I thought this subtopic on black orcs deserved its own thread, as its unrelated to the main topic. I think it's obvious that D&D is more popular than other RPGs -- that's not interesting. I'd prefer to focus for what has worked for people in practice.
Quote from: ForgottenF on June 27, 2024, 12:03:43 PMThe pattern I've seen in my time with the RPG world is that there is a demand for more out-there and creative concepts, but they have a hard time sticking. You see complaints like Chris' (with which I hugely sympathize) all the time. I believe there's even a TV Tropes entry for "my elves are different". Most DMs go through a phase of trying to make their homebrew settings as unlike classic D&D as possible, but inevitably they always go back to the Tolkien/Gygax standards after a while.
I tend to attribute this to the limitations of the medium. I'm sure I've said this before, but the big difficulty with RPG world-building is getting 4-6 people around the table to all imagine close enough to the same thing. If as a DM you try to describe things to your players that they aren't already familiar with, you up the chances of confusion at the table, and increase the amount of game time you have to spend on exposition. When non-standard fantasy settings are successful, it's usually by importing other extremely well known tropes from horror, scifi or history.
Quote from: SHARK on June 27, 2024, 02:35:30 PMTalislanta was absolutely creative, fresh, and very much *not* in the traditional, Tolkien bubble. But you know what? Exactly. My players were momentarily intrigued--but ultimately, they balked at Talislanta. Why? Not identifiable. Too many weirdly coloured races, strange animal races, offbeat, mystical religions. They simply could not get into it.
Hell, you don't even have to imagine a Fantasy world to get that kind of rejection. NYAMBE, an awesome D&D game setting for 3E, was entirely set in an African-like setting. You could, of course, make Nyambe part of any world you desired. You could run entire campaigns with Nyambe Characters, set in the Nyambe setting. Very innovative, creative, and different.
Nyambe also *failed* pretty hard. The Ars Magica company, the Nephew people, the owners, originally embraced publishing Nyambe with lots of fanfare and applause. Within a year or two, Nyambe was unplugged and died. Why? Lack of sales. No one wanted to buy Nyambe or play games in Nyambe. They did Nyambe up good, too. Hardcover book, full colour, maps, great layout, all the good stuff. Yes, I bought it cheerfully. Fantastic book, awesome options, creativity, and all the while being *different*--while also familiar, as it was D&D. Still, sadly, Nyambe failed.
I'm not familiar with Talislanta, but it's been a very successful line. I've played plenty of other non-D&D fantasy, like Ars Magica, Amber Diceless, Harnmaster, historical (and alt-historical) fantasy, and others.
I also bought Nyambe, but I didn't find it very playable out of the box. There is no sample adventure, and no sample PCs. There is a 6-page GM-only "secrets" section, but many of the things listed as "adventure hooks" are mostly high-level motives for adventure like a war between two countries, but not a fleshed-out adventure hook (i.e. what do the PCs do about the war).
I think the bigger issue is that it tries to bite off too much at once. There are probably fifty new core words to play the game - new core races like Ngoloko and Unthlatu, new core classes like Gamba and N'anga, a dozen countries, plus new equipment, monsters, etc. I think Chris Donut did a tremendous job of creating a detailed world, but he didn't bridge it well to be accessible.
Things that have worked for me include:
1) Reduce new terminology and concepts. Using an existing system and/or keep new weird options limited. Spears of the Dawn only has 5 countries and 4 classes, which is simpler than Nyambe's 12 countries and 16 classes.
2) Reduce the scope of the game. If it is a very different setting, instead of covering the whole continent shallowly, I'll keep adventures within a small territory or city. It helps to keep adventures centered on a narrow home base.
3) Mixing in some familiar elements with the unfamiliar can be a bridge. I haven't picked up the Pundit's Silk Road material yet, but it seems like a good opportunity to have a mix of European and Central Asian elements. The Silk Road stuff had supplements unlike Arrows of Indra, so I'd guess it aroused greater interest. I did similar with my old Vikings & Skraelings campaign, about alternate-history 1300s northeastern America with vikings - so PCs were mostly Nordic but were interacting with a lot of Algonquian and Iroquoian peoples.
4) Even if many/most of the setting pieces are wholly unfamiliar, using a known genre can help give context. Swashbucklers of the 7 Skies is a weird floating-island steampunk world, but using swashbuckling stereotypes and tropes helps make it easier to play.
I'd be curious about how people might have done similar in their games, or other strategies they've used to play unfamiliar settings/cultures.
I was ultimately unsuccessful in trying to convince my regular group of players to try Coriolis when we were looking into a new space opera game. They didn't necessarily object to the system--it was the "Arabian Nights in Space" vibe that didn't win them over. Thankfully everyone enjoyed Twilight Imperium enough to try Genesys/Embers of the Imperium, because I had already told them I'd be sitting out if the group decision went back to Star Wars.
I think it's something of a chicken and egg situation. It's hard to get people to play something in a drastically different setting without supporting material and adventures, but the supporting material adventures likely won't be economically viable if the game doesn't have many players.
Spears of the Dawn was definitely simpler, but I felt it was still rather sketchy. I might be in the minority, but a bunch of random tables aren't terribly helpful when the setting is so different. (The same applies to Pundit's Arrows of Indra, which was a great game, only with no support).
