Contributor, RPG Superstar 2008 Top 4, Legendary Games
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Journey to a lost continent.
Uncover a deadly past.
And watch your future die.
Coming 2018 from Legendary Games - , a massive 20-level adventure saga and campaign setting featuring dragons, the dream-time, and the conquest of two worlds!
Wait, what? :O. Do we play as dragon characters or do we get dragon companions or we embark on a conquest to eliminate dragons? (I am getting way too many flashbacks to the 90's rpg video games). Details, man! Give us details! ;D
CB
Intrigued... TELL ME MORE.
Huzzah!
Huzzah!
Are you a part of this?
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I'll be very interested in something like that, remembering the old time playing Council of Wyrms.
Good for you. The world wants a dragon based PF AP, and it's not on Paizos agenda!
Saves us having to write our own now!!
Is "Rage of Wyrms" a deliberate play on words for Paizo's old 3.5 campaign?
Probability approaching unity.
yes please LG tel me more detail. That was great if we play dragon caractere.
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From my limited understanding (i.e., this is Jason's brainstorm in conjunction with Robert Brookes), the primary expectation is that you'd play normal PCs (though, you could clearly have a draconic bloodline sorcerer/arcanist/bloodrager or a PC with Eldritch Heritage or a campaign trait for someone being dragon-blooded), but the overall AP intends to pit you against dragons rather than having you play one. Seems like this kind of question surfaces even on Paizo APs. They'll announce something like Reign of Winter and suddenly everyone wants to play a winter witch, even though they're going to be your adversaries for the most part. Regardless, Rage of Wyrms is meant to be a LOT more than just fighting one of each chromatic dragon type per AP chapter. As Robert explained, you're dealing with dragons from Day One, meaning they'll pervade the entire storyline, not just be served up as the final BBEG of each adventure.
Aside from that, Jason shared that the PCs are expected to journey to a Lost Coast kind of region within this new campaign setting. They'll be conquest-minded in the sense that they're representing their home country/empire and trying to establish a colony. They'll run into a superior, isolationist civilization already in that region, and Jason compared them to something like the Wakanda from Marvel comics, but far more fantasy-based than sci-fi-based, of course. This superior civilization once dealt with a horrific dragon-related catastrophe in the past, but all of the dragons were since put into a "dream time" that's kept them at bay for a long, long time. With the PCs' arrival (and subsequent antics), they're destined to awaken those dragons, tick off the local civilization, and face not only the elimination of their fledgling colony, but also a full-scale invasion of their homeland by the same dragons they've unleashed.
I think that's the extent of everything we shared at the "What's New With Legendary Games" panel on this upcoming AP, but I'm sure Jason or Robert will come along and expound upon it, as necessary.
My two cents,
--Neil
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Cheers Neil
Sounds interesting ( I have no interest in playing a dragon!)
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So are there any more connections to Age of Worms than one linguistic echo?
@Neil: thank you for the information there. It does sound pretty cool! I can't help but think of the 2nd Edition Council of Wyrms setting, Mystara setting, AND the Savage Coast setting.
Hm, it will be interesting to see the overall story. Plus, I am keenly curious in seeing how LG handles Dragonslayers (the ones put out by Paizo in their Dragonslayers' Handbook were nice but I felt like they were still lacking - I didn't feel inspired to play a dragonslayer based on those archetypes they presented).
Cheers!
CB
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Thanks, Neil, I'm now more than intrigued. I am excited. There's a sort of odd assumption in fantasy RP adventure design that dragons have been done to death.
No, they really, really, REALLY haven't.
You get the odd dragon as a random encounter, you sometimes get them as a part of an encounter site, but it's ridiculous how rare it is that a dragon with an actual personality is part of an adventure. Let alone more than one that's part of an entire AP featuring dragons from part 1.
This is very exciting.
I like dragons.
I have an impertinent question.
Journey to a lost continent.
Uncover a deadly past.
And watch your future die.
Why would I want to watch my future die? That sounds depressing.
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Thanks, Neil, I'm now more than intrigued. I am excited. There's a sort of odd assumption in fantasy RP adventure design that dragons have been done to death.
No, they really, really, REALLY haven't.
You get the odd dragon as a random encounter, you sometimes get them as a part of an encounter site, but it's ridiculous how rare it is that a dragon with an actual personality is part of an adventure. Let alone more than one that's part of an entire AP featuring dragons from part 1.
This is very exciting.
I like dragons.
I feel the same. The only settings that I have played and/or run that really gets into presenting dragons as actual characters with a personality beyond "I am superior to everyone else" and much more than a statblck were Council of Wyrms and Dragonlance. Dragons are capable of so much more than being a final encounter.
