Steve Jackson Games - Site Navigation
Home General Info Follow Us Search Illuminator Store Forums What's New Other Games Ogre GURPS Munchkin Our Games: Home

Go Back   Steve Jackson Games Forums > Roleplaying > GURPS

Reply
 
Thread Tools Display Modes
Old 10-26-2016, 04:42 PM   #31
Polydamas
 
Join Date: Jan 2006
Location: Central Europe
Default Re: Banestorm Navies

Quote:
Originally Posted by Michael Cule View Post
You know I've never played (nor even noticed) the ruling that only the spells from the core book are commonly available. That may explain the difference in tone of my campaigns.
Because GURPS Magic has been around for a long time (and used to feature prominently in the Line Editor's home games) there seems to be a lot of 'headcannon' and things which the authors meant to include but did not spell out as clearly as they could have. In the GURPS 3e days there were a whole set of krommnotes which some people took as Holy Writ, and the earlier spell lists have an unwritten set of basic assumptions about how magic works which I find harder recognizing in later and larger lists. I still think that David Pulver's idea of breaking the core spell list down into a few modules, deleting prerequisites and boring spells, etc. was good.

And Yrth was designed as a setting for everything from epic high fantasy to low fantasy slice-of-life to "imagine if our SCA household was thrown into a fantasy novel" so some things are left vague. It sounds like CraigM has a clear idea of how things work in his Yrth, and hopes that he can make a rational fantasy setting with the right feel while including that big long list of spells, so I hope that others with more time will have suggestions for him!
__________________
"It is easier to banish a habit of thought than a piece of knowledge." H. Beam Piper

This forum got less aggravating when I started using the ignore feature

Last edited by Polydamas; 10-26-2016 at 04:49 PM.
Polydamas is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 10-26-2016, 05:10 PM   #32
CraigM
 
CraigM's Avatar
 
Join Date: Nov 2012
Default Re: Banestorm Navies

Quote:
Originally Posted by Fred Brackin View Post
I just looked in Banestorm and it lists Tredroy as being a city of 200,000 not 500,000. It is described as definitely being the second largest city on the continent.
3rd Ed Tredroy has it as 550,000. Weird.
__________________
Craig
CraigM is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 10-26-2016, 05:13 PM   #33
Anthony
 
Join Date: Feb 2005
Location: Berkeley, CA
Default Re: Banestorm Navies

The weather spells came originally from GURPS Grimoire (3e), imported from I think GURPS Arabian Nights. In general things from Grimoire were taken as having lesser stature in than things from GURPS Magic (3e) though there are a fair number of overpowered or just broken spells in both books (a big difference is that Grimoire was basically a compilation of spells originally added from multiple worldbooks, pyramid articles, and the like, with multiple authors, and thus is extremely inconsistent).
__________________
My GURPS site and Blog.

Last edited by Anthony; 10-26-2016 at 05:16 PM.
Anthony is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 10-27-2016, 04:12 AM   #34
Phil Masters
 
Phil Masters's Avatar
 
Join Date: Aug 2004
Location: U.K.
Default Re: Banestorm Navies

Quote:
Originally Posted by CraigM View Post
3rd Ed Tredroy has it as 550,000. Weird.
I forget what discussions, if any, we had about that - but the original material wasn't always internally consistent, and I don't think Tredroy and Fantasy always agreed with each other very well. Anyway, 550,000 would be ruddy huge for a medieval-style city. So we probably had our reasons there.
__________________
--
Phil Masters
My Home Page.
My Self-Publications: On Warehouse 23 and On DriveThruRPG.
Phil Masters is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 10-27-2016, 05:49 AM   #35
malloyd
 
Join Date: Jun 2006
Default Re: Banestorm Navies

Quote:
Originally Posted by Phil Masters View Post
I forget what discussions, if any, we had about that - but the original material wasn't always internally consistent, and I don't think Tredroy and Fantasy always agreed with each other very well. Anyway, 550,000 would be ruddy huge for a medieval-style city. So we probably had our reasons there.
But it's not a medieval style city. From the map in Tredroy it's an unwalled city 10 or 15 miles across. Of course that map scale also indicates it sits on a river wider than the Amazon, crossed by 4 bridges longer than anything built on Earth until 1936, but hey making ridiculous canon numbers is part of the game, right? Works for Traveller.
__________________
--
MA Lloyd
malloyd is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 10-27-2016, 04:58 PM   #36
Icelander
 