But ultimately what I did was just end up setting down an African inspired kingdom (mostly Ancient Ethiopian) on the edge of my main continent and used the mosnters from Nyambe and SotD (as well as Charles Saunder's article on African monsters in Dragon)
D&D had a relatively easy time because much of D&D derives from Tolkein, whatever Gary said about it, and Tolkein had deep roots in European myths. So folks in civilizations coming from Europe already had the premises, themes, and stories written into the cultural roots and souls, and D&D connected with these deep-set ideas. Things like Talislanta, which are entirely fictional, and Nyambe, which emulate African ideas don't have these deep connection to American and European minds, so it's a lot more work to learn the setting, and less compelling to boot. Perhaps a way to make this work is to use the myths and themes we're familiar with with a thin veneer of another setting or culture to make it look exotic and interesting. It worked for Star Wars after all.
Greetings!
Well, I realize that my player groups are Americans, so, I embrace the traditional historical foundations for heroic fantasy and myth. In my own Thandor world, most of the players choose more or less standard characters. Occasionally, someone will play a character from some exotic land--such as an African-type homeland, Indian, or Asian-flavoured homeland. I also drop in various NPC's that are weird and exotic.
Then, well, I get my own "Variety Fix" by sending the group off on crazy, epic journeys into strange, foreign lands, such as African-themed, Indian-themed, or Asian-themed. That all works very well.
Honestly, though, being inspired by history and mythology, there are areas that you might think of as being stock and routine--but they may not be. They may be far more exotic than one would anticipate. For example, I have had player groups get involved with savage, Germanic tribes, or become involved with adventuring in far off, Norse-like Viking lands. Viking, Germanic barbarian tribes, and Slavic tribal cultural environments have demonstrated to myself and my players that they can also be exotic and different--and provide unexpected surprises, even for people that are more or less immersed in European folklore and mythic traditions.
Semper Fidelis,
SHARK
I am very invested in this question, though as my previous comments probably show, I don't have a satisfactory solution.
My interest is less in the practice of swapping out one set of historical-cultural references for another, and more in doing more purely fantastical and out-there stuff (so less Nyambe, more Talislanta). I've been craving a pure-fantasy/science fantasy campaign for about two years now, and in that time I've latched onto and subsequently abandoned the notion of running games in Talislanta, Lovecraft's Dreamlands, the Ultraviolet Grasslands, Carcosa and Calidar, as well as been picking away at my own weird cosmic fantasy setting. These ideas have not gone forward for various reasons, but the difficulty in getting players to get their heads around a non-standard setting is a commonality.
The only technique I've hit on for this which I think would likely to work, is one borrowed from other mediums. That is, matching the players' ignorance to their characters. You see this a lot in Sword & Planet fiction, where the protagonist is just a regular dude who gets transported to the weird world, and the reader gets to learn about the setting along with the POV character. In an RPG, you could do the same trick of making your characters strangers to the setting, or another approach would be making a setting which presents itself as a relatively normal fantasy world, with all the weirdness going on in the background, where it's only going to be encountered when adventuring, and the PCs aren't meant to understand it. That latter approach would also allow you to drip-feed the unusual elements of a setting, which should make them easier to convey to players.
Point 1: new terminology is not an issue
speaking not from an RPG background, but rather from a avid reader of fiction, Dune, by Frank Herbert hits you with soo much new terminology and linguistics and yet it's all instantly understandable, to the point they became common in all other sci-fi, when you hear Las-gun you instantly know what they mean, or Thopter, or spice melange.
I don't believe made up terminology and names are what can drag an weird alien setting down, it's that they should be couched in what humans expect and sprinkling real terms to anchor them.
Point 2: for Point two I simply agree, limiting the scope of a game means they don't have to drink the whole setting in at once, which is helpful.
Point 3 and 4 I have no comments on as it'd be redundant based on on whhat I had to say apout point 1.
Quote from: Mishihari on June 29, 2024, 03:12:29 AMThings like Talislanta, which are entirely fictional, and Nyambe, which emulate African ideas don't have these deep connection to American and European minds, so it's a lot more work to learn the setting, and less compelling to boot. Perhaps a way to make this work is to use the myths and themes we're familiar with with a thin veneer of another setting or culture to make it look exotic and interesting.
I think it's also critical to create interesting stakes which the players can become invested in and care about, both on a large scale for the setting and on a smaller scale for adventuring heroes. When all the countries and cultures feel too strange to identify with, for example, it makes it hard to care about what they might be going to war over or who wins.
A sense of history and change over time is also critical, I think. To meaningfully change the world (the quest for which is ultimately what a lot of RPG campaigns wind up turning on) you have to have a sense of how it's changed before and a sense of the big movement arcs of history, and seeing how present cultures connect to previous ones.
One of the smartest ideas I thought the game
SkyRealms of Jorune included, to pick another fairly well known "weird fantasy" setting, was to make the process of gaining
citizenship (and the pitfalls to avoid in the process) a key PC action motivator, as well as putting the rediscovery of Earth tech at the heart of the setting's politics -- this gave adventuring parties looking for treasure a key way to become movers and shakers in the setting simply by doing what RPG adventurers always do.
Quote from: ForgottenF on June 29, 2024, 09:34:47 AMThe only technique I've hit on for this which I think would likely to work, is one borrowed from other mediums. That is, matching the players' ignorance to their characters. You see this a lot in Sword & Planet fiction, where the protagonist is just a regular dude who gets transported to the weird world, and the reader gets to learn about the setting along with the POV character. In an RPG, you could do the same trick of making your characters strangers to the setting, or another approach would be making a setting which presents itself as a relatively normal fantasy world, with all the weirdness going on in the background, where it's only going to be encountered when adventuring, and the PCs aren't meant to understand it. That latter approach would also allow you to drip-feed the unusual elements of a setting, which should make them easier to convey to players.
