To preface: I LOVE LOTR and evrything that goes along with it. JRR Tolkien is probbaly my favorite authhor of all time, and I can practically quote the Hobbit verbatim. However...
I want to De-Tolkein-ize DnD. I think Monte Cook's Arcana Evolved is a good place to start, but I hate his story line and world. What do I mean? I am over Elves, Dwarves, Halflings and Orcs of all flavours. I'm just done with them in thier current, iconic form. Warhammer, WOW, etc all use the same basic templates. Ugh. So what subtle Tolkien-esque influence would you make over? Cat like dragons? Roguey halflings? The Half Elf (Elrond?)? Lay on MacDuff!!!
Well you could do a more human centric game like The Wilderlands which tends to focus alot on humans from different regions. If you still want to use the demi-human races but changed I might start by looking at Darksun for inspiration. They may not work in a non-desert settings, but they did try and make them different from the typical demi-humans. Honestly I rarely play demi-humans to begin with so it hasn't been an issue for me.
I had a friend who tried to come up with a "NEW" campaign setting. He'd come up with these strange name and we would ask him "What are those?"...
and he'd reply: "Oh, they're like orcs, but with purple skin"...
"And those?"...
"Ah, those are like goblins..."
"And those?"...
"Those are giants..."
So we ended up with the same thing but with different names. To me an orc is an orc, even if he's purple.
I say, if you want to do something completely different, you'd have to re-invent the wheel. To start off, I'd say remove the humans, give everyone wings, take away the swords and start the campaign on a barren moon-like world infested with giant sixteen-legged fish. In short; Go wild!
Ultradan
I agree with Ultradan. Tolkien may have laid some of the basic groundwork for our current archetypes, but the fact remains that they are architypes. It's not really so much an influence of Tolkien as a generally held reference point. Orcs having daylight sensitivity; elves not sleeping; "halflings" (hobbits) having used to be chubby short guys (again, hobbits): These are inlfuences of Tolkien. To have a fantasy game without relying on thoses bases, one would have to do something literally unrecognizeable, or or go with an all-human campaign. The later is probably the better option.
That said... cool!
Start off by removing 95% of intelligent monsters. Just leave a few that are really alien and threatening and mysterious, such as mind flayers. Outsiders are okay, too, but most of the races native to the Material Plane should go. You can keep the same ability adjustments as exist for the various races in the PHB and just ascribe them to different kinds of people, make up some new cultures, and adapt the minor abilities to match.
Now, all the inter-species conflicts are gone, and you're left with room to just develop various human cultures and their kingdoms, which has a lot of potential. Many people tend to be very human-centric (I wonder why we humans would be that way?), and when designing worlds (homebrew or published), they tend to focus overwhelmingly on the human portion of it, to the point that it can be rediculous to consider that all the other races actually might have a place to live.
You've just solved that problem by saying, "They don't." Now you can worry just about the plots and stories of men, without having to remember to put in an orc invasion here or an elven war there to acknowledge the existence of these peoples.
Check out Rich Burlew's world designing articles over at Giant in the Playground (giantitp.com). He still has gnomes and gnolls, but almost everything else is human-centric. They're very good articles when considering world building.
Enjoy!
thanks all. Yeah, I've read a lot of the stuff @ GITP. One of the things I've always tried to do when designing regions is to emphasize the economics, as most cultures trade a lot more than they fight. But PCs are pretty much the opposite :) Ilike the multi-species worldview JRRT and core DnD represent, but its just tired to me, as are lizard or cat PC races. I was big into Anthrpomorphics (the comic) and Fusion (the comic) in the early 90s. I guess I am trying to capture that sort of star wars cantina feel, you know? The feeling that everyone is a very long way from home.
Forget "races" then...
Go with immeasurable variance...
Sounds clunky, yet it does not have to be...
Making this up on the fly, so bear with.
Human is your start point unmodified.
Have two tables… pro and con.
For every pro… you must pick a con.
So plus on to STR but minus one to DEX.
Thick hide (+1 to AC) but do not receive constitution bonus for HPs.
For “special abilities” limit the class (DM has to keep game balance.
Let the players make up the race.
For every new NPC “race” encountered.
Have two tables… pro and con...
The DM picks a special defense and a special weakness.
The players will never know what they are up against.
And for the DM…some surprises too...
You may find an antagonist race for the party you never imagined.
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I want to De-Tolkein-ize DnD.
Iron Kingdoms.
You've still got elves and dwarves, but elves are vicious, bitter creatures who pretty much hate humanity and the dwarves are mostly tradesmen and crafters who really don't give a crap about morality and aren't necessarily friendly (though they remain largely lawful).
