Subject: MYSTARA-L Digest - 4 Mar 2003 to 5 Mar 2003 (#2003-65) From: Automatic digest processor Date: 06/03/2003, 19:00 To: Recipients of MYSTARA-L digests Reply-to: Mystara RPG Discussion There are 14 messages totalling 964 lines in this issue. Topics of the day: 1. Different Mystaras 2. AD&D - OD&D Conversion (3) 3. My 7th request for debugging ESD maps 4. Implications of "The Radiance." 5. Origin of Mystara's races 6. Savage Coast (2) 7. Languages 8. Cultures (3) 9. weather ******************************************************************** 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: Wed, 5 Mar 2003 10:32:21 +0100 From: Giampaolo Agosta Subject: Re: Different Mystaras Dan Eustace wrote: >> 1) Alphatia returns in the Hollow World, but much smaller, and limited >> in magical power; > > I've toyed with this idea myself, but MC hasn't reached the point "to sink > or swim" so to speak. Neither mine has--we're at the end of year 1000, and we're going on slowly. > After working on the MA FC of Alphatia team, I don't > really like the idea of the entire thing being rebuilt as a FC in the HW. > I'd probably put the continent in the water (replacing one of the other HW > continents), or just put HW Alphatia on one of the other continents. I think the floating continent idea is not that bad. It's just that the Alphatians should not be allowed to avoid the effects of the spell of preservation, nor to get out of their FC. I'm going to solve the issue of having too few spellcasters in the Hollow World for the Alphatian culture to survive by allowing Alphatians NPCs of lesser int or wis (say, 9-15) to have limited spellcasting abilities--either as mages/clerics with a level limit or as NPC classes, or by acquiring cantrip-like NWPs. Basically, Alphatia will be populated by a large number of low-level spellcasters (able to cast 1st to 3rd level spells, e.g.), most of them unable to raise to higher levels >> 2) No NACE, Zandor will remain in control of most surviving Alphatian >> territories, except Thotia and its neighbours; > > Sounds reasonable. Thanks. I forgot to add that Floating Ar remains basically independent, since Zandor doesn't have a skyship fleet, and Queodar is too far and insignificant for him to tak concern right now. >> 3) Darokin will break up in three parts under the attack of Hule and the >> Shadow Elves crisis; >> 4) Canolbarth becomes a larger version of the petrified forest in Dymrak >> Woods; >> 5) The "Night of Hell in the Shire" takes place; >> 6) The Wrath War will have longer consequences, and more nations will >> take part. > > All of this underscores the severity of WotI, which could well send the KW > into a dark age. Yes, a collapse of Darokin would certainly bring a major halt to several nations--Glantri, for example. It will also redefine the alliances, push Karameikos to strengthen its sea-based trade, set Ierendi as the major competitor for Minrothad, and give Thyatis the opportunity to concentrate on its colonial attempts. > I'll probably have some similar stuff take place, as IMC > WotI is but a prelude to a larger and darker conflict which will essentially > be the final climax of a very long running campaign. More on this in > another post, when I have the time to explain it in full. Ok. If you want to have a look at my timeline and setting, here are the links: http://dnd.starflung.com/endknown.html (Known World and WotI timeline) http://dnd.starflung.com/tempires.html (Alphatia and Thyatis) Bye, -- Giampaolo Agosta http://digilander.iol.it/agathokles ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 5 Mar 2003 10:41:53 +0100 From: Federico Kaftal Subject: AD&D - OD&D Conversion I read that in the RulesCyclopedia TSR provided rules to convert D&D games and characters into AD&D 2nd edition game statistics and back again. As I don't have the book itself, could anybody quote for me the meaningful passages (esp.about converting character levels, back and forth)? Thank you. Federico _________________________________________________________________ The new MSN 8: advanced junk mail protection and 2 months FREE* http://join.msn.com/?page=features/junkmail ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 5 Mar 2003 11:06:39 +0100 From: Federico Kaftal Subject: My 7th request for debugging ESD maps I didn't receive any answer to my e-mail below. Does this mean that you are NOT going to take care of these bugs? Shall I just give up waiting for the corrected files which I have legally purchased and provide myself with illegal copies? Thank you for an answer. Federico Kaftal ------------------------------- 6th message (Feb 1, 2003) ______________________________ As per your advice, I started downloading again the bugged