CB
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You know, I love that it's AGAINST dragons. AND I really hope that it will not be "kill a dragon of each age category", but rather one that focuses, for once, on depicting dragons as these extremely challenging, nigh-unstoppable forces of nature that they are. Pretty much every depiction of dragons in modules tends to use them as pretty much not-too-smart combatants or as throwaway difficulty bumps, not as these really smart, really long-lived, immensely powerful creatures.
So yeah, color me intrigued!
Very intrigued
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Thanks, Neil, I'm now more than intrigued. I am excited. There's a sort of odd assumption in fantasy RP adventure design that dragons have been done to death.
No, they really, really, REALLY haven't.
You get the odd dragon as a random encounter, you sometimes get them as a part of an encounter site, but it's ridiculous how rare it is that a dragon with an actual personality is part of an adventure. Let alone more than one that's part of an entire AP featuring dragons from part 1.
This is very exciting.
I like dragons.
I feel the same. The only settings that I have played and/or run that really gets into presenting dragons as actual characters with a personality beyond "I am superior to everyone else" and much more than a statblck were Council of Wyrms and Dragonlance. Dragons are capable of so much more than being a final encounter.
CB
Once again proving that you have excellent taste, CB, as well as that great minds think alike.
Now, I have less interest in actually playing dragons than a normal campaign where the antagonists are dragons, so this sounds right up my street (not that I'd complain about some rules to enable playing dragons, just that it's less important to me).
Very much want to see where this goes, with a huge side order of "take my money" for LG.
This is going to be fun!
According to my talking with Jason, the format is going to be similar to the Dungeon Magazine APs, but whether or not LG kickstarts it is still up for discussion. So let us know what you the customers would like.
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Honestly, I think Kickstarter is a pretty good format for releasing third-party adventure paths, at least until a company definitely has enough of an income stream to self-fund all the way through. It lets people invest as they'd like, provides a good channel for communicating about the inevitable delays, and if it's particularly successful, it can help make a bitter, better product.
I've backed several adventure paths in the past (including The Blight, the Northlands Saga, and Legendary Planet), and I would definitely be willing to keep doing that.
This exactly. Plus, I greatly enjoy having the opportunity to insert things I created (like npcs) or really like (feys, dragons, etc.) into gaming products (*coughs* Forest Campaign *coughs*). ;)
CB
That's a good question. Given how the AP takes place in a foreign land, it is not like you can reasonably rely on the old fashioned "Ye Olde Magick Shoppe" for exchanging or buying goods anywhere. I think maybe the idea of legacy items that are tailored to each character class and grows at given levels seems like a good fit for this AP. I am not familiar with the Unchained automatic bonus progression system so I cannot comment on that.
CB
ABP cuts in the customization aspect of PCs, so not fond of it on that side. For NPCs is probably more useful, especially if main enemies should be dragons and loot is contained in their hoards rather than spread throughout the AP.
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Not all dragons for slaying
Hopefully with the BBED we can try to outwit, flatter, quest, out do, etc rather than just fight. That way brass bronze etc can be an adversary to overcome without a fight.
So are there any more connections to Age of Worms than one linguistic echo?
No. If anything, the AP is a little more like Savage Tides than Age of Worms.
So we can expect dragons with eyepatches, peg legs, or rum as their preferred treasure? ;)
CB
I'll let Jason explain the similarities. I never got all the Savage Tide issues myself.
...I really hope that it will not be "kill a dragon of each age category", but rather one that focuses, for once, on depicting dragons as these extremely challenging, nigh-unstoppable forces of nature that they are....
I think that's exactly what Jason and Robert have in mind. I also advised Jason to make liberal use of our very own Path of Dragons supplement and mythic rules to make them even more challenging for high-level PCs.
This going to be kickstarted like the legendary planet AP?
Undetermined at this time, but I would assume so.
A dragon based AP? Sign me up!
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Contributor, RPG Superstar 2008 Top 4, Legendary Games
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Is "Rage of Wyrms" a deliberate play on words for Paizo's old 3.5 campaign?Probability approaching unity.
You know me too well!
Amusingly, Robert Brookes and I were Gmail-chatting about names for the AP and had gone around and around on several and all of a sudden we each texted that one to each other simultaneously, followed by a round of laughter. Apparently it is kismet. :)
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Contributor, RPG Superstar 2008 Top 4, Legendary Games
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I have an impertinent question.
Why would I want to watch my future die? That sounds depressing.Journey to a lost continent.
Uncover a deadly past.
And watch your future die.
You totally wouldn't!
The whole point is that the PCs go into this expedition with some preconceived notions about what they'll find, based on the natural expectations for how things are back home. They do typical adventurer stuff, the kind of thing that would get them renown as heroes back home.
