Best RPG for Arabian adventures

[bedir than]

Thanks for this thread!
I'm not-working-in-the field Middle East Cultures & Civilizations major who once up a time knew Arabic.
I read a lot of G Willow Wilson whose fiction is mostly modernist magical realism. I think I'd love S.A.'s stories.

I'm in the al-Qadim is fine bucket. Back when I tweeted with Ahmed al-Jabry (he's Saudi iirc) regularly. He and his cohort do a great job of talking about what al-Qadim does well and what it does not.

 

[GM Lent]

While I confess I have not watched the 18 hours of this analysis, in defense of a setting I am extremely fond of, I should point out that this is not a unanimously held opinion.

The 20ArabiaRPG youtube channel also did a multi-part analysis of the line (at least of the main setting box) at around the same time. This is a group of relatively young natives to the region (I think they are Yemeni or Qatari, from memory?) who were reading the product for the first time and reacting to it as they went (unfortunately, their newness to the product meant they read the two booklets from the Land of Fate box in the wrong order, which got confusing for all concerned). While they certainly found things that could be improved, they on the whole had a reasonably positive impression and ended up streaming a (regrettably short-lived) game in the setting.

Hi there! I'm the guy who wrote Campaign Guide: Zakhara - Adventures in the Land of Fate, which is the 5th Edition conversion of Al-Qadim that folks mention above.

d20Arabia is headed by Ahmed Aljabry, who was our main cultural and language consultant on the book (we had a total of three consultants, but he worked with me/us far more and far more closely than the other two did). He is Yemeni (though last time I spoke with him he was living in western Saudi Arabia), and he provided a ton of great insight for our cultural and political sections. He is a funny, charming, and amazingly easygoing guy and was a delight to work with; if anybody reading this is looking for a consultant on West Asian culture and/or language they should should definitely look him up.

He did express some disappointment in the way the Asians Represent group approached their Al-Qadim review; he was one of the people in that review group, at least initially. I don't know if he remained through their entire process but I do know that a big part of why he did the d20Arabia piece was to provide a contrasting perspective.

It's interesting to me that while I'll happily concede that my book could have been much better, and there are definitely things I would do differently if I was starting it now, the main actual complaint I've seen/heard from people has been that we made an active choice not to focus on stuff like the slavery and misogyny presented as matter-of-fact in the original works. We made very few actual changes, we just didn't foreground things the way they had been before. An example of something we DID change was stuff like the age of one of the Grand Caliph's wives, who as written in the original Land of Fate box set would have been 15 or 16 when she married the early-40s-ish GC.

The cultural roots on which the setting is based may have included real-word examples of unions such as that, but we saw no need to even tacitly endorse such behavior in our work. If it's super important to someone to have child marriage in their game, absolutely nothing we do can or is intended to prevent that, and power to them I guess, but we were absolutely not going to have it in the baseline we were establishing.

And incidentally, Tales of the Caliphate Nights is a most excellent work, and was written by our own Aaron Infante-Levy, whom I met here on EN World when he was heading an early 5e Al-Qadim conversion group. In fact, I originally wrote the Cities section of the Campaign Guide for that project; when that group fell apart I took my Cities work and later expanded it into the more complete setting guide.

 

[humble minion]

Hi there! I'm the guy who wrote Campaign Guide: Zakhara - Adventures in the Land of Fate, which is the 5th Edition conversion of Al-Qadim that folks mention above.

d20Arabia is headed by Ahmed Aljabry, who was our main cultural and language consultant on the book (we had a total of three consultants, but he worked with me/us far more and far more closely than the other two did). He is Yemeni (though last time I spoke with him he was living in western Saudi Arabia), and he provided a ton of great insight for our cultural and political sections. He is a funny, charming, and amazingly easygoing guy and was a delight to work with; if anybody reading this is looking for a consultant on West Asian culture and/or language they should should definitely look him up.

I ... knew that, and I'd completely forgotten! Thanks for the reminder. I did buy that product, thought it's a while since I've read through it. I was a bit sad to see the end of the hakima though. And if i was writing Al-Qadim from the ground up now, I'd move on from the elemental wizards. To me that just seemed like TSR's fairly lazy fallback option when they wanted an 'exotic' magic system. Al-Qadim, Dark Sun, I think OA did it as well.

The cultural roots on which the setting is based may have included real-word examples of unions such as that, but we saw no need to even tacitly endorse such behavior in our work. If it's super important to someone to have child marriage in their game, absolutely nothing we do can or is intended to prevent that, and power to them I guess, but we were absolutely not going to have it in the baseline we were establishing.

I'd have to agree with that approach. I mean, it's not like most campaign settings based on European medieval tropes spend much time covering serfdom, or punishment by mutilation, or dynastic child betrothal, or that sort of thing, even though they are fairly well-documented historical happenings too.

 

[GM Lent]

I ... knew that, and I'd completely forgotten! Thanks for the reminder. I did buy that product, thought it's a while since I've read through it. I was a bit sad to see the end of the hakima though. And if i was writing Al-Qadim from the ground up now, I'd move on from the elemental wizards. To me that just seemed like TSR's fairly lazy fallback option when they wanted an 'exotic' magic system. Al-Qadim, Dark Sun, I think OA did it as well.

Thank you for your support!

We included hakimas - it's one of the character kits, and it's on on page 81. Or am I not understanding what you mean by "the end?"

