Subject: MYSTARA-L Digest - 20 Jul 2002 to 21 Jul 2002 (#2002-188) From: Automatic digest processor Date: 22/07/2002, 17:00 To: Recipients of MYSTARA-L digests Reply-to: Mystara RPG Discussion There are 13 messages totalling 703 lines in this issue. Topics of the day: 1. Mystaran Almanac: AC1018 Events (a short review) (2) 2. A Quick Sea of Dawn Question (2) 3. Mystaran Almanac: AC1018 Events (a short review) Part 2 4. Vault of Pandius website (5) 5. 2nd Mystaran Meeting held in Milano, Italy (2) 6. Culinary Overview of Mystara ******************************************************************** The Other Worlds Homepage: http://www.wizards.com/dnd/OtherWorlds.asp The Mystara Homepage: http://www.dnd.starflung.com/ To unsubscribe, send email to LISTSERV@ORACLE.WIZARDS.COM with UNSUB MYSTARA-L in the body of the message. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Sun, 21 Jul 2002 11:19:57 +0300 From: Solmyr Subject: Re: Mystaran Almanac: AC1018 Events (a short review) I'm pretty sure that E.L.F. can be altered to fit almost any European language (it can be made to fit Russian), since "elf" is a fairly international word. F.A.E.R.Y. on the other hand is more difficult. As is NACE. As for the concept of NACE itself, if I ever run a Mystaran campaign, I know I won't have it nearly as united as it seems to be in the Almanacs. I personally would make it structured more like the real-world CIS (Commonwealth of Independent States, i.e. the former USSR republics). Agathokles wrote: > > David Knott wrote: > > > > From: "Agathokles" > > > > > > Well... in Italian, the Erewan organization's acronym is "ELFI", which > > > means "elves". So, at least one of them works even in Caurenzan. > > > > Well -- the English version stands for "Elven Liberation Front", as > > I recall. What does "ELFI" stand for? And is that phrase correct > > in terms of Italian grammar? > > Elfi Liberi delle Foreste Inesplorate > Free Elves of the Unexplored Forests > > Which means the name was changed to fit the acronym. -- ********** Aleksei Andrievski solmyr@kolumbus.fi World of Enothril website - http://enothril.topcities.com/ The Archmage's Tower - http://www.geocities.com/solmyr.geo/ "War does not determine who is right. War determine who is left." ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 21 Jul 2002 09:26:39 -0500 From: Stone Marshall Subject: Re: A Quick Sea of Dawn Question Personally, I would say five remain. Out of a possible thirty that seems like a good number and there are still enough different barons to make life on the island interesting. On my map of Gaity there are five villages and each could be a stronghold for the barons. Just my two cents! Multizar the Mage > From: Alex Benson > Reply-To: Mystara RPG Discussion > To: MYSTARA-L@ORACLE.WIZARDS.COM > Subject: Re: [MYSTARA] A Quick Sea of Dawn Question > Date: Sat, 20 Jul 2002 13:57:12 EDT > > Yes Mystarans, I, the self appointed champion of things Alphatian, am in > need > of a tidbit of information. Okay, the question involves Gaity. Ironically I > wrote some events and the atlas entry for previous MA editions. Hence some > added frustration on my part. Feel free to gloat. > > I am using the NWN Toolset to create an adventure on Gaity. I need to know > how many Thyatian barons there are. > > As far as I know there has never been a cited number. The PWAs have the > island originally segmented into 30 dominions (I assume 30 barons). Later, > the Thyatians pulled out as part of a treaty. The resident Thyatians were > given the choice of staying. Without a Thyatian governor, the barons fell > into civil war with each trying to win control of the island. To come up > with > a current number of barons one has to take several things into account: > > 1) how many of the original 30 barons remained behind? > 2) how many have been killed or deposed during the subsequent fighting? > 3) how many have joined ranks? > > I know that there possibly isn't a definative answer. I looked. However, I > would be pleased to hear some opinions and suggestions. Likewise, I would > not > mind hearing some suggested NPC descripts for the barons. And perhaps some > ideas for subplots and details for the Gaity areas. Offer some names along > with your suggestions. That way if I use them you'll get an in-game credit > for your