BRP 5th edition?

[g33k]

On 1/30/2023 at 1:58 AM, CussaMitre said:

It was mentioned here and I think that I would like to join the voices that asked that: is there any chance to update the SRD?

Compared with the BGB, it's missing quite interesting rules...

I think Chaosium is "re-evaluating" things; but the existing landscape is still changing, as WotC re-evaluates their own "OGL" efforts, now shifted entirely over to CC-BY-4.0 ... which in turn the market/landscape is still reacting to.

I'm sure Chaosium will announce their decisions ... as soon as they're, y'know, decided.  🙂

(Edit to add: what I don't expect is any "we're thinking of this, we're thinking of that" discussion; I think Chaosium finds it unproductive to argue with fans over those things, and inevitably angers/disappoints fans who wanted this and/or that, that doesn't make the final cut; but maybe I'm wrong, I've been wrong before and doubtless will be wrong again!)

Edited February 1, 2023 by g33k

[DreadDomain]

On 1/29/2023 at 11:28 PM, MOB said:

Recent events 🤔 mean a new edition of BRP is now more of a priority than when Rick made this comment last year.

That would be great. To this day, I often refer to the BGB when I want to have an additional or an alternative rule and from time to time I am amazed that the rule in the BGB is actually better or easier. BGB is not a beautiful book but it is very complete and the content is awesome! 

[albesias]

On 1/29/2023 at 2:28 PM, MOB said:

Recent events 🤔 mean a new edition of BRP is now more of a priority than when Rick made this comment last year.

Great news! A suggestion, a real golden cover would be amazing!!!

[MoonRightRomantic]

On 1/28/2023 at 1:03 PM, Atgxtg said:

Not really. CoC7 is an experimental offshoot of the BRP rules, and does some things different from all the other BRP games. If they "updated" the BGB to be more in line with CoC7 then it would be less compatible with other BRP games including Magic World and, especially, RuneQuest.

Plus. I believe Chaosium is more into promoting stand alone rules with settings rather than generic mechanics, as the former sell better.

At the very least, they could add those as optional or variant rules. The BRP rulebook already includes a bunch of optional or variant rules reflecting different settings and editions. 

[Atgxtg]

14 hours ago, MoonRightRomantic said:

At the very least, they could add those as optional or variant rules.

No, at the very least, they could do nothing and just leave the book as it is. That would be doing the very least. Now they could certainly choose to add in the CoC7 stuff as optional rules, but that would be doing more than the very least. In fact, anything other than tacking the CoC7 stuff on in a few pages at the end of the book, would almost certainly require re-typesetting and reformatting the book.  

14 hours ago, MoonRightRomantic said:

 

The BRP rulebook already includes a bunch of optional or variant rules reflecting different settings and editions. 

Yes, but all those optional and variant rules came from pre-existing BRP games, and ones that used rules similar to RuneQuest/Stormbringer/old CoC, and ones that were mostly out of print or hard to find at the time of the BGB's release. If they added the CoC7 rules, then a strong case could be made for adding in the variant rules from all the BRP related games, such  Pendragon and Ringworld, which are at least as similar to BRP as CoC7 is. 

Besides, anyone who is fond of CoC7 can just pull it out and mix 'n match it with the BGB if they wish to get what they want. It's not like you can't port stuff you want from the BGB to CoC7. The same is true for anyone who has Stormbringer/Elric!, RuneQuest 3, RuneQuest 2, Worlds of Wonder, Superworld, etc and want's to grab something from the BGB. Everything works both ways. It a GM running Hawkmoon wants to port over laser cannon stats from the BGB, or a Stormbringer GM wants to port over stats for archaic firearms, they can.   The main advantage to the BGB was that it collected a lot of rules from older games that are no longer available, at least not in the same form, so somebody who wanted them could have access to RQ's Battle Magic, or Stormringer's Sorcery, as most of that was out of print at the time. 

In fact, with most of the older Chasoium stuff being available again, and with  RQG, Magic World, CoC7, available, the BGB isn't as valuable now as it was when it was released. In most cases you don't need the BGB to fill the gaps. What you can't get now, is stuff that the BGB doesn't cover, most of which is due to licensing, such as RingWorld. 

[MoonRightRomantic]

On 3/21/2023 at 10:42 AM, Atgxtg said:

No, at the very least, they could do nothing and just leave the book as it is. That would be doing the very least. Now they could certainly choose to add in the CoC7 stuff as optional rules, but that would be doing more than the very least. In fact, anything other than tacking the CoC7 stuff on in a few pages at the end of the book, would almost certainly require re-typesetting and reformatting the book.  

