Systems that transcend their settings

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Is Talislanta the first system to use the modifier bonus as the attribute?
 
Hi all! First post, but been reading quite a while. To get back to the original question, I always thought Traveller was a system that could be used for multiple settings. (And Cepheus Engine settings, I think, proves my hypothesis)
cheers!
I was actually surprised looking at Traveller on the net for the first time, after playing it for most of my youth, that the OTU was the most common setting to play in rather than a homegrown one. We never used it.
 
Hi all! First post, but been reading quite a while. To get back to the original question, I always thought Traveller was a system that could be used for multiple settings. (And Cepheus Engine settings, I think, proves my hypothesis)
cheers!
A tribute to the Burgess Shale period of Traveller

A Tribute to the Burgess Shale Period of Traveller
by Ken Pick

Know, O Travellers, that in the early days of GDW, before the rise of the Third Imperium, there was an age undreamed of, where unknown races and empires and federations strode among the stars, their ships sparkling through Jumpspace between worlds lost to our ken. Once there were many species of
Traveller -- other worlds, other races, other galaxies, other times, other roads taken -- only to be eclipsed forever by the Imperium. From many Travellers to one, and when that One shattered and fell, so fell Traveller...

The Burgess Shale Effect

Do you remember when CT
Was only Books 1, 2, and 3
And a homespun setting that you wrote?

-- Doug & Kirsten Berry, "The Traveller Saga" (filk)

The Burgess Shale is a geologic formation in the Canadian Rockies, incredibly rich in fossils from Earth's early Cambrian period -- the earliest known (except possibly for the Edicara) muticellular life on Earth. Over 90% of these fossils are unclassifiable except as "Problematica" (unclassifiable weird ones), matching no known phylum.

Note: A Phylum (plural Phyla) is the next-to-largest step in the Linnaean System of biological classification. For example; all fish, reptiles, dinosaurs, birds, and mammals -- anything with a spinal cord/backbone -- group into a single phylum: Vertebrates.
Apparently, when multicellular life first appeared (possibly spurred on by the DNA-shuffling effects of sexual reproduction), it exploded into a myriad of "experimental" forms (preserved in the Burgess Shale), followed later by an apparent mass extinction. Only the handful of phyla that survived that extinction left descendants; all life on Earth belongs to one of those remaining phyla -- maybe 10-20% of the phyla that lived at the period of the Burgess Shale.

The same phenomenon happened in FRP gaming. Early Traveller (as was typical in FRP games of the day) was a set of basic character rules, small starships, and basic worldbuilding, without any "official" background. As in D&D of the time, the game master had to make up his universe from scratch, filling in the holes and errata in the original ruleset. (Especially since except for the starships and gravs, early Traveller technology was pretty much contemporary; any "really futuristic" stuff had to be homebrewed.) In those days before the official GDW "Third Imperium" universe, each gamemaster built his Traveller universe differently, leading to a variety of star-spanning civilizations and high-tech that has not been seen since.

Just like the Problematica of the Burgess Shale.
 
I can't even begin to describe how formative this picture was on my young brain...
220px-Talislanta.jpg
Wow, Talislanta...what can I say?
I love this cover, it conjures up alot of memories for me...

This is the edition of Talislanta that my mate had when we were teens back in my final year of High School

Buckle up, it's Memory Lane time...!

It was the late 1980s, we loved rpgs and had been playing them for most of our high school experience. By the time we were in our Senior Year we had settled into a groove, my mate was our MERP/Rolemaster GM, and I was our RuneQuest GM. We also had a D&D and an AD&D GM, although we hardly played their games due to Rolemaster and RuneQuest campaigns taking centre stage for us.

Then my mate shows up with this gamebook called Talislanta (TSL). It is the one in the image posted above, I thought that was the original edition, but in hindsight it may have been the 2nd edition of TSL.
It was late 1989, we only had a term to go before Graduation. I think we were all gob-smacked about how cool TSL was.The setting felt like a cross between Barsoom and trippy Moebius comics and it was totally unique for us.
We took turns reading his book, and there was something about the game mechanics that we felt was really good as well.

It was on our agenda to play, but we had to wrap up my mate's Rolemaster campaign first, which was interspersed with my hobbling RQ campaign,

Life had also become full of other teen activities since we had started hanging out at the local Rollerskate Rink and the Drive In Theatre, not to mention just slacking off at friends houses whose parents let us run amok.

