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Night10194
Feb 13, 2012

We'll start,
like many good things,
with a bear.

Mors Rattus posted:

Wait. They knew what the Sanhedrin were, they had to for Midian to make any sense at all, and still chose to use the word for their evil villain group with a literal Nazi in it.

They may be betting you don't know who the Sanhedrin are.

Alternatively, the people who wrote stuff like 'Africa and South America are missing all their poo poo' may be turboracists.

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Mors Rattus
Oct 25, 2007

FATAL & Friends
Walls of Text
#1 Builder
2014-2018

I think it's #2.

Night10194
Feb 13, 2012

We'll start,
like many good things,
with a bear.

Mors Rattus posted:

I think it's #2.

It could be both!

Young Freud
Nov 26, 2006

Night10194 posted:

They may be betting you don't know who the Sanhedrin are.

Alternatively, the people who wrote stuff like 'Africa and South America are missing all their poo poo' may be turboracists.

Yeah, I'm betting if we looked for these developers now, they'd have some awful political views and follow Paul Joseph Watson on Twitter.

Dallbun
Apr 21, 2010
We hack our way through Greek myth in today’s edition of

The Deck of Encounters Set One Part 9: The Deck of Merpeople, Minotaurs, and Nymphs

60: The Bridegroom

The PCs are on a ship, but hit very stormy weather, and the ship crashes into a large, barren rock. At least let them make some appropriate proficiency check, card! Anyway, later a merman chieftain sticks his head up and offers to aid them if one of them agrees to marry his daughter, who has a curse on her that says she must marry a surface dweller or die. They’ll follow through if someone accepts. “The DM is encouraged to develop this encounter further.” You mean, like, with a merman divorce ceremony as soon as the conditions of the curse are fulfilled? Because that seems like the obvious course of action.

I don’t like the railroading required to get the PCs onto a desert island. I’m not going to destroy the PCs’ ship by fiat just for mermatrimonials. Pass.


61: The Message

An oceanside village does some trading with the merpeople. Since they’ve got a relationship set up, a merman comes to them with a task - they need a message sent VERY QUICKLY to another tribe of merpeople, but the fastest route is over land. Also they don’t write it down or anything, the messenger needs to go in person. The villagers ask these brawny-looking PC strangers if they’ll help transport the mermessenger. If they do they’ll be rewarded with “pearls and rare, expensive shells” with no stated GP value.

Mostly it’s a logistical problem of transporting a water-breather over land. I like that the messenger is both grateful and “resentful of their aid, because his weaknesses are exposed.” Yeah, I’d be pissy too if I was getting toted through a hostile environment in a large tub filled with water floating on the back of a Tenser’s floating disc, or whatever nonsense the PCs come up with. Keep.


62: Labyrinth

“The PCs visit a city controlled by a cruel and unjust tyrant. While there, they commit a minor 'offense' (not bowing low enough to an official, violating curfew, or any similar misdeed). Before the PCs can flee, they are arrested by a superior force and thrown into the intricately constructed labyrinth that serves as the monarch’s prison."

:catstare: This is not a random encounter. This is the plot synopsis for an extremely railroady adventure. Pass.

Oh right, there’s more. Guess what? There’s a maze. Useful spells don’t work. “The maze twists and turns within itself, requiring Intelligence checks to avoid going in circles. Eventually, however, the PCs will reach the center.” THERE ARE NO CONSEQUENCES OR CHOICES. ROLL TO SEE HOW MUCH TEDIUM YOU MUST ENDURE.

At the center is a large cage with a minotaur. “Just as the PCs enter the area, the cage door opens and the minotaur immediately attacks the party.” They’ve got to kill it to escape, and it will never flee because it’s been starved and wants to eat them. Great. Forced combat with no opportunities for evasion, negotiation, or retreat. My favorite.

WAIT THERE’S MORE. When they kill the monster, it shimmers and turns back into a human man. “The PCs have won their freedom, but they should realise that the tyrant will only replace the minotaur with another polymorphed human.” WHO IS THE REAL MONSTER HERE?

The author. Pass again.


63: Shaman

The PCs come across a clean-cut minotaur wearing a medallion being attacked by a group of gnolls. In a cinematic cutscene, the minotaur breaks away, casts entangle on them, and finishes them off. Then it notices the PC. It’ll attack if they’re aggressive, but otherwise will approach the largest, most male-presenting fighter in the party. It seeks a certain rare herb for spells and rituals, and asks them if they’ve seen it but doesn’t otherwise want help from “lesser creatures.” It’s a third-level shaman.