I tried that in the early aughts in a homebrew campaign I called Water Uphill World (https://www.darkshire.net/jhkim/rpg/wateruphill/), where the PCs were kids transported into a fantasy world (like Narnia). Also, I ran a dozen sessions or so of Lacuna Part I (https://jaredsorensen.itch.io/lacuna-part-1), where the PCs are agents conducting missions inside a dream world (like The Matrix mixed with Dreamlands).
I felt like Lacuna worked better because the PCs had very clear missions they were assigned. Even though they later started questioning Control, the missions gave them a clear hook to act on. Trying to run this more like a sandbox can be difficult, because the players can feel disempowered and lost by not understanding what is going on and depending on NPCs who know much more than them.
If I was doing this again, I'd make sure the PCs had some key actionable / tactical secrets that let them in on the bigger plot. i.e. Even if they didn't know what Weyerandan culture is, they know that the Weyerandan governor named Yukop secretly is plotting rebellion and is gathering an army of goblins (and other stuff).
Quote from: jhkim on June 30, 2024, 02:03:47 AMI felt like Lacuna worked better because the PCs had very clear missions they were assigned. Even though they later started questioning Control, the missions gave them a clear hook to act on. Trying to run this more like a sandbox can be difficult, because the players can feel disempowered and lost by not understanding what is going on and depending on NPCs who know much more than them.
Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. Players have a hard enough time self-starting when they're familiar with all the setting assumptions. Stick them in a world when they have no idea what's going on and they're sure to flounder.
If familiarity was an issue, then you'd see a lot more Americana settings. Instead, American gamers are mostly obsessed with emulating Tolkien's Middle Earth, not Baum's Oz. Oz is quintessential American fantasy, but gets overshadowed by European fantasy in America. Instead of cowboys, rifles, and fearsome critters, our fantasies are full of knights, swords, and orcs. Why do Americans overwhelmingly prefer to ape an ahistorical pastiche of medieval Europe over their own mythic history?
Quote from: BoxCrayonTales on June 30, 2024, 01:08:17 PM...Why do Americans overwhelmingly prefer to ape an ahistorical pastiche of medieval Europe over their own mythic history?
Because even today the majority of Americans are of European decent.
European mythic history is our mythic history.
Yes we have a unique American mythology as well, but it is of a more recent era. Which is just less popular rpg fodder across the board. I mean, how big are rpg's set during the napoleonic and Victorian eras really?
Quote from: BoxCrayonTales on June 30, 2024, 01:08:17 PMIf familiarity was an issue, then you'd see a lot more Americana settings. Instead, American gamers are mostly obsessed with emulating Tolkien's Middle Earth, not Baum's Oz. Oz is quintessential American fantasy, but gets overshadowed by European fantasy in America. Instead of cowboys, rifles, and fearsome critters, our fantasies are full of knights, swords, and orcs. Why do Americans overwhelmingly prefer to ape an ahistorical pastiche of medieval Europe over their own mythic history?
American folklore just isn't as fertile ground as European folklore is, and most Americans aren't all that connected to it. There's a lot of reasons for this: It derives from a much shorter time period, and a lot of it is imported from the old world. It's also very regionally particular, so a person not from Appalachia isn't likely to have grown up with Appalachian folk tales, etc, and as a general matter, a post-enlightenment society doesn't produce the richness of mythology that a pre-enlightenment one does.
There have been a few popular wild west settings, and some marginally successful colonial ones, but even most American fantasy writers have chosen to go back to their European roots when writing fantasy. If there's something that I'd say defines American fantasy as distinct from European (particularly English) fantasy, it's that it tends to lean more on sci-fi elements rather than folkloric ones. That tradition starts with guys like Edgar Rice Burroughs and then carries on through the Weird Tales era into more mid-century writers like Fritz Leiber, Jack Vance, or even guys like Stan Lee, and then from there into people like George Lucas and Stephen King.
I don't think you could call Wizard of Oz "quintessential American fantasy" when most Americans aren't aware of it beyond the 1939 movie. Honestly, if you want to know what the quintessential American fantasy is in terms of "American-ness" and cultural impact, it's the comic book superhero and his antecedents in pulp characters like the Shadow. Outside of that, I'd say the most "American" RPG setting is either Call of Cthulhu, which combines the essentially American genres of cosmic horror and the noir/hardboiled detective story, or Cyberpunk which is again a combination of noir/crime fiction with sci fi.
I would chalk it up to Tolkien's popularity more than anything else
A big issue with games that have crazy settings is the players lack of books they can read.
Typically, only the GM buys the rulebooks with the lore in it.
You can get into games like D&D easier because the setting is well known. Hell, it is damn near it's own trope most people know. A D&D campaign will be vaguely medieval Europe alagory, but with the superstitions all turned on.
Or specific settings like Star Wars, where players all know it from other media.
But, an RPG with a complex and intricate lore is going to be a bit of a sell to get players to invest in it. Sometimes, it works. Rifts for example.
I'll speak for Talislanta specifically.
People have criticized Talislanta for years on contradictory things like "It's too exotic." inversely "It's just humans in different colors." Or as advertised "NO ELVES!" then contrarians will screesh - "Dude all these races are elves! They got pointed ears!". Rarely has anyone ever actually PLAYED Talislanta and gave it any real criticism other than these surface features.
