I'll need to check that scribd file against a download I found years ago.
I do agree most of the fluff was from l5r but that was hardly a surprise ^^

Sounds interesting, until you come to the fact that most people know shit about Japanese history beyond what few facts they can gleam from some feudal period based anime, which is what the Isle of Nippon is based off (Nippon is in fact what the Japanese call them selves and their island). Now I say this under the premise that the players themselves are Nipponese, but if they're Gaijin (Japanese for non-Japanese) that might actually work out better than what I previously mentioned. Then they all get to be the stranger in strange lands and thus their ignorance isn't a hindrance but a quirk, with hopefully one of them knowing Nipponese or having a local translator for interacting with other people.

Edit: Also, the Nippon Army Book appears to rip off of the entirety of the Legend of the Five Rings game, which I myself find insultingly lazy.
This message was last edited by the player at 19:15, Tue 23 Oct 2012.

It's already been established that one of the Merchant Houses in Marienburg has at least some trade with Nippon, if I remember correctly; of course that's a riff on the Dutch connection to Japan IRL history.

Gaijin PCs could arrive working for said merchant house (too lazy to look up who it is right now, but it's in Marienburg: Sold Up The River) and explore the country that way... Riffing on later history, they might get drawn into a native rebellion against the Shogun/whomever is in authority; a movement led by Sigmarite converts.

As fun as L5R is - and the existence of The Great Wall on the map there certainly lends itself to a tie-in or similar thematic material - I would personally prefer something more firmly based in Japanese mythology and culture rather than the Chinese-Japanese pastiche of Rokugan. After all, if you want China, there's already Cathay...

This sounds like a game someone should run *Fake cough* (Wrong thread I know, but the conversation is going down here so I tossed it out there.)

I think you could definately have some fun with it. Travelling to the end of the world as part of the marienburgher convoy, and what do they discover when they land?

Beastmen.

Every-bloody-where there are beastmen.

In reply to Tullyandy (msg # 430):

Travelling with Dieter and his overly talkative nobleman employer?

See, I like the wall being there, In my mind Chaos forces have taken over the North end of the Island... I don't know why it's there, I've never played L5R.

Pretty much same concept, some evil force is being contained behind the wall. Though given other maps of the Warhammer Fantasy world, the map provided does not match: http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_s5cj...00/Warhammer-Map.jpg

So my guess is that the map in the Army Book is also ripped directly off L5R or possibly a map from a much older edition.

In reply to Sarge (msg # 433):

Gamesworkshop once released a map of the entire Warhammer world back in the day. I remember there being a great wall in Cathay that was made to keep out the hobgoblins and their Khan (I am not touching that one!), but it has been a while. I also, of course, never bothered saving a copy of said map since I lack Devin's other wordly digital imaging skills.

Yeah, the "Great Bastion"? The link I posted has that listed. And apparently the legend of the Hobgoblin is a war between a large Goblin tribe, and a nomadic tribe of humans called the Hob. Apparently a the peak of their final battle, the Hob's god dragged an aspect of Gork into the sun with him, thus fusing both gods and their people's together. But that's all according to the Hobgoblin Army Book, so yeah, take it with a grain of salt. Either way, Green Skins are weird.

Hey, you're right. I didn't even think to check the map I posted against the World Map one...

Something interesting occurred to me while watching Dr. Who (BBC America On Demand is a great thing) that I have often pondered: Is it a coincidence that Albion was introduced into the setting around the time Gamesworkshop's American Audience expanded?

What do I mean by this? If you take Albion out of the picture, Ulthuan is Britain or the United Kingdoms depending upon your terminology and feelings. The Dark Elves have always inhabited what is America.

So you have a land of highly cultured, but fractious peoples who once ruled the world (the sun never set on their empire if you will! ;)) with the best navy the world has ever seen. Then there's a land in the shores of a distance place made up of former citizens of this fair country. They followed a rebel, generally caused merry hell, and then settled the lands to rule as they please. These land being ruled in a cruel mockery of the governmental and legal proceedings of the original land. Their whole society is based around power and a constant attempt to seize it. Those with power can, quite literally, get away with murder while those without it can't. There's also the bit about strange preserve cults that have sprung up ;).

Anyone else notice the eerie similarities to the Dark Elf raids and the privateering that occurred in the 1800's? Then there's the attack that the High Elves led on the Dark Elves reminiscent of The War of 1812 (as we Americans refer to it).

