Talislanta: does anyone here play this little gem of a forgotten fantasy world?

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This actually looks pretty sweet, and I kind of like the idea of archetypes to enforce uniqueness.

I'm downloading the 4e rulebook, is that what people suggest I should use starting out?

There's so many god damn versions of this game.

I don't know much about Talislanta, but what I do know is right up my alley, could anyone explain this setting to me?

Yes, the Big Blue Book for 4E is the best all-around version you can get, IMO.

Talislanta is an exotic fantasy game with some unique magic systems and traditions and very non-Tolkien non-European world in general (though everyone will quibble about whether it's that original after all).

Worth at least checking out since all the books are available for free legally on talislanta.com.

Thanks for repeating the exact thing I did know about Talislanta.

Why not 5th edition?

SkyRealms Of Jorune, scifantasy post apoc on another world
Torg, pmuch rifts
World of Synnibarr, total clusterfuck is all I can remember
Reich Star, nazis in space
Tekemul, swords and sorcery and aliens sort-of indian but mostly orientalist
Ars Magica, wizards and shit in sort of 1000

That's all I remember from old whitewolf magazine reviews and adds.

For a tagline of "Still No Elves" they have plenty of elf looking motherfuckers. They have a straight up fairy. Also, since when does wearing a mask make you another race?

Some of it's ideas are good, others are babies first new setting.

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Someone give me a quick rundown on the Magic system that makes it so great.

I don't care about the fluff, but just the mechanics behind the magic system. I'm at work so I can't get a rulebook PDF on this potato phone.

Yeah the Ariane in particular are literally just ebony-skinned Tolkien elves completely embodying the stereotype.

>since when does wearing a mask make you another race?

Since it was cool as fuck.

I think this sampler has an overview.

It's okay when some ideas don't work in such a huge setting where you're free to ignore them. There are lesser settings with worse ideas.

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This looks like something I would enjoy, but idk which edition to go for. Do they still support the older editions, or does the source move on to whatever the latest is? Generally I just go for the most recent with these things; WHFRP being my personal exception. ITT we've got people saying 2nd, 3rd, and 4th, are the best candidates. Stands to reason that 1e can be improved upon, as they're generally prototypes, but does 5e suffer from forced trends, or does it actually build upon the previous editions? Because as far as I know 2e and 3e are notably esoteric, and it's a fundamentalist thing to recommend them.

2nd edition is pretty much a straight improvement over the 1st edition.

3rd edition has better rules than 2nd edition but has some annoying metaplot stuff.

4th edition is a much more substantial overhaul of the rules but a lot of people like it. The main complaint is that the magic is less interesting.

I wouldn't call any of them esoteric.

I've read mainly into 5e and it seems to be mostly the same as 4e, with the notable exception of character generation.

4e has out of the box archetypes with some customization.

5e has life paths/careers, which are slightly comparable to Traveller terms without randomness (though you naturally could decide to roll anyway). You choose a race and get some basic skills and items and then you add terms to your character depending on what he has done with his life. They can modify attributes, give each a choice of various skills, add perks and give additional items. Each career takes a few years depending on the complexity of the subject matter. How many careers you are allowed is up to the GM.

You can make an old Marukan with 4 terms in beggar or be a hunter wo then learned talismancy from his shaman.

Generally the editions get more complex with the rules as they progress.

2e is the simplest, and probably easiest to get into. The others have feats, more skills, more magic options, more lifepaths and character backgrounds, etc.

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Well, that's certainly an interesting reversal of the common trend (from FATAL insanity to the the contemporary "roll d6 to resolve everything")

That's because even the new editions are old.

I notice it got the obligatory d20 edition.

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I'd love to play Talislanta. It's the first fantasy setting I've ever found interesting, really (more of a scifi guy), but every time I bring something new to my group they just want to keep on with DnD instead

>D&D
>setting
here we go again........

I haven't had much luck convincing various groups to try Tal either. "Too weird", they say. "I don't get it", they say.

>"Too weird"
It is painful how little imagination and curiosity people seem to have.

It really depends on what kind of fictional media you grew up on. There are plenty of people who watched Thundarr the Barbarian or Pirates of Dark Water and have no issues with Talislanta...but if all you ever read was The Belgariad, then your horizons may be limited.

