Morrowind as a campaign setting?

[Meadred]

Hello,
has anyone here done any work towards adapting the Morrowind/Daggerfall CRPG as a campaign setting? I recently started to play Morrowind (again), and it feels as if the whole setting is just begging to be "ported" to your favourite pen-and-paper RPG.

Cheers,
Meadred

 

[Sado]

Not for D20. I played around with a D6 version, still have it around here somewhere.

 

[Suldulin]

I made a homebrew some time ago, unfortunately I lost almost all of it since most of it was posted on another forum that went down and I didn't have any copies on my side

For the magic system though I definetely suggest using Elements of Magic Revised

 

[Meadred]

Thanks for the suggestion! As I don't have "Elements of Magic" (yet?!), what is the main reasoning for using that?

Also, to both Sado and Suldulin, did you try to convert the enormous amount of information regarding the setting into player handouts or something like that?

Cheers,
Meadred

 

[Dinkeldog]

Morrowind's magic system is mana based and skill based.

 

[Thebalor]

IIRC, the morrowind website says they made arena (the first MW game) based off of the campaign setting a couple of the developers were playing as. Really, the setting doesn't look all that bad to convert, the main problem is just the magic system. That could be wholly replaced if you believe it to be too much trouble, though you would probably want to include spells like soultrap and intervention. The enchanting magic items part of the game is actually pretty neat, though you'd have to make it more difficult so that people don't do as lots of people did and turn a set of clothing into armor of 100% sanctuary (immunity to physical attacks).

 

[Ry]

Would you try to have an overarching plot in the game? The main thing I'd see as problematic was the prophecy; it seems very much designed for one PC to start hogging the spotlight.

 

[Thebalor]

Would you try to have an overarching plot in the game? The main thing I'd see as problematic was the prophecy; it seems very much designed for one PC to start hogging the spotlight.

You needn't run the same story as the game. As a matter of fact, that would probably be ill-advised considering its popularity. There are vast swathes of Tamriel that are pretty much unexplored at this point, and given the fact that the Empire is on the brink of collapse, there is huge potential for adventure. Morrowind is just one of 6 Imperial districts.

Here is a useful resource: http://til.gamingsource.co.uk/ The Imperial Library. They have write-ups of pretty much every subject about The Elder Scrolls, and all the books and other texts from all the Elder Scrolls games.

 

[Sado]

You needn't run the same story as the game. As a matter of fact, that would probably be ill-advised considering its popularity. There are vast swathes of Tamriel that are pretty much unexplored at this point, and given the fact that the Empire is on the brink of collapse, there is huge potential for adventure.

Not to mention 3 other continents

Morrowind is just one of 6 Imperial districts.

I count 9: Cyrodiil, Skyrim, High Rock, Hammerfell, Black Marsh, Elsweyr, Sommerset Isle, Valenwood, and Morrowind.

Or are you not counting the three Elvish provinces?

 

[Sejs]

The enchanting magic items part of the game is actually pretty neat, though you'd have to make it more difficult so that people don't do as lots of people did and turn a set of clothing into armor of 100% sanctuary

Alchemy was far, FAR worse than Enchanting, heh.

Oh it was beautiful. Artful even. The system scales infinitly, you see. And a potions effectivness is based on both your Alchemy skill, and your Intelligence. And you could make Fortify Intelligence potions. Say your Int and Alchemy are both 100. Make 10 FI potions - say each one boosts your int by +10 for 180 seconds. Drink them all. Your int is now 200. Make 10 more FI potions - oh but these ones boost your int by +17 for 312 seconds.

Make some, drink them. Make some, drink them. Make some, drink them. So on and so forth. You'll get to the point where the FI potions you're turning out boost your int by +1500 or more and last for several hours. Then, once your intelligence is sufficient to shame most gods, go ahead and make some normal, lesser potions. Like levitate. You'll end up with something rediculous like Lev at power 50,000. If you're outdoors, moving even slightly in one direction will rocket you several map squares over, and then crash the game as it tries to load all the areas you went thru simultaneously. Fortify Speed? You will run thru walls. Literally. You will become too fast for collision detection to keep up with. So on and so forth.





Anyway - I love Morrowind to bits. I think it would make a wonderful game setting. I do, however, think that not every aspect of the game should be translated. Like the aformentioned abusable enchanting and alchemy systems. Other things, like the skill/mana based magic system would be quite doable, but would require a pretty major rework of d20 mechanics to pull off properly, such that the resulting offspring wouldn't really be d20 any more. It would be something else.