What monsters would you like to see ?

[Nightshade]

Originally Posted by drohem

Well, there's nothing new under the sun so I can look past the superficial similiarities.

It just means that advertising slogan comes across too much as "Well, nothing we _call_ elves." Since some of those differ less from stereotypical elves (the Cymrillians in particular come across as little different at all from the more morally neutral versions of high elf types you see) than some types in other games _called_ elves, it comes across as a bit arch.

[drohem]

Eh...I had no problem with it. The slogan and awsome art by P.D. Breeding is what initially attracted me to Talislanta. Also, I found the system innovative and a welcome change from the 'normal' class-and-level systems of the time.

[TRose]

Well for the monster in the first book, I think it should include a good numbers of monsters a starting player can fight and have a chance to win . Things like the old rubble runners, skeletons , weapon snakes and the like. I like dinosaurs too, but to even a group of rune levels a dinosaurs is a very tough match. 6 Runelords+1 Tyrannosaurus-Rex= 1 well fed Tyrannosaurus-Rex.
Might add I have always liked Giant insects and other similar creatures. Nice thing is you can use them in almost any setting . Or any strength level of your players. you can set your new players to fight a foraging party of worker ants and your more experience against a hive full of soldier ants.

[Atgxtg]

For starters just wanted to say that I do agree with most of you post here, just to show that we do agree some of the time.

Originally Posted by Nightshade

Yeah, that advertising campaign always made me roll my eyes a bit. They tried to make their societies different, but in the end, they didn't strike me as significantly different than the high elves/wood elves model.

Tell me about it. Good artwork. I even met the artist once. But coming up with lots of variants of elves, dwarves, whatever is easy-especially in such a simple system.

Originally Posted by Nightshade

I understand your attitude, but like I said, sometimes that part just doesn't matter to people that much; they want something vaguely like typical high elves for some background reason, so why bother to spend time thinking about the details when the extent will do?

Its always a good idea to remember that for some GMs worldbuilding is not that fun; its often a chore.

Oh, I agree that it doesn't matter to some people, and I think having some sterotypical fantasy write ups ala Magic World makes sense if BRP is going to be a generic RPG.

But, while some don't care, and some GMs don't enjoy world building, some do. If they don't spend some time working out the details, then they will lose those customers who do care about that stuff. Considering the nature of past BRP products, the fanbase for BRP is probably more into the caring department.

I think some detailed non-generic races would be nice, and wouldn't hurt those who don't care about races or worldbuilding. Giving GMs some new races that they may or may not use doesn't force them to world build. More like the opposite. Right now, BRP has nothing out, so any GM is forced to either start worldbuilding, or buy a setting and convert.

Given the nature of BRP in the past, and that there are going to be many setting books, I would except and probably prefer that most non-humans races be written up in said setting books. For instance, I could see satrys and nymphs being written up for an Ancienct Greek sourcebook, but not necessarily being in the core book, or in a generic bestiary. I could see Dragons being universal though, since most cultures (historical or fantasy) seem to have them. We could have both Celtic and Norse Elves (Tuatha de Daann and Alfar) written up for their repsective settings.

I just don't want to see BRP turn into yet another LoTR clone. Lots of other RPGs do that already, and one more isn't going to make a big splash. Besides the BRP rules aren't geared toward "high fantasy" anyway. I think it's better suited towards historical or mythicic historical settings or "dark & gritty" fantasy worlds.

Originally Posted by Nightshade

while not quite fitting that, DarkSun actually had rather different takes on many of the races than was typical as I recall.

Yeah, I got to play DarkSun once. It was quite a bit different than the typical D&D campaign.

Originally Posted by Nightshade

On the other hand, people use Gloranthan style non-humans in a lot of theoretically original RQ worlds for much the same reason; the work is already done for them. I've even seen people import Gloranthan religions for that reason; it saved them the trouble of working out a cult, even though the context often seemed odd without Gloranthan backhistory.

I think that was partially due to a lack of options. If all you owned was RQ, and you wanted to run some sort of elf, all you had were the RQ3 elf stats. Considering just how xenophobic most RQ cultures are, including the non-human ones (more like ESPECIALLY the non-human ones) it's no surprise that non-humans didn't get a lot of detail in many original RQ settings. I think CoC's Deep Ones probably made the top 5 list for "friendly to humans" in BRP! Race relations in RQ were not nearly as good as in most RPGs.

[NickMiddleton]

Originally Posted by Atgxtg

Yeah, I got to play DarkSun once. It was quite a bit different than the typical D&D campaign.

If I had enough money, and a wand of "nullify idiocy by IP owner" Dark Sun is one of the currently fallow settings I'd have redone for BRP...

I still may try and do a version of it once the books out actually.

Cheers,

Nick Middleton

[Nightshade]

Originally Posted by Atgxtg

Oh, I agree that it doesn't matter to some people, and I think having some sterotypical fantasy write ups ala Magic World makes sense if BRP is going to be a generic RPG.

That was all I was saying really; the reason you see quite so many vanilla offerings is that for many people they simply make it easier to use the material.