files: my first chioce was "GAZ8 - The Five Shires ESD", which is even mentioned as being recently updated in your page: http://www.svgames.com/esdupdates.html The result is: nothing has changed! The files I downloaded anew and those I had previously downloaded two months ago are IDENTICAL, and contain the same bugs as before. You made me spend 4 hours and 2 extra bucks for connecting and downloading the same bugged file a second time: how can you justify that? Now please tell me: should I just give up and draw the conclusion that, once you've got my money, I'm no longer an attractive customer and had better stop questioning you? How can I even TRUST you now, after you say that some files have been updated while they have NOT? Federico Kaftal P.S.: this message is CCed to the Mystara-List as they might very well be interested in knowing how you handle your ESD customers. ----Original Message Follows---- From: "SVGames - Support" To: "Federico Kaftal" Subject: Re: Repeated request for ESD maps Date: Tue, 28 Jan 2003 08:12:14 -0800 Thanks for contacting us. We have provided updates to the files mentioned below. You can access the updated files by re-downloading the files from your confirmation page and the respective product pages. ----- Original Message ----- From: "Federico Kaftal" To: Cc: Sent: Tuesday, January 28, 2003 6:34 AM Subject: Repeated request for ESD maps > Dear sirs, > could you please update me - after two months from my original request, I > still got no corrected file whatsoever. > > This is the fifth time I'm writing to you, not every day but every two weeks > or so, in order to give you and your vendor enough time. > Would you mind explaining the reason (if any!) of such a huge delay? > Thank you. > > Federico Kaftal > > > (I re-attach my previous mails for your convenience): > > ------------------------------- > 4th message (Dec 28, 2002) > ______________________________ > > Dear sirs, > I know that you are still waiting for your vendor to send you a bunch of > corrected files, but in the meanwhile I am sorry to say that I have noticed > more, major bugs: > > After printing the maps of the following items: > - Red Arrow, Black Shield (TSR 9160) > - The Minrothad Guilds (TSR 9236) > - The Five Shires (TSR 9232) > > I noticed that in The Minrothad Guilds (both Country map and Trade Route map > and internal cover map too) and in The Five Shires (Country map only) the > various pieces each map consists of have been scanned with different > proportions: it's therefore impossible to tie them together because they do > not tally! > > Furthermore: the Country map of The Minrothad Guilds has not been cut before > scanning: as a result, the various pages contain redundant parts of the > image, which makes one more reason for being it impossible to tally them > together. > > Furthermore: another one (Red Arrow, Black Shield), has some three or four > pages missing: the large map is not complete at all! > > Please add to this my previous e-mails, where I said that the whole of The > Northern Reaches (TSR 9230) Country map is entirely missing, and the dungeon > map of The Dymrak Dread (TSR 9272) has got a missing page too. > > It's a scandal, I dare to say, that EVERY item I bought in ESD format > including a map has one or more major bugs! These maps are one of the > strongest reason why one would not plainly photocopy modules from a friend, > but rather download original items in ESD (and PAY for them): I tend to > believe that if this situation goes on, you'll soon be receiving a huge > amount of protests and people will stop buying ESD items: the quality of the > maps scanning is so poor that obviously they were given to non-professional > workers and underwent no testing at all (i.e.: nobody took care of trying to > download, print and re-construct the whole module to check if everything was > OK). > > I don't want to be involved in any discussion or justification with your > scanning vendor - I just expect WotC to provide me with totally debugged and > "tested" maps, downloadable, printable and with A4 pages perfectly > coincident with each others, in order to be able to scotch them together and > recreate the exact map. That's all. > > I would advise you to put a higher pressure on your vendor, because the > quality of their job really does not meet basic levels. > Regards, > > Federico Kaftal > > ------------------------------- > 3rd message (Dec 18, 2002) > ______________________________ > > Dear sirs, > after your first e-mail announcing that you would contact the dealer in > charge of the ESD scanning to have them look into the bugs I reported, I > didn't hear from you anymore. Could you please solicitate your vendor? > Scanning those few