Kael I was thinking of making an "official" map of your world placing resources and starting points based on the setup from your original D&D campaign. Are you open to the possibility of me making this? If so can you post a pic of your original map including national borders of each race represented in FFA?

Great idea, I'd like to take a crack at doing so myself.

We should get it done. This mod is awesome but it lacks a definitive "Earth" style map.

I have very little map editing knowledge but I'd be more than happy to work with someone who is more experienced with making maps.

All we'd need is a map from Kaels original D&D game and some references about where civs are placed and the basic terrain around them.

I think Kael will do it once FfH makes it to Ice, final phase. Then we will also have quests, equipment...

I love the mod but I feel like the lack of a definitive FFH scenario really hurts the mod. So many civs are terrain dependent yet theres no guarantee they'll be in an area abundant with that terrain.

It would really do this mod justice to create one.

have you tried dreiches FFH map scripts? they put civs in their correct terrain usually

I think Kael will do it once FfH makes it to Ice, final phase. Then we will also have quests, equipment...

Yeap, remember that FfH2 is still beta and because of how ambicious it is it has been broken into 4 phases, "Light", "Fire", "Shadow" and "Ice". We have only completed the first of those phases. There is still much more to come. And as TheJopa said the scenerios are slated for the last phase (you cant make the scenerios until everything else is in).

Yeap, remember that FfH2 is still beta and because of how ambicious it is it has been broken into 4 phases, "Light", "Fire", "Shadow" and "Ice". We have only completed the first of those phases. There is still much more to come. And as TheJopa said the scenerios are slated for the last phase (you cant make the scenerios until everything else is in).

Of course you can! Just call it a "Beta Scenario" or "Scenario Lite."

Of course you can! Just call it a "Beta Scenario" or "Scenario Lite."

Its more about the point that the things I want for the scenarios haven't been developed yet. I could make scenarios without those features, but they would just be obsoleted when the next version came out. Better to spend the time working on getting the features added.

Come to think of it, WE'VE never seen a FfH world map!

Wilboman is right. It really wouldnt hurt if you could show us. :p

Come to think of it, WE'VE never seen a FfH world map!

Yeah it's true. Even if we are in the desigin team we do not exactly what Erebus looks like, you should post a skecth of the world ......... in the private forum :D

And then we can drop hints about it in this forum.

Can someone guide me to drieches FFH Map scripts please? :D Many thanks ^^

They're right here. (http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=183924)

Thank you very much good sir

You can get a good hint as to civ placement by who a civs' enemies are (design:civilizations thread, I believe.)

Well it seems like I struck a cord with the community. Everyone is curious what the FFH world looks like.

They're right here. (http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=183924)

i can never find that when i want lol

i can never find that when i want lol

Good thing it's in your sig now, eh?:D

Edit: though your should spell it "flavor" in your sig unless you hate Freedom.

You mean Jake Featherston's party, or simply generic Freedom with a big F?

You mean Jake Featherston's party, or simply generic Freedom with a big F?

Just freedom, but capitalized to show its importance and significance. Hm... that reminds me, I ought to buy more books by Turtledove. I'm already running behind on A Song of Ice and Fire.

i prefer the british flavour on spellings heh

How honourable of you:p

You mean Jake Featherston's party, or simply generic Freedom with a big F?

Hmm. Didn't realize that people outside of america read those books.

I read the first two of the settling accounts series, but the Pitsburgh thing (stalingrad) pissed me off, so I haven't bought anything more.

Ah well, I still enjoy them, despite Pitsburgh. I like the descriptions, and besides, if you can apply it properly, there is a measure of historical lesson to be learned.

Hmm. Didn't realize that people outside of america read those books.

I read the first two of the settling accounts series, but the Pitsburgh thing (stalingrad) pissed me off, so I haven't bought anything more.

Didn't realize people within America read books...

Didn't realize people within America read books...

lol, I have to agree :lol:

Unfortunately we really are swimming in an unwashed mass of humanity over here. But some of us do regularly prove that we are literate.

Yeap, remember that FfH2 is still beta and because of how ambicious it is it has been broken into 4 phases, "Light", "Fire", "Shadow" and "Ice". We have only completed the first of those phases. There is still much more to come. And as TheJopa said the scenerios are slated for the last phase (you cant make the scenerios until everything else is in).

So we can expect a world map in 2010? :cry: :crazyeye:

Apparently Erebus is a flat world. So in the meanwhile we can theorize what happens when you fall off the edge!

You get eaten by Kael´s evil twin !

