An Amber-in-all-but-name Game?

[Nihilistic Mind]

Qwilion, thank you for doing this, and thank you for the updates!

[RPGPundit]

First I need to hammer out the licencing though

Steve.

And what exactly would you be licensing, if it wasn't Amber (the setting)?
Would you be licensing Erick Wujcik's words? Text from the original edition?

I mean, if its just the rules, you don't actually need a license for that.

RPGPundit

[Qwilion]

The idea that you can't copyright game mechanics is pretty common that does not mean that I can't extend the courtesy to Diceless by Design it also allows us  to referance the title of the book and state that it will be based on Erick's work.

I like to give credit where its due, and consider it Nostalgia and Respect for Erick.

[Qwilion]

Just thought I would let you folks know.

Jason Durall (Shadow Knight, Game of Thrones Rpg), has agreed to work as the Lead Designer on a potential Diceless Patronage Project for Rite Publishing

Talks are proceeding with Diceless by Design, we have had a half dozen emails right now, all of which have been very positive.

[steelmax73]

sounds good i will donate some to a Patronage Project

[Croaker]

No!!!

I... Wow, I just hope this'll work. And yes, I'm ready to give money for this, too

[RPGPundit]

It sounds like one way or another, there could be an "Amber Diceless Renaissance" in the works.

RPGPundit

[Qwilion]

Well Diceless by Design is reviewing my pitch, they were off at Ambercon this weekend so I don't expect to hear back from them until later this week.

I have already put together a projected threshold goal/budget, and I have the artist, I will still need to recruit an editor but I have plenty, so all I am awaiting on is the approval.

[Qwilion]

Weekly update

Recieved Wed, Mar 31, 2010 at 5:35 PM

Steve

I'm just waiting for Eric and my schedules to sync up so we can discuss the details.  I'm swamped this week, but trying.

Regards,

Edwin

In my head I have been calling this "By Any Other Name"  as a reference to this thread, the symbol of the silver rose, and Shakespeare quotes.

expect another update next week.

[Qwilion]

A nice update from one member of  Diceless By Design (There are two folks who have to approve this)

Based on what I've read on this {email} thread, this project sounds great to me. What support do you need in order to get this moving forward, Steve?

Without going into exhaustive details I have put forward a framework for the proposed "Powered by Erick Wujcik's Diceless Rpg" licence, i let them know it would want it to be signed by April 31st and asked them if they would like me to present a licence proposal.

[jibbajibba]

What are your major design ideas?
To put together a generic diceless system based on the ADRPG model or do something more specific?

[Qwilion]

@JibbaJabba

Updated Rules with a new setting.

but here is a bit of what I said in those email coverasations.

"The setting would be Jason Durall's domain to develop, based on the input of patrons. I give our freelancers as much free range as the budget allows. It will also be influenced by the patrons and senior patrons on the project something Jason and I have discussed in detail, which can best be described as play-testing while still developing the setting and gaining instant feedback from your fanbase as you discuss each section.
 
On the expansion, I expect that to be Jason's vision of a 2nd edition of the rules set, but presented in the take-it-or-leave-it format that Shadow Knight was presented in. Since the fundamental design philosophy of amber tends to be trust in the GM, I would like to retain that feel in our Diceless Project.
   
For a GM this can be a new Shadow or a new Pattern, or a shdow of the Courts of Chaos or Corwin's New Pattern version of Rebma, Tir-na Nog'th,  or perhaps even the reflection in Chaos of Corwin's new pattern. With the shadows of Amber the possibilities are endless. Again we leave it up the GM as we will not be using any Amber IP
 
My fundamental idea is to look at the underlying tropes of Amber, and playing with those tropes, along with making use of things like Shakespeare, Tarot, amid looking at what influenced Zelazny's writings, like his acknowledged inspirations, The World of Tiers and Kuttner's "The Dark World."

Steve Russell
Rite Publishing

[jibbajibba]

@JibbaJabba

Updated Rules with a new setting.

but here is a bit of what I said in those email coverasations.

"The setting would be Jason Durall's domain to develop, based on the input of patrons. I give our freelancers as much free range as the budget allows. It will also be influenced by the patrons and senior patrons on the project something Jason and I have discussed in detail, which can best be described as play-testing while still developing the setting and gaining instant feedback from your fanbase as you discuss each section.
 
