Conan Rules in a High Fantasy Setting?

[sundragon2012]

I began working on a new setting for fantasy role playing. I would say D&D but I am not sure anymore. I bought the Conan D20 rules and Road of Kings and ran a few sessions and I LOVE the rules. They are crisp, clean, vivid, and brutal.

I can see these rules working very well for an OGL high fantasy setting like the one I am working on at this time. My setting, atmospherically anyway is Tolkien meets Howard meets Moorcock meets Lovecraft. In other words it is a high fantasy setting with moderate levels of magic (in the D&D sense) that supports gritty realism along with magic and dark fantasy. As a game master I never believed that just because magic exists things do not have to be light, fluffly, simplistic or santized.

Does anyone else think that a high fantasy setting, with moderate amounts of magic and Conan's gritty rules would work? Right now I am writing background material and mapping the setting and have some time before I decide on a rule set to support it.


Chris

 

[***BARON***]

oh man, from now on we're playing Conan... no more D&D. I don't care if they get to 3.99999999 ed.

Make mine Conan! 8)

 

[sundragon2012]

oh man, from now on we're playing Conan... no more D&D. I don't care if they get to 3.99999999 ed.

Make mine Conan! 8)

That's cool.

I just wanted to know if any folks thought that D20 Conan's rules would work well for a gritty high fantasy setting.


Chris

 

[***BARON***]

well it already is a gritty fantasy setting.. just slap together a more playable (read: less godlike) build for a dragon and let her fly so to speak. There are actually a lot of monsters in the main conan book and undead... use em and be more liberal with them than Conan might.

Tolkien is actually pretty low key. I mean there are billions of orcs... but otherwise you just have PC races. Magic isn't very overt. Monsters come along quite rarely. It's so doable.

 

[sundragon2012]

I think that by simply adding a spell point based, fatiguing magical system I think it would be pretty simple to add a bit of high fantasy to the base Conan rules making them appropriate for gamers who like their high fantasy a bit grittier. I can imagine a setting where there are wizards in the traditional sense, or even clerics in the traditional sense, but they are more rare. No assumptions about becoming magical "christmas trees", no wealth guidelines, a good loose XP system and some vivid combat dynamics and I think I would have a great recipe for a gritty high fantasy setting.

I think it can be done. I have to do a bit more research before I know for certain.


Chris

 

[***BARON***]

I really haven't experimented very much with magic at all... but yeah it seems like a blast. I don't like D&D magic particularly... and hate it at very high levels in terms of both magic and power gaming in general.

the HP stop getting rolled after 10th. You can NOT beat Conan.

 

[Azgulor]

I think that by simply adding a spell point based, fatiguing magical system I think it would be pretty simple to add a bit of high fantasy to the base Conan rules making them appropriate for gamers who like their high fantasy a bit grittier. I can imagine a setting where there are wizards in the traditional sense, or even clerics in the traditional sense, but they are more rare. No assumptions about becoming magical "christmas trees", no wealth guidelines, a good loose XP system and some vivid combat dynamics and I think I would have a great recipe for a gritty high fantasy setting.

I think it can be done. I have to do a bit more research before I know for certain.


Chris

Well, I was shooting for a "mid-magic" rather than low-magic/high-magic, but I combined the Thieves' World Player's Guide with Conan. TW's spellcasters replaced the sorcerous scholar from Conan. Basically, it's a fatigue based (but not point based) spellcasting system. By default, it uses D&D spells, which would be fine for High Fantasy. I'm trying to tweak/modify to strip out the worst High Fantasy offenders - Teleport, Invisibility, Hold Person, etc. Not quite where I want it yet, but getting there.

So yes, I think it's very doable. I too, will only use Conan for the basis of my d20 Fantasy games. D&D-as-written? No thanks.

Azgulor

 

[Bregales]

That's cool.

I just wanted to know if any folks thought that D20 Conan's rules would work well for a gritty high fantasy setting.

Chris

Not really. Conan's gritty deadly combat, healing & rest is based on a no-magic healing setting. It took the basis from DeedleDee and made healing quicker because, well, there are no clerics to cast cure moderate wounds. Sorcery is also based solely on a world where very few have access to sorcery.

If you develop a system where there are wizards' guilds and young Grey Mousers learn from fabled wizards, then the very concept behind the sorcery is shifted. Maybe taking Azgulor's advice about using mixed systems would work better.

This world is gritty without high fantasy. It's based on a visceral world, which works and is so believable because it's whole embodiment works it's own will, where everyone has their own agenda, where most of the populace never see 'outlandish' things, and only those roguish warriors and thieves who tread the earth meet up with it's horrors and majesties. If you enter "MEDIUM" or "HIGH" fantasy, you change the whole premise of the equation, therefore, the formula is faulted from the source of the preposition. This game's system is built around it's world environment. If you change the style of the environment you need to adjust all the rules. As two of my players already stated & emailed, it's not a balanced game. That's fine, to me, because unlike dnd it's based on a dark savage time, and only the barbaric spirit can prevail against the outer dark and dim follies of mortals.

