rust

Technology is not exactly a strength of BRP, the technology information in the BRP book is entirely generic. There is not much of a system to design technolo- gy or to distinguish between designs from different stages of a technological development. Without such a background a system of technology levels does not seem to make much sense.

My advice would be to be careful with the number of opponents and with missile weapons. Outnumbered characters can more easily become dead characters than in many other systems, and missile weapons are often more efficient than in ma- ny other systems. Apart from that, as Conrad wrote, keep it simple. You can always add more op- tions later on, if you and the players really want them.

For English material I usually prefer PDFs, simply because the cost of the postage otherwise tends to make the material more expensive than I am willing to pay - and PDFs are also much more easy to store and to keep in pristine condition than printed material. I rarely have an entire PDF printed, I usually copy only the parts of the material I intend to use for a specific setting or campaign into my own material, which I then have sometimes printed. Colour or black and white ... well, I do not really care. I like good art, no matter whether it is in colour or black and white, and I strongly dislike both the "soft porn approach" and the "gun porn approach" often seen in roleplaying material. Anyway, good text (and, where useful, good maps and thelike) are a lot more important to me than general illustrations.

For example because the effect of a spell (e.g. SIZ of object it can lift, strength of opposite spell it can cancel, etc.) is calculated in increments, and these are called levels ?

As I understand it, the magician does not have to relearn the spell. Edit.: I did just reread the part on Spell Levels on page 89 of the BRP book, and in my view it only mentions additional POW and time, but no need to learn the spell at a higher level.

If you are looking for something simple, you could just use a roll against POW or a multiple of POW and some modifiers whenever the situation could cause fear.

I suspect the question of IP ownership could easily become a problem, for exam- ple if one of the companies involved changes hands or closes down - this could become the kind of stuff that makes lawyers wealthy.

I am not aware of any such collection of creatures, but it would not be difficult to create them with the Mutation rules from the Powers chapter of the BRP book, and it would have the advantage that you could design precisely what you want for your game.

This problem seems to have been solved, meanwhile I downloaded the PDF again, and this time it had the map on pages 140 and 141.

Yes, indeed. Over here we are lucky, because most roleplaying gamers know Call of Cthulhu and have played it at least once, so they are somewhat fami- liar with BRP and not as likely to be confused and overwhelmed by the BRP to- me, but I think that someone who is a true newcomer to everything BRP may well have serious problems with the labyrinth of options and not much of a red thread to guide him through.

My experience is completely different. I know quite a lot of people who bought BRP because they wanted to use settings like Crusaders of the Amber Coast or Rome, and so these settings have indeed expanded the BRP community.

Strange, my copy ends on page 139 with an armour table, no map, and there is no advertisement for BRP, only for Cthulhu Invictus.

With my Thule setting mostly completed, my next little project will probably be my own version of the Tragic Millenium Europe setting from the Hawkmoon no- vels. Since I do not want to use the plot from the novels and the locations of that plot, I am currently looking for alternatives - and I think The Green could very well be somewhere on Tragic Millenium Earth, or in one of Moorcock's ma- ny dimensions of his Multiverse that can be reached from there. I would not be surprised if some Guardians of the Kamarg would be sent to The Green by Bowgentle, on a mission to obtain some rare ingredients for his expe- riments, or by Count Brass, on a mission to hunt down some dangerous scientist- sorceror from Granbretan who has his secret hideout and laboratory there ... Edit.: By the way, I seem to miss a map of the entire Green - or I am just too stupid to find it.

Since I wanted to mine Merrie England for ideas to use in my Thule setting, I did not wait for the BRP version and downloaded the Runequest version from DTRPG. Merrie England turned out to be a very useful addition to Stupor Mundi and Cru- saders of the Amber Coast, and it really has a lot of nice ideas which I can "bor- row" for the Thule setting, for example the informations about the Jews (there will now be a Jewish moneylender in my setting ...). A very nice supplement, highly recommended.