Ohh! I just wish I knew something about Erebus. Is it mostly water? Is it a place where the world is desert with only a few oasis? Is it a Pangea world, or is a place riddled with arcapellagos? Perhaps it's riddled with narrow deep seas, with currents so fast they could peal barnicles off the rocks live on. Our perhaps its a land of bogs, salt water marshs, and lagoons.

Perhaps it has mountain ranges that peak over in archs like the spines of a dragon. Maybe it has trees so big and so old that they them selves turn to rock and make new mountains. Are there solidary mountains all alone, yet so high that they rise up and suport the sky it self?

Are there plains in Erebus with grass that ebes and flows with the wind like a golden sea, dotted with huge orange spires made by termite like creatures the size of rats, who are found only in our dreams?

What is erebus like? I really want to know... Please just give us a hint.

Ohh! I just wish I knew something about Erebus. Is it mostly water? Is it a place where the world is desert with only a few oasis? Is it a Pangea world, or is a place riddled with arcapellagos? Perhaps it's riddled with narrow deep seas, with currents so fast they could peal barnicles off the rocks live on. Our perhaps its a land of bogs, salt water marshs, and lagoons.

Perhaps it has mountain ranges that peak over in archs like the spines of a dragon. Maybe it has trees so big and so old that they them selves turn to rock and make new mountains. Are there solidary mountains all alone, yet so high that they rise up and suport the sky it self?

Are there plains in Erebus with grass that ebes and flows with the wind like a golden sea, dotted with huge orange spires made by termite like creatures the size of rats, who are found only in our dreams?

What is erebus like? I really want to know... Please just give us a hint.

To be honest FfH2 comes from about 17 years of D&D campaigns. They took place on different words, not one big consistent compaign. The general mythos was always the same (though more developed over time) but I would create new worlds for different campaigns.

One of the campaigns was the one that included the armageddon spells. Tebryn (and a cast of evil partners) was casting them and tearing the world apart. The nations of man banded together to to try to fight him. That campaign included the leaders Falamar, Rhoanna, Charadon, Tebryn, Jonus, Varn, Morgoth and Auric.

Another campaign (the one that was truely "Erebus") was set on a world that used to be the heaven of the god of knowledge. That heaven was attacked and lost the war. To keep the knowledge of that world from falling into the demonic hands (the world was dotted with massive libraries) the god released a mist that covered the world, stealing the memories of anyone who touched it except for the few angels he had left. From a mythology perspective this was the loss of knowledge from creation and the birth of rhetoric. Humanity found and moved into this world, without knowing it was once a neutral heaven. They built boats that could sail on the mists and had only a few cities, built on the peaks of mountains and a valley that was blocked from the mist entering. That was the campaign that included the Calabim and the Elohim. The Cliffs of Hastur that were talked about in Mardero's pedia entry were in that world and the people threw Lita off of the cliffs not to her death, but into the mist which would remove all her memories. Lita was one of the angel of the god of knowledge, and when she was rejected by the people and thrown out of the city a demon grabbed her as the story described. Mardero was half demon, half angel in the campaign and able to enter the mist without losing his memories because of his angelic parentage (along with his siblings). Allowing the demons to continue their assult on the world.

The Bannor were from a campaign just about them which took place on yet a different world and took place long after Sabathiel had abandoned them and they had driven their passion for exacting laws into a fanatical (and evil) end.

Cassiel, Basium and Hyborem were pretty consistent characters in all of my games. I loved the themes they represented and used them pretty liberaly.

A lot of characters were either created just for the mod (Balseraphs, Luchuirp, Khazad, Ljosalfar and the Svartalfar). Most characters have been modified from their D&D versions. I am not trying to recreate my D&D world(s), just use the campaign as inspiration for what we are making.

So the true answer is there is no set world. Im sure we will build a world map when this is all said and done, but it will be the work of the team and I, not a copy of a map I used in a D&D game.

Well such a random assortment led to a surprisingly consistent and interesting world. :goodjob:

Not official, but here is a huge map for those who want one. It's Fire specific though I believe it'd work for prior versions if the small amount of hell terrain was taken out and the sentry towers were removed.

Note that there are two maps, one with 18 civs, one with 16 (sorry Falamar) to facilitate Infernal/Mercurian playing.

Download here (http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?p=5116514#post5116514)

I'd spell it "flava".. way more hip!

17 years of playing D&D having Kael as Master... that must have been awesome. My deepest envy for those thet were lucky enough to enjoy it! :D
What version of D&D did you play, if I may ask?

17 years of playing D&D having Kael as Master... that must have been awesome. My deepest envy for those thet were lucky enough to enjoy it! :D
What version of D&D did you play, if I may ask?

We went through all three versions. Most of the time it was 2nd edition, which I hated. By the end the "house rules" rulebook was over 100 pages and covered the spheres as well as tons of other changes. It really wasn't recognizable as 2nd edition anymore.