Yes, but all those optional and variant rules came from pre-existing BRP games, and ones that used rules similar to RuneQuest/Stormbringer/old CoC, and ones that were mostly out of print or hard to find at the time of the BGB's release. If they added the CoC7 rules, then a strong case could be made for adding in the variant rules from all the BRP related games, such  Pendragon and Ringworld, which are at least as similar to BRP as CoC7 is. 

Besides, anyone who is fond of CoC7 can just pull it out and mix 'n match it with the BGB if they wish to get what they want. It's not like you can't port stuff you want from the BGB to CoC7. The same is true for anyone who has Stormbringer/Elric!, RuneQuest 3, RuneQuest 2, Worlds of Wonder, Superworld, etc and want's to grab something from the BGB. Everything works both ways. It a GM running Hawkmoon wants to port over laser cannon stats from the BGB, or a Stormbringer GM wants to port over stats for archaic firearms, they can.   The main advantage to the BGB was that it collected a lot of rules from older games that are no longer available, at least not in the same form, so somebody who wanted them could have access to RQ's Battle Magic, or Stormringer's Sorcery, as most of that was out of print at the time. 

In fact, with most of the older Chasoium stuff being available again, and with  RQG, Magic World, CoC7, available, the BGB isn't as valuable now as it was when it was released. In most cases you don't need the BGB to fill the gaps. What you can't get now, is stuff that the BGB doesn't cover, most of which is due to licensing, such as RingWorld. 

Ok, then release a supplement collecting those rules.

[jajagappa]

1 hour ago, MoonRightRomantic said:

then release a supplement collecting those rules.

Probably two issues/considerations:

1) RuneQuest/CoC/Pendragon - these are all core IP for Chaosium. Adding to the BRP system which under ORC is generally available for others to use as they wish likely exposes that IP to licensing issues (i.e. others could take that IP and use however they wanted). 

2) For Stormbringer/Ringworld, etc. - as those were licensed worlds, there may well be constraints from a licensing standpoint on what might be added to BRP.

Unless otherwise noted by Chaosium, I would not expect what is unique to their core product IP to be included.

[Atgxtg]

1 hour ago, MoonRightRomantic said:

Ok, then release a supplement collecting those rules.

Possible but:

1. Someone would have to collect those rules into a supplement and reformat them like the ones in the BGB, which would take time and money away from other projects.
2. Who want's it, and is willing to pay for it?

For example, let's look at the opposed game mechanics used in Pendragon. Anyone who wants to use it in BRP must already be familiar with the Pendragon system and could just port it over right now, and so would not need to buy another supplement containing those rules to do so. The same holds true for CoC7 rules. Anyone who wants them probably already has or CoC7 or could just buy it and port the rules over. So again there is no need for them to buy another supplement.

The BGB itself came out at a time when most o Cahoisum's other RPGs were out of print and not available, especially RuneQuest. The printing of RQG, and also CoC7 which not only put a lot of those rules back into print but also change many of them to the point where they don't line up as well with the earlier products works against the cross compatibility of the BGB. 

Now where I think your argument has some merit, from a business sense as a gaming sense (that is more that just "it would be nice to have it and we want it", which I do understand) is with the unique rules from games like Ringworld. If the rules could be decoupled from the Known Universe setting (because the Niven estate owns it) and maybe reworked into a different,  scifi setting (something that official BRP lines tend to be a bit light on), it probably would sell. If it was a setting that had stuff tat could be adapted to other scifi settings, with spaceship rules and such, I think it would probably sell very well, and become the go to book for those wanting to use BRP for sci fi. Kinda like how the Investigator Weapons supplements for COC are so comprehensive that they are the go to book for firearm stats for just about any BRP game, not just CoC. The stats are there and the stats make sense in most BRP games (and damage could be doubled for the games where they don't), so why not use them? Same with some of the Ringworld stuff- the non-Ringworld specific stuff. 

 

I understand that you'd like to see a comprehensive book that covers all the rules. Many of us would. Personally I'd like to see some more RQ3 rules as options, and so on, but I have to consider if that would be viable from Chaosium's point of view. Plus, I have RQ3 so I can port over anything I want from it into a BRP game (or vice versa), so I'm not really losing out. I have sympathy for your position, I just don't think it is all that practical to make the changes or produce the supplement you want. 

 

 

[MoonRightRomantic]

Coming from a d20 background, I prefer consolidation: a core rulebook which collects all rules applicable to most settings, settings released as their own supplements, etc. I also think ttrpg books could benefit from more flexible formats than PDF, such as HTML5. Those online d20 SRDs is a good example. I imagine you could create an HTML book that cross-references both the universal rules and setting-specific rules for you, without needing to repeat redundant information.