In theory I like the idea of elemental wizards, especially in a land like Zakhara where elemental magic already has a strong presence due to geniekind. If I were designing the setting from the ground up now, I would create an entirely new class for the elemental specialist wizard and just ditch the base 5e wizard entirely. IMO each wizard "specialist" should have its own distinct spell list, so you wouldn't run into situations where your Water Mage was learning and casting burning hands and fireball, for example. The specialists should actualy be specialized, and the 5e framework doesn't really allow for that as written.

Now, if we want to talk about the problem with our character kits, let's go to town; if we ever get around to revising the book that part would probably see the biggest change. The concept overall ultimately makes way more sense as a mix of feats and backgrounds, and the folks who did the Fantasy Grounds conversion of our book took that approach in their version. Adding an entirely new mechanical subsystem for the kits was simply not the best idea; we wanted to avoid having what was basically a feat tax on Zakharan characters, but there are simpler solutions than adding a whole extra layer to character creation.

I'd have to agree with that approach. I mean, it's not like most campaign settings based on European medieval tropes spend much time covering serfdom, or punishment by mutilation, or dynastic child betrothal, or that sort of thing, even though they are fairly well-documented historical happenings too.

Yeah, we didn't "remove" anything or even suggest that people do so, we just didn't foreground some of the original setting's more problematic aspects. Some people took real issue with that choice, through.

 

[kronovan]

...However, True20 isn't a system that has aged well in my opinion, and has quite a bit of weaknesses. Such as using Mutants & Mastermind's Toughness saves in lieu of hit points, but as you don't increase them as you level up, one shots become a lot easier at middle to higher levels when a lot of magic and monsters still scale damage-wise...

True20 for sure is a system that could use some houserules. Toughness saves aren't typically a problem for Warrior role PCs, because they can dip into their Toughness feat up to 5 times and end up with a hefty toughness save bonus. And similarly, Expert role PCs can multi-dip their Defensive Roll feat to get an equivalent benefit. Doing multiple dips isn't too much of a problem, considering that T20 grants PCs a feat every level. Not to mention that the better armor, for which the Warrior can wear all types, gives substantial toughness save bonuses. It's really only the Adept role that's challenged for toughness saves. That said, Adepts have the Mana Shield power in The Adepts Handbook, which gives them a generous toughness save bonus equal to half their level.

An easy way to houserule toughness saves, is to allow them to gain bonuses at a "Normal" saving throw progression. That grants them a hefty +6 bonus by the time they reach level 19 but doesn't give them their 1st +1 until level 3. Which is good IME, because toughness saves are more easily made at early levels. Albeit, if I did that I'd lower the cap on the number of Toughness and Defensive Roll dips. The structure of Roles and progression of saves is completely transparent in the last edition of the rules (True 20 Adventure Roleplaying, Revised Edition), via a Role points build system with charts and paragraphs clearly giving guidelines on how you'd homebrew your own. So if you follow that as a gage, such houserules are unlikely to break game balance.

TBH, I've seen persistent failed toughness saves at higher levels as more a a problem of poor leveling choices. What the Narrator chooses to do is of course to some extent setting dependent. While I might choose to houserule around toughness saves for a Tales of the Caliphate Nights game, I wouldn't do that for a Shadows of Cthulhu campaign, where the consequences of combat are supposed to be more lethal.

 

[Dalekdad]

I'd consider Savage Worlds for pulp swashbuckling and there is the Hellfrost: Land of Fire setting, but I don't know how 'Al-Qadim-y' it is.

 

[johndesmarais]

Tales of the Caliphate Nights is a setting which I'd rate as excellent. IMO next to Shadows of Cthulhu, it's among the best settings ever released for True20. I consider it classic Historical Fantasy due to the amount of research that went into it and how much of the culture of the Abbasid Caliphate's golden age it highlights. But it's not just all history, with a dizzying number of options for players and some quality tools and content for the Narrator.

It is closely tied to the True20 rules though, so it could be farily challenging if your desire to run it with another TTRPG. I've only ever adapted other TTRPG settings to T20, so I couldn't comment on how much effort that might be. If you know True20 and are comfortable narrating it, TotCN is a terrific setting to run and play in.

Why had I never heard of Tales of the Caliphate Nights before? I love this genre - warts and all - and thought I had the every major-system supplement for it that was out there.

 

[jdrakeh]

Without a doubt, In a Wicked Age. Directly influenced by Scheherazade's tale telling.

 

[Jahydin]

I really like The Nightmares Underneath.

My elevator pitch would be "Middle-Eastern Shadowdark". Kind of a greatest-hits of OSR mechanics in one of my favorite dungeon crawl settings ever. Love that the labyrinths are ever changing and dreamlike.

If interested, @Libertad did a great in-depth review of it here.

 

[Voadam]

My first thought is 7th Sea 1st edition which has both a big swashbuckling pirates theme in an alternate fantasy age of sails earth but also a major fantasy Islamic Arabic region sourcebook the Crescent Empire.

The Burning Sands was mentioned earlier which is the fantasy Arabic setting complement of the earlier editions fantasy Japanese Legend of the Five Rings using the same basic roll and keep rule system as 7th Sea, but 7th Sea is tuned to be more swashbuckling Errol Flynn pirate appropriate while the Five Rings is tuned to be more samurai lethal duel with easier PC death. The swashbuckling tone seems more appropriate to me.

I don't remember Middle East themed fantasy analogues standing out as much in the revised 7th Sea 2e setting, but it also has a Crescent Empire sourcebook, a Pirate Nations sourcebook, and there are parts of the new to 2e fantasy Africa Lands of Gold and Fire that might have stuff for a decent fantasy Arab dominated North Africa.

I have not played either edition, though I have read some of the 1e sourcebooks (not the crescent empire one) and some of the d20 conversions of the 1e setting.