lawrence.whitaker

Heh... Okay, I'll do my utmost. However, Tom Zunder, Gwenthia's God Emperor, is also running a Gwenthia game, so in the event I find my time at a premium (which is a possibility), Tom's 'Against the Sorcerer' will be a great intro to Gwenthia.

Excellent! And hopefully a decent Norwegian contingent may follow in your wake...??? It'll be nice to see you, and perhaps we can have a drink and a chat. Damn! I guess this means I'm running some Gwenthia...

Does this mean you're coming Sverre? Drop me line or PM if you need help with any booking type stuff.

Not that well. Its designed to reflect a race (Melniboneans) that has superb cultural and educational maturity. You could, with some work, adapt it to fit a non-literate, primitive culture, but its not really designed to work in that way.

UE Magic can be lifted and ported into BRP with very, very little work. The key thing is the Spot Rule section, which helps you deal with exceptions and particular circumstances, but otherwise its a matter of combining the right sphere and rune, and investing enough MP. It can be MP-heavy, but its meant to be. The flexibility of the system outweighs the MP cost, and a clever sorcerer will get round that. BTW, I should warn people that a modified version of the UE magic may well appear in either Signs and Portents (the Mongoose online magazine) or a future Elric of Melnibone supplement.

Hey, I'm all for such debate and tinkerings! If there's a good solid case for changing something to fit the source material, I'm very happy to discuss. I agree that MRQ magic doesn't quite fit the Gloranthan bill as its stands.

Great pics and report Sverre. I'm sooooo glad you enjoyed yourself and, especially the MRQ Elric Pittel ran >:-> If you come to Continuum... I may well run the Gwenthia game again :thumb:

Precisely so, Paolo. I suspect you're right in that Greg won't join the list (rules in general are not a forte of his and he's certainly moved on from BRP), but he'll appreciate the courtesy. Thanks for doing this! Gentlemen, let's move on...

I'm sorry you feel I'm trying to rain on the parade, Sinisalo, but you're completely misunderstanding my intentions. All I'm trying to do is... A) Point out that Issaries, the owner of the Glorantha IP, operates a fan policy regarding Gloranthan fan-based output, either in physical or electronic print. Both Moon Design and Mongoose have paid for licences to produce Gloranthan material and that it would be wise to just check that nothing's being, or could be, infringed. Neither of these is particularly onerous to do, and is a simple, common courtesy to the licensor and licensees. As Paolo has already said: Emphasis mine. This could run the risk of contravening either the Fan Policy or an existing license, if the intention is to publish something - free or not - in the public domain. You clearly don't feel such things are important, but I happen to think they are. Far from trying to 'wave the threat of cease and desist notices', I'm just trying to make sure that no-one else - Greg or otherwise - does. In other words, make sure that this project, which I think is a good one, gets off to the best possible start. The exchange of ideas is no problem, but publishing stuff could be. Still, if you want to run that risk, then be my guest. I'm not getting into any flamewars over this so don't expect me to get into debates here, or anywhere else. But please, do look carefully at what I was saying before accusing me of being heavy-handed. I hope that there aren't any problems - but its surely better to make the appropriate checks first (and Paolo may have already done so) than to plough straight in and repent later.

I think this is good and welcome (and have joined), but would urge you to email Greg and just clarify how the group stands regarding the Issaries Fan Policy, the Moon Design and the Mongoose licenses. You may have done this already (and secured blessing), but as the proposal is to publish something that will be in the public domain, you will need to, at the very least, consult with Greg as the licensor, to ensure that no IPs or existing licenses get breached (thus resulting in Cease and Desist notices).

rjmeints@aol.com He's been travelling, which may account for the lack of reply, so try the above.

Surely this is a simple matter of commonsense? Why on earth would you need an explicit statement? If you're playing a brontosaur, then its simply like-for-like, but if you're a poor old human, armed with a decent shield, and see a bloody great foot coming your way, intent on stamping you flat, you're hardly likely to say - 'Yep, I'll parry that.' You'd most likely say 'Shit! I'm rolling out of ther way!' And, if someone did try to parry whilst I was GMing, then they'd find themself pancake-shaped. There's no way on earth that a human, no matter how good their skill or how big their shield, could withstand a tree-sized leg, backed by 40-odd tons of animal behind it. Magic's another matter; but in terms of straight combat... Really, commonsense should prevail in situations like this - no matter what the rules do or don't say.

But she might have a marvellous time, Simon! Think how happy you'll be then...

The Pact system from Elric is highly portable to BRP, but it is designed to reflect specifically the Elric saga, so you might want to tone down some elements, like the 100% cult skill raise, or Eternal Life, to reflect the realities of your own campaign. But that's very easily done, and there's no reason why mechanics like this shouldn't be used in BRP. The forthcoming 'Cults of the Young Kingdoms' book has dozens of cult gifts resulting from a Pact that are more subtle in their effects, so this could be a source of inspiration if that's how you want your campaign to go. Personally I never like or used the Allegiance system from the Chaosium Elric! game, and find that Pacts, Gifts and Compulsions reflect the saga far more accurately, but its really a matter of preference. Allegiance is eminently usable and will suit certain kinds of settings and campaigns better than Pacts.