pages doesn't require more than a few hours, not to > mention weeks! I know what I'm saying, because I've worked for years in the > field of software localization, and I had this sort of debugging done more > than once, in a few hours if necessary. > We're talking about scanning some nine or ten pages, without any art > make-up, and updating two PDF files with a few more sheets... > > Thank you for updating me soon. > > Federico Kaftal > > ------------------------------------- > 2nd message (beginning of Dec, 2002): > _____________________________________ > > Dear sirs, > > I have just downloaded another ESD: TSR930ESDPDF.1 (GAZ7 - The Northern > Reaches) and after joining it with the split free file, I see that the whole > large, full color double-sided map of the lands of Ostland, Vestland and > Soderfiord is entirely missing. > > What's happening? Did you sell us incomplete copies? Note that the Northern > Reaches Gazetteer is not at all a rare object: there are shrinkwrapped > copies on sale at Amazon. So, why is the big double-sided map missing? > I attach my previous mail for your convenience. > > Regards, > Federico Kaftal > > ------------------------------------- > 1st message (beginning of Dec, 2002): > _____________________________________ > > Dear sirs, > > I have just downloaded ESD TSR9272ESD.PDF (The Dymrak Dread) and I notice > that there's one page missing: > > At the end of the booklet there's a dungeon map obviously consisting of > eight pages: only pages I-VII are there, the upper right page of the map has > not been scanned. > > Would you please make sure to add the page to the ESD and to send me the > missing page by e-mail as well? > > Thanks for your answer. > > Federico Kaftal > > _________________________________________________________________ > MSN 8: advanced junk mail protection and 2 months FREE*. > http://join.msn.com/?page=features/junkmail > > > _________________________________________________________________ MSN 8 with e-mail virus protection service: 2 months FREE* http://join.msn.com/?page=features/virus ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 5 Mar 2003 12:16:42 +0100 From: Jacob Skytte Subject: Re: AD&D - OD&D Conversion Federico Kaftal wrote: > I read that in the RulesCyclopedia TSR provided rules to convert D&D = games > and characters into AD&D 2nd edition game statistics and back again. = As I > don't have the book itself, could anybody quote for me the meaningful > passages (esp.about converting character levels, back and forth)? The conversion is less than perfect, but the relevant parts say: Experience level: 1-12 No change 13+ AD&D to D&D: 1 level =3D 3 levels; D&D to AD&D: 3 levels equal 1 = level Hit points: Cleric, Fighter & Thief: AD&D to D&D: -1 hp per HD; D&D to AD&D: +1 hp = per HD Magic-User: No change Dwarf: AD&D to D&D: -1 hp per HD if Fighter, +1 hp per HD if Thief; D&D = to AD&D: +1 hp per HD Gnome: AD&D to D&D: -1 hp per HD if Fighter Elf: AD&D to D&D: -1 hp per HD if Fighter, +1 hp per HD if Mage; D&D to = AD&D: No change Halfling: AD&D to D&D: -2 hp per HD if Fighter, -1 hp per HD if Cleric; = D&D to AD&D: +2 hp per HD All D&D Dwarves become Dwarven Fighters in AD&D (Dwarf-Clerics become = Clerics if using GAZ6). All D&D Elves become Fighter/Mages in AD&D. AD&D Half-Elves in D&D become human if single-classed, Elves if = multi-classed. D&D Halflings become Halfling Fighters in AD&D, but may be = Fighter/Thieves. "Special" AD&D classes become regular D&D classes with skills reflecting = the change (i.e. AD&D Ranger becomes D&D Fighter with wilderness skills, = AD&D Bards become D&D Thieves with musical skills), though Paladins = convert to Paladins if at least 9th level. D&D Mystics become AD&D Monks or dual-classed Fighter/Thieves, advancing = as Fighter. There's more to it than this, but this was the short version. Jacob Skytte scythe@wanadoo.dk ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 5 Mar 2003 12:22:39 +0100 From: Felix Holtschoppen Subject: Re: AD&D - OD&D Conversion Hi, well, most of it is really self-explanatory if you consider the similarity between the two game systems. Concerning level conversion RC states that lvls 1-12 stay the same in both systems while every 3 lvls above 12th in D&D equal 1 lvl in AD&D and vice versa. There are a lot of tables in the RC which mostly say nothing but "use D&D equivalent" or "use AD&D equivalent". As for alignments RC suggests using AD&D lawful, neutral, chaotic element as the equal for D&D L,N,C while AD&Ds good, neutral, evil element is either a hint for role-playing (in D&D) or is decided upon by previous behaviour (in AD&D). The biggest problem will be the class/race system, though. The RC suggests basing the decision on the