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Good reviews on Runeblogger's page, and I'm just parking this one of Mythras here:
elruneblog.blogspot.com

Review: Mythras, the roleplaying game (RuneQuest 6)

Review of Mythras, the roleplaying game formerly known as RuneQuest 6th edition. Read about this intuitive, strategic, D100 game system.
elruneblog.blogspot.com elruneblog.blogspot.com
Just keeping the fiery flames of the BRP Edition Wars flickering, heh heh
 
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Jaeger said:
Also: Where can we pester them for an English edition!?
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Rights issues? I'm presuming they have a Swedish-only licence, so would have to co-publish, JC-ise, or extend that in some way for an English version.
 
Alai said:
Rights issues? I'm presuming they have a Swedish-only licence, so would have to co-publish, JC-ise, or extend that in some way for an English version.
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Pretty sure none of the actual text of the original version that was a translation of Magic World from Worlds of Wonder remains in the game. I would be incredibly surprised if there were actually any rights issues with publishing Drakar och Demoner in English.
 
raniE said:
Pretty sure none of the actual text of the original version that was a translation of Magic World from Worlds of Wonder remains in the game. I would be incredibly surprised if there were actually any rights issues with publishing Drakar och Demoner in English.
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Apologies, I think I got my wires crossed at some point and got the impression there was Gloranthan content involved somehow. Maybe for Freudian reasons, or else due to discussion of that elsewhere in the thread. Or else I have no idea why I was banging on about the Jonstown Compendium...
 
Alai said:
Apologies, I think I got my wires crossed at some point and got the impression there was Gloranthan content involved somehow. Maybe for Freudian reasons, or else due to discussion of that elsewhere in the thread. Or else I have no idea why I was banging on about the Jonstown Compendium...
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The Glorantha content would be from a different Swedish company, Eloso, which is doing a Swedish version of the new RuneQuest (after their Swedish version of Call of Cthulhu 7). See this post :smile:
raniE said:
Now on to info about Swedish RuneQuest. Anders Blixt, the lead designer and an old hand (he worked on Drakar och Demoner in the 80s and 90s, and on the recent Swedish Call of Cthulh edition, so he knows BRP). He also writes in English, so I don't have to translate anything. Here is what he posted today about work on RuneQuest:

  • Runequest Swedish Edition (RQSE): We have started working on Eloso's Runequest. RQSE emphasizes culture gaming in a colorful, profound milieu where adventurers are part of well-established communities and must face major challenges as a tightly-knit team. RQSE comprises one rulebook (with a localized version of RQ BRP) and one setting book for the Talastar region. We are currently busy with determining what content we will translate from the Runequest Glorantha game and what texts we need to write from scratch.
So, as we have a separate thread about RuneQuest Glorantha, I know that not everyone is too thrilled with this new edition (I haven't actually checked it out myself, which I probably should as a BRP head), but that's basically what the rules will be based on. Most Swedish BRP games have been different from RuneQuest, so it'll be interesting to see how it is received in Sweden.
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So there's a lot of activity in Swedish BRP right now, with several major BRP projects going on at the same time. And you are right, for Eloso there may be licensing issues where they can't publish their Talastar stuff in English.
 
raniE said:
The Glorantha content would be from a different Swedish company, Eloso, which is doing a Swedish version of the new RuneQuest (after their Swedish version of Call of Cthulhu 7). See this post :smile:
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Right, I must have read that post (about the Talastar setting book), saw the later question, mind slipped a gear or three and confused the two.

Mea maxima culpa... [Exit, stage left, flogging self penitently.]
 
Alai said:
Right, I must have read that post (about the Talastar setting book), saw the later question, mind slipped a gear or three and confused the two.

Mea maxima culpa... [Exit, stage left, flogging self penitently.]
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It’s a relevant question about the Talastar material though. So if you want that in English, probably ask Chaosium and Eloso both to have it translated. Same for the info on Sweden in the 1920s from Swedish CoC.
 
To non-BRP players this is no big deal, but for me I really would of preferred if RQ6/Mythras had remained the core BRP build for RuneQuest: Adventures in Glorantha (RQG). Both of these versions of BRP are quite similar and hit all the beats that really capture my imagination, however I just feel that Mythras improved various rules, and it is hard to go back after that.

Despite that, I do think that Glorantha itself has never been so well presented as it is with the contemporary RuneQuest line. The new products are a visual feast, and really capture the vibe of this rich ancient world setting.

The RQG Starter Set will be released next week, and the Gen Con preview copies have been getting good reviews. This recent video just turned up in my feeds, and I must say that I'm impressed, and will definately be grabbing this starter set

Gloranthan cultists will be happy this coming Sacred Time :thumbsup:
(Xmas/New Year)

 
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K_Peterson said:
I'm not sure about the starting points. I've not compared OQ to other systems to get an idea of whether its inflated or not.

