The Great Pendragon Thread

Best Selling RPGs - Available Now @ DriveThruRPG.com
If anybody wants a current guide to supplements (EDIT: Per below these are all mostly suited to a long term campaign):

  1. Book of Battles 2nd Edition. Basically an alternate mass combat system. Very complicated, so unless you like really heavy crunch and maticulous rules it's not necessary

  2. Book of Armies. Stats for every unit and army across the various periods of the game. Most games would probably be more than adequately served by the ones in the core

  3. Book of Records Vol I&II. PDF only. Interactive Character and Battle Sheets.

  4. Book of Feasts. Actually a collection of cards for generating various events that could happen at Christmas and Easter feasts (e.g. a Bard mocks you in song, meeting a knight who served with your father). Adds a good bit of fun to Feasts so I'd recommend it, but not crucial.

  5. Great Pendragon Campaign (GPC). Well known. A massive campaign taking you from 485 in the middle of Uther Pendragon's rule all the way to the aftermath of Arthur's death in . It uses Mallory's version of the story as a base, but also adds in plenty of details from Welsh folklore, French Romances and modern cinematic takes.

  6. Book of the Estate. Guide to running a knights manor. Includes things to buy for the estate, common servants, economics, a more balanced alternate Winter phase for the game and more. This is very useful when Knights come into land and probably the supplement most worth getting together with the next one.

  7. Book of the Warlord. A detailed breakdown of Britain politically and legally. Also includes stuff for running the larger estates and castles of Barons along with giving a who's who of Barons in the early periods of the game. It's basically the setting book.

  8. Book of Uther. Extends the GPC back to 480 and gives an overview of Uther's court and progress.

  9. Book of Sires. Greatly extends the Family history part of Char Gen by allowing generation of Knights from other kingdoms, different starting times from 480s default and several more events. It's mainly about characters from outside Logres.
 
Last edited:
One of the things I really like about the Great Pendragon Campaign is the way it amalgamizes the Dark Ages legends with the classic pop-cculture image of Arthurian knights in full plate 15th century high gothic armour, as Arthur's reign causes this sort of bubble of rapid social and technological advancment.
 
Last edited:
Endless Flight said:
All this information is brain overload. Is the core rules enough for a newbie like me?
Click to expand...

oh yeah, the supplements are entirely unnecessary, the game is complete within the core rulebook, as a hyperfocused RPG about playing an Arthurian knight. That said, there's some really good adventures, and there's many older supplements that I would put in GURPs 3rd territory, as in - just a great amount of historical/folklore info that could be utilized for any fantasy game.

The thing about the game is that it is sooo rich, so steeped in a specific culture, that the supplements mentioned above are really more like expansions than anything.
 
TristramEvans said:
One of the things I really like about the Great Pendragon Campaign is the way it amalgamizes the Dark Ages legends with the classic pop-cculture image of Arthurian knights in full plate 15th century high gothic armour, as Arthur's reign causes this sort of bubble of rapid social and technological advancment.
Click to expand...
I think it is largely because the primary source - Malory's Morte D'Arthur - was actually written in the 15th Century and the story is littered with anachronisms.
 
There was a Kickstarter for it here a long while ago, along with two other books:


Slowed down a good bit by both Stafford and Wieck passing away early, the updates there are the only notifications I know of. It seems to be heading for sometime in mid-2021 for release.

It's Stafford along with John Matthews who wrote "The Complete King Arthur". You might know him better, his books on Celtic stuff were a bit off, but I can't speak for his writings on English folklore and Arthurian myth where he might be much more solid. Stafford however from help he gave me with Middle English and Arthurian works a while back really knew his stuff so I'm very much looking forward to it.
 
TristramEvans said:
oh yeah, the supplements are entirely unnecessary, the game is complete within the core rulebook, as a hyperfocused RPG about playing an Arthurian knight. That said, there's some really good adventures, and there's many older supplements that I would put in GURPs 3rd territory, as in - just a great amount of historical/folklore info that could be utilized for any fantasy game.

The thing about the game is that it is sooo rich, so steeped in a specific culture, that the supplements mentioned above are really more like expansions than anything.
Click to expand...
That's just Stafford's way. It's the same with Runequest. You can keep digging into Glorantha forever if it interests you, but you are also fine running Runequest with just the core book.
 
I see James Lowder is in charge of the project now and he has the right professional background to guide it to completion. But it seems the book(s) are limited to backers only.
 