abilities of the character, thus a D&D elf becomes AD&D elven Fighter/Mage, AD&D human dual-classed characters become single-classed in the current active class. AD&D rangers become D&D fighters with wilderness skills and so on. As for weapon mastery RC considers "expert" WM as equal to AD&D "weapon specialization" and vice versa. Anything that has no equivalent in the game system converted to (spells, second class, special abilities, magical items, etc) is lost in the conversion. I personally own both the OD&D and the AD&D core rulebooks so I just use the original spell/magic item since most are readily convertable using plain common sense. I hope that was enough to help you, Felix ----- Original Message ----- From: "Federico Kaftal" To: Sent: Wednesday, March 05, 2003 10:41 AM Subject: [MYSTARA] AD&D - OD&D Conversion > I read that in the RulesCyclopedia TSR provided rules to convert D&D games > and characters into AD&D 2nd edition game statistics and back again. As I > don't have the book itself, could anybody quote for me the meaningful > passages (esp.about converting character levels, back and forth)? > > Thank you. > > Federico > > _________________________________________________________________ > The new MSN 8: advanced junk mail protection and 2 months FREE* > http://join.msn.com/?page=features/junkmail > > ******************************************************************** > 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: Wed, 5 Mar 2003 12:40:16 +0100 From: Jacob Skytte Subject: Re: Implications of "The Radiance." Ramses Ramirez wrote: > But why would the Radiance cease draining magic just because the = switch was made from favoring the Sphere of Energy to favoring the = Sphere of Entropy? Wouldn't the Immortals feel that a balance would be = necessary here (by keeping a 'rad drain' penalty) as well so that = Entropy wouldn't get too powerful? Entropy loses nothing from magic being drained from the world; that = penalty hampers Energy, who favors magic-users. Whatever the Immortals = may feel about it, in the adventure it was an Old One who changed the = Nucleus of the Spheres, and I doubt they're about to mess with anything = an Old One did for the next few millenia. What "Entropy drain" means is = still a mystery... Will Matter endure longer (decay and erosion = decresing), Time stretch on (lifespans or perhaps fertility increasing), = Energy be increasingly created (new creations popping up) and Thought = increased (wisdom and understanding becoming very widespread)? Forgive = my simplification of the Spheres; I know there's more to it than that, = and that not everything was accurate, but I hope you get the idea... The = world we'll end up with, when Entropy is very drained will be as strange = and different as the world without Energy (or magic). The question remains, is the Radiance still capable of producing Energy = Immortals, or does it now produce Entropy Immortals? Will the lands of = Glantri now attract Entropic followers? Isn't something like that = already happening in the Almanacs with Synn & Kol and the general = acceptance of humanoids as a Principality? When will we see the first = Entropic Immortal rise to power from the Entropic Radiance? ::) (And the Radiance already has touches of Entropy to it, with the wasting = disease.) Jacob Skytte scythe@wanadoo.dk ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 5 Mar 2003 08:11:55 -0800 From: Ramses Ramirez Subject: Origin of Mystara's races Hello everyone. I am aware that the following Immortals were responsible for creating (or bringing) their respective races: Hel: created beastmen. Brought in Chromatic dragons Ka: Carnifex Kagyar: dwarves Ordana: elves and so forth... My questions are: a) With the exception of the Flaems and Alphatians (which both came from another dimension) , who created the human race? b) On a similar vein... Where did the residents of Blackmoor come from? Or who created them? c) I read on a couple of websites that Hel brought the chromatic dragons and created the beastmen.. Where is this said in canon? Also, where did Hel "bring" the chromatic dragons from? Ramses --------------------------------- Do you Yahoo!? Yahoo! Tax Center - forms, calculators, tips, and more ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 6 Mar 2003 03:04:10 +0800 From: Greg Weatherup Subject: Re: Savage Coast Asgor Ironfist wrote: > Well, the people os the city-states are just traladarans in another place, or they're based in something more specific? like the boldavian traladarans... that would be Transilvania, right? First off I should mention that I am at school computer lab and this computer is well used (I can tell because the vowel key's and some of the