New free RPG, looking for feedback

[thedeadone]

Hi all, new here, so I hope this is the right forum to post this too.

I've just put online a free RPG I've been working on it, called Lost Heroes. It's only the setting at this point and still needs some work. (). I am planning on doing a full system (based on Fudge) but made a decision a while back to do the setting separate from the system, to help focus and clarify the world.

It's based on the modern day but the players take on characters who are the Chosen of the Gods. I've included six different panthenons of Gods, four of which are based on my research: Angels and Demons, Olympian (Greek) Gods, Aesir (Norse) and the Tuatha De Dannann (Celtic).

I'd love to know what you guys think of it, both the good and the bad and any further suggestions. I've been working on it for an age, only showing it to friends, so I really need to give the concepts and ideas a bit of light.

Thanks - Mark

[Rob Lang]

Welcome Mark, glad you could join us. Once I've moved house, I'll download and give Lost Heroes a fat read. Until then, I am sure there are some other people on here who will pitch in!

[Runjikol]

Hi Mark,
The book left me feeling a bit overwhelmed. There was more about the pantheons than what I'd do as a player or GM. I'd consider cutting the detail in half and putting more effort on game-hooks and play advice. Hope that's helpful.

[thedeadone]

[Evil Scientist]

Wow, this is a massive piece...!

In my understanding, "play advice" in your case should be something similar to the GM section in Vampire: the Masquarade. If you are not familiar with it, in a nutshell it includes a choice of themes and how they could be incorporated into the campaign. E.g. "lost faith", "individual vs. community", e.t.c. It'd help the GM (and the players) to chose what type of a game they are aiming for.

One more thing. Sorry for all the World of Darkness parallels - I'm not saying that your game is a rip-off or anything, but there surely are some similar features. Your game-world is overwhelming, because while the quantity of races, sub-races and various detailed information is split to dozens of lines in WoD, your game presents it as a whole, at once. Sorta like entering a room and getting a bucket of ice-cold water spilled all over you. It's just too hard to pick what you want to do. I understand that it's a universe you are trying to create - but in my opinion, you should leave more place for the GM's and players to inhabit.

Splitting your game into several "lines", pantheon-sourcebooks, e.t.c. might be a good idea. That way the users can decide which elements to include.

Also, adding some simple, non-running-text overviews (like, tables, schemes and indices) for quick reference would be a good idea. Organizing your material is very important.

By the way, can you tell us a bit about that one campaign experience?

[SheikhJahbooty]

I agree Evil Scientist. I felt the same way. The setting is kind of this weird kitchen sink. It's better than WoD in my mind in that it strives to go back to original mythological sources and be less pop, but it's still something that needs to be chopped up like WoD.

One lesson that you might be able to take from the new edition of WoD is to make things generic, and provide examples of how they work in a game world that the GM and players could then build.

By this I mean, chop it up according to types of religions, rather than specific religions, so you could have an animism book, and that would cover things like jinns, fairies, kami, spirits, angels, demons, etc. Then you could have a pantheon book, and that would cover those religions that have pantheons that have exploits and adventures and legends, details about how to join pantheons and what probationary members of pantheons are generally capable of. The pantheon book could cover specific examples, like Catholic saints, Grecoroman divinities, Celtic gods, Norse gods, Hindu gods, etc. There could be a book on supernatural realms, one on monsters and "the adversary", one on he implications of an ultimate creator and sustainer of he universe, one on mortal shamans and sorcerers (Carlos Castanedas doesn't tell significantly different stories from those told about Gwion Bach), etc.

I mention this because I had such a crap time playing Changeling the Dreaming, and such an awesome time playing Changeling the Lost. In the first we were kind of locked into this setting of Celtic fairies and seasonal courts. In the second we were able to create a world of Mardi Gras weirdness, voodoo, and the bizarre mythological fusion that is the culture of New Orleans.

And maybe choose one example city that could be used to pile a lot of these things on each other, some real cosmopolitan place, like Seoul, or London, or New York, or Alexandria (Egypt), or Bombay. Someplace with a history where people have modern religions, Christianity (preferably more than one type), still believe in fairies or jinns or kami or spirits or something, someplace where the old gods were worshiped at one point, or still are.

If I were playing this game with my friends, would we enjoy more a game that has rules and examples for everything the author could think of and let's us pick and choose what we want, or a game with Greek gods and Celtic gods, etc? I mean if my friends and I want to play a game of supernatural adventures we would set it in New York. There wouldn't be Celtic or Roman gods, but there would certainly be Orishas, Catholic saints, a couple of Taoist immortals, devotees and avatars of Hindu gods, Feng Shui sorcerers, all sorts of creatures living in abandoned subway tunnels, angels, demons, spirits (who would be a worldly lot, some enjoying buttermilk left for them by Irish immigrants, some enjoying sake left out by Japanese immigrants, some building underground salons under the subways and sewers where they keep their human harems).

But London was colonized by the Romans at one point, and Saxons at another, so if we played a game set in London, it might be pretty cool for one of the PCs to be a son of Mercury, or Loki, or Lugh, or a Christian saint, or part fairy.

[thedeadone]

Thanks for the feedback guys! It seems it's my turn to be a bit overwhelmed. Will try and respond in due coarse.

[thedeadone]

[SheikhJahbooty]

I think you're totally right about how system can be used to guide readers into a setting, by seeing what sorts of characters they are expected to create, how strong they are, how those characters can interact with the world, etc. If I were reading it and I clearly saw how I could create a character like Saint Bede, whom angels carried into other worlds, or a character whose mom is Loki*, then I think the question of making a unique and compelling campaign set closer to what I know would have never come up.

I liked reading that this setting is for historical as well as modern gaming. It definitely makes me want to read more of it more carefully.

* Njorth accused Loki of bearing children in the Lokasenna, and Loki insulted Njorth's life and his heritage, but never called Njorth a lier. In fact, I think Loki is the mom of Odin's weird horse.