NOW LIVE! Today's the day you meet your new best friend. You don’t have to leave Wolfy behind... In 'Pets & Sidekicks' your companions level up with you!

Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="Phaeryx" data-source="post: 3948508" data-attributes="member: 55763">I've got this.  I also have all of the older Talislanta books.  I wouldn't recommend running a Talislanta campaign without some of the older sourcebooks.  It's a brilliant setting, but the D20 book is poorly put together.  True, Talislanta has never been about racial balance, but the bigger problem with the D20 version is that it entirely ditches the 3.5 magic system for it's own poorly thought out system.  The older editions of Talislanta actually had lists of spells to choose from, making things alot easier.  3rd edition had mechanics for creating new spells as well.  The D20 version follows the 4th (Tal) edition in that there is no spell list and spell creation is entirely intuitive/creative.  A nice idea, but lazily done.  There's no follow-through.  You get no example or sample spells.  NPC creation is a homework nightmare.  It's not worth it.I'd like to run Tal D20 using 3.5 magic rules but they don't jibe well with the flavor of Talislantan magic, the way it's forms are divided into different orders, which don't conform to the schools of D&D magic.  The magical orders in Talislantan magic didn't exist in the first two editions, but it was an innovation that fit in well with the cultures established in the setting, and that's the good stuff.One solution I had in mind was to use the magic system from Thieves' World, which better conforms to the Talislantan practice of magic but preserves the list of existing spells from D&D.  You could go through the existing D&D spell list and arbitrarily divide them into the Talislantan orders, so that only certain cultures, or practitioners of certain orders, would know or have access to the spells associated with them.  Thus, a mage who, because of his race or background, had access to spells of the Sorcery order (which would be a broad list containing the most generic spells) could learn Geomancy spells (stuff with the earth descriptor, etc,) by finding a Gnomekin or someone familiar with Geomantic spells to teach him.  You would have to do away with the distinction between arcane and divine magic for this to work.  And there are alot of spells, so it would be alot of work categorizing them.The Thieves' World casting system would support a system in which there was no distinction between arcane and divine spells, while maintaining spellcaster classes (the Mage and the Priest) who have distinct focuses for casting spells-- one focuses more on ritual casting, for example-- but they could be made to share a master spell list (if they don't already, I can't remember).Game mechanics were never the strength of Talislanta, though.  The cultures and history of the setting are amazing, and the names of peoples and places are as evocative as the artwork featured in the older books, but the info in the D20 book just scratches the surface.  Most of the older setting supplements, like the Cyclopedia series, are still available online through 3rd party sellers on Amazon, etc.</blockquote>

Verification