Would You Buy This Game?

[Arnwyn]

No, I would not buy this book, and I am not interested - but *not* because "Dante sucks".

It's simply because I'm not interested in yet another campaign setting (what is it with d20 publishers and campaign settings? We can only game in so many!).

 

[kenjib]

Straight d20 using the standard D&D classes seems like an odd choice for this subject matter. I like the idea of RPGs taking a more literary bent, but I would have to take a real close look at this one before buying it. A simple grafting of Dante onto D&D could be kind of painful. I mean, druids, rangers, psionics, bards, clerics casting raise dead left and right...

It almost seems like an independent OGL game like Slaine or Wheel of Time would be more appropriate.

 

[Wayside]

I'd say no. The Commedia isn't really RPG material. Dante's damned suffer in ways tailored to their trangressions, and they have no real will to speak of. Once you're there you don't get to make decisions; you can't decide to go off adventuring. You're Hell's bitch. It just doesn't make sense to me to try to populate his vision with autonomous characters, when it's very much a static, clockwork kind of construction.

 

[talien]

I wouldn't buy it because I'm sick of Hell. I don't really use a lot of demons or devils or whatever in my games so I certainly wouldn't want to play in a game that was all about that. I'm not big on games based on politics either, unless the political aspect is just one part of the game, otherwise, politcal intrigue is not at all intriguing to me. Lastly, I as I have gotten older, I am more and more finding ANYTHING based on Hell or demons to be kind of juvenile. It's too "teehee I'm Evil!" for me. The product sounds only loosely based on the original works of Dante and that wouldn't be a draw for me either, as those were some dry boring reads I could never get through.

So, my vote would have been "No, I'm just not interested." Congrats on putting up yet another poll with skewed and limited options.

Hmm.

* Don't use a lot of demons or devils. Right, there goes my pitch, "it's like the Book of Vile Darkness." In other words, it would help you flesh out your bad guys. So scratch that.
* Politics. Well it IS hell. So yeah, it wouldn't be for you.
* Hell being juvenile. I'm glad you brought this up...

The nine planes of Hell that you see in the Manual of the Planes? Most of that is from Dante. Malebranche (that are missing now but were in the original monster manual)? From Dante. While Dante hardly can claim the Styx, he can certainly be credited for grouping the Styx with the other rivers (including Archeron and Phlegethon).

It's sort of like claiming the Bible is too religious. Dante, along with Milton, did a lot for the current perceptions of hell. It's hardly juvenile.

* Dante's a dry boring read. Tough to counter here. Obviously, the game takes dramatic license and turns many of the concepts on their ear. Instead of looking at Hell as a place where everybody goes to rot, it sees them as potential recruits. Sort of like putting prisoners to work. If you've got the best thieves, liars and magicians all in one place, wouldn't you want to do something useful with them?

* While I'm proud to join the long line of apparently skewed and limited surveys, this poll is definitely doing its job -- showing just how much interest and viability there is in producing this book. So thanks for your feedback, even if I didn't give you the option, "I really, REALLY don't like Hell."

 

[Alzrius]

I think the book, and the blurb posted for it, sounded great! I admit I've never read Dante's Inferno, but reading about that made me want to! Things like a new look at hell/the Abyss/fiends and such always makes me give something a second glance. While I'm ordinarily not too too big on new campaign settings, the "add it on top of any existing world" dispels most of the reservations I have about that. Also, the promise of so much new crunch, and a large flavor section, definately increases my interest level here.

I would definately make the book hardcover, since something with that much information is going to be thick, and with that many pages a hardcover works better. Also, the one bit of criticism I might want to offer is that you might want to think about picking up existing versions of creatures like succubi, erinyes, centaurs, etc. But that might not even be feasible, since the existing versions are "D&D-ized".

All in all, I feel the description definately warranted the "Yes, in hardcover" option I voted for. And of course, I've been damn impressed with your work thus far Talien (as you well know ). Here's hoping that we get scorched by the Inferno!

 

[talien]

OTOH, my games tend to run into more of a grey area in terms of alignment. It is hard to determine an NPCs motivations. Detect Alignment will only work on outsiders, creatures without free will and those strongly aligned with a power (i.e. very high level clerics). The kind of world you describe here doesn't seem to fit in well with the kind of game I like to run.

It's interesting. Once you've read Dante's Inferno, you start to understand that even though a sense of right and wrong thrust people into Hell, it doesn't mean THEY thought they belonged there.

One of the first things I'm going to do for the blurb on the back of the book, because while reference to the Divine is accurate, it's not actually that relevant to the book. As someone else said, there's plenty of opportunities to flesh out Purgatory and Heaven. Oooh, I so want to write those!

But anyway, imagine this:

* You die, and find out that there is some more powerful divine power that considers your world to be "pagan" and thrusts you into hell. This is Dis, where clerics of a million religions end up.
* Worse, your GOD gets tossed into hell too. See, he wasn't as important as he thought he was. Now he's in the first circle of Hell, Limbo. Maybe you want to visit him since you're burning in Dis.
* Or perhaps you're a druid and you didn't even know about any other supreme divine being. Well, we can't be too harsh on the druid, so he gets placed in Limbo where all his spells work. Not knowing the Divine Presence is punishment enough.

Dante's Inferno definitely doles out the punishments. But in the Abyss, we expand on those tropes. It's less political allegory and more a living, breathing universe. There's plenty of room for gray. Although there's not a lot of room for good guys, there's certainly enough issues with keeping law and order.

In a lot of ways, playing in the Abyss is like playing in a gigantic prison. Everyone knows they're there to be punished. They know they did wrong. They know they chose the wrong side. And now they're stuck with each other in Hell. But that doesn't make Hell black and white, nor does it make it boring. They're stuck in hell along with very different groups, each with their own affiliations and punishments. They continue to live wretched lives -- that's the point, right? If you're mindless and static, it's not much punishment.

I'm not sure where I'm going with this other than to say that I think the Abyss has great potential for moral angst.

 

[Joseph Elric Smith]

Of course I would buy it in hard bound if it was well edited. I love Dante.
ken

 

[Zappo]

I love Dante, and I know very well that he practically defined the western idea of hell, but I don't need Yet Another Campaign Setting, and neither do I need More Stuff About Hell.

 

[kenjib]

In a lot of ways, playing in the Abyss is like playing in a gigantic prison. Everyone knows they're there to be punished. They know they did wrong. They know they chose the wrong side. And now they're stuck with each other in Hell. But that doesn't make Hell black and white, nor does it make it boring. They're stuck in hell along with very different groups, each with their own affiliations and punishments. They continue to live wretched lives -- that's the point, right? If you're mindless and static, it's not much punishment.

I'm not sure where I'm going with this other than to say that I think the Abyss has great potential for moral angst.

Is it fun to play in a campaign where you are both narratively and morally required to be wretched all of the time?

 

[Gothmog]

I personally would LOVE to see this. I have the original Abyss game, and while it was good, the mechanics were a little clunky at times. Also, I would welcome the oppotunity for someone to detail Hell and its inhabitants more thoroughly. One thing I would really like to see is a move away from demons/devils as "big monster who attacks 6 times per round" combat machines, and more in their roles as tempters, corruptors, and manipulators. More detail on infernal politics, culture, mindset, and theology would be really cool. Demons and devils done properly can be the most horrifying creatures in a campaign, and I'd love to see someone take on the challenge of making them more than goofy "I'm EEEEVIL!!!!" guys.