I've got a pdf of OpenQuest Basic handy, and this is the breakdown of how you apply points among the Skill Categories:

View attachment 27478

This breakdown - to me - just feels weirdly arbitrary and limiting. Maybe it's because I'm so used to BRP systems that offer free skill point spends, or the allocations of points occurs in a more logical manner. It feels like you'd get pretty similar characters, and I don't like that in my BRP-play.
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I've handled this a couple of different ways in my OQ games that I've ran.

Originally, I made a table of various types, such as Martial Characters, Magical Focused, Adventurers, Crafters and the like and did the arbitrary spreads using the same total numbers. It was okay, but a bit clunky, so I dropped that

What I've done the past several times that I've ran OQ, is to take a page from Magic World (I think is where I got is) and have the characters assign a number of skills with various bonuses, which will vary depending upon the type of game I'm planning on running. That has worked really well, and I have had brand new players (as in never played Tabletop before) have a character up and ready to go in 10 to 15 minutes, a big part of which was explanations of what things are.
 
This showed up today. The box has some impressive weight to it, with a 'once you open this you will never shut it again' feeling that we got from DC heroes 1st edition back in the day. I had to turn over to the back to confirm my worst fears. I need stronger eyes. I'm starting to sound like a broken record now about my crappy eyesight but RPG companies need to think about stuff like this. Sure, it's great to get the kids on board (if you can) but the old farts with piles of disposable income need to be considered too.

I've ruled out buying any more Mythras as it's pointless if I can't read the thing. This looks nice, was decent value (twenty odd quid delivered with free pdf chucked in) and arrived in 6 days.







looking at the pdf it seems slightly easier to read. The other kind of issue I have is one with all PDFs these days. Print friendly please! Black text on plain white backgrounds would be great, thanks.

This is the sort of thing I'm on about:

rqg.png


The various OSR Kickstarter guys (with of course a nod towards the excellent Sine Nomine/Kevin Crawford) usually consider these sort of things.

For example:

Stars Without Number Revised Deluxe...

Image2.png


And the complimentary lightweight version of the same file, as print friendly as it gets really...

Image3.png


These may seem nitpicking things but they matter. I am happy to give you my money if you make allowances for the ageing reasonably well off with cash to spend types who have crappy old eyes.

Moan, groan. Now get off my goddamn lawn.

grimace-clint-eastwood.gif
 
Jenx said:
This showed up today. The box has some impressive weight to it, with a 'once you open this you will never shut it again' feeling that we got from DC heroes 1st edition back in the day. I had to turn over to the back to confirm my worst fears. I need stronger eyes. I'm starting to sound like a broken record now about my crappy eyesight but RPG companies need to think about stuff like this. Sure, it's great to get the kids on board (if you can) but the old farts with piles of disposable income need to be considered too.
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I feel your pain, being at that point of life of tipping over from bad vision with redeeming features for this sort of thing, to just generally terrible. And you'd think that old farts with more money than they had at the time wanting to relive their gaming glory days from the '70s, '80s, and/or '90s are exactly the market they're targeting.

On the PDFs, you might be able change things like background images, text contrast, and if you're very careful with you fiddling around perhaps also substitute some of the iffier fonts. PDF editors, online and command-line filters, and viewers with accessibility features may be of use here.
 
Jenx said:
I've ruled out buying any more Mythras as it's pointless if I can't read the thing.
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Alai said:
I feel your pain, being at that point of life of tipping over from bad vision with redeeming features for this sort of thing, to just generally terrible. And you'd think that old farts with more money than they had at the time wanting to relive their gaming glory days from the '70s, '80s, and/or '90s are exactly the market they're targeting.
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single most commented thing about Mythras core. problem is, Mythras has to cut content or make a much bigger print book to make this happen. Current edition would at about 150 pages (+50%).

Lyonesse and Babylon are quite a lot larger (mythras in the middle here)
1637289750951.png1637289772504.png1637289905237.png

I expect further mythras books will be like this, because the comments have been quite vocal :smile:
 
J Jenx To think though that the RQG Starter Box is twice as easy for me to read in comparison to the Mythras core book. :sad: Lyoness is much better but still no joy to read it's between these two for ease to read for me due to the thin light font type.
I look at the font type used in the Savage Worlds books I've recently read through and wished that Mythras would split into two books and use a similar font type to those books. Basically pull a GURPS 4th edition and split the core book.
 