Anyone running a campaign? I've been interested in both the setting and system for a while.

True. But one would think Star Wars, which is far from obscure, would acclimatize people to that level of "weird" as well.

Talislanta is fantasy Star Wars. In 20 years I've introduced the game to 4 or 5 different groups and at least one person always makes the comparison.

If I am just starting the game and getting into the overall setting, would the 4th Edition blue book be all that I need to go? Are there any must have supplements?

4th ed blue book is enough. The rules are complete, the lore is deep enough, and the art conveys enough.

The world book offers much deeper lore with no stats. A good read but also a bit of a rabbit hole.

You might want to grab the menagerie for creatures to encounter.

Thanks anons, that's all I needed to know.

>Talislanta is fantasy Star Wars.
Really? How? I play Tal and I don't see the comparison.

Unless you go into the EU Star Wars isn't really that weird, and most of the fanbase consists of movies only or movies with a small smattering of EU material.

At a base level it's just a fantasy story with space ships, which isn't that hard to grasp.

That was kind of my point, I don't know about EU stuff and I think they are a comparable level of "weird". That is conceptually not at all. Only the quantity of standard fantasy settings makes Talislanta stand out as unusual.

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Any good fallible sheets out there for this game? Can't find any for 5th or 4th.

You know why I never got into Talislanta? Because each time I ask about it, people tell me "lol why don't you read the book, it's only marginally shorter than war and peace".

>You should try it mate, it's so full of creativity!
>Can you give me examples of this creativity?
>book

The rules on movement are a little confusing.
Says at SPD 0 you can move 50ft a round; 10 spaces in D&D terms. Pretty swift.
It then notes that 1mph would be about 9ft/round, and says a character may double this distances at a full sprint, but could only maintain it for a number of rounds equal to their CON.
It then says that all combat movement is either Advancing or Retreating, which are both done at half-speed, and Feeling which requires a roll to not suffer consequences from booking it.
Right?
Would it not have just been easier to say that character's Movement is equal to 25ft + SPDx5 in combat, x2 outside of combat? The numbers in either case sync up to using a grid even, if you wanted to, it's just not worded very well.
Almost creates an image of people booking it at 5-6mph everywhere they go, even though they're just walking, like a poorly coded video game.

-also suffers from ye old fallacy of people being able to support over a hundred pounds without being slowed down (one's own body weight + 25% for every +1 STR)

I just started reading it yesterday; simming the lore mostly, just going over the mechanics. It's very Morrowind, very other-worldly. Nothing really ground-breaking yet, but it's much more colorful than your usual affair of dwarves and wizards and what not.

also the penalty for hitting a moving target is based on their SPD, not how fast they're actually moving.

It doesn't use minis or combat maps, so nobody really cares much about it.

If you're too lazy to even quickly flip through a book with fancy pictures in it and read a few paragraphs for yourself, then this hobby is clearly not for you.

You're literally asking to be spoon fed right now. The books are free and are the link when you search "Talislanta".

Do you know those people who are like "Elder Scrolls turned to shit after Morrowind"? This is the kind of RPG they would enjoy.

It's a type of fantasy setting you rarely see, divorced from the norms of LotR style fantasy. Just as an example, if you pick a character from the major races of the Seven Kingdoms, here are your choices.

>Democratic Green-Skinned Wizards
>Two-Brained Lizardmen Scholars
>The Clone Army of Warriors who Differentiate With Tattoos
>Goblin-esque Trapsmiths, Lockmakers, and Thieves
>Fairies who are All About Love and Beauty
>Avian Warriors
>Sturdy Gnomekin

Then there's a bunch of other off-kilter shit you can get your hands on if the DM lets you run hog wild. What's cool to me is that if you have an experienced DM, it is very easy for them to keep surprising you as a player

Also the magic system is rather creative, letting you basically cast anything so long as you explain why your magic lets you do it, and the DM can give you a DC.

To go on really briefly, Talislanta gives me the same feeling that Conan stories do. It's an intangible sensation, but there are places with whacked out religions, you're constantly bumping into new threats and strange encounters, and a decent chunk of the civilizations operate on a tribal level.

