John T Posted August 14, 2004 Report Share Posted August 14, 2004 Anyone here remember the I.C.E (I think) Shadow World fantasy setting for Hero/Chart Master (forget what that silly system was ACTUALLY called...)? I remember it had a very complete word concept, but not much else about it. It's one of the (many) games I created a character for, but never actually got to PLAY. Oh well, just askin'. John T Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
steriaca Posted August 14, 2004 Report Share Posted August 14, 2004 Re: Shadow World setting Anyone here remember the I.C.E (I think) Shadow World fantasy setting for Hero/Chart Master (forget what that silly system was ACTUALLY called...)? I remember it had a very complete word concept, but not much else about it. It's one of the (many) games I created a character for, but never actually got to PLAY. Oh well, just askin'. John T Yep. I remember it, and avoided the darn thing like the plauge. Basicly, it was a Rolemaster setting with HERO stats just because thay were helping Hero Games (I don't realy want to say thay OWN Hero Games at that time...) What I realy disliked about the entier I.C.E./Hero arangment was I.C.E.'s piorities once it started looking like Hero was selling more than there own products. Thay countered by steping UP there stuff, then deciding that, yes, thay WERE a universal system also. THEN thay blantetly "borrowed" from Hero most of the text from there books, only omiting the Hero stuff and placing there own. Anyways, enougth of my rant. Except for this disclamer: I don't work for Hero Games, I was never in on anything happening durring the I.C.E. age, I don't acualy hate I.C.E. (othoe I would never buy anything from them curently, and I don't know if thay are still in buisness). I MIGHT work for Hero Games in he future (one Digital Hero artical does not count as "working for them"...not till Steve can say to me "write this book, and we will pay you"), but that does not mean diddlysquat when talking about Hero's past. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tkdguy Posted August 14, 2004 Report Share Posted August 14, 2004 Re: Shadow World setting I do have the Shadow World setting, since I used to play Rolemaster before they changed everything. Its main problem was that it was such a huge world, the adventures written were all over the place. And the setting books (ie Emer, Jaiman, etc.) had some adventure seeds, but they only covered the minimum details, IMO. They took much more care with their MERP products. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DreadDomain Posted August 15, 2004 Report Share Posted August 15, 2004 Re: Shadow World setting Anyone here remember the I.C.E (I think) Shadow World fantasy setting for Hero/Chart Master (forget what that silly system was ACTUALLY called...)? We actually played a bit in Shadow World about 10 years ago. We pretty much got interested in the setting when it became FH compatible. Of course, we got a little disillusionned when we realize they were only a few FH stats at the end of the book. The setting was a little bit too generic for my taste. Well, maybe it was not so generic but since it was so poorly described, it was hard to have an idea of what the different cultures were looking like. My friend still has pretty much everything published about SW. Since then, Hero got new owners, ICE went bankrupted and got new owners and Shadow World is own by Eidolon Studio (but still published by ICE)... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
John Desmarais Posted August 15, 2004 Report Share Posted August 15, 2004 Re: Shadow World setting Anyone here remember the I.C.E (I think) Shadow World fantasy setting for Hero/Chart Master (forget what that silly system was ACTUALLY called...)? I remember it had a very complete word concept, but not much else about it. It's one of the (many) games I created a character for, but never actually got to PLAY. Oh well, just askin'. John T The very first Fantasy Hero game I ever ran used Shadow World as it's setting. The campaign later expanded out to a multigenre fantasy and SF game incorporating the "Space Master" universe. Fun, but after a while it made my head hurt. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NuSoardGraphite Posted August 16, 2004 Report Share Posted August 16, 2004 Re: Shadow World setting I remember Shadow World very fondly. I picked it up after I started playing Rolemaster around '89 and promptly discovered one of the best published campaign settings I've ever laid my eyes on. I generally don't like other game companies published campaign settings and usually design my own, but when it came to Shadow World, I was very satisfied by what they came up with. It was very derivative of Middle Earth, but that stands to reason because at the time they (ICE) published the Middle Earth Role Playing game. The history of the SW setting was very detailed and filled with loads of adventure ideas. Plus, when you put all the supplements together, it provided you with thousands of miles worth of adventuring potential, where as other campaign settings I've seen (with only a few exceptions) tend to focus on a single continent or a smaller section of a continent. When it came to Hero stats though, the SW supplements were lacking, with only a couple of exceptions (the Emer sourcebook and SW addendum were good, the others were woefully incomplete). It was painfully obvious that ICE