It would be nice to have a high powered "historical" fantasy series

[johndallman]

Originally Posted by b-dog

Ok. Anyway I just think it would be cool to have loose history historical setting with high powered PCs and monsters to fight. It would be a fun setting.

It would, but there's a fairly big decision to be made up-front, which is how much you're prepared to mess with history.

For example, in England, you probably want both King Arthur and Robin Hood, who aren't remotely contemporary in any of the versions of their legends. If that's no problem, then fine, go ahead with them. But than there's another issue - Robin Hood's main antagonist, the Sheriff of Nottingham, is an official, and he can't be working for Arthur, because he abuses his power too much; Arthur would fire him. So you need some way to separate the two chunks of history that allows PCs to have adventures in both, if they want to.

So do you have a Torg-style patchwork reality, or a time travel campaign, or what?

[Astromancer]

Originally Posted by b-dog

I liked GURPS Silk Road and also Arabian Nights a lot. What I was thinking is there could be a high powered historical fantasy series that could set easy to play templates, magical items and monsters to defeat. I think that having the series be able to overlap and supplement the Dungeon Fantasy series would be smart and useful too. I would think that maybe 125 or 150 point starting templates would work well but it should include expansion to the DF norm of 250 and beyond. In short this should have a world where high powered PCs and monsters are part of the setting. I would like a world where there is both historical interest along side adventure and magic. It should be a middle road historical and epic fantasy. One where you start low powered and then work your way to hero, where the treasure has interesting historical connections and magic items have a culture surrounding them. It should also span the globe in search of adventure, sort of a fantasy James Bond traveling around the world.

Why travel only one world? Elric might have been a self-destructive twit who blamed it all on his sword (yeah he may have had a point) but he traveled to many universes. How much twisting would it take to remake Flash Gordon into a science fantasy setting? Planetary Romance was never far from Fantasy fiction to begin with. Either alchemical rocket ships or spelljammer type Luminiferous aether ships could send your fantasy PCs across the Zodiac in so many wild ways.

[b-dog]

Originally Posted by Astromancer

Why travel only one world? Elric might have been a self-destructive twit who blamed it all on his sword (yeah he may have had a point) but he traveled to many universes. How much twisting would it take to remake Flash Gordon into a science fantasy setting? Planetary Romance was never far from Fantasy fiction to begin with. Either alchemical rocket ships or spelljammer type Luminiferous aether ships could send your fantasy PCs across the Zodiac in so many wild ways.

What I would like is to have books with a particular setting in mind like say Mythic Siam or India and then have not only historical stuff but also high powered magic items, heroic templates and cool monsters to fight. This could be used in your setting of World jumping or in a high powered historical setting or even added into a dungeon fantasy game. I would like the touches and costumes and feel of an exotic world. The culture and other stuff makes the world exotic and interesting and not stifling or too strict.

[b-dog]

The way I view this high powered fantasy series would be a sort of a bridge between the historical GURPS books and Dungeon Fantasy. Most people know what to do in a dungeon fantasy game kill monsters, explore ruins and find treasure but a lot of people will have more trouble with making historical adventures. So this book would be oriented toward action, finding treasure and killing monsters. For example, GURPS Vikings might have low level adventures that deal with a lot of cultural issues and so on. GURPS High Powered Fantasy Vikings would focus on heroic temples of Vikings from myths, lots of interesting magic items and treasures that have a Viking flavor and of course high powered monsters statted up and ready for combat. This book would be usable with the Dungeon Fantasy series so that players can explore the lands of Thule which may be gotten to from a magical gate or whatever. It could also be used as a place to steal ideas from too.

[jason taylor]

Originally Posted by johndallman

It would, but there's a fairly big decision to be made up-front, which is how much you're prepared to mess with history.

For example, in England, you probably want both King Arthur and Robin Hood, who aren't remotely contemporary in any of the versions of their legends. If that's no problem, then fine, go ahead with them. But than there's another issue - Robin Hood's main antagonist, the Sheriff of Nottingham, is an official, and he can't be working for Arthur, because he abuses his power too much; Arthur would fire him. So you need some way to separate the two chunks of history that allows PCs to have adventures in both, if they want to.

So do you have a Torg-style patchwork reality, or a time travel campaign, or what?

He can in real life because the real King Arthur was probably plagued by Sheriffs of Nottingham he couldn't get rid of because all the replacements are equally awful or the Sheriff was clever enough not to get caught by the Inspector General of the Round Table, or something equally mundane.

[simply Nathan]

Originally Posted by johndallman

For example, in England, you probably want both King Arthur and Robin Hood, who aren't remotely contemporary in any of the versions of their legends.

In one book I read, young Arthur had an adventure with Robin Hood and his Merry Men...against Morgan la Fay, who never showed up in adult Arthur's adventures.

[RyanW]

Originally Posted by johndallman

It would, but there's a fairly big decision to be made up-front, which is how much you're prepared to mess with history.

For example, in England, you probably want both King Arthur and Robin Hood, who aren't remotely contemporary in any of the versions of their legends. If that's no problem, then fine, go ahead with them. But than there's another issue - Robin Hood's main antagonist, the Sheriff of Nottingham, is an official, and he can't be working for Arthur, because he abuses his power too much; Arthur would fire him. So you need some way to separate the two chunks of history that allows PCs to have adventures in both, if they want to.

Hmm. I tend to play my historicals quite a bit differently. I might play with history quite a bit, but it's always a specific time and place.

For example, I fiddled one up some time ago but never had the chance to use was based on the Golden Jubilee of the not-quite-so-stillborn son of Princess Charlotte, and was very explicitly the summer of 1880.

[trooper6]

Originally Posted by b-dog

The way I view this high powered fantasy series would be a sort of a bridge between the historical GURPS books and Dungeon Fantasy. Most people know what to do in a dungeon fantasy game kill monsters, explore ruins and find treasure but a lot of people will have more trouble with making historical adventures. So this book would be oriented toward action, finding treasure and killing monsters. For example, GURPS Vikings might have low level adventures that deal with a lot of cultural issues and so on. GURPS High Powered Fantasy Vikings would focus on heroic temples of Vikings from myths, lots of interesting magic items and treasures that have a Viking flavor and of course high powered monsters statted up and ready for combat. This book would be usable with the Dungeon Fantasy series so that players can explore the lands of Thule which may be gotten to from a magical gate or whatever. It could also be used as a place to steal ideas from too.

You seen to know exactly what you want and how your would organize it. You should write it up!

[Apollonian]

Originally Posted by simply Nathan

In one book I read, young Arthur had an adventure with Robin Hood and his Merry Men...against Morgan la Fay, who never showed up in adult Arthur's adventures.

T.H. White's The Sword In The Stone, IIRC - Chapters 10-12. /pedant

[CraigM]

Originally Posted by b-dog

Ok. Anyway I just think it would be cool to have loose history historical setting with high powered PCs and monsters to fight. It would be a fun setting.

GURPS: Mythic Greece would work well for that. Achilles, Perseus, Apollo, Medusa...