There’s really nothing for the PCs to do here as written, but let them intervene in the fight if they want, and make the minotaur more willing to help reciprocally, and it becomes a little more gameable. Keep.


64: Blinded, Part 1 of 2

The party stumbles on a nymph picking flowers. Save or go blind! Could be worse, she could have been bathing.

If the party is evil, mostly neutral, or threatening, the nymph runs. “If they are good-aligned or have a druid with them,” she apologizes and offers to help them with that blindness and lead them to a “forgotten treasure trove!” …if they go kill five orcs for her. That’s right - five orcs. They’re… camped out over there. Go murder them to progress to Part 2.


65: Blinded, Part 2 of 2

The nymph’s promised treasure trove is in the back of a cave, but there’s an ogre that lives there. Go murder another humanoid, murderhobos! Once that’s done, they find orc bones, filthy leather armor, and “four gleaming short swords” that are +2 but only in the hands of an orc. Do they all have fancy names? (“The runes name Randirist, the Adventurer-cleaver.”) Are these what those five orcs were after? Were they a group of classless, 1-HD orcs on an epic quest? Was this their 0-level DCC funnel, and did we just cause a TPK?

The nymph is like “whoops guess you can’t use the treasure after all lol” and disappears into the forest, then sends a sprite with a 500 gp large gem to give them by way of apology.

I like the Swords of Orc Gondolin, but this is just random humanoid-slaughtering that doesn’t really go anywhere. Pass.

Dallbun fucked around with this message at 16:07 on Oct 26, 2017

By popular demand
Jul 17, 2007
Probation
Can't post for 21 hours!
That last one is actively trying to be tedious and uninspired.
Seems like what a10 year old GM comes up with when he only got ten minutes to plan an adventure.

Mors Rattus
Oct 25, 2007

FATAL & Friends
Walls of Text
#1 Builder
2014-2018

I'm pretty sure in most D&D systems, five orcs couldn't conceivably threaten a nymph at all.

potatocubed
Jul 26, 2012

*rathian noises*
My stock 'nymph' adventure is one where a nymph keeps bathing in a river, striking the fish dead and causing them to pile up downstream where they're spreading disease and an awful smell. The adventurers must find this nymph and introduce her to indoor plumbing!

Feinne
Oct 9, 2007

When you fall, get right back up again.

PurpleXVI posted:

As poo poo as The Last Exodus is, the idea of running your own pirated copy of reality to try and crack the encryption on the real thing so you can fight God on your own terms is kind of cool. It feels a bit Shin Megami Tensei.

It is in fact pretty much literally Digital Devil Saga 1 and 2.

Barudak
May 7, 2007

If Omikoshi were the focus of the game, instead of something that gets maybe 15 total paragraphs dedicated to it it would be one thing. Instead its just plopped into a game where the most mechanical support it gets is a few items in the back of the book saying they give +1 to Shigon in a game with no skill called Shingon.

By the by, were not done with things that undermine TLE’s setting. There will be a power revealed during chaacter creation that the game itself will point out undermines the setting. I think, however, were done with the racism except for the two page spread on describing the Millenium Religion of the racists.

Halloween Jack
Sep 12, 2003

La morte non ha sesso
The idea that the universe is basically an operating system and that there are flaws in the code is a very rich one, I think, even if you set aside the obvious similarity to The Matrix. (There are about a thousand ham-handed and cheesy pitfalls to avoid when writing such a setting, though.)

While it's not explicitly stated, I see the universes of Kult and many of the suggestions for world-building in Trail of Cthulhu as being based on this premise.

marshmallow creep
Dec 10, 2008

I've been sitting here for 5 mins trying to think of a joke to make but I just realised the animators of Mass Effect already did it for me

PurpleXVI posted:

As poo poo as The Last Exodus is, the idea of running your own pirated copy of reality to try and crack the encryption on the real thing so you can fight God on your own terms is kind of cool. It feels a bit Shin Megami Tensei.

That is such a good premise it should be the actual game we are playing, not the rest of this dross.

By popular demand
Jul 17, 2007
Probation
Can't post for 21 hours!
And I used to think that Kult takes gnosticism way too hard and edgy but next to TLE...
E: we should really come up with some sort of award for the most pretentious and awful game.
Chris fields gets a dishonourable mention for lifetime achievement .

