[Rumor] Conan 2nd Ed to use Runequest system?
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Sutek
Mongoose
After 18+ pages a conversation is apt to drift a bit...lol.
But the future of 4th edition D&D is entirely a valid part of the conversation, since Mongoose used OGL to base the Conan RPG on.
What's funny to me is the further info that Wizards is apparent;y deciding that RPGs aren't profitable. At $30-$40 a pop for each book, if Wizards hasn't been able to generate some extra cash off of D&D then what they need to quit the business altogether. There's absolutely no way that I belive that WoC hasn't made money hand over fist with D&D 3.0 and 3.5.
The fact that they have staff that arent' creative enough to create subsequent quality supplemts that appeal across the board may be something they need to look into. I was so monumentally underimpressed with Ebberon that I can't even begin to quantify for you all. I just yawned when I saw it, thought "why didnt' they just make these new Greyhawk races?" and put it out of my mind. WoC has yet to truly revisit Greyhawk and the other worlds of D&D, or to develop an absolutely unique alternate campaign world product line.
That's where this 4.0 D&D jibber-jabber relates to the future of Conan and what Mongoose may or may not do to keep the liscence alive. D20 works. It's a good, clean system and it's popular. If WoC changes D&D so drastically as to leave D20 to the ancestors (which I doubt very seriously will happen), then that would be the only circumstance under which I could see Mmongoose following suit and lifting Conan over to RQ. Personally, I think all this WoC rumor garbage that "RPGs arent' profitable" has more to do with other companies, like Mongoose, having product lines that are suddenly more successful than actual D&D. The fact that the last year's WoC D&D publications suck just doesn't seem to occur to the powers that be over and Wizards. It must have more to do with the fact that RPGs are just not profitable. Gosh, that just depends on whether you are losing more money than you're making, and if you publish vapid books with little substance consisting of nothing but new feats and prestige classes, well, customers tend ot go looking for something fresh elsewhere. Wow...whadaya know? :shock:
I think it's a lot mor elikely that WoC will try to pull off 4.0 as a cleaned up 3.5, sticking to the PHB/DMG/MM formula. Anything else would be on par with suicide in the industry. But, there again, maybe they'll do it to just dangle that "unprofitability" in the faces of consumers and compettitors effectively to say "see, we told you it would never work" and put this old RPG dog down. I dont' see that happening either. Magic and minis are only profitable because people are still curently willing to dole out loads of cash for replicas of crappy commons just to have the few good candidates that it takes to be competitive. There's still the RPG crowd out there that aren't interested in being competative, enjoy social interaction on a level other than "untap, upkeep, draw a card" and will stay brand loyal to D&D, whatever WoC do to it.
Then there's us. We've not really "jumped ship", but instead have found a viable alternative craft on the same river that we can hop over to for a change of pace from fighing dragons and dodging fireballs. Frankly, if Woc were smart (which I'm beginning to doubt if the rumore are true) then they'd make up a low magic, high combat adventurous campaign world and make it into a product line. Oh well. That leaves us, the Conan fans, squarely and loyally with Mongoose. Only now we see the insidiousness of the OGL plan - get other companies to stand still with the OGL long enough to produce thier own materials, then pull the rug out from under them claiming it to have not been profitable all along.
<pause>
But the future of 4th edition D&D is entirely a valid part of the conversation, since Mongoose used OGL to base the Conan RPG on.
What's funny to me is the further info that Wizards is apparent;y deciding that RPGs aren't profitable. At $30-$40 a pop for each book, if Wizards hasn't been able to generate some extra cash off of D&D then what they need to quit the business altogether. There's absolutely no way that I belive that WoC hasn't made money hand over fist with D&D 3.0 and 3.5.
The fact that they have staff that arent' creative enough to create subsequent quality supplemts that appeal across the board may be something they need to look into. I was so monumentally underimpressed with Ebberon that I can't even begin to quantify for you all. I just yawned when I saw it, thought "why didnt' they just make these new Greyhawk races?" and put it out of my mind. WoC has yet to truly revisit Greyhawk and the other worlds of D&D, or to develop an absolutely unique alternate campaign world product line.
