The art of Dungeon Fantasy 13: Monsters 1

[tg_ambro]

Originally Posted by lexington

This would seem to clash with currently evident setting assumptions. I strongly suspect it will not appear in official Dungeon Fantasy material.

DF has been silly, not copyright infringing.

[demonsbane]

Originally Posted by Toadkiller_Dog

Sure, ominous to you. To me, it's just sheer coolness. Kovalic drawing stuff I made up! That would be awesome!

Yes, truly ominous for me. But well, you seem to be a fan of him. Good for you then, Peter.

If for a chance you were thinking about non cartoonish art made by John Kovalic, I would be happy with that.

Originally Posted by sir_pudding

Do you need a disclaimer that says "I R SERIUS CAT! THIS R SERIUS GAME!"?

No. Just no official label, no stupid disclaimer. I already said it so I wonder what's your point by making such question.

Originally Posted by robkelk

He did choose to feature a somewhat-controversial topic in the last four online Dork Tower strips (starting here); perhaps some folks might be reacting negatively to him because of this...?

I don't know what you're talking about . . . and I don't hate Kovalic. I don't know him and I guess he's just doing his work. But I'd regard as unfortunate to see his cartoonish art into role playing products I (in principle) like, and I wouldn't support such product. Excepting if there were a specific section on humor in which such art would be suitably placed -like "Odds and Ends" in Pyramid magazine.

Originally Posted by robkelk

As for DF artwork - as long as it illustrates what's being discussed on the same page, it could be stick figures for all I care. I already know what swords or pit traps or orcs look like.

Then we return to the people who isn't concerned at all by art, and to the already mentioned "example art", including the current style, which certainly could be much worse.

Originally Posted by sir_pudding

I'm wearing a Kovalic t-shirt now, I suppose I could be wearing a three piece suit, but that wouldn't be very comfortable, would it?

. . . and? Are you warm enough? Enough sexy? :-) Do you think John Kovalic scandalizes me? Please, it just bores me, profoundly.

Originally Posted by sir_pudding

Can you provide some examples? Most of what I've seen is derived from other GURPS sources.

Better, look for yourself. e23 offers previews of each PDF, and I believe the indexes are included. They are exhaustive. That should be enough for understanding the point you're asking for.

[sir_pudding]

Originally Posted by demonsbane

. . . and? Are you warm enough? Enough sexy? :-) Do you think John Kovalic scandalizes me? Please, it just bores me, profoundly.

I meant that I am wearing a silly T-Shirt with Igor holding a sign that says "Help" and the legend "Will game for Food". This is not a serious shirt. It is humorous. It advertises to the world that I like playing games. I could be wearing serious clothes such as a suit, or perhaps a uniform instead but these wouldn't be as fun as the shirt. A game that takes itself so seriously that it wouldn't want me with my Dork Tower t-shirt to play in it, is probably not a game I want to play.

Better, look for yourself. e23 offers previews of each PDF, and I believe the indexes are included. They are exhaustive. That should be enough for understanding the point you're asking for.

I've read all of the DF pdfs except Ninja. I can't personally recall anything that's not derived from other GURPS sources or specific to the DF subgenre. Can you please give me a specific example?

[demonsbane]

Originally Posted by Kromm

A straight, serious Fantasy Bestiary would be another kettle of flesh-eating, undead fish.

Originally Posted by Lupo

Straight and serious like this Monster Manual? :)

Like this one, better. ^_^

(The same book with better budget for a suitable an excellent cover, I believe).

Originally Posted by Toadkiller_Dog

The unintentional irony of this thread is that now I really want some Kovalic art in this book, if it's at all possible to get it. That would make me really happy, and I've already got Just The Monster In Mind.

Originally Posted by Toadkiller_Dog

Sure, ominous to you. To me, it's just sheer coolness.

And maybe these are just provocative manifestations of a somewhat rebellious personality, in the context of this thread ;-)

Originally Posted by sir_pudding

I meant that I am wearing a silly T-Shirt with Igor holding a sign that says "Help" and the legend "Will game for Food". This is not a serious shirt. It is humorous. It advertises to the world that I like playing games. I could be wearing serious clothes such as a suit, or perhaps a uniform instead but these wouldn't be as fun as the shirt. A game that takes itself so seriously that it wouldn't want me with my Dork Tower t-shirt to play in it, is probably not a game I want to play.