consonants don't register) so If you can't make sense of what I'm typing it's probaly bcaus th vowl did not register. The Traladarans are (as I understand it) Mystara's slavic peoples. Those in Boldavia representing a cross between Russian's (even though the real Rus wre a slavic/nordic mix) and Magyar (aka Hungarian, venthough Magyar's are a Uralic peopl's). I think the city stats wre plannd to be a balkan's reprsentation. > and like all the savage baronies, that are versions of the same spanish/portuguese in different eras and places (by the way, it's so strange that mystaran Gauchos speaks espas instead of verdan... some of my brazilian "real gaúchos" friends sometimes complains about that, hehehehe) :) > By the way, you said that the Knights of Halav is an religious order, and i think that it probably is, indeed (well, it carries the name of Halav, by the way, hehe), but i was thinking in this order like the french musketeers (yes, the three musketeers), and lawful guard that protects the king (in this case, the Margrave) form everything, and that's why i ask if this could be an honorbound company too. interesting intrprtation, but the KoH are in all the city stats, which would mean either the order is fractured among the city-stats (with each company/contingent being devoted to that polities ruler) or it would have to have some sort of extra-national or sovrign status (and a widespread popular support of neutrality). > And they reverend Petra and Zirchev too? good Qustion. > Thanks for this link, this text about the ispans will be very useful ^^ By the way, why there's almost anything at the Vaunts of Pandius about the Verdans? do you guys mind if i post here some of my ideas about this places? please do! Gecko aye this worn out publc kyboard! -- _______________________________________________ Sign-up for your own FREE Personalized E-mail at Mail.com http://www.mail.com/?sr=signup Meet Singles http://corp.mail.com/lavalife ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 6 Mar 2003 03:18:18 +0800 From: Greg Weatherup Subject: Re: Savage Coast still on this worn out public computr. Asgor Ironfist wrote: That is gtting off topic so see my personal mssag to you on that whch I will writ aftr this on (unless I give up on this public keyboard first) > Verdan in Esterhold have any connection with the verdan people? I don't think so but I don't know much about Skothar. > And Slag would be english, right? Does Slag an Daro dialect (that is already an Thyatian dialect, right?) I'd suggest that what ever is the most used (or most Common) by the characters you set as the players native language (in your case Portugesa, in mine pidgin english), and then work out the other languages based on that (if you even need to). > I have just 2 comments abou the verdans: their Coinage and holydays. Surely the don't use the same worlds for they money, but translate the name to verdan (at leats, that's what i think!). Since i didn't find this name on Vaunts, i made it myself: Real (pp), Ouro (gp), Médio (ep), Dez (sp) and Centavo (cp). The plural would be: Réis, Ouros, Médios, Dez (the same as singular) and Centavos. The plural of Real could be Reais as well (like the current brazilian money), but Real/Réis is the money that was used in the time of the Empire of Brazil (after it's independence), so it would fit better. Ah, and 1000 Réis is called Conto de Réis. (or pehaps Mirréis too, an contraction of Mil [Thousand] and Réis). But that then raises the question, is that just a local name for the same thing or is a completely different mint design? Is a Centavo in a Verdan state the exact same as a cp in Cimarron (in other words, are the baronies still in a monetary union?) translations are always good. Gecko -- _______________________________________________ Sign-up for your own FREE Personalized E-mail at Mail.com http://www.mail.com/?sr=signup Meet Singles http://corp.mail.com/lavalife ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 5 Mar 2003 20:54:20 +0100 From: DM Subject: Languages Hi there! Just my 2 shiny electrum (ouch!) pieces to add to the "cultures" thread. About the Thyatian-Hattian linguistic differences yet being the same civilization, that's an old thing I wrote back in 1999 on this list IIRC: The Thyatian language seems to be either Latin (Anaxibius) or Italian (di Malapietra), which are obviously closely related as both are derived from the same base Latin language. Now, given that the Hattians are part of the same group of peoples the Thyatians are from, it would seem that their languages would be similar. Yet the Hattians seem to have a distinctly German language, much different from that of the Thyatians. So, how did the Hattians, who aren't separated (geographically speaking) that far from the other Thyatians, develop this language on their own? Indeed, this mystery is much simpler than it seems. Thyatians, Kerendans and Hattians were in their origins Antalian tribes that Nithians moved from the Heldann-Northern Reaches area to Davania in order to establish there new colonies. Unfortunately for them, they revolted and drove off their masters, and then thrived in the forests and plains of Davania, becoming the ancestors of the Hinterlanders. Then, around 1.000 BC, the gnolls invaded Traldar and King Milen fled south to Davania, where after his death a great warleader founded the Empire of Milenia. The Milenians developed a new way of writing and a new tongue, resulted from the influence of the other Neathar and Oltec tribes with which they mingled, and thus the Milenian (Greek) was born. The Milenians then conquered and enslaved the surrounding populations, influencing heavily their culture and language. At this time (600 BC ca.), the Kerendans, Thyatians and Hattians migrated northward to avoid the complete submission to Milenians, and arrived in modern day Thyatis. Thyatians and Kerendans had been strongly influenced by Milenian-Greek culture, and so they developed a new language and culture based 10% on their old Antalian ancestry and 80% on the Milenian culture, resulting in the Thyatian-Latin language and culture. Then, as the centuries passed, Kerendans developed their own language based on 2 distinct ethnic groups, the Kerendans (Italians, as Italian is the result of the mixture of Latin and Italic dialects) and the Ispans (Spanish, very much similar to Italian and Latin). What about the Hattians, then? Simply, they remained very attached to the old ways of the Antalians and their dialect and culture is a close reflection of this: it is not Antalian since it was influenced by Thyatian and Milenian, but it is very much similar (the same difference between High German and Low German, or maybe between German and Danish). See this link for another interesting thought on Traladaran written by James (Mishler): http://www.geocities.com/TimesSquare/Dungeon/2967/linguist.html And this one for a well detailed list and notes on the known tongues spoken on Mystara: http://www.geocities.com/TimesSquare/Dungeon/2967/mystlang.html Cheers! 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: Thu, 6 Mar 2003 04:13:00 +0800 From: Greg Weatherup Subject: Re: Cultures I'm getting ready to hit this kybord! Giampaolo Agosta wrote > Greg Weatherup wrote: >> If it helps, When I was getting ready to play King Louis of Renardy in Rob Fry's BR-Mystara game I remember reading somewhere about the first king of Renardois (now one of the immortal saimpts) was a lupin from Glantri and married a Renardois noble lady to make the first king and queen. > > Uhm, perhaps it was this passage from the Immortal Project, Saimpt Clébard entry: > "In mortal life, Clébard de Clairvault was a wizard and one of the lupin followers of Sire Claude d'Ambreville. After his presumed death (and the disappearance of Château d'Ambreville) in 896, Clébard left Glantri, as he already disagreed with the glantrian succession laws that excluded Claude from inheritance of his title. He reached Renardy with other glantrian lupins, and there he became Baron de Marmandie. Clébard married Princess Ralon of Renardy and inherited the throne, starting the feudal age of his country. It was under Clébard's rule that most of the current renardois law was codified, unifying ancient lupin traditions and the legal principles that Clébard learnt from Sire Claude. Clébard also gave his name to the royal dynasty and added his Fleur de Lis to the old Golden Fox in the kings' coat of arms. Having ruled his country for nearly twenty years, he abdicated in favour of his eldest son Gaston in 928. He attained immortality only in 954, under Korotiku's sponsorship." that is exactly th one thank you Giampaolo! >> Furthermore are there not two languages used by the renardois lupins? a 'upper class' one and a 'lower class language'? I always kind of interpereted those two as meaning the link could be expanded based on the Norman (French) conquest of England, originally two seperate cultures that eventually merged into modern times England, but in that/this timeframe there was/is still two distinct culture/linguistic groups. If I was ever to expand the history of Renardy that is the route I would take (not that I have any plans to do so). > > Indeed. The "upper class" language ("Renardois") is based on French, while the lower class language, "Lupin" is the ancestral language of the Lupins, composed of barks and howls :) Ys, o (great now 's' ar not working ethr!, hopfully I can finish thi bfore th rest goes! Argh!