Orcs have been replaced with the ogrun which are basically gigantic humanoids (Large size) that were brought into the world as a slave race from across the desert and eventually earned respect as a race of their own (much like the history of blacks in America).
There are no halflings and no gnomes. Goblins fill their place by being inventive little critters who have slowly integrated themselves into civilization. If you're familiar with World of Warcraft, they're very much like the goblins you'll find there, not like normal D&D goblins that live in huts and throw rocks.
They completely threw out the Monster Manual and provided their own MM called the 'Monsternomicon' which has very few 'iconic' fantasy creatures in it. Lots of undead, some crazy swamp monsters and bizarre variations on trolls (nothing like traditional D&D except the regeneration part). Dragons are still present, but they are all terrifyingly powerful and irredeemably evil. Plus, there's only like... 4 of them in the entire world.
Oh, and they have guns, bombs, trains, and steam-powered warmachines. Yeah. That non-Tolkien enough for ya?
Hmm.. tell me more. Though I must admit I prefer swords and sorcery to musketry.
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Hmm.. tell me more. Though I must admit I prefer swords and sorcery to musketry.
Everything you ever wanted to know...
It's a relatively low-magic setting, incorporating magic with technology to maximize effectiveness. It's also a very gritty setting where the gods do not appreciate their mortal servants meddling in the fates of others (healing magics can sometimes backfire). Overall, very dark and dirty, but I love it more than any other setting out there.
A good notions of deTolkienizing D&D is to look at sources that predate the Big Man.
Lord Dunsany, Aston Smith, Howard and Lovecraft all fashioned very rich, dark worlds. Okay, non human PCs are thin on the ground, but one could use Dragonkin, Thri-kreen and other underexposed options.
The Evil forces in the setting don't have to be faceless, cosmic evils like Sauron- a Lawful, intolerant regime that espouses racism, sectarianism or some other ism can be more then evil enough.
Perhaps the "Evil" is in fact a hardcore Lawful Good force that sees it's mission to "cleanse" the unbelievers and heathens.
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Hmm.. tell me more. Though I must admit I prefer swords and sorcery to musketry.Everything you ever wanted to know...
It's a relatively low-magic setting, incorporating magic with technology to maximize effectiveness. It's also a very gritty setting where the gods do not appreciate their mortal servants meddling in the fates of others (healing magics can sometimes backfire). Overall, very dark and dirty, but I love it more than any other setting out there.
I've played in Iron Kingdoms, and it was fun. I'm not a fan of the Steampunk aspects mixed with my D&D (Can you say Eberron?), but it's a fun place to visit. Plus, the Warmachine Miniatures Game (FANTASTIC tabletop game) provides you with a full line of minis to use in your game.
Remove all the Tolkien races and replace with raptoran, goliath, dvati and kenku etc. Make humans a minority/new race. Replace core D&D and it's combat and magic systems with ToM and ToB/complete classes instead. Make the world a weird place with floating deserts and oceans.
There. Might be fun?
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I've played in Iron Kingdoms, and it was fun. I'm not a fan of the Steampunk aspects mixed with my D&D (Can you say Eberron?), but it's a fun place to visit.
I can understand that, Larry. The big thing to note, however, is that Eberron isn't really 'steampunk.' The trains and airships run on bound elementals. There's no hiss of the boiler, no clouds of smoke billowing up from the smokestack, no sooty coal-shovelling workers. Eberron is very 'clean' in most of the heavily civilzed areas while IK is gritty, dark, and dirty almost everywhere. It's a subtle change, but I think it paints a completely different backdrop to the setting.
Iron Kingdoms is very fun. Though I fear I sold my Monsternomicon to a used book store for some reason.
:(
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Read a lot of Andre Dumas, or Edgar Rice Burroughs, or anyone else for that matter that wrote involved adventure stories BEFORE Tolkien. Give dragons animal intelligence (2) and don't let them talk. Get rid of the need for one of the "big 4" classes in every adventure, and try writing some for, say, a party of all rogues, or all bards. Try playing with fewer players. As previously said, try ditching the non-human races, or at least put a different spin on them (e.g., make elves, gnomes, and dwarves Fey NPCs, kinda like in Poul Anderson's "The Broken Sword").
Read a lot of Andre Dumas, or Edgar Rice Burroughs, or anyone else for that matter that wrote involved adventure stories BEFORE Tolkien. Give dragons animal intelligence (2) and don't let them talk. Get rid of the need for one of the "big 4" classes in every adventure, and try writing some for, say, a party of all rogues, or all bards. Try playing with fewer players. As previously said, try ditching the non-human races, or at least put a different spin on them (e.g., make elves, gnomes, and dwarves Fey NPCs, kinda like in Poul Anderson's "The Broken Sword").