By popular demand fucked around with this message at 16:54 on Oct 26, 2017

DalaranJ
Apr 15, 2008

Yosuke will now die for you.
60. You have to convince the magic IRS that you didn’t marry a mermaid just to free her from a curse.

marshmallow creep
Dec 10, 2008

I've been sitting here for 5 mins trying to think of a joke to make but I just realised the animators of Mass Effect already did it for me

DalaranJ posted:

60. You have to convince the magic IRS that you didn’t marry a mermaid just to free her from a curse.

Seems to me that Mer-dad might have had something to do with this whole perfect storm crashing you on the rocks. Way too convenient. This could be the start of something bigger.

Barudak
May 7, 2007

marshmallow creep posted:

Seems to me that Mer-dad might have had something to do with this whole perfect storm crashing you on the rocks. Way too convenient. This could be the start of something bigger.

Curse? Oh yeah, it was a curse that shed never move out of my guest bedroom. Youre problem now, son

Feinne
Oct 9, 2007

When you fall, get right back up again.
Also you eventually realize there is no magic IRS, it's just some dude who wants an excuse to hang around while you're forced into excessive PDA with a mermaid under threat of severe financial penalty. Hyper-specific flaws taken by power gamers strike again!

Freaking Crumbum
Apr 17, 2003

Too fuck to drunk


Feinne posted:

Also you eventually realize there is no magic IRS, it's just some dude who wants an excuse to hang around while you're forced into excessive PDA with a mermaid under threat of severe financial penalty. Hyper-specific flaws taken by power gamers strike again!

then it turns out that the magic IRS dude is a simulacra spell cast by a wizard, and the wizard has also polymorphed himself into your mermaid wife, all so that he can get off to someone making out with him under false pretenses while he's morphed into his genderswap merfolk fursona

don't act like wizards don't develop insanely specific fetishes

Barudak
May 7, 2007

Freaking Crumbum posted:

then it turns out that the magic IRS dude is a simulacra spell cast by a wizard, and the wizard has also polymorphed himself into your mermaid wife, all so that he can get off to someone making out with him under false pretenses while he's morphed into his genderswap merfolk fursona

don't act like wizards don't develop insanely specific fetishes

Honestly, this sounds like a pretty tame wizard fetish.

AmiYumi
Oct 10, 2005

I FORGOT TO HAIL KING TORG
I love this thread.

Alien Rope Burn
Dec 5, 2004

I wanna be a saikyo HERO!


Starfinger Core Rules Part #27: "If we terminate the License due to breach, you have to immediately stop selling products that use the Compatibility Logo and you must destroy all of your inventory of those products (including all marketing material)."
(Credit: Starfinger Compatibility License.)

But do you want to compete with Paizo at their own game? Seems like a great plan for all the remoras out there. Well now you can... again! It's time for the Starfinger Compatibility License, which just like the Pathfinder Compatibility License, lets any person fall backwards into Starfinger publishing! Essentially, it lets you use the Starfinger logo and declare compatibility as long as you abide by Paizo's rules - no making a supplement that looks official, no "adult" or "offensive" content, nothing outright illegal, etc. And if you violate it... well, see the quote above. And so they know which people have signed up for this, they have a public registry. Which, as far as I can tell, they never review, check, or edit.

So, like the Pathfinder review, before we're through, let's take at best worst beworst entries on the registry. If you're just a little dev that really doesn't deserve this, you have my meaningless apologies.



Bat in the Attic Games posted:

I would be using the [Starfinger] rules to implement the Majestic Stars setting I have developed for the science fiction genre. Products would be a series of rules supplements, setting books, and adventures.

quote:

Mankind has reached the stars only to find… Earth
Birds flying under distant skies, fish swimming unexplored seas, and dinosaurs ruling unknown continents. On a hundred words there are the children of Earth. Children from an Earth of sixty-five million years ago.

Now man has outgrown his cradle and traveled into the black, wondering who and what scattered the seeds of Earth throughout the cosmos. Mankind is forging a new life among the stars but old fears and conflicts still threaten. The year is 2425 and this is their universe, the Majestic Stars.
What is the status of humanity?

