Holy Crap Game Books (re: the Ptolus book)

[Mercurius]

I recently purchased a used copy of Ptolus: City by the Spire mega-manual and...holy crap. This is a game book. There is really nothing else like it. There are some great game products out there, chock-full of stuff, but this...wow. I know, I know - I'm about a decade late on this, but let me share the moment. I'll never run it, but it provides a ton of inspiration and endless bathroom reading.

(Best of all, I only spent 55 $heckles on it!)

Any other Holy Crap Books out there? Anything comparable? The new Glorantha books seem to perhaps out-do Ptolus.

 

[delericho]

Possibly "Castle Whiterock"? A boxed megadungeon, ranging from 1st to 15th level; it's a big one. I particularly like the way it's split into four colour-coded books, with Red, Blue, Green, and Black covers - very old school.

 

[Dioltach]

I'm quite impressed by Numenera. Not as thick as Ptolus, perhaps, but just as beautifully produced.

 

[NineLizards]

At the time I considered buying it (probably should have done) but didn't.

Life got in the way, and this thing was expensive... Even getting it printed today, with one of the online printing services, it still ain't cheap.

But... I did buy the .PDF versions, and enjoyed them immensely. So much that I decided to print a copy and get it properly bound. A couple of years ago I printed (most of) the pages, only to stack them in a box and put them in the attack, busy with other things.

One more project to accumulated dust.

Until today...





Hardcover, rubber glued linen spines. Sorry, no leather on the outside This hobby is already expensive enough

There are a few differences with the original Ptolus book:

• I used the .PDF versions which sometimes have 'double' page numbers
• I've added relevant information (read: pages) from Secret of the Delvers Guild and some other online resources, then sorted / inserted them in appropriate places
• Parts of the Ptolus Sketchbooks were added, again as close as possible to the references in the original Ptolus book
• I added some colored paper to separate sections (normally I wouldn't do that because it would all look better on the same kind of paper, but as these were printed over time, on different printers, on different paper, it doesn't bother me too much)
• I used and rebuild the 'extended index', used the 'extended table of conents', and added some custom backpages
• As it's pretty strong, but not as strong as the original Ptolus book I split the contents over three books
• I combined Night of Dissolution and Secrets of the Delvers' Guild into a fourth volume

It's just fun to just leave through these pages... I guess, deep down in my heart, I'm still a tourist...







Happiness is just a hardcover, I guess...

 

[darjr]

City of Brass

 

[Mistwell]

I recently purchased a used copy of Ptolus: City by the Spire mega-manual and...holy crap. This is a game book. There is really nothing else like it. There are some great game products out there, chock-full of stuff, but this...wow. I know, I know - I'm about a decade late on this, but let me share the moment. I'll never run it, but it provides a ton of inspiration and endless bathroom reading.

(Best of all, I only spent 55 $heckles on it!)

Any other Holy Crap Books out there? Anything comparable? The new Glorantha books seem to perhaps out-do Ptolus.

I liked Ptolus too. Is it for Pathfinder though? I thought it was 3e?

 

[darjr]

It started as the playtest campaign for 3e. It was released for one of the 3s. 3.5 I think. It came from him after he left wizards

 

[Nebulous]

I bought the Ptolus book too years back. It's quite a tome, chock full of some really interesting stuff, but I never used it and never would most likely. I think I wanted it just for the sake of having it on my shelf. It's a damn good looking game book.

 

[Mistwell]

It started as the playtest campaign for 3e. It was released for one of the 3s. 3.5 I think. It came from him after he left wizards

My point is, why is it in this forum as it's not Pathfinder or Starfinder, as far as I know?

 

[Celebrim]

I recently purchased a used copy of Ptolus: City by the Spire mega-manual and...holy crap

Ptolus in my opinion is what an average homebrew campaign sourcebook would look like, if the average homebrew DM actually took careful notes and took the time to work them into a publishable state and had the writing chops to manage that.

My guess is that collectively we are turning out 100's or 1000's of Ptolus books a year that no one will ever read, and will get lost on 3.5 floppies, or thrown into rubbish bins when in the process of moving.

I'm sure that there is a whole wing of Morpheus library devoted to homebrew settings.