rust

And I could see Alchemism as en extension of this, freeing the divine self from the restrictions of the (evil?) material world.

I think alchemism had a kind of dual nature, on the one hand the religious

background you mentioned, but on the other hand also very non-religious

proto-scientific background.

Many of the Arabic alchemists and at least some of the European ones (e.g.

Albertus Magnus, a saint ) had a quite scientific, experimental approach to

alchemism - they were far more scholars than mystics, I think.

I am not sure what this could mean for your setting, except that scholars

with sorcery skills might become a profession, perhaps also a "second career"

for certain religious figures (like Albertus).

Somehow I have to think of "The Name of the Rose" (I hope this was the

English title) and the Franciscan monk played by Sean Connery ...

If you want to introduce Gnosis and Christian "heresies" based on Gnosis into

your setting, I would recommend to use Manichaeism as the background:

Manichaeism - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

I think it does make sense.

For example, both the Latin Church of Rome and the Orthodox Church of

the Byzantine Empire would basically be on the same side, with the same

basic (Christian) allegiance, but in fact they were bitter enemies most of

the time, and the consequences of an allegiance "to Rome" could therefore

be rather different from the consequences of an allegiance "to Byzantium"

for a player (or non-player) character - for example during the time when

the crusaders had conquered Byzantium.

Moreover, more than two dualistic "Good - Bad" allegiances would also give

you an opportunity to introduce interesting "shades of grey" when it comes

to the relations between crusaders and muslims, I think.

For example, the Templars often allied with muslim rulers, and the muslims

had their own various allegiances (Sunna, Shia, etc.) that prevented them

from being a unified power and that could give them more "colour" than

just one ("bad") "Islamic allegiance".

Here is some links on equipment that are usefull while on dirtside ...

Thank you very much for the links.

Knight doesn't really exist in RQ or BRP, but there is the noble, soldier and warrior. How would you advice me handle knights, are they nobles or soldiers/warriors?

Just remember that Knight is a title, not a profession.

While all knights usually are considered (minor) nobles, and most are trained

as soldiers/warriors, there may well be knighted people from many different

professions: Priests, artists and scholars, merchants ... - the higher nobility

had a habit of using knighthoods as general rewards, and sometimes even

sold them to the highest bidders.

@ Dredj:

Thank you once more for the interesting links.

@ Fergo113:

I used the free demo version of Sky Chart III:

Southern Stars Systems - SkyChart III

Yep, looks good, I like them.

My settings usually are science fiction. I have used various BRP-based sys-

tems for them, for example Ringworld and Cthulhu, and currently I am using

a combination of BRP (roleplaying system) and Traveller (character history,

world building, technology).

In my opinion BRP is much easier to learn than GURPS and somewhat easier

to learn than d20. You do not need minis, there is no advantages / disadvan-

tages system, and it is at least not as expensive as, for example, D&D 4e -

all you need is the core rulebook, and I hope that there will be a "light" edi-

tion in the not so far future.

The tactical depth depends very much on your choice of the kinds and num-

bers of options you will use for your game. You can have it as easy and slim

as in Call of Cthulhu, but you can also give it considerably more depth.

Frohe Weihnachten und ein Gutes Neues Jahr !

Well, in this case: Merry Christmas !

Besides, there are so many famous weaponsmiths and famous named weapons

in the various cultures' legends and therefore in most settings that I would

hesitate to make all those extraordinary weapons magical ones instead of ex-

cellent results of craft skills.

For my taste, treating them all as magical could create a kind of "magical in-

flation" of a setting, with far too many magicians studying magic to become

weaponsmiths ...

The other thing I was playing with was Traditions/Cults/Magics. This could be more trouble on the balance thing. Wouldn't a magician who specializes in trees/wood magic have a bonus or even a spell that helps them craft wooden items? What about folk who may specialize in earth or metal magic? Might they have magical advantages when working with iron or bronze?

The Harnmaster system has exactly that kind of magic, too, so it might be

interesting for you to take a look at it.

I've got a set of rules for extended projects in BRP somewhere ... I ought to PDF and put up here...

I would be very interested in it.

In my experience modifiers have a tendency to accumulate unexpectedly,

so I would most probably not give any single modifier of more than 15 %.

However, I would not introduce a "glass ceiling" for stacked modifiers, be-

cause it is almost impossible to come up with a logical expanation for this

in the setting.