We were actually really surprised to see a ton of our house rules picked up in 3rd edition including feats, difficulty classes and character points. They were actually so similiar that we were able to drop whole sections of the house rules when we converted. I really liked 3rd edition but i didnt get to play much on it because we were all getting so busy.

One of the rules they didnt pick up that I always liked is we split hit points into two categories, body hit points and dodge hit points. A character would start with his first level as all body hit points, then gain 1-4 points of body hit points per level depending on his class, everything else would be dodge. The difference between them was that:

1. You lost dodge hit points before you lost body hit points (so you had to run out of dodge hit points before you would suffer any body damage).

2. Attacks that required touch had to do body hit point damage to effect you (such as posioned weapons, specter touches, etc).

3. Dodge hit points healed back quickly, you would get back a few per hour even when walking around.

4. Body hit points healed back slowly, just a point or 2 per day.

5. Surprise or other attacks that you couldnt didge would go directly against body hit points.

6. Some races would get a higher portion of body hit points (dwarves) and some would get a higher portion of dodge hit points (elves). So an elven fighter may have the same amount of total hit points as a dwarven fighter but have more dodge and less body.

I also had hero points and party pool. Hero points were points awarded for exeptional success, I used to throw in obscure little side quests that the party usually wouldnt encounter but every once in a while they would trip over and complete. A player could use a hero point 1 time to throw 2 dice instead of 1 and take the better roll.

Party pool is similiar, it is points the party has to spend to throw multiple dice. It represents the party's teamwork and points were awarded or taken away when they did things that brought them closer or farther apart as a team. Unlike the hero points the party pool refreshed at the begining of every adventure, so they got used a lot in boss battles.

One of the rules they didnt pick up that I always liked is we split hit points into two categories, body hit points and dodge hit points. A character would start with his first level as all body hit points, then gain 1-4 points of body hit points per level depending on his class, everything else would be dodge. The difference between them was that:

1. You lost dodge hit points before you lost body hit points (so you had to run out of dodge hit points before you would suffer any body damage).

2. Attacks that required touch had to do body hit point damage to effect you (such as posioned weapons, specter touches, etc).

3. Dodge hit points healed back quickly, you would get back a few per hour even when walking around.

4. Body hit points healed back slowly, just a point or 2 per day.

5. Surprise or other attacks that you couldnt didge would go directly against body hit points.

6. Some races would get a higher portion of body hit points (dwarves) and some would get a higher portion of dodge hit points (elves). So an elven fighter may have the same amount of total hit points as a dwarven fighter but have more dodge and less body.

That's an interesting system. Reminds me of a few days back: a friend of mine mentioned that he was reading some D&D-themed novel, and one of the things he said was "There's not hit points like in D&D, if a goblin stabs you with a spear, you're dead no matter how many battles you've fought." That led me to say "Well, 5 hp of damage to a level 20 fighter and 5 hp to a level 1 wizard are completely different things. The wizard might have gotten run through with the spear, while the fighter would have just taken a glancing blow." I like the idea of making a distinction between actual wounds and "dodge points."

Yeah, it worked out pretty well. One of my favorite side effects of that system was the ability to duel "until first blood". Allowing both opponents the ability to fight without risk to serious injury (or weeks healing) but still giving a decent battle.

Of course Dwarves thought that was just for nancy boys and dandelion eaters (elves).

The dodge hp sounds kinda interesting. Reminds me a bit of the defencive bonus in Rolemaster/MERP.

I played Rolemaster/MERP a huge amout when I was younger and I found the combat system to be far superior to that of D&D because of the critical hit tables. Your oppenent rolled a d% and added his attack bonus to which you would subtract tour defencive bonus consisting of your armour's magical bonus, your sheild bonus and your quickness bonus. The resulting number would be matched to an appropriate weapons chart to see what your damage was. The damage usually came with a critical which you would then roll on another table. If you took a hit, even if you were a lvl30 fighter wearing platemail, and got a bad critical role you could suffer minimal hit point damage but still be killed instantly (or more horribly be stunned until you blead to death). And I know D&D had the natural 20 for double damage but you never really appreciate how frail your character is until your foe "Catches you in the armpit for +30 hits, shattering your ribcage and destroys a variety of organs". My 21st lvl fighter took that from a 3rd lvl Orc on a double open ended roll. No matter how good your healer is you just never recover from that...

Yeah, it worked out pretty well. One of my favorite side effects of that system was the ability to duel "until first blood". Allowing both opponents the ability to fight without risk to serious injury (or weeks healing) but still giving a decent battle.

