Quote from: SavageSchemer;1139839I'm confused, Tenbones. I thought 4e had a "pick a template, change a few stats and go" style of character creation too. Am I misrememberingi that? It was 5e I thought had the lifepath style of chargen.

I think you're right. I actually run 4e at my table with 5e chargen.

Quote from: SavageSchemer;1139875One additional question for those of you who've run this thing. While the core mechanic is dead simple, the book is LOADED with edge cases and special circumstance and specific applications of that core rule. My question would be, how much do you adhere to all the extra rules information as opposed to taking in the "spirit" of how to apply the rules and just wing it in practice? I tend to favor rules that present a simple mechanic (like this does) and then turns me loose to make my own rulings.

The rule of Talislanta is *always* do what you think feels right.

But those exceptions and "feats" etc. Usually are easy to keep track of. Just make sure you do some basic combat - melee and ranged. It's pretty easy.

When you start doing multiple attacks, and the other manuevers, you can fit those in as you go. Most of it is common-sense like called shots or bypassing armor - you're taking the Armor DR as your penalty. If your PC's want to do some kind of "stunt" - they recommend you just assign a penalty and decide the effect (this is where I wish there was more meat).

Quote from: tenbones;1139793If you want to keep it simple - I'd go 2e. If you want to keep it a little more complex (but still quite easy) and cohesive with a little D&D leveling flava - go 3e. If you want Talislanta in full bloom with a very robust and medium-crunch magic system - go 4e. I'd avoid 5e entirely since it has editing issues but there was some definitely interesting directions they were taking it.

Honestly - and this is STRICTLY my opinion. 3e is the easiest for Chargen. Pick a template. Re-arrange 2 points for stats. GO. Literally you can pick it up and get rocking with a character in less than minute. You'll spend more time looking at the Archetypes than actually making a character.

2e is pretty easy too. Not too different. But they don't really use a leveling mechanic and it's all skill-based.

If you want a REALLY cool life-path style chargen, it's more involved, but richer - go 4e (Big Blue).

There are no pitfalls except you should understand the regional assumptions and cultural mores of the different races. I highly recommend starting in the Seven Kingdoms for your first go-round since it's close to the "D&D-style" of fantasy. But understand that each of the Seven Kingdoms is *very* distinct in their own right. Just start in Cymril and pretend it's Neutral Good Melnibone (with issues).

Serendipitously enough I was just going through 2e's books, especially the Cyclopedias! I was reminded about its sword & planet alienness by how it was detailed down to the small animals, insects, and even plants. This is a sign it is meant to be... and will all end in tears.

I also think I have discovered the best way to get new players into the Talislanta headspace -- Italo music, the 80s Euro love child of disco & synth. We are all so gonna be locked away, aren't we?

So, as to not get lost in the panoply of setting options, I need to pick some brains about which location first (Continent > Culture > Nation/City). I am thinking expansive deserts with gorgeous sunsets, sail-driven sand barges & salt flat wind racers, & scantily clad barbarians fighting over fashion rags & too much jewelry. I want Mad Max Meets Marshall's Massive Mid-Year Sale, and Jeff Dee is lead clothes designer (flaring cuffs & exposed thighs EVERYWHERE!).

Anywhere on the maps you can point me to narrow my search? Pray for us all.

Quote from: Opaopajr;1139981Serendipitously enough I was just going through 2e's books, especially the Cyclopedias! I was reminded about its sword & planet alienness by how it was detailed down to the small animals, insects, and even plants. This is a sign it is meant to be... and will all end in tears.

I also think I have discovered the best way to get new players into the Talislanta headspace -- Italo music, the 80s Euro love child of disco & synth. We are all so gonna be locked away, aren't we?

So, as to not get lost in the panoply of setting options, I need to pick some brains about which location first (Continent > Culture > Nation/City). I am thinking expansive deserts with gorgeous sunsets, sail-driven sand barges & salt flat wind racers, & scantily clad barbarians fighting over fashion rags & too much jewelry. I want Mad Max Meets Marshall's Massive Mid-Year Sale, and Jeff Dee is lead clothes designer (flaring cuffs & exposed thighs EVERYWHERE!).

