Markdoc

Oh, yeah they could - it tastes a lot worse. A lot. Cheers, Mark

Yeah, long ago, we worked out all the stuff we should carry with us, including such necessaries as "Spool of silver wire". You might laugh - but one night, some werewolves nearly ganked themselves charging us though a door with silver wire solidly anchored across it at neck height .... The only catch is that you required a team of bearers to carry it all. So one of my gaming buddies made a sketch of these fine henchmen ... Here's Bearer No. 4 ... cheers, Mark

Yeah, one thing I forgot to note: I've never been a fan of the whole "divine magic/arcane magic" shtick which as far as I know originated in D&D anyway. For me, magic is as magic does. In the game setting I referred to above, multiple religions have "divine magic" which they maintain was originally taught to the first priests by the gods, but it's still just magic. Anyone of sufficient skill can learn it and practice it, if they can get access to information or teaching on it. cheers, Mark

What they want is off-the-shelf content. Stuff that a busy GM can simply buy and run with. Sadly, that's exactly what Hero isn't. And of course, that's why I choose Hero for all of my games The only way I can see to square that particular circle is to give new GMs (or at least, GMs new to Hero) a tight nailed-down fantasy setting keyed off all the tropes most people are familiar with these days, and then, at the end, a series of short suggestion on how to customise/change that and convert content from other popular settings. cheers, Mark

I use a mix. In the last campaign I ran, religion was a major plot driver. The conventional religion had "distant gods" who in theory visited the world and interacted directly with humans, but who - in practice - never actually showed up (or at least hadn't done for centuries). A lot of religious practice started with stories like "Long ago, the Butterfly Girl was courted by 5 suitors in this village and she set them each 5 tasks. We honour this memory in the harvest festival, by the suitor's contest and bla, bla, bla." On the other hand, some cults worshiped what they claimed were aspects of the gods. Certainly someone - or something - occasionally answered their prayers in person. This caused a