REIGN of the Known World
06 November 2007
Over at Tanelorn, Jörg is collecting ideas as how to port the Artesia RPG setting over to Greg Stolze's REIGN. As I expired my membership at Tanelorn, here are my ideas regarding REIGN:
There are some similarities and some differences between REIGN and ARTESIA, mechanically and setting-wise. As we throw away the REIGN setting of Heluso and Milonda, we'll only use it as a reference for the implementation of details (like magic etc.).
Of course, we primarily aim to port over the game world. But a lot of that game world feel is transported by rules, such as the excellent arcana rules, the diverse magic and belief systems and character generation with a detailed life path.
The problem with porting over the arcana rules is that a lot of it's interesting details are rooted in ... well, details, which you won't find in REIGN. The compelling thing about REIGNs compact core is playing against us here.
I'm undecided as to wether I'd repurpose them instead of passions (so they become multi-faceted alignment-like stuff) as Vermi supposed; or to use them for experience points with a conversion rate to get to the desired amount of XP/session. That would entail building a list of things in REIGN that are covered by the Arcana; which probably is a thankless job.
The magic systems of Artesia are metaphysically diverse, but they all rely on the same mechanical core. A similar approach is found in REIGN. One could try building Artesia-like magical schools with the magic rules found in the third Supplement; and I think this approach is sound. But then you probably find yourself remodeling stuff like memory trick and other gifts, which are right into "you still want to play the other system, no?" land.
Gifts could be done in the vein of REIGN disciplines; levelled shticks; some corner cases could be done as smallish magic schools without initiations. It seems feasible to do branching disciplines instead of linear ones to subsume similar basic gifts and have them evolve over time.
The folks over at grofafo are right now trying to build transformations from artesia to REIGN, because their intent seems to use the Artesia Life Path as is. Good for a start, but I'd write new ones along the lines of the life paths available for REIGN in the supplements.
Of course, we primarily aim to port over the game world. But a lot of that game world feel is transported by rules, such as the excellent arcana rules, the diverse magic and belief systems and character generation with a detailed life path.
The problem with porting over the arcana rules is that a lot of it's interesting details are rooted in ... well, details, which you won't find in REIGN. The compelling thing about REIGNs compact core is playing against us here.
I'm undecided as to wether I'd repurpose them instead of passions (so they become multi-faceted alignment-like stuff) as Vermi supposed; or to use them for experience points with a conversion rate to get to the desired amount of XP/session. That would entail building a list of things in REIGN that are covered by the Arcana; which probably is a thankless job.
The magic systems of Artesia are metaphysically diverse, but they all rely on the same mechanical core. A similar approach is found in REIGN. One could try building Artesia-like magical schools with the magic rules found in the third Supplement; and I think this approach is sound. But then you probably find yourself remodeling stuff like memory trick and other gifts, which are right into "you still want to play the other system, no?" land.
Gifts could be done in the vein of REIGN disciplines; levelled shticks; some corner cases could be done as smallish magic schools without initiations. It seems feasible to do branching disciplines instead of linear ones to subsume similar basic gifts and have them evolve over time.
The folks over at grofafo are right now trying to build transformations from artesia to REIGN, because their intent seems to use the Artesia Life Path as is. Good for a start, but I'd write new ones along the lines of the life paths available for REIGN in the supplements.