Humanity has spread out in a 100 light year sphere centered on Earth and the other core worlds. They are still divided into nations and many world have multiple governments. There been limited exploration out to 500 light years. Hundreds of inhabitable worlds are known. It is appears that the vast majority of them are terraformed worlds that were created by a dinosaurian civilization dating from 65 million years ago.

Dinosaurs?

It appears that the ancient dinosaurians terraformed most potentially inhabitable world within their range. The limits of which hasn’t been reached yet.

On some the descendants of dinosaurs still roam. On others they died out, mammals or other animal orders have taken their place. On at least two worlds, sentient life developed and created their own civilization. The mammalian Kang'rits whoes technology was a century behind humanity at the time of first contact, and the Saurians whose technology is a century ahead of humanity. The Saurians are descended from dinosaurs however they are not the Ancients of 65 million years ago.
Make space dinosaurs playable or hard pass.


When I looked up Tramma, I found more than I bargained for.

Davide Tramma posted:

The products are adventures/adventure paths compatible with the [Starfinger] core rulebook.
The will use the setting "The Pact Worlds System".
They will refer to the Product Identity as stated in the rules.
Is is possible to get this specific license in order to use the setting "The Pact World System" and produce e-book ?

Thanks
Dear Paizo: please don't license out your setting to right-wing Italian fascists. That wouldn't happen... could it? :ohdear:



GeekPunk posted:

THE OUTBLACK - Amid the darkest portion of space, where the even the ancient light of the stars seem unable to penetrate the dark shroud of a post-apocalyptic expanse, the denizens of planets long destroyed struggle to survive amid the merciless void of the Outblack.
THE OUTBLACK is a proposed campaign setting for [STARFINGER].

It's said that not even light can escape the egotistical pull of an edgelord.



John R Davis posted:

SECTOR CRAWL: BEYOND THE BLACK EXPANSE

Of all the great mysteries in the universe, one fact had always been held to be true. There is nothing beyond the Black Expanse.
Smah’ala Space Station, orbiting the great class III sun prides itself at being the Bastion of the Last Breath, The Anchor of Civilisation, the final point of cheer, beyond which there is nothing.

This is all set to change.

It is well documented that each time a ship enters Hyperspace a slight, near undetectable tear is known to open into the planes beyond. Recently a tear has grown in size and stability. Some call it a Rift in space. Through this burgeoning gap signals are beginning to be detected. They come not from the planes elsewhere, but from beyond the black expanse itself. Or so the greatest minds thought at that time.

A probe was hastily sent through and strange data arrays began to be broadcast back to the space station. Beyond all myth and legends, a Jump-Gate was detected, the safe and instant way to travel with no risk!!. The long held dream of all space-farers.

A crew of ready volunteers, some of the most experienced, intellectual, and bravest in the known worlds were sent through in the most modern and powerful ship able to squeeze into the fluctuating anomaly. Something went wrong, terribly wrong. Not only was all contact lost with the starship Herald but the rift began to become unstable and start to close. To the dismay of all, the chance to find an ancient Jump-Gate seemed diminished.

An eminent scientist, too old to travel she claims, found the cause of the catastrophe, the starships' energy profile was very high and caused a calamitous interaction with the rift. She proposes a low tiered vessel, a basic explorer designation craft, could simply drift through the tear on minimal power, and survive. With its crew, intact.

This is where you come in.

Sector Crawl: Beyond the Black Expanse is a 64 page 3-D hexploration set in the great beyond, for 1st level PC’s using the [Starfinger Core Rules]. It promises great glory, or a grim death, for those who dare to try to uncover its secrets.

An Adventure Scape (a sandbox in space) allowing the freedom to explore in any direction.
A set of ancient mysteries, long-held legends, and hidden untruths to discover.
A myriad of random and range encounters.
Aliens to encounter, moons to explore, resources to exploit and entities to exterminate.
Enough content to get PCs to at least 7th level.

3-D hexploration, huh? Also how black is space, let me tell you how black it is-



Production Platform 3 Toys, LLC posted:

Production Platform 3 will initially be converting our original Pathfinder Roleplaying Game sci-fi supplements to the [Starfinger Core Rules] mechanics and then expanding our catalog - from genetically-engineered humans to alien flora and fauna to be used anywhere adventurers dare to go. From super-soldiers to sky-sharks to space galleons, we're here for you.

Watch for our stand-alone campaign settings - RadLands and Crossing the Black - currently being developed!
It's so black.