The fact is - not many people played the damn game which is a goddamn shame. There is literally NO REASON TO NOT PLAY IT - it's FREEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!! (http://talislanta.com/). All FIVE EDITIONS! Free. Legal. A gift from Steve Sechi, the creator to all of us, the lovers of RPG's.
Yes, Talisanta has its fans, and they are diehard. But we're all ghosts screaming from the edge of town into the wind for all its worth. Talislanta, in my honest opinion, is an unsung game and one of the best ever made.
The system, the original d20 system! still looms large in design. It's *fantastic*. It scales, it uses basic math. No weird symbols. It has degrees of success. It takes into account the skill of PC's. It had crits/fumbles long before they were ever official in D&D. And it always amazed me how the system, once pulled free of Talislanta (The OMNI System) never got traction... alas that's another discussion.
Let's talk about the exotic nature of Talislanta. Is it non-European? I mean... it's got Kingdoms and Empires, but it's nothing expressly European by analogy if only in the most vague terms. But I'd say modern D&D isn't either. Was it exotic vs. 1e D&D, its contemporary? Sure, I'll give it to you...
ONLY if you're saying that "humans" are the real deciding factor. Yes, there are no Elves in Talislanta. But there are no humans either. Talislanta is "exotic" like Star Wars is exotic. Star Wars has humans, Talislanta has Archaens which with a squint are just humans with slightly pointed ears and light green skin. Ironically, you'd say they look vaguely like Elves. You'd say their culture is a fantasy pastiche of high-magic that has been completely ripped off by the Netheril culture of the Forgotten Realms (and while I have no proof - I'll maintain to this very fucking day and argue the point that the entirety of Netheril and ALL the concept of it was "inspired" (i.e. ripped off) from Talislanta. But I'd probably say Talislanta was inspired by all the cool shit Sechi was reading while on magic mushrooms like Jack Vance, and probably some Lord Dunsany or something.
Talislanta *should not* freak players or GM's out. You can do any kind of thematic thing you'd want to play in any mainline D&D game, plus the core concept of the Seven Kingdoms in Talislanta is such that you get to play in a high fantasy mageocracy (it pretends it's not a Mageocracy but it is) that TOTALLY embraces the style of play that reeks of high-magic abuse. BUT the system self-regulates and embraces casters as glass-canons.
It does everything D&D of the past and the present wishes it could do. Want to do some Sword and Sorcery? Talislanta has you covered. Outside the Seven Kingdoms and mighty Empires that flourish on the continent, it is BESTIAL and SAVAGE. You have lots of reasons to go out there too - the secrets of the ancient culture that dominated the world has ruins galore. (sound familiar doesn't it? Talislanta DID IT BETTER). You can be a swashbuckler, a pillager, thief and savage pit-fighter - Conan would be right at home. You can be a bard and entertainer, courtesan, aristocrat and political partisan - yeah they have Progressive vs. Conservative politics cooked into the cultures too. It's great. You want bad guys? The entire continent is teaming with them outside of civilization. The Beast Men - better than orcs. Some have even gone "pseudo-civilized" and you can play them. You want Asian-themed stuff - the Kang Empire, basically Klingons with red skin, got you covered. You want Hutt Crime cartels? The Quan (former rulers of the Kang) are slowly trying to reclaim their power. The golden skinned Mandalans and their ninja- err "Mystic Warriors" are undermining the power-structures of their Kang Daim-uhh... Warlords. Oh yeah - they got martial-arts. OOO exotic.
What I'm saying is this: Talislanta navigates the cultural analogs WITHIN fantasy that we all like, with a dash or hint of real-world inspiration and goes one level deeper. It feels a little exotic, but not so exotic that you won't immediately take to it like a fish in different waters. And it rests on top of RIDICULOUSLY good system. All the editions are 98% compatible. If you like classes go 3e.
It's has incredible lore which you can TOTALLY IGNORE.
It has a prequel game which I helped write - if you wanna go grimdark you can try my version, a prequel set after The Great Cataclysm. Very low magic, but very high chop-chop. Talislanta: The Savage Lands (https://www.drivethrurpg.com/en/product/233187).
My hot sports opinion: The reason people never play Talislanta is simply because they never really played it. I don't know of anyone that actually has run Talislanta that hasn't gotten their groups to play it on the regular. I suspect people just hear about it in posts online like this one, and go "Oh yeah, I remember those ads in Dragon." and come up with some reason to simply not run it. Most players only play what they get served, so...
What makes it work is because 1) it's well designed with intensely good internal consistency. 2) the setting is old-school sandbox, it's made to let GM's break shit and go wild 3) the setting mechanics are robust and EASY while maintain scalability unheard of back then and even now it still is head and shoulders above most other systems. 4) Its only failing is it never quite got enough GM's to run people regularly enough to hit escape velocity. Instead it's remained in the limbo of "Oh yeah! That game." in the pantheon of RPGs. Which is a shame.
Greetings!
Beautiful, TENBONES!
*Laughing* Yes, yes, I was subliminally calling you to comment in this thread! I knew you would not disappoint us! You come in like an A-10 Warthog, chain-gun blazing!
I have always loved Talislanta!
So much so, truth be told, as I could not really get my player groups into Talislanta--so I was continuously inspired to bring many aspects of Talislanta into my own world of Thandor. But you knew that already, my friend!