I couldn't care less about what clothes are you wearing, and I don't judge people by their clothes, that is too misleading for saying the least. So please Sir don't misunderstand (or don't try to turn) my disinterest (and in the context of role playing books, pure rejection) in cartoonish art -John Kovalic's usual work- as a reject or degradation against you for my part. I'm not trying to insult anyone, and I'm aware there are people that is posting in this thread thinking very differently than me -for saying the least, and this is entirely reciprocal-, but still, that doesn't mean we have the need of being impolite between us. If you like humorous shirts, OK what's the problem? I don't know you personally, but so far I don't see reason for thinking that you could not participate OK into a "serious" fantasy session if you want, leaving out of character chat and hilarious jokes aside during its duration.

I acknowledge Kovalic art is effectively hilarious, but usually I'm not much interested in such type of humor.

Originally Posted by sir_pudding

I've read all of the DF pdfs except Ninja. I can't personally recall anything that's not derived from other GURPS sources or specific to the DF subgenre. Can you please give me a specific example?

Since you say you already have read the books, I can't take this question in an entirely serious way, because you should know the answer already! Examples? Tons of character templates, races & monsters templates, elucidated or tweaked rules for enhancing gameplay, original gear (regarding any other GURPS release), rules for handling the money differently, specifically tweaked spell-lists . . . Do you want an specific example? For what purpose? Open any book in almost any page and there is.

What you want to demonstrate, I think (for you implying that GURPS DF books are "dispensable, not essential resources", and GURPS Basic+Magic+Fantasy is enough), is every Dungeon Fantasy item isn't essentially but a worked example constructed with the "serious" and core GURPS books: that's true in most cases (not in Dungeon Fantasy 6 - Artifacts, for instance, with the 'rule' "It does what it does"), but the fact of these items (templates, gear, information, traps, monsters, treasure types, specific spell-lists, power ups, artifacts, races, different interpretations on already existent GURPS rules, etc) being derived from the main toolkit doesn't make the items to originate, describe, develop or to stat by themselves, so they are fantasy game resources that, despite owing themselves -mostly only in their mechanical aspects- to the GURPS toolkit, are original, new and irreplaceable, inestimable material available on the GURPS Line that people is, obviously, willing to pay for. It's creative work -and usually very well crafted!-, not stuff automatically easy to do for yourself with the toolkit (as Mailanka admits), material that you can't find published/repeated in other non-DF GURPS books.

Originally Posted by Mailanka

Have you ever tried to put together a template book like DF 1? Or put together a big pile of power-ups? Or cobble together a whole book of monsters? I have! It's not easy! A well-written, light-hearted book takes as much work as a serious, well-researched book.

On the other hand, the GURPS-main toolkit derived nature of most GURPS Dungeon Fantasy items make them extremely suitable for many sorts of fantasy campaigns, and not only lighthearthed ones -hence I find the "silly" and "comic-relief" labels "officially" expressed and stapled in these forums as annoying and limitative; at the same time, the same GURPS-main toolkit derived nature of the Dungeon Fantasy items makes difficult to draw a sharp line of demarcation between GURPS Dungeon Fantasy and GURPS Fantasy, despite Kromm's try of absolute separation between both, which I find only half-convincing, at most (but not lacking of honesty of intention).

Originally Posted by Dungeon Fantasy 1: Adventurers, Introduction

"For that, get GURPS Fantasy. (...) For that, there’s GURPS Dungeon Fantasy."

I'll be looking forward to DF 13: Monsters 1 by Kromm and Peter. We'll see how it is.

[Peter V. Dell'Orto]

Originally Posted by demonsbane

And maybe these are just provocative manifestations of a somewhat rebellious personality, in the context of this thread ;-)

I am notoriously contrary.

And stubborn when provoked. Which makes for a fun combo, really. Try coaching me sometime!

But more seriously, I have a backhand Kovalic writing credit to my name (for making fun of Gandalf, of all things) but nothing drawn by him for my work. I'd love to get him doing my art. Not all of it - I've suggested at least one other artist to Kromm for this book. And I'm not saying I want it to look like the Munckhin monster manual. But like I said, I can think of at least one monster that I'd like to see John Kovalic draw, in any style he so chooses to do it in.

[Not another shrubbery]

Originally Posted by Turhan's Bey Company

The Dungeon Fantasy line could survive a few Kovalic illustrations without turning into a clown circus.

That is a great idea for a parody... all the DF templates in action pictures as clowns!

