that are disturbing by modern standards, par-
ticularly with regard to gender and race. We recommend approaching these sources with a critical eye.

The Dictionary of the Khazars, by Milorad Pavic
This might actually belong in the fantasy section.
Like Gentleman of the Road, below, it concerns the
mysterious kingdom of the Khazars, about whom we
know very little. Pavic’s book, however, is substantially
stranger and more exotic than Chabon’s. Take this pas-
sage, describing a princess:
At night, she wore a single letter on each eyelid,
inscribed as are those put on the eyelids of horses
before a race. The letters came from the proscribed
Khazar alphabet, in which each letter kills as soon
as it is read. Blind men wrote them, and the la-
dies-in-waiting shut their eyes when they attended to
the princess in the morning, before her bath. Thus,
she was protected from her enemies while she slept.
Such customs would fit the aristocracy of the Red
Martians well, and who’s to say there aren’t First Mar-
tian or Cydonian glyphs that could kill even as they’re
mirrored in the mind’s eye?
Gentlemen of the Road, by Michael Chabon
This novel follows two adventurers in an Eastern
European kingdom where “a Jew’s worth was measured
by his steel.” Chabon creates a distinct historical place...
while at the same time making it a place outside our
understanding of history. The result is simultaneously
grounded and fantastic.
Gentlemen of the Road is also good gaming inspi-
ration for many of the same reasons as Leiber’s sword
tales, which strongly influenced it.
Goddess, by Kelly Gardiner
A fictional biography of real-life swashbuckler and
opera star Julie d’Aubigny, Goddess styles itself as the
confessions of a dying woman…but one who’s hardly
repentant. The result is an alternately dashing and mel-
ancholy whirlwind of a novel, spanning love affairs, re-
bellion, and fame. The way Gardiner writes d’Aubigny’s
look back has very much the same feeling as our look at
the last days of Mars.
D’Aubigny herself was a major influence on Cava-
liers of Mars, and it’s worth looking up more flamboy-
ant accounts of her life online.
Royal Flash, by George MacDonald Fraser
The Prisoner of Zenda as retold by cowardly and un-
lucky Victorian scoundrel Harry Flashman...who can’t
seem to help coming out as the hero. Flashman is a bit
of a swashbuckler, but has more than a little in common
with Cugel the Clever. Flashman could be a Cavaliers
of Mars protagonist, but also consider Rudi von Stern-
berg, the murderous sellsword, whom we’ve adapted as
a Martian villain multiple times.

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