[OT] Dangerous Journeys: Who's Played It?

[ColonelHardisson]

I own all the Dangerous Journeys books, but I've never played it. There are tons of good ideas in the books themselves, very inspirational and suitable for mining for other games, even 3e or d20.

However, the rules themselves are...well...let's say extremely detailed. I read through them when I first got the books, and have skimmed them since, but, to be honest, my brain capacity is simply not up to digesting all the info required to play. But that's just me.

I know some have played DJ, and I was wondering if any of them could tell us about their experiences with it. A good honest evaluation, please; I could see this turning into a DJ or 3e bashing thread and I really don't want that. What would be interesting is if an impartial person, or one who tries to be objective, could give us a good comparison/contrast of DJ and 3e.

No flame wars, please!

 

[Agamon]

Me, too, exactly, CH. I bought all the books, but I had enough trouble figuring out the rules, let alone teaching them to others. So while we made a few characters, we never did actually play.

I'm interested in hearing some opinions, as well.

 

[Dahak]

I played Mythus Prime (both the first section of the Mythus book itself, and later the nice standalone condensed book) a number of time, but the full DJ Mythus game was just a bit much for a college student (with other interests) to remember. Prime itself was rather nifty, though, and Lejendary Adventure looks like it's heir.

 

[Col_Pladoh]

Me, too, exactly, CH. I bought all the books, but I had enough trouble figuring out the rules, let alone teaching them to others. So while we made a few characters, we never did actually play.

I'm interested in hearing some opinions, as well.

When I wrote the DJ/MYTHUS material I had in mind an encyclopedic, skill-based rules set from which the individual Journey Master coule pick and choose what was wanted, what was to be left out of the campaign.

When I was rnning my own campaigns--one of the unpublished UNHALLOWED horror genre, and a MYTHUS game--for soe five years or so, I used almost all of the rules. It was easy, as the work fell mainly upon the players

However, when I came to developing a new skill-based system, the LEJENDARY ADVENTURE RPG, I opted for the reverse, "rules-lite" and skill bundles, so that mechanics and rules are minimal, and the Lejend Master decides what to add for detaling areas of play thought to need quantification.

My one regret abot the MYTHUS system is that it is so bloody hard to translate characters and creatures from it to any other system...

Gary

 

[Agamon]

When I was rnning my own campaigns--one of the unpublished UNHALLOWED horror genre, and a MYTHUS game--for soe five years or so, I used almost all of the rules. It was easy, as the work fell mainly upon the players

That's what I like to do, too, but they always expect me to teach them to play, which is tough on a GM that has a lot of other things to worry about starting a new campaign in a new game. That would be why I never have played a new RPG unless there was at least one other person in the group that had good knowledge of the rules.

My one regret abot the MYTHUS system is that it is so bloody hard to translate characters and creatures from it to any other system...

Though not impossible, apparently.

 

[mythusmage]

I Got to Overrule Col_Pladoh on His Own Game

I've played and run. Once played under Col_Pladoh, and ran a couple of games at conventions. The Col. is a devious bastard as a GM, BTW.

The sure mass of verbiage does have a way of hiding the trees in the forest. To put it in a nutshell:

Task Resolution: Roll percentiles. If the result is equal to or less than the persona's adjusted STEEP, success. If the result is greater than adjusted STEEP, failure

STEEP (Study, Training, Education, Experience, Practice): In a sense the persona becomes "steeped" in the knowledge or skill. (Never engage Gary in a pun war, unless you're ready for the long haul.) STEEP is a measure of how well the persona knows the subject. A STEEP of one indicates somebody who really doesn't know what he's doing, while a STEEP of 50 is a mark of somebody who's gotten pretty good at it.

Adjustments can be made either in favor of the persona, or against the persona. Sometimes they will be additions to, or subtractions from STEEP. Othertimes they are either multiplications or divisions of STEEP. Anything that lowers STEEP is bad. Anything that raises STEEP is good.

Everything uses this engine in DJ. All skills are simply applications of the system. However, thanks to a rushed writing job ("We want it yesterday!"), and a rushed editing job ("No, we want it the day before yesterday!"), things weren't as clear as they could be.

I was working on correcting those mistakes, but unfortunately a glitchy computer (which has all the files on it) put a stop to that. Click on Mythusmage.combelow. Clicking on the golden lion dragon will take you to the Welcome page. On that page you'll find a PayPal donation button. I'm on disability, I could use the help.

In any case, DJ is not for everybody. But for an adventurous fellow looking for a different game than DnD, it's worth looking at.

BTW, if you are in the San Diego area, and you'd like to try a Mythus adventure, drop me a line and we'll see about getting together.

 

[MancerBear]

I too, was one of those people who bought the game, read the rules, and decided it was just too damned complicated for my liking

I do have to say though, Mythus Earth (at least, I think that's what they called it) was cool. I like the idea of playing on alternate earths.

I no longer have any of the DJ books with me, as I sold them during a financialy hard time. I'm sorry I did, really. I would love to have them to base another campaign in, though it would be d20, of course.

 

[el-remmen]

I own the book and have not even been able to get rid of it on eBay. . .

I found it lacking any kind of inspiration at all and just kind of ponderous.

Anyone interested in taking it off my hands?

 

[ProfAnime]

Well, I have played it quite a few times, especially right around when it came out. I agree that it is difficult to get through the books, but the actual system is quite simple to use in play.

Mythusmage covered most of ithe rule system, though the only area where it got quite annoying was the rates at which various Heka-generating skills returned Heka to the character. Of course we just house ruled it to be that you got back a tenth of your heka for every hour of full rest. Worked well for us.

nemmerle- I would not mind possibly taking your copy of the game off your hands, what books do you have? send me an email and we can discuss price etc.

 

[Piratecat]

Meta note: this isn't OT! Nothing about gaming is, even if it isn't D&D.. Of course, if the subject hadn't featured the game's name in it you probably would have wanted to add that in brackets like [DJ], but otherwise you're fine.