 

[Azgulor]

Bregales makes a good point. Conan - by itself, does not lend itself well to High Fantasy.

Conan as a baseline with the appropriate tweaks, however, is doable. Whether those tweaks are Tolkein-style races or D&D-style magic or something else from your favorite d20 supplement, is up to you.

Azgulor

 

[Sutek]

Hmmm...I disagree, but only on the basis of this: What is high fantasy, really?

Now, if you want Dragons in there...man are your party members in trouble. (lol) By that same token, the average Orc becomes a serious menace. Most of the abilities that low CR creatures lack make Orcs fairly tame in D&D terms, but they wouldnt'have that problem in a Conan based world. Since everyone uses two weapons better, can't rely on AC to protect them and can die at taking 20+ points of damage, Orcs in numbers could be devestating, nevre ming you average drake.

Magic is different. You can't equate the healing system in Conan to it's Magic system, or the magic system of another game for that matter. Conan's healing is more based on the notion of HP as representing fatigue rather than actual wounds. You fight, get beat up and worn down, then you rest a few days and you're ready for more. Besides that, Conan magic is really more deadly than anything that does 1d4 for every 2 levels or 5d6 in one shot. Yeah, that's horrendous, but if a dude can simply pull your heart right out of your chest, no damage roll even being made, that just seems much more deadly.

What is a magic potion? Well, any thing sufficiently technologically advanced can easily be percieved as being magic. We might see pepto-bismol as a pick goop that is made of chemicals that makes our tummy ache go away, but a Kalaheri bushman might think it was a magic potion that healed him. Everything is relative.

Elves and dwarves would work better as NPC races, in my opinion. Keep them mysterious and other-worldly. They should all also be like 6-10 levels higer than the PCs at any given time simply because they live for millenia or forever or something. Elves in the party don't make sense in a gritty fantasy setting because', realistically, they be both bored out of thier skulls having nothing to talk about with mere mortals, and any Elf of the same character level as the rest of the humans in the party would either be a very, very young Elf or a very, very stupid one.

Weapons throw a spanner into the works regardless of whether it's D&D or not. In a more gritty high fantasy setting , these sorts of thing woul dalmost always have to be "quest items" - stuff the party gets after a huge journey to find that specific thing. You dont' jsut stumble accross rings of protection and +3 daggers from killing bad guys.

 

[René]

I'm trying to tweak/modify to strip out the worst High Fantasy offenders - Teleport, Invisibility, Hold Person, etc.

Yeah, Teleport & Invisibilty are plot killers par excellence - they were the first things to be kicked out when I had started my Dark Sun campaign years ago. To neutralize them you need a lot of magically warded houses / locations, which gets very fast very silly.

 

[Sutek]

If you can find it, there's a nice pared-down list of spells in the D20 Call of Cthulhu core book that is a pretty rational list. It's for a darker and even more deadly setting (massive damage threshold of 10, people!) and will probably save you alot of time going through all the 3.5 spells. It's 3.0 compatable, but little other than a few spell names changed between the two versions.

 

[Bregales]

Magic is different. You can't equate the healing system in Conan to it's Magic system, or the magic system of another game for that matter. Conan's healing is more based on the notion of HP as representing fatigue rather than actual wounds. You fight, get beat up and worn down, then you rest a few days and you're ready for more. Besides that, Conan magic is really more deadly than anything that does 1d4 for every 2 levels or 5d6 in one shot. Yeah, that's horrendous, but if a dude can simply pull your heart right out of your chest, no damage roll even being made, that just seems much more deadly.

That's very true, but DeedleDee magic was a basis for creating Conan's system: namely, that they decided to use certain OGL spells & effects, schools, while changing the basic arrangement to make it fit the Hyborian feel. As for wounds representing fatigue, actually DnD makes the same basis. (v3.5PHB, p.145: Injury and Death, which like most of DnD doesn't actually state what the effect is but uses combined inferences).

What is a magic potion? Well, any thing sufficiently technologically advanced can easily be percieved as being magic. We might see pepto-bismol as a pick goop that is made of chemicals that makes our tummy ache go away, but a Kalaheri bushman might think it was a magic potion that healed him. Everything is relative.

Good point, makes me think of the movie, "The Gods Must Be Crazy".

Elves and dwarves would work better as NPC races, in my opinion. Keep them mysterious and other-worldly. They should all also be like 6-10 levels higer than the PCs at any given time simply because they live for millenia or forever or something. Elves in the party don't make sense in a gritty fantasy setting because', realistically, they be both bored out of thier skulls having nothing to talk about with mere mortals, and any Elf of the same character level as the rest of the humans in the party would either be a very, very young Elf or a very, very stupid one.