We had discovered bands like Motely Crue and Guns N Roses, and this had a bit of impact on how much gaming time were were doing, and probably on our grades as well. Suddenly growing long hair, underage alcoholic activities, and access to girls seemed a big priority for us, heh heh. We were in a small town in Australia, but in our minds we were on Sunset Strip LA with all it's Hard Rock cheese and glory. Rpgs did not disappear, but they took a nose dive for us around this time.

The sad thing was that we never got to play TSL, as we all split up to go away from town for our tertiary study educations and other vocational pursuits. Living in different locations around the state, my core group of friends (and initial gaming group) fell apart in 1990.

TSL was never played by us, and it remained a missed opportunity to this day.

I met up again with one of my closest mates (the Rolemaster GM) in the mid 1990s when fortunes had us living in the same city, Brisbane (QLD AU). We were doing different things by then, but had an affinity with the Aussie pub rock scene and the USA grunge rock bands (and later thr Britpop scene and Aussie/UK inidie music scene), so that led to some mutual bonding experiences and reforging of old friendships. We also got back into rpgs, with White Wolf Storyteller being the system for us at that time, the 'World of Darkness' seemed edgey enough to factor into our so-called 'cool' lifestyle.

The partying side of things subsided as we moved out to live in more suburban locations, and the gaming side became more prominent again.

In the mid-2000s I bought the then-current edition of Talislanta, the big blue hardcover version (4th edition TSL), but again we never got to play it. I was married by then, so the focus had shifted a little bit from gaming. My gaming time was knocked out again by rearing infants in the late 2000s. When we enthusiatically got back into rpgs around 2010 onwards, we had to prioritise our games, and my 4th edition TSL just sat on the shelf. I have alot of good will for it and intend to play it one day,...

About five years ago I discovered Talislanta.com - this was a great find, as the entire TSL range was free in digital form
So I downloaded most editions and supplements in pdf form to take a squizz. I hadn't seen half of these titles on the gaming store shelves, so I was pretty happy with the sudden abundance of TSL material that was legally free on this site.

I also supported the Talislanta: The Savage Land (6th edition TSL) kickstarter in recent years, so I have that beautiful book on my shelf as the most recent version of TSL

Despite having the 4th and 6th editions of TSL in hardcover, there is still something very captivating about the original version (which I only have as a pdf).
It feels very old-school, a product of the indie/cottage industry of rpgs that was hard for me to find back when I was a teen. The classic cover is up there with RQ2 , MERP, or the old AD&D covers in regards to nostalgic appeal for me, even if I have never run or played TSL

My mate remains part of my current gaming group today, We have actually known each other for 40 yrs, and been gaming for a bit over 35 of those.
We occasionally think of TSL as one of our biggest Failure-To-Launch games.

I think TSL needs to go back on our 30 year agenda! :thumbsup:
 
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I know I'm in the minority - 4e is probably the best edition, it's the most popular. But 2e is so slim and stripped down. My personal favorite is 3e which nestles right in-between both. But I can do any of them.
I was on the 4e bandwagon for a good while. But you're being too modest, because I actually think TSL is the best version of the rules out there. Take 2e, clean it up and get rid of leveling...<chef's kiss>

The setting felt like a cross between Barsoom and trippy Moebius comics and it was totally unique for us, and there was something about the game mechanics that we all felt was really good as well.

I approve this message.
 
Wow, Talislanta...what can I say?
Ii love this cover, it conjures up alot of memories for me...
I wish I could get more on board with Talislanta. It looks really cool. And I have almost all of the stuff up to 4e in print (almost all of it picked up used, a few books in the late 90s from a used book store, the rest around 2002-2004 at used book stores or game stores with huge used game departments). Actually, I have two of almost everything... :-)

I even tried to run a Cold Iron campaign in the setting.

But one of the stumbling blocks I hit was the near lack of terrestrial fauna and flora, heck, if you read carefully, it doesn't even exactly have humans...

I so want to love this, yet I just can't get my head around it enough...
 
There are a load of systems that can transcend their settings, but most are not really my favorites - so I'll leave them be. :smile:

As was already mentioned.