input. > > ******************************************************************** > The Other Worlds Homepage: http://www.wizards.com/dnd/OtherWorlds.asp > The Mystara Homepage: http://www.dnd.starflung.com/ > To unsubscribe, send email to LISTSERV@ORACLE.WIZARDS.COM > with UNSUB MYSTARA-L in the body of the message. _________________________________________________________________ Send and receive Hotmail on your mobile device: http://mobile.msn.com ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 21 Jul 2002 16:46:58 +0200 From: Thibault Sarlat Subject: Re: A Quick Sea of Dawn Question hey a map!! may i ask you to send me a copy of your map by e-mail please... I am currently mapping the alatians in 8 miles per hex Thibault Sarlat. ICQ 16622177. homepage http://www.mystara.fr.st Join me at:thibault.sarlat@wanadoo.fr;clenarius@hotmail.com ----- Original Message ----- From: "Stone Marshall" To: Sent: Sunday, July 21, 2002 4:26 PM Subject: Re: [MYSTARA] A Quick Sea of Dawn Question > Personally, I would say five remain. Out of a possible thirty that seems > like a good number and there are still enough different barons to make life > on the island interesting. On my map of Gaity there are five villages and > each could be a stronghold for the barons. Just my two cents! > > Multizar the Mage > > > >From: Alex Benson > >Reply-To: Mystara RPG Discussion > >To: MYSTARA-L@ORACLE.WIZARDS.COM > >Subject: Re: [MYSTARA] A Quick Sea of Dawn Question > >Date: Sat, 20 Jul 2002 13:57:12 EDT > > > >Yes Mystarans, I, the self appointed champion of things Alphatian, am in > >need > >of a tidbit of information. Okay, the question involves Gaity. Ironically I > >wrote some events and the atlas entry for previous MA editions. Hence some > >added frustration on my part. Feel free to gloat. > > > >I am using the NWN Toolset to create an adventure on Gaity. I need to know > >how many Thyatian barons there are. > > > >As far as I know there has never been a cited number. The PWAs have the > >island originally segmented into 30 dominions (I assume 30 barons). Later, > >the Thyatians pulled out as part of a treaty. The resident Thyatians were > >given the choice of staying. Without a Thyatian governor, the barons fell > >into civil war with each trying to win control of the island. To come up > >with > >a current number of barons one has to take several things into account: > > > >1) how many of the original 30 barons remained behind? > >2) how many have been killed or deposed during the subsequent fighting? > >3) how many have joined ranks? > > > >I know that there possibly isn't a definative answer. I looked. However, I > >would be pleased to hear some opinions and suggestions. Likewise, I would > >not > >mind hearing some suggested NPC descripts for the barons. And perhaps some > >ideas for subplots and details for the Gaity areas. Offer some names along > >with your suggestions. That way if I use them you'll get an in-game credit > >for your input. > > > >******************************************************************** > >The Other Worlds Homepage: http://www.wizards.com/dnd/OtherWorlds.asp > >The Mystara Homepage: http://www.dnd.starflung.com/ > >To unsubscribe, send email to LISTSERV@ORACLE.WIZARDS.COM > >with UNSUB MYSTARA-L in the body of the message. > > > > > _________________________________________________________________ > Send and receive Hotmail on your mobile device: http://mobile.msn.com > > ******************************************************************** > The Other Worlds Homepage: http://www.wizards.com/dnd/OtherWorlds.asp > The Mystara Homepage: http://www.dnd.starflung.com/ > To unsubscribe, send email to LISTSERV@ORACLE.WIZARDS.COM > with UNSUB MYSTARA-L in the body of the message. > ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 21 Jul 2002 22:43:36 +0200 From: DM Subject: Re: Mystaran Almanac: AC1018 Events (a short review) Part 2 At Tue, 16 Jul 2002 22:38:05 +1000, Alfred O'Meagher=20 wrote: > The fanbase of most profitable d20 publishers produce more stuff than the= MA > team, and there are usually fewer people doing it. Please, name them. I want name and stats, not just mere allusions. And then= =20 we'll do page counting, obviously ;p > I agree totally with the > other poster who commented that the almanack just reads like notes from > someone's campaign. Campaign notes are all well and good, but we all do=20 > that anyway. The almanac writes to inspire other people using facts or adventure seeds.