I mean really.. FUCK... what the hell? What kind of drugs were these guys on?? I mean holy motherfucking shit this stuff makes Tekumel look normal.  Jesus fuck, were "Andrew and Amy Leker" injecting cocaine directly into their tear ducts while had a three way BDSM-session with "Miles Teves"? Was Jorune the product of drug-addled fever-dreams, or just a metaphor for having someone anally violate you while they whip you and make you call them mommy?


I mean, this is one wierd fucking game.

RPGPundit

I almost get this game.  The setting essentially crashes the Starship Warden on an alien world and then advances the history a few centuries.  Too bad the mechanics were nigh uncomprehensible to me.

It's a Dolly Parton song, right?

It was ALIEN, and I liked that--not just wierd, but downright truly evocative alien world. Sadly the mechanics did blow.

But how the fuck could anyone play it with any semblance of consistency?

RPGPundit

Might help with the discussion if you went into more detail about what you think is off-the-wall about it. Yeah, I have a copy of Jorune, and I get what you mean in a general sense. But it's more interesting when specifics are pointed out.

I had a copy of Jorune years ago. Despite the nostalgic terms I hear regarding the game, I can't remember shit about it other than it was too weird to live...

Clue us in, Pundit, what exactly makes it unplayable?

Amazing art, some of the best in RPGs ever. Forces use of made up terms even for regular RPG concepts which in my case put the game over the line for playability. I could possibly have houseruled the game or made use of one of the fanconversions at the excellent jorune.org, even possibly have gotten the setting, but I couldn't even get into how to create a character.

Never has had an edition that was playable out of the box due to incomplete sections, bad rules, and/or bad editing. Now out of print due to creator infighting. Has some great fans who could release a new edition with approval.

Setting? Metamorphis Alpha on E.R. Burroughs World. Kinda.

The magic/psionic/wtf it was stuff sounds really cool but never got the rules of it. The setting seems to hinge on it, as well as the adventure, neither of which I got. I do like the bio-things that make the native life edible and the "try it and see what it does" somethings. Like figuring out a TV in Gamma World without it being so obvious to the player.

I wound up selling my Jorune books to some group that plays it, more power to them, and got into Tekumel. Tekumel in contrast is human-centered (more like early D&D), despite being gonzo has a lot of internal consistency, sticks to standard RPG terms and archetypes (mostly), its default play mode is close to D&D, has had two playable out of the box editions, and is almost entirely still in print.

Edit: One of my Tekumel players (that one that initially had a problem with Chlen hide) played in some Jorune campaigns with some of the fan conversion authors. She had a lot of fun but brought up the term problem when I was pitching Tekumel to her. In that regard Tekumel is a lot easier for her to play. AFAIK her favorite game is WFRP. ;P

Yea, exactly. In Jorune all you can really do is play totally alien cultures in a totally incomprehensibly alien world. Its too disconnected from our reality to attempt it.

Yeah, the artwork is good, in a kind of early-80s sci-fantasy "wierd worlds" sort of sense.

RPGPundit

Quote from: RPGPunditYea, exactly. In Jorune all you can really do is play totally alien cultures in a totally incomprehensibly alien world. Its too disconnected from our reality to attempt it.

Yeah, the artwork is good, in a kind of early-80s sci-fantasy "wierd worlds" sort of sense.

RPGPundit

Well the books gave the material for running it--it explained a lot of the world, the moons, the 'magic' and social customs. It wasn't 'too wierd to play' but its very much takes people who sense of gaming isn't always about "adventuring" but could also be about dressing up there 'paper dolls' and putting them in social situations. I'll admit when I owned Jorune it wasn't for me, seriously, but I can see how to use it, to what ends, and why.


(of course I'm rather fond of adventureing as part of gaming--the dress up style paper doll thing is occasionally cool too)

Quote from: jrientsI almost get this game.  The setting essentially crashes the Starship Warden on an alien world and then advances the history a few centuries.  Too bad the mechanics were nigh uncomprehensible to me.

I almost missed that reference...the Warden is the ship from Metamorphosis Alpha, and I understand that Jorune developed out of a heavily-homebrewed MA campaign. In fact a number of creatures are transmogrifications of MA beasts, according to The Museum of Roleplaying games:

QuoteAn interview with Andrew Leker, published in Joe Coleman's excellent fanzine "Sholari," described how Andrew evolved Jorune from Metamorphosis Alpha. Knowing that, it's easy to see the transition: cougaroids become crugar, wolfoids become woffen, bearoids become bronth. Mental mutations become dyshas

I had no trouble with the terminology. Instead of saying, "That's not what it's called!" I told myself, "Oh, that's what they call it." I had no trouble learning the rules, because I didn't get hung up on the nomenclature. (Yes, I'm talking to you, OP.)

Whereto the weird. My Mom was a biologist. You aint seen weird until you've looked at the stranger quarters of biology. Infants that eat their mother's skin for example. Or infants that eat their mother. Then there are organisms that trade great gobs of their own genetic material with each other. (I will leave Canine Transmissible Venereal Tumor and Devil Facial Tumor Syndrome and how they might be related for your Googling or Gigablasting skills.)

