Black Comnpany - Pros & Cons?

[Angel Tarragon]

I don't know much about the setting. Tell me all about it, whats good and whats bad.

 

[Teflon Billy]

I don't know much about the setting. Tell me all about it, whats good and whats bad.

The writing style is peculiar and takes some getting used to, but the setting and story are both compelling.

The story itself is Military Fantasy about a legendary mercenary unit that is in way over it's head.

The RPG supplement is excellent, nicely modeling the source material and presenting a pretty great "Rare Magic" ruleset for use in your own games.

If you can get it cheap during the GR sale you are getting a steal.

 

[Darklone]

Get it, read it, enjoy it, love it, play it.

 

[MarauderX]

Read it for the enjoyment. I wouldn't use too much out of it, especially the magic system. The numbers for the magic, while interesting, seem half-baked.

The setting itself follows closely with the books, but the rules that accompany them don't match too well.

 

[Particle_Man]

It is dirt cheap because of the Green Ronin sale.

It is grim and gritty, with no absolute alignment and lots of shades of grey. If you like that you should like this.

Oh, and it has a neat new magic system that you could port elsewhere.

 

[Rodrigo Istalindir]

The magic system is neat, but I suspect it would be hard to play at the table. It really requires advance preparation, which kind of flies in the face of the 'customize the spell to fit the situation' intent.

There are some nice rules for non-magic magic items, etc. If you liked the books, the setting material is very good (or, if you like the setting material, it's good motivation to read the books). The setting has powerful-but-rare magic; hedge wizards and dabblers probably aren't too uncommon, but real power takes time. Bad things happen to good people, and the overall outlook is a little bleak. It's probably halfway between your standard D&D and Midnight.

If I were going to run grim and gritty from a single source, I'd probably take Conan over Black Company, though.

 

[Twowolves]

The books are great, and the CS models the setting very well. It's not for beginners, though, especially the magic system.

Also, don't get too attached to the characters. In the books or the game!

 

[Angel Tarragon]

The books are great, and the CS models the setting very well. It's not for beginners, though, especially the magic system.

Also, don't get too attached to the characters. In the books or the game!

I'm pretty used to Grim Tales magic so.....

 

[Maester Luwin]

Hey Frukathka! You may have seen or heard of the magic system in Black Company as True Sorcery. Also by Green Ronin. I like Black Company. It follows the books fairly close. I love Grim Tales too. Thanks Maester Luwin

 

[Imperialus]

Like others have said, the magic system can be a bit of a nightmare. It looks really cool on paper when you read it but when you actually spend 20+ minutes trying to calculate assorted DC's, Drain, and Damage you'll start to regret playing a mage. It does speed up a bit after a while but it still takes an inordinate amount of time. We ended up winging it and making up DC's and whatnot on the spot after a while just eyeballing what seemed reasonable.