Anywhere on the maps you can point me to narrow my search? Pray for us all.

Probably the Desert Kingdoms (Carantheum, Djaffa, Rajannir/Rajanistan) as well as the desert regions of Zaran.

The continent of Altarus could also work, although there's far less info available.

@Tenbones or anyone else who might know, any talk of a 6th edition? There's obviously plenty of stuff available, but I'd love to see a new "classic Talislanta" edition with the productive quality of Savage Land.

Quote from: Mercurius;1140043Probably the Desert Kingdoms (Carantheum, Djaffa, Rajannir/Rajanistan) as well as the desert regions of Zaran.

The continent of Altarus could also work, although there's far less info available.

You're a life saver! ... and an enabler.
Blessing upon you, and pray for our poor minds! :cool:

Quote from: Mercurius;1140047@Tenbones or anyone else who might know, any talk of a 6th edition? There's obviously plenty of stuff available, but I'd love to see a new "classic Talislanta" edition with the productive quality of Savage Land.

There was talk.

I had a very specific vision on where to go with a 6e. Basically my concept was to take Talislanta to the other continents. Remember during the Fall, some of the Archaen flying cities went spiraling to the ground, some planeshifted to who the hell knows, others shot off into random locales presumed to crash into magical atomic destruction...

Well why not have 6e focus on one of the other continents on the world of Talislanta? You'd have some of the same races (Archaen stock), their servitor races - plus now we have an entirely clean palette to design another history, on another landmass, with its own empires and cultures. There would be some familiarity - of course, some of the races would be the same, but many would be new. And the cultures would be entirely different. But the SAUCE would be that First Contact would be made with the classic Talislanta continent so you could leverage all the other content with it too.

As to why it's not happening - well some of the writers loved the idea. And before we got going on it some passive-political things occurred which forced me to pull out of the potential project. As it stands, I don't know if it's going to happen (to my knowledge it's not). But I love all the other writers on the team and hope they make it happen and circumstances change to let me dive in without the politics getting in the way (and these are my personal politics - not the other writers).

As an aside, for music yeah you could go for the whole 80's synth-fantasy vibe.

When I was writing Talislanta: Savage Lands... I was *highly* influenced by the music of Dead Can Dance. Which is kinda funny reading Dan's review... it's supposed to be bleak and post-apocalyptic on purpose. If you read the history of this era as briefly described in the previous editions... it was pretty hardcore.

The album Anabasis (from Dead Can Dance) often found itself playing in the background as I wrote. It's beautiful and dark and captures a lot of the sensibilities I was writing about - I mentioned in the interview I did with Dan that when writing Savage Lands, I was caught up in some somber moments that I was getting deep into some of these races and cultures and suddenly realize "These guys are all going to go extinct..." So I wanted to really contrast the "high fantasy-ish" aspects of classic Tal with the desperateness of the Savage Lands. The songs "Opium" and "Anabasis" in particular capture that feeling I was going for. Elements of the tribal, loss, resolve, hope, wonder and death all wrapped together.

"Opium"
https://youtu.be/zReWPjreJzI

"Anabasis" (live)
https://youtu.be/tLzBENQ3Ii8

Obviously we were going for an entirely different vibe than classic Talislanta. These were the Bad Times before the Good Times.

Speaking of designing on a clean slate - what's the recommended way to go about creating new cultures & templates? Would it be accurate to conclude the method used for the peoples & professions we know about were just "made up on the fly"? Or by gut feel? I've tried a few times to discern some kind of "point buy" system and if there was one, it eludes me entirely.

Quote from: tenbones;1140193There was talk.

I had a very specific vision on where to go with a 6e. Basically my concept was to take Talislanta to the other continents. Remember during the Fall, some of the Archaen flying cities went spiraling to the ground, some planeshifted to who the hell knows, others shot off into random locales presumed to crash into magical atomic destruction...

