Merrie England

[Trifletraxor]

The Age of Eleanor

Merrie England is a setting that allows you to play in medieval England, but an England where Robin Hood roams the forests, where evil magicians cast spells on their enemies, where great dragons terrorise the land and where the fairy folk still rule Fair Elfland. Revel in the mysteries of Morris Dancing, crusade against the heathen, uncover the secrets of the Masons, oppose the unjust taxes of your absent king, or simply abuse your authority over peasants and vassals. Your imagination is the only limit!

This book contains character generation for Norman, Saxon, Jewish, Welsh, Cornish, Scottish, Irish, Fairy, Saracen or Moor player characters and has descriptions and rules for magic use and religions, as well as medieval background, scenario hooks and historical figures. Earlier published for the MRQ system, Merrie England is about to be released for BRP!

....

Just checked the Cubicle 7 site and found that it was about to be released for BRP this month! Huzzah!

[soltakss]

Merrie England: Age of Chivalry will almost certainly not be released this month, but Paolo will be able to give more information on that ...

[Trifletraxor]

But they said so on the Cubicle 7 site!

[RosenMcStern]

Never trust a cube (or cubicle).

It was delayed, you should have it for February.

[rust]

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.

[soltakss]

If you liked the RQ version of Merrie England, then you'll hopefully like the BRP one better.

It's being heavily edited at the moment so should be ready in a few months.

[HierophantX]

What's the holdup with the editing? I mean, it's pretty cut and dry right, just change some basic rule mechanics and chargen stuff? I'd have thought most of the text would be duped?

[Agentorange]

What's the holdup with the editing? I mean, it's pretty cut and dry right, just change some basic rule mechanics and chargen stuff? I'd have thought most of the text would be duped?

Maybe that's the problem ? The text has been duped and now it's confused about what it's meant to be.

If only they'd duplicated it things would have been so much easier.

[soltakss]

For a start, there's probably three times as much stuff in the new Merrie England.

Then there's the fact that I am slapdash when making sure that rules hang together and tend to wander, so need to be reigned in sometimes.

When converting from two similar systems it is easy to miss things or leave some things unconverted, so it takes a while to make sure that everything is correct for BRP. Personally, I'd leave it as a halfway house between BRP and RQ, but I'm not the one paying for it to be published.

Also, Paolo had to work on the Italian version of RQ, so Merrie England had to take a back seat, which is fair enough.

[RosenMcStern]

Unfortunately, supplements cannot be published in a "halfway" fashion, even if we know that most people on this forum will play them exactly that way. Moreover, there are many people out there who have not known BRP or MRQ for long and would be confused by contradicting bits. So it took three people to spot all the points that are not "pure BRP" and fix them. But the process is more or less over now, so the book will be available soon, with a campaign and a lot of additional contents.

[Agentorange]

For a start, there's probably three times as much stuff in the new Merrie England.

That's interesting, can you tell us a little more about the new content ?

[sdavies2720]

For a start, there's probably three times as much stuff in the new Merrie England.

That's cool. It makes me wish I hadn't bought the MRQ version...Actually, now that I think about it, I'm just as happy to support the companies that are putting out quality material. And I'm running MRQ, so it is nice to have a fully compatible version.

...When converting from two similar systems it is easy to miss things or leave some things unconverted, so it takes a while to make sure that everything is correct for BRP. Personally, I'd leave it as a halfway house between BRP and RQ, but I'm not the one paying for it to be published...

Bless you for taking the time! I suspect that developing rules for similar-but-different systems must be devilishly tricky. At least you need meticulous proofreading/editing to obliterate all the old rule references. That is something that Mongoose apparently forgot with some of their early MRQII supplements.

I'm looking forward to seeing what you do with the rules!

Steve

[Jeffrywith1e]

I don't have anything from Cubicle 7 other than the Doctor Who stuff. With that in mind, is this book in full beautiful color (like the DW products?)

[soltakss]

That's interesting, can you tell us a little more about the new content ?

The Chapter Headings are:

Player Characters

Religion and Magic

Magical Science

Major Religions

Nobles, Knights and The Crown

The Land and People

Further Afield

The Crusades

Trading and Adventuring

The Afterlife

Angels and Demons

Creatures

Famous Characters and Sample Characters

Campaigns

The full Table of Contents is at http://www.soltakss.com/merrieengland/ME_TOC.txt

Of course, these might change with editing and layout, so please don't hold me to them.

[soltakss]

With that in mind, is this book in full beautiful color (like the DW products?)

The RQ one wasn't, apart from a sumptuous cover and a map (colour in the PDF). However, the illustrations were in a medieval style which suited black and white.

I don't know what the illustrations in the BRP version will be, but I would guess that they will be excellent again.

[Agentorange]

The Chapter Headings are:

Player Characters

Religion and Magic

Magical Science

Major Religions

Nobles, Knights and The Crown

The Land and People

Further Afield

The Crusades

Trading and Adventuring

The Afterlife

Angels and Demons

Creatures

Famous Characters and Sample Characters

Campaigns

The full Table of Contents is at http://www.soltakss.com/merrieengland/ME_TOC.txt

Of course, these might change with editing and layout, so please don't hold me to them.

