A while ago I posted list of ideas for games I'll never get the chance to run. Here's some more entries from noisms' Gargantuan Tome of Unfulfilled Gaming Desires:
Catalogue 16a, book XVII, chapter 9, subsection IV, no. 163: A time-travelling game, probably using GURPS, in which a future civilisation creates time travel, goes back in time and contacts people from ancient Sumer, but is then destroyed by nuclear war. The player characters are ancient Sumerians who subsequently come across the gate that leads them to the future, which they travel through and discover a world without humans but all kinds of futuristic technology. And aliens. And radiation.
Catalogue 34j, book X, chapter 83, subsection I, no. 18: Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay 2e - Characters from the Old World travel off on a voyage of exploration and end up being shipwrecked and washed up in Cathay.
Catalogue 29a, book II, chapter 11, subsection X, no. 4: D&D Animal Fantasy a la Redwall, but rather than mice and otters and badgers and the like, the major races are all based on varieties of insects and spiders. Locust Bard, anybody? Tarantula Fighter? Wasp Mage? No takers?
Catalogue 2k, book LXV, chapter 1, subsection XX, no. 38: A forge-style, indie, story-games.com, you-only-play-about-three-times-before-it-gets-samey-and-boring style game set in the Stalinist USSR. Basically a variant on wink-murder or the Prisoner's Dilemma, the characters pass notes to the DM every five minutes saying which other player they want to denounce to the KGB and have sent to the Gulag. But the denounced players can save themselves by correctly guessing which other player dobbed them in. Works better if you also have to drink a shot of vodka every time you get sent to the Gulag.
Catalogue 6w, book C, chapter 91, subsection V, no. 20: The PCs are Russian adventurer/explorers in the vein of Yermak Timofeyevich, participating in the conquest of Siberia. A bit like the Wild West (so I'd use the Deadlands rules), except with Tatar raids, crumbling remnants of the Mongol Empire, lots of snow, and China, rather than California, waiting on the other side.
D&D Animal Fantasy a la Redwall, but rather than mice and otters and badgers and the like, the major races are all based on varieties of insects and spiders. Locust Bard, anybody? Tarantula Fighter? Wasp Mage? No takers?
ReplyDelete*raises hand*
I'd go for it in a heartbeat, especially if mantids and scorpions were options. And (although cousin critters) somehow, some way, trilobites or something based on them.
The PCs are Russian adventurer/explorers in the vein of Yermak Timofeyevich, participating in the conquest of Siberia.
ReplyDeleteI am so there for this...familiar enough to be easy to get into and yet utterly alien.
Sumerian Future, WFRP Cathay and the Wild East for me pls. :)
ReplyDeleteGreat blog!
ReplyDeleteRecently I've begun to feel that the DM'ing urge, that itch to create campaigns and worlds, is a redirected desire to write a novel. And at least there, the damn characters will go where you want.
Like you said in your Song of Ice and Fire review, create your own worlds! It's fun!
Conquest of Siberia? Awesomeness.
ReplyDeleteAs for the first one, very cool, but I'd avoid GURPS, really, and head for S&W and Mutant Future on that.
I'm also into the insect redwall thing, but for the love of god, no Tarantulas.
ReplyDeletePlease. *wibble*
Definite yes on both the Russia games, though.
taichara: Mantids and scorpions would of course be mandatory.
ReplyDeleteHerb: I think it would strike the right balance between weirdness and accessibility, which is something I often struggle with. (I lean heavily towards weirdness over accessibilty.)
Chris: The Wild East! Why didn't I think of that?
crazyred: You might be right. I'm not a frustrated novelist really because I don't often try, but I do write silly bits and pieces of short stories and novels from time to time. Probably it all comes from the same place.
Hamlet: I was thinking of making it real hard SF - just with ancient Sumerians!
Rach: What, don't you like tarantulas?
This is definitely going to lead to a blog post about my own as-yet-unrealized campaign and game projects. Thanks! And sign me up for the Sumerians and Siberians campaigns, too. ;)
ReplyDeleteNo, no I don't like them. Or spiders in general, really. Unless their name has "-Man" attached thereto.
ReplyDeleteSign me up for Conquest of Siberia. I've been sold on that ever since I learned that the Turkmens called the Russian general Skobelev "old bloody eyes."
ReplyDeleteHave you seen Atanarjuat (The Fast Runner)? Those guys would be my native Siberians, even though they're actually Inuit.