= =20 We make up events from scratch and use our own campaign material for=20 inspiration (those of us who play regularly, at least). Personally I have even written facts which have played differently in my=20 campaign, changing them to suit the almanac's plots, and have written=20 adventures I haven't even played with my PCs. So, the almanac is just this: a coherent set of events to inspire the DM=20 and entertain the fans of Mystara, together with sound and interesting=20 geographical descriptions of the various regions of the world. > The campaign I play in produces about double the almanack output > each quarter, mainly because most of the contributors are just happy= players > producing Bard journalism pieces and writeups of new classes, kits and > variants they have encountered. *repressing giggles* oh, how lucky for you then! You should try sending something to the list=20 for our perusal, and since u've got these many crunchy stuff, try sending=20 it to WotC as well: they could make new classes rulebooks using your stuff= :) But really, this has not so much to do with the almanac: you are telling us= =20 u are producing especially classes+kits, so you're focused on crunch, we're= =20 focused on fluff OTOH. > And I am correcting the defects that I perceive - cf previous post on the > Netbook of Days. I am going to collate the information for the years 1000= to > 1200 AC inclusive, from originally published TSR stuff, then from the notes > and comments of the game designers, then from the online contributions from > the designers then from fan sources. All fan material will be italicised so > it is clear that it is an addendum and not in any way official. Oh, please do. So DMs and players will have a plenty of visions to choose=20 from (MA, WiF and NoD) for their campaigns (see? we are not that obnoxious= =20 as u may think).. but beware: you might then look a bit cliquish by writing this Netbook=20 alone, and surely u don't want yourself to be compared to us ! ;ppp > Following the official figures > for sales from some of the valuation sites and so on it would follow that > most people exposed to what became Mystara actually froze their knowledge= of > it at a very early point - like back in the Isle of Dread kind of era.= Newer > players have still also encountered that era preferentially because more of > the Isleo f Dread module and its boxed set were produced than most of the > other stuff. Now with the ESDs and so forth people are going back to it=20 > once again. I don't think so. In fact, I believe the most likely purcharser for ESD are= =20 not newbies or new D&D 3E players, but old timers who want to complete=20 their collection. Thus, they bring nothing new to the Mystara fanbase. > According to Fantaseum's poll, the forum sites polls, valuation sites polls > and the big download sites polls, 3e gets about 40% to 45% of the market,= 2e > about 30% and everything else about 25%-30%. What market? I don't get it: u are saying there is still a market for AD&D= =20 and other D&D editions around?? Do u really think there are still people=20 out there buying old D&D stuff to begin playing? personally I don't feel=20 it's the case, since the 3E stuff is so much more common, while old D&D=20 editions stuff are not only more difficult to find, but also remarkably=20 higher in price than what they used to be, and almost on par with new 3E=20 products. THat said, new players are more likely buy the new 3E products=20 (which are supported by a great wide variety of publishers) than old and=20 not always nice looking manuals and modules. > Since the basic "Mystara" > setting was really quite vanilla, with increasingly strange and specific > stuff added as time went on, it follows that there is a colossal residuum= of > useable material, and it's pretty much everywhere. ??? Maybe that's the case in USA (I heard there were many D&D books in K-B= =20 stores), but not certainly around here in Europe... and I still have doubts= =20 over the first case. > Also, all the Atlantis stuf online is a no-brainer for Alphatia, our very > own drowned continent. Instead of accepting that the survivors struggle on > with some inane equivalent of an anachronistic pseudo-empire, why wouldn't > the