badcat

...:ohwell:

That's part of my objection to the movie...you can't leave politics outside the door. It's what the movie is. Pretty visuals and all, I can't help but feel that the portrayal of the military is meant to be 'realistic' somehow, and white western civilization, well, that's what we DO, and the noble savages with their um, ally, are giving the evil imperialist humans (who are apparently stand-ins for evil American imperialists) the boot. No thanks. I was a Navy man and I know how evil the American military isn't. Nor is capitalism evil. It's just the economic system that happens to have produced the most affluent civilization in history with the fewest evils. Current forces seem intent on killing the goose that laid the golden egg... Anyway, with that level of spacefaring technology (in the movie) we would have all the access to natural resources we would need, multiple solar systems in all liklihood...killing natives for their stuff would be sort of obsolete. It's not a good story, it's insulting as hell, and normally I could shelve all that and go for the eye candy. But not this time, not in the current very dangerous political climate. It's McCarthyism in reverse. After Aliens I cannot believe Cameron did this. Besides, they could nuke em from orbit. It's the only way to be sure.

I must be one of the six people who are not going to go see this...

The crappiest thing that has been done to a favorite game of mine, IMO, is the deal between Chaosium and Mongoose to 'kill' the pdf versions of Stormbringer 1 when MRQ came out. It still gripes me. And it makes me hesitant to buy into anything from either company again. Although I have picked up two or three items from both companies together since then I would have been much more likely to have bought *many* more of the rpg books they have published since the SB1 stuff 'disappeared', SB1 having been my game of first choice (having access to replacement pdfs would not have hurt their business as much as what they did, in my case) and a game which was literally jerked out from under me. That's real. So although 'RQ2' looks like it might be OK (or maybe not...there may be too many options and so forth whilst the latest BRP book sort of raped the system of its charm for me), I'll probably look to other games altogether. Savage Worlds is probably going to be my go to game from now on, although some of the SW settings would be good with BRP or MRQ2, and I drift in that direction when I see shiny toys like MRQ2. I really think enough is enough, but hey, this thread and some attitude from Mongoose adherents has pushed me away, I do believe! Happy gaming, I will be running some Savage Worlds this weekend. It's simple, playable and fun...much like SB1 was before it was deleted from existance.

And there I thought that was an original thought that I had had. :ohwell:

I am thinking about converting this to BRP, SB1 rules to be exact. Has anyone else taken a look at this setting? Nordic/Germanic feel, and it looks tailor make for a conversion to another system, as the Gazeteer is said to be rules free. The dice (stat and skill) are easy to convert to 3D6/%, there is even a site called savageheroes that gives guidelines. Take a look, this setting is almost perfect for BRP. A Nordic world in the grip of fimbulwinter! Plus the books are real pretty.

OK, now we know. BRP et al is an old fart game!:eek:

I just got an e-mail saying this will be available on the 23rd, and apparently is part of a 30% off Halloween sale. I looked at their catalog and there it was. Are the monographs sturdy enough to stand up to heavy use, or should I just go ahead and get the pdf? Anyway, I cannot wait to get it sale or not....here we go!

Congratulations.:thumb: There's a copy sold here. Or two or three. And a lifesaver it is. I was thinking about Pathfinder, at least to play, because I REALLY have been wanting to get into an old style adventure oriented D&D sort of game lately (as player or GM). Pathfinder is just too much like 3.5, as pretty as it is. I am sure glad I decided to check out some old stomping grounds today...I had no idea. It's actually being printed! About the monsters, if it's not too late, could you include two of my favorites (I didn't see them in the list), the manticore and griffon? You have me all excited about a new game again, like a 10 year old. A couple of other questions; what are the projected page counts of the two books? And, is Trollslayers fairly compatible? And thank you. Very much. This is something I have wanted for a long time, and never got very far with on my own.:happy:

Thank you for your ideas. As for the thread, I expect it to just die. I doubt I'll even look at the site for at least the rest of the year. The holidays are upon us... Have a good Christmas!

