Posted on

Random Musings. Immigration and borders & Shadow World Essaence Barriers.

How’s that for topical?

I remember my first exposure to the Loremaster Series (Iron Wind and Cloudlords). One aspect that made an impression on me  was the barrier aspect to the “Essence Flow”–magical currents that also acted as real physical barriers. This was more pronounced in Cloudlords where Tanara was physically isolated from other parts of Jaiman and featured very different and unique cultures. The underground, goth Duranaki, the Viking like Muri, the Inca style Yinka, the rural, gentle Suline and the Roman/heroic cloudlords. Pretty unique and cool!

This Essence Barrier element allowed for niche cultures, isolated civilizations and hidden lands; a major flavor to the SW setting and a reason d’etre for the Navigators.  Many secret and hidden areas were the result of pre-defined, permanet Essaence Flows: Nexus, Karilon, Dream Island, Secrets, etc.

But over time, has this aspect of SW been minimized? Terry has included some parts of this in the Jaimani Crowns and touched upon it with the time barriers/Jinteni…BUT…do you feel it’s still a significant part of the SW story? Does enforcing physical barriers create gaming problems for travel and sandbox issues?

Just curious what everyone thinks. Do you incorporate Essaence Barriers in your campaign? How does that work?

 

 

Posted on

Shadow World Wish List: the definitive Master Atlas.

With every new product Terry Amthor publishes, the world of Kulthea grows larger and more detailed, but it’s been quite a while since an updated version of the SW Master Atlas was produced. In truth, there has been a tremendous amount of world building material generated, but it’s been scattered among the various SW supplements over the last 30 years.

In general, a setting’s “Master Atlas” should contain the overview and broad strokes of the world—the foundation that sets the table for all other material. It should differentiate between “world spanning”, “universal” and “ubiquitous” and material that is regional in nature. Using that very basic definition you could argue that the Loremasters and Navigators are Master Atlas material while the Eight Orders of the Emerian Empire are not. Certainly, some of this is arbitrary, but if a new Master Atlas was planned, what should be included? Part of it is consolidating this “world material” from existing products and the other is filling in the blanks—new material that fleshes out the world, answers important questions or establishes setting specific material that might be different than general Rolemaster rules. (see the blog here)

IIRC, Rolemaster Companion I was generated from the “Red Book”—a notebook filled with optional material used in the early days by key ICE employees and playtesters. The material was cleaned up and made into Companion. We have our own version of the “Red Book”—our own Master Atlas that consolidates all “world material” into the existing MA4 text (converted in editable Word format). We went through each product, starting with the Iron Wind, and added any pertinent material: languages, creatures, Loremasters, artifacts, key persons etc. When a new product comes out, we go through it and do the same thing; our current MA stands at 320 pages without the numbered timeline and without fauna/flora. With fauna/flora our comprehensive MA would be well over 500 pages without artwork and graphics. Is that too large for todays consumers?

Some of that (100+ pages) is our own material—some of it posted up on the Misc SW Files. What is the origin of Elves? What happened to the Earthwardens? Where did the Dragonlords come from? What is the origina and the genesis of the various monsters/creatures? What are the reasons behind “magical” alloys? What is the background behind the lack of chemical processes in SW? We wrote it out of necessity, much of it years ago when it wasn’t clear if SW would continue. I think we came up with some good answers to many of these questions—but ultimately may be modified based on new material Terry produces.

Even with all the material we have, plus the material we’ve written I think there are gaps in the Master Atlas. After 4 versions, it’s probably not a priority for Terry to tackle the Master Atlas yet again even as he updates other past regional products. But…if such a product were to materialize, what would you like to see in it? Here are a few of my own:

1.       Language etymology. Matt did some work on it and I tried some basic classifications but it would be nice to have a basic “language tree” based on the root languages and sub families to build a framework for future products and establish relationships between cultures for language skills/translations etc.

2.       Essence Flow and Foci Map. While I like the idea of not creating permanent Major Flows, they are a key part of the world. Nexus is surrounded by them; Tanara was isolated by them etc. There was a map from an earlier product (Emer in the Atlas Addendum) but I think reintroducing these permanent flows helps fix the Flows as an important physical manifestation of the setting.

3.       Setting specific creatures. Much of the flora/fauna of SW is just a duplication of Creatures & Treasures. This feels like shoe horning a generic fantasy framework into a more unique setting. I would prefer to see a broadening of SW specific bestiary: more fusion and bizarre creatures.