That's where this 4.0 D&D jibber-jabber relates to the future of Conan and what Mongoose may or may not do to keep the liscence alive. D20 works. It's a good, clean system and it's popular. If WoC changes D&D so drastically as to leave D20 to the ancestors (which I doubt very seriously will happen), then that would be the only circumstance under which I could see Mmongoose following suit and lifting Conan over to RQ. Personally, I think all this WoC rumor garbage that "RPGs arent' profitable" has more to do with other companies, like Mongoose, having product lines that are suddenly more successful than actual D&D. The fact that the last year's WoC D&D publications suck just doesn't seem to occur to the powers that be over and Wizards. It must have more to do with the fact that RPGs are just not profitable. Gosh, that just depends on whether you are losing more money than you're making, and if you publish vapid books with little substance consisting of nothing but new feats and prestige classes, well, customers tend ot go looking for something fresh elsewhere. Wow...whadaya know? :shock:
I think it's a lot mor elikely that WoC will try to pull off 4.0 as a cleaned up 3.5, sticking to the PHB/DMG/MM formula. Anything else would be on par with suicide in the industry. But, there again, maybe they'll do it to just dangle that "unprofitability" in the faces of consumers and compettitors effectively to say "see, we told you it would never work" and put this old RPG dog down. I dont' see that happening either. Magic and minis are only profitable because people are still curently willing to dole out loads of cash for replicas of crappy commons just to have the few good candidates that it takes to be competitive. There's still the RPG crowd out there that aren't interested in being competative, enjoy social interaction on a level other than "untap, upkeep, draw a card" and will stay brand loyal to D&D, whatever WoC do to it.
Then there's us. We've not really "jumped ship", but instead have found a viable alternative craft on the same river that we can hop over to for a change of pace from fighing dragons and dodging fireballs. Frankly, if Woc were smart (which I'm beginning to doubt if the rumore are true) then they'd make up a low magic, high combat adventurous campaign world and make it into a product line. Oh well. That leaves us, the Conan fans, squarely and loyally with Mongoose. Only now we see the insidiousness of the OGL plan - get other companies to stand still with the OGL long enough to produce thier own materials, then pull the rug out from under them claiming it to have not been profitable all along.
<pause>
Monty Cook just wrote in his blog that that seems to be what Wizards is going to do, quit rpgs altogether. His Malhavoc Press is going dormant after 2 last releases (they'll still sell what books they have, but he's quitting writing rpgs for "other pursuits" and his hint at doing one last "outside job" seems to be contributing to the 4th ed. book. So with Malhavoc Press not planning on any more releases after their in process books come out is another forebidding sign.
Hmm, if WotC stops publishing RPG's, will that mean that our favourite classic D&D settings will finally be available for purchase by other publishers? That could be a good thing.
Honestly though, after purchasing a few books from different publishers I have to say that WotC has probably the best support for all their games. They constantly update errata, FAQ's, and publish free online content for all their books, which I for one love. This was my biggest disappointment from Mongoose. There is little to no support for Conan d20, which quite frankly, has quite a few problems which I won't go into right now. Let's just say that I've had to inject quite a few house rules to make up for the mechanical shortcomings.
I love the Conan stories and comics, and the world of hyboria is a unique and wonderful place to roleplay, so I will continue to run my campaign in this world. But I will most likely never use the Conan d20 system for the rules ever again. 8)
Honestly though, after purchasing a few books from different publishers I have to say that WotC has probably the best support for all their games. They constantly update errata, FAQ's, and publish free online content for all their books, which I for one love. This was my biggest disappointment from Mongoose. There is little to no support for Conan d20, which quite frankly, has quite a few problems which I won't go into right now. Let's just say that I've had to inject quite a few house rules to make up for the mechanical shortcomings.
I love the Conan stories and comics, and the world of hyboria is a unique and wonderful place to roleplay, so I will continue to run my campaign in this world. But I will most likely never use the Conan d20 system for the rules ever again. 8)
slaughterj
Mongoose
I'd prefer the system to continue, but would like to see it revised, with a newer skill list to take advantage of further developments in that area in various RPGs - e.g., a stealth skill instead of move silently & hide, a notice skill instead of spot & listen, etc.
jadrax said:
Except of course for the occasion they licenced out all the D&D interactive computer software rights to Atari without discussing it properly with the D&D guys at WotC, putting the kibosh on the E-Tools project and reducing it to a nasty little runtime MS Access database
Sutek
Mongoose
See, WoC could reslease D&D 4.0 as a revised D20 set and we'd all buy it all over again. (lol) I would, most likely. It's more likely to sell as a revision with little change, but with fixes and updates from eratta. Then they'd see that RPGs do sell.
