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Message: <blockquote data-quote="argo" data-source="post: 3294351" data-attributes="member: 5752">Bias disclosure: I have GM'd several Conan campaigns (I'm in the middle of running Slavelords of Cydonia with the Conan ruleset right now) and been a player in several others.  I don't own IH but thumbed through the IH rule book before deciding to adopt the Conan system as my game of choice. Take that for what its worth.I think that Conan fits this bill to order.  The basic assumption is that magic is scary-bad and unnatural and basic mechanics (corruption save) are included to reinforce this.  The mechanics are set low enough that a PC spellcaster could "walk the line" but it is easy enough for the GM to ratchet up the intensity or even ban PC spellcasters and declare all his sorcorers evil-insane with no problems.I will admit that stating up a NPC sorcorer in Conan takes about as long as stating up a DnD spellcaster (45 min or so) but since they are usually singluar villans I'm not too bothered by that.Well, on the one hand Mongoose put a lot of effort into making the Conan ruleset a faithful intrepretation of REH's stories.  So setting details permiate the entire ruleset.On the other hand... REH's Hyborian Age was already a patchwork of different historical cultures from pirates to red indians to zulu warriors to arabian nights to plate-armored knights.  So if you embrace the spirit or the origional tales you can do the same.However, I think I will give the nod here to IH which seemed to me to be fairly setting-neutral.I think Conan is the clear winner here.  I like tatictal combat and minatures, however IH's use of token pools and stunts seemed to take it to a level I was unwilling to go to.Combat in Conan is built on the basic 3.5 ruleset, however what the rules do is open up more "basic options" to everybody.  For example in Conan-everybody can finesse melee, no feat required-everybody can move-attack-move, no feat reqired-most fighting classes get TWF for free at first levelSo even a low level fighter can switch it up between sword 'n board, spring attack, TWF, ranged combat, THF and so forth as needed.  Tactics becomes a matter of sizing up the situation and your resources and adapting your abilities to the combat at hand.  This keeps things interesting without significantly increasing the rules-mastery reqired by the players (assuming they already know 3.5 combat).Also... combat in Conan is deadly.  THF are killing machines, sneak attack is often a one-hit kill and even the "lesser forms" are still plenty deadly.  Multiple opponents get bonuses to hit.  Hit points cap out at 10th level.  Getting caught flat-footed means having an AC of 10.  Bloodletting is fast and nasty. In the final analysis though, what really sold me on Conan over IH was that IH was (by admission) designed to run a DnD-style game without the christmas tree of magic items.  Conan feels to me to be more of a true Swords 'n Sorcery game where even a 20th level Barbarian would hesitate to face an army of mooks.  Just IMHO.Hope that helps.</blockquote>

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