Questbird

Since this thread is already quite long, perhaps start a new one asking for ideas

on new, fresh and original worlds for BRP ?

This thread may be old, but it is well-named. The worlds that we here nominate will most likely be similar to those that those outside of BRP would like to see. That will include generic settings and copyrighted places. One advantage of worlds based on existing literary or film properties is that they are more accessible to the players; they can learn more about the world in ways other than at the rpg session. And even in the USA, copyright doesn't last forever -- at least not yet.

Disney BRP, anyone?

I didn't go for our Solar system because I wanted a completely free hand, and there's just too much information available on the Solar system for my liking. I don't think most games or authors really appreciate how stupidly VAST star systems are, and this baby is bigger than most.

Interesting. A generic system for...a System would be good. As for our Solar System, I don't have a problem with its size and I find the amount of information about it useful. In fact I think some familiarity with the setting helps the players. The referee could add social and political stuff. The farthest planets and (ahem) Plutons would take quite a while to reach, though I expect propulsion systems would improve. Those planets will be like South Sea islands in the 17th century (except for the vegetation): remote, small population, cut off from the mainstream.

Many of those I'd like to see have been nominated already in this thread. Here's some which attracted my special attention.

Shaira said:

I've recently been reading W. H. Prescott's "History of the Conquest of Mexico" and "History of the Conquest of Peru", and have been amazed by the depth and drama of the situation. That's a period which is rich for RPG pickings yet which has been (AFAIK) neglected so far.

 

1.) I studied Peru and the Conquistadors and I agree that sixteenth century South American history, with or without the fantastical elements would be a great setting.

RosenMcStern said:

Seriously, Dario Corallo and I have been thinking of an adaptation for this setting for decades (literallly). The only problem is that Vance's works are still copyrighted, and I prefer settings that can be published without having to pay royalties in advance. Even publishing it as a free product could cause trouble.

I think Burrough's Barsoom is public domain now, and I am sure Dario has some GURPS adaptation for it ready (easily BRPable). But Planet Tschai is much more fascinating. Just shout "Onmale!" and go berserk :thumb:

 

2). Yes I would love a Vancian Planet of Adventure BRP setting. I have the GURPS book but it doesn't quite cut it.

3). Third is mostly original for this thread. I would like to see a hard science fiction set in colonies of the Solar System of the future with NO INTERSTELLAR DRIVES to get us quickly outta there. It's a part of our future which most science fiction writers skip quickly over to get to the stars and the aliens and galactic empires. The inclusion of functioning Faster-Than-Light drives crosses the border between real hard science fiction and speculative fantasy. (Wormholes are conceivable, though human-traversible ones are less so). Cthulhu Rising and especially its Jupiter setting is not bad for this if you dump (or conceal) the Mythos aliens and the star drives (this goes for 2300AD too). However, the Solar System is an amazing wilderness. It is real, it is public domain. It is the perfect sandbox campaign. Literary inspirations: 'The Stars My Destination' by Alfred Bester, 'Martian Time-slip' by Philip K. Dick (maybe also 'Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep') and 'The Ennead' by Jan Mark (which is set in an alternate Solar System, but similarly constrained there).

4.) The post-human Earth described in Illium and Olympos by Dan Simmons might be an interesting setting too. (Though perhaps it could be made as a variation of (3) above.)

And, on a tangent:

RosenMcStern said:

Tamriel is copyrighted by Bethesda (or whomever owns Bethesda Softworks at present, I cannot recall the name), so an official conversion is unlikely to appear. I heard they are planning to publish the system and the setting as a P&P RPG, and in this case it will be rather similar to BRP, as the game is skill based and has hit points, fatigue points and magic points. Unfortunately it also has a HP increase when leveling.

Incidentally, the Morrowind setting was written by Ken Rolston, and you can find "suspiciously sounding" names among those found on the isle, like "The Grazelands" and "Puzzle Canal".

 

There is a fan-created Tamriel BRP conversion here (link is dead)

Thanks Mithras. Here's my LibraryThing review of Warlords of Alexander:

An interesting historical setting for Basic Roleplaying: the warlike successor kingdoms which emerged after the death of Alexander the Great. Alexander's empire stretched from eastern Europe to India at its greatest extent. The author points out that this setting contains many fantasy roleplaying tropes: the remnants of a great empire, a common currency and language and bands of adventurers seeking plunder.

Rules for character creation include modifiers for many human groups as if they were different 'races', characterised by Greek stereotypes at the time. There are very detailed descriptions of the power groups and regions of the shattered empire. These power blocs (and armies too) are given human-like statistics. This is an interesting approach but it doesn't quite work for me to describe organisations this way. One great rule is the ubiquity of the Olympian gods. Each god governs certain skills and any character (except those with any Science skill) can call on a god to improve a skill roll governed by that god or goddess. Calling on the gods too much results in godly disfavour however. There are also rules for army battles, once again using not-quite-right human attributes for armies, and descriptions of military troops and styles.

Famous Greek monsters of myth are mentioned, but later downplayed; this setting is more historical than fantastical. Nothing to stop a referee adding some monsters though. Overall a very interesting pre-Roman ancients setting, with a huge and diverse (and not all European) empire to explore.