The two modifiers you mentioned are the ones I was thinking of, and in both

cases I would lower them to 15 % in one of my settings.

There may well be some extraordinary magical materials which would allow

even higher modifiers, but I would keep such powerful specials out of the

general rules and introduce them only in specific adventures.

One way to handle the additional hit points could be to simply connect them

to the crafter's skill and add 1/10 (or so) of the modified skill as additional hit

points.

This would put all the factors (meticulous, superior tools, superior materials,

magic, skill level of the weaponsmith ...) into one simple and easy to calculate

number, I think.

Just an idea ...

In my opinion it would work well, although some of the modifiers seem to be a

little high. I would hesitate to give a modifier higher than +15 %.

Thank you very much, Dredj and Solardog !

By the way, here is a picture created with a planetarium program. It shows

the view from Enki II, about 300 light years rimwards from Earth, towards

the Sol system (invisible in the centre of the picture) on January 1st of the

year 2840.

Hello Dredj, thank you very much for the links !

I will take a look at them a little later, I am currently busy designing a num-

ber of spaceships based on Mongoose Traveller's High Guard supplement,

which became available as a PDF today - feels a bit like birthday.

By the way, the Enki II / Tashara Colony setting is doing fine. Meanwhile it

has grown to about 60 pages of background material, and the characters

of the campaign have already established a first outpost on the desert pla-

net, survived some adventures, and will soon encounter their first (and pea-

ceful) neighbouring alien species, the Suri Badawi.

Not long afterwards they will pick up an emergency call from a planet named

Horpa, where they will have to deal with my adapted version of Outpost 19

and their first problems with Precursor technology.

I love very detailed worlds, but I prefer the ones I built myself. Unfortunately

my creativity is limited, and I like to offer my players background details in a

"style" different from my own, something I would not have thought of.

Therefore any "generic" material really would be most welcome as an option

to make my setting more interesting and rich than I could create it on my own.

I would buy "generic" or "semi-generic" adventures and campaign material,

provided I could fit the material into my own setting without too much

effort.

In fact, this is what I plan to do with Outpost 19, and I am glad that its

setting is "open" enough to enable me to fit it into my campaign easily.

By the way, there is quite some "generic" science fiction location material

available, from descriptions of starships or spaceports down to lists of fu-

turistic weapons.

Good adventures like Outpost 19, however, are very rare, and it would be

nice to see more of that kind.

Thank you for the information.

I will take a look at the FM, it is available on the net.

... roughly doubling the damage for increasing the charge by a factor 8 to 10 ...

Thank you for a very useful rule of thumb.

Hmmm ... :confused:

I think the armor value of the car protects the passengers inside the car,

but I doubt that it is meant to protect the car itself.

First of all: Congratulations, a very nice adventure indeed ! :thumb:

I plan to adapt it to my own setting and use it as the first part of a

Precursor subplot of the campaign, giving the characters a chance

to learn more about the early history of the region and perhaps dis-

cover some more Precursor sites (and, if they are extremely lucky,

even some potentially useful but mysterious technology).

Therefore I am very interested in your concept of the Precursors and

their technology. So, if you have already decided upon any more de-

tails, please let me know.

Thank you !

Since mines and LAW rockets cause explosions, I would use the Explosions

rules from the Spot Rules chapter and apply all the explosion damage as ge-

neral damage to vehicle and passengers alike.

The mine would detonate within 1 m of the car and would cause the 6d6+6

hit points damage, reducing your car to 9 hit points on average (let us not

mention the poor passenger ...).

Since your vehicle would still have more than 5 hit points, but less than half

of the hits points it started with, the Vehicle Damage rules on p. 216 / 217

would allow you to drive what remained of your vehicle at half speed, if you

wanted. Think of a vehicle that has been thrown through the air and badly

damaged by the mine blast, but is still able to crawl.

Later on the first LAW rocket would almost vaporize the wreck of the car with

28 points of damage against the remaining 9 hit points.

Well, at least this is how I would handle it.

Edit.:

On second thoughts, if you divide the car into hit locations, with a zone within

1 m of the mine explosion and a second zone within 1 + m from the explosion,

and give the lower zone - most probably including the engine or other vital

parts - 75 % of the weight and hit points of the car, this lower zone will take

enough damage to destroy the engine completely, I think.

Oops, a link, of course ...

Here it is:

Chaosium Inc.