@!) it' lik th Norman conqust of nglnd only pacful (or is it???) and no battl of Hasting with Saimpt Clébard rprsnting th incoming cultur, Sampt Ralon rprsntnig th pacful mrging of th two groups, and th third most powrful (I forgt th name) rprsnting th original group. But isn't that third on also sort of a war patron? Prhaps it's not soo pacfull aftr all! Gecko -- _______________________________________________ Sign-up for your own FREE Personalized E-mail at Mail.com http://www.mail.com/?sr=signup Meet Singles http://corp.mail.com/lavalife ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 6 Mar 2003 04:30:19 +0800 From: Greg Weatherup Subject: Re: Cultures I should giv up on this computr alrady but I'v got som tim to kill still bfor my xam so I just hop this is intlligable. Asgor Ironfist wrote > Hi everyone! > Well, first of all, thanks everybody, it's very nice to fell welcome, thanks a lot =) > Er... Morphail? i think i met you before, at Kazaa... or am I mistake? Morpahil, arn't those you'v turnd into undad pawns supposd to kp thir concton to you a scrt? :) (I seem to hav th 's' back!) > About thyatian, yes, i already realised this connection between thyatian of thyatis and latin, thyatian of kerendas and italian, and thyatian of hattias and german. But in some text on Vaunts i read that Daro would be an thyatian dialect as well, and i think that daro would be english, right? Th MML seems split on wethr Daro is a mre dialect of Thyatian or a seperate (though heavily influenced) language in its own right. > And Slag is another thyatian dialect, but Cimarron, that speaks this language more than the other baronies (and nations of the SC) is very simmilar to the american far west (and all it's names are in english too). If your talking about place names, then keep in mind that cartographers try to strike a balance on place names between it's local name and it's better known name in the language of the place where the Atlas will be sold. For example, is it Germany, Alleman, Deutchland, or what? (or Brazil vs Brasil?) > And in Bellayne, there's a lot of english words and names, but Rakastaine would be more like japanese, i think (at leats, the alphabet is based on the japanaese ideograns), so Bellanish is unusuall. I liken the language to Romanji (I don't think that is spelled right, the method for writting Japanese Kanji in the Roman script). Plus that fits with the culture in my opinion. Gecko (Wow, I think the 'e' key is working better now, I only have to press it 3 times now!) -- _______________________________________________ Sign-up for your own FREE Personalized E-mail at Mail.com http://www.mail.com/?sr=signup Meet Singles http://corp.mail.com/lavalife ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 6 Mar 2003 04:52:10 +0800 From: Greg Weatherup Subject: Re: Cultures I have time for one more before my exam (still on this bad kyboard) Asgor Ironfist wrote > Hi again > Ok, they never put the "real" name of the Colony of the Horn (that would be Colônia do Chifre), or never translated Terra Leãoça (that would be... i'm not sure, but i think that it would be Lion-Jaguar Land, beacuse i think Leãoça is an contraction of Leão and Onça), keep in mind that a place name that merely sounds like a certain language can be very invocative in a players mind, sometimes even better! for example, If I give my players a quest to travel to a far off village named Wei Ping, There minds are already thinking of an oriental setting (one of those cases where the inability to seperate all of player vs Character knowledge is actually helpful). similarily with Terra Leãoça. > but even the names is in english in Cimarron (John of the Wain, for example). Despite this, sometimes i like to think that Threshold have this name because of the daro (threshold is so close to darokin...) I at first thought similarily, since it being rendered in English I broke it down into 'Thres' and 'Hold' which would indicate it grew up around a fortified strong point on the 'theshold' (sp?) of the border. But it actually is up a different vally than th pass to Darokin. > By the way, Rakastan leads me to another question, about Ochalea. All ochalean names makes me think that this would be an mystaran China (or Korea, i don't know the difference, sorry), but some of the texts on Vaunts about Ochalea makes me think that it would be like Japan... which one is the correct? Or none? Or both? yes, Ochalea as China (I used to think it was Korea or even indo-china, but officially it is M-China) has always been an oddball. No fan material has correctd th nconsistncis to my satisfction as yet. > In fact, i have an theory about this, i hope you don't mind if i put it