Actual quote: "Next NPC up, Master Chief Squeaky, head of Custodial services aboard the Uranus Hertz. Created by Sean McMannamy."

Time for the cutting edge of planetary puns with:

Happy Gnome Publishing posted:

Happy Gnome Publishing, led by best-selling Spec Fiction author T.J. Lantz, is proud to announce Redshirts, a twelve level Sci-fi/Comedy campaign guaranteed to provide the funniest experiences in the Galaxy. Taking cues from genre classics such as Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, Spaceballs, and Futurama, Redshirts aims to take you where no man has ever really wanted to go before (Like to pick up the captain's dry cleaning from a quarantined planet or to get the command crew tacos from a nearly abandoned space station). Everyone know the universe is a dangerous place, but it's even worse when you're a Redshirt.

Redshirts will be available September 2017.
"He's dead, Jim!" "It's okay, go ahead and cast mystic cure." "Oh, right. Jim, that tired old gag of mine doesn't really work in this system, does it?" "I suppose it doesn't, Bones, but given the ability of transporters to just replicate a person, in body, mind, and soul: did it ever really work?"

Well, at least there's unintentional humor in Starfinger to be found?



Louis Porter Jr. Design Inc. posted:

Polymecha - General [Starfinger] material
What, not Haven: System of Violence?



Nkids posted:

Nkids
Dew Crew
Squirtle Squad
What? :raise:

Have I mentioned that Paizo just lets people post anything to this registry? Well, there you go. One publisher posted themselves twice... or maybe there are two different companies named "Misfit Games".



Rite Publishing posted:

Jade Nebula Campaign Setting
Have you considered just calling it "Space China" or "China in Space" or "Kung Fu 2100"?



Ryan Wolfe posted:

I have a couple dozen starship designs that I have developed over the last decade or so and sell on RPGNow:

http://www.rpgnow.com/browse/pub/606/0hr

My plan is to create additional content to facilitate the use of these and future ships in [Starfinger].

I'd also love to work on official [Starfinger] products if I could be of service.

~Ryan Wolfe
0-hr.com
I can understand putting in a job application online can feel like you're just flinging it into the void, but in this case it's literally true.



Silver Games LLC posted:

None yet, but Ponyfinder will launch to the stars, given time.
Oh. Well. Good for them.

given the endless march of space is so dark settings this actually feels like something of a respite



Spellhawks Press posted:

Riftjammers - The Alaxia Expanse is a star system on the Outer Fringes of the Great Verse. Transplanar travel through rifts in the void are dangerous and unpredictable but it gets you where you need to go. News of the Drift network in other systems has many talking but it's still the frontier in Alaxia. Too survive you need a ship,crew, and nerves of steel to enter the rifts.
A sentient Godmind A.I called Nexyss created the Omnicortex. A vast artificial mindscape that allows the flow of information, entertainment, and commerce.
All material is still being written & playtested. Nothing is official yet.
I'll wait for the official version, then.



Stephen Robertson - Final Frontiers - Prth posted:

I am the proud owner of a complete Pathfinder collection, part Physical, Part digital, and use it to promote Pazio content here in Perth through the Tabletop Gaming Organisation I am part of.
Did... you register just to brag? Well, to each their own.



Storm Bunny Studios posted:

Our first new setting will be Alessia - A Magitech World. Built to support 5e, [Starfinger], and Pathfinder, Alessia is a world that has reached the height of its magical development, which it has nurtured to replace technology at almost every level of society. Combining its understanding of magic with its need to reach the stars, Alessia has become a sanctuary world for over two dozen different races; it is a place of transformation and expansion, a world filled with Peace Keepers fighting to keep an encroaching darkness at bay.

Storm Bunny Studios will also be introducing Rćnor, the Bloodlands, a Nexus System planet recovering from global devastation caused by the Everheart's Fall and the Skyfires it caused. Now in its Third Age, Rćnor is waking up, recovering its history, and actively working to regain its place in a much larger universe.
All, yes, I remember Everheart's Fall and the Skyfires, and all sorts of other word salad that means nothing when you're doing a paragraph pitch for your game, stop that.

"But don't you want to know what that means-", the straw designer mumbles.

No.