survivors' efforts come to naught, so that Alphatia becomes like > Mycenae, a vanished race and culture that produces sub-Alphatian nations > with bits and pieces of vanished Alphatian lore? Much more interesting. > Also, the game designers gave Alphatia the kiss of death - shouldn't that > mean that the canon zombies should let it drop also? Because "unfortunately" that's what the official Mystara writers at TSR=20 decided back in 1993, before it became discontinued, so the writers of the= =20 almanac had to go with it. > In terms of official sites or what have you, I think the Birthright support > site wins pretty much hands down. It is beautifully laid out, lovingly > detailed, added to in a coherent way and still caters to any potential > variant by clearly setting out styles of play and reviews of same by people > who tried it. The entire look and feel is fantastic and closely follows the > colour scheme and professionalism of the original rulebooks. Navigation is > simple and the core information on the setting is summarised and correctly > indexed. The links are updated regularly and the additional rules are set > out alongside sidebars of canon information. > I use it a lot because Birthright is one of the other rules sets we use in > our campaign. My legacy holder mixes it up with cinnabryl mutants. Yes, you can do it, but we couldn't write this up in the almanac, else it=20 would be much more criticized for being "weird" and "not in tune with the=20 old Mystara feel", which we strive to keep always alive with coherency. > It's great that some Mystara fans make the effort to do an almanack at all, > I just hope they don't hurt their hands patting themselves on the back all > the time. It's pretty good, but not great. *shaking head* First of all, why should a person who likes what he/she writes not be happy= =20 about it and instead feel ashamed? Second of all, we never "pat our back": we prefer other people to judge our= =20 work after reading it. THen we asset the evaluations and try to make better= =20 the next time. but u see, your opinion fails to help us in writing better=20 stuff since u don't complain about something specific or make examples: u=20 simply bash the almanac overall just because it's the almanac and you're=20 not writing it. But nobody prevented u to do so, on the contrary. If u think u have valuable contributions to make, Herv=E9 made it clear to= =20 send em to the almanac. We're always looking for writers (to introduce to=20 the clique, yes, that's our true secret pourpose..) :p > Possibly the best thing to happen D&D will be if Hasbro sells the brand= name > for some quick bucks. That way Mystara might actually be resurrected in > useable form. Mystara and old D&D was already sold to Kenzer & Co. ,who has already=20 stated they won't be producing any new Mystara material or stuff for that=20 campaign, but merely rehash the old adventure modules with a comic streak=20 (see the new 3E adventure "Little Keep on the Borderlands")... But I also hope Mystara could be sold to a new small company and be=20 revived. But even if it won't see again the life in a pen & paper product=20 for 3E, I'm pretty happy as it is, since I have kept it very much alive=20 with my campaigns in the last 8 years after its canceling. > Anyway I get to practice what I preach soon because I am getting some pages > to do with what I wish. I will be putting up the Shannara-oid Mystara > campaign and I will also put up all the files and so on I found online. I > will post the address once it is all finished and up and running. Simply do it. I am sure I won't read them however, since I have no interest= =20 in Shannara, but that doesn't stop u from doing it for other=20 Shannara-Mystara fans. I sure won't bash u for that ;) DM Senior Editor of the Mystaran Almanac Lt. Cmdr. of U.S.S. Unicorn "You don't stop playing because you grow old: you grow old because you stop playing!" Visit Marco's Mystara Homepage at: http://www.geocities.com/TimesSquare/Dungeon/2967 And Mystara Italian Homepage at: http://www.geocities.com/TimesSquare/Dungeon/9940 Join the Mystara Webring at: http://www.geocities.com/TimesSquare/Dungeon/2967/mystring.html Join the Starfleet Academy at: http://gioco.net/startrek (Italian RPG PBEM) ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 21 Jul 2002 17:02:40 -0400 From: Dan Wallace Subject: Vault of Pandius website Has anybody been able to get on the Vault of Pandius website? I haven't = all weekend. Anybody know what's wrong? Dan ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 21 Jul 2002 23:19:57 +0200 From: Federico Kaftal Subject: 2nd Mystaran Meeting held in Milano, Italy Hail, fellow Mystarans! This is just to inform you that yesterday, 20/07/02 five of us Italians met each others for the second time to exchange frivolous Mystaran experiences and expectations (this might sound cliqueish, I know; nevertheless we didn't feel guilty). We came from various cities of Italy and met in Milano, at Agathokles' house: there were Matteo Bernabé, Marco Dalmonte (DM), Giulio Caroletti (Iulius Scaevola), Giampaolo Agosta (Agathokles), and Federico Kaftal. We spent a whole day discussing various subjects such as: The Second Week Without Magic Balancing the Mystic Eriadna's Death The Resurrection Spell Mystarans in Ravenloft Hasbro's and TSR's marketing policies Pronouncing "Nithia" & "Thothia" (that was the weakest thread, I admit) Outer Beings and Nithia Almanacs and other ongoing projects And many more; and we stopped just the time for enjoying an exquisite RW lunch most kindly offered by Giampaolo's mummy. Well... dunno if you consider all of this OOT - it's not the beginning of a thread, after all; however, it's beautiful and Mystara-related. That's another prove that our beloved [discontinued] World is ALIVE AND KICKING. Cheers! Federico Kaftal _________________________________________________________________ Send and receive Hotmail on your mobile device: http://mobile.msn.com ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 21 Jul 2002 16:09:27 -0700 From: The Stalker Subject: Re: Mystaran Almanac: AC1018 Events (a short review) On Sun, 21 Jul 2002 11:19:57 +0300, Solmyr wrote: > I'm pretty sure that E.L.F. can be altered to fit almost any European > language (it can be made to fit Russian), since "elf" is a fairly > international word. F.A.E.R.Y. on the other hand is more difficult. As > is NACE. > > As for the concept of NACE itself, if I ever run a Mystaran campaign, I > know I won't have it nearly as united as it seems to be in the Almanacs. > I personally would make it structured more like the real-world CIS > (Commonwealth of Independent States, i.e. the former USSR republics). > It looks that united to you? That's a problem because I don't think that was the intention. On the surface, yes, but beneath that Nayce is threatening to break apart all the time... Favian vs. Karszamon vs. Verothrics and all the squabbling rulers with Underocean causing further havoc on top of that... Nayce has not lived long, and one intention this year was to show that this 'united confederation' is threatening to tear itself apart as everybody struggle for power... Or as Star Wars' Senator Palpatine would say, "There is no interest in the common good!" That seemed very true to me. Herve, if you're reading, I hope I haven't spoiled anything here. After all, anyone can read the events and see things are not all well in Nayce. - The Stalker ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 21 Jul 2002 16:46:16 -0700 From: Bleakcabal Subject: Re: Vault of Pandius website Yeah it doesn't seem to work, what's worst I have had 2 emails to shawn stanley bounced ! --- Dan Wallace wrote: > Has anybody been able to get on the Vault of Pandius website? I haven't all= > weekend. Anybody know what's wrong? > > Dan > > ******************************************************************** > The Other Worlds Homepage: http://www.wizards.com/dnd/OtherWorlds.asp > The Mystara Homepage: http://www.dnd.starflung.com/ > To unsubscribe, send email to LISTSERV@ORACLE.WIZARDS.COM > with UNSUB MYSTARA-L in the body of the message. _____________________________________________________________ GameDev.net Email Service - "Plenty of 1's and 0's" _____________________________________________________________ Promote your group and strengthen ties to your members with email@yourgroup.org by Everyone.net http://www.everyone.net/?btn=tag ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 21 Jul 2002 19:03:42 -0700 From: Chris Furneaux Subject: Re: Vault of Pandius website --- Bleakcabal wrote: > Yeah it doesn't seem to work, what's worst I have > had 2 emails to shawn