The fact that Monte Cook is getting out of RPGs is probably because, like I said above, his solo books are crap. They are redudancies looking down thier snotty, eliteist noses at his own baby, 3.X D&D.
What a cry baby.
The fact that Monte Cook is getting out of RPGs is probably because, like I said above, his solo books are crap. They are redudancies looking down thier snotty, eliteist noses at his own baby, 3.X D&D.
What a cry baby.
quigs said:
You're kidding, right? If Conan didn't have any support, I doubt this thread would have gone on for 18 pages. Fans of the RPG like the support and don't want it to stop b/c of D&D 4e, MRQ, or any other bs reason.
And on a side note, I have never GM'd or played in a game of D&D that didn't have house rules of some kind or another. If straight-up WotC-only D&D is your thing, that's great but I don't think you represent the majority of D&D/d20 gamers.
Azgulor
I kid you not Azgulor. I never stated that I spoke for anybody but myself either, and I do not plan on buying RQ. My idea of support is actually in reference to supporting the books that an RPG publisher has already released, not in planning future supplements. Forum posts, FAQ's and Erratta, etc.
As a GM with a full-time job and a very hectic schedule, I have little to no time to plan adventures or stat up NPC's and encounters. So when I go looking through a Conan RPG book for interesting enemies, alchemical items, or monsters, I want to be able to grab them right out of the book and run with it. When I ran D&D, I had very few instances of numbers not adding up, or troubles finding what I wanted and running it right out of the book. With Mongoose, its the opposite. Almost every stat block in all the Conan books that I have is incorrect in some way. Many of them are incredibly huge errors that either make a monster or NPC unusable without a complete re-engineering or are missing the information entirely. Scrolls of Skelos and Free Companies are two of the worst culprits for this.
While its not unusual for an RPG to require errata or FAQ's and to contain some minor mistakes, I find it disturbing to see so many of them in Mongoose's material. Add to that, they have not posted a single FAQ or Eratta since AE came out and almost every single post on the Rulesmasters forum about Conan topics goes unanswered.
Mongoose is obviously not as large a company as WotC and probably has nowhere near as much money to throw at this kind of thing, but even a little "official" support would be appreciated.
I hope that clarifies what I meant.
As a GM with a full-time job and a very hectic schedule, I have little to no time to plan adventures or stat up NPC's and encounters. So when I go looking through a Conan RPG book for interesting enemies, alchemical items, or monsters, I want to be able to grab them right out of the book and run with it. When I ran D&D, I had very few instances of numbers not adding up, or troubles finding what I wanted and running it right out of the book. With Mongoose, its the opposite. Almost every stat block in all the Conan books that I have is incorrect in some way. Many of them are incredibly huge errors that either make a monster or NPC unusable without a complete re-engineering or are missing the information entirely. Scrolls of Skelos and Free Companies are two of the worst culprits for this.
While its not unusual for an RPG to require errata or FAQ's and to contain some minor mistakes, I find it disturbing to see so many of them in Mongoose's material. Add to that, they have not posted a single FAQ or Eratta since AE came out and almost every single post on the Rulesmasters forum about Conan topics goes unanswered.
Mongoose is obviously not as large a company as WotC and probably has nowhere near as much money to throw at this kind of thing, but even a little "official" support would be appreciated.
I hope that clarifies what I meant.
High Lord Dee
Mongoose
This article by Monte Cook has some interesting bits about WOTC, d20, non-d20 and how it all ties together to make the industry. Thought it might be appropriate here.
http://www.ptolus.com/cgi-bin/page.cgi?mc_los_155
HLD
http://www.ptolus.com/cgi-bin/page.cgi?mc_los_155
HLD
bloodshadows
Mongoose
I have all the Conan books, even the Gurps Conan books... but D20 just doesn't do it for me. It's okay at first but once you reach a certain level, it's get's to be a pain on the GM. I've switched to Savage Worlds and haven't looked back. It emulates the Conan stories VERY well. The fact that Solomon Kane will be Savage Worlds just sweetens the pot.
I knew nothing of this system change news at GenCon or I would have brought it up at the Robert E. Howard Q&A there. I can tell you that all the people there believed in Howard's work 100% and did not want to dilute it in any way. Conan was the primary topic and while Mongoose was represented, there were few questions in that direction. I think it was mostly held to the next couple of releases coming up.