Terran Empire Publishing posted:

We hope to adapt our Pathfinder compatible campaign setting, Manastorm: World of Shin'ar, to [Starfinger]. The new setting will take place in the Milky Way Galaxy, centered on Earth and the Terran Empire that has risen from the ashes of alien occupation.
Wait, if it's centered on Earth, why is it called...? :confused:



Third-Party Publishers posted:

Use of the [Starfinger] Roleplaying Game Compatibility Logo for advertising licensed products, including on product covers and in product descriptions, per Exhibit A: Usage Requirements.
I don't know if this is a template that just somehow got put on the list or what. Did I mention they don't ever seem to check it?



XII-IXX (Twelve-Nineteen) posted:

As an imprint of GeekPunk Games, XII-IXX will expand THE OUTBLACK campaign setting, as well as additional [STARFINGER] compatible products including...

GRIMM SPACE - An original campaign setting inspired by the tales of the Brothers Grimm with a dark sci-fi edge.
Wait, why do you need an imprint for work in the same setting... wait, is that a space station made of gingerbread?

Mmmm. Looks delicious. Set a course!

Next: PUNCH IT.

Alien Rope Burn fucked around with this message at 19:55 on Oct 26, 2017

unseenlibrarian
Jun 4, 2012

There's only one thing in the mountains that leaves a track like this. The creature of legend that roams the Timberline. My people named him Sasquatch. You call him... Bigfoot.
If you're going to do Fantasy China in space just call it "Outlaws of the Galactic Margin" and start collecting your 108 PCs.

DalaranJ
Apr 15, 2008

Yosuke will now die for you.
Do you have to ensure compatibility with the OGL as well if you make a Starfinger supplement?

Alien Rope Burn
Dec 5, 2004

I wanna be a saikyo HERO!

DalaranJ posted:

Do you have to ensure compatibility with the OGL as well if you make a Starfinger supplement?

"In order to make use of the compatible content, your product must operate under and rely on the [Starfinger] Roleplaying Game. Standalone game systems are in no event authorized hereunder."

Alien Rope Burn fucked around with this message at 19:48 on Oct 26, 2017

inklesspen
Oct 17, 2007

Here I am coming, with the good news of me, and you hate it. You can think only of the bell and how much I have it, and you are never the goose. I will run around with my bell as much as I want and you will make despair.
Buglord
Pretty sure Redshirts is already the name of a space-opera themed comedy.

Alien Rope Burn
Dec 5, 2004

I wanna be a saikyo HERO!

inklesspen posted:

Pretty sure Redshirts is already the name of a space-opera themed comedy.

Also a video game, well, okay, it's singular. But.

DalaranJ
Apr 15, 2008

Yosuke will now die for you.

Alien Rope Burn posted:

"In order to make use of the compatible content, your product must operate under and rely on the [Starfinger] Roleplaying Game. Standalone game systems are in no event authorized hereunder."

Oh, yeah, I guess the OGL applies to game systems so creating a setting is protected under the individual game.

Halloween Jack
Sep 12, 2003

La morte non ha sesso

Alien Rope Burn posted:

Manastorm: World of Shin'ar

phbbbbbbbbt hahahahaha

Mors Rattus
Oct 25, 2007

FATAL & Friends
Walls of Text
#1 Builder
2014-2018

unseenlibrarian posted:

If you're going to do Fantasy China in space just call it "Outlaws of the Galactic Margin" and start collecting your 108 PCs.

In fairness, if you're going to model a space empire on something, China hasn't been done to death nearly as much as Britain or Rome.

Alien Rope Burn
Dec 5, 2004

I wanna be a saikyo HERO!

Mors Rattus posted:

In fairness, if you're going to model a space empire on something, China hasn't been done to death nearly as much as Britain or Rome.

It's not a bad idea but Jade [whatever] raises my hackles. Well, if I had hackles, they would be raised.

Mors Rattus
Oct 25, 2007

FATAL & Friends
Walls of Text
#1 Builder
2014-2018

I would probably go with 'All Stars Under Heaven'.

wiegieman
Apr 22, 2010

Royalty is a continuous cutting motion


Alien Rope Burn posted:

It's not a bad idea but Jade [whatever] raises my hackles. Well, if I had hackles, they would be raised.

Why? It's decent shorthand for "this is a China setting".

Halloween Jack
Sep 12, 2003

La morte non ha sesso
The Inscrutable Oriental Nebula: Prefectures of Xia'Nana

Alien Rope Burn
Dec 5, 2004

I wanna be a saikyo HERO!