Such an awesome post, Tenbones!
Semper Fidelis,
SHARK
Hmmm, I do agree on just about everything you say, tenbones, except for the "if your group tried it, they'll like it!" Because the assumption thereafter doesn't carry: groups don't necessarily stick with playing it (basically they don't with the switch of systems and settings). Even as GM I found people would rather shrug about doing it again and go back to the popular & familiar.
Talislanta IS great. I tried it, I liked it, I'd like to run it again. I thought I could cultivate new fans. But casuals would politely try it once and rather go back to the popular, and hard cores are already invested in mastery and would rather go back to the familiar.
But as one of my buddy's culinary teacher said:
"The secret to good business is the familiar and a hint of the new, and keeping costs down (the priceless silicone scraper). Every pastry shop that lasts follows this pattern of following expectations. In a Western pastry shop this is the core four: 1) a cakey plain thingie, 2) a creamy vanilla thingie, 3) a chocolate thingie, and 4) either a nutty thingie (allergies) or a fruity thingie (seasonal availability). If you are feeling your oats you can have a fifth mystery thingie and see how adventurous your local market demographic is, but don't feel you can 'teach' your customers what they'd prefer because it doesn't work well."
Even if people did like the experience they often don't seek it out thereafter. They follow the popular. They seek the familiar with a hint of the new.
Tragically it seems the human nature answer to this topic, for profit and lasting change, is "Change 20% or less and resell the old wine in new casings." Open-minded travelers are less prevalent than we want for sharing our favorite things.
Quote from: Opaopajr on July 01, 2024, 10:46:32 PMHmmm, I do agree on just about everything you say, tenbones, except for the "if your group tried it, they'll like it!" Because the assumption thereafter doesn't carry: groups don't necessarily stick with playing it (basically they don't with the switch of systems and settings). Even as GM I found people would rather shrug about doing it again and go back to the popular & familiar.
Talislanta IS great. I tried it, I liked it, I'd like to run it again. I thought I could cultivate new fans. But casuals would politely try it once and rather go back to the popular, and hard cores are already invested in mastery and would rather go back to the familiar.
But as one of my buddy's culinary teacher said:
"The secret to good business is the familiar and a hint of the new, and keeping costs down (the priceless silicone scraper). Every pastry shop that lasts follows this pattern of following expectations. In a Western pastry shop this is the core four: 1) a cakey plain thingie, 2) a creamy vanilla thingie, 3) a chocolate thingie, and 4) either a nutty thingie (allergies) or a fruity thingie (seasonal availability). If you are feeling your oats you can have a fifth mystery thingie and see how adventurous your local market demographic is, but don't feel you can 'teach' your customers what they'd prefer because it doesn't work well."
Even if people did like the experience they often don't seek it out thereafter. They follow the popular. They seek the familiar with a hint of the new.
Tragically it seems the human nature answer to this topic, for profit and lasting change, is "Change 20% or less and resell the old wine in new casings." Open-minded travelers are less prevalent than we want for sharing our favorite things.
During my MBA program I had a marketing professor named Tom Kinnear who is pretty prominent in his field. He put it this way: "Changing customer behavior is the hardest thing in the world"
Quote from: tenbones on July 01, 2024, 04:35:56 PMI'll speak for Talislanta specifically.
People have criticized Talislanta for years on contradictory things like "It's too exotic." inversely "It's just humans in different colors." Or as advertised "NO ELVES!" then contrarians will screesh - "Dude all these races are elves! They got pointed ears!". Rarely has anyone ever actually PLAYED Talislanta and gave it any real criticism other than these surface features.
The fact is - not many people played the damn game which is a goddamn shame. There is literally NO REASON TO NOT PLAY IT - it's FREEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!! (http://talislanta.com/). All FIVE EDITIONS! Free. Legal. A gift from Steve Sechi, the creator to all of us, the lovers of RPG's.
Yes, Talisanta has its fans, and they are diehard. But we're all ghosts screaming from the edge of town into the wind for all its worth. Talislanta, in my honest opinion, is an unsung game and one of the best ever made.
The system, the original d20 system! still looms large in design. It's *fantastic*. It scales, it uses basic math. No weird symbols. It has degrees of success. It takes into account the skill of PC's. It had crits/fumbles long before they were ever official in D&D. And it always amazed me how the system, once pulled free of Talislanta (The OMNI System) never got traction... alas that's another discussion.
Let's talk about the exotic nature of Talislanta. Is it non-European? I mean... it's got Kingdoms and Empires, but it's nothing expressly European by analogy if only in the most vague terms. But I'd say modern D&D isn't either. Was it exotic vs. 1e D&D, its contemporary? Sure, I'll give it to you...
ONLY if you're saying that "humans" are the real deciding factor. Yes, there are no Elves in Talislanta. But there are no humans either. Talislanta is "exotic" like Star Wars is exotic. Star Wars has humans, Talislanta has Archaens which with a squint are just humans with slightly pointed ears and light green skin. Ironically, you'd say they look vaguely like Elves. You'd say their culture is a fantasy pastiche of high-magic that has been completely ripped off by the Netheril culture of the Forgotten Realms (and while I have no proof - I'll maintain to this very fucking day and argue the point that the entirety of Netheril and ALL the concept of it was "inspired" (i.e. ripped off) from Talislanta. But I'd probably say Talislanta was inspired by all the cool shit Sechi was reading while on magic mushrooms like Jack Vance, and probably some Lord Dunsany or something.
