I hope some minor portion of this was spurred by me talking you into Conan d20. If so, I’m going to start mailing you random things to see what happens.
Auran Empire Campaign Setting - 10
I mostly want this because of all the posts you’ve made on the metaphysics, but I expect to liberally lift all manner of goodies.
Guns of War - 10
Wasn’t that part of the D@W goals?
Lairs & Encounters - 10
This would be super handy as of ~4 weeks ago, as I’m busy building a sandbox.
Secrets of the Undercity - 7
Sinister Secrets of Sakkara - 6
I’ll put up some token resistance, but if you end up sprinkling these with the sort of behind-the-dice metaphysical/systemic systems that seems to happen elsewhere, upgrade those numbers.
Domains At War: In The Navy, with Guns of War options - 99 (Wishin’ and hopin’ and thinkin’ and prayin’)
So, really, given that once I hit your Kickstarter I get beta documentation, I don’t really make a lot of differentiation between a retail purchase and a Kickstarter from you. Hell, I’d prefer any sort of setup that gets me into the product now, in whatever form that takes, just because I’m a big fan of kicking the tires and you’re always good with feedback or modification from the same.
Heroic Fantasy Companion - 6. I’m sure it would be a great book but when I want a “low magic” game I default to a non-D&D-powered system.
Auran Empire Campaign Setting - 10. What little I’ve gleaned from the setting looks and sounds very evocative and I’d love to set a game there. Especially if it’s got vast big hexmaps for a Judge to populate and call his own.
Guns of War - 7. Sounds like a cool book to have around and get something going, but not a must for me.
Lairs & Encounters - 8. Sounds very, very useful to a seat-of-the-pants Judge like myself.
Secrets of the Undercity - 9. Like I said, I’m really interested in the Auran Empire stuff.
Sinister Secret of Sakkara - 7. Again not a must-have but I’m a fan of low-level stuff.
Would the Heroic Fantasy Companion lean more toward Conan or more toward Tolkien? If it’s the former, I would definitely be more interested. But I don’t especially care about roleplaying in Middle Earth type worlds.
Clearly a cluster of high interest in Heroic Fantasy (230), Lairs and Encounter (229), and Auran Empire (226).
Of course we can’t forget that Domains at War: In the Navy scores at 99 on the basis of one heroic backer’s vote. (I appreciate the vote of confidence…)
Many of you asked whether our Heroic Fantasy supplement would be “Tolkienesque” or “Conanesque”. It would aim to cover both. My personal opinion is that the similarities between these two genres are greater than the similarities between either genre and core D20-style fantasy RPG. I place both genres squarely within “Heroic Fantasy”:
Both share the ethos of the Germanic heroic age*
Both are set in our own mythical path
Both feature larger-than-life heroes capable of facing down hordes of foes
Both feature subtle magic that charms, mesmerizes, manipulates
Both believe magic a has corrupting influence (with 2 settings: “some magic corrupts” and “all magic corrupts”)
Both have substantially fewer magic items than a typical D&D adventure
Etc.
I think the main difference between the two is that Middle Earth adds a layer of Christianity**; Hyboria adds a layer of Cthulhu. Or, put another way, Middle Earth is (Beowulf + Christianity) while Hyboria is (Beowulf + Cthulhu). So for instance Middle Earth has a Satan-like dark lord, while Hyboria has alien evils from out of space and time.
*Aragorn and Conan are both variants of Beowulf: Reckless adventurers in their youth who become responsible kings as adults.
**I know Beowulf itself has a Christian layer, but it’s pretty thin.
ACKS Heroic Fantasy Companion - optional rules for gaming in lower-magic worlds like Hyboria and Middle Earth; new combat and healing mechanics, rules for heroic codes and heroic funerals, magical corruption, pinnacles of good (Rivendell), 50+ new spells inspired by heroic fantasy fiction (e.g. Summon Giant Eagle, Sunder Structure)
ACKS Heroic Fantasy Companion 10
Auran Empire Campaign Setting - 4 for the fluff, 9 for the crunch
Guns of War - 9
Lairs & Encounters - 10
Secrets of the Undercity - 4
Sinister Secrets of Sakkara - 4
Of course we can’t forget that Domains at War: In the Navy scores at 99 on the basis of one heroic backer’s vote. (I appreciate the vote of confidence…)
I know, right? That guy, I swear.
I’d agree with that. Everyone calls default DND ‘Vancian’ but it’s Vance as seen through a wargamer’s lens; done more literary than gamist I think would come out quite different, even if based in Vance. I’d honestly do Vance as Mutants & Masterminds.
I’m very interested in seeing what you come up with. Mongoose’s Conan was a good attempt; Green Ronin’s Black Company/True Sorcery was also a good effort (I’d maybe place that somewhere inbetween Tolkien and Conan?)…I’m not sure what else there was in the d20 world? Game of Thrones, but there wasn’t a real magic system.
I think you’ll have a big advantage in designing to the trope/genre, not necessarily a set of pre-published stories that you have to limit yourself by - you can make it consistent to the literary sources without constantly having to work in things that go “Hey, remember when this character did this?” and trying to balance that sort of stuff from 1st to Xth level.
The source material for The Black Company is fantasy + Vietnam. GR’s attempt at it didn’t quite pull that off, mostly because 3.x D&D is too heroic even when it tries to tone things down. The magic system was interesting, but very slow in play unless the magic-user spent a fair amount of time putting together a list of spells.
It gets rid of the German heroic ethos for a grey-and-gray morality, has relatively low-powered main protagonists who are working for/against much more powerful personalities (Lady, the White Rose, the Ten Who Were Taken, the Dominator, etc), who defeat foes through fighting dirty and being too stubborn to die, with mostly subtle magic (and amazing spells requiring a powerful caster, a lot of time to prepare, and high risk), corrupting magic (any spellcaster stronger than Goblin or One-Eye seems to turn evil eventually), and relatively few magic items until Lady starts mass-producing the Roman Candles.
