David Gemmell's Books would make a good RPG

[Kekataag]

Sorry if this has been mentioned before, but I thought to add that David Gemmell's books would make a great RPG.

As a core book, the Drenai Saga RPG could encompass roleplaying in the times of Waylander, Druss, Skilgannon, Ulrich, etc. Given that Mr Gemmell's book encompass ten to fifteen thousand years of earth's history, MGP could also release expansion books detailing:

- the Apocalypse Cowboy era fo Jon Shannow;
- the Days of Ice and Fire and the rise of the first cities;
- the Knights of Gabala and their battle against Demonic Werebeasts;
- the time of Emsharas and the Battle of the Four Valleys;
- the War of the Pearl;
- the War of the Twins;
- the world of the Rigante/Vars/Varlish;
- the Ice Age of the Avatars;
- Ancient Greece and it's 'mythical alternate'
- Atlantis during Pendarric's reign;
-
...to name a few.

My own opinion of the genre (and given existing rules on the market) means that this RPG could be easily portrayed using Iron Heroes (Waylander is an Executioner, Druss an Armiger, Skilgannon and Decado are Weapons Masters, for example), so I would hope that if 4th Edition is houseruled enough, 4th Edition may be a suitable basis for the game (though my jury is still out until I've seen WotC's rules).

Alternatively, a systemless book would also be good (like Green Ronin's Pirates Guide to Freeport).

What does everyone think?

 

[The Greek]

I personally love Druss...no not in that way.

(not that there is anything wrong with that).

There is so much cool stuff in his books and they are definitely better written than most of the fantasy novels out there. Maybe one day in the far future I can persude Matt to cough up the readies...

 

[broken serenity]

i can name at least 10 people who i know would get back into rpg's just to play a gemmell based rpg so i think that far future should become not to distant imo

 

[Soulmage]

David Gemmell, Glen Cook, and Steven Brust are the best three Fantasy authors out there IMO. Nobody else writes characters and storylines that are as engaging as theirs.

 

[broken serenity]

in david gemmellls case he wrote better, he died in july 06 of heart failure
but i agree all those authors are truelly kings of the fantasy writing world.

 

[dave-the-lost]

Either an RPG or a miniatures game based on Gemmel would be fantastic.

I don't see why Mongoose couldn't use RuneQuest as the engine.

However, nothing would turn me off buying it faster than making it d20.

 

[broken serenity]

agreed plus some of gemmells most well known charecters would end up pigeonholed into classes they dont fit it d20 is used, i can see something like deadlands working for the jon shannow stuff at a pinch though but it'd need some changes.

 

[Balgin Stondraeg]

Bizarrely there's still an unfinished Druss miniature out there (it may be released at some time in the future):

That's clearly unfinished from the armpits up and I reckon the lower half would recive some reworking and more detailing before it'd be anywhere near finished. Since work on the mini was temporarily discontinued (out of respect due to Mr Gemmel's death - the sculptor was going to send him a free copy when it got released) the axe is now available separately on a conversion "bits" sprue. I can provide a link if anyone's interested.

If you guys buy The Quintessential Warrior (from Mongoose publishing) there's a prestige class called Legend with lots of Druss inspired feats (similar to Die Hard and stuff like that). The illustration by the prestige class is quite clearly Druss too .

There are also some pretty good Online Map of the lands of the Drenai Saga that is the basis for the "official Del Rey map", whatever that is. I've never heard of that before.

 

[klingsor]

Del Ray is a large American publishing house. Presumably they publish the American editions of his works and have a map in them if only because they are fantasy and all fantasy books have maps.

 

[broken serenity]

why dont they just use the maps he used to have in a few of his hardback editions then instead of that colored mess

 

[axman]

In 1 of the 3rd Ed runequest books there is a pic which is so totally taken from legend, with Druss hurling a Nadir warrior from the ramparts of the Dros. RQ is almosr perfet for the Drenai saga and i would have done it ages ago if i could get more of my friends to read his work.
I am getting there though

 

[Faënril]

Drenai cycle !

 

[Tacobake]

david gemmell anything would make a good anything, and I'm glad we're all in agreement.