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Noble Knight has a copy of the Worlds of Wonder set


Brimgeth

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1982.

Frankly speaking, while Worlds of Wonder was groundbreaking in 1982, it has very little to recommend it in 2014.

Worlds of Wonder has a very minimal ruleset comprised of the old 16 page BRP booklet, and similar sized booklets for fantasy, superhero and sci-fir campaigns. While a novel concept in 1982, and the first real expansion of the RQ/BRP game system beyond fantasy, pretty much everything in it has been superseded by newer, better supplements that are better fleshed out, with more complete and functional rulesets. The BRP core rulebook, for instance, pretty much covers everything in WoW and more.

Heck, if your just curious about it, try googling Worlds of Wonder and you will probably find quite a bit about (or all of) it on-line.

Chaos stalks my world, but she's a big girl and can take of herself.

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No ships. It had gate travel (like stargate) but included a setting, character creation, some aliens and robots, a scenario. Some of it was used in the monograph Outpost 19. I like old RPG's in boxes, so I think it's cool. But yeah not much too it and not for that price. I got WoW for $50 a couple years ago. I think I did get it from Noble Knight, can't remember.

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I'm interested in the sci-fi aspect of the set, myself. Are there any details what was included for a sci fi campaign? starships? robots? power armour and bolt guns?

The Future World booklet setting mainly used Gates (transporters between planets more-or-less) to move from planet to planet. No stats for starships. Robots were covered well enough that I think they were an option for use as a PC. Various high tech armors and force fields are covered. Lots of weapons divided into broad categories (Projectile/Laser/Blaster/Missle/Grenade/Melee) along with a Force Sword (light sabre).

I would love to see the setting developed more, as it seemed like a combination of Traveller and Fringeworthy. The default character group would probably be a team of ICE (Imperial Corp of Engineers) employees who went through gates to explore new worlds or check on how frontier worlds were doing. Several alien races were also competing for habitable planets.

No way I'd pay over $50 for the WoW boxed set but I'm glad I picked one up back in 1989 for about $20. Chaosium was so, SO close to a universal gaming system back in the early 80's, but never quite pulled it off (beyond the adaptability of the D100 system).

Edited by ORtrail
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The free download version of WoW was useful for me because it contained powers and abilities far beyond the page limitations of the Big Gold Book for superheroes. A lot of the Superworld powers made it into the BGB, but not all.

Huh?! What's in the WoW version of Superworld that didn't make it into BGB? The boxed Superworld had tons of stuff that isn't in BRP, but I can't think of anything in the booklet version that didn't get covered.

Chaos stalks my world, but she's a big girl and can take of herself.

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Huh?! What's in the WoW version of Superworld that didn't make it into BGB?
The fact that you get stuff like telepathy as a useable super power in WoW sets it apart from the BGB (which has it in a separate set of powers). Also the disadvantages in the WoW Superworld version yield more points than the BGB ones. Edited by Conrad
http://www.basicrps.com/core/BRP_quick_start.pdf A sense of humour and an imagination go a long way in roleplaying. ;)
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I would like to see Chaosium reissue WoW, with the rules cleaned up a bit, in one book. One that is cheaper than the BGB.

Well, they've released Magic World ...

Sorry, couldn't resist it.

Simon Phipp - Caldmore Chameleon - Wallowing in my elitism since 1982. Many Systems, One Family. Just a fanboy. 

www.soltakss.com/index.html

Jonstown Compendium author. Find my contributions here. 

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I would like to see Chaosium reissue WoW, with the rules cleaned up a bit, in one book. One that is cheaper than the BGB.

Considering that the BGB exists in part to "clean up" rules from previous supplements, you're basically asking for the BGB minus the parts you don't want and at a discount. (Plus superpowers and magic spells that didn't make the original cut, and maybe spaceship rules.) We all wish that, for the BGB and every other multi-genre game. "One custom GURPS, please, in one book." "Oh, hey, do you have something lighter than FATE Core but heavier than FAE?" "I like Swashbucklers of the 7 Skies, but do you have an Old West setting?"

If you want such a book for your gaming group, you have a few not-so-good options:

  • In the old days we bought one book for the entire group and shared it. How this works for campaigns on Skype, Google+, or Roll20
  • These days with the OGL and Open Content you can actually remix rules and release your own house rulebook. Not every game is Open Content, though, including BRP. (Legend and RuneQuest 6 are, though. Retroclone?)
  • For one campaign I created a summary of BRP rules in about 10 pages, but adding a full list of spells, gear, or superpowers might be a bit much.

Now if you mean that Chaosium should print and market a WoW reissue ... well IIRC WoW didn't sell so well the first go-round, whereas Stormbringer sold well by Chaosium standards. Undoubtedly the Moorcock license brought in most of the sales, but I can see where they'd want to sell a trimmed BGB that emulates Stormbringer, not WoW or Superworld.

Edited by fmitchell

Frank

"Welcome to the hottest and fastest-growing hobby of, er, 1977." -- The Laundry RPG
 
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  • These days with the OGL and Open Content you can actually remix rules and release your own house rulebook. Not every game is Open Content, though, including BRP. (Legend and RuneQuest 6 are, though. Retroclone?)

While Legend is open, RQ6 is not, it is traditionally licensed. The other OGL/OpenContent SRDs are for Renaissance, and the d100 SRD.

SDLeary

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RQ6 [...] is traditionally licensed.

My mistake. But you could still start with any of the SRDs and put together something like the original Basic Roleplaying pamphlet. The tricky part is reproducing superpowers, gear, and spells-as-skills without in any way plagiarizing existing rules.