[MoonRightRomantic]

Chaosium released a new rulebook a few days after my last post: https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/431991/Basic-Roleplaying-Universal-Game-Engine

[Nerun]

Seven changes in the new edition:

https://www.chaosium.com/blogbasic-roleplaying-universal-game-engine7-changes-in-the-new-edition/

[g33k]

On 4/4/2023 at 7:43 AM, MoonRightRomantic said:

Coming from a d20 background, I prefer consolidation: a core rulebook which collects all rules applicable to most settings, settings released as their own supplements, etc...

Chaosium has revealed that their prior sales-numbers tell them -- very very strongly! -- that all-in-one titles with a strong setting (RuneQuest, Call of Cthulhu) sell tremendously better than generic, broadly-applicable rules (BRP BGB) or fantasy-pastiche settings (Magic World).

They had (previous to the WotC OGLpocalypse self-pwn event) announced Magic World would not be receiving any further effort (supplements, reprints, errata, etc), and the BGB might get a revision... someday... but if so it would be a long, long ways off.

I cannot blame them for looking at the bottom line, and cutting products that were not profitable.  I understand MW was (based in large part on extended warehousing costs for the slow-selling title) actually a month-on-month loss for Chaosium.  On the other hand, fans do reasonably point to a fairly-severe lack of support for MW, and the BGB, speculating that -- if Chaosium supported those products the way they support their main lines -- maybe they'd do much much better.

Now... well.
BRP:UGE is a thing.
Chaosium is supporting it, very-very strongly.  As a project @Chaosium, it went zero-to-60 in virtually nothing flat; and they are rocking the edit-and-revise schedule on a quick timeframe, too.  Also:  I do not believe ANY Chaosium release has gotten its own bespoke Actual-Play stream as quickly as this has!

So -- if we want to see further/ongoing Chaosium support for the product-line -- it's really on us, the fans.
Buy it.  Play it.  Proselytize.  Get out there and run the game... flog it at FLGS's... demo it at Open Gaming events... sign up to run it at conventions... etc etc etc.

 

On 4/4/2023 at 7:43 AM, MoonRightRomantic said:

... I also think ttrpg books could benefit from more flexible formats than PDF, such as HTML5. Those online d20 SRDs is a good example. I imagine you could create an HTML book that cross-references both the universal rules and setting-specific rules for you, without needing to repeat redundant information.

That sounds like a nifty approach.  I expect it'd be a fair amount of extra work on the tech side of things.  Eventually, methods would be standardized, and it'd get easier for everyone (maybe even become an industry-norm)... but trailblazers would have to lead the way.

[Rick Meints]

39 minutes ago, g33k said:

I cannot blame them for looking at the bottom line, and cutting products that were not profitable.  I understand MW was (based in large part on extended warehousing costs for the slow-selling title) actually a month-on-month loss for Chaosium.  On the other hand, fans do reasonably point to a fairly-severe lack of support for MW, and the BGB, speculating that -- if Chaosium supported those products the way they support their main lines -- maybe they'd do much much better.

A problem that BRP and MW shards that very few authors submitted manuscripts for those product lines. Chaosium doesn't have that many "in-house" writers who just write whatever they are assigned to. We rely fairly heavily on freelancers, and they write what they have an interest in writing. Every title for BRP and MW sold poorly, at least in terms of being profitable. It's hard to even break even when you sell maybe 500 copies of something. Distribution seldom carried the BRP and MW titles, and even if they did it was in very small amounts. POD is nice, but you make less money printing 10-50 books at a time. It's when you print 1000+ that the numbers start to work. Support is a rather vague word. Even if Chaosium had produced 4-6 BRP/MW titles per year I doubt the line would have prospered. While "support" could also mean marketing, advertising, and similar, Chaosium just didn't have the money to do that 7+ years ago, and we have a pretty limited budget for those things even today. It sucked toilet the hundreds of MW fans know we weren't going to publish additional choices, but that's what the economics of the situation were. We'll see how the new version of BRP goes, and we hope to see it flourish, and we want to support it so it does.

[g33k]

5 minutes ago, Rick Meints said:

A problem that BRP and MW shards that very few authors submitted manuscripts for those product lines. Chaosium doesn't have that many "in-house" writers who just write whatever they are assigned to. We rely fairly heavily on freelancers, and they write what they have an interest in writing. Every title for BRP and MW sold poorly, at least in terms of being profitable. It's hard to even break even when you sell maybe 500 copies of something. Distribution seldom carried the BRP and MW titles, and even if they did it was in very small amounts. POD is nice, but you make less money printing 10-50 books at a time. It's when you print 1000+ that the numbers start to work. Support is a rather vague word. Even if Chaosium had produced 4-6 BRP/MW titles per year I doubt the line would have prospered. While "support" could also mean marketing, advertising, and similar, Chaosium just didn't have the money to do that 7+ years ago, and we have a pretty limited budget for those things even today. It sucked toilet the hundreds of MW fans know we weren't going to publish additional choices, but that's what the economics of the situation were. We'll see how the new version of BRP goes, and we hope to see it flourish, and we want to support it so it does.