FASERIP or now my personal favorite iteration is G-Core X! Actually, I didn't really appreciate just how good the system was back in the day. I liked it of course. But you can really do anything with this thing and it's stood the test of time with minimal tweaks (G-Core X has just sweetened it for me).

MEGS or DC is another one. But for me, while it's an incredible system, and it scales to truly cosmic levels it's lacks the granularity that FASERIP had. DC felt like it couldn't do street level all that well but it really shined at comic heroes and beyond. Just my two cents.

Light versions of BRP such as Monster World or OpenQuest. They just add to the system in a good way without over complicating it.

Can't really go wrong with Open d6.

OSR D&D mechanics. Might not be the best per se but you can still adapt them to anything really.
 
What amazes me is that none of the online VTTs seem to support Talislanta. I mean, everything has been released legally for free and yet none of the online VTTs have even something as simple as a character sheet available for any edition of Talislanta. :cry:
I think Fantasy Grounds MoreCore extension supports Talislanta dice rolls.
 
Talislanta is actually a very solid system that fades into the background. Only recently ran it -- and albeit briefly in PbP at TheRPGSite due to health issues -- but what I crunched and engaged with was robust. It handled a chaotic, high volume mix of PCs, NPCs, separate factions therein, and a mix of conversation, chasing, and combat simultaneously. Granted a lot of what my PbP players saw (and log is present still in said forum) was player facing, the behind the screen processing was a breeze once I got used to it.

I would easily recommend the system to anyone, especially new & old D&D veterans (both TSR & WotC) looking to run more Degree of Success and Mass Combat elements without as much kludge friction. :thumbsup:
 
My favourite setting system that has not had the generic treatment as far as I am aware is Ubiquity from Hollow Earth Expedition.
Stat plus skill dice pool where every die has a 50/50 hit rate is so simple and yet it just works

I have played it with HEX, All for One and a couple of my own homebrew settings.
 
My favourite setting system that has not had the generic treatment as far as I am aware is Ubiquity from Hollow Earth Expedition.
Stat plus skill dice pool where every die has a 50/50 hit rate is so simple and yet it just works

I have played it with HEX, All for One and a couple of my own homebrew settings.
A system named ubiquity really needs a generic supplement:tongue:!
 
I always thought the system from HoL was far better and more flexible that it shows. Early on in my hacking career I used in for a bunch of different things.
This was the first system that properly subdivided unarmed combat between "That Psycho Bruce Lee Shit" and "Make Somebody Stop Living With Your Fist."

JG
 
My favourite setting system that has not had the generic treatment as far as I am aware is Ubiquity from Hollow Earth Expedition.
Stat plus skill dice pool where every die has a 50/50 hit rate is so simple and yet it just works

I have played it with HEX, All for One and a couple of my own homebrew settings.

It's funny. I've used Ubiquity for so many things that I'd sort of forgotten it doesn't really have an official generic treatment. I tend to run a lot of "pulp" games anyway, so that's probably a factor. I also tend to categorize Ubiquity as a streamlined D6 Legend in my head. Anyway, I definitely agree.
 
MEGS or DC is another one. But for me, while it's an incredible system, and it scales to truly cosmic levels it's lacks the granularity that FASERIP had. DC felt like it couldn't do street level all that well but it really shined at comic heroes and beyond. Just my two cents.

MEGS can do street level fine. In Underground, Ray Winninger just changed the exponential system so that each AP is 1.5x the previous AP instead of 2 in DCH.
 
This was the first system that properly subdivided unarmed combat between "That Psycho Bruce Lee Shit" and "Make Somebody Stop Living With Your Fist."

JG

HoL was the easiest con game I ever ran. The rules take 5 minutes to explain. Character generation never took longer than about 10 minutes.

And then the utterly gonzo action started right out of the door. One of the most memorable characters made was "Shep the Dog-faced Boy." He was utterly stupid, loyal to a fault, and was always farting. His main attack was to hurl himself at the enemy, gnaw ineffectively on their leg, and then release his unholy gas cloud. It worked really well until one fateful moment where it ... didn't. His death site was framed and put on a wall in the museum because the blood spatters were so evocative.
 