4.       The Pales. Something I’ve been working on is added material on the Pales: environment, more denizens, realm powers etc. It would be great to have them fleshed out as real places that could be visited or used for travelling. My group is currently in the 2nd Pale and pushed me to build the setting out more for the adventure.

5.       Finished SW specific spell lists. Additional spell lists for the Unlife (type specific rather than general) and the other groups detailed in Powers of Light & Darkness.

6.       Finalized and consistent rules about the Unlife. Eliminate the “Anti-Essaence” and create framework for channeling (?) the Unlife and corruption rules.

7.       Notable world wide holidays and religious celebrations.

8.       Simultaneous publication for D20 rulesets.

Just a few of my ideas—anybody have any other ideas for the “definitive” SW Master Atlas?

Posted on

Dyson’s Dodecahedron

I am truly terrible at maps. Thankfully one of the best fantasy cartographers I have ever come across is Dyson Logos. His blog, Dyson’s Dodecahedron, is an immense resource for maps including amazing isometric layouts.

This particular one…

Vault of the Ghost King

…is ideal for those of you of a Shadow World bent. The elevator just smacks of higher technology. To my mind even the spiral stairwell would quite possibly be beyond many cultures.

I am thinking of using one of Dyson’s maps for the session of fruitless searching that I mentioned last time. I guess that many GMs will have already discovered Dyson but I thought I would feature him anyway just in case there are GMs out there who have not discovered him yet.

You should certainly check the blog out.

Posted on

Brief thoughts: masks in your fantasy setting.

In my recent blog post I referenced the Mayan, Lord Pakal. Pakal was buried wearing a jade funerary mask and it reminded me that masks are very cool! You’ve probably used or encountered a mask in your RPG game—maybe it’s a powerful magic item, a funerary mask found in a crypt /tomb or worn for a festival or celebration. I was reminded of masks worn by cultures or organization in popular fiction and how the mask itself became a defining trait.

Masks can be powerful symbols—they can hide an identity or gender, signify membership, convey emotion, create equality and/or eliminate social barriers. In a fantasy setting, masks can convey tone or atmosphere to the group using a very simple description. One-off masks are great, but what about standardized masks worn by whole groups of people/fighters etc?

Two that immediately come to mind:

1.       The Immortals in the movie 300. Certainly the movie was highly stylistic and not that historically accurate, but the masks make the enemy both anonymous and menacing.

2.       The Seguleh. If you haven’t read the Malazan series—do so! The Seguleh were a militant, hierarchal society of skilled warriors. All wore masks, each one signifying their rank (1st being the best warrior).

I can’t recall any particular group that sports masks as part of their uniform in Shadow World—can you? I’ve included a few cool masks worn by some cultists and like the effect they had on the players.

Anyone have any magical masks they want to share: stats, powers, description etc?

Posted on

“Long Skulls” and the Worim of Shadow World.

I just got back from Mexico and had the opportunity to visit some Mayan ruins. Seeing various ancient sites (Coba, Tulum, Chitzen Itza) is great creative inspiration for roleplaying! It’s also a reminder of an unusual and curious phenomena found not only in Central and South America, but all across the world: Elongated Skulls.

Accepted thinking is that skull elongation was the result of various types of head-binding practices adopted by primitive cultures. The application of clothes, boards and ropes on an infant’s skull to deform and stretch the soft craniums in children. Unfortunately, attributing ALL elongated skulls to this theory is challenged by 3 basic issues:

  1. Pre-natal skull elongation. There are documented cases of in-utero and very young infants with skull elongation.
  2. Cranial Volume. While purposeful elongation can change the shape of a skull, it does not alter the volume of the skull. There are many examples of elongated skulls with 20-25% higher cranial volume. (see Paracas skulls).
  3. Differences in skull suturing. Certain elongated skulls have only one parietal plate rather than two as in normal skulls.

Skull deformation, aberrations in volume and suturing are often ascribed to dolichocephaly, hydrocephaly, craniosynostosis or Antley-Bixler syndrome, but there is not enough evidence to support these medical theories. Elongated skulls have been found in Egypt, Malta, Russia, Peru, Bolivia and Mexico and head-binding was performed in the Congo, Vanuata and Malasia. Notable rulers in both America and Egypt are known to have elongated skulls: Tutankhaten (King Tut), his father Akhenaten, Nefertiti, and the Mayan Lord Pakal.