Of course Dwarves thought that was just for nancy boys and dandelion eaters (elves).

Hm... any chance that you could post some of the relevent changes to this thread? I may use something like this in my upcoming game. Just whenever you get the time in between working on FfH and RL related stuff, of course. ;)

Whatever he said2.

I would like to at least see it too.

It's funny that there was some time when I thought about implementing something similar for my campaigns. It's an interesting system, but at the time there were several things that made me reject it. For instance, spectres and level draining creatures suddenly become far less dangerous. It would also be almost impossible to die from level draining: a character would die sooner from the small wounds that these monsters also cause. Also, constitution bonuses would either have to apply to the dodge bonuses (which doesn't make much sense) or to the body pool... and since they can be as high as +4 per level, that would end up in having more or less the same problem as before. How did you address these issues?

People might call me crazy, but I think the best of the versions was the first -not even the advanced (the series of Basic, Expert, Companion, Master and Immortal): the very first. It was a complete and balanced game, with the best immortal rules I've seen so far. I actually thought about using it with the additions I saw fit, though I never had time to actually doing it. I like the idea of having characters have different progression speeds with the wizard as the ultimate power... if he survives which should be very difficult. That was lost I think in other versions.

With respect to the third edition, I don't like the idea of having hundreds of unbalanced and in some cases ridiculous "prestige clasess". It's just an excuse to fill more and more manuals. I hate that someone decided that necromancy should be reserved mainly for clerics (!!). I resent that there are loads of cleric spells that are mere copies of former wizard ones. They even have miracle which is nothing less than the once legendary wish! Currently a priest is a wizard with armor, more hitpoints, capable of healing and that does not requiere to use a book of spells... I however like the attacks of opportunity system, though I never use figures. I prefer to keep the images in the mind of the players. Placing a figure kills it, and also destroys the idea of a chaotic and moving combat. Excuse the long rant...

With respect to critical tables I played Lord of the Rings -which uses the same system Dark Russel describes- and I find them risky (which is not necessarily bad, although needs to be taken into account) and incomplete. You would need a full book of tables to make that system coherent: how can a goblin crush the skull of a dragon?, for instance. What if you fight a jelly or a black pudding? Or something with no organs? Or something with no certain organs? What if someone is fighting a monster that is below him?Would he still be able to sever his leg, for instance? I found it funny... but unbalancing and difficult to really make it work. However it's just my personal impression.

This kind of critical hit chart was never taken into official D&D - despite showing up several times in magazines and supplements - is that D&D is built to work as an epic fantasy game. It isnt very epic if the predestined savior of the world (Or something like that) gets killed by a random mugger while heading to his showdown with the lord of all evil or something. And you've got to agree, there IS a chance that this sort of thing will happen, despite it not being very likely.

When I'm playing epic, I tend to keep most of the base D&D rules. I only change them when I'm playing something with another theme.

With respect to critical tables I played Lord of the Rings -which uses the same system Dark Russel describes- and I find them risky (which is not necessarily bad, although needs to be taken into account) and incomplete. You would need a full book of tables to make that system coherent: how can a goblin crush the skull of a dragon?, for instance. What if you fight a jelly or a black pudding? Or something with no organs? Or something with no certain organs? What if someone is fighting a monster that is below him?Would he still be able to sever his leg, for instance? I found it funny... but unbalancing and difficult to really make it work. However it's just my personal impression.

That's exactly why we went with Rolemaster for the rules. Same company as MERP but far more extensive ruleset. Each weapon had an attack table and there was a critical table for both large and super large creatures so unless you got a double open ended role (if you got a 96-100 on a d% die you would role again and add the result, and if you rolled a 96-100 on that roll you role again, and so on), you were not going to kill a Dragon with a critical hit (you mostly did extra damage). Rolemaster was great because it was skills based, not ability based, so any character class could take any skill, it just cost more skill points. If you were a mage and wanted to learn the Clerics necromancy spell lists for instance, you could do that but not at the rate that a cleric could.

Anyways, after playing D&D for 5 years I switched to Rolemaster after the first gaming session as it allowed me to create the character I really wanted to play.

btw, the best critical I ever got was during an excursion into an ancient temple. An Orc band had set up shop there and we came to investigate. In the final battle in the temple, the Orc shaman was hiding behind a pillar casting spells on his troops who kept us pinned down with arrow fire. My hobbit theif used his skill with mathmatics to successfully calculate a ricochet point on the wall, rolled an open ended roll with his sling to attack the shaman who I managed to hit. The attacks critical role indicated that I had crushed his skull with a blow to the back of the head. Needless to say, the rest of the orcs went into disarray and we finished them off.

...end of line.