Now to do as Peter Griffin and hit the old dusty trails *cue fire alarm going off*
This message was last edited by the player at 13:20, Sun 07 Apr 2013.

That's actually an interesting idea. Aye, it's plausable enough.

Well, I've been rereading my Gotrek and Felix, so I decided to share something that anyone whose played with me or in any of my WFRP games will be well aware of. I am not sure if anyone is aware, but Felix Jaeger was always an author avatar of William King himself. It therefore should come as no surprise that Ulrika was a stand-in for his ex-wife.

You can tell exactly how their relationship went by the way the books went. Ulrika goes from being a vision of loveliness who Felix has a passionate affair with to a soulless, bloodsucking monster whose dragged away by her batshit insane family to plague the entire world with their own particular brand of evil. That is after she's been seduced by some pompous Eastern Noble.

Before anyone asks, I have no idea who inspired Gotrek Gurnisson. I was too busy laughing at the revelation of that to ask.

I wasn't aware of that at all until you mentioned it, but I see it now! My money's on Gotrek being a doorman, all that rage vented.

hehe, perhaps Tully. I know that a lot of Bill's Gotrek and Felix stories were fantasized versions of his travels in Eastern Europe. It's no coincidence that Praag was featured so much while he was in Prague during the writing of Beastslayer.

If you have any questions, my friend, feel free to ask me. Keep in mind though that you can't unread what I write and that I know some of Black Library's darker secrets.

Forbidden and dangerous knowledge, eh Tzeentch?

Hehe, you could say that ;). Let me give you the most mind blowing of all. Lookup the book Gilead's Blood. Notice the two authors on it. Now find out this "Nik Vincent" character's real last name. Take one guess as to how Dan Abnett is able to "write" so many books so quickly.

Looks interesting, but I dont get it...

She's his wife. So Baron is postulating that while Dan writes one book Nik writes another as him, he doubles his output and therefore his income.

What I'm saying, to put it a bit more plainly, is that Dan Abnett and Nicola Vincent-Abnett are a husband-wife team that write under the name Dan Abnett both because his name has far more recognition (Judge Dredd comics anyone?) and for a less than savory reason. Name me one Black Library author who is a woman (If you know of one, please let me know... perhaps there could conceivably be a short story author, but I am not aware of anyone whose manage to penetrate the old boys' club). Personally, I've always felt Nicola was the better half, but that's just me :P

Interesting I didn't know that.

Black Industries against Women Authors? Plausible as it is, do you think it's more likely to be a deficiency on the number of Female Writers in the Games Workshop universes.

I'm more apt to believe it's a coincidence rather than a conspiracy, because I can't name a single female author who writes subject matter even close to the grim dark subject matter GW loves to go on about, yet there are thousands if not millions of published female authors. So perhaps it's just a lack of interested female authors that's holding them back?

It is a rare woman who is interested in the Dark Grim, that is true. The only prominent female Science Fiction writer I can think of is Ursula Le Guin, I admit this. That said, I would like to enter this into evidence: http://books.google.com/books/...html?id=VQz9AQAACAAJ

The Lord of GrimDark and His Darker, Eviler Half wrote Bananas in Pajamas books. Fear the cuddly bananas as they smother your brain with cuteness! :P




By the way, if we're going to hiring practices, I could speak out quite a bit on this. Let's put it this way, you'll find that Graham McNeil, James Swallow, Ben Counter, and a few other 40k writers all wrote for Dan Abnett's "Judge Dredd" comics before they went into Warhammer 40k. The universal truth is that if you're in good with Abnett, you can get yourself a steady writing job at Black Library. If you're not, then you're basically screwed in for an uphill battle.

Let's take Black Library's old moderator Narativium as an example (I forget his real name). He, entirely for free, was the moderator of the now defunct Black Library forums, did low-level editing work (proof reading, grammar corrections, etc.), and generally slaved away for Black Library's editing staff for about 2 or 3 years. His reward? He had a single short story published and was paid around $300-400 for it. If you check his blog, you'll find that they haven't published any other of his work for the past 4 years.

Of course, you can be like Nick Kyme and be an editor. Then it doesn't matter that you've been rejected by pretty much every single Science Fiction and Fantasy company out there. You can still get yourself published at the company which you've got a great deal of pull in.



I'm ranting a bit too much here though and I have WFRP games to update, lest my players grab the pitchforks and torches.
This message was last edited by the player at 03:44, Fri 19 Apr 2013.