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Old 01-19-2015, 04:27 PM   #13
Peter Knutsen
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Join Date: Oct 2007
Location: Europe
Default Re: Charlemagne's Paladins - roleplaying in the 8th century

Quote:
Originally Posted by Anders View Post
You know, every time you write chainmail DanHoward dies a little inside... :)

Yes, mail is ok but not mail-and-plates - right? Longswords in GURPS are longer than 40" - is that really something which occurs in the 8th century? Joyeuse, the Emperor's sword, is in GURPS term a broadsword.

The only Frankish coin around seems to be the denier, worth $4 (240 to the pound). There may be other from other realms, of course.
Going by GURPS Vikings in some things, perhaps even many things, could b good. Sure, there are minted coins, and the towns are "civilized" places, but in most parts of the world of the campaign, hack-silver is just as good. Gold coins would be from old Rome, or from the Byzantines (I don't know how much communication there was between Charlemagne and Byzantium, but later during the Ottonian Renaissance, one of the Otto Emperors married a Byzantine princess), or from Moslem lands (and I'm not sure if they minted gold coins that early).

One thing to keep in mind is that Rome isn't long ago, in the 8th or early 9th century.

Charlemagne wasn't trying to start anything new. He was trying to re-create something old, an ideal that's actually still fairly recent. The Western Roman empire fell only a few centuries ago. People still vaguely remember all the sanitation, medicine, education, wine, public order, irrigation, roads, aqueducts, public health, peace, etc.

Then again, there's also the raw lust for power. You can create the setting as very cynical if you prefer, with Charlemagne simply using the "ideal of Rome" as a vehicle. Or with hi being the only true idealist and everybody else being cynical.

I have that supplement, but I don't actually remember much of it. It left me unusualy underwhelmed (a lot of the page count was spent trying to make AD&D jump through hoops it can't ever become able jump through), but I don't know of a better supplement for that period. At least I don't know that there is a Pendragon one. There ought to be (because its an extremely obvious thing to write and publish) , but when I last looked into it a few years ago, there wasn't.

With paladins (proto-knights-in-inadequately-polished-mail), being a major part of the setting, you ought to try to get yourself a simple system for defining horses, since the individualization of favourite horse of each player character, and each major NPC, would be very likely to be of importance.

GURPS seems to tend towards either full-detail (where each horse has its own freakin' character sheet) or no-detail (all horses are exactly alike). If you can find some house rules, or make them yourself, that offers a compromise, that would be ideal. (Also look into whether thoroughbreds existed in that period - if they do, the PCs may want to try to get friendly with the Saracens, the enemy, in order to trade for better mounts, or even hoping to receive them as gifts).
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