On the expansion, I expect that to be Jason's vision of a 2nd edition of the rules set, but presented in the take-it-or-leave-it format that Shadow Knight was presented in. Since the fundamental design philosophy of amber tends to be trust in the GM, I would like to retain that feel in our Diceless Project.
   
For a GM this can be a new Shadow or a new Pattern, or a shdow of the Courts of Chaos or Corwin's New Pattern version of Rebma, Tir-na Nog'th,  or perhaps even the reflection in Chaos of Corwin's new pattern. With the shadows of Amber the possibilities are endless. Again we leave it up the GM as we will not be using any Amber IP
 
My fundamental idea is to look at the underlying tropes of Amber, and playing with those tropes, along with making use of things like Shakespeare, Tarot, amid looking at what influenced Zelazny's writings, like his acknowledged inspirations, The World of Tiers and Kuttner's "The Dark World."

Steve Russell
Rite Publishing

Okay.
What do you think the bite points will be re the IP? Will you be able to mention Pattern, Amber, Chaos? or will you need to be totally apart? Or have you yet to determine that with Diceless?

I am just wondering how from a system perspective you can cover stuff like Powers generically.

Just trying to see if this will be a generic rules system with toolkits for building out powers that would enable you to create Amber-like abilities, or if it would look to keep the core powers.

[Qwilion]

Okay.

What do you think the bite points will be re the IP? Will you be able to mention Pattern, Amber, Chaos? or will you need to be totally apart? Or have you yet to determine that with Diceless?

It will be 100% apart. We will not mention any Amber IP, we will have different names for the tropes.  You could not mention Courts of Chaos or Logros but you can talk about Order vs. Chaos. Like I said it will be a new setting so there will be no need to mention it Amber IP, I expect we will be referancing the rules as they apply to the new setting

I am just wondering how from a system perspective you can cover stuff like Powers generically.

As a generic example of how easy it is and Jason I am sure will do it better.  

Order Imprint,  Advanced Order Imprint, Chaos Mastery, Advanced Chaos Mastery, Tarot Artistry, Advanced Tarot Artistry, Shapechange, Advanced Shape Change, Constructing Personal Mirror Worlds

Power Words, Sorcery, Conjuration. and Construction personal artifacts  are pretty generic and are used in many other games, so I see no reason to change named  or use synonyms unless it specifically deals with an IP issue.

Just trying to see if this will be a generic rules system with toolkits for building out powers that would enable you to create Amber-like abilities, or if it would look to keep the core powers.

This will be up to Jason Durall and what the patrons want out of the rules section. I don't expect this to be generic, I do expect compatibility.

[Croaker]

I just don't know what to say, save thank you for trying this, and for all these efforts.

As per the system and world, there must even be ways to keep the "infinite worlds setting.
For exemple, imagine we played in a universe inspired by Moorcock (We can't, copyright-wise, but still...), in which we played Lord of Order or Chaos. You can thus have immortal beings able to travel between paralell worlds in a conflict of Order vs Chaos.

Hum... What about a family of gods? This potentially gives us place for a lot of personnal powers (god of an element...), as well as for a generic pantheon vs pantheon.
Something like this (yeah, this is poor and badly written, this is just for the idea):
The universe was created by the Progenitor god, which fathered sons and daughters, creating a dinasty of Light. All was well, until he went slowly mad and began killing his children. He then disappeared, supposedly killed by his eldest son eons ago. This son became the king of the gods, and in turn fathered a whole new pantheon, although some of his siblings may still be living somewhere. This new pantheon began reigning on the creation, and, of course, to bicker.
But the gods are not alone in the creation.
Somewhere, at the End of creation, Dark gods exist. No one knows their origin, but their evil powers are on par with those of the Light.

And the creation? Have it like those stories which inspired the Discworld: A great turtle housing the world of the gods (Amber), supported by 4 lesser turtles housing the lesser gods, supported each by 4 turtle worlds housing the heroes, and then, the worlds of the mortals, becoming less and less perfect. The gods being able to travel from worlds to worlds and use their divine powers to influence and change them.

The same way, you can have tarot cards as a kind of power.

Tell me you can't play "amber" and have al the Amber themes with this