here, hehehe. The original ochaleans would be sthokarian colonists, simmilar to the ethegarians. They start developing a more sedentary culture there, and some rakastas learned their culture. Then the alphatians conquered Ochalea, and this rakastas migrated to another place (pehaps Sind, and then Yazak Steppes?), and both human peoples started to live together and mix freely. So the original people of Ochalea never dissapeared, they have been there all the time. But, like Renardy, there's one upper class culture, with great alphatian influence, simmilar to the RW China, and another one, more simmilar to the ochalean original culture, simmilar to the RW Japan. In that has possibilitis making it similar to historic Manchu China..... > fact, i did it because one the players of my rpg group ask me to have an pc like Rurouni Kenshin, an samurai of the Meiji Revolution. So i changed a little the ochalean independence (it was more close to the Meiji revolution), and start to think about this idea that i just said... what do you think about it? Sorry if someone else already had this idea before and i'm here speaking if i had it first. I'd be interested in hearing how you usd the Meiji in your campaign. Gecko Exam time! -- _______________________________________________ Sign-up for your own FREE Personalized E-mail at Mail.com http://www.mail.com/?sr=signup Meet Singles http://corp.mail.com/lavalife ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 5 Mar 2003 23:48:58 -0500 From: Dan Eustace Subject: Re: weather > I would normally reply directly to you, but you didn't include an email... > sorry to all who are on the list and receiving this reply to Dan. > Anyway, to answer a few of your questions. Well, hopefully at least a few other people are interested. I know there was talk of diff. weather systems and an M-weather project that never got off the ground on the list a year or 2 ago. > We've had quite a demand for the F to C conversion so that might be coming > up in the next version. Great! Otherwise us Americans wouldn't know what the heck was going on! I work in science and have to deal w. degrees C on a daily basis, but it still isn't 2nd nature when thinking of temp. BTW, the conversion is F = (C*9/5)+32. > Wind is included only in the major sense. If for some reason, there is a > strong gale that would change things like sand or dust in the area. Perhaps > if your PC's are in the arctic snow and wind is making it unclear, then it > will be brought to your attention with special events icons and rules in the > table. That's too bad, as wind speed and direction would add alot, esp. for ships at sea, where travel is affected, and for missile fire. One more column with something like "SW10" or "N40" for wind direction and speed would be great. Or even broad categories like, Calm, Lt. breeze, Strong breeze, gale, etc. would also work well. Esp. if this was tied to an algorithim so that it wasn't just random. Imagine the PCs ship getting stuck in the doldrums around the equator, for instance... > As far as the disabled items, I regret to inform you that the coolest stuff > is with the disabled items. :-( > These allow you to not only make custom printable pages showing only the > information you want your PCs to know, but also the use of those slider > bars. They allow you to "contort" the weather in small ways to be hot and > cold, wet and dry, chaotic, etc. It's really cool when you get to try it, > and the full version is dropping in price really soon to 9.95.... YAY!!! Well I can wait for the real version for all the bells and whistles. Let me know when that price goes into effect, and consider it sold! > As far as the readme file goes... Go ahead and email me directly for it. > tech@faenworks.com > I can also send you some sample templates for other worlds such as Harn and > Dragonlance, if you want to check them out as examples. You should have one > good example already that is the GENERIC WORLD example. I found the readme files, and figured out how to play with the xml a bit. I made a rough Mystara template and it worked, but there's much more detail that I have to go thru! > Before I let this become too long, macro/cross locational weather systems > are allowed providing you add an extra area to the template to cover the two > areas. I think I should add a section to the read me for that. Thank you > for bringing this to our attention OK. Could you e-mail me privately with some more details on how and where to put this in the xml template? deustace@attbi.com Thanks. This program has some real potential. ------------------------------ End of MYSTARA-L Digest - 4 Mar 2003 to 5 Mar 2003 (#2003-65) *************************************************************