Thanks, Rick.  Getting the perspective from the folks who actually have the numbers, and explain their own reasoning, is IMHO invaluable.

FWIW, I have a BRP:UGE project under way.

 

[DreadDomain]

3 hours ago, Rick Meints said:

Every title for BRP and MW sold poorly, at least in terms of being profitable.

Adding a customer's perspective, I would also add to what Rick said that it did not help that they were all fairly poorly produced (except for some great covers) when compared to alternatives on the market. Mediocre art, graphic design and layout was certainly not helping in a market where books were getting prettier, flashier, more colorful.

Rewind to early to mid 2010s and you're looking for an alternative-to-d20-generic-fantasy rpg.  With no pre conceived notions you flip through Dragon Age/Fantasy Age, Shadow of the Demon Lord, Magic World or the Savage Worlds supplement of the moment (and I am sure many others that I do not think of at the moment).  Add to it that it was also competing with RuneQuest 6 in the d100 space and one really had to be in the camp of "this-is-based-on-Stormbringer-which-was-my-favorite-fantasy-rpg-at-the-time" for MW to have a chance against the others.

[pansophy]

I think available new technology might help creating great titles and beautiful books by fans. DTP has never been so easy and accessible, and by looking at fan made productions for the Genesys system, a lot of descent looking material can be created.

Maybe it would help if Chaosium creates some 'layout files' for fans together with some free-to-use artwork to boost this concept. It works for Genesys, for Free League YZE and also for the Cypher System. I also understand that artwork is expensive and layout files (Adobe, Word) are a pain to create to be usable for everybody.

I think I'm just looking at options here to boost interest in the product. Saying that, the current version of BRP (1.02) is really enjoyable and readable. Thank you all to make this happen (Fans & Chaosium)!

[g33k]

6 minutes ago, pansophy said:

I think available new technology might help creating great titles and beautiful books by fans. DTP has never been so easy and accessible, and by looking at fan made productions for the Genesys system, a lot of descent looking material can be created.

Maybe it would help if Chaosium creates some 'layout files' for fans together with some free-to-use artwork to boost this concept. It works for Genesys, for Free League YZE and also for the Cypher System. I also understand that artwork is expensive and layout files (Adobe, Word) are a pain to create to be usable for everybody.

I think I'm just looking at options here to boost interest in the product. Saying that, the current version of BRP (1.02) is really enjoyable and readable. Thank you all to make this happen (Fans & Chaosium)!

Chaosium's "Community Content" programs on DTRPG (JC for RuneQuest, MR for Call of Cthulhu) have such layout files, art resources, maps, etc.

That program is specific to the DTRPG "Community Content" programs, though, and the terms there are entirely-different from the ORC license.  It is possible that BRP will get a similar "CC" program... but the T&C's, again, will be subject to the general framework that DTRPG requires.

I hope the programs you mention -- for Genesys, YZE, Cypher -- inspire Chaosium to do something similar.

[TrippyHippy]

I think one of the commercial problems with the ‘Big Gold Book’ version of BRP was that it couldn’t really forge a distinct enough identity for itself. Call of Cthulhu is, in and of itself quite ‘universal’ in as much as it is timeless. That is, when considering future, historical or modern day settings it is already able to cater for these things. The Cthulhu brand gives a spin to being ‘straight’ genre books - even things like the superhero genre sounds interesting if given a Cthulhu-esque spin - and any supplement with the CoC brand has a more established market.

With some sense of slight irony, the development of Call of Cthulhu 7E does, however provide a niche of sorts where the ‘classic’ BRP system can mark itself as being slightly different. It will probably get its best support from 3rd parties in the long term, although I do think having at least a core book of BRP adventures ought to be done, along with some re-issues of other classic game lines. In fact, an ideal type of supplement would be a 'BRP Multiverse' book, with about 10 so short but evocative settings that could illustrate the diversity of settings that could be used with the game.

 

Edited May 19, 2023 by TrippyHippy

[smiorgan]

On 5/18/2023 at 10:53 PM, DreadDomain said:

 Mediocre art, graphic design and layout was certainly not helping in a market where books were getting prettier, flashier, more colorful.

[...]

 Add to it that it was also competing with RuneQuest 6 in the d100 space and one really had to be in the camp of "this-is-based-on-Stormbringer-which-was-my-favorite-fantasy-rpg-at-the-time" for MW to have a chance against the others.

This and this. 

I was firmly in the core target demographic of "this-is-based-on-Stormbringer-which-was-my-favorite-fantasy-rpg-at-the-time", and wanting badly to like MW. Still, I struggled with the typos, sloppy layout, haphazard art of that book.