I’m not suggesting “Ancient Aliens”, but there is an argument to made for elongation via genetics verus elongation via binding. A distinct race of people, with elongated skulls, that also held positions of power is depicted in history and through the archeological record. Is it possible that the wide-spread practice of head-binding by many cultures around the world was “emulative”?

So what does this have to do with Shadow World? Terry has sprinkled bit and pieces of information throughout his books including this one:

“The tall, slender Lydians are most populous in Mythenis and some regions of Gaalt, thought they are found on other cool climes—especially in the southern hemisphere. This race has a somewhat elongated skull and large, bright, amber-colored eyes. They have fair skin, pale blond hair and are more slender than the Laan or Talath and tend to be hirsute……Some Loremasters believe that the, or perhaps the Talath, are descendants of the Worim.

And this:

“Some Loremasters hold that the Trogli are a race descended from the Worim: those who chose to hide underground at the end of the Interregnum.

So what do we know about the Worim? Only what we can piece together from various obscure mentions: they are non-native to Kulthea, had a high level of technology and built machines (tunnelers and war-machines). They may be precursors to the Laan (or Talath, or Lydians) or Trogli.

Until Terry expands upon the Worim, we’ve had to come up with some of our own material. First and foremost, the Worim had elongated skulls. This genetic trait was passed down to a lesser degree to both the Lydians and the Trogli. We’ve also generated some additional summary info in our SW Civilization Summary here (btw you need a Forum membership to see and download files).

This helps differentiate the Worim from some of the other Interregnum civilizations, Taranian & Jinteni, and adds a unique physical marker to the race. For some great ideas and SW campaign flavor, google elongated skulls, Paracas and especially Lord Pakal’s tomb.

Posted on

Miscellaneous Musings

Heading off to vacation so I probably won’t get new posts up for the next 10 days or so, but I thought I’d put up some random thoughts.

  1. It’s great to see new contributors to the Rolemasterblog! People who don’t sign up for the RM Forums don’t see the various RMU development threads and may not realize there is ongoing discussion and activity. I think this blog helps spread the word about RM and perhaps reaches other RPGers who might not go the forums.
  2. I got a few more messages re: BASiL mentalism spells. Right now I’m making real progress on finalizing my next submission: Empire of the Black Dragon and I’m very focused on that. Writing is HARD, but I find that it’s easier to write following your creative impulses. I’m having a great time writing adventures–its just flowing so I’m going to go with it. Part of it is the “unique’ nature of the material which is more fortresses and layouts than regional & cultural overview. Reformatting mentalism spells is more work than creative but I will get around to it!
  3. I started another great book, The Twelve Kings of Sharakhai. I’ve always loved a good desert setting and we really haven’t had one with Shadow World yet. Terry? With that said, I wonder if someone could come up with a unique desert culture that isn’t the standard middle eastern/Arabian tropes? I’ve always been intrigued by the Synshari race.
  4. I’ve been reading a lot of other blogs (and linking to good posts I find here). Not many Rolemaster blogs and almost no Shadow World blogs. BAD!!! The ones that I do find haven’t had any recent posts–some have been inactive for years.
  5. Armor makes a difference! My PC’s generally go light on the armor due to our simplified rules and the inherent trade off between encumbrance and protection but a couple of them are reconsidering…. The had a “run-in” with an Alliance Jenaara and Kal-chah warriors and got their butts kicked!
  6. Peter, the banner pic you put up is much better than the word jumble that was up before.
  7. I have a great artist interested in doing the layouts for my next project–hopefully he signs on!!
  8. I’m loading up my kindle for my trip–any good book recommendations?
Posted on

Special skills, special spells. Gods in roleplaying.

As part of the ongoing discussion of Clerics and Channeling in Rolemaster and Shadow World I thought I would call attention to a great blog and commentary over at Grognardia.

Peter has talked about rolling Channeling into the Essence Realm and I have basically rolled all of the Realms together–only organizing them by casting mechanism.

But this blog raises some earlier thoughts I had about Clerics and Channeling in general. Before Shadow World I was running a “diety-lite” setting where Gods were mere abstracts providing the homogenous powers provided by Spell Law Channeling. Now with Shadow World, I’ve fully embraced the use of active, involved Gods and built the Orhan/Charon spells lists and organizations to better define Clerics “special skills”.

