Ask me about Egyptian Adventures: Hamunaptra

[Mouseferatu]

What do you mean by "Major Plot Hook"? With out their being any adventures are you just presenting the country with some major things that are in motion?

Correct. While there are no adventures (or at least none yet, I hope ), we've got a lot of story seeds and plot hooks scattered throughout the set. The expansion of the desert is one of those, and is touched on more than once.

Lets talk rules. I imagine there awill be new prestige classes and feats, but are their also new core classes? If so are these replacements for the current ones or add ons? Does it discuss in any way the current classes and what would be appropriate to the setting? For instance I don't see Druids and Paladins as they are really fitting, but I could be wrong. Anything new with clerics since you include a basically the egyption gods and their relationship with mortals was very different then we see in a tradiitonal D&D game.

Hamunaptra includes an entire array of new core classes. They're all recognizable as being based on the core classes of the PHB, and a few are changed only in flavor, but most have minor to moderate mechanical changes as well.

Because we have alternate versions of all the core classes, there's no real discussion of how the core classes themselves would fit in. If you plan to portray outsiders to Khemti, in most cases it's pretty simple just to have the Khemtians treat them very much like their Khemtian equivalent (modified by the fact that they're foreigners, of course).

The roll of clerics and religion is discussed in detail.

Is the history of the country and the gods discusses?

Absolutely.

 

[Crothian]

What if any new creauters are there? Obviously mummies have a big egyptian feel, do you include them? And that of course also brings up the great pyramids, tomb raiders, curses, and the like. How are these addresses? Are their slaves or a type of caste system? Are laws and punishments described? Is it assumed to be a normal magic, high magic, low magic setting?

When Pramas posts a prevew of the setting, you should just have him link this thread. Hope the constant questions aren't annoying, as you can probably tell I'm really looking forward to this and my interest is high.

 

[Mouseferatu]

What if any new creauters are there? Obviously mummies have a big egyptian feel, do you include them? And that of course also brings up the great pyramids, tomb raiders, curses, and the like. How are these addresses? Are their slaves or a type of caste system? Are laws and punishments described? Is it assumed to be a normal magic, high magic, low magic setting?

When Pramas posts a prevew of the setting, you should just have him link this thread. Hope the constant questions aren't annoying, as you can probably tell I'm really looking forward to this and my interest is high.

Not annoying at all. I'm glad you're psyched.

Without going into too much detail--gotta leave some surprises for the books --we've got a range of new creatures. Some are brand new, some are inspired by Egyptian mythology. And some sound familiar by name, but are totally different than what you've seen before. (Let's just say that the Great Sphinxes of Khemti are nothing like the wimpy kitty-cats in the Monster Manual. )

Curses and tombs are discussed, as relates to the culture. So are social castes. I can't say for certain how much space is devoted to laws and punishment.

High or low magic? That's an interesting question. In terms of mechanics--treasure tables, that sort of thing--it's not changed from the norm. Culturally, however, Khemtians believe magic to be prevalent, and many wear protective charms or amulets that may or may not have any real power. The hand of the gods is seen in most of daily life, and most magic has at least something of a religious connotation. (The standard arcane/divine dichotomy has been replaced with something a tad more complex, and more appropriate in feel to the setting.)

 

[Angel Tarragon]

How easy will it be to use this with D20 Modern/Past (when it comes out) to [re]create adventures based off Boris Karloff/Arnold Vosloo?

 

[Crothian]

What is your favorite section of the book? What parts did you write? Anything besides adventures that you wanted in that didn't make it?

 

[Macbeth]

When will I get my copy?

Really, I think Crothian's covered most of it, but could you tell us if there are any more player races beyond that standard D&D races and the gnoll-like people from the preview?

 

[Akrasia]

It is very disappointing that there are no adventures in the campaign setting. :\

IMO I am far more likely to give a "different" FRPG setting a try if there are a few adventures included. Even if I don't use them myself, they can give the DM some good guidance on what s/he should be aiming at in terms of "character", "plot", etc.

I am sure that there were important design reasons for not including adventures, and I will still give it a look, but it is disappointing nonetheless. Especially in a box set!

Nice to hear about the map, though!

 

[Mouseferatu]

How easy will it be to use this with D20 Modern/Past (when it comes out) to [re]create adventures based off Boris Karloff/Arnold Vosloo?

Well, I'm one of about 8 people on these boards who isn't yet familiar with D20 Modern, so I can't say for certain. I'd imagine pretty easy, though. Again, all the flavor is portable to any system, and I can't imagine converting from "standard" D20 to D20 Modern can be too tough.

As far as Vosloo, just stick him in anywhere. You can never go wrong with Arnold Vosloo.

 

[Angel Tarragon]

I know. He makes a perfect villain or dark hero (Darkman 2).

Woot: 400th post!

 

[Mouseferatu]

What is your favorite section of the book? What parts did you write? Anything besides adventures that you wanted in that didn't make it?

Oooh... Not sure I can name a specific favorite part. I liked what we did with the sphinxes. I like the alternate classes/races. I like the cultural and magic info. I like the setting info. There is, frankly, not a part of the book that I worked on that I didn't like. (Sorry if that sounds like a cop-out.)

I can tell you that my favorite parts to write was the information on the Anpur (gnolls), the ghaffir core class (takes the place of the paladin, sort of), and the new monsters.

What did I write? Well, the Anpur, as I said. Several of the classes. Some new monsters, some new magic items, some new spells, some new PrCs. Some cultural info. A bunch of the city-states and other locations of Khemti. And a chapter on how the culture views magic, and how it impacts daily life.

What would I have liked to include other than an adventure? Well, more monsters and classes, for one.

There are other things that might have been interesting to do, but I can't honestly say I missed doing them, because including them would have taken us too far from our mandate--which was, as I said eariler, to keep this as D&D-compatible as possible without losing the Egyptian flavor. As it is, I think we struck pretty close to a perfect balance, so I'm happy with the decisions we made.