Seconded- Dumas, Haggard and such make for great source material. An interesting angle I played featured humans as the "Old Ones"- exceedingly rare or extinct race that uplifted, fashioned or summoned the PC races. This kind of post human setting can really throw all preconceptions out the window straight away.
To me, the best way to take out Tolkein is not by removing elves and orcs, but by removing: clear cut distinctions between good and evil, ancient artifacts, kingdoms in conflict, armies on the march, and plots in which the fate of the world hangs in the balance. Basically, I'm talking about all the trappings of heroic quest fantasy. Instead, try something like...I don't know...an urban campaign where the players work for a thieves' guild, make their home in a brothel, blackmail politicians to stay out of jail, and forge an alliance with the ratmen in the sewers. That's the kind of thing Tolkein wouldn't touch with a ten foot pole.
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Read a lot of Andre Dumas
Not all Frenchmen are named André, this one is an Alexandre, buddy ;o))
Bran, Comte de Monte Cristo. :)
I want to De-Tolkein-ize DnD.
The Wheel of Time Roleplaying Game (based on Robert Jordan's series) was a pretty good product. It also featured a nifty variant magic system. It used 3.0 rules, though. You can purchase copies through Amazon.com. Strangely, I can't find it here on Paizo, although they do offer Prophecies of the Dragon, the only adventure published for the setting.
For a "human" only setting, I just noticed The Deryni Adventure Game (based on the Katherine Kurtz novels). Other settings, such as Oriental Adventures and those already mentioned in the thread, can also be used.
However, the simplest (not necessarily the easiest) way is to create your own campaign. Go through the PHB and the Race books and decide which ones to use and which ones to remove; go through the Monster Manual(s) and decide which monsters you will or won't allow; decide how magic (and psionics, if you want to include it) works (will you use Magic of Incarnum or one of the systems in Tome of Magic?); decide which splatbooks to use for classes, feats, and prestige classes; create your own world history, geography, and ecology (Frostburn, Sandstorm, and Stormwrack may prove useful, along with Book of Exalted Deeds/Book of Vile Darkness, Fiendish Codex I & II, Libris Mortis, and Lords of Madness); draft up a player's guide of readily available knowledge and character creation guidelines (races, classes, allowable equipment, rules in effect).
To me, the best way to take out Tolkein is not by removing elves and orcs, but by removing: clear cut distinctions between good and evil, ancient artifacts, kingdoms in conflict, armies on the march, and plots in which the fate of the world hangs in the balance. Basically, I'm talking about all the trappings of heroic quest fantasy. Instead, try something like...I don't know...an urban campaign where the players work for a thieves' guild, make their home in a brothel, blackmail politicians to stay out of jail, and forge an alliance with the ratmen in the sewers. That's the kind of thing Tolkein wouldn't touch with a ten foot pole.
A Thieves' World style setting... sounds like fun.
There's usually nothing wrong with switching between "high" and "low" fantasy themes several times in the course of a campaign, or even mixing some into the other (a gritty mercenary campaign, for instance). Some characters lend themselves more easily to one or the other, but D&D as a whole leans toward "high" fantasy. Mostly, it comes down to adventure/campaign design.
Build a world around an Oriental Theme - or an African Theme or a South American Theme or any theme but Dark Ages Europe and the rest should sort itself out with alittle help (don't add orcs to your African theme for example).
I'd read a lot about the themed region before trying to make a fantasy world based on it because without a specific idea of how something should be your likely to fall back on to a default setting of your own culture and thats going to feel like standard issue D&D.
Aletrnitivly...why do you need to use Monte Cooks world just because your using his races and classes?
Read a lot of Andre DumasNot all Frenchmen are named André, this one is an Alexandre, buddy ;o))
C'est vrai, mon ami. My fingers slipped while typing: Alex... ANDRE. Vous voyez, maintenant? Mais, merci bien alors.
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Thanks for all the input ya'll!! One issue I think all Auteur DMs run into is that only so many of your players are going to wade through 100 pages booklets on back story, rule tweaks, etc if they came to play DnD. Even when I was a player in an aborted FR campaign, reading the FR source book was just... ugh. Interesting, but... ugh.
And I hear ya re: alternate cultures. I'm simultaneously working on lands set in all sorts of culture ports. But once again, you need to have the PHB common stuff, and when you restrict or remove some of that, people can get upset. Back to the note book
:)
I like the idea of paring back to a more basic mythological foundation.
Forget Elves, Hobbits, Orcs, etc... the way they were portrayed by Tolkien. If you wanted to keep the same sort of 'regional' basis (IE: vaguely dark ageish European theme) there is a wealth of mythology to draw from. Tolkien (As well as many D&D authors/developers) used some, of course. But the Sidhe of myth are much different than the Elves of Tolkien if I remember correctly. Goblins/Hobgoblins, various other bugaboos.
