Welcome! Introduce Yourself!

[higgins]

Hi, Hector!

Awesome to see you here and I'm so glad that you have found us!

As for other supplements, India would indeed be interesting. I don't think there's even a GURPS India. I have to admit that I'm not especially familiar with that subject though.

[hector]

Indian martial arts are somewhat obscure, as is most of its history to most people not from there, as such things go, but it would be rather interesting to see a game supplement based on them for this. Hopefully we'll come across someone who actually knows something about it...

[higgins]

Now that I think of it, even Indian role players are pretty obscure. Sure, on the internet it's hard to tell, but most boards seem to be filled mainly by Americans and Europeans, with a healthy dose of Australia. I could be totally wrong though, but that's my impression.

[jafuli]

Hello, I am Jafuli, a French Tros fan ... I am also european martial arts practitionner. I don't have that much time to play (the classical kids+job) so I read, devise some rules, wander ...

[The GIT!]

Well, this seems like a moot point but, wtf I just wanted to say hi (again) and wish GHP the best of luck with their new endeavours. Personally, Band of Bastards sounds very intriguing and I really want to see the beta as soon as it comes out. Good luck guys

[higgins]

Thanks!

It's always useful to have good luck, so, we definitely welcome it.

[Meyobrin]

Yo, I'm Meyobrin.

Captain's personal lab rat and calculator. I stay up at four in the morning number-crunching and sound-boarding for an insomniatic Malloy. Usually the first to be experimented on with new rules and mechanics.

Ahoy.

Figured it was time to post on this board, Ha.

[Agamemnon]

Yo, I'm Meyobrin.

Captain's personal lab rat and calculator. I stay up at four in the morning number-crunching and sound-boarding for an insomniatic Malloy. Usually the first to be experimented on with new rules and mechanics.

Ahoy.

Figured it was time to post on this board, Ha.

haha. Welcome aboard. Meyo has been an unofficial, and occasionally unwitting Grand Heresy lab rat for a while. He is the D'Artagnan to our three musketeers.

[higgins]

Welcome, Meyobrin!

[Iorwerth]

Got the email. Glad you are all still going

Looking forward to seeing what you up your sleeves!

[Agamemnon]

Haha. good to see you back! We were a bit worried how many of those actually went through, after they wound up in OUR spam-folders. Pretty bad when your email to yourself comes back as spam. But such is life.

Keep your eyes peeled! new update in the works!

[Siggi]

Hello again!

Wow, guys, now look at you! I can still remember some of you writing posts at Trosforums and now you've got a real company of your own! That's really inspiring and "Grand Heresy Press" sounds pretty cool (well, maybe a bit Warhammerish).

I was excited to read your letter, to learn that SoS was not abandoned, that it evolved into something new. The concept of 'Band of Bastards' hangs thick in the air: many my fellow players often played such bastard characters and made fun of common high fantasy clichés. It is often more fun to play cynical, down-to-earth characters that try to survive in a world that feels more realistic.

That said, I'm forced to admit that I'm a bit disappointed by the change in the scale of your future game. I expected – and I still expect! - that your new system, the new refined set of rules would be real good, that it would be fantastic. It's based upon most innovative and ingenious TroS rules anyway! The way that you approached those rules (as I could judge by your teasers) fascinated me. And I waited for the playtest of the game to try the rules in a small campaign... set in Warhammer Fantasy world. I believe that the strong point of SoS was its universality, flexibility. You could take it and play in almost any historical/fantasy setting. Westeros, the Old World, Middle Earth, Earthsea, the world of Geralt the Witcher - all these settings and many more could become the background for adventures, played with Song of Steel rules! Song of Steel could become the new GURPS! In a couple of years you could be signing contracts with wizards-of-the-coast-level players of the gaming industry. And now it's just a small indie game about a band of bastards...

All in all, I still believe that you're doing great job and, frankly, I envy you a bit: making your own wonderful game - a dream come true for many of us here. I understand that I still may take GoB and play it in any setting I like, so not much has really changed. And the news about built-in magic rules is intriguing: I have a passion for magic systems! Maybe all these ideas of the future world domination of SoS were just an illusion that I've made up for myself... Anyway, I wish you luck and hope to see the game out soon!