Well why not have 6e focus on one of the other continents on the world of Talislanta? You'd have some of the same races (Archaen stock), their servitor races - plus now we have an entirely clean palette to design another history, on another landmass, with its own empires and cultures. There would be some familiarity - of course, some of the races would be the same, but many would be new. And the cultures would be entirely different. But the SAUCE would be that First Contact would be made with the classic Talislanta continent so you could leverage all the other content with it too.

As to why it's not happening - well some of the writers loved the idea. And before we got going on it some passive-political things occurred which forced me to pull out of the potential project. As it stands, I don't know if it's going to happen (to my knowledge it's not). But I love all the other writers on the team and hope they make it happen and circumstances change to let me dive in without the politics getting in the way (and these are my personal politics - not the other writers).

This is such a god-damn tease. Jesus H Christos, that would be awesome. It is really a shame that the other continents haven't been more fleshed out. The Worldbook is one of my all-time favorite RPG books.

Quote from: Mercurius;1140245This is such a god-damn tease. Jesus H Christos, that would be awesome. It is really a shame that the other continents haven't been more fleshed out. The Worldbook is one of my all-time favorite RPG books.

Doug actually has a magnificent start on the development of the continent of Celadon which he'd made years ago, and I was pushing to use that as a springboard - or do something entirely new. I have a lot of notes on what I was brainstorming but because I decided to not move forward, I moved on to other projects.

Now - I will say this, Dougs Celadon was not finished, but damn me it was *very* cool conceptually. There's a lot of stuff I'd like to have developed within it. There was no definite decision on going with it - but I certainly would have been fine with running with it. Most of my stuff was totally independent but could easily have been nested into Dougs stuff.

Or we could have just gone with something entirely different. Yeah it's a tease... and I'm not going to dive into it because I may re-purpose it later heh.

As for why Talislanta rocks -

It's a lightweight *easy* system that was way ahead of it's time. And it's held up beautifully the whole way. The setting is wonderfully exotic, but if you read any Jack Vance or classic S&S there is a familiarity to it that's very distinct from D&D.

The world has a deep history with distinct ages that are all rich in their own lore, which informs the setting where it starts. All the conceits you'd find in dungeon-crawls, hex-crawls, politics, and good ol' fashioned sandbox play are all on the menu.

Tons of races with their own cultures. Tons of culture specific gear. Really evil bad guys. Really complex good-guys. It's got a wonderful bestiary I will put up against any fantasy game. Ecology is very well established with writeups on flora and fauna, and their uses in-game. Now with Savage Lands we have Mass-Combat, and "Tribe play" which can easily be ported to the classic era. Magic scales to unbelievable levels that puts D&D to utter shame... (getting to play at that level is another matter - but it's fully supported).

The biggest limitation to the game is the imagination of the GM and players getting over the "appearance" factor.

Quote from: tenbones;1140296As for why Talislanta rocks -

It's a lightweight *easy* system that was way ahead of it's time. And it's held up beautifully the whole way. The setting is wonderfully exotic, but if you read any Jack Vance or classic S&S there is a familiarity to it that's very distinct from D&D.

The world has a deep history with distinct ages that are all rich in their own lore, which informs the setting where it starts. All the conceits you'd find in dungeon-crawls, hex-crawls, politics, and good ol' fashioned sandbox play are all on the menu.

Tons of races with their own cultures. Tons of culture specific gear. Really evil bad guys. Really complex good-guys. It's got a wonderful bestiary I will put up against any fantasy game. Ecology is very well established with writeups on flora and fauna, and their uses in-game. Now with Savage Lands we have Mass-Combat, and "Tribe play" which can easily be ported to the classic era. Magic scales to unbelievable levels that puts D&D to utter shame... (getting to play at that level is another matter - but it's fully supported).

The biggest limitation to the game is the imagination of the GM and players getting over the "appearance" factor.

I think that's just it. D&D is embedded within well-known tropes and common references; when I was describing it to my daughters before playing, it was easy enough to say that "It is kinda like Lord of the Rings, but you play one of the characters."

Tolkien is well known, even among people who haven't ready the books but seen the movies. Vance and Clark Ashton Smith are not, and Talislanta is unique and distinct from those. Less of a "jumping board."

I also agree re: the system. To me it finds the perfect balance between simplicity and enough granularity for a variety of play experiences.

