I'm English, but if I was doing a roleplaying game based on the works of an American author I'd want to do it in American English. As it is, there's a slight, unnecessary discord between the Conan stories and the Conan RPG books. (I'd also have kept Howard's spellings, such as simitar instead of scimitar.)
Conan RPG's use of British English
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Sutek
Mongoose
Dude...I've watched a LOT of BBC over here from Doctor Who to Eastenders, and anytime Brits have tries to do American accents, there's always that one word or sylable that eeks through and is, not matter how hard they're trying...wrong.
It's jsut easier to go with what you know, and besides that...I rarely say the word "thews" here in Texas...
:lol:
It's jsut easier to go with what you know, and besides that...I rarely say the word "thews" here in Texas...
:lol:
Altantean DM
Mongoose
Sutek said:
"thews?" Am I prounciating it wrong? I always thought it was "THOZE." I don't mind it, but you do make a point. Maybe Mongoose should have won the Lord of the Rings RPG License and DeCipher should have won the Conan RPG license. OF course, no one can tell. With CPI in Scandinavia, it's all up in the air.
Jason Durall
Mongoose
Altantean DM said:Maybe Mongoose should have won the Lord of the Rings RPG License and DeCipher should have won the Conan RPG license. OF course, no one can tell. With CPI in Scandinavia, it's all up in the air.
As someone who worked on Decipher's LotR line, I am glad that Mongoose got Conan. I would have hated to see LotR in a d20 system, and would have hated it more seeing Decipher stop publishing Conan.
Jason Durall
Mongoose
Sutek said:
Is this Malcolm?
Jason Durall
Mongoose
My bad - I know a Malcolm in Houston who's played the LotR game but was disappointed with the outcome of the line, and when I last saw him, I recommended he give the Conan RPG a try.
Jason Durall
Mongoose
I don't think he's here - but I'll send him a link to this thread.
Altantean DM
Mongoose
Jason Durall said:Altantean DM said:Maybe Mongoose should have won the Lord of the Rings RPG License and DeCipher should have won the Conan RPG license. OF course, no one can tell. With CPI in Scandinavia, it's all up in the air.
As someone who worked on Decipher's LotR line, I am glad that Mongoose got Conan. I would have hated to see LotR in a d20 system, and would have hated it more seeing Decipher stop publishing Conan.
Somebody could have made LotR work in the d20 System to everyone's expectations.
And the way Decipher acted, the Conan License would have been worsely treated.Odovacar's Ghost
Mongoose
No can surpass ICE's version of LOTR or should I say MERP.
Lando The Archmagi
Banded Mongoose
Odovacar's Ghost said:
Love MERP, still own it and play it. Could be converted to d20 at least the 1st edition version of AD&D since it had conversion tables for everything.
Wish it hadn't gone under and I like the LOTR CCG, but not the LOTR RPG as its obviously not supported properly and looked nice, but never tried it.
Lando
Arkobla Conn
Mongoose
Let me tell you - I'm a huge LOTR fan
and a huge RPG fan
And I thought the books were gorgeous....
But tell me it's a d6 base game....and I won't even read it.
Like it or not, d20 is the way to go. It's easy - most players understand the mechanics and you can easily inject flavor and special rules. Decipher goofed big time...my guess is, they took a bath on the fact that the masses don't want a different system...they wanted a different (familiar) world.
and a huge RPG fan
And I thought the books were gorgeous....
But tell me it's a d6 base game....and I won't even read it.
Like it or not, d20 is the way to go. It's easy - most players understand the mechanics and you can easily inject flavor and special rules. Decipher goofed big time...my guess is, they took a bath on the fact that the masses don't want a different system...they wanted a different (familiar) world.
Jason Durall
Mongoose
Arkobla Conn said:
I can't change your mind, but believe me when I say that the Decipher LotR RPG was quite good at evoking the Middle-earth feeling, and the mechanics were not even remotely the problem. Our group played a 30-session campaign using Decipher's rules set - and it was the best campaign any of us had been in, and the best the GM ran. The rules did wonderful service in supporting the epic level of heroism and high danger the campaign called for.
Sales on the line were good, and any other company would have been ecstatic to have them. However, Decipher, a card company, thought that the profit margins on the books were not enough to justify their expense. They didn't do any promotion on the line - virtually nothing aside from basic distribution information - and it still sold very well.
If anything, the masses were fine with the rules system (as in need of fixing as they were), but there was very little effort made by Decipher to promote the LotR (and Trek) games, due to (what I am told) was a high-level management contempt for RPGs in general.
No, it doesn't make any sense, but that's what I've heard firsthand from at least two folks who worked with the studio, and it certainly supports my own experience playtesting, proofing, and writing for them.
And now, I am off to Gen Con!
Greg Smith
Mongoose
Arkobla Conn said:
That really is your loss. LotR is an excellent game.
Decipher's LotR RPG won several awards and sold extremely well for an RPG product. Decipher had hoped to rival WotC but couldn't. They did goof, but not in the game mechanics, in the marketing and release of the game.
Arkobla Conn
Mongoose
I am not saying that having alternate mechanics can't be done - I'm saying in this day and age, if its not d20, it isn't happening. My players (and I) are jaded about the myriad of different rulesets that came out. We have found d20 does the job admirally well and has versions for the different genre's we like. (And believe me, it took me buying them all the 3rd edition PHB's on the cheap when 3.5 came out to finally convert them from 2nd edition) We've played MERP, West End Games Star Wars, the Vampire line & Ars Magica - so we have experimented with other types of games. It boils down to - after playing for 20 years, most of us want to get to playing and not need to learn new basics for each genre we choose.
For as sweet as the Decipher game is/was - I guarentee you that had it be d20, Decipher would be raking in the cash. It's a d20 world out there now - that was WOTC's plan all along.
For as sweet as the Decipher game is/was - I guarentee you that had it be d20, Decipher would be raking in the cash. It's a d20 world out there now - that was WOTC's plan all along.
Greg Smith said:
It could be said that deciding to make the mechanics non-d20 was a marketing goof
I've been in stores where the d20 stuff is on the main shelves near the entrance, and the non-d20 at the back. People are usually gathered around the d20 material, with the odd stray customer wandering into the back for the more "specialist" items.I have nothing against non-d20 games, I own and like quite a few of them. The problem is that a d20 logo seems to sell just about anything nowadays. There is a large number of gamers out there who will snap up anything to do with d20. There are others (as is evident from this thread) who will only buy d20. d20 gives you compatibility (to a degree) between different manufacturer's products, something no other so-called "generic" system does (I'm not knocking GURPS as a system here, I am however knocking SJ Games for not jumping on the OGL bandwagon with the rules to open the system up to other manufacturers).
Customers love the fact that a Mongoose supplement about Wizards can be used in a scenario by WotC (or Green Ronin, or whoever), without having to convert stats. They (and I) love the fact that Lone Wolf, d20 Cthulhu, or most other d20 RPGs can be converted fairly easily (although not without a few glitches) for use as a sourcebook rather than a campaign setting. And from a more personal POV, I can't find words to say how great I think it is that Mongoose can come out with a book to supplant Core Rulebook I and not be sued into next year for it