Turns out, oh boy did they make a mistake (or some of the similarly oblivious NPCs with them do). And then all dragon-hell breaks loose and the rest of the AP is about reacting to the holocaust they've unleashed.
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Contributor, RPG Superstar 2008 Top 4, Legendary Games
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You know, I love that it's AGAINST dragons. AND I really hope that it will not be "kill a dragon of each age category", but rather one that focuses, for once, on depicting dragons as these extremely challenging, nigh-unstoppable forces of nature that they are. Pretty much every depiction of dragons in modules tends to use them as pretty much not-too-smart combatants or as throwaway difficulty bumps, not as these really smart, really long-lived, immensely powerful creatures.
So yeah, color me intrigued!
Woohoo for intrigue, but as to all dragons being uber-dragons... I'd say yes and no. That is to say, yes, absolutely there will be really smart, really long-lived, immensely powerful creatures among the dragons.
But there will also be young dragons. And dumb dragons. And not-immensely-powerful dragons.
I think that's where Golarion has kind of painted itself into a corner as far as dragons go. They can only use dragons as BBEGs because they have more or less defined in the way they've created the setting that the only dragons that exist ARE the oldest, smartest, most powerful dragons, and virtually all of them are isolationist loners. It ends up as kind of a tautology. You can only use dragons as BBEGs because BBEG dragons are the only dragons there are, so you have to use them as BBEGs.
Where are all the young dragons? Are dragons functionally extinct as a species, with just the oldest ones lingering on and clinging to life? How do dragons integrate with other cultures? As masters? As minions? As mercenaries?
You can rest assured that we'll be using dragons in a wide variety of roles and contexts throughout the way the adventures and setting are constructed, from the biggest boss dragons to dragon minions of many kinds. It won't be a simple "climb the ladder of wimp to god dragons" nor will it be a "one giant dragon at the end of each adventure" situation either. We've got a lot of fun ideas that we'll be trying out in this project, and we're excited for you all to see it as it develops.
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Contributor, RPG Superstar 2008 Top 4, Legendary Games
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It'll probably help if some point in the adventure - maybe right up-front where things are explained to the GM in the first volume? - discusses ways of running dragon encounters so they're genuinely frightening... even after the party has been doing them for awhile. Too much of anything gets stale, after all. XD I'd hope for a lot of environment in the encounters, too, so it's more than facing a big wyrm.
Sure. The tactical flexibility of dragons is one of the things that makes them so much fun.
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Contributor, RPG Superstar 2008 Top 4, Legendary Games
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This going to be kickstarted like the legendary planet AP?
We are still working on the outline and setting and story bible, and we plan to get writing assignments out by the end of June at least for the early installments.
We will definitely be getting a lot more writing done ahead of time with Conquest than we did with Legendary Planet, but exactly how we release it depends on a number of things. It's too early to say for 100% certain, but my best guess at this point is that we would get writing going and do some art and map buys early just out of our ongoing revenues so that we could start releasing the adventures in the run-up to a Kickstarter compilation project next spring to fund the majority of the art and map buys and print/ship costs, allowing us to (hopefully) get the full thing completed and shipped to us in time for GenCon next year.
That requires a pretty ambitious set of goals, so we'll see how it all shakes out. One of the things we'll be doing differently, as Matt suggested, is disconnecting the adventures themselves from any bonus products we do. Rather than doing giant 100+ page Paizo AP-style books (which look great and are a great value for customers), we'll be doing adventures about 40-50 pages (which may have a few new monsters or items in them), but any side products we do will be standalone books. Making more discrete products means that no individual piece has to wait on the sidelines while its companion pieces get done, so each chunk can get written (and converted for 5E, for that matter) and cycle through the process more quickly.
If things move along well, GenCon 2018 is certainly possible, but Legendary quality always comes first, so we will see how it goes.
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Contributor, RPG Superstar 2008 Top 4, Legendary Games
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Not all dragons for slaying
Hopefully with the BBED we can try to outwit, flatter, quest, out do, etc rather than just fight. That way brass bronze etc can be an adversary to overcome without a fight.
I can guarantee that there will be many kinds of dragons, some potentially friendly, some not, and not all of them along the chromatic/metallic spectrum.
RPG Superstar 2014 Top 4
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Some observations:
1) Imagine Skull Island meets World of Warcraft: Cataclysm meets Dragonlance meets Black Panther's Wakanda.
2) Fight dragons, fight ALL the dragons. From level 1 to level 20. You're going to be up to your eyeballs in wyrms.
3) That said, dragons won't be the only enemies. It they will be the most prevalent.
4) Balance is aimed to be a mixture of exploration, dungeons, and "first contact" scenarios with an extremely magically advanced society. Imagine if Azlant didn't fall but instead went into hiding. How would you be the ambassador of the outside world?
5) DID I MENTION DRAGONS?