wasn't really interested in including Fantasy Hero stats in their supplements, and only did so in order to sell more books. In that aspect, they aren't very good for Hero players to invest in (except for the aforementioned Emer, SW Supplement and the Jaiman sourcebook) but for someone who has no problem doing a little conversion, it would make a great campaign setting. I think the only thing one would need to do to make it ready-to-play would be to work out the specifics of the Magic System (if you wanted to use the base Essence, Channelling and Mentalism systems, magic would be a Multipower with individual slots for spells) design some of the more Shadow World specific creatures (Herald of the Night, Shards etc) and some of the more commonly found Magic Items and away you go (specific NPC's can be converted whenever the GM needed to bring them into the game) I plan to either purchase the new Shadow World books or find the old ones on Ebay (or elsewhere if possible) as I plan to use it as my main campaign setting for FH. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tkdguy Posted August 16, 2004 Report Share Posted August 16, 2004 Re: Shadow World setting If you have FH for 4th Edition, you can find write-ups on how to describe Essence, Channeling, and Mentalism spells. They're basically a set of Limitations. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MordeanGrey Posted August 17, 2004 Report Share Posted August 17, 2004 Re: Shadow World setting I used the Shadow World module "Demons of the Burning Night" and the demon city, Tarek Nev, as a re-occuring location in a massive, long-running Planescape conversion to Fantasy Hero a few years ago. It was great. Very well written history of the battle in the city between angels and demons that fit nicely with the whole Blood War conflict in Planescape. The players had two different groups of characters over a three year span. Both groups traveled to the city at different times. One group before the war, and one group much later when the city was an aging ruin. I'd recommend it for source material that could be used in multiple settings. Especially if your game deals heavily with religion or the Planes. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
badger3k Posted August 19, 2004 Report Share Posted August 19, 2004 Re: Shadow World setting Here's a web link: http://www.ironcrown.com/SWintro.htm I think there's a link to the creators site (didn't check, but it was there a while back) which is quite detailed, including a large adventure. Look for Kulthea or Shadow World in Google - I found several sites from there as well. It was an interesting idea, and incorporated the Spacemaster sci fi elements into it. The Unlife were an interesting twist on standard undead, and the flows of essence made things difficult sometimes. I think I only used it once, because the concept was different than what I wanted to run (and I had my own world already). I still have my set from when it first came out. edit - yeah, the Link to Terry Amthor's site works. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
KawangaKid Posted August 19, 2004 Report Share Posted August 19, 2004 Re: Shadow World setting I ran a short three-session game set in a combined Shadow World / Mystara / Anime setting. I have the Shadow World boxed set, maps and the booklets (including the HERO conversions). Pretty cool stuff... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
KawangaKid Posted January 5, 2011 Report Share Posted January 5, 2011 Re: Shadow World setting I ran a short three-session game set in a combined Shadow World / Mystara / Anime setting. I have the Shadow World boxed set' date=' maps and the booklets (including the HERO conversions). Pretty cool stuff...[/quote'] Interestingly enough, I recently posted on my blog about the very recent change in ownership / management of the I.C.E. intellectual property. This includes Rolemaster and HARP. But apparently, there was already a pretty good systemless player's guide for Shadow World that came out recently by Guild Companion Publications -- the guys who will take over the IP from here on in: http://www.rpgnow.com/product_info.php?products_id=83779 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NuSoardGraphite Posted January 9, 2011 Report Share Posted January 9, 2011 Re: Shadow World setting Thanks for the info Kawanga. This book sounds perfect for me to show my players the basic info on Kulthea. I kept having to write that stuff up and print it out for new players so they wouldn't get a look at the "good stuff" in the main books! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Shadowsoul Posted January 10, 2011 Report Share Posted January 10, 2011 Re: Shadow World setting I played in a short campaign run by Bismark which was set in Kulthea and used the Hero System. I enjoyed it but that may have just been because Bismark knows how to throw a good fight rather than the setting itself. I'm quite glad that we never came up against Undead in that campaign as the Unlife makes even low level skeletons quite scary. Still there is some interesting stuff in this setting. Murderous super-androids, swords dropping out of the sky and marsupial ogres to name a few examples. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bismark Posted January 20, 2011 Report Share Posted January 20, 2011 Re: Shadow World setting Oh, how I like compliments Just noticed this thread because recently I have been hooked again on an old 'time eater' known as Diablo2 and been playing in a lot of private (passworded) games on bnet (where lurks the all-powerful 'Lag Monster' - the greatest enemy any on-line toon will face). Shadow World is up to 4th edition now - the 4th ed book and the Masters of Light and Darkness supplement are pretty darn good; I might well pick up that Players' Guide PDF myself. It's a fun setting - especially the feeling that "the bad guys have won but they don't know it yet" - mainly because they all hate each other. BTW, in case you did not know, the 'murderous super-androids' alluded to in the previous post are the incredibly scary magical constructs known as Shards. The undead are very scary - in HERO terms they would all have an area effect STUN Drain (Power Defence as countermeasure)-even scummy low-end skellies and zombies. Really cruel GMs would crank that up with a bit of BODY Drain as well (probably with a much lower frequency of effect). I have some characters for 5th ed HERO in this setting (taken from my campaign, in fact) which I can make available if anyone wants to grab them for inspiration/ideas/brutal criticism ;)/whatever. Now I really must do an update to 6e of one of my favourite Shadow World monsters - the Hue Eater/Life Eater Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NuSoardGraphite Posted January 21, 2011 Report Share Posted January 21, 2011 Re: Shadow World setting The Shards are nasty. Very fast little buggers they are. In HERO terms, they are probably at least Speed 6. More powerful Shards are faster, approaching Speeds 8 and higher. Scary guys! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Escafarc Posted January 21, 2011 Report Share Posted January 21, 2011 Re: Shadow World setting I preferred ICE's Iron Wind setting. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tkdguy Posted January 22, 2011 Report Share Posted January 22, 2011 Re: Shadow World setting I used the setting for an online game, although I used AD&D 2nd Edition instead of Rolemaster. It didn't last very long, since hardly anyone posted. But I wrote up a mentalist character class (since I don't like AD&D psionics) and detailed specialty priests for the Lords of Orhan. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Michael Hopcroft Posted January 22, 2011 Report Share Posted January 22, 2011 Re: Shadow World setting I preferred ICE's Iron Wind setting. I can't find any information on that immediately. What was that one about? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Old Man Posted January 22, 2011 Report Share Posted January 22, 2011 Re: Shadow World setting Yeah, I was gonna ask too. I'm kind of a setting freak. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Escafarc Posted January 22, 2011 Report Share Posted January 22, 2011 Re: Shadow World setting I can't find any information on that immediately. What was that one about? Yeah' date=' I was gonna ask too. I'm kind of a setting freak.[/quote'] Here's some links it seems it was actually called the Loremaster Series the first book was The Iron Wind. If I remember correctly it was somewhat dark and gritty without sinking to the Warhammer level. http://www.icewebring.com/ice-products/loremaster/ http://www.icewebring.com/ICE_Products/SW/SW_5020_Iron_Wind_1.php http://www.icewebring.com/ICE_Products/SW/SW_5020_Iron_Wind_2.php Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Old Man Posted January 22, 2011 Report Share Posted January 22, 2011 Re: Shadow World setting Wow, that's neat. I'll have to keep an eye out for that one on eBay. I had no idea ICE had published settings besides Shadow World and MERP. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
KawangaKid Posted January 22, 2011 Report Share Posted January 22, 2011 Re: Shadow World setting Since there's no stats in the Player's Guide, was thinking of revisiting the old stats in my old copy and seeing if a conversion to 6th Ed would be in the cards. Then again, I never returned to the other projects in my Hero Forums blog... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NuSoardGraphite Posted January 23, 2011 Report Share Posted January 23, 2011 Re: Shadow World setting Wow' date=' that's neat. I'll have to keep an eye out for that one on eBay. I had no idea ICE had published settings besides Shadow World and MERP.[/quote'] Much of what was in Iron Wind was incorporated into the standard Shadow World setting. It took place in Muir Fosistyr which is found in Northern portion of Jaiman. They mention as much in the Jaiman sourcebook and some of the newer Shadow World atlases. In fact, the Iron Wind book was the very basis from which the Shadow World setting was developed from. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tkdguy Posted January 23, 2011 Report Share Posted January 23, 2011 Re: Shadow World setting That's true. The World of Loremaster became part of Shadow World (aka Kulthea) just like D&D's Known World became part of Mystara. Some of the settings (like Vog Mur) were altered by certain events in the Shadow World setting, however. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Michael Hopcroft Posted January 23, 2011 Report Share Posted January 23, 2011 Re: Shadow World setting Now I want to see the new Shadow World book. Just to get a glimpse of what the setting would be like. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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