Get Kovalic on the phone!
:)

[sir_pudding]

Originally Posted by demonsbane

I couldn't care less about what clothes are you wearing, and I don't judge people by their clothes, that is too misleading for saying the least. So please Sir don't misunderstand (or don't try to turn) my disinterest (and in the context of role playing books, pure rejection) in cartoonish art -John Kovalic's usual work- as a reject or degradation against you for my part. I'm not trying to insult anyone, and I'm aware there are people that is posting in this thread thinking very differently than me -for saying the least, and this is entirely reciprocal-, but still, that doesn't mean we have the need of being impolite between us. If you like humorous shirts, OK what's the problem? I don't know you personally, but so far I don't see reason for thinking that you could not participate OK into a "serious" fantasy session if you want, leaving out of character chat and hilarious jokes aside during its duration.

Any game that takes itself so seriously that it wouldn't include any art by Kovalic for fear of "being too silly" isn't the game I play when I play Dungeon Fantasy.

What you seem to be missing is that I like DF. I like that it's silly and that I can use for games without deep characterization or serious thematic exploration. I also think Amon Amarth rocks too! And I enjoyed playing Diablo. I don't listen to Amon Amarth when I want to listen to Wagner. I don't play Diablo when want to play Morrowind. I don't play Dungeon Fantasy when I want a game with deep characterization and serious themes.

Furthermore I don't see how "classic" modules like Temple of Elemental Evil (really can that title even be goofier? Evil as an element? An element of evil? An element that is evil? What does that even mean?) or Against the Giants can really be described as serious gaming for serious gamers.

I acknowledge Kovalic art is effectively hilarious, but usually I'm not much interested in such type of humor.

I noticed.

Tons of character templates

Specific to the DF subgenre. These would be completely out of place in a serious game. They lack realistic characterizations. Key social stats are missing. They don't even have Cultural Familiarity! They are all optimized as hyper-competent combatants. At any rate Templates aren't new material, just rearrangements of existing traits.

, races

Nearly all derived directly from other templates in GURPS books and then re-tweaked for the sub-genre A lot of the special rules here would be utterly inappropriate outside of DF. Elves that are Unaging but don't pay points for it because Aging spells still affect them? Teeny-Tiny Fairies as strong as a small child (with hit points that don't match mass)?

monsters templates

Pretty neat, but firstly lists of "monsters" is really only appropriate in the sub-genre, and secondly there isn't any strictly new there. Is there? Besides these are some of the silliest things in the line. Almost none of these creatures would make sense in a realistic setting.

elucidated or tweaked rules for enhancing gameplay

All of which either just reiterate rules from somewhere else (Martial Arts mostly) or attempt to model silly DF conventions in GURPS rules. Realistic games don't have much use for rules that let you start combat hidden behind your foes, or do instant First Aid.

original gear (regarding any other GURPS release),

Everything realistic is almost certainly going to be in Low-Tech. Everything else is the silliest stuff in the line.

rules for handling the money differently

These are definately not appropriate in realistic games! They only make sense in a game where the PCs primary income is loot, and the market is some generic town with vague black box economic.

specifically tweaked spell-lists . .

The changes to GURPS Magic do seem portable, and I really do think it's odd that Kromm seems to disagree. However I already made those changes before DF came out.

Do you want an specific example? For what purpose? Open any book in almost any page and there is.

The only one I can find is DF9's rules for fractional Allies. Which are pretty cool.

but the fact of these items (templates, gear, information, traps, monsters, treasure types, specific spell-lists, power ups, artifacts, races, different interpretations on already existent GURPS rules, etc) being derived from the main toolkit doesn't make the items to originate, describe, develop or to stat by themselves, so they are fantasy game resources that, despite owing themselves -mostly only in their mechanical aspects- to the GURPS toolkit, are original, new and irreplaceable, inestimable material available on the GURPS Line that people is, obviously, willing to pay for. It's creative work -and usually very well crafted!-, not stuff automatically easy to do for yourself with the toolkit (as Mailanka admits), material that you can't find published/repeated in other non-DF GURPS books.

Sure it's pretty awesome. I think it's great. I don't use any of it really when I'm running Desolation Road, though. I certainly could have run Desolation Road without it ever existing. Thaumatology and Fantasy were by far the two most important books for that campaign. There's no reason you can't run a "serious" fantasy game with deep characterization and complex themes and SJGames has published resources that support this. For the most part these resources aren't the DF line, though. While I do see that you can get some use out of DF when running a game like that, they aren't directly applicable.

The question I was asking is what is missing from the rest of the GURPS line that you need currently to run a "serious" game with deep characterization and complex themes? What is specifically in the DF line that enables this that isn't in another GURPS book?

I'll be looking forward to DF 13: Monsters 1 by Kromm and Peter. We'll see how it is.

