[MUD-Dev] Marc Hernandez' Server

[Travis S. Casey]

On Sun, 16 May 1999, Jay Carlson wrote:
> Greg Munt writes:

> > Beware the LotR influence. In my opinion, the majority of fantasy in the
> > latter half of this century was produced by Tolkien disciples.
> > Now, I'm not
> > saying Tolkien was bad - far from it - but too much of *anything*
> > is always
> > a bad thing. For example, compare Tolkien's creatures to the AD&D classes
> > and races. (Elves especially. I'm sick of these peace-loving
> > woodfolk; it is
> > SO ridiculous to embody an entire race with the same characteristics.. And
> > then when they vary, turn them into another race entirely - dark elves!)
> 
> Does anyone on this list remember a series of ads from circa 1985, for sure
> was in Dragon in that time period that showed a bizarre looking creature
> leering at you with text like:
> 
>     NO ELVES.
> 
>     In [game system name] we have astral herbalists, byith, water-slavers,
> [...continued list of intriguing creature names...], and best of all....no
> elves.
> 
> I think I would have bought the game on sight if any of the local gaming
> stores had carried it.  Might make an interesting design strategy or promo
> campaign to make a big point that *nothing* from Asgard is in this mud.

That was Jorune (or, more properly, "Skyrealms of Jorune").  From what
I've heard, it had an interesting setting, but only a decent system.

I do agree that the ads were highly effective in generating interest --
now if only their distribution had matched their advertising, they might
have done really well.

Personally, I've always found it effective to take people's expectations
about races, creatures, etc., and twist them a bit.  For example, I ran an
AD&D campaign in which:

 - the "wood elves" were actually rebels against the elven government

 - "dark elves" existed, but they weren't much like the standard ones,
   and they were friendly with the dwarves

 - halflings, instead of living in the country and enjoying the simple
   things, lived in large cities and enjoyed... well, let's just say
   that I drew my inspiration from the later Roman Empire.

The players liked it -- there were enough things that were familiar that
they could get a good handle on things, but there were also things that
they'd only heard rumors about (like the dark elves) and those rumors were
wrong.

--
       |\      _,,,---,,_        Travis S. Casey  <efindel at io.com>
 ZZzz  /,`.-'`'    -.  ;-;;,_   No one agrees with me.  Not even me.
      |,4-  ) )-,_..;\ (  `'-'
     '---''(_/--'  `-'\_) 



_______________________________________________
MUD-Dev maillist  -  MUD-Dev at kanga.nu
http://www.kanga.nu/lists/listinfo/mud-dev