Trippy said:
I think it is largely because the primary source - Malory's Morte D'Arthur - was actually written in the 15th Century and the story is littered with anachronisms.
Click to expand...

I've read suggestions that the 'rapid technological progress' thing is in part inspired by White's Once and Future King, though it's been so long since I read that book that I really can't say. I've also wondered if Twain's Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court might be an inspiration.

I think at one point Stafford explained that it was a way to deal with the sort of power creep in possessions and magic items that D&D players expected. Rather than picking up enchanted armor and swords as the game progressed, your knight got better equipment because everyone did.

When we played Pendragon we always used a relatively unchanging 12th-13th century tech level.
 
I don’t know a lot about King Arthur. I always assumed those stories took place in the 11th or 12th century. Had no idea it was the 5th.
 
Séadna said:
There was a Kickstarter for it here a long while ago, along with two other books:


Slowed down a good bit by both Stafford and Wieck passing away early, the updates there are the only notifications I know of. It seems to be heading for sometime in mid-2021 for release.

It's Stafford along with John Matthews who wrote "The Complete King Arthur". You might know him better, his books on Celtic stuff were a bit off, but I can't speak for his writings on English folklore and Arthurian myth where he might be much more solid. Stafford however from help he gave me with Middle English and Arthurian works a while back really knew his stuff so I'm very much looking forward to it.
Click to expand...



It makes me sad I missed that KS

I'm familiar with John Matthews, yeah, with so little Celtic stuff available to an English audience, he's unavoidable, but there did always seem to be a taint of "New Age-ness" to his stuff
 
Lofgeornost said:
I've read suggestions that the 'rapid technological progress' thing is in part inspired by White's Once and Future King, though it's been so long since I read that book that I really can't say. I've also wondered if Twain's Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court might be an inspiration.

I think at one point Stafford explained that it was a way to deal with the sort of power creep in possessions and magic items that D&D players expected. Rather than picking up enchanted armor and swords as the game progressed, your knight got better equipment because everyone did.

When we played Pendragon we always used a relatively unchanging 12th-13th century tech level.
Click to expand...

Once and Future King does has strong themes of magical thining and technological 'progress.'
 
Endless Flight said:
I don’t know a lot about King Arthur. I always assumed those stories took place in the 11th or 12th century. Had no idea it was the 5th.
Click to expand...

The historical Arthur (if he existed, our earliest records of him com from two very unreliable 8th century manuscripts) was very different from the popular image; essentially the last bastion of Romanized Briton holding off against the incursion of Saxons.

He became popularized by (somewhat ironically Norman) writers at the end of the Middle Ages concurrent with the rise of Chivalry as a concept among the nobility, at which point he became an idealized national hero (and some Kings of England "legitimized" their claim to the throne by comissioning geneologies that traced their lineage back to Arthur). At that point however, historicall accuracy was not really a big deal, so the presentation of Arthur by Mallory and his contemporaries was essentially him re-envisioned as a 14th century personage, hence the full plate armour and late medieval attitudes/aesthetics he was meant to embody.
 
The core book on White:
White, T.H. The Once and Future King. Harper Voyager, 2015. This modernist rendition of Malory’s works is a great source for detailed information about the Middle Ages, as well as being perhaps the most readable modern version of the legend. If you read only one book from this bibliography, this is a good choice: It combines medieval lore with the traditional story in a delicious mix of literature. It also has terrific versions of King Arthur and Mordred (a real rotter).
Click to expand...
In this, T. H. White’s Once and Future King is closest to the spirit of the basic King Arthur Pendragon game
Click to expand...

Two other big modern influences on the game are the 1981 Excalibur film which the GPC uses for many scenes. Also "The Wicked Day" by Stewart and "The Mists of Avalon" by Bradley which the GPC uses to flesh out the personalities of NPCs especially the baddies.
 
Once And Future King is fantastic (I've waxed on about it here at The Pub before but damned if I can recall what thread that was), but I really have to recommend the lesser-known Sword At Sunset by Rosemary Sutcliffe (1963) as one of the best Arthurian novels of all time, and a great introduction for new readers to an Arthur closer to the Welsh folk hero of the Mabinogian.
 
I'd also recommend Mary Stewart's The Crystal Cave, a coming-of-age tale of Merlin. I'm not usually one for series and the book is quite self-contained but I do want to check out her other books from the viewpoint of young Modred and Arthur as well.
 
History is interesting enough without people having to embellish it, but I digress!
 