stanley bounced ! > > --- Dan Wallace wrote: > >Has anybody been able to get on the Vault of > Pandius website? I haven't all= > > weekend. Anybody know what's wrong? > > > >Dan > > I havn't been able to connect either. And the news server is down too I noticed. Chris. __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Yahoo! Health - Feel better, live better http://health.yahoo.com ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 21 Jul 2002 22:37:20 -0400 From: Geoff Gander Subject: Re: 2nd Mystaran Meeting held in Milano, Italy Frederico wrote: > > Hail, fellow Mystarans! I would be *very* interested in knowing the gist of what you guys said about all those topics. Would it be possible for you to paraphrase what was said or decided? Other people on the list might be interested, and it could be fodder for an adventure idea or two. :) Geoff -- Geoff Gander, BA 97, MPA 02 Carnifex Loremaster/Mad Roleplayer Master of the Elemental Plane of Bureaucracy au998@freenet.carleton.ca : www.geocities.com/TimesSquare/Realm/2091 ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 21 Jul 2002 22:42:00 -0400 From: David Knott Subject: Re: Culinary Overview of Mystara From: "Christopher M Cherrington" > This is a subject I have been meaning to work with for a long time. I will > begin by sharing a very special class of bard, the Chef. This is written > using the 2E format. (Please forgive me for not converting it, and my high > level chefs are immune to any flames sparked up by me using 2E). Although > all comments and opinions are welcome ;) I will assume you didn't convert because the conversion would be too easy -- in 3E, a chef would be a mid to high level Expert (NPC class) with (Cook) as one of his class skills, Skill Focus (Profession (Cook)) as one of his feats, high wisdom (for bonus to Profession (Cook) skill), and other skills selected to give him synergy bonuses to Profession (Cook). An adventurer with Profession as a class skill could achieve similar results, and could use his class abilities for the bardic and magical abilities associated with your Chef class. For the flashier aspects of food preparation, add ranks in the Perform skill and select "show cooking" as a specialty. So if anyone asks you for a 3E conversion of your class/kit, just point them to this message. ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 21 Jul 2002 22:49:31 -0400 From: David Knott Subject: Re: Vault of Pandius website From: "Chris Furneaux" > > I havn't been able to connect either. And the news > server is down too I noticed. What are the details of that news server (location, etc.)? I lost that information a while back when I gave up on the newsgroups there for lack of activity. If it has now become active, I would very much like to rejoin it if it has become active (and please feel free to answer me publicly since I suspect others lurking on the list would also be interested). ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 21 Jul 2002 22:59:35 -0400 From: Dan Wallace Subject: Re: Vault of Pandius website I also noticed mystara3e.starflung.com isn't working either so it seems to be a problem with the domain server and not the website in particular. Dan ----- Original Message ----- From: "Chris Furneaux" To: Sent: Sunday, July 21, 2002 10:03 PM Subject: Re: [MYSTARA] Vault of Pandius website > --- Bleakcabal wrote: > > Yeah it doesn't seem to work, what's worst I have > > had 2 emails to shawn stanley bounced ! > > > > --- Dan Wallace wrote: > > >Has anybody been able to get on the Vault of > > Pandius website? I haven't all= > > > weekend. Anybody know what's wrong? > > > > > >Dan > > > > > I havn't been able to connect either. And the news > server is down too I noticed. > > Chris. > > __________________________________________________ > Do You Yahoo!? > Yahoo! Health - Feel better, live better > http://health.yahoo.com > > ******************************************************************** > The Other Worlds Homepage: http://www.wizards.com/dnd/OtherWorlds.asp > The Mystara Homepage: http://www.dnd.starflung.com/ > To unsubscribe, send email to LISTSERV@ORACLE.WIZARDS.COM > with UNSUB MYSTARA-L in the body of the message. ------------------------------ End of MYSTARA-L Digest - 20 Jul 2002 to 21 Jul 2002 (#2002-188) ****************************************************************