However, were I to start from scratch I might do something different. Probably further consolidate all spells into the single realm of “Essaence”, and when and if applicable utilize “Channeling” as gifted benefits or powers from Gods or Higher beings when applicable. That’s basically what I’m doing now, but in the context of controlled spell acquisition and DP expenditure.

Interesting to read D&D design theory from 1984 and similarities between providing special Diety specific skills/spells and our own discussions on Diety specific spells lists.

 

Posted on

Time Travel in Rolemaster & Shadow World

In a recent BLOG POST, I touched upon Time Travel as a technology or mechanism that could be introduced into a Shadow World campaign. Tricky, right?

A lot has been written on time travel in RPG’s and if you have ever allowed it in your game you know it can generate great adventures but create a lot of hassles as well. Some suggested solutions are only allow travel into the past, time travel only occurs in alternate timelines that don’t affect the current one or there are side effects to encountering yourself in the past etc.

I mentioned a few mechanisms to introduce time travel or time manipulation during game play:

  1. Portals. These can be used not just to transport over distances but over time as well. Several gateways Terry describes in Emer Addendum hint at such a power.
  2. Flow Storms/Foci. Want to change things up? Add a Time jump into the effects of an Essaence effect. Not only can you send the players to another interesting time/place but you create a whole adventure path if they want to return to their own time.
  3. Spells. Spell Law never introduced Time related spells, but I think some were added in a companion? (citation needed). I posted up our Time Mastery spell list on the RM Forums. The list is a work in progress–and very powerful in some aspects and very limited in others. A couple of spells take some work and ingenuity on the GM’s part:

6. Time Jump I – Caster can “jump” 1 rnd/lvl into the past or future.

I thought of only allowing the caster to jump into the future–that’s an easy solution where the caster is basically “out of play” for the # of rounds. But that’s not really useful unless it’s just used to avoid a impending bad situation. So how do you handle a caster going back X rounds into the past? First you have to realize that there will be 2 casters for X of rounds (then the other will cast the spell and go back into time and everything is back to normal).  One option is to have the PC announce that they will be casting the spell in the future and then they can play 2 versions of themselves for those set number of rounds. One issue is that the original caster may not survive or be able to cast the Time Jump spell in the future… One resolution is to qualify that time travel creates a new timeline and that this new timeline might not end up the same way. That also means that there will be 2 casters permanently in this new timeline. Interesting…

This spell gets much simpler at higher levels when a caster can travel forward or back years or decades and thus removes the problem of 2 casters or travelling such a short time that the other “self” is present.

8. Time Bubble I – Caster is enclosed in a unmoving time singularity. He can either slow time by 1/2 or speed time by x2 during the duration. The caster cannot interact with anything outside the bubble or vice versa.(no causality). Perception is modified by the time difference(slow inside will make outside activity appear hyper fast, etc.)

Time Bubble is a more useful and less complicated time spell. Basically the Caster is demising themselves from the current timeline and either speeding up or slowing down time within that bubble. This allows the caster to create extra time to heal, prepare another spell or just get away from a dangerous situation. The bubble wall is inviolate. (Unless someone else has Time Merge to cross into the bubble.)

15. Time Stop I – Target up to MEDIUM size is enclosed in a time singularity where time is stopped. No information(visual or otherwise) can pass through the barrier.

A useful spell, it’s basically a version of Time Bubble that can be cast at a distance on a target–basically freezing the target for the duration of the spell. This does not slow or speed up time within the bubble but stops it completely. For a group, this would allow them time to prepare, heal or buff against a troublesome foe.

But Time Travel doesn’t have to be literal. Here’s the thing–one of the great parts of Shadow World is the immense timeline. It’s a great read, adds a lot of depth to the world building, but most of it will be lost on players: I’ve read it A LOT and I can’t keep track of most of it!So when people ask WHERE they should start a SW campaign I say how about “WHEN”? Want a hack ‘n slash one-off adventure? Introduce the PC’s to a battle during the Wars of Dominion. Want a mixed genre sci-fi/fantasy campaign? Start during the interregnum and have the PC’s be Worim, Taranian or Jinteni characters with technology and interacting with the fantastical creatures of SW.

So many possibilities–anyone play around with Time Travel in their game?

Posted on

Surgeons, Healers, Physicians in roleplaying.

Elisha Mancer mini.jpg

Hey, I’m on a roll with short blogs–mostly because we got hit with several FEET of snow and we are still not plowed out.

If you are not familiar with Charles Stross you should be. He’s a successful author and also writes about the intersection of technology and social issues. His BLOG is worth following and his readers offer some in depth commentary.