TristramEvans said:
(and some Kings of England "legitimized" their claim to the throne by comissioning geneologies that traced their lineage back to Arthur).
Click to expand...
You almost seem to imply these were merely cynical ploys. No politician would ever engage in such a thing! They were just getting back to their roots: finding out they were direct descendants of King Arthur, Joseph of Arimathea, Julius Caesar, Alexander the Great, Herakles, and Yahweh himself was a complete and utterly unexpected surprise.
 
Endless Flight said:
History is interesting enough without people having to embellish it, but I digress!
Click to expand...

certainly, but legends, like religion, influence history. King Arthur might be fictional, but his impact on British culture is still enormous, and, psychologically, the Arthurian legends offer a direct view into the aspirations, worldviews and morals contemporary of the authors
 
TristramEvans said:
Once And Future King is fantastic (I've waxed on about it here at The Pub before but damned if I can recall what thread that was), but I really have to recommend the lesser-known Sword At Sunset by Rosemary Sutcliffe (1963) as one of the best Arthurian novels of all time, and a great introduction for new readers to an Arthur closer to the Welsh folk hero of the Mabinogian.
Click to expand...

Sutcliff's is one of the classic 'historical Arthur' books--of course, she wrote a lot of Roman Britain novels, mainly aimed at what nowadays would be called the Young Adult market. Her The White Company, a fictionalized version of the Goddodin, would be a good read as background for a Mythras Mythic Britain campaign. I liked Bernard Cornwell's Arthur trilogy as well.

I have to plug Geoffrey of Monmouth, though--his History of the Kings of Britain is arguably the source of the Arthurian story in the form that we know it and it's quite readable, in the Penguin translation at least.
 
Lofgeornost said:
Sutcliff's is one of the classic 'historical Arthur' books--of course, she wrote a lot of Roman Britain novels, mainly aimed at what nowadays would be called the Young Adult market.
Click to expand...


I kind of think of all King Arthur as "Young Adult" by default, but that's probably largely due to the stories being a staple of my young childhood readings.

One of the nifty things about TH White's The Once and Future King is the way it starts like a YA story with the Sword and the Stone and gradually introduces more adult and philosophical concepts as the series goes on and Arthur ages
 
This book was my introduction to King Arthur, very early in my childhood, given to me by my grandfather when I was, I think 6 or 7? (I was in first grade, so whatever age that is)

a4a750a08485b76d69158b28c73129ae.jpg
 
Old copy of the Grail Cycle I have. The printing is from my grandfather's day but the actual story was written at about the same time as Mallory.

It's not much to look at but the tradition here is a bit odd in ways I've never really gotten to the bottom of. Arthur is married to Genebra, a daughter of the Roman emperor. Arthur himself carved the Round table. Bors sees an owl not a swan in his visions. The grail isn't put in an ark but on open display. It has a story about how Percival and Galahad met that's not in the Anglo-Norman canon. Arthur is also exaggerated a bit where stuff the Fisher King has or did is attributed to him.

It's a bit with Persival (Persaual) and Bors (Boos)

20201020_194855.jpg
20201020_194913.jpg
 
Last edited:
Lofgeornost said:
I've read suggestions that the 'rapid technological progress' thing is in part inspired by White's Once and Future King, though it's been so long since I read that book that I really can't say. I've also wondered if Twain's Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court might be an inspiration.

I think at one point Stafford explained that it was a way to deal with the sort of power creep in possessions and magic items that D&D players expected. Rather than picking up enchanted armor and swords as the game progressed, your knight got better equipment because everyone did.

When we played Pendragon we always used a relatively unchanging 12th-13th century tech level.
Click to expand...
It's worth noting that Morte D'Arthur wasn't the first source of the legend, but itself has been translated and reinterpreted multiple times. Malory wrote it while imprisoned during the War of the Roses, and is a reflection of his times. The telling of the story itself is pretty brutal and violent. I think Pendragon and the aforementioned Excalibur movie capture that essence pretty well actually.

White's Once and Future King was written in the 1950s and can be seen as being part of the same wave of fantasy stories that emerged alongside Lord of the Rings in that respect.
 
There is a radio interview here that discusses upcoming Pendragon publications and rules changes. In summary:
  • Classic (1st Edition) Pendragon will be getting a Kickstarter in upcoming weeks to fund a reprint of the original boxset.
  • Pendragon will be seeing a new sixth edition, with some changes but it will be backwards compatible. It is based on Greg Stafford's intentions.
  • There will be a Starter Set, akin to the Call of Cthulhu starter set, for both Pendragon (and Runequest) in the next year.
  • The Great Pendragon Campaign will be getting a new edition in multiple volumes (eras), or collectively as part of a slipcase.
  • There may be a Ancient Greece and Japan (Samurai) adaptations of the Pendragon rules, akin to Paladin, at some point.
  • There is a lot of supplemental support for just Pendragon itself coming.
  • People are looking forward to watching The Green Knight when it comes out.
 