I think that's an extreme way of viewing things. Ultimately it depends on the capabilities of the players and the GM. The Love/Hate rules I've developed aren't designed to either enforce or judge roleplaying. They're there as a measure of a particular passion and how that passion influences other skills and abilities. The personality traits found in Pendragon and BRP (for NPCs) are again used as a measure of strength of feeling - an aid to the roleplaying rather than a strict enforcement of it. There are times when emotional and social measures can't be easily roleplayed and having a mechanic to introduce how they can have an effect is, IMHO, a good thing. We have skills for all manner of other things that aren't easy to roleplay, so why not traits, passions and, in your example of Oriental Adventures, honour and allegiance? For example, in one game I'm playing at the moment, my character is a nasty piece of Fagin-like work with a sadistic streak. I'm not sadistic or confrontational by nature, and whilst I can roleplay the traits to a certain extent, I find that using a skill roll like Intimidation helps greatly to bringing about the effects that I wouldn't be comfortable roleplaying to the full (nor the GM necessarly wanting me to!) So I think these things definitely have a place. I don't think they either enforce or judge roleplaying, but they're a very useful device for simulating how personality or depth of feeling influences or impacts on a character's other skills, abilities and interactions. This particular discussion, BTW, perhaps deserves its own strand? Its a very good, thought provoking debate, but not necessarily to do with BRP conversion? Just a thought.

I think that traits, in general, can get a little out of hand. HQ frequently suffers from augment-fests, so the rules on Love/Hate are focused squarely on these as passions, without muddying the waters with similar mechanics for jealousy, envy, and the such like. Things of that nature are actually handled under the game's Compulsions and are designed to be roleplayed rather than boiled-down to a percentile roll. However, Love and Hate are such extreme emotions, and so fundamental to the Elric saga, that I think they have a solid place. You can argue that jealousy is a sort of sub-trait of hatred - I mean, if you have Hate (Elric) at 25%, do you really hate him? Or is it more likely you're just jealous of his sword? So no, I deliberately avoided a whole Traits mechanic because it can get in the way, and can detract from roleplaying too. Love and Hate, though, are such strong drivers that, in the Elric saga, they trigger the destruction of entire cities.

There's a LotR ruleset for BRP already, which is a conversion of Decipher's LotR game to BRP. The designer is Colin Brett and I really like the way he's handled the conversion. http://www.colinabrett.uklinux.net/pdfs/brp_lotr_2.0.pdf

Excellent, Merak (and always nice to see ol' Merak from Stormbringer 1st ed coming out of retirement...!)

Continuum's a great convention. Guests this year are: Greg Stafford Jeff Richard Sandy Petersen Mark Galeotti Angus Abranson I'm waiting to hear from Charlie Krank, too. There are LOTS for Glorantha/BRP/MRQ games being run over the course of the weekend, which is 1st to 4th August. The con has a long tradition of support RQ, HeroQuest and Chaosium's stable. Sandy is running his famed 'Evil High Priest' Cthulhu freeform and Greg will be running HeroQuest and Pendragon games. If you want to book for Continuum, do so before Tuesday as the price increases from 1st April. At the moment the prices are: Registration for Residential Members: £20 (£35 from 1st April) 3-Night room (Fri, Sat, Sun) booking: £105 Single Night room booking: £40 per night All rooms are extremely comfortable and en-suite. Each room has bed linen and towels, plus telephone and internet access. The rooms are grouped into flats of 6 rooms, with a large, airy, well equipped kitchen - great for impromptu gaming. If you intend to come along just on a Day Pass, these cost £18 each per day and can be bought on the day or in advance. What else can Continuum offer? Superb range of games. We'll have the preliminary timetable up soon. Great bar with Real Ales Seminars and guest presentations: Glorantha, HeroQuest, RuneQuest and BRP Auction Pub Quiz and Ice Breaker events to get everyone into the con spirit Continuum's noted for its friendly and relatively relaxed atmosphere. If you've never been to a convention before, its a good place to start, and we have a small army of Mentors who are there specifically to help newcomers get the most out of the con. And if there's a strong enough BRP Central presence, I dare say we could help facilitate a BRP Central seminar so you can all get to meet each other face to face. I really do hope to see lots of you there. PM me if you have any specific questions. Loz