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I just noticed there's writing on this image saying breeding-black
???

That is his name.

I believe it is a woman, hence the double name.

So... low-tech?

>I believe it is a woman, hence the double name.
Hohoho. Yes, Patricia Breeding-Black is a fantasy artist and a woman.

What kinds of BBEGs do your players encounter throughout the campaign?

Depends, it is after a magic apocalypse.

>Do you know those people who are like "Elder Scrolls turned to shit after Morrowind"? This is the kind of RPG they would enjoy.
Can confirm. I discovered this yesterday in this very thread and I've added it to my very small list of settings that represent what I like best in a fantasy setting.

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What is the ETA on Savage Lands?

I think it's out but hasn't ended jet.
New chapters monthly or something?

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the worst of the fat men

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I love that picture. So casually devouring some Sawila like a quarter roast chicken.

And the wheels on the skull-throne! Like a mobility scooter.

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From the pit, I summon thee

These guys are cool. They are undead trafficking with devils but still aren't 'capital E' evil.

Even if they did resurrect the Thane how bad could it be?

Excuse me if I'm not an obese failure with free time out the ass.

Amazing, an entire person in the thread who's not a cunt. I'll probably not get into the game anyway if that's the player base we're dealing with.

I sorely miss the time when it was okay to put pictures of slavegirls into fantasy rulebooks. Let's be honest here: 90% of the people who read these books enjoy this kind of imagery.

Pornography!

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>Excuse me if I'm not an obese failure with free time out the ass.
Sorry I didn't realize you were working overtime on posting on Veeky Forums. Fuck off with your shitty time management, it's never been more clear that a poster isn't in to the hobby.

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But it's Current Year, user!

Bad political comment aside, nice to see a new Talislanta thread on Veeky Forums. The game is underrated AND it has nearly all editions and books available for free in good quality pdf on the website.

Does anyone have any advice for creating archetypes, if the need arises in a game?

The game itself embraces that archetype will seldom share the exact same powerlevel and strives to be more flavorful and true to its setting than balanced. A Xambrian Witchhunter is in another league than a Marukan Dung Merchant, and that is intended.

My advice would be to eyeball the general rough volume of statistics that is given out and paint a picture with the selection, remember including the less glamorous skills.

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>Dung Merchant
Is that really a class?
t. real life dung merchant actually fertiliser distributor

There are guidelines in the back of the 2e core book. They're not great though. It basically says use an existing archetype as a guideline for ability bonuses then give skills based on the rough list provided. There's no real sense of balance or anything but that is how the game has always been.

As suggested by it's mostly an exercise in eyeballing. Look at other archetypes that are close to what you are after and tweak them. So if you want to make an Aamanian Assassin look at the Arimite Revenant or maybe the Torquar and figure out appropriate skills from there.

Some things are not mutable, or at least shouldn't be if you want to maintain the feel of the game. So no Thrall wizards, Jhangarans are superstitious by nature, Mandalans and Green Men are pacifists and so forth.

I believe it is fifth edition that where the complete Omni-system was used as the core rules. It has a much more open character creation system and you are less restrained by archetypes. The d20 version is also more open to guided tweaking but then you have to deal with the issues that system brings to the table.

Yes, NPC class, but there is no mechanical difference between PC and NPC.

The people of the city state Maruk are believed to be afflicted by an ancient curse of bad luck. The old wealth of their state and populous is all but gone.

Yup. The Maruk were cursed in a past age to have supernaturally bad luck and as a result their once thriving society crumbled. There horrible luck has made them a culture of pariahs. I think 3 archetypes are offered in the 4e guidebook: Dung Merchant, Mercenary, and Talismancer. The Talismancer sounds cool but true to Marukian stereotype they're kinda shit. They craft magical talismans to mitigate their horrible misfortune. They're mid-tier magicians at best.

The Marukian Mercenary actually isn't that bad for a starting warrior type. He's no Thrall or Kang but a CR +3, HP 22, and a decent array of skills is nothing to sneeze at.

Behold jung Vivec had his humble beginnings in Maruk.

When he saw the poor mudfarmer at the fields of Kummu, he was really just overcome by nostalgia.

[DEEPEST LORE]

>Kang
Now I know you're trolling.