Quote from: ggroy;462747"The Princess of Mars" by Edgar Rice Burroughs, seems to have been written in this style a century ago (in 1911).

Hmmm... I'd have to think about that... been a long time since I read that.

QuoteThis sounds like a thinly disguise criticism of 4E D&D.  

I Didn't have 4E in mind specifically... I mostly stay out of that fight.

Quote from: Opaopajr;462781I have a question. Do you get sick of the Setting, the Themes, the Mood, or the System?

All of the above, really.

The setting is the big one. I don't get it.  I don't see what's so cool or special about kings and princesses, knights in armour, elves, trolls and goblins, swords with names and evil wizards.  Maybe for some people it's satisfies some sort yearning for a mythical, idyllic past and simpler times, I don't know, but I just don't get it.  

On top of the that I tend to have issues with typical fantasy themes and systems. It doesn't have to, but fantasy seems to  be big on exploration. Whether it's the great outdoors or the dungeon, there is a whole lot of moving to the next location and triggering whatever is there. That's never been fun for me. Zero to hero, also prevalent in fantasy, doesn't work for me either. I generally prefer to start with a competent character and pretty much stay roughly at that level.    

And though there are a lot of systems that can do fantasy for our group it's mostly been D&D. The game has got it's virtues, but all in all I'm not a fan of the D&D model, with the levels, attritional combat and the focus on the acquisition of ever better equipment.

At the end of the day you can tweak system and themes but if the basics of the setting don't appeal, it's a bit of a lost battle. We could (and have) play a city based Warhammer FRP game with a Cthulhu like plot and that would be  a step in the right direction. But I still fail to see how setting this game in a faux Renaissance Europe helps anything.

Quote from: Soylent Green;462804All of the above, really.

I hear you. Not much to be done about that. I love it, btw.

Quote from: Soylent Green;462804The setting is the big one. I don't get it.  I don't see what's so cool or special about kings and princesses, knights in armour, elves, trolls and goblins, swords with names and evil wizards.  Maybe for some people it's satisfies some sort yearning for a mythical, idyllic past and simpler times, I don't know, but I just don't get it.

Yeah, the tropes are one of those things that's rather on/off. At best you could put it in some tribal commune on the savannah with panther people and evil witch doctors. When I think high fantasy setting I'm open to more cultural tropes than the standard fare. But that's definitely not the norm; pseudo-Europe definitely has popular cache. It's one of the reasons I loved M:tG Mirage block...

Quote from: Soylent Green;462804On top of the that I tend to have issues with typical fantasy themes and systems. It doesn't have to, but fantasy seems to  be big on exploration. Whether it's the great outdoors or the dungeon, there is a whole lot of moving to the next location and triggering whatever is there. That's never been fun for me. Zero to hero, also prevalent in fantasy, doesn't work for me either. I generally prefer to start with a competent character and pretty much stay roughly at that level.    

And though there are a lot of systems that can do fantasy for our group it's mostly been D&D. The game has got it's virtues, but all in all I'm not a fan of the D&D model, with the levels, attritional combat and the focus on the acquisition of ever better equipment.

I love exploration! However, what you're talking about reminds me of plot investigation and pixel bitching while someone changed the drapes. I myself rarely get a good exploration game in high fantasy because I end up with the same thing you dislike. I like sandboxes. Too often people run exploration as window dressing, not letting the player explore the inner elements as well, such as ecology, politics, economy, social, etc. I feel your pain, but from a different direction.

And zero to hero, let's go save the world!, has always been a pet peeve of mine. A tiresome trope and wholly overused in video games. The scope is too big; takes a large world and reduces it to a lynchpin of a single party's story. Irritating.

And yes, I too have my issues with AD&D. Hate levels, hate classes, hate chargen min/max minigame, hate drowning in tables and modifiers... but still I play. Sometimes I can swing people to my home brews, sometimes even to different systems. But I'll do a give and take with the table.

Quote from: Soylent Green;462804At the end of the day you can tweak system and themes but if the basics of the setting don't appeal, it's a bit of a lost battle. We could (and have) play a city based Warhammer FRP game with a Cthulhu like plot and that would be  a step in the right direction. But I still fail to see how setting this game in a faux Renaissance Europe helps anything.

I see, it sounds like it's mainly pseudo-Europe location and all the entrapping tropes that are nauseating you. You wanna go on vacation, but someone's happy where they are. Sort of an impasse, no?

At best, what do you want to play? What intrinsic difference is your greatest priority? Is it time/tech period, cultural location, or game system? I'm hearing themes and mood aren't enough. So the next question is: what would be enough?

I tend to vacillate from the low-fantasy to high-fantasy spectrum, from one campaign to another.

RPGPundit

I would love to do some low fantasy.  Unfortunately, everyone loves having access to powerful magic.

Have you thought about Birthright's setting conceit that the vast majority of magic is mainly Illusionist & Divination schools with access to all 1st & 2nd lvl school spells? Mages of other schools exist, but it's in the realm of 200-400 people for an entire continent (the size of the island of UK, but never you mind). And wizards who can cast realm magic are half that number.

In this way legerdemain and seers are common, but true magic (and its equipment) are pretty rare. Or even better, just cap off all spells to 1st & 2nd lvl, dump classes, make people choose professions and skills and run from there!

Can you sell your crew on Runequest? Never played it, but it's on my list of games to look at. It seems to receive kudos here. That, low magic, and maybe a setting change away from Europe might just be what the doctor ordered. (I vote Australian outback. Then you can have a bard with a didgeridoo.)

Quote from: jgants;463019I would love to do some low fantasy.  Unfortunately, everyone loves having access to powerful magic.

They might surprise you. My series of Tiwesdaeg campaigns were quite popular, and were low magic. The only ever PC wizard was in the first one, and she chose blood rune magic - magic powered by shedding blood and writing runes with it. Everyone was disgusted by her.

The magic was magical, and the monsters were monstrous.

Magic was a source of wonder, it could not be explained and was viewed with awe and fear. A villain wizard used blood magic to deceive and rape, and was loathed by all. One of his many illegitimate sons was an alchemist hunchback, and every player remembers him stripping naked, smearing himself with a foul-smelling unguent, and flying away with a baby.

Over the several campaigns, the monsters met were a dragon in one campaign, a giant, dwarves in their mountain, an ice giant, and a dog-headed man. The players were, I think, the most afraid of the dog-headed man, living in the ruins of an ancient villa, being fed by superstitious locals.

Quote from: Opaopajr;463174Can you sell your crew on Runequest? Never played it, but it's on my list of games to look at. It seems to receive kudos here. That, low magic, and maybe a setting change away from Europe might just be what the doctor ordered. (I vote Australian outback. Then you can have a bard with a didgeridoo.)

I actually do have some thoughts around using Runequest.

One idea I had is a fantasy setting based on Pre-Incan Peru.

The other was a more mythical Greece theme, inspired by the computer game Titan Quest.