As the poet said: "Praised be the daring of all bold dreamers!"

[higgins]

Thank you for the kind words, Siggi!

Maybe all these ideas of the future world domination of SoS were just an illusion that I've made up for myself...

That's the thing though. Name one (1) universal gaming system that's been successful starting off as generic.

Every major gaming system that I'm aware of started off being successful as a focused product first. BRP came from Call of Cthulhu, D6 came from WEG Star Wars, d20 came from D&D 3rd, HERO came from Champions, Storytelling System from Vampire: The Masquerade, FATE came from Spirit of the Century, One-Roll Engine came from Godlike, SilCORE came from Heavy Gear, Powered by the Apocalypse came from Apocalypse World, Savage Worlds came from Deadlands. Hell, even GURPS achieved success as The Fantasy Trip first (or at least so I gather).

So, I challenge you.

Name one.

[Agamemnon]

That said, I'm forced to admit that I'm a bit disappointed by the change in the scale of your future game. I expected – and I still expect! - that your new system, the new refined set of rules would be real good, that it would be fantastic. It's based upon most innovative and ingenious TroS rules anyway! The way that you approached those rules (as I could judge by your teasers) fascinated me. And I waited for the playtest of the game to try the rules in a small campaign... set in Warhammer Fantasy world. I believe that the strong point of SoS was its universality, flexibility. You could take it and play in almost any historical/fantasy setting. Westeros, the Old World, Middle Earth, Earthsea, the world of Geralt the Witcher - all these settings and many more could become the background for adventures, played with Song of Steel rules! Song of Steel could become the new GURPS! In a couple of years you could be signing contracts with wizards-of-the-coast-level players of the gaming industry. And now it's just a small indie game about a band of bastards...

I appreciate the vote of support. I'm sorry you feel that way, but I think you've misread the situation. There is nothing stopping you from taking the game as it exists and as it will be published and running it in whatever scenario you please. Indeed, while we've got something of an implied setting in the rules, and we're offering a "Starting place" in the book itself, we're deliberately not writing a full campaign world and all that entails because we want you to create your own worlds with it.

Likewise, the renaissance was chosen as the period in no small part because it has the widest variety of arms and armor showing up at the same time. There's no other period with the diversity that shows up here. But that wasn't just important because you get to have knights in heavy plate conducting a cavalry charge against grenade-launchers (though. really. its hilariously absurd that this was historical fact), but because that meant we could have all of your options in one book without parsing it out into a dozen period supplements, or without 90% of the book itself being a history lecture on what to use when.

The real difference between Song of Steel and 'Bastards is that SoS was basically just a tool kit. There was a great game in there, but you had to build it first and that makes it very hard for people to experience your game as you had it in mind. 'Bastards has kept the modular nature of SoS, but given you a "default" place to start, so that people who are just want to try out the game to get a feel for it can actually do so without having to actually build it from scratch first.

We've kept all of the levers, we've kept everything modular. Some things have gotten more modular in this incarnation. Character creation got easier to customize for a campaign. Even the new magic system can be dropped or swapped out without issue. The tool kit is still there. It's just gotten some better packaging.

[Marras]

Hi! I have not played TRoS even though I own a copy (maybe I should go and fetch it from a cellar again). Although I'm not a veteran of that game system I have been gaming from mid 80's and this game looks very promising.

Curiously enough I like to run games where characters are more like anti-heroes than actual heroes in classical sense. So that part of the game earns points from me even without knowing much else.

I am thrilled to see dynamic weapon teaser because after reading (a bit) about swords it seems that there was no real difference between a dagger and a short sword at some point and if I can get a system that gets even close to modelling that kind of situation it makes an old simulationist in me smile broadly.

My biggest concern about the system (and why I didn't actually manage to start to run TRoS) is the amount of work that I imagine the GM has to face when running combats. Maybe I am wrong here (please say so) but if there is a situation where 4 PCs face 6 NPCs in melee combat (I wouldn't say it is a far fetched example), how much bookkeeping it requires from GM?