What's this about a plagiarized map in Conan: City of Shadizar?

[Carnifex]

Well I'm not scourger but I hope that you don't mind if I ask you a couple of questions about the Horned God. In the process of revising the Horned God has all the Slaine-specific material (e.g. names of characters, tribes, locations etc.) been retained or are Mongoose going for something more generically "celtic"? And do you know if the artwork from the comics is going to be used again?

I *believe*, but could be wrong about this, that the Slaine-specific material is being retained.

 

[Carnifex]

Here's my question as conciesly and directly as I can put it. Will I be able to run The Horned God as a core D&D campaign with players playing a barbarian, a bard, a druid, a fighter and a rogue without an emphasis on human sacrifice?

I believe that this is the kind of thing that the revision of the campaign is trying to achieve; I'm not sure what role the human sacrifice thing will have in the Horned God campaign but as the aim is, AFAIK, to make it fully 3.5 compatible, my guess is it will certainly not have much emphasis on it, at least for the Player Characters (I don't know whether the specific adventures feature it much as plot elements or suchlike).

Art-wise, I would imagine the art will be reused as it is still supposed to be 'Slaine'.

Again, I could be wrong about this as I'm not the guy dealing with the Horned God stuff

 

[InzeladunMaster]

To answer your question, though, I would like to have seen a streamlined combat system in the Conan RPG, one that captured the frenetic pace of the fictional battles, in which Conan and his companions cleaved through platoons of disposable minions en route to the evil demon/sorcerer/whatever. .

Thank you for your well-thought out response. You might be interested in Conan: Pirate Isles or Conan: The Free Companies, then. Both have narrative combat systems that would be in line with what you are mentioning.

I would also like to have seen sample NPCs (major and minor)

All of the supplements do this. Conan: Across the Thunder River and Conan: Shadizar have a plethora of such NPCs, but all the supplements have them. Did GURPS Conan present a lot of NPCs?

an even more restricted magic system than was presented (sorcerers in the literature were exceedingly rare, extremely powerful, and usually quite solitary -- a case could be made for disallowing magic to PCs altogether),

Individual GMs can do this as desired. Many of the pastiches have DnD style sorcerers running around with Conan (Steve Perry's Corinthian Squares come to mind), so the magic system is flexible. Both types of game can be run. It is up to the Games Master to present the appropriate atmosphere for his campaign. (I wonder why so many people seem to want rules for something the Games Master should take responsibility for.) There is a section in Conan: The Scrolls of Skelos that discusses the magical atmosphere. All the spells in the core rules are present in the Howard short stories, though. The spells are not DnD conversions by any means.

more extrapolated background material (I've seen the Howard essay already, thanks), an accurate map

Both present in the supplements. Not everyone has seen the Howard essay, though. I think its inclusion is appropriate.

fewer instances of obvious cut-and-paste from the SRD, and a mass-combat system (in the core book, where it belonged, not as a doh-woopsy web enhancement).

I actually prefer the narrative systems of mass combat presented in Conan: Pirate Isles and Conan: The Free Companies.

They'd have to churn out a real gem to get me to change my mind, and so far I've heard nothing to indicate that they have.

If you have a chance, and do not mind, check out Conan: Across the Thunder River.

I feel that GURPS Conan provided a broader base for adventuring, perhaps because it drew on the pastiches as well as the original stories, which increased the available background material. Yes, the non-Howard stories themselves were stylistically inferior, but they fleshed out whole sections of the Hyborian world for which little or no information was previously available. (When writing serial fiction, it's okay to leave big chunks of the setting undefined, but not so in an RPG.)

Conan: The Road of Kings and Conan: Shadizar draw upon pastiche sources, both the Tor series and the comics.

The GURPS version also presented magic as much more esoteric and rare than the OGL version, IMO, which seemed to be trying for a compromise between its D&D (high-magic) heritage and the subject matter. The GURPS combat rules were too involved, but it would have served OGL Conan to move away from that example, not toward it.

I will have to see what GURPS did with magic, then. As it stands, my players avoid Conan the Roleplaying Game magic because of its corruptive effects and the generally nasty way it is presented. Again, a Games Master's choices can make all the difference here.

Thank you so much for your answers. You have given me some things to think about as I continue the series.

Vincent N. Darlage

 

[scourger]

And here you see the classic "can't please everyone" problem. One person will complain that your D20 game was too D&D-like while another will say that it wasn't D&D-like enough.