Occasionally Charlie will bring in a guest blogger to cover his site while he’s travelling. His most recent is E.C. Ambrose. I’m not familiar with his books, but he writes dark historical fantasy about medieval surgery–cool right?

I thought E.C.’s most recent POST about the differences between Physicians, Surgeons and Barbers was a great primer and road map for varying healing professions in RM and SW. Of course, fantasy RPG’s allow for magical healing which could usurp traditional healing methodologies, but that will depend on the ubiquity of magical healing in your game. Peter tends to rely on herbs (which while “magically” could be considered a more mundane process than spells), while others have easy access to healing spells.

My first SW Misc Material upload was a Healing Chart meant to combine magical healing, mundane healing and herbs into a simplified chart. This connects Surgeons (mundane and technical), Priests (spells but with access issues), Herbalists (witches, shamans and low tech communities) with the location of the PC’s: cities, towns, villages, remote.

Anyway, given that SW does have a past history of high tech, it makes sense that various cultures would have distinct professional paths for mundane and magical healing. E.C.’s blog post provides a historical model for your own RPG setting.

Anyone read E.C.’s books?

Posted on

Random Musings: Rolemaster & Shadow World 2/12/17

Being stuck in severe winter weather is a good excuse to get some writing and work done! I’m still polishing up my next few blog topics but thought I would write a quick blog on some misc. thoughts. This is more to clear my head and refocus my thoughts on various RPG items that are floating around.

  1. There is definitely an “ebb & flow” to the Rolemaster Forum activity. Generally, it seems like the hot topics are created on the RMU forums–intense debates on rules. Right now things just seem slow.
  2. Despite my own frequent blogs about alternate rules I’m having less and less interest in rule sets. Every time I come up with something new, Peter or some one else proposes something as interesting, valid or workable. It feels like a rabbit hole that never ends. In the end I am much more interested in game content than rules. I change rules frequently–with a small group of players it’s less game testing and more about how the rules interact with the narrative flow of the game. My players learned long ago that advocating for rules that allow for min/max, power gaming or mechanistic advantages are missing the point.
  3. Being stuck indoor has allowed me to take a deeper dive in Emer III. I read it when it first came out and scanned several times since, but hadn’t really churned through it or processed new info. I have taken each “canon” SW product and pulled out any world or overview info and added it to our Master Atlas. If you comb through all of Terry’s work and separate local and regional info from world spanning info it results in a much more comprehensive MA. Ours is heading towards 400 pages without creatures or the timeline.
  4. Emer III is fantastic. Like each new product, it continues to fill in gaps in the world building that were hinted at over the last 30 years: Jinteni technology, the Dragonlord, Tower of Vour, Krylites. At 208 pages it covers a lot of new material and straddles a difficult line of overview and specific material. Terry has always been good at that–intensely detailed NPCs, equipment and layouts with broad overviews that still convey a flavor or style.
  5. I’ve said this before but almost every Loremaster or Shadow World product could cover years of gaming. Sure, like everyone else I always want to see new material from Terry, but there is currently enough material now for a lifetime of play. Every product is dense with possible adventure hooks that would be make into a long term campaign!
  6. I’ve been working on an outline to finish the Grand Campaign. My goal was to try and include a snippet of material from each product–that way a group could experience a little bit of each product and visit or explore SW “greatest hits”. Unfortunately I think there is just too much material now! What I have ended up doing is moving several plot lines down to optional to maintain the core adventure path.
  7. My players are finishing up “Priest-King of Shade”. Ideally it would have gotten the PC’s to 12-15th lvl but they are all around 10th lvl. That’s fine–they are segueing into “Empire of the Black Dragon” (which is meant to be Pt. 3 of the series). Empire is less linear than Priest-King; more the style of “Fortresses of M.E.” so the playtesting is an important part of generating adventure layouts for the final product.
  8. I’m hoping I’ve found someone to redo my layouts for Empire. It’s basically 4 facilities, each very different in style and purpose. We shall see!
  9. BASiL Mentalism. A number of people have contacted me about putting up the Mentalism spells. I’m working on it! Unlike Essence or Channeling, I felt that Mentalism needed more work. I started formatting them and ended up making significant changes to the Monk style spells and making changes to the Telekinesis spells.
  10. It’s great to see new contributors to the RolemasterBlog. I hope that the other people that showed interest will participate as well!