I was originally hoping (and waiting) for the Pirates supplement for BRP that had been announced quite a while ago, but then suddenly disappeared from my radar screen - it would have been most welcome for two of my other partially finished settings, too. As far as I understand it, Interplanetary could have some very useful material on combat, but I would still need either a supplement or a sudden inspiration for ac- ceptable seafaring rules. While I can mostly "handwave" such rules for my other pseudo-historical settings (e.g. the Thule setting), a true swashbuckling setting would need such rules. So I am still hoping that the Pirates setting will reappear somewhere in the not all too far future ...

I have one, but unfortunately it is in German. In most cases I begin with a description of the physical layout of the territory covered by the setting, including at least one map, and followed by descripti- ons of the important or especially interesting resources, plants and animals. The next chapter describes the population of the setting's territory, the histo- ry and the general politics. I usually add descriptions of the main settlements, wherever possible with maps. Then come the economy, including lists and prices of the available equipment, and the trade and trade routes, often with another map. The next part is the culture and religion of the population of the setting, from everyday life (houses, clothes, food ...) and special occasions (festivals, etc.) to the scientific knowledge and the theology of the society or societies. The last part covers the modifications to the game system used (available and new skills, etc.), the game stats of important personalities of the setting, tem- plates for generic non-player characters (e.g. "peasant" or "town watch mem- ber") and the stats for any unusual animals or creatures. Since I normally do not use magic or psionics in my setting, there is no chapter to cover this, but in the few cases were I use them I add them to the cuture chapter. There is no special reason for the order of the chapters, it is just the way I tend to work through my notes to arrive at a semi-finished setting. The basic framework or "skeleton" of a setting usually is between 20 pages for historical and pseudo-historical settings and 50 pages for science fiction settings (which need a lot of descriptions and explanations of the technology used). Once this framework is finished, I usually put the setting aside until I have a new idea I want to add or have a group of players interested in the setting. In the latter case, we discuss the setting, and I add the details and changes the play- ers consider necessary to have fun with the setting. This tends to expand the setting to between 50 and 100 pages at the start of a campaign.

I see your point, but I tend to be a bit more strict when it comes to skills. That said, I always use the Complementary Skills option (BRP p. 50), and in all but modern and science fiction settings I bundle the natural sciences into one single skill "Natural Philosophy" (or "Quadrivium" for medieval settings) without any specialization of skills.

I would hesitate to allow the use of related skills at half chance in all situations, in my view this does not always make sense. For example, not every problem in astronomy or physics can be solved with a good mathematics skill alone, often more specific knowledge from the problem's field is required. Therefore I would also hesitate to allow a player to use a related skill's half chance as the base for learning a skill, because the basic knowledge even of closely related skills is not really identical. Just as in the real world, where someone who has studied mathe- matics will hardly get a second degree in astronomy or physics in half the time.

This is one of about half a dozen partially finished pseudo-historical setting pro- jects on my shelve. I was not satisfied with what I had at the time, so I put it on ice and hope to return to it when I have some more convincing ideas for it, including a better system than the mix of BRP and Flashing Blades I was working on (and also players potentially interested in this setting).

The only possible trace of the author I am aware of is a post of "Manilianus" on the Yog-Sothoth forum:

I think this is very much a matter of personal taste. In my view, Mongoose Runequest I was definitely not as good as the original Runequest, it had lots of problems which even lots of errata could not solve. In my opinion Mongoose Runequest II is a much better system than Mongoose Runequest I, and I really like what I have seen of it so far. However, it is also quite different from the original Runequest and has a different "feel" - some people are likely to welcome the differences (like the combat actions), others will continue to prefer the original. That said, Mongoose Runequest II is doubtless a very good system.

What Trifletraxor wrote. ^^ In my view the Gloranthan Classics (see some links below) include some of the best roleplaying material ever written, and the original Runequest gives you easy access to these treasures. http://rpg.drivethrustuff.com/product_info.php?products_id=83383 http://rpg.drivethrustuff.com/product_info.php?products_id=83384 http://rpg.drivethrustuff.com/product_info.php?products_id=83386

Frankly, the three "Basic" supplements (Gamemaster, Creatures and Magic) are only really worth the cost if you ran out of fuel and urgently need something to burn in order to keep you warm.

Yep, thank you, there it is.

The same here, I also do not see the option for rating the product.