Quote from: RPGPunditYea, exactly. In Jorune all you can really do is play totally alien cultures in a totally incomprehensibly alien world. Its too disconnected from our reality to attempt it.

Yeah, the artwork is good, in a kind of early-80s sci-fantasy "wierd worlds" sort of sense.

RPGPundit

"FURRIES IN SPAAAACE!"

Quote from: RPGPunditBut how the fuck could anyone play it with any semblance of consistency?

RPGPundit

Firstly "Jesus fuck, were "Andrew and Amy Leker" injecting cocaine directly into their tear ducts while had a three way BDSM-session with "Miles Teves"? - Whoa, I would have prefered a more detailed rant , but you know this line is so :cool: Because sooner or later some of us find ourselves in a drug fuelled three way with Teves

Okay. Here's the thing. When I say some settings do wierd well, Jorune is the perfect example of this. I mean it's puply foundation  - men with ray guns, struggling in a hostile world filled with aliens - is to my mind extremely easy to relate to.

And here's the thing it does "meat and potatoes" adventuring so well. Firstly the default assumption that most pcs would want to achieve citizenship - drenn status - is an easy way to begin adventuring - or in Jorune speak they become tauther - . Okay what are the benefits of citizenship? Prestige, influence , the use of enegy weapons etc.

So, it's a convenient method to start  a campaign. The fact that they have to get other drenn to inscribe their Chalisk (sp) - a kind of disc - to satisfy some bureaucratic requirement, is just a convenient excuse to go out and carry out missions for disparate folks. Does this sound familiar ? Yeah, because thats what happens in most D&D campaigns. Only here there is a setting consistensy and logic behind the whole thing.

What kind of adventures could you have in a trad fantasy setting? You could explore ruins. Rescue the princess/prince. Salvage lost magical items. Engage in a political [mis]adventures. Use magic. Encounter strange races....

In Jorune it's pretty much the same thing. Explore ancient Shantic ruins on a floating Skyrealm. Rescue a Drenn's child from the dreaded Ramian. Retrive lost Iscin tech from a Cougar infested highland (beware though for some Cougar behave like normal animals before standing up and revealing their true mischief) Go to the court of the Dharsage and try your luck at staking a claim.Engage in Isho duels in kerning bays (but really haven't you outgrown these childish sport...) Encounter the Tolgar, the missing children of Iscin....

And then there is the tech. No this is not really anything new. I'm sure other settings had high tech, before Jorune. Besides adding something a little out there to the setting, also kind of balances out, the three branches of humanity - normal humans, the Isho sculpting Muadra and finally the Boccord - by allowing only normal humans to use tech.

It's also a convenient rationale from most of the "races" out there. The Wolfen, Cougar, Blount, Tolgar etc were the results of Iscin (the name of the scientist -but now generally used to descibe certain earth tech and skills) genetic experiments.

But, that's not really the cool thing. Remember the Cougar killed Iscin and enslaved the (hard drinking Wolfen) and this sets of some interesting role playing hooks for Wolfen or Cougar pcs. That's what Jorune did so well IMHO, it created this strange alien world but it illustrated how folks could use it to run pretty much any kind of trad adventures and play these strange cultures - only the adventures had a certain, flavour..

I mean think about it. The pcs are walking down the crowded streets of Ardoth and one of them suddenly comes face to face with himself...How could this be? Simple some Iscin has found a hidden cache of earth cloning tech and obvously cloned the pc :eek:

And the magic - Isho -I found this part the most interesting but pretty bare. I always had to beef up the this section with the more unique /strange spells/abilities from other sources to make the whole Isho aspect a little more substantial.

Sorry for the long history lesson. I like Jorune, it's not for everyone. Now my biasness is complete, I have posted about Jorune - didn't do it justice - but hey, I run games better than I talk about them

Also please note, that some of the terms I'm using may be inaccurate, because it's been ages since I played Jorune, and the terminlogy comes from fond memories but more importantly from the boxed set and 2nd/3rd ? edition soft cover campaign book.

Regards,
David R

Quote from: RPGPunditYea, exactly. In Jorune all you can really do is play totally alien cultures in a totally incomprehensibly alien world. Its too disconnected from our reality to attempt it.

Not at all.

A smart GM begins the players as humans. It's six thousand years from now, but they're still human - they still love and hate and eat and shit and work together and squabble and so on.

"Drenn" are citizens. The rest aren't. You aim to become a citizen, because citizens are the upper class - you'll get to vote, push other people around, and when you find the ph4t l3wt in the form of old earth technology, you get to keep it - non-Drenn have to hand it in at the big cities. The whole Drenn thing is both an interesting cultural thing, and a motive for adventuring.

All the rest is hard to understand and complex, yes. But only the GM has to understand it at the beginning of play - the PCs, the players will discover it as their characters do. The obscurity of the game world isn't the barrier to play, it's the whole point of the play - exploring an alien world.

Remember that there was a time when Tolkien wasn't a cliche, nor was Star Wars - we had to explore those worlds to know them well enough for them to be a cliche.