Icelander's Avatar
 
Join Date: Mar 2006
Location: Iceland*
Default Re: Banestorm Navies

Quote:
Originally Posted by Michael Cule View Post
Thing is if that's true I don't see the mages being powerful enough to keep the Underground Engineers from overthrowing the Ministry of Serendipity and their equivalents.
Yeah, I don't think the setting can support both a magical conspiracy that has successfully prevented almost a millenia of technological, military and societal change and a low-magic feel where mages are not integral to the functioning of society. It's one or the other. If mages are successfully preventing society from adopting cannons, chronometers, steamships and canned food, they must be providing some sort of magical alternatives for seaborne trade and naval affairs. They might be inferior to the end result of adopting technology, but have to offer some benefits over the first few tentative steps.
__________________
Za uspiekh nashevo beznadiozhnovo diela!
Icelander is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 10-27-2016, 05:37 PM   #37
sir_pudding
Wielder of Smart Pants
 
sir_pudding's Avatar
 
Join Date: Aug 2004
Location: Ventura CA
Default Re: Banestorm Navies

Quote:
Originally Posted by Icelander View Post
Yeah, I don't think the setting can support both a magical conspiracy that has successfully prevented almost a millenia of technological, military and societal change and a low-magic feel where mages are not integral to the functioning of society.
There's no contradiction between "Only the spells in the Basic Set are common" and "The Ministry of Seredipity has access to powerful Mind-Control spells". Assuming that the Ministry only has access to commonly known magic seems baseless.
sir_pudding is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 10-27-2016, 06:06 PM   #38
Icelander
 
Icelander's Avatar
 
Join Date: Mar 2006
Location: Iceland*
Default Re: Banestorm Navies

Quote:
Originally Posted by sir_pudding View Post
There's no contradiction between "Only the spells in the Basic Set are common" and "The Ministry of Seredipity has access to powerful Mind-Control spells". Assuming that the Ministry only has access to commonly known magic seems baseless.
I guess I don't believe that simply going around mind-controlling leaders would work to keep society unchanged for all these centuries. For me, plausibility requires some societal reasons that constrain the creativity, self-interest and greed of mercenaries, pirates, privateers, merchants, explorers and all the other people who have powerful reasons to adopt everything that makes their professions easier and more profitable. The mages need carrots, as well as sticks.
__________________
Za uspiekh nashevo beznadiozhnovo diela!
Icelander is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 10-27-2016, 06:34 PM   #39
sir_pudding
Wielder of Smart Pants
 
sir_pudding's Avatar
 
Join Date: Aug 2004
Location: Ventura CA
Default Re: Banestorm Navies

Quote:
Originally Posted by Icelander View Post
I guess I don't believe that simply going around mind-controlling leaders would work to keep society unchanged for all these centuries. For me, plausibility requires some societal reasons that constrain the creativity, self-interest and greed of mercenaries, pirates, privateers, merchants, explorers and all the other people who have powerful reasons to adopt everything that makes their professions easier and more profitable. The mages need carrots, as well as sticks.
Sure, it isn't an especially rigorous setting. It's basically a bunch of handwaves to make fantasy RPG tropes sort of plausible.
sir_pudding is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 10-28-2016, 05:49 AM   #40
Polydamas
 
Join Date: Jan 2006
Location: Central Europe
Default Re: Banestorm Navies

Quote:
Originally Posted by sir_pudding View Post
Sure, it isn't an especially rigorous setting. It's basically a bunch of handwaves to make fantasy RPG tropes sort of plausible.
There is definitely room for "high-magic, the MoS just focuses on a few conspicuous things" and "low-magic, low-tech" visions of the setting. I just am not sure that its possible to make a version of the setting with just the right feel without being very careful about how magic works, and since I don't have the books with me, I sure can't comment on specific spells. But lots of people find that fun and still have time for it, and good for them!

Trederoy can be a plausible city in a world with medieval technology plus magic and multiple intelligent species, or an excuse to have Arabian Nights tropes, swashbucking tropes, and Evil Theocracy tropes in the same place (and magic would help with the size and density of the city and the presence of plenty of bridges and stone buildings). It all depends on what the GM and players enjoy!
__________________
"It is easier to banish a habit of thought than a piece of knowledge." H. Beam Piper

This forum got less aggravating when I started using the ignore feature
Polydamas is offline   Reply With Quote
Reply

Tags
banestorm, yrth

Thread Tools
Display Modes

Posting Rules
You may not post new threads
You may not post replies
You may not post attachments
You may not edit your posts

BB code is On
Fnords are Off
[IMG] code is Off
HTML code is Off

Forum Jump


All times are GMT -6. The time now is 10:54 PM.


Powered by vBulletin® Version 3.8.9
Copyright ©2000 - 2024, vBulletin Solutions, Inc.