Wheel of Time MU(SH|X)
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Sounds great. As long as I can RP channelling saidar (or saidin, depending on the time period) in the not-too-distant-future, all is well.
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There were just SO MANY chapters where little to nothing actually happened. I don't know. Maybe Jordan was trying to do subtle world-building in various ways, but far too often things just ended up exceedingly boring and I was almost begging to reach a point where things went somewhere.
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@yyrqun said in Wheel of Time MU(SH|X):
Sounds great. As long as I can RP channelling saidar (or saidin, depending on the time period) in the not-too-distant-future, all is well.
Why would the time period determine whether you RP channeling saidar or saidin?
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One thing that endlessly frustrated me about Wheel of Time was that the main character established his Male Channeler School, probably the second most powerful group/organisation after the White Tower.
Then he just ignored them and left them alone for months at a time to do whatever the fuck. Despite the fact that he could teleport. Despite the fact that dozens of them were able to teleport themselves and thus could have established communications between his wildly disparate holdings and nominal allies. Just popping in to do a double check and supervision pass every few days for an hour could have made the whole series infinitely less head impact against wall inducing.
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@arkandel Because many games don't allow male channelers (or non-Darkfriend ones) until after the Black Tower comes into existence.
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@wildbaboons said in Wheel of Time MU(SH|X):
And this still is something I'm considering doing. I'm on the fence between rolling out an Evennia (since its Python and I want to learn that anyways for professional reasons)...
plz no
Unless you intend to be super diligent about documentation. Having to fumble through a bunch of shitty help files sucks the fun right out of a game.
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@seraphim73 I guess I hadn't thought of that possibility. That's probably because it sounds like a very bad way to design a game if they're making one of the major, unique archetypes in the setting literally unplayable.
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@krmbm Documentation would be needed no matter what I end up choosing.
@Arkandel Without the Black Tower they are a rather unplayable archtype thematically as it is or at least a very difficult character to play well in a cooperative environment.
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@wildbaboons C'mon, there are lots of possibilities!
- Darkfriends (as noted)
- Black Tower
- Male Aes Sedai in the Age of Legends
- Male channelers in general with a cleansed Saidin and/or following the final book.
- False Dragons in general. Just because your character is destined to go mad and die in a couple of years it doesn't mean you can't play them
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@arkandel Lots of possibilities, but not sure if I'd feel comfortable playing a male channeller in the Third Age if I had to go mad, or swear allegiance to the Dark
In fact, think I would probably be an Aes Sedai anyway. The monastic nature of their organisation and the nuance of the Ajahs interests me more than the militaristic Asha'man, but that's just a personal preference.I do think a Fourth Age setting would be best, though, now that all of the books are done. The legacies of the main characters would be there, but they'd mostly all be in the distant past. Plus, there'd be a lot of room for dramatic upheaval and change in the world, and as you said, male channellers will likely be a popular concept. Lots of material to work with, such as:
- Aviendha's vision of the future and the Seanchan threat. Perhaps her attempting to change the future would affect some things, but not everything -- so there's a general plot to work with, but also one that's potentially open-ended.
- Daes Dae'mar: perhaps the Cairhienin wanting to break free of Andor and scheming as to who'd be best on the throne. In Andor itself, perhaps the symbolic tradition of female-only inheritance for the royals would be contested now that saidin is cleansed.
- The role of the Asha'man in the Fourth Age, and seeing the Black Tower when it's more like a Tower instead of a farmhouse.
- Changes in the White Tower such as having female Warders, Red Ajah who secretly still oppose the Asha'man for some reason, and a larger pool of novices etc. now that women older than teenagers aren't turned away.
- How Aiel society would change after the events in the novels.
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@yyrqun I was considering that as well, but wasn't sure what the reception would be for folks looking to get more the feel of the books themselves and the absence of the Dark One/Shadowspawn/etc as the big bad to go up against. Quick brainstorming of the idea was making Shara an unplayable faction (not enough info on them anyways) to set them up as the Others and some other sort of evil like Mordeth establishing itself.
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@wildbaboons Perhaps it would be jarring to some, but IIRC most big WoT games in the past used mirror-worlds, which have their own issues. Instead of the Trakands and Damodreds you get other houses in their place, and you have to learn the divergences instead of just jumping into the theme.
Again there'd be some issues with a game where people play NPCs around the time of the books, as it'd mostly be reacting to the big offscreen changes that players wouldn't usually have a role in; the most important and powerful Aes Sedai would always be canon, etc.
So I think the future would be a rather unique thing, especially because afaik there haven't been any WoT games released since the books' completion, so the Fourth Age has never fully been on the table before.
WRT the Dark... yes, that'd definitely be the biggest factor holding back the Fourth Age. I imagine there could be some bitter Darkfriends still hoping to break the Wheel, but their threat would be much smaller. But hopefully having a raw human conflict alongside the new issues mentioned above, would be enough for the playerbase.