Acmegamer said:
Basically pull a GURPS 4th edition and split the core book.
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Yeah, I don't have an issue about multiple rulebooks unless it's obviously just to bloat the price (splatbook spawnapalooza).
I'd be happy with... say... a Mythras corebook and a separate magic book... or whatever split makes sense.
Especially if it's not going to be a strong sewn binding, I want rulebooks books to be shorter.
 
It is font size and the font choice, and to a lesser extent some of the design and layout choices. 13th Age and Mythras have comparable word counts per-page but 13th Age is much more legible than Mythras core because of the choice of font (Warnock?) which is chunkier than Mythras (Baskerville?). At a small size Mythras letters are small and thin which makes the letters harder to read, 13th Age does better because its letters are fatter to begin with. TDM are doing better with recent books, but if "Destined" (forthcoming Mythras superheroes) does not take a different design approach I think I am done with Mythras books for a while.
 
Baragei said:
It would be boring if the layout was good too.
I keep telling myself that was the thought process.
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Is the layout bad? In what way?
I have the RQ6 version. I've only seen the PDF of the Mythras version, but it all seems pretty clearly put together.
 
Font-choices and readability issues aside; no, the layout isn't bad as such. It is ..functional. Most of the time.

edit: I should note that, barring CF, I haven't had any issues with the supplements.
 
Simlasa said:
Is the layout bad? In what way?
I have the RQ6 version. I've only seen the PDF of the Mythras version, but it all seems pretty clearly put together.
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Yeah I don't find any issues with the layout of Mythras core book or the RQG core book. Neither of them are like the Conan core book, which while beautiful is a nightmare of layout. lol
 
Jenx said:
I need stronger eyes. I'm starting to sound like a broken record now about my crappy eyesight but RPG companies need to think about stuff like this. Sure, it's great to get the kids on board (if you can) but the old farts with piles of disposable income need to be considered too.
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I feel this pain. I had to get spectacles a few years ago. Add dyslexia into this mess and there is no point in buying any books at all. I respect collectors and art and all that, but if there isn't a screen reader format I don't bother anymore. Most PDFs are so borked for screen readers (Adobe's fault entirely) that it is easier to make a home brew. ;)

Large print and screen reader ready digital formats should be a NO BRAINER. Your concerns are valid. Needing 20/10 visual acuity to comprehend a book is an accessibility issue.

Now I need to get those orcs off my lawn.
 
Large print leads to more or larger pages though, which probably translates to more expensive and definitely to more bulky books. I like compact books, they’re easier to fit on shelves and to sit down and read. They’re also easier to pass around the table.
 
raniE said:
Large print leads to more or larger pages though, which probably translates to more expensive and definitely to more bulky books. I like compact books, they’re easier to fit on shelves and to sit down and read. They’re also easier to pass around the table.
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and thus, Mythras Imperative :smile:

but man, i do feel like a very trim generic d100 would be good. 64 pages, traveller size.
 
raniE said:
Large print leads to more or larger pages though, which probably translates to more expensive and definitely to more bulky books. I like compact books, they’re easier to fit on shelves and to sit down and read. They’re also easier to pass around the table.
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Large print capable PDF or digital. I agree that the economics of hardcopy large print is not feasible.
 
Hugh said:
Large print capable PDF or digital. I agree that the economics of hardcopy large print is not feasible.
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Sure, for digital, rock on. I have seen this happen in physical products though, when the hex sizes for The Fantasy Trip went from classic 1 inch hexes to 1,5 inch hexes in the new edition, largely due to poor eyesight among the game's older fanbase. This of course dramatically increases the size of table you need for the same amount of hexes.
 
I was able to look through the box some more last night before I went to bed. Just right off the bat, I will say that this is one of the best starter sets I’ve ever seen. It’s right up there with the D&D essentials box from Wizards and in some ways surpasses it. Fourteen pre-generated characters, each with their own folio! Each has their own backstory and a “how to play this character” blurb. A couple of blank character folios. A couple of reference sheets. The double-sided map on thicker paper. One side shows Sartar and the other Jonstown. A set of coppery colored dice. Then you have the four main booklets which are pretty hefty. Two are 61 pages (the rules and gazetteer), one is 57 (solo quest which has a whopping 200 entries!) and the last (adventure book) is 81. This retails for $29.95 and that is bargain for this. Highly recommended if you are interested at all in d100 games or Glorantha.
 
I keep hoping that TDM would make a Mythras: Extra Large Font for all you guys (and for the future-me as well:devil:)!
Yes, the layout would cost them money, but people would repurchase it, I suspect...and use the system more, which would lead to extra sales across the range:thumbsup:.
 
Since I use PDFs anyway and have a big honking monitor, not an issue for me with Mythras font size.
 
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