New Fantasy Worlds

I cannot say that I haven’t created a new fantasy world in decades.  Sure, I’ve been using our World of Fletnern for over 30 years, but I’ve created other worlds.  I’ve created dozens of alternate Fletnerns (you know all messed up like in the comic books).  I’ve also created some brief game worlds for when the party bounces into another world / dimension / plane.  I’ve even created some sketch worlds as backgrounds for alien races that have invaded Fletnern.  But developing a fully fleshed out new world?  OK, yeah, it has been a while!

Why does this matter?  Well, Board Enterprises has been around since the early 90s.  We’ve been writing games and supplements.  You might have heard of a couple, like Legend Quest or Grain Into Gold.  Not saying we’re absolutely the best there is at this, but we’ve at least got a lot of experience.

We’re taking those decades of experience and building a brand new world from the mythology on up.  But we’ve learned a lot, both from what we’ve done and what others have done.  This is going to be a new fantasy world - You know a world where there’s magic.  We’re not going to create a copy of Merry Ole England and add a couple of folks who can cast spells.

What we want to do is simple, at least in concept - Let’s create a world of fantasy and magic where the magic is the important part.  We’re not going to put a couple of magic swords in and assume that now it’s a fantasy world.  What changes when you’re equally worried about dragon attacks as you are about enemy nations?  What changes when you have spell casters wandering around?  What happens when you put magic spells and magical items into the economy of the world and not just in the military?

Hopefully now you’re seeing that this is not easy.  But we can do it.  We (Board Enterprises) can do it, but it is going to be a lot easier (and a ton more fun) if you join us. 

We’re not trying to convince you to abandon the campaign world you’ve been using in favor of using this new one!  That’s not the point!  OK, you can if you want to, but we want to develop a new world and in building it work through a ton of issues that you may or may not have considered when you built yours (or the designers didn’t think through when they wrote it).  That means you will be in a position to enhance your own world, but only where you think we came up with a cool idea.  Isn’t that what you want?  A game world that is both yours and uses some of the best ideas that you hadn’t thought of?

Please support us in this effort!  Click here to see what we’re doing through Kickstarter.  We would love to have you onboard, sure for the financial support, but also for the guidance so we know exactly what aspects are important to you.  If this works, we’ll keep it going! and we’ll need your help to steer!

Zine Quest 2

Board Enterprises has launched our first crowd funding project:  The World of Sylansse.  This is going to be an e-zine in Kickstarter’s format, which means standard (USA) paper folded in half to create a little 8.5”x5.5” booklet.

We don’t have a ton of time to make it work.  It will be live 2/23 through 3/9.  We really hope you will want to get involved!  But this is us!  We are who we are, and we want to hear from you.  Yes, the folks at Board Enterprises have been doing this since we published Legend Quest back in the early 90s.  If you’re more interested in elven magics, let us know!  If you’re more interested in the human factions, tell us that too.  Orcs, ogres, dwarves, trolls?  Let us know!

Let’s be confident!  Let’s assume this is going to work!  When it does, then we’re going to need your guidance too.  Do we keep going with myths, history and faction descriptions?  Do we focus on setting and describe the various regions?  Or do we start getting into the campaign starts?

Please at least check it out!  See if it’s what you’re looking for.

High Fantasy and Magic Items

You know why GMs can give out swords that add +1 to hit and +1 to damage like they don’t mean anything?  Because they don’t mean anything.  Allowing a PC to hit 5% more often and do 10% more damage (we’re making assumptions) means nothing to the overall threat of the mission.  Sure, after a while, these types of bonuses will add up and increase the overall power of the party, but a “magical sword” is primarily ineffective, certainly immaterial in small numbers.

But do you know what matters?  A magical map.  Imagine if a fantasy era party could pull out what is effectively a satellite view on a GPS.  Can you imagine the power of such an item?  The party wouldn’t get lost, even if they didn’t have a guide / ranger with them.  They would be able to unerringly get right to the secret passage into the castle or whatever the mission is this week.

Oh, as GMs we pretend that the party can follow a map they are given without getting lost, but in reality secret maps to secret doors would only put the party near the secret passage and the chances that they would actually find it are pretty low.  Even if they could follow the map precisely, they would be spending a lot of time looking at the parchment map and staring around the area to get their bearings.  You know, the kind of suspicious activity that sentries can typically detect from hundreds of yards away.

Look, there is a point here!  While FRPGs stress magic swords and wands, in a true high fantasy world, there would be far more magic on civilian / non-military purposes.  Just like technology in the modern era has brought all manner of non-violent benefits to us, there should be magic items that have nothing to do with causing damage to enemies.  But because our game sessions are so often based on adventurers battling enemies, we forget this massive piece.

Are we way off base here?  Well, the USA is frequently criticized for spending 15-20% of its budget on defense.  Can you say that only 20% of the magical items in your game master’s guide are focused on battle?  That’s not even a fair question, because while it might be 15-20% of the federal budget, it is closer to 5% of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP).  And let’s be clear - These amounts include spending on things like housing, maintaining what they already have, and the salaries of the service men and women.  If your world has 90% of the magical items created focused on doing damage, you’re not role-playing.  You’re playing a war game that let’s you concentrate on one individual soldier on the field.  Oh yeah, you are; that’s probably how/why your game rules were originally written.

Why do we care?  Why should you care?  Because as game masters and world builders, we are using those battle magics when we create our campaign worlds.  Too often, we are only using those battle magics.

That’s why we’re looking to do this new E-zine and partnering with Kickstarter.  If you want to work with us (or just come along for the ride), click here and get involved!  We’re going to think our way through what we’re calling “highest fantasy” and create a sample world while we do it.  You don’t have to use this new world, but we guarantee there will be ideas and concepts we get into that you haven’t considered before.  Read it because it’s fun!  Read it because you can take some of the ideas and then make them your own for your campaign world. 

We’re going to blow your mind in thinking about how magic really should affect a fantasy world.  Whether you’re fully onboard or just want a ticket to the show, you owe it to yourself to join us!


https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/boardent/the-world-of-sylansse/