[frogspawner]

Originally Posted by Triff

There's nothing wrong with the "gates" approach, but doesn't create much of a cooperative world, unless there's something to bind it all together. Then everyone would just work on their own projects, as we do now.

Ah, but we haven't published our own projects, and given other people permission to develop parts if they feel inspired (or have we?). I believe we would be inspired to add to other people's worlds, and I hope authors would be generally willing to accept such contributions. Then - Bingo! Co-operative worlds.

Originally Posted by Rurik

6. Wacky races.

Great list, Rurik. (Surely Dick Dastardly and Muttley would require a license, though? ) Seriously, I might add characters - like Rurik himself.

I'm not into gates per se, I agree if you want gates you can just put them in ANY worls to link to ANY OTHER world.

They'd be under GM control of course. No need to make 'em fixed gates: maybe spells or similar (like Corum?).

Originally Posted by RMS

I'm going with the basic premise that anyone who receives worship, gains power from that, so an emperor who receives worship from his subjects really does gain power in the world, and conversely can dispense that power to his worshippers how he sees fit. This is a two way street, so that if a minor god loses his worshippers he loses real power and potentially his divinity and can return to being mortal. Anyhow, I'm going off topic here, but if anyone has ideas on some reasonable way to model this I'd love to hear it.

OK. My take on this, to avoid the problem of having to have an exact current worshipper-count, is that souls who have become attuned to gods through worshipping them go to their version of heaven/hell when they die - where they act as a power-source for that god (until exhausted/reincarnated/whatever). Like Drohem's avatar! (An interesting side-effect of this might be, if a pogrom were carried out against a god's worshippers that god would actually become more powerful for a while - and so have more divine wrath available to exact retribution...

Originally Posted by soltakss

I like having different species, it adds flavour and a certain amount of exoticism...

Originally Posted by Atgxtg

I'm for human centric. I think you get better cultures that way.

Uh, oh - trouble already...

Originally Posted by Atgxtg

1. Each Author gets a good sized island...
2. Players can share landmassess...
3. Any big freaking powers need to be approved...
4. ...
...

Uh, oh - lots of rules already...

Who'd administer? Who'd arbitrate? Take it from someone who knows...

Originally Posted by lawrence.whitaker

I'd say one thing: embarking and a shared world is fun, but its heaps more work than you probably bank on.

That's why I say 'Gated Worlds': Authors do as they please, having final authority over any contributions; and GMs can easily avoid worlds they don't want to use. We'd avoid a lot of unnecessary work, and could get on with the real job... world creation.

Originally Posted by Rurik

RQ originally had Elves and Dwarves and Trolls and whatnot, and those were accessible to people coming over from other games. In fact the races evolved into Aldryami, Mostali, and Uz and became quite different from the norm. However, being able to say to someone new 'this is an elf' makes them accessible to a new player...
So I really don't mind elves, dwarves, and trolls - it is just important to set them apart from the standard to give them their own flavor. Even Orcs are OK by me - just not Hobbits or Halflings - screw them.

I agree. Someone on another thread was just saying how the wacky names in Tekumel made it unplayable for them!
How to make 'em different, though? I liked the Harn idea of insectoid Orcs spawned by a huge larva-like queen; Elves - should be soulless, dangerous child-stealers (but why? and how to role-play them?); Dwarves - selfish, sociopathic, more like trolls really; Trolls - like Norse giants (or Greek titans/legendary monsters, or Grendel?). And no Ducks.