Had a look at the full table of contents, what a lot of great stuff ! I'm curious about the Duergar, I take it you're going for the more folkloric version which had all sorts of glamour/illusion powers ?

[soltakss]

Had a look at the full table of contents, what a lot of great stuff ! I'm curious about the Duergar, I take it you're going for the more folkloric version which had all sorts of glamour/illusion powers ?

Short, ugly creatures, the Duergar are dwarfs from the Simonside hills of Northumberland in the north of England. Duergar live within the hills and are known to be both mischievous and malicious. They lead travellers astray by carrying lanterns into bogs and push walkers off the hillside.

So, as Fairy Folk they would have magical powers, their particular powers are not explicitly mentioned. They are definitely Bad Fairies, though.

I didn't have enough room to detail all the creatures, so most of them are in sketch form. Perhaps they could be expanded on in a later volume.

[soltakss]

That's cool. It makes me wish I hadn't bought the MRQ version...

I don't!

Actually, now that I think about it, I'm just as happy to support the companies that are putting out quality material. And I'm running MRQ, so it is nice to have a fully compatible version.

The Merrie England rules for MRQ are different to BRP. MRQ does some things better (Hero Points, Legendary Abilities, Divine Magic) and BRP does some things better (Character Generation, Weapon Damage). I'd love to see Legendary Abilities in BRP and a BRP-style character generation in RQ.

So, you could use things from Age of Eleanor in Age of Chivalry and vice versa.

Bless you for taking the time! I suspect that developing rules for similar-but-different systems must be devilishly tricky. At least you need meticulous proofreading/editing to obliterate all the old rule references. That is something that Mongoose apparently forgot with some of their early MRQII supplements.

Age of Eleanor was written for MRQ1/2 and there were some things there that were possibly ambiguous, ruleswise. Hopefully we won't have many of those in the new edition. It is difficult, especially for me, as I have MRQI, MRQII, BRP, RQ3 and HeroQuest running around in my head and find it difficult to separate them.

I'm looking forward to seeing what you do with the rules!

Thanks.

The majority of Age of Chivalry is fluff, the rules content is relatively small. But, that's how things should be - the basic rules system should be enough to describe most things, anything new should be setting-specific or should describe new mechanics.

BRP does things slightly differently, so some things have been slightly changed. Divine Magic has been overhauled, Demonology has been expanded, Astrology has been expanded (but might not work and could well be changed) but nost of the other things are unchanged.

[Agentorange]

Short, ugly creatures, the Duergar are dwarfs from the Simonside hills of Northumberland in the north of England. Duergar live within the hills and are known to be both mischievous and malicious. They lead travellers astray by carrying lanterns into bogs and push walkers off the hillside.

So, as Fairy Folk they would have magical powers, their particular powers are not explicitly mentioned. They are definitely Bad Fairies, though.

I didn't have enough room to detail all the creatures, so most of them are in sketch form. Perhaps they could be expanded on in a later volume.

I've got a volume on British folklore somewhere ( well, I've got several, but you know what I mean ) which contains a story about a northumberland farmer who gets lost at night, he takes shelter with an old man who keeps saying that he ( the farmer) should take the only bed in the hut, suspecting that the old man is a duergar and knowing their reputation he refuses, in the morning when he awakes he finds the hut is gone and where the bed was supposed to be is the edge of a steep cliff. There's another one somewhere else which also suggests that Duergar have glamour/illusionary powers, but only for malicious purposes

EDIT: I think the farmer story was in Dark Fairies by Bob Curran

[BMonroe]

I didn't have enough room to detail all the creatures, so most of them are in sketch form. Perhaps they could be expanded on in a later volume.

I gotta say, I really like this. I'm becoming a big proponent of having more DIY stuff in RPGs, and I like this tactic a lot. Giving a GM the basic sketch of a critter, and letting the individual GMs the ability to customize it to their specific campaign is neat. Makes the fey specifically very mysterious and strange.

[Narl]

Any update on the release of Merrie England for BRP? I see Cubicle 7 has it on preorder for March. Is it shipping yet?

[RosenMcStern]

Alas, no. Let us say early Q3 2011.

[tedopon]

Is this going to be available on Chaosium's site, or just Alephtar's? Shipping is cheaper in the US from Chaosium, and I also have a couple other things I want to grab anyway.

[RosenMcStern]

Yes, from Chaosium, too. We are now hammering the last few beasties into the stat block grid (Simon REALLY went amok with demons, this time) and then it goes to the printer. You should be able to get it in some weeks.

[tedopon]

Yes, from Chaosium, too. We are now hammering the last few beasties into the stat block grid (Simon REALLY went amok with demons, this time) and then it goes to the printer. You should be able to get it in some weeks.

I can't wait. You guys put out the Top Shelf stuff. I've loved every book so far.