Hyboria - More of the same?

[grodog]

I think that one of the items that makes the Hyborian World stick out in comparison to other fantasy worlds in general, is that Howard published a 10,000-ish word essay entitled "The Hypborian Age" which details the history of Conan's (and Kull's) world. That essay states:

When I began writing the Conan stories a few years ago, I prepared this "history" of his age and the peoples of that age, in order to lend him and his sagas a greater apsect of realness. And I found that by adhering to the "facts" and spirit of that history, in writing the stories, it was easier to visualize (and therefore to present) him as a real flesh-and-blood character rather than a ready-made product.

I think that the effort that Howard put into the Hypborian Age, in order to keep it consistent with his future writings and stories, lends a lot of credence and respect among F&SF fans to both the Hyborian world itself, as well as to the fictions that people it. Few other writers have provided their readers with a baseline "setting bible" as part of the fictional experience (Tolkien's Silmarillion certainly comes to mind), and I think that Howard's efforts to do so certainly help lend his setting some additional verisimilitude.

 

[kenjib]

Yeah, I don't think it would be very interesting at all if you haven't read and enjoyed the books. As another example, I don't want to bother with Robert Jordan so I'm certainly not interested in the Wheel of Time RPG setting material at all.

I think that worlds based on literature are going to be more dependent on appreciation of the literature because worlds made for gaming are made with the game in mind from the ground up, so they have a much different focus (or at least they really should).

EDIT: That said, you're lucky if you want to start reading Robert Howard because a collecton of his unedited and unaltered works is starting to be released (one book has come out so far). Until now it was really hard to get anything other than really bastardized, posthumously co-authored (talk about editor ego problems!!!), of his stuff.

 

[trancejeremy]

I would say that the Mongoose Conan RPG does a poor job of conveying Hyboria.

I was similarly unimpressed, until I just picked up "The Coming of Conan the Cimmerian", which Howard's original stories. They're wonderful.

Granted, it's not the most logical place in the world. But it does have a certain magic, as Howard used bits and pieces of legend along with real world cultures. It's exotic yet familiar at the same time.

 

[Turjan]

I think that worlds based on literature are going to be more dependent on appreciation of the literature because worlds made for gaming are made with the game in mind from the ground up, so they have a much different focus (or at least they really should).

That's exactly the point why I'm really hesitant when it comes to RPG's based on literature. Good literature has deep and interesting main characters, and the world is not much more than a bit of stage decor around them. On the other hand, in a good setting, the author has to provide a functioning, live and diverse world that makes you want to play there with different kinds of self-created characters. Most of the time, these two points of view are mutually exclusive, and at the moment, I don't intend to try the Conan RPG.

 

[Kichwas]

From a world design POV Hyboria suffers froma lot of problems that I've often used to attack other worlds.


That said, Howard was not exactly all that old when he wrote this material, younger than many of us here on these forums.

He also wrote it in a time when the white world had a very racist imperially driven view of the world - and in that regard it is almost amazing in how it does not automatically declare anyone with darker than Anglo skin evil, stupid or worse (Read Tarzan for a comparrision here - an amazingly racist work).

Hyboria is a simpler world, but it's better than it could have been given what the people of the time it was written knew and assumed about the world and humanity.

Today, I wince everytime I look at the map and see that desert in there, but I can accept it as a product of it's time. Likewise I can actually be glad that while the races fill stereotypes Howard did not seem to portray them so horridly as many of his contemporaries did.

 

[Emirikol]

The Hype is about the fact that Conan is finally being done as an element that can be kept on a gamer's shelf with pride.

Hey..it's a hell of a lot better than the house rules I had to put together to play using the D&D system

I still can't believe that they bought all of the rights and only used the REH stuff to create an entirely new pastiche >

I'm a proud owner of the book and will buy the 2nd printing when it comes out too.

jh

 

[Krieg]

Am the only one who think that Howard would be quite bemused to hear himself referred to as an "academic"?

Snoweel, given REH's background I believe you would be quite surprised to find that you and he have quite a bit in common.


On a very different note...Arcady, while you may this to be a shock, not everyone who lived in the early part of the 20th century was a racist bigot. As in every age/societ there were folks who were quite capable of not passing judgement on an entire society.

(Edit: I don't want that to sound like I'm attacking Arcady, it just bugs me when sweeping generalizations are made in an attempt to point out the sweeping generalizations made by others. Just a pet peeve of mine.)


Back on topic, everyone has done an excellent job of pointing out why Hyboria is the way that it is. In many ways Howard was limited by the medium in which he told his stories & had to find ways to to maximize it's ability to convey an image. He did this by tying real-world concepts/names to his world's locations to make it easier for the reader to visualize and connect with them using a limited amount of space.

 

[rounser]

I'd recommend considering the Wilderlands as an alternative to Hyboria. It's got the same pulpy feel and is specifically made for D&D. A conan-analogue (like Blackmoor's Marfeldt the Barbarian) would feel right at home.

www.judgesguild.com

 

[S'mon]

I think Hyborea is about mood and language, it's about the peoples - dark-eyed Hyrkanian riders, hawk-faced Stygians, Aquilonian knights in jet and gold...

The world exists as backdrop to the characters, it is not an exercise in world-building in the Tolkienesque sense that most fantasy gamers are accustomed to and seem to expect.

It notably didn't suffer from many of the modern cliches of world-creation based on a pseudo-medieval setting, although pastiche writers have tended to harm the unique flavour - the green jungles of Khitai are _not_ Imperial China, for instance, no matter what the pastiches or the rather lamentable Mongoose map would have you believe. Aquilonia is not France, neither is it Rome or Byzantium. Zingara is not late-medieval Spain; Howard's lands draw elements from the real-world but are not imitiations and should not be treated as such. The importance of the setting is in the mood & feel of the place, which is a million miles from the sub-Tolkienesque world we expect to see.
Even having most the western continental coast a barbarian wilderness and the great kingdoms of the age largely land-locked is something I don't think I've seen in any modern world setting.

 

[Wulf Ratbane]

Just because the Beatles were first doesn't stop me from seeing them as 'just another boy-band' for example...

You've got to be kidding me.

Hopeless.


Wulf