Ursula Le Guin's "Earthsea" series has a VERY different feel from Tolkien's world. Different cosmology, different type of culture, interesting theories on the evolution of man and magic, no frolicking demihumans, and while the dragons may still be described with "feline grace", they are a VERY different animal than Smaug and have a different place in the world. (And if you happened to see that horrid Sci-Fi channel movie of the same name, try to erase it from your memory.)
Read the first novel, "A Wizard of Earthsea". It's not long.
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"Iron Heroes"
This setting has very little magic, no demi-humans and can have a gritty Conan / Lovecraft type feel. Really a fun RPG.
Tiger lily, thanks for the recommendation, but I read all of the Earthsea books about 15 years ago ;) And re read them just last year. thats part of what got me started on this kick. I even statted out the shadow beast ;)
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Play Ravenloft...
Have you ever read any of Terry Pratchet's diskworld seires?
while a satirical author the campaign setting could easily be adapted to a darker setting...
and it doesnt feel Tolkienish at all to me
(skip the part about the world being flat and so on though if you want to betaken seriously)
Have you ever read any of Terry Pratchet's diskworld seires?
while a satirical author the campaign setting could easily be adapted to a darker setting...
and it doesnt feel Tolkienish at all to me
(skip the part about the world being flat and so on though if you want to betaken seriously)
Why would you want to have diskworld then change it so you can take it seriously?
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Why would you want to have diskworld then change it so you can take it seriously?Have you ever read any of Terry Pratchet's diskworld seires?
while a satirical author the campaign setting could easily be adapted to a darker setting...
and it doesnt feel Tolkienish at all to me
(skip the part about the world being flat and so on though if you want to betaken seriously)
Eight year thread necro. You might be waiting a bit on that reply.
Honestly, when I want d20 but without all the glamour of elves, dwarves, and Orcs I play Modern d20 with a lot of v3.5 thrown in. Having "fantasy" elements like Elves and Dwarves can still be there but change up ALL their common tropes that we've grown accustomed to. Mannerisms, appearance, what their culture is like goes a long way to making them less "De-Tolkein-ized". Elves who are all bald and love machines, Dwarves that have a love for all things wild, Orgrish (blend of Orcs/Ogres) who are some of the most pious and devout beings on the planet, demon-worshipping halflings, lawful good - to a flaw - Vampiric covens who seek world peace, and a small % of the human population nearly wiped out almost 200 years ago due to self-destruction and human-on-human warfare.
The setting could still be Earth, maybe 2120, but not much has been developed technology-wise since the fragments of two worlds collided with each other. Guns and ammo for small arms is still pretty easy to come by but the more pricey the gun the less chances of finding ammo are. Same goes for military-grade weapons (sans Black Market). Taking jobs plundering old ruins of the Human-dominated world has a LOT of opportunities there: from cannibalistic barbarians to fey-inspired fragments of the Fantasy world reaching into Earth, to even Cthulhu-esque references.
The cool thing here is that ALL the maps you could EVER want to use are just on Google-maps. Need ruins for a defensible island? Well you should check out Alcatraz! What about foiling the plot of an evil scientist that wants to use a still-standing monument as a beacon to bring in their Overlord masters? Well you better find a way to Seattle's Space needle to stop him! But before you do that, a group of elves uncovered an old missile silo that still holds the remains of a live nuclear warhead in the heart of Deutchland. You'll need to race to Berlin and stop them in time before they accidentally set it off! Or did someone pay them to do this??
Of course you can also scrap the whole d20 Modern vibe and go with a "Guns don't work anymore" and you're stuck with steam-powered movement and cold-hard steel to protect you.
there are a lot of interesting 3PP worlds that are pretty unique.
Neo Exodus is kind of a Babylon 5 for Fantasy with a lot of interesting and unique ideas like psychic ratmen hive mind, Mutant beastmen and an Arcane God built by humans
Wicked Fantasy uses the traditional races but takes them all in new directions. Like Orcs who are trying to set aside their war like past and Dwarves who will literally turn to stone if they don't indulge in work (or beer) every day. Lot of really nice detail and work has been put into it.
The only pure tolkienisms are IMHO the main races and the presence of the occasional dark lord and his army of expendable always CE/LE minions. Just change out the races and gray the morality a bit.
An obvious way, and to make it easily understandable for new players, it to simply base your campaign setting off different mythologies or time periods. Have a Greek setting with playable satyrs, tritons, and similar races, where the main conflicts revolve around dealing with amoral Gods and preventing the Titans and similar creatures from being released. Or do a magitek setting modeled after the China Mieville books.