Sorry, but exactly what kind of Kabbalah are you talking about here?  When you say traditional Jewish Kabbalah, which are you referring to specifically?

This game/system sounds like it will, like almost all RPGs, be a niche product with a small market share. Mostly RPGs are labors of love. With rare exceptions, nobody gets rich writing RPGs. There is nothing wrong with that. The more Kabbalah you put in the game, the more it will be like Glorantha or Tekumel. By that I mean, it will be a strong draw for those that like it or are intrigued, but the esoteric-ism will be a barrier for general acceptance. But since I love both Runequest/Glorantha and the Tekumel setting, I don't see those barriers as a problem, I see it as a strength. I think that CRKrueger exactly lays out what your target buyer wants from Kabbalah.

Quote from: CRKrueger;848697You had me with a syntactical Kabbalah magic system.

You lost me a little when everything in the world was going to be built using the Kabbalic elements.

You lost me more when you said they weren't going to really be Kabbalic terms.

If you're gonna do the Kabbalah thing, go whole hog, go big or stay home.  

GURPS with some basis of Kabbalah in the Point Buy system...meh.

A system that tells me what I can do with different combinations of the 72-fold name of God...pure fucking gold.

The enthusiasm you got in the first line of Krueger's post is what you need to sell GMs and players on learning something with the system complexity of GURPS or Pathfinder.
 
As far as using the Kabbalah as a universal system, we already have universal systems like Heroquest and Fate at one end of the spectrum. GURPS and HERO at the other end of the spectrum. And BRP and D6 in the middle.

Existing players and GMs who want a universal system already have one. Why should they switch to Kabbalah as a universal system over one of those existing systems that they already understand?

Quote from: RPGPundit;848991Sorry, but exactly what kind of Kabbalah are you talking about here?  When you say traditional Jewish Kabbalah, which are you referring to specifically?

Lurianic. I've steered clear on other Kabbalistic interpretations, not because I think they're wrong, but because they had differing interpretations on the coorespondences of things like planets to the double letters, and the pairs of contraries that thry represent, etc. As an interdependent system of rules relationships, i needed one self-consistent model.

Quote from: Bren;849009As far as using the Kabbalah as a universal system, we already have universal systems like Heroquest and Fate at one end of the spectrum. GURPS and HERO at the other end of the spectrum. And BRP and D6 in the middle.

Existing players and GMs who want a universal system already have one. Why should they switch to Kabbalah as a universal system over one of those existing systems that they already understand?

The value in my take on a universal system is that it allows you fine control over how everything works, while maintaining mechanical engagement with the system. In other words, it's a firm system with specific rules, but the rules are granular enough that you build anything specific with them. Your powers and items work the way you (GM ir player) want them to, rather than how a listing says they do.

There are other major innovations, but the primary one is that it's meant to be an ultimate tinkerer's ruleset. Balance is applied from the smallest rules, so you can build without worrying. You'll know when something's overpowered, because you have to choose to make it such.

Quote from: Monster Manuel;848661I chose Kabbalah because it did the job I set out for the game, as a model that attempted to describe reality.

I'd just hate to have spent 11 years developing a "game" that was useful mostly as an academic curiosity. I want to play it!

Is the source material in any way a turn off or draw in itself? Would you judge it on its own merits as a game?

Thanks.

Just think of it this way. If your game was a movie, would people want to see it? And if most players don't role-play period at the table, what would they find fun with the game?

Quote from: Monster Manuel;848661I decided to model the forces of creation in Kabbalah-- the letters of the Hebrew Alphabet and the sephiroth of the Tree of life-- using what I called "Elements"- words that serve as the components of Effects and structures. They are simultaneously nouns and verbs, so you can use them as either in context. I've talked about the game before, so maybe if you Google me with regards to the project (called "Tribute"), you'll get more data. Long story short, it works a bit like a syntactic magic system with nouns and verbs- or perhaps a simple object-oriented programming language. I't's not a traditional Effects-based game where you can buy powers off the rack, because you can build your most basic effects from components that do things like convey their target in any specified frame of reference, or drain energy of any kind, rather than taking a flight power and tailoring it.

How is that different from Ars Magica or Sorcerers of Ur-Turuk?

The game is a generic toolkit like Fudge or Gurps. The Kabballah is not a magic system, it's the game machanics themselves. All game mechanics are described as units called Elements that correspond to  Kabbalistic concepts. To whether I'd watch a movie about the game, I'd have to say "Mu". There's no inherent setting in the core rules, the game is pure mechanics. A better analogy for it would be the tools used to make movies.

You don't have to learn Kabbalah before you play the game, but playing it should give a person a perspective on these concepts that will help them learn should they want to.

A side note: Kabbalah (with some additions from Blake) was used for the cosmological structure of the "Hero Universe" in the 5th and 6th Editions of the HERO System. See The Mystic World or The Book of the Empress for a discussion of the dimensional layout; I think the former might be more useful to you, to whatever extent it can be useful.

Quote from: Armchair Gamer;849057A side note: Kabbalah (with some additions from Blake) was used for the cosmological structure of the "Hero Universe" in the 5th and 6th Editions of the HERO System. See The Mystic World or The Book of the Empress for a discussion of the dimensional layout; I think the former might be more useful to you, to whatever extent it can be useful.

Thank you. I'm appreciating these recommendations.