TristramEvans said:
certainly, but legends, like religion, influence history. King Arthur might be fictional, but his impact on British culture is still enormous, and, psychologically, the Arthurian legends offer a direct view into the aspirations, worldviews and morals contemporary of the authors
Click to expand...
I like to call it mythohistory. Whether or not it was based on a real figure, or a composite of several real figures, we're unlikely to ever know. But the effect on culture and actual history is still highly significant. Robin Hood is another one and like Arthur he's been reinvented an infinite number of times to fit the needs of the society at the time. Robin doesn't become a noble until the late 16th century and that's when he becomes a supporter of Richard the Lionheart, probably because the nobility of the time didn't like a folk hero based on a yeoman rebelling against his betters! And early Maid Marion (same period) isn't quite as chaste as all that; she's associated with May Day and May Day is a festival of fertility.. (I'm using Robin Hood as an example because I know the legend much better than I know Arthur, as you can probably tell).

We see something similar with the "Norman Yoke". The idyllic pastoral pre Norman Britain the myth is based on almost certainly never existed. But the myth itself was strong enough that it was a massive influence on the radical fringes of the Parlimentarian army in the English Civil War.

I think you get it in America with the George Washington cherry tree myth. We know that one isn't true. We even know the name of the biographer that made it up. But its lack of literal truth interests me much less than what it tells us about the American national psyche.
 
Black Leaf said:
I like to call it mythohistory. Whether or not it was based on a real figure, or a composite of several real figures, we're unlikely to ever know. But the effect on culture and actual history is still highly significant
Click to expand...
In addition, and this is more true the deeper into the past you go, that they didn't really distinguish between mythohistory and history or didn't see the distinction as being important.

Firstly a chronicler might have had several sources. Today we would recognise that some of them were myth, some were proper histories and others were politically biased histories. Back then however the assumption tended to be that everything the "venerable ancestors" said was true. Chroniclers would have from our perspective created stories or altered the sources to fix the plot holes and inconsistencies between them. From their perspective however, since it was a given their sources were true, they viewed this more as figuring out "logically" what must have occured to explain discrepancies. And then this gestalt fusion of previous sources and new invented material to connect them itself becomes a source for later chroniclers.

Secondly they often simply didn't care about fact. Livy wrote his histories to be edifying and morally instructive deliberately and knew certain elements of them couldn't reflect the true past of Rome.

Finally there's the limits of human memory. Many small battles and minor heroes are combined into a single large battle and "superheroes" because they're easier to remember. One cool thing in modern studies of myth is that people often use linguistic evidence, sometimes with the help of AIs, to "pull apart" heroes into the minor figures they were built from.

Black Leaf said:
I'm using Robin Hood as an example because I know the legend much better than I know Arthur, as you can probably tell
Click to expand...
What's a good book on Robin Hood?
 
Last edited:
Séadna said:
What's a good book on Robin Hood?
Click to expand...

Several options here.

Ronan Coughlan's The Robin Hood Companion is very good on modern popular culture's rediscovery of Robin Hood and how that links to past evolution of the legend.

The more conventional option is JC Holt's Robin Hood which digs really deeply into the early texts. It's not a light read, but it's a very rewarding one.
 
Not for history, obviously, but this BBC kid's program is genuinely one of my favourite modern interpretations of the myth. It's basically Blackadder for kids.



Notably, Barrington in the opening sequence is played by Danny John-Jules AKA the cat from Red Dwarf.
 
Black Leaf said:
Several options here.

Ronan Coughlan's The Robin Hood Companion is very good on modern popular culture's rediscovery of Robin Hood and how that links to past evolution of the legend.

The more conventional option is JC Holt's Robin Hood which digs really deeply into the early texts. It's not a light read, but it's a very rewarding one.
Click to expand...

For the historical Robin Hood, A.J. Pollard's Imagining Robin Hood: The Late Medieval Stories in Historical Context (Routledge, 2004) is also good. Pollard is a late-medieval specialist and more interested in the 14th-15th century material than Holt, IIRC.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Banner: The best cosmic horror & Cthulhu Mythos @ DriveThruRPG.com
Back
Top