System changes suck unless it's done because you choose to. We all suddenly had 3.0 books that were useless once 3.5 came out. I remember when West End Games lost the Star Wars licence and the D20 version was announced... there are still D6 versions on the Web. If Conan should change, IF, what more is there really as far as new material that would have to be converted? Adventures, yes, but so much of the Hyborian world has been charted now by Mongoose that all should be well.
Annoying, yes. Reason to abandon Mongoose, nah.
I knew nothing of this system change news at GenCon or I would have brought it up at the Robert E. Howard Q&A there. I can tell you that all the people there believed in Howard's work 100% and did not want to dilute it in any way. Conan was the primary topic and while Mongoose was represented, there were few questions in that direction. I think it was mostly held to the next couple of releases coming up.
System changes suck unless it's done because you choose to. We all suddenly had 3.0 books that were useless once 3.5 came out. I remember when West End Games lost the Star Wars licence and the D20 version was announced... there are still D6 versions on the Web. If Conan should change, IF, what more is there really as far as new material that would have to be converted? Adventures, yes, but so much of the Hyborian world has been charted now by Mongoose that all should be well.
Annoying, yes. Reason to abandon Mongoose, nah.
slaughterj
Mongoose
bloodshadows said:
There is already the main book, each of the class books, and a few adventures, but only a few region books (some cities, Stygia, Aquilonia, and the Picts). Most of the region books are yet to be released, though in another year or so (given the soon release of Argos & Zingara, and presumably others), that might be taken care of. Then once Mongoose has released everything in D20/OGL, they could consider a version of the rules in Runequest, and dual-stat future adventures (or the few other supplements they come up with, e.g., like Faith & Fervor and Free Companies, there might be other subjects than mere regions to expand on). Another consideration is that they have just released RuneQuest, and there surely will be errors, errata issued, and other clean-up, which if you wait a while and address those, then they can be incorporated into a RQ version of Conan that might be eventually released (maybe in 1-2 years).
I am likewise getting frustrated with the d20 system as a GM. I spent the better part of last night's adventure looking for rules for some unexpected PC actions, and the game slowed to a crawl, and my players are only 6th level! I'm pretty experienced as a GM and there are still questions that pop up now and again that stump me.
d20 works well for D&D, but its not my favourite for Conan. Especially after reading the REH stories. Savage Worlds looks really good so I'm thinking that my next (if there is a next) Conan campaign will be run using those rules.
Not interested in RQ really. But I'll still have a look at any Conan RQ pdf's MGP puts up for download.
d20 works well for D&D, but its not my favourite for Conan. Especially after reading the REH stories. Savage Worlds looks really good so I'm thinking that my next (if there is a next) Conan campaign will be run using those rules.
Not interested in RQ really. But I'll still have a look at any Conan RQ pdf's MGP puts up for download.
slaughterj
Mongoose
Savage Worlds didn't look appealing to me at all, and I know the author... It looked a lot like early D&D with feats, so why do people get so excited about it?
I can't say that I've been privy to any rumors aside from the wishful thinking of a lot of RQ fans. But being a fan of Stormbringer, I know I would LOVE to see a BRP compatible Conan book.
That doesn't have to mean the end of Conan d20 though. Rather, all that's necessary is a Runequest: Conan book, similar to the Conan d20 Core book. Provide the main modifications to the system, details on magic and whatnot, and you're gold. That would make everyone happy. Conan d20 people keep happily grabbing up every bit of Hyborean goodness that comes down the pike, plus all those suppliments become accessible to the RQ crowd. You could do monster conversions as web freebies (or provide a simple system), so no real need to dual stat the books (which would likely alienate a chunk of the d20 audience regardless of the amount of space it took up). Presto! Everyone gets what they want!
Tom
That doesn't have to mean the end of Conan d20 though. Rather, all that's necessary is a Runequest: Conan book, similar to the Conan d20 Core book. Provide the main modifications to the system, details on magic and whatnot, and you're gold. That would make everyone happy. Conan d20 people keep happily grabbing up every bit of Hyborean goodness that comes down the pike, plus all those suppliments become accessible to the RQ crowd. You could do monster conversions as web freebies (or provide a simple system), so no real need to dual stat the books (which would likely alienate a chunk of the d20 audience regardless of the amount of space it took up). Presto! Everyone gets what they want!
Tom