The funny thing is that many of them - not necessarily the ones I've quoted above - will insist that the game is totally flawed due to it being too D&D / not enough D&D and that the company concerned are fools who've completely misread the market for releasing it as such - apparently oblivious to the fact that there are other people arguing the exact opposite way.

(Similarly, if you do an OGL game people will complain about it duplicating the Players Handbook they already own, while if you go down the D20 route, people who don't already own a Players Handbook will complain about having to buy it).

All true. One gamer's trash is another gamer's treasure. For this particular item, I'm looking for something generic enough to allow me to run it my way, which may or may not be what others seek. I believe the way to launch a successful product is to make it generic enough to keep it portable but specific enough to differentiate it--a very difficult mix to quantify. But, generic & portable doesn't necessarily help develop a niche market, either; which is a goal probably better served by making things game-specific. I am glad to see that The Horned God will be redone to make it more generic & portable (and the more Slaine-specific material is still out there, too). Looks like a win-win for Mongoose.

 

[scourger]

I *believe*, but could be wrong about this, that the Slaine-specific material is being retained.

Sounds good. The setting did present a lot of flavor that was nice.

 

[scourger]

I believe that this is the kind of thing that the revision of the campaign is trying to achieve; I'm not sure what role the human sacrifice thing will have in the Horned God campaign but as the aim is, AFAIK, to make it fully 3.5 compatible, my guess is it will certainly not have much emphasis on it, at least for the Player Characters (I don't know whether the specific adventures feature it much as plot elements or suchlike).

Art-wise, I would imagine the art will be reused as it is still supposed to be 'Slaine'.

Again, I could be wrong about this as I'm not the guy dealing with the Horned God stuff

Sounds very good, and I appreciate the unofficial word. The module will be worth a look to me based on the premise of 3.5 compatability. Plot elements are okay, I just don't want sacrifice as a feature of the game with everyone scrambling for it. Keeping the art probably only adds to the depth of the adventure, but I am judging the preceding books by their covers.

 

[johnsemlak]

Originally Posted by Crothian
If you guys are done, we can get back to the topic on hand.

Other mongoose books that have been real good are the Book of. I've only seen Book of planes and book ofstronholds but both were good quality works. Book of planes has some great ideas and simpole mechancis that really add a lot. I was impressed with that one.

Has anyone checked out the Book of Hell, in the classic play line. I've been intruged by this one, but the Book of the Planes and Book of Immortals seem to get a lot more interest.

 

[Sam Witt]

I think it would be fair to say that the Quintessential Psion is dark in places.
Its probably more far to day that the Quintessential Psychic Warrior is the product of a disturbed mind. (Psionic cannibalism in particular)

Disturbed? Darn. I was shooting for depraved. I'll try harder next time.

Sam

 

[Arcane Runes Press]

Disturbed? Darn. I was shooting for depraved. I'll try harder next time.

Sam

Well, when they asked me to expand Chaos Mage into a Quintessential book, your writing made me feel soiled - also I drank heavily, and questioned my sexuality, but that might have just been a phase.

Patrick Y.

 

[Man-thing]

Has anyone checked out the Book of Hell, in the classic play line. I've been intruged by this one, but the Book of the Planes and Book of Immortals seem to get a lot more interest.

Ah the Book of Hell, its coming was first prophecised in the Book of Planes and before long it had arrived on store shelves dwarfing previous works.

In brief:

The Book of Hell takes the plane of Infernum and expands it into a 256 page sourcebook/setting.
(rough break down)

40 pages of how to go to hell and what hell is like
20 pages of new hell spawned creatures
40 pages on the Houses of Power and their membership as well as the four princes
20 pages of new demons and devil types

[[ Remembering that in the Manual of the Planes there is only one hell where both Demons and Devils exist. There is no blood war so Demons and Devils could co-operate to further their own agendas]]

Demon Bikers (Biomechanical tech), Laws of Hell, Corruption, Demon pacts, magic, hell specific technology, Hell broth's (How many damned does it take to make a phial of Strain), Transmorgrification and hellish mutations.

Its a very fun read. There is a ton of stuff in there to make a character's trip to Infernum a memorable experience.

That said...

Rumour has it...

That next month "Infernum" is launching. Its written by Gareth Hanrahan and will empower players to play Demons in hell, collecting and torturing souls and trying to seize power and eventually the infernal throne. (Its on my 2005 must have)