I also agree with this. By the way, my group's former Tiberius player said that Conan so favors barbarians that it unbalances all other classes, whereas DnD's class system is based wholly upon game balance. He suggested barbarians encountered should be 1-3 levels higher instead of giving them better benefits than other classes. An interesting point I concede.

Weapons throw a spanner into the works regardless of whether it's D&D or not. In a more gritty high fantasy setting , these sorts of thing woul dalmost always have to be "quest items" - stuff the party gets after a huge journey to find that specific thing. You dont' jsut stumble accross rings of protection and +3 daggers from killing bad guys.

I also favor this argument. By the way, in several Conan stories Conan does stumble upon the quest magic item: "Devil In Iron" and "Shadows in Zamboula" come to mind (although magic item in the latter story is not pertinent to the story, but the magic belt that Khemsa gives Conan at his death in "People of the Black Circle" turns out to be very important for his facing the Black Seers of Mount Yimsha).

In the end, I just opted to give my personal opinion based on the question posed in this thread. Every group to greater or lesser degree tweaks the rules to make house variants, and I applaud sundragon2012 for having a go at it. I just believe that the game was worked on so hard by Mongoose's designers to make it particular to this world, that a lot of work must be done to 'de-establish' it from this world. In the end, who cares what we think, you are your own judge and make your own decisions. So long as you're consistent with your rulings amongst the players, that's all that matters.

 

[Damien]

I happen to feel that gritty rules and a higher fantasy setting work rather well together. My homebrew setting will be like that when it's finished. What you end up with is a world of majesty and awe, where people still die and terrible things still happen.

If you can envision a world of sprawling towers and massive, protected forests where, beneath the eaves of those huge trees, a group of Elves hack a group of Orcs to bloody pieces with gleaming (but mundane) swords and a fierce glow in their otherworldly eyes... then you can envision a high fantasy world with a gritty flavour.


As for magic... the major contention with keeping magic out of Conan, in my opinion, is healing and lethality. If you can find an elegant way to drop most healing magic and most severe direct-damage spells like Fireball... then magic fits just fine in Conan as a neutral force rather than an almost-always-evil force.

and any Elf of the same character level as the rest of the humans in the party would either be a very, very young Elf or a very, very stupid one.

Oh please. That's silly!

We all have known since 3E was released that PC classes are for "special" people and that most inhabitants of a world never get a single PC class level. If a 300-year-old Elf that's only a 5th level soldier is "very stupid," then the 70-year-old human that's only a 1st level Noble must be mentally retarded.

That's a concession the game makes -- people don't all advance just by getting older, like they might in real life. They advance because of events around them or things they've done. An Elf without many levels simply hasn't done anything yet to warrant getting to the next phase of unlocking his natural talents.





I do agree that magical weapons don't fit. But I also don't think they're really necessary to a high fantasy setting. Make crafting magical items extremely hard.. fit only for extremely high-level magic-users and Gods, or something. And make it so that no mortal can make more than one item. Simple as that. You can also use Conan's existing suggestion -- magic items tend to have a specific purpose and should only be used for that purpose. Maybe even being mundane weapons when not being used for that purpose.

Maybe there's a spear that just acts like a normal spear.. but gets a damage and attack bonus against Dragons... or something.


That's both keeping with high fantasy and the gritty Conan rules.


I also like the idea of expanding Masterwork options like Green Ronin did for The Black Company Campaign Setting -- although to keep things gritty I wouldn't offer quite so many 'levels' of Masterwork... capping it at maybe two or three beyond "normal" weapon.. so it would go something like:

Inferior
Average
Fine
Excellent

So an inferior weapon might be rusted, or nicked. An average weapon is a standard weapon right off the equipment list.. a fine weapon has one special ability as per the BCCS and an excellent weapon has two. Just an idea.

It gives you the opportunity to make 'better' or 'more impressive' weapons without having characters be defined by their trinkets and gear.

 

[Diabolus]

To the OP: Yes. I concur with Damien. I use the Conan RPG in the Judges Guild Wilderlands of High Fantasy setting and it works very well. REH and the Conan stories, as well as HP Lovecraft, and Tolkien (not to mention Science Fiction) were the inspiration for the setting when it was originally published in parts back in the late 70s/early 80s.

Yes, Orcs are and should be considered dangerous. The situation in the Dearthwood with the Wild Orcs of the Purple Claw being held back from the City State of the Invincible Overlord by the Dunael Borderers working with Elves is very analogous to the Picts in the Westermarck.

I plan to pick up Across Thunder River (Vincent Darlage - your books just OWN!) and will likely use it to make my savage orcs even nastier and I really look forward to Hyboria's Fallen this Christmas, as two of the characters have Pirate levels. In converting materials it's great to actually have a Pirate and Noble classes to utilize instead of having them be generic fighters with nautical or diplomatic skills.

As for monsters, keep them special. A good gamemaster can do that easilly.