DalaranJ posted:

Oh, yeah, I guess the OGL applies to game systems so creating a setting is protected under the individual game.

Well, the Starfinger Compatibility License is completely separate from the OGL. Paizo has no say over the OGL itself. The Compatibility License basically just lets you put the "Starfinger Compatible" icon on your product, ads, website, etc.

wiegieman posted:

Why? It's decent shorthand for "this is a China setting".

In my experience it's usually shorthand to mash Asian mythology and Western pop culture tropes about Asia into a vague melange of stereotypes mumbling about mysticism and honor and inscrutability. The "It's not Japan, it's Rokugan" sort of notion. "Oh, we don't have to more than surface-level stereotyping, because this isn't China, it's the Land of Scarlet and Jade."

That isn't always the case, of course. But more often than not.

kommy5
Dec 6, 2016
I'd prefer to call my Space China Empire the "Mandate of Heaven." It sounds too obvious, but apparently everyone else has a jade fixation.

Halloween Jack
Sep 12, 2003

La morte non ha sesso
I wonder if East Asia has some shorthand they use to signal that a fantasy setting is vaguely premodern European. ButtzGualt: Realms of Gold and Wool.

NGDBSS
Dec 30, 2009






So that whole collection of Jade [Realm] settings has something of a history. Back when Arcana Evolved (by Monte Cook, noted ideas man and stuck-in-his-own-rut designer) was somewhat fresh, Frank Carr decided to do some homebrew design for the game. Among other things he (maybe) made a Gunmage (based on AE's Mage Blade class and some Malhavoc firearms supplements that weren't the punishing nonsense of PF guns) and (definitely) the Ofuda Mage.* The concept of the latter was basically that they specialized in placing magical effects on cards (as in the cover art for Heroes of the Jade Oath), and while it probably wasn't a full caster or the Runethane it was still a decent effort in the context of AE design. (As with most d20 products, casters were better than noncasters.)

At some point Mr. Carr decided that he'd make a whole East Asian-themed setting for AE, but due to various delays it got stalled out for a while. Eventually AE had no remaining buzz and instead PF was the new hotness on the 3.x scene, so with some tweaks Lands of the Jade Oath got published instead as a 3rd-party PF product.

Thus when Starfinger was announced, we ended up seeing a repeat of the old d20 glut where everybody dogpiled on the misguided success of a creator, and of course LotJO was no exception.

*Perhaps someone else developed the Gunmage? I can't actually find the source for it.

Servetus
Apr 1, 2010

Halloween Jack posted:

I wonder if East Asia has some shorthand they use to signal that a fantasy setting is vaguely premodern European. ButtzGualt: Realms of Gold and Wool.

I suddenly want to play in a western medieval fantasy setting written by a Chinese writer who knows as little about Europe as the people writing Jade [Blank] know about China

wiegieman
Apr 22, 2010

Royalty is a continuous cutting motion


Alien Rope Burn posted:

In my experience it's usually shorthand to mash Asian mythology and Western pop culture tropes about Asia into a vague melange of stereotypes mumbling about mysticism and honor and inscrutability. The "It's not Japan, it's Rokugan" sort of notion. "Oh, we don't have to more than surface-level stereotyping, because this isn't China, it's the Land of Scarlet and Jade."

That isn't always the case, of course. But more often than not.

I suppose so, but it may be just a symptom of all setting writups glossing over cultures and it not being as noticeable with something that's Western Europe, Except Not.

I really do want to see like a Roman era setting from a Chinese writer though. That would be interesting.

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Alien Rope Burn
Dec 5, 2004

I wanna be a saikyo HERO!

Halloween Jack posted:

I wonder if East Asia has some shorthand they use to signal that a fantasy setting is vaguely premodern European. ButtzGualt: Realms of Gold and Wool.

As much as Western stereotypes would imply otherwise, my unresearched observation would be that "Dragon" whatever seems to be the callout to Dragon Quest and similar psuedoeuropean settings. "Fantasy" with myriad variations can also fill in for this.

Servetus posted:

I suddenly want to play in a western medieval fantasy setting written by a Chinese writer who knows as little about Europe as the people writing Jade [Blank] know about China

They're not Chinese, but have you tried some JRPGs?

(Mind, I don't know how good or bad Jade Nebula will or won't be, it's just a knee-jerk response.)

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