I predict there's going to be a lot of creatures that are cool encounters for dungeon delving type games and very little deep discussion of ecology, folklore, or magic symbolism. In other words it will be a "silly" book. I suspect though that you will be happy with it (b-dog might not be, as it probably won't have any new power modifiers like "evil magic" or be full of monsters that can eviscerate Superman).

This is I think because you and Kromm are using silly very differently, here.

[Athanbeli]

Originally Posted by sir_pudding

Furthermore I don't see how "classic" modules like Temple of Elemental Evil (really can that title even be goofier? Evil as an element? An element of evil? An element that is evil? What does that even mean?) or Against the Giants can really be described as serious gaming for serious gamers.

This seems to imply that, for quite a long time, the whole gaming industry was centered on sillyness, and that GMs and players all played silly games. But do you think they would have acknowledged this judgement of yours, back then?
Their games were a bit naive and predictable, perhaps, certainly not silly.

Currently, I'm a player in a 'Return to the Temple of Elemental Evil' campaign (basically TEE on steroids, from the late 90s I think...). I admit that I constantly mumble to myself '...as a GM, I could not bring myself to do things such as these in my gurps game!...'. Still, the players are all very committed to the campaign.
A couple of them take part in my own low-fantasy gurps game, too. If they were to choose between the two games, they'd probably opt for my game. Yet, this is because I managed to make them feel the passion and dedication I'm willing to put in this creation of mine, not because of the starting premises.

[sir_pudding]

Originally Posted by Athanbeli

This seems to imply that, for quite a long time, the whole gaming industry was centered on sillyness, and that GMs and players all played silly games. But do you think they would have acknowledged this judgement of yours, back then?

I certainly did as early as the mid-80s. I also realized I liked a lot of things that weren't entirely serious. I played a lot of Paranoia in those days as well.

As I said up thread, I see the appeal of GURPS DF as primarily nostalgic and deconstructionist. It's fun to play games with my up grown-up tastes deliberately suppressed. Just like it's fun to listen to Haggard or to watch cartoons.

Their games were a bit naive and predictable, perhaps, certainly not silly.

I think that "silly" is being used differently by different people.

A DF adventure where involving a raid on a tribe of "monsters" isn't going to concern itself with the social, political, or ecological effects of the raid. There aren't going to be any non-combatants for the PCs to worry about. PCs aren't going to have difficult moral choices that lead to possible atrocities that torture them all of their days. A realistic serious fantasy campaign would concern itself with these issues. DF doesn't. That is the sort of silly that I think Kromm is talking about. Somehow I really doubt that if Kromm changed his mind and put out DF 15: Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, DF 16: Serfs, and DF 17: Plagues the critics in this thread would be all that happy.

[b-dog]

Originally Posted by sir_pudding

Furthermore I don't see how "classic" modules like Temple of Elemental Evil (really can that title even be goofier? Evil as an element? An element of evil? An element that is evil? What does that even mean?) or Against the Giants can really be described as serious gaming for serious gamers.

Here is the background story that I heard. There was a demon lord named Zuggtmoy, who was the demon queen of fungi, and she had a consort named Iuz, who was a cambian (half-infernal in GURPS DF terms) and they decided to increase their power through gaining worshippers. But since fungi was not too appealing to worshippers they decided to make a religion dedicated to the Elder Elemental God so that they could gain more worshippers. The Elder Elemental God was worshipped by by worshippers of each faction of the elements, air earth, fire and water. With all four elemental forces under the control of Zuggtmoy she quickly gained immense power and began using elemental attacks against the surrounding lands; floods, forest fires, earth quakes, storms etc. This brought quick response by the most powerful wizards, clerics, paladins and other forces of good which quickly shut down the temple and imprisoned Zuggtmoy inside of it while Iuz was able to escape. So the temple is basically named for the fact that the evil that came from it was from the elemental forces under control of Zuggtmoy

The Elder Elemental God was a column of elemental energy that was worshipped through the clerics of air, fire, water and earth. But this elemental god was not a mere abstraction though, it was an avatar of Tharizdun who was using Zuggtmoy to try to escape his prison. Tharizdun is the AD&D version of Nyarlathotep and this god has been imprisoned due to the fact that he would destroy everything if released. So Tharizdun was using Zuggtmoy and Iuz to get enough worshippers to give him the power to break his prison.

The adventure starts after the temple has been sacked and the former clerics are trying to rebuild it. They have no way to contact Zuggtmoy due to the binding placed by the forces of good. But Zuggtmoy is in the temple trying to find a way to break free while Iuz is content with rebuilding his own worshippers.