accomplishedThe Friday night gamers have started to play the Atlantis: The Second Age RPG, to be published by Khepera Publishing, based on the games from Bard Games (1985) and Morrigan Press (2005). Atlantis: The Second Age is a sword & sorcery roleplaying game set in the Antediluvian world filled with savage warriors, powerful magics, and cosmic horrors. It's a Sword & Sorcery fantasy roleplaying game in the vein of the old Tor and DAW books, owing a lot to Robert E. Howard, Clark Ashton Smith, Michael Moorcock, and Fritz Leiber.
Once the Friday night gamers showed up at KathyB's place for the evening's events, I showed them the map of the Antediluvian world from the original game, and talked with them about the game world and answered their questions to the best of my ability for about an hour. This covered everything from basic game mechanics, matters about some parts of the game world, the cultures available, and everything in between. That part was somewhat exhausting for me, as the Antediluvian world is just soooooooooo *BIG*, but the players seemed content with the knowledge and then we moved on to actual character generation.
Character generation in the Khepera edition of Atlantis: The Second Age is a relatively straightforward, somewhat easy to get through process, but it does require a good deal of thought and the making of choices. (You can get an idea of how character generation for the system works with the detailed example, Nadaria of Cimmeria, that I posted up to the blog yesterday.) That said, half the fun of the character generation system for Atlantis: The Second Age is the Life Path system; all of my players, when it came right down to it, opted to go through several Life Path events to make their player characters more interesting.
The characters that the Friday night players created for the Atlantis: The Second Age RPG are an interesting, somewhat eclectic mix, to say the least. Here's what the Friday night players created.
KathyB - She decided to break with her traditional character type, the thief, and instead went the route of Sahauviia the Green, an Atlantean Sorceress who spent some time at sea, and had several encounters during her time adventuring that left her...changed.
Nick - He created Mahoo of Aquaga, an Erian Andaman/Owlman Scout, whose life and personality has been shaped by some of the events that occurred to him, though he's not a believer in Fate. hehe
Tom - Tom tends to like to play fighters, but he, like KathyB, decided to break with tradition, and created Sadikar al Tarnufeh, a Gondwanan Scholar who seems to have a passionate interest in medicine and all things of the body.
Joanne - She had a good time talking with me about the region of Tamarac, and created Calfuray, a Human female Herbalist from Tamarac (we had to create a new Professional package for her, but that was no problem). The character went that step beyond, having had a few interesting adventures and finding that her combat skills became a bit more important than she had planned due to some of her life experiences. Such is the ways of the Life Paths, you know. :)
Angela - She had a somewhat tough time deciding which of several concepts she wanted to go with, but settled on Koomara Hadansi, a female Human Scavenger (another new Profession) of First Age artefacts from Galacea (Europa). She ended up with a modicum of magic as well, and found that she needed to add some Skills to be competent at what she wanted to do.
David - David became enamoured of the ape-men of Lemuria during our chat at the beginning, and so he created Orga Queld, a Lemurian male Craftsman exiled from his homeland for deeds too unspeakable to mention here, who found himself with a bit more combat ability than he expected and that his adventures at sea weren't all that worth talking about.
Ellie - My goddaughter wanted a character who wasn't related to her mother's, and she created Melucene Palleremos, the daughter of a Hesperian Priestess whose mother attempted to sacrifice her to the Gods.
All in all, an interesting group of characters with a lot of potential, and the players had a good deal of fun with the process and really did a good job of giving their characters a little bit in common, so that they don't start in the gaming void of not knowing each other. While they didn't struggle with any of the game elements per sé, they did admit to having a difficult time coming to grips with the concept of the Atman, and how it affects their characters. Overall, the players quite liked the character generation system for the Atlantis: The Second Age RPG, and are now looking forward to starting their game on Friday night next.
For that matter, so am I! :)
Note: Edited on June 6th to reflect more information about the characters, including their names.