(from http://www.librarything.com/work/11051921/reviews/71032896 )

Yes, that was what I meant. The second weapon is the one which gets the riposte in standard Elric!/SB5; the first is used to parry.

However for the other ripostes I mentioned, the Tirikelu-inspired ones, if it is in response to a failed attack, I don't see why it wouldn't be with the primary weapon.

One of the things which vaguely annoyed me about the riposte rules in Elric! was that if you were armed with two weapons, instead of a weapon and shield, then the only time you would ever get to use your 2nd weapon in a fight was a riposte, which required a critical success. On reflection, perhaps that is right, because it means two-weapon styles are only useful for very skillful fighters. Doesn't stop players wanting to do it though.

I like that idea of a riposte. The only problem I would have with it is that the better the parry the harder the riposte. So if you rolled a special parry, you would have less of a chance for a riposte than if you had rolled your parry on the nose. I'm sure there is a mathematical work-around to that, but I'm too sleepy to think of it...

Maybe you could keep the rule about making a full-strength riposte on a special success. So for example someone with Trident 50% parrying vs. a failed attack roll

score 50 --> riposte at 50%

score 11-49 --> riposte at that score

score 01-10 --> riposte at 50%

net result is to increase by 1% the chance of getting the equivalent of a special success. Not too bad.

The classic British 80s rpg Dragon Warriors* was written by Dave Morris and Oliver Johnson who wrote a lot of RQII stuff in White Dwarf back in the day.

Speaking of Dave Morris, his free Tekumel game Tirikelu (also vaguely RQ inspired) had a very interesting mechanic for ripostes which is relevant to this discussion.

A successful parry vs. a failed attack would give the defender the chance for a riposte. The defender needed to make another roll less than his successful parry roll to make a free attack which (by definition) could not be parried if successful. In other words, the attacker had left an opening which the defender might exploit.

I like this idea because it makes ripostes more common than in BRP, where depending on your rules (I use Elric!/SB5) you need to make a critical parry with a second weapon or shield to make one. In the Tirikelu system ripostes are less effective than normal attacks, but I like the way the line may be blurred between attacker and defender.

Of course, this does rely on rolling attack and defense rolls at the same time, which was the contention of the original post. It does give one possible reason for doing so though.

It was three years ago, so I'm not 100% sure, but I believe it was "Shanghai Village" smack in the centre of Chinatown. Red walls and great dumplings

Ah yes, I know it. The dumplings are good and cheap too.

Here's my LibraryThing review of the Chronicles of Future Earth:

http://www.librarything.com/work/10972783/reviews/70219266

Thanks a lot. And from Melbourne, the place of my favourite Chinese restaurant

The research was based on countless books... The reason I almost only quoted Giles's was because of copyright issues.

Which is your favourite Melburnian Chinese restaurant, out of interest?

Thanks for the kind welcome, Chaot, I do remember you well. zeitgeistgeist it was. Now back to our regular transmission.

Here is my review of Celestial Empire from my LibraryThing (http://www.librarything.com/work/book/70037020):

An excellent roleplaying resource. It is dense enough with historical and cultural detail to make for a fascinating setting (or rather, settings, because it describes the differences between several dynastic periods in China) without repelling the reader with too much detail. It is an admirable introduction to the classic Chinese setting for Western roleplayers. Information on religions, cults and cultural attitudes are interesting and provide immediate game hooks. The game information about professions, allegiances, spells and monsters is well done. My only criticisms would be that the research (or the quotations at least) relied almost exclusively on the work of British sinologist Herbert Giles, and that no adventure is provided. However this is a very good piece of work, and it inspires me to run an ancient Chinese campaign. (Four and a half stars).

Thanks, Gianni. A roleplaying supplement with just the right balance of background and game information. I will have a review of Chronicles of Future Earth soon (after I have pondered it a little further).

The second is to borrow the Maelstrom system. It's composed of 5 levels of ritual magic. A first level spell would be something that could easily be chalked up to chance. A foe trips at an inopportune time. The sun hits someone's eyes wrong at a crucial moment. etc. Fifth level spells are spells that make the impossible possible.

A fellow named Questbird put this system to good use in his Lankhmar game.

That would be me. This is an old thread, but I'll just add to it anyway. The Maelstrom system has some nice features.

1. It's pretty simple. The mage says what effect they want to achieve, the GM assigns a difficulty based on how likely that event is to happen* at that particular time, the mage makes a check to see if it works.

2. It's situational. Because it's all based on likelihoods and probabilities, the mage can act to make his spells more likely to work. For example to make someone trip in combat, the spell might be Unlikely, but if the mage flings a barrel of marbles underfoot (or orders his underlings to do it), it might change to Likely. This encourages quick thinking and planning for the mage character.

3. It's subtle -- good for low magic or historical campaigns where you don't really know whether magic or witchcraft really works.

This is not the only magic system I use in my campaign, but it's a good one.

* as Chaot said, on a scale from Likely, Unlikely, Improbable, Wildly improbable, Impossible