I think some detailed non-generic races would be nice, and wouldn't hurt those who don't care about races or worldbuilding. Giving GMs some new races that they may or may not use doesn't force them to world build. More like the opposite. Right now, BRP has nothing out, so any GM is forced to either start worldbuilding, or buy a setting and convert.

Quite true. I'm just not sure that the more specific you make a race, the less overall utility it has. A generic, troll-like race is applicable to a lot of worlds; if you elaborate them to the degree of the Uz, you start running into some corners that can catch on things.

I just don't want to see BRP turn into yet another LoTR clone. Lots of other RPGs do that already, and one more isn't going to make a big splash. Besides the BRP rules aren't geared toward "high fantasy" anyway. I think it's better suited towards historical or mythicic historical settings or "dark & gritty" fantasy worlds.

I largely agree, as you may gather from comments I've made elsewhere. When I'm thinking of high fantasy, I don't tend to look to RQ.

I think that was partially due to a lack of options. If all you owned was RQ, and you wanted to run some sort of elf, all you had were the RQ3 elf stats. Considering just how xenophobic most RQ cultures are, including the non-human ones (more like ESPECIALLY the non-human ones) it's no surprise that non-humans didn't get a lot of detail in many original RQ settings. I think CoC's Deep Ones probably made the top 5 list for "friendly to humans" in BRP! Race relations in RQ were not nearly as good as in most RPGs.

Well, if there's a dominant theme in Glorantha, its mythic conflict; it just happens to be that that conflict is _particularly_ pronounced with nonhumans (and they get along _fabulously_ with humans compared to how most of them get along with each other).

[Atgxtg]

Originally Posted by NickMiddleton

If I had enough money, and a wand of "nullify idiocy by IP owner" Dark Sun is one of the currently fallow settings I'd have redone for BRP...

I still may try and do a version of it once the books out actually.

Cheers,

Nick Middleton

Hey, get the economy size wand. There are a lot of good RPG products that WotC killed when they dropped all lies to support d20. Quite a few of them products made by rival companies that ended up in the hands of TSR. Just zapping Hasbro would probably free up the majority of "orphan" RPGs and wargames.

[Atgxtg]

Originally Posted by Nightshade

Quite true. I'm just not sure that the more specific you make a race, the less overall utility it has. A generic, troll-like race is applicable to a lot of worlds; if you elaborate them to the degree of the Uz, you start running into some corners that can catch on things.

Maybe. But on the other hand a bland generic race might be applicable to a lot of worlds, but such worlds all seem the same. It's just as easy not to use bland stuff at all. If they must make a "generic" version of a species, I'd rather they stay true to the historical sources than to LotR. This would also make them a bit more generic, since historical menaces are more less well defined that the typical generic monster. The distinction between elf, dwarf and troll is fairly non-existent in most cultures. Dwarves ARE Elves.

Originally Posted by Nightshade

Well, if there's a dominant theme in Glorantha, its mythic conflict; it just happens to be that that conflict is _particularly_ pronounced with nonhumans (and they get along _fabulously_ with humans compared to how most of them get along with each other).

LOL! Yeah, the non-humans seem to have completely contradictory ideologies, whereas human ideologies generally only partially conflict with those of the non-humans. The exception being the Dragonewts, who seem to "weird-out" everybody else equally. Probably the fact they Dragonewts are virtually immortal and can eventually evolve into Dragons probably is enough to keep everyone else at arms distance, AND prevents them from topping anyone's "racial animosity list". Either thant, or said racial enemy got wiped out/eaten long ago.

[drohem]

I'll jump on that bandwagon. I really like the Dark Sun campaign setting as well. Wild and ferral halflings? Heck ya! Also, it was the first AD&D campaign to really make use of psionics (of which, I am a fan), and it pioneered the concept of creating characters above 1st level (characters started at 3rd level due to harsh nature of world).

[Nightshade]

Originally Posted by Atgxtg

Maybe. But on the other hand a bland generic race might be applicable to a lot of worlds, but such worlds all seem the same. It's

That only matters to an end user if he sees those other worlds; if he only ever sees two local games, a bit of similarity is unlikely to be considered a great evil by most people.

just as easy not to use bland stuff at all. If they must make a "generic" version of a species, I'd rather they stay true to the historical sources than to LotR. This would also make them a bit more generic, since historical menaces are more less well defined that the typical generic monster. The distinction between elf, dwarf and troll is fairly non-existent in most cultures. Dwarves ARE Elves.

Well, they're all flavors of faerie folk, but I wouldn't say that makes them the same; even svartalven were quite a bit different from the regular Norse elves.

LOL! Yeah, the non-humans seem to have completely contradictory ideologies, whereas human ideologies generally only partially conflict with those of the non-humans. The exception being the Dragonewts, who seem to "weird-out" everybody else equally. Probably the fact they Dragonewts are virtually immortal and can eventually evolve into Dragons probably is enough to keep everyone else at arms distance, AND prevents them from topping anyone's "racial animosity list". Either thant, or said racial enemy got wiped out/eaten long ago.

Well, the fact they're pretty much detached from it all doesn't hurt; its not clear if Dragonewts really have any real purpose in the world, unlike other Gloranthan nonhumans who usually have an agenda of some sort.