Hmmm - I think you have a contradiction here... On the one hand you say that you've made every effort to get rid of artificiality, then you say, emphatically, that because you know magic, you won't be interested in technology or spiritualism. Why not? Aren't minds curious? In the real world, people have very diverse interests. You simply don't get such mutual exclusivity. However, you do in roleplaying games, where there's a desire to achieve a certain game balance, and that's the very sort of artificiality you say you've completely removed. Your elf might very well believe that magic is superior to tech or spirtualism (though how magic and spirtuality are so mutually exclusive, I fail to see), but every discipline offers a different way of doing something that might offer an advantage over another. Why would I drive a car if I can fly? Because flying costs magical energy, I'm presuming, and I might want to conserve that for something else, yet I still want to get downtown. I might also want to transport a passenger or a load. That might be tough if I fly, so a car (or a cart, or a subway, or a plane) might be much more expedient. You cannot, in all honesty, say that all these things co-exist, and that you've removed artificiality, and then go on to say. 'But elves never drive cars or use guns because they have magic. So there.' If you really have removed artificiality, then you'll get tons of diversity. I'm not trying to pick holes are dismiss your ideas - or to be deliberately provocative, either, but I think Vhraeden may be in danger of some contradictions that you then have to spend a heck of a lot of time explaining away (which is essentially what you're doing in the bits you've quoted from the book). If you genuinely have removed artificiality, and created a setting that provides a great base for cultural conflict (whilst promoting how the worldviews differ) then you shouldn't need to spend time in justification and explanation. It'll be inherent in the themes, the setting and the system.

But a publishing company will. Any company that publishes professionally produced books has printing and distribution costs to take into account. That's a financial risk to them, and so the size of the book, which will influence their costs, and thus the price point, will be a big factor. This is where I can see you having problems interesting a professional games company. Then self-publishing is probably your best bet. This gives you the level of control you're looking for. A games company will want to impart its own control of the book if its going to spend money on publishing, printing and distributing it. If you go the self publishing route, then you're shouldering the risk and outlay yourself - which you seem to be willing to do - and maintain complete control.

And thanks for the speedy answer! Am I right in assuming, then, that the three cultural blocs inhabit parallel realities, but not the same physical reality? If so, then yep, I can buy the above. If they co-exist in the same plane, on the same world, then I have trouble with it. Every culture inhabiting the same physical space, if it has the means to travel and communicate, is going to absorb elements of the cultures it meets and disseminate elements of its own. In that regard, it would be nigh-on impossible to keep your fae, human and goblinoid cultures as distinct as you say they are. And, if you have a fae mage who is capable of understanding deep esoteric and magical theory, why wouldn't he also grasp the principles of physics, or the co-ordination skills, needed to drive a car? That's where I have a problem with using clear divisions between magic users and tech users, as exclusive propositions, if the three cultures inhabit the same plane of existence. It seems to be more of a game balance mechanic to limit PCs power, rather than a genuine way of representing different cultures and how they clash. You can, by all means, have magic use as a dominant cultural trait in one society, and tech use in another, but saying that one culture will never understand the trappings of another is rather artificial. Cultures always exchange doctrines, practices and understandings. That's how the world works. Someone might not choose to understand magic or tech, but there'll always be those who strive to do so, in order to gain an advantage or an edge over their enemies, if for nothing else. If there isn't this possibility, then the premise is rather short-changing the PCs and limiting all kinds of great adventuring potential too. One of the things that made Shadowrun so fun was the ability to play an Elven, magic-wielding street samurai who could teleport, but was also equipped with cyberware and tech augmentations. But, as I say, if you have three 'bubble' realities, or the cultures occupy parallel dimensions, where the laws of the universe are unique, then I can buy what you're saying!

The idea of 60+ playable races, and 173 pages of skills and powers makes my head spin a little, but this is clearly a labour of love for you, and that you've got this written into a playtestable form is a great credit to you. I also think there's a lot of good ideas in the snippets you've provided, and the idea that even the gods have to obey the rules is something I could have real fun with. Cultural conflict is great. But I don't understand how denying PCs pegasi AND assault copters translates into a reflection of cultural conflict. Surely cultural conflict is about the clash of ideologies, beliefs and social codes? You can certainly have mechanics to handle that, but it seems to me that limiting what PCs can and can't have in terms of magic/mythic kit and hi-tech kit is more a game balance thing than a solid attempt to reflect cultural tensions. Perhaps you could explain a bit more? And this is where you may run into trouble. A 600 page core book is unlikely to be attractive for a professonal publisher. It carries several risks: Format, layout and editing such a huge book will be a massive job. Games companies have limited time and resources, and tackling 600 pages, plus 173 pages of skills and powers (which will need cross-reffing, double checking for fit, consistency and balance, etc), may not be attractive simply in terms of the amount of time it will take. The second risk is physical size. A 600 page book, even in paperback, is going to be a monster tome to physically print, bind, ship and display. This indicates a high price-point, which may put customers off. Also, there's artwork to be considered - a LOT will need to be commissioned to break up the text and that pushes-up the page count. The book, with 600 pages of text, once layout and art s factored in, could be up to 700 pages - double the size of BRP Zero, for instance. The third risk is Licence. Have you submitted this to Chaosium? If its using BRP, then you really need to. Unless, of course, you've found a publisher who has licenced BRP already. If you haven't, and you decide to PDF or go for prnt on demand, then you'll need to have some form of agreement with Chaosium to use the BRP system. All that said, I do wish you well with the work, and I've enjoyed reading the snippets you've put-up here. Lawrence

Exceedingly neat and clear. Nice work Sarah.