I really want to run a sword and sorcery campaign for my new group soon but am struggling to choose between 3 games.

Which would you choose between Conan Adventures in an Age Undreamed Of, Astonishing Swordsmen and Sorcerers of Hyperborea 2e, or Barbarians of Lemuria Mythic Edition?

None of the above. Instead, Crypts & Things Remastered

Like AS&SH, it's basically a Swords & Wizardry hack, but IMHO, it works better.  AS&SH is weird to me, it's a strange combination of OD&D and B/X, where they want to get rid of multi-classing (I guess because everyone is human), but come up with a bunch of hybrid classes (to simulate multiclassing). And then it lifts a bunch of stuff from CAS and HPL and either slightly changes the name or uses it in a completely different context.

Crypts & Things keeps it simpler. Only 4 basic classes, but some more exotic ones but they are more original than just a combination of the two classes (and lets you play a serpent man). It also has a more original world, not just location names plucked randomly from Cthulhu mythos stuff.

I am also considering Primeval Thule for D&D 5e.

Quote from: JeremyR;1086216None of the above. Instead, Crypts & Things Remastered

Like AS&SH, it's basically a Swords & Wizardry hack, but IMHO, it works better.  AS&SH is weird to me, it's a strange combination of OD&D and B/X, where they want to get rid of multi-classing (I guess because everyone is human), but come up with a bunch of hybrid classes (to simulate multiclassing). And then it lifts a bunch of stuff from CAS and HPL and either slightly changes the name or uses it in a completely different context.

Crypts & Things keeps it simpler. Only 4 basic classes, but some more exotic ones but they are more original than just a combination of the two classes (and lets you play a serpent man). It also has a more original world, not just location names plucked randomly from Cthulhu mythos stuff.

This is one I have had my eyes on as well.  I also own Atlantis the Second Age.

Quote from: daddystabz;1086217I am also considering Primeval Thule for D&D 5e.

I'm loving it! Can't recommend it highly enough as a campaign setting. It's incredibly rich and I keep finding new cool stuff. The 5e rules work very well for a Marvel Savage Sword of Conan feel - higher magic than the REH stories but still a lot of fun, very accessible but still with a very S&S tone. I think my only major change to core 5e was to remove the raise dead type spells or have them create undead.

My campaign blog in sig gives a good taste. The published adventures are very good, apart from the three in the hardback I think my favourite is Watchers of Meng.

The tone can be tweaked quite easily by limiting classes, eg disallowing the Cleric class except for Old One cults would give a dark more horrific tone.

Quote from: daddystabz;1086214Which would you choose between Conan Adventures in an Age Undreamed Of, Astonishing Swordsmen and Sorcerers of Hyperborea 2e, or Barbarians of Lemuria Mythic Edition?

I would go with the Conan Adventures game. It's a lot of fun to play and seemed really easy to run (I was a player and the GM was fairly new to gaming but had no problem keeping the game going).

I'd probably go with Astonishing Swordsmen & Sorcerers of Hyperborea. I like the setting, and I think many of the adventure modules are good. But I've always liked Crypts & Things, too, and would consider that one, as well.

Quote from: Philotomy Jurament;1086222I'd probably go with Astonishing Swordsmen & Sorcerers of Hyperborea. I like the setting, and I think many of the adventure modules are good. But I've always liked Crypts & Things, too, and would consider that one, as well.

If I wanted an OSR sword and sorcery game I think Crypts &Things in the Primeval Thule setting would be great.

RPGPundit did a good review of Barbarians of Lemuria. It's in the Review section and the accompanying thread is quite good with lots of discussion about BoL and why its got a fandom.

As for me, I'd run Swords & Wizardry: White Box and use Carcosa as the setting. If I wanted more gonzo S&S, I'd use The Islands of the Purple Haunted Putrescence as the setting.

I'd use BoL Mythic, as nothing else quite captures the feel of the original 1930s early source material (which for me, is what S&S is all about). I know you have done work on a BoL Hyborian game before (did you run it?) so you know the plusses and minuses of the system.

The big one is limited PC development - if you don't regard 'levelling up' or any equivalent improvement as a vital part of your gaming experience (which I don't), and can live without the zero to hero arc, then BoL wins hands down, in my opinion. If those things are important to you, then it's not the game for you. If you like to start with a competent PC and development for you is your PC's influence/notoriety/reputation in the game world (not gaining ever more widgets as you progress) then BoL delivers.

Really it all comes down to horses for courses - play the system that delivers what you and your players think of as S&S. Definitions of this vary widely! Or you could run three campaigns in all your possible choices and burn out on S&S for the following decade!

NB: I've not run Atlantis: The Second Age, but it does look intriguing...

Quote from: Spinachcat;1086226As for me, I'd run Swords & Wizardry: White Box and use Carcosa as the setting. If I wanted more gonzo S&S, I'd use The Islands of the Purple Haunted Putrescence as the setting.

