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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Cthulhudrew" data-source="post: 2117072" data-attributes="member: 4090">To expand upon Estlor's commentary here- the "Red Curse" (it hadn't been named as such yet) was primarily a "flavor" creation. It provided, in terms of game mechanics, an explanation for several cultural elements of the Savage Baronies region. The existence of the cinnabarl poison in the soil was responsible for the coloration of the skin of the natives (a coppery, reddish tone), as well as a rationale for the "savage" nature of the area- it diminished the Intelligence and Wisdom scores of those subject to the native peoples/creatures, and spurred them on to fight over the most valuable materials in the region (cinnabryl), which could counter the effects of the poison. IE, the region was "savage" because its people were less intelligent and more brutish, and warred over the native ore in the soil. The "drug use" aspect only came into play when the cinnabar was used in a non-natural way- to endow the user with supernatural powers (at the cost of Constitution). The "curse" itself was not presented as drug use at all. To me, that was the attraction of the original presentation of the Savage Coast materials- the lure of power, but with a high cost.The thing about the change that makes the least amount of sense to me was the apparent rationale behind it. TSR, by many reports, wanted to do away with the perception of drug use, so instead of having supernatural abilities granted by purposeful ingestion of essence of cinnabar, now everyone is still contaminated by the poison in the soil, but has to use cinnabryl in order to stave off its disfiguring effects. In essence, they got rid of the small number of drug users, and instead made everyone methadone addicts. Huh?Bruce Heard's work often (and to some, sadly) has a "tongue in cheek" edge to it, but the only parts of the original Princess Ark series that seemed to me to be less than serious were the aforementioned Cimmaron, with Duke John, and the "teenage ninja tortles" of a later episode. Most of the rest of it was serious, and compelling, even before the transition to Red Steel, IMO. The parts that weren't could easily be dispensed with.To be fair, everything you mention above (with the exception of the Inheritor orders) was present in the OD&D version, and in fact, came from same. The Inquisition nation of Navarre (I think that was it...) was one of the first of the Savage Baronies to be described, and an Oltec artifact was revealed to be the source of defense of one of the Guardianos nations in (IIRC) the second "Savage Baronies" article. The intrigue and wars were mentioned and even formed the backdrop of that same article (where Haldemar and crew are drawn into conspiracies of attempted murder). In any case, as Estlor points out, there isn't anything inherently worse or better than either version, it really just depends on what you want in your own campaigns. There are some differences- even some timeline glitches between the two versions that slipped past- but whichever of the two "Red Curse" types you go with in your campaign, I think having the entirety of the original articles and the Red Steel materials will provide you with an invaluable resource to running campaigns in the region that will serve much better than only owning one set of resources.</blockquote>

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