I will think about gods later I guess, right now the project is mired in national/racial bonuses and background. Soon, now I think about it. Definitely dark and dangerous. Probably use stuff like demonic entities masquerading as gods, lending help to ambitious sorcerers for bits of their souls, said sorcerers thinking they are serving 'gods' who are really malign alien entities. I am not likely to have 'real' gods that use deus ex machina to get the PCs in and out of trouble and grant specific spells. Like D&D. More Conan than Elric. Speaking of which, yes I am aware of the correspondence between Howard and Lovecraft. Many of the Conan stories featured Lovecraftian horrors (Thing in the Pit?, Drums of Tombalku) and others show the influence (Devil in Iron, Tower of the Elephant). The big difference seems to be...in the Conan stories, if something came into our human sphere of existence it could be killed, and in the Lovecraft stories humans are just victims/playthings/food. I like to try capture the spirit of the former in my games. I've found players like that too. My last group I had one guy who loved BRP, wouldn't play CoC, and played Stormbringer only because I used the 'Tanelorn escape clause', if you know what I mean. I love the Hercules TV series, especially the early TV movies. Gods and all. My setting is a small planet about the size of Mars, I guess. 16,000 thousand miles in diameter, one super continent 7,000 miles across. One of the reasons being the one you cite. I am arranging things so most of the cultures can come into play as the writers *made* Xenas' mythological earth. The real earth is a BIG place. You might remember that the land of China was more or less mythical until a guy named Marco Polo made an epic caravan journey, and even then it was so far the next few centuries everyone tried to find a way to get there by a shorter route, as Columbus. Anyway, I have a city that will be the base for the game in the rough center of the continent at the base of a mountain range that splits the continent, and is a major trading center. Ulume, I think I will call it. And like the Xena stories, many different culture accessible from there. To expedite that I will use a system of gates like Stargate, partially malfunctioning of course. It's just a mishmash of lots of my favorite stories/movies/books, not an attempt at the greatest rpg ever done. Fun is the object, and have you noticed how many of the most fun games are ones that rip off every genre and convention in sight and wind up being fun as hell? Ever heard of Arduin. It can go too far too, like Synnabar. I am trying to make a fun but not over the top game. It really is hard to find the balance. Barbarians is something like that. Koptu is. I just want to make my own personalized version. It's a fun hobby.

OK, be a troll. Threadcrap to your hearts content.:thumb: Because other than that, you definitely have nothing to say.:ohwell:

I like the organizations idea, I just have'nt gotten that far along. Another thing on the to do list. I have not looked at Desolation yet, but I think I will get it for Christmas. None of the stores around here would stock it, apparently (so they said) because their distributor couldn't get it. Funny, Noble Knight and FRP both had it, for discount at that. I could have ordered it, but my wife wanted to have something to 'put under the tree' that I wanted so I pointed her in that direction a month or two ago. I was looking at your magic system conversion thread but I don't have a good idea of the system yet (I have just seen the online previews). It looks interesting, and I will revisit it when I have read Desolation. I like the idea of burn, it might have taken the sails out of certain old munchkin player friend I used to rpg with. The last time I ran Stormbringer I had a player, a woman, who wanted to do things like disarm and hold, so I partly developed a system for 'special moves'. Usually I would ask for a stat save (most often for DEX, but sometimes POW or CON) in tandem or just before the actual attack. Ideas started coming from various other systems, like Seventh Sea (taunt, intimidate), Blue Rose, and so forth. She wanted to do things like trip her enemy and hold the sword to their throat while standing over them. Made me work, she did. So I was coming up with impromptu ways to do these things, but never formalized any of it as houserules. I just came up with a way to let her try to do her 'moves' on the spur of the moment whenever she got creative. So BRP will defintely work for something like that. Usually I keep a sort of low profile and don't encourage it though. I really do like simple systems, and would happily play BoL as is. A little more substance would be nice it I were running it though. I have done up the nation and race modifiers for BoL, SB1 style. If you are interested I could post them, although I have decided to develop my own setting in preference. The BoL work is sort of a trial to see how it looks. I was not sure that sort of thing would work outside of the Young Kingdoms setting (few or no 'demihumans' but almost all human with regional modifications). My own setting has much more in common with the Young Kingdoms or Hyboria than Middle Earth, like BoL. I though about translating Hyboria too, but BoL has the flavor and brevity to make it more pleasure than chore. My setting in the end will be BRP BoL with the serial numbers filed off anyway. I'm just out to exercise my brain and have fun, not make the best game ever. Well, that was long winded. Appreciate your interest, feel free to post any more ideas...you are having a definite influence on my project, believe it or not!:thumb:

I don't care what you think, ghost. I started this for advice on what *I* want to do with the general setting material. Whether you approve or not matters not at all. That's not what this thread is about. If you don't have anything constructive to add, and you obviously don't, just stay away.

Thanks for the ideas. Monsters. Tentacly monsters? Please describe. Like mind flayers of D&D fame? There are already ogres...Ceruleans. Grooth are beastmen. Insect men is good, maybe like raknids from Talislanta. They can be foes of the Ceruleans on the plains, issuing from the chasm. Fast skeletons, big snakes and insects are on the list. I don't know about trolls and centaurs, they are a bit too high fantasy I think, as are fire breathing dragons. Creatures like manticores and chimerae could be the results of vat experiments. I will definitely emphasize Poison and Plant Lore. The armor is going to be like SB1, random, no defense but with parry/dodge being interchangeable within the round. Armor will be like, for example chainmail bikini 1D3-1, bracers bring it up one level to 1D4-1, boots to 1D6-1, helm to 1D8-1. Other armor working the same way with the heaviest being 1D12+2 and reducing DEX and movement 6 points. Essentially working as the BoL armor rules with values to suit SB1 BRP.