And as far as a pure expression of imaginative creativity, in my opinion it stands above every published RPG setting, comfortably ahead of my next tier of favorites like Earthdawn and Shadow World.

He tenbones, quick question. As far as lore is concerned, anything in 5E that is lacking in earlier editions? I've often considered picking up Hotan's, but as far as I can tell its just expansion on Chronicles (plus, there are no copies available except for one or two for $150ish). Never really dived into the Darkness book.

Quote from: Mercurius;1140303I also agree re: the system. To me it finds the perfect balance between simplicity and enough granularity for a variety of play experiences.

And as far as a pure expression of imaginative creativity, in my opinion it stands above every published RPG setting, comfortably ahead of my next tier of favorites like Earthdawn and Shadow World.

I agree with you here. But we have to be honest... there has always been *something* about Talislanta that seems like a 'bridge too far' because Earthdawn, in particular, is *far* more popular in its heyday than Talislanta ever was. But those of us that love Talislanta keep the torch burning. It was largely the reason why I jumped onto the Savage Lands project, every person on there did it for the love of the game.

Quote from: Mercurius;1140303He tenbones, quick question. As far as lore is concerned, anything in 5E that is lacking in earlier editions? I've often considered picking up Hotan's, but as far as I can tell its just expansion on Chronicles (plus, there are no copies available except for one or two for $150ish). Never really dived into the Darkness book.

There is *very* little in the core 5e game that adds anything lorewise that is relevant. In fact that was one of the big hanging points about doing 6e, Steve (Sechi) is pretty particular about new material, and he correctly said "Why do 6e when we already have five editions of the same material?"

I completely agree - as both a creator and consumer, it would not serve the fanbase (old or new) to simply do yet another edition of the same material. That's when I precisely why I said "Well it's a big world and a LOT of stuff out there has never been explored. There's lots of possibilities that some of the Archaen ancients made it to other continents during the great cataclysm. It's all but implied by the fact that many of the flying cities simply got flung to "somewhere" never to be seen again. So the premise is sitting *right* there.

Plus with Flying Ships etc. and levitational magitech - it's only a matter of time before explorers brave the scary skies over the endless seas to search for lands unknown, right?

Quote from: tenbones;1140312I agree with you here. But we have to be honest... there has always been *something* about Talislanta that seems like a 'bridge too far' because Earthdawn, in particular, is *far* more popular in its heyday than Talislanta ever was. But those of us that love Talislanta keep the torch burning. It was largely the reason why I jumped onto the Savage Lands project, every person on there did it for the love of the game.

Yes, true.

Quote from: tenbones;1140312There is *very* little in the core 5e game that adds anything lorewise that is relevant. In fact that was one of the big hanging points about doing 6e, Steve (Sechi) is pretty particular about new material, and he correctly said "Why do 6e when we already have five editions of the same material?"

I completely agree - as both a creator and consumer, it would not serve the fanbase (old or new) to simply do yet another edition of the same material. That's when I precisely why I said "Well it's a big world and a LOT of stuff out there has never been explored. There's lots of possibilities that some of the Archaen ancients made it to other continents during the great cataclysm. It's all but implied by the fact that many of the flying cities simply got flung to "somewhere" never to be seen again. So the premise is sitting *right* there.

Plus with Flying Ships etc. and levitational magitech - it's only a matter of time before explorers brave the scary skies over the endless seas to search for lands unknown, right?

One good reason to do a new edition would be to bring it up-to-date with contemporary publishing quality. Savage Lands (which I only own in PDF) is so far ahead of the previous editions, and I'd love to see classic Talislanta re-done in similar fashion.

But yes, great ideas. I haven't delved in Talislanta for some years, but this is making me want to hit the books again.

Speaking of which, do you know if and when a print copy of Savage Lands--with the original game system--will be available? As I said, I backed the kickstarter via PDF only, but haven't read through it because I dislike PDFs. Would love to pick up a print copy, but everywhere I look says "pre-order."

EDIT: it seems like Chaosium picked it up and will be publishing it? I can't find an announcement but it shows up in online stores as pre-orders from Chaosium.