Frank

"Welcome to the hottest and fastest-growing hobby of, er, 1977." -- The Laundry RPG
 
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I'd rather see a straight reissue of Worlds of Wonder, warts and all. The supposedly "cleaned up" and "improved" games lack the zest and personality of the originals.

If WoTC can do it with AD&D I don't see why Choasium couldn't do it with WoW.

Or better yet, since the BGB does exist, just release new Superworld, future world books as settings books (we already have the new magic world) but don't make them standalone products.

Simply in depth setting books that require the BGB with a list of which rule system switches to turn on.

BGB = BRP Gold. New book = BRP Platinum.  Stay metal. 

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I had just a casual look at an online version of WoW and a tiny particular arouse suspicion on the quality of whole "operation". The original Magic World, IIRC, states that an action is a critical success if the player rolls 01 and their character's skill is 50 or less, or if the player rolls 01 or 02 and their character's skill is 55 or more. Was it just a slip, or the birth of the WW (White Wolf) style of game design, "assemble some nonsenses and publish a new game"?

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Magic World used RQ2-style percentages, which went up in units of 5.

So, 05-50 has a critical on 01 and 55-100 has a critical of 02.

Percentages in the full 01-100 range didn't come in until RQ3.

Simon Phipp - Caldmore Chameleon - Wallowing in my elitism since 1982. Many Systems, One Family. Just a fanboy. 

www.soltakss.com/index.html

Jonstown Compendium author. Find my contributions here. 

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I see, thanks. What impressed me badly was only that, saying that a roll of 01 was a critical with a skill of up to 50 and a roll of 01 or 02 was a critical with a skill of 55+, the book didn't make clear what roll was a critical for skills in the 51 to 54 range.

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I don't think a straight 'warts n all' reprint of the original Worlds of Wonder would do much for the BRP system. Perhaps a kickstarter for die-hard fans, although I'm unsure if it'ld be worth the expense. It was almost 30 years ago, a good product in its day, but a dated one now unfortunately.

However, if the concept was revisited as a slipcase or boxed set with three sturdy hardcover books with revised and NEW content (Futureworld, MagicWorld, and SuperWorld), and an additional slim hardcover edition of the BRP Quickstart Rules then that might be a good product. The Quickstart Rules pretty much provides enough core content, and that way some of that doesn't get revisited in the other books.

Now if these books were hardcovers with decent art, then the whole thing could be a game changer on the shelves. The title 'Worlds of Wonder' is much more evocative than a functional term like 'Basic Role Playing', and a product like this would stand its own on the shelves alongside D&D, Pathfinder, Shadowrun, Numera, White Wolf, Warhammer, Savage Worlds, etc. Basically it has to be 'pretty on the eye & heavy in the hand' to attract new players now, as this is what the popular products are all about.

It could be followed up with a 'Worlds of Wonder, Set 2': (WestWorld, SpyWorld, and SteamPunkWorld perhaps). Who knows...(dreaming here)

One could argue that MagicWorld has only been revisited in title only, the current book feels more like Elric/Stormbringer than the original Magic World product. That is not to say that is a bad thing, but the original product of Magic World has more in common with the BRP Classic Fantasy monograph than it does with the current Magic World; in spirit at least. The Professions were presented much more like fantasy archetypes (Classes), and the game had a simple quality to it, almost 'beer & pretzels', ideal for old fashioned dungeon crawls. I think it was a good idea to publish the new Magic World, although I would have preferred another title, as it bears little resemblance to the flavour of the earlier Magic World. Perhaps a title like 'Realm' would have been more apt?

A Worlds of Wonder product like I have described would be a good thing, although to publish it at present may only confuse new BRP players as to which path to follow with in regards to their BRP fantasy games, given that Chaosium already has a current published fantasy setting. Perhaps the other titles could be revised and published as separate settings, which is more likely to be the case if the idea was looked at. I don't think they would sell all that great as separate titles however. In many ways, Worlds of Wonder was the sum of its parts, and the charm came from having a few settings in one product.

As far as a kickstarter goes, I would possibly like to see Chaosium offer a direct reprint of the RuneQuest Gateway content that they published as a boxed set prior to the release of RQ3. I never saw it, but I have heard decent reviews, so I'm curious. But again, whether that would be a viable use of staff resources is an obvious hurdle for anything like this. Perhaps some of the content could be rehashed to fit 'The Realm', and then it could become a MagicWorld publication perhaps?

In all honesty Chaosium is probably wise not to divide their efforts too much, and keep their current focus on Call of Cthulhu and perhaps Magic World. This is not to say that a licensee couldn't pick up other settings, along the lines that Pagan Publishing, Cubicle 7, and Alephetar Games has done in the past. But I can't see Chaosium flying the flag too much for anything that's not going to be related to Cthulhu 7E in the near future. I guess that's logical, considering its a new edition of the flagship product. Given this I can't see much future for Worlds of Wonder, kickstarter or otherwise =|

Edited by Mankcam
grammar

" Sure it's fun, but it is also well known that a D20 roll and an AC is no match against a hefty swing of a D100% and a D20 Hit Location Table!"

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If WoTC can do it with AD&D I don't see why Choasium couldn't do it with WoW.

The uncomfortable fact is that AD&D, warts and all, heralded the D&D craze of the 1980s and is still fondly remembered by a large percentage of gamers. (Not me, but other gamers.)

Worlds of Wonder, on the other hand, received reviewers' praise but did poorly in the market. Call of Cthulhu, Stormbringer, and RuneQuest did far better. Unfortunately I can't quote actual numbers, especially since nobody released numbers back then, but CoC, SB, and RQ went through multiple editions and reprints, while WoW pretty much came and went.

Frank

"Welcome to the hottest and fastest-growing hobby of, er, 1977." -- The Laundry RPG
 
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