Shara did always seem more like the militant isolationist sort than invaders, but I think something could definitely be done about them being absent from the Dragon's Peace. I did always envision Seanchan as the aggressors, but that would probably only work if Mat and Tuon's child was the Kylo Ren of this world...
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@yyrqun The Dragon's Peace will fall apart once the Dragon is out of the picture. I think there's a lot of room to create a kickass political game with all the nations picking up their pieces, some more destroyed than others, all trying to gain the upper hand in this brave new world.
Shara would make for some good NPC antagonists, as would factions within the Seanchan Empire.
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Rumour was that Jordan always intended an outrigger novel to follow the main WoT books, but which would follow Mat and Tuon in Seandar.
That's a setting I could get behind. Lots of intrigue, monsters, political upheaval (do the daes dae'mar gain freedom? What about captured Aes Sedai who had been taken back already?). It's different and far enough away from Randland that you're left with lots of opportunities to create some cool stories.
The only challenge is that you might need a Mat or Tuon from time to time, since the Empress does play a big role in Seanchan society. But, you could get around that with emits and so forth, and then have people have to deal with her Voice or whatever.
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@dontpanda Having played on WoT for longer than I care to admit, I can't say having book characters around as key figures seems like a good idea to me any more.
They can add flavor and act as NPCs, but they can also very quickly turn PCs into their sidekicks.
- He who takes offense when not intended is a fool. He who takes offense when intended is a greater fool.
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@arkandel Yep. I agree entirely.
I should have said, "IF you wanted to have a Mat or Tuon around, that's a challenge." I see how the way I worded it "might be" could have led someone to conclude I thought they should be around. I do not.
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Out of the ideas i have had none of them had involved repeating the time frame of the books, mostly they had been before, though the idea of after is also intriguing.
There are other issues to deal with though, such as the channeler/non-channeler imbalance and everything that comes with that.
It does also raise an issue of setting.. if it is set after the books end then the game does not necessarily need to be set in one location, it can easily be spread all over the place with Gateways providing easy, instantaneous travel from one place to another either through NPCs or just automated Gateway stations setup with PCs to provide travel around ala space game shuttle systems. It would still make things easier if it WAS focused on one location though
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@wildbaboons Before would definitely be interesting, too.
One solution could be to have a quota on channelers or restrict them in other ways like applications, probationary periods... but that is a bit strict seeing as how magic is core to the theme. A hard question, since the best Bladesmaster is nothing next to the best Aes Sedai.
Gateways would be an interesting device, though it'd probably be best to have some permanent hubs no matter the time period. Caemlyn and Tar Valon being the most crucial and then depending on other factors, Cairhien (for some more political RP), or Tarabon/Illian/Seandar (if a Seanchan invasion is a focus). Or an Aiel hub if Shara is important; no doubt Aiel will be a popular culture, too.
Having a lot more time pass ICly might also be good for cutting down travel times, but also because there will no doubt be people who want to start out as Novices and become Aes Sedai but don't want to wait 20 RL years...
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Here are some things I consider essential to a WoT game. By its nature, the list is of course subjective.
- The channeling system; it's the coolest thing about the setting, after all.
- Politics. It's a big part of the original books - the Dragon Reborn took like ten books to get all these nations to work together even in the face of their own complete annihilation.
- Non-channeling niches. The second coolest part about the books are the fighting systems - the Flame and the Void, Warders and Far Dareis Mai, archers and sword-breakers, all that stuff.
- Prophecies. It's a Wheel of Time because things keep happening and cryptic things are destined to occur again, but no one quite knows how until after they do. I think a strong metaplot should be a given.
- Bad guys. We had some kickass ones introduced in the books both in terms of characters (the Forsaken were an amazing touch) but also the Black Ajah, darkfriends not knowing each others' identities, constant paranoia about who is one, etc.
I think if a game can retain and use these factors it will succeed, but I'll add one more that's MU* specific:
- Retaining as many book elements as possible. Sure, a game could go off script completely ("we'll place this in the Second Age, all the Houses are different, the Ajahs are different, there are no Warders, the Aiel are still getting formed...") and maybe it'd be super cool, but then you lose the instant access a book reader has to this stuff. You lose playable archetypes that got players wanting to play there in the first place.
I'd personally either place a MU's timeline in the period of the books or basically right afterwards while the dust has yet to settle.
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I love the WoT universe. They were the very first fantasy books I read, and they became my gateway to reading for pleasure in English, as I couldn't wait for book 2 to be translated into Norwegian, and picked up the English version. But when I reread the books a few years ago it was obvious they could've use way better editing. Jordan started to get pretty repetitive in his writing, too. There are only so many references to women with their fists on their hips glowering I could take before it felt like I aught to do a drinking game.
Anyway, if I were to set a game in this world, I'd probably do it either 1) After the books, or 2) during the rise of a False Dragon sometime in the past.