MEGS can do street level fine. In Underground, Ray Winninger just changed the exponential system so that each AP is 1.5x the previous AP instead of 2 in DCH.
Yeah, that could work alright. I actually bought Underground a few years back on drivethru. But I returned it, because the scan was so terrible I could barely read it. :sad:
 
I wish I could get more on board with Talislanta. It looks really cool. And I have almost all of the stuff up to 4e in print (almost all of it picked up used, a few books in the late 90s from a used book store, the rest around 2002-2004 at used book stores or game stores with huge used game departments). Actually, I have two of almost everything... :-)

I even tried to run a Cold Iron campaign in the setting.

But one of the stumbling blocks I hit was the near lack of terrestrial fauna and flora, heck, if you read carefully, it doesn't even exactly have humans...

I so want to love this, yet I just can't get my head around it enough...

I can't underline this post enough to exemplify the last 40-years of comments I've heard about Talislanta. And it serves as a reason why I created this thread.

ffilz ffilz I'll let you in on a secret. Treat Cymrillians like "humans" and you'll see their culture is not very different than any high-magic culture on the surface. They're a mageocracy you could plant in the middle of the Forgotten Realms without missing a beat. They just happen to be pastel-green with slightly pointed ears.

The flora/fauna thing. I want to hug you because the fact you brought this up tells me you're a details guy. THIS was my first headbender decades ago when I started running it in 1e. "Do deer even exist?!?!?!?!" So my solution was simple. I just interspersed regular fauna with the Talislantan flora and fauna, until I got my head around the ecology better. And I'm confident Steve Sechi won't complain if you toss in a herd of elk running around the woods outside of Cymril.

There still aren't elves in this game either. NO ELVES (/snicker)
 
I think Fantasy Grounds MoreCore extension supports Talislanta dice rolls.
By support I meant have character sheets or rule sets already created.

I'd love to see Talislanta on one of the electronic tables. I wish I knew more about Roll20, or the like to cook up a sheet.
I looked at the various sites and my eyes just kind of glazed over when I tried to figure out how to make it myself.
 
Treat Cymrillians like "humans"
I was going to suggest this too.

You can think of Cymrillian, Sirista and Dhuna as being essentially the same. All these (and some others around the continent) are descended from a group of people called the Phaedrans, who are responsible for creating a number of the races found on Talislanta. Given this, I tend to think of Phaedrans as the original humans (or magical trans-humans), and the rest as either being offshoots of that original line, or creations of them by means of genetic and magical manipulation.

Edit: I use the word Phaedrans above, but the hyper advanced culture I was thinking about was the Archaens. The Phaeddrans actually were basically remnants of the Archaen culture and formed after the fall. The Cymrillians, Sirista and Dhuna are offshoots of Phaedra though.
 
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I can't underline this post enough to exemplify the last 40-years of comments I've heard about Talislanta. And it serves as a reason why I created this thread.

ffilz ffilz I'll let you in on a secret. Treat Cymrillians like "humans" and you'll see their culture is not very different than any high-magic culture on the surface. They're a mageocracy you could plant in the middle of the Forgotten Realms without missing a beat. They just happen to be pastel-green with slightly pointed ears.
I thought they were a dwarf-gnome hybrid:grin:?
 
I can't underline this post enough to exemplify the last 40-years of comments I've heard about Talislanta. And it serves as a reason why I created this thread.

ffilz ffilz I'll let you in on a secret. Treat Cymrillians like "humans" and you'll see their culture is not very different than any high-magic culture on the surface. They're a mageocracy you could plant in the middle of the Forgotten Realms without missing a beat. They just happen to be pastel-green with slightly pointed ears.

The flora/fauna thing. I want to hug you because the fact you brought this up tells me you're a details guy. THIS was my first headbender decades ago when I started running it in 1e. "Do deer even exist?!?!?!?!" So my solution was simple. I just interspersed regular fauna with the Talislantan flora and fauna, until I got my head around the ecology better. And I'm confident Steve Sechi won't complain if you toss in a herd of elk running around the woods outside of Cymril.

There still aren't elves in this game either. NO ELVES (/snicker)
Oh, I get that Cymrillians are effectively the humans of the setting. I just observed that even the humans weren't quite human...

It was just the whole of the setting that ended up feeling unapproachable to me. But someday maybe I'll run it. Maybe even start with 1e... :-)
 
I can't even begin to describe how formative this picture was on my young brain...
220px-Talislanta.jpg


Same here. Even though I'm moving pretty much fully digital, that series is one I've never been able to let go:
 

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