Who's seen this game? I've got the only English system translation available for Engel (it's d20). It's a game put out by Feder & Schwartz SSS, which I think is the White Wolf branch located in Germany. I know that there's a German system out there which hardly exists at all; as far as I know, it's just drawing from a Tarot deck and guessing at what it means.

But, it's been translated into d20. That's the good news.
The bad news? It's a bad translation. Which is surprising, because most of this SSS stuff is really well thought out. The production values are amazing, and the world is really fucking cool. But I want to finish the work and create a superior d20 translation - here's what I was thinking of.

The game is set up to accomodate the Engel of the Church - a sort of Warhammer 40k-esque humanistic 'against the monster' kind of thing. Their chief opponents are the monsters of The Lord of Flies, and their greatist weapons against it are the super-human Engel - angels sent from heaven to do the work of the lord (and pontifus maximus) against them.

Set up, it's really not made to do it well. Their best effort was to create new classes for each caste of angel (based on arch-angel's domains - Raphilite, Michalite, Urielite...), but they're not mechanically slick. Humans get to use regular D&D classes, except without magic. Which means Fighter, Rogue, and non-spellcasting NPC classes. Which is lame, and in addition, the texts all focus on what it's like to be human, and focuses on regular humans as opposed to Engel.

Which tells me that I'd really prefer to make the game about humans with the Engel making cameos. It's almost two games.

The Engel are almost super-human in the text, but they're wimps in the books. I think I can change that, too, by creating something like Engel-caste only Feats that mimic powers and abilities. In this way, it'd be kind of similar to how I'd treat superheros in d20. I don't want to create new classes for them. For humans, well, I'm really considering making the game a port of either True20 or using d20 Modern.

I was thinking about porting low-leveled Exalted rules for the Engel, but that's another project. I'm far more savvy with d20, and more enthusiastic about a project I'm well versed in.  I'm happy to expound on setting in order to promote mechanical ideas, and very happy to hear thoughts about accomodating post-apoc humans and their religiously-bound super-soldiers in the same d20 setting. It's a new project, one that takes its place beside my new gaming enthusiasm for work (now that I'm out of school, for the most part).

Quote from: Thanatos02Their chief opponents are the monsters of The Lord of Flies, and their greatist weapons against it are the super-human Engel - angels sent from heaven to do the work of the lord (and pontifus maximus) against them.

Heh heh heh.

But true, the mechanics used in the English translation are a wreck. It's no wonder that there have been several attempts to convert the game into other systems, like the Storytelling variant discussed here.

Hmm, you could get the original game and a good dictionary

If you are going the D20 route - or almost any other Route for that mater I'd suggest going with Mutants and Masterminds for D20 so you have a good mix of powers mechanically laid out for you already.

Another system that lends pretty easily to converting is the One Role Engine system from Godlike, there is a free version out called Nemesis and they have a new more super powers centric one called Wild Talents.  Easy system to learn and it's pretty adaptable.

Then there would also be a Tri-Stat system.  Again easy to learn, free and plenty of stated powers to work with.

Oh, and if someone wants to take a look at that card-based "Arkana" system, it's available as a PDF download here.

Thanks for the link, I really will peruse it in a little while.
I'm leery about using MM because I have no access to the books, and I don't really need powers already laid out. The original books give a good idea of what kind of powers the Engel have in a d20 format, so if I don't like them as written, it's easy for me to convert them. I'm just wondering how to format the conversion.

The d20 books I've access to are d20 Modern and Future, relevant D&D 3.5 volumes, and Blue Rose (which we all use for True20) if I wanna borrow a friend's copy (again). (Yeah, Brantai, that's you. ^_^;)

The WW conversion looks really good. Like, I'm still going forward with d20, but I've bookmarked it and am keeping it in mind for my hopeful Storyteller conversion. (I'm still thinking Exalted, really, but that's a good work.)

I would definately go with a rules lighter approach. Maybe a True20 template for each of the Orders of Angels. So you have the freedom to explore the awesome setting.

Quote from: KrakaJakI would definately go with a rules lighter approach. Maybe a True20 template for each of the Orders of Angels. So you have the freedom to explore the awesome setting.

You know, True20 pretty much worked off the back of d20 proper, and D&D. I could probably do a healthy True20 conversion of d20 Future for the Engel setting.

If that's starting to sound convoluted, well, maybe. But it seems like it plays out ok in my head. Maybe using Feats to replicate Engel abilities and using the Wealth checks to see what Engel or other church-breathern can requisition. (I might go ahead and leave a loose coin-and-barter system for the Junklords and commoners.)

I think the DC checks for purchase represent how money is likely to be used far more for the church then just how much coin they have.