Or track down the original version of Geoffry McKenney's Carcosa supplement. Later printings were done for LotFP, but the first one was for OD&D and really kicked ass.

Anything but Conan Adventures in an Age Undreamed Of. I like both BoL and Crypts & Things.

Quote from: Philotomy Jurament;1086222I'd probably go with Astonishing Swordsmen & Sorcerers of Hyperborea. I like the setting, and I think many of the adventure modules are good. But I've always liked Crypts & Things, too, and would consider that one, as well.

Would it take a lot of effort to use Crypts & Things to run AS&SH? If you want OSR Swords & Sorcery that sort of sounds like the best option...

Quote from: daddystabz;1086214I really want to run a sword and sorcery campaign for my new group soon but am struggling to choose between 3 games. Which would you choose between Conan Adventures in an Age Undreamed Of, Astonishing Swordsmen and Sorcerers of Hyperborea 2e, or Barbarians of Lemuria Mythic Edition?

Sword and sorcery means different things to different people and I'm not exactly sure what expectations you may have. I'll give you my impression of AS&SH, which I've been running at conventions and online for a few years now. In the name of full disclosure, I have also written a tiny little bit for it at this point. I've never played/read Conan Adventures in an Age Undreamed of, Barbarians of Lemuria Mythic Edition or Crypts & Things, so I don't have much to offer on them. With those caveats...

AS&SH bills itself as a Swords, Sorcery and Weird Fantasy game with rules and conventions informed by Gygax and Arneson and literary inspiration from Howard, Lovecraft, Smith, Burroughs, Leiber, Merritt, Moorcock, Vance, and Wagner, among others. What that means is that it plays like AD&D and the default setting of Hyperborea feels like a Weird Tales mash-up with some super science and "ancient technology" elements sprinkled in (radium pistols, laser swords, anti-grav belts and even flamethrowers).

To me, the setting's a nice, pulpy vision of humans (no fantasy elfs, dwarves, hobbits, etc) surviving in a dying world against alien, elder, demonic, twisted, mutated or dead things (no dozens of colored dragons etc). The world exists as a flat slice of cold mountainous land spinning through the void, hacked away from an ancient earth, with its surrounding ocean spilling into infinity. Its bloated, dying red sun skirts the horizon, never fully setting or rising. A great plague wiped out almost everything 1,000 years ago and the surviving Amazons, Atlanteans, Esquimaux, Hyperboreans, Ixians, Kelts, Kimmerians, Picts and Vikings, among others, never really recovered, leaving plenty of creature-filled ruins to explore. The gods all seem vengeful or at best uncaring. Overall, it feels designed to be more episodic than epic, which I love, because I don't like epic high fantasy stuff. Go raid that lost tomb and raise enough money for one last great feast!

Another thing, at this point there are a lot of AS&SH adventures too (ten with two more on the way), so it's not just another "OSR" rules book with no supporting material.

Now, if you believe "swords and sorcery" means little/no magic, magic is evil or magic must corrupt the user, you can probably still make the AS&SH rules work if you want. You would disallow all of the casting classes and exclude most/all magical items (or technological items). Would be harder to untangle those elements from the default setting though, which is the main draw for me, and the reason that I use the rules system. So, if you don't want sorcery to be playable in any meaningful sense, it might be easier to use a different game where the's an anti-sorcery bias built into everything.

One of these days I want to run Crypts and Things with the Call of Cthulhu d20 magic system ported over.

So in CoCd20, anyone can learn spells out of mythos tomes (altho for C&T you could restrict it to sorcerer class). Casting generally does temporary attribute damage to the caster, as well as sanity loss. It's some dark shit.

Shout out for Low Fantasy Gaming as well. It's low magic, and such magic as exists is dangerous.

Quote from: Chainsaw;1086246To me, the setting's a nice, pulpy vision of humans (no fantasy elfs, dwarves, hobbits, etc) surviving in a dying world against alien, elder, demonic, twisted, mutated or dead things (no dozens of colored dragons etc). The world exists as a flat slice of cold mountainous land spinning through the void, hacked away from an ancient earth, with its surrounding ocean spilling into infinity. Its bloated, dying red sun skirts the horizon, never fully setting or rising. A great plague wiped out almost everything 1,000 years ago and the surviving Amazons, Atlanteans, Esquimaux, Hyperboreans, Ixians, Kelts, Kimmerians, Picts and Vikings, among others, never really recovered, leaving plenty of creature-filled ruins to explore. The gods all seem vengeful or at best uncaring. Overall, it feels designed to be more episodic than epic, which I love, because I don't like epic high fantasy stuff. Go raid that lost tomb and raise enough money for one last great feast!

Sounds very awesome! But $70 for an OSR core book? Ouch.  
http://www.hyperborea.tv/