Talislanta *should not* freak players or GM's out. You can do any kind of thematic thing you'd want to play in any mainline D&D game, plus the core concept of the Seven Kingdoms in Talislanta is such that you get to play in a high fantasy mageocracy (it pretends it's not a Mageocracy but it is) that TOTALLY embraces the style of play that reeks of high-magic abuse. BUT the system self-regulates and embraces casters as glass-canons.
It does everything D&D of the past and the present wishes it could do. Want to do some Sword and Sorcery? Talislanta has you covered. Outside the Seven Kingdoms and mighty Empires that flourish on the continent, it is BESTIAL and SAVAGE. You have lots of reasons to go out there too - the secrets of the ancient culture that dominated the world has ruins galore. (sound familiar doesn't it? Talislanta DID IT BETTER). You can be a swashbuckler, a pillager, thief and savage pit-fighter - Conan would be right at home. You can be a bard and entertainer, courtesan, aristocrat and political partisan - yeah they have Progressive vs. Conservative politics cooked into the cultures too. It's great. You want bad guys? The entire continent is teaming with them outside of civilization. The Beast Men - better than orcs. Some have even gone "pseudo-civilized" and you can play them. You want Asian-themed stuff - the Kang Empire, basically Klingons with red skin, got you covered. You want Hutt Crime cartels? The Quan (former rulers of the Kang) are slowly trying to reclaim their power. The golden skinned Mandalans and their ninja- err "Mystic Warriors" are undermining the power-structures of their Kang Daim-uhh... Warlords. Oh yeah - they got martial-arts. OOO exotic.
What I'm saying is this: Talislanta navigates the cultural analogs WITHIN fantasy that we all like, with a dash or hint of real-world inspiration and goes one level deeper. It feels a little exotic, but not so exotic that you won't immediately take to it like a fish in different waters. And it rests on top of RIDICULOUSLY good system. All the editions are 98% compatible. If you like classes go 3e.
It's has incredible lore which you can TOTALLY IGNORE.
It has a prequel game which I helped write - if you wanna go grimdark you can try my version, a prequel set after The Great Cataclysm. Very low magic, but very high chop-chop. Talislanta: The Savage Lands (https://www.drivethrurpg.com/en/product/233187).
My hot sports opinion: The reason people never play Talislanta is simply because they never really played it. I don't know of anyone that actually has run Talislanta that hasn't gotten their groups to play it on the regular. I suspect people just hear about it in posts online like this one, and go "Oh yeah, I remember those ads in Dragon." and come up with some reason to simply not run it. Most players only play what they get served, so...
What makes it work is because 1) it's well designed with intensely good internal consistency. 2) the setting is old-school sandbox, it's made to let GM's break shit and go wild 3) the setting mechanics are robust and EASY while maintain scalability unheard of back then and even now it still is head and shoulders above most other systems. 4) Its only failing is it never quite got enough GM's to run people regularly enough to hit escape velocity. Instead it's remained in the limbo of "Oh yeah! That game." in the pantheon of RPGs. Which is a shame.
Okay, you say it's a great game. I'll take you at your word. But how do you get people to play it?
Talislanta's just too much. Forgotten Realms or Golarion are, I think, about the high end of what most peoples' attention span can absorb when it comes to countries, cultures, religions, creatures, celebrities, etc, and Talislanta blows right past that without even slowing down. If Talislanta's cultures got the same sourcebook treatment as the Realms, it would fill an entire shelf easily, and most people aren't going to dedicate enough of their lives to learning it. If the setting had some movies or a TV series or something to get the gist across to people without them having to read and retain hundreds of pages, I think it would've been a massive success.
Quote from: Valatar on July 02, 2024, 01:32:43 AMIf the setting had some movies or a TV series or something to get the gist across to people without them having to read and retain hundreds of pages, I think it would've been a massive success.
Or even some devoted fan making YouTube lore breakdowns would make a big difference, much like what Mr. Welch does for Mystara. I did a YouTube search for "Talislanta lore" and turned up a single vlog from a tiny channel that only included a cursory explanation of the setting.
It might be difficult for someone like tenbones, who's clearly been into Talislanta for years now, to remember what it looks like to someone just being exposed to it for the first time.
From an outsider's perspective I think Talislanta has a few things specific to it that make it harder to for it to catch on than other non-standard fantasy settings:
One would be the lack of a clear elevator pitch. For better or for worse, most of the successful non-standard settings seem to have a pretty clear gimmick or unique selling point to them. From what I've seen, Talislanta is one of things you have to put some investment into before you "get it". Not a bad thing in and of itself, but it's always going to be a barrier to entry for outsiders.
The other is a kind of vicious cycle that affects that kind of highly detailed, lore-rich setting. I look at Talislanta and tend to think "I'd like to play this if I could get a GM that really knows it and can run it well, but I'd be leery of running it myself first". I suspect that's not a rare sentiment. So you get people who hold off on trying the game until they can find veterans to play it with, but the only way you get those veterans is if there's active games going. The game dies on the vine because people are too intimidated to jump in. The only way the cycle breaks is if there's enough veterans out their actively pursuing new players, or enough new people who are so enthralled with it that they choose to do the necessary study to essentially become veterans before playing.
Maybe Talislanta would benefit from publishing a series of adventures expressly designed to help new GMs run the setting without needing to be lore experts first.
Quote from: ForgottenF on July 02, 2024, 05:23:38 PMFor better or for worse, most of the successful non-standard settings seem to have a pretty clear gimmick or unique selling point to them. From what I've seen, Talislanta is one of things you have to put some investment into before you "get it". Not a bad thing in and of itself, but it's always going to be a barrier to entry for outsiders.
The other is a kind of vicious cycle that affects that kind of highly detailed, lore-rich setting. I look at Talislanta and tend to think "I'd like to play this if I could get a GM that really knows it and can run it well, but I'd be leery of running it myself first". I suspect that's not a rare sentiment. So you get people who hold off on trying the game until they can find veterans to play it with, but the only way you get those veterans is if there's active games going.
Quote from: ForgottenF on July 02, 2024, 05:23:38 PMMaybe Talislanta would benefit from publishing a series of adventures expressly designed to help new GMs run the setting without needing to be lore experts first.
I don't know Talislanta, but this sounds like some of the principles I mentioned early on.
1) As you say, some good introductory adventures that anyone can run out of the box.
2) A limited part of the setting that can be the focus for a short campaign, where the group doesn't have to know the whole setting.
3) A good genre hook - similar to the "elevator pitch" you mention. This doesn't have to cover the whole setting, but it should cover the starter adventures and initial setting slice.
Do these exist for Talislanta?
Quote from: jhkim on July 02, 2024, 08:33:16 PMI don't know Talislanta, but this sounds like some of the principles I mentioned early on.
1) As you say, some good introductory adventures that anyone can run out of the box.
2) A limited part of the setting that can be the focus for a short campaign, where the group doesn't have to know the whole setting.
3) A good genre hook - similar to the "elevator pitch" you mention. This doesn't have to cover the whole setting, but it should cover the starter adventures and initial setting slice.
Do these exist for Talislanta?
Tenbones would know better, but as far as I'm aware, the answer to 1 and 3 is "no". I have heard several people mention The Seven Kingdoms as the default starting zone, but from what I can see that's more analogous to Grehawk's Flanaess, or at least the Grand Duchy of Karameikhos, than it is to something like the Village of Hommlet.
Regarding number 3: There is a real danger in asking for a setting to have a clear genre hook or simple pitch. That attitude inevitably tends towards pushing a setting back into the creative box of needing to be like the other settings people already know, potentially defeating the whole point of coming up with something more unique. It's not impossible to be both original and relatable, but it's a very delicate balance.
Quote from: Mishihari on July 02, 2024, 12:35:20 AMOkay, you say it's a great game. I'll take you at your word. But how do you get people to play it?
Well there's the rub, now isn't it? If you as a GM are inspired to run something - you just tell your group "This is what I'm running. You in?" If you have to do the sales-pitch, which even *I* have to do with my group of veteran players that I know for a fact would play anything I'd run, it's only fair to give your players the best elevator pitch and stand firm on running it.
Players always get the final vote of not playing. That's the rule.
Quote from: SHARK on July 01, 2024, 07:20:49 PMGreetings!
Beautiful, TENBONES!
*Laughing* Yes, yes, I was subliminally calling you to comment in this thread! I knew you would not disappoint us! You come in like an A-10 Warthog, chain-gun blazing!
I have always loved Talislanta!
So much so, truth be told, as I could not really get my player groups into Talislanta--so I was continuously inspired to bring many aspects of Talislanta into my own world of Thandor. But you knew that already, my friend!
Such an awesome post, Tenbones!
Semper Fidelis,
SHARK
Bwahah and like a demon from the void, I come when called. FRESH SOULS!
Quote from: Opaopajr on July 01, 2024, 10:46:32 PMHmmm, I do agree on just about everything you say, tenbones, except for the "if your group tried it, they'll like it!" Because the assumption thereafter doesn't carry: groups don't necessarily stick with playing it (basically they don't with the switch of systems and settings). Even as GM I found people would rather shrug about doing it again and go back to the popular & familiar.
Talislanta IS great. I tried it, I liked it, I'd like to run it again. I thought I could cultivate new fans. But casuals would politely try it once and rather go back to the popular, and hard cores are already invested in mastery and would rather go back to the familiar.
But as one of my buddy's culinary teacher said:
"The secret to good business is the familiar and a hint of the new, and keeping costs down (the priceless silicone scraper). Every pastry shop that lasts follows this pattern of following expectations. In a Western pastry shop this is the core four: 1) a cakey plain thingie, 2) a creamy vanilla thingie, 3) a chocolate thingie, and 4) either a nutty thingie (allergies) or a fruity thingie (seasonal availability). If you are feeling your oats you can have a fifth mystery thingie and see how adventurous your local market demographic is, but don't feel you can 'teach' your customers what they'd prefer because it doesn't work well."
Even if people did like the experience they often don't seek it out thereafter. They follow the popular. They seek the familiar with a hint of the new.
Tragically it seems the human nature answer to this topic, for profit and lasting change, is "Change 20% or less and resell the old wine in new casings." Open-minded travelers are less prevalent than we want for sharing our favorite things.
I'm not going to say I haven't experienced this myself. But I'll add this, every group I've ever run it for, were always open to playing it again, maybe not as a go-to, but they would always seriously consider it.
One thing that always got my players going was when I'd mix it up a bit and mix Talislanta with Spelljammer. They'd get the best of both worlds (pun intended). With Talislanta skyships and powerful magic, it makes for one hell of a port-o-call for Spelljammer. And it's an excellent way of introducing traditional D&D players to the setting.
I did the same thing with Kara-Tur and Al-Qadim.
Talislanta is a good example. I wanted to give the world a shot. I still might. It looks cool. I backed the recent edition and got my pdfs. I appreciate that past editions are free.
1) I'm kinda done with d20 games. Talislanta isn't d20 per se, but it's close enough. I would have more willing to try this system 5-10 years ago. At that time, though, the character creation would have put me off. I'm more willing to entertain what are basically pregens these days.
2) Talislanta has the first partial success system that hasn't made me want to smack the designer. At least the upcoming edition, I can't really comment on previous editions. Basically, instead turning half of the player's successes into partial failures, this takes half of the player's failures and turns them into partial successes.
3) It has elves. Lots of them. Seriously, those are elves, and so are those, and also those. I don't know which races I'm referring to, because I just got this book "last Thursday," but you know what races I'm talking about, and you know those are elves. That being said, there are some really cool races and cultures here, and while I'm on the fence about the archetype-based character creation, I do like that the archetypes serve to reinforce their racial identities.
4) There is a lot of world that is not fleshed out. Ordinarily this wouldn't be too big of a problem, except the primary appeal of Talislanta is the world.
5) I can't fly by the seat of my pants very well and make shit up, because the world is too different from what I'm used to. This is related to point 4, but I think it stands on its own.
The last two points are where I think unfamiliar settings fall down. There's too much and not enough at the same time. It's too much in terms of how different it is from what the customers are readily familiar with, but then there isn't enough support for the new setting to get them on track. They have to fill in the gaps with what they know, and then they have a familiar, traditional setting. The more they do this, the more their version of the world begins to resemble a traditional fantasy setting. Then they get to wondering why they're not just playing a traditional fantasy setting.
Forgotten Realms and Dragonlance were a lot more familiar right out of the box, but on top of that, they were supported by numerous novels. That's something a lot of the unfamiliar settings just don't have going for them.
Quote from: tenbones on July 02, 2024, 10:15:08 PMQuote from: Opaopajr on July 01, 2024, 10:46:32 PMHmmm, I do agree on just about everything you say, tenbones, except for the "if your group tried it, they'll like it!" Because the assumption thereafter doesn't carry: groups don't necessarily stick with playing it (basically they don't with the switch of systems and settings). Even as GM I found people would rather shrug about doing it again and go back to the popular & familiar.
Talislanta IS great. I tried it, I liked it, I'd like to run it again. I thought I could cultivate new fans. But casuals would politely try it once and rather go back to the popular, and hard cores are already invested in mastery and would rather go back to the familiar.
But as one of my buddy's culinary teacher said:
"The secret to good business is the familiar and a hint of the new, and keeping costs down (the priceless silicone scraper). Every pastry shop that lasts follows this pattern of following expectations. In a Western pastry shop this is the core four: 1) a cakey plain thingie, 2) a creamy vanilla thingie, 3) a chocolate thingie, and 4) either a nutty thingie (allergies) or a fruity thingie (seasonal availability). If you are feeling your oats you can have a fifth mystery thingie and see how adventurous your local market demographic is, but don't feel you can 'teach' your customers what they'd prefer because it doesn't work well."
Even if people did like the experience they often don't seek it out thereafter. They follow the popular. They seek the familiar with a hint of the new.
Tragically it seems the human nature answer to this topic, for profit and lasting change, is "Change 20% or less and resell the old wine in new casings." Open-minded travelers are less prevalent than we want for sharing our favorite things.
I'm not going to say I haven't experienced this myself. But I'll add this, every group I've ever run it for, were always open to playing it again, maybe not as a go-to, but they would always seriously consider it.
One thing that always got my players going was when I'd mix it up a bit and mix Talislanta with Spelljammer. They'd get the best of both worlds (pun intended). With Talislanta skyships and powerful magic, it makes for one hell of a port-o-call for Spelljammer. And it's an excellent way of introducing traditional D&D players to the setting.
I did the same thing with Kara-Tur and Al-Qadim.
OK, I get it. From what I'm getting it sounds like you mix enough of the familiar back in to get up to that 80%+ familiarity and or popularity.
I'd say Talislanta is such a solid system that one could port it over direct into something very familiar, such as Forgotten Realms The North. It'd be great for mass combat rules, especially raids on caravans or oases of civilization. But is that too 50%/50% for system to setting? What would I have to add more to get that 80%+? Or am I overthinking it as Talislanta is way more familiar to D&D superficially, e.g. d20, stats, etc.?
Quote from: tenbones on July 01, 2024, 04:35:56 PMThe fact is - not many people played the damn game which is a goddamn shame. There is literally NO REASON TO NOT PLAY IT - it's FREEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!! (http://talislanta.com/).
It's not though. Not really. It may not cost money but that's not the only cost of learning a new game. There's also a cost in time and effort. The more unfamiliar the game or world are, the higher this cost will be. Talislanta is a lot to take in.
Yes, player familiarity with a setting is absolutely crucial. That's the only reason why I would think of using an established and widespread IP such as Star Wars or Star Trek, although all the lore can then become a straight jacket. The great benefit of using a very generic fantasy setting with elves, dwarves, orcs, and whatnot is that the players will have at least some familiarity with it, thanks to movies and video games. I'm one of those crazy people who downloaded all of the Talislanta files about two years ago. However, I have only skimmed the contents because I own more pdfs than I'll ever be able to read in my lifetime, let alone use in play.