Covering for Kayla, A Rather Off-Topic Discussion
Subject: Re: Whew.
Erk says, "I don't see a problem right now."
To Telwyn he will add, "Please keep an eye on that door. We don't want to be mistaken for allies of those attacking the camp, and our little songbird's lock picks may give the guards the wrong impression."
From: Mike
Subject: Re: Whew.
Telwyn nods and positions himself by the door. If anyone comes in he will try to get a report on the situation outside (both to get the information and to give Kayla some more time).
From: Jake
Subject: Idea for a game I'm kicking around
I'm thinking of developing a gameworld that would allow for roll playing in a fantasy version of early colonial Burma. I haven't quite decided whether the invading colonial power would be masters of technology or magic yet; if I go with technology it'll be modeled after England's early 19th century industrial capabilities. If I go with magic, magical devices will be pretty mundane in the empire, with the magical equivalents of lighters, flashlights, and the like being fairly common. If I go with that I'll have to think pretty seriously about how to set it up so that the various hill tribes' magical systems are quite different both from each other and from that of the Empire. I'll also need to balance it so that the Empire's magical system isn't so much more powerful that the hill tribes don't stand a chance, while still making it plausible that they'd have made the inroads into the region. There's still a lot of thinking to be done before I even begin to get ready to run a game set in this world, but would there be interest in playing in it if I were to create it?
From: Jeff
Subject: Re: Idea for a game I'm kicking around
I would be interested, the idea sounds very cool indeed. But it *also* sounds very, very tricky and very, very easy to screw up...I don't envy you the task of setting it up and creating it, heh
From: Jake
Subject: Re: Idea for a game I'm kicking around
Yeah, it's going to be pretty tricky, I think. I'm not sure how to go about combining technology and magic in a way that's both well balanced and believable, and part of what I want to capture is the extreme diversity of cultures that early colonial Burma had (and to some degree still has), which will take forever. Fortunately, the Victorian adventurer George Scott wrote some incredibly detailed ethnographic material on the various tribes in his Gazetter of Upper Burma and the Shan States, which I'll be able to draw inspiration from. Unfortunately, it's a pretty expensive book. I've found one volume of it on abebooks.com for $30, but both volumes will run me hundreds of dollars.
At this stage I'm not sure I'll create the world, but doing so sounds like a lot of fun.
I've also thought about not fantasizing it at all, and trying to just create a roll playing game set in that time and place, using Scott's work as direct source material. It was a pretty fascinating time and place.
From: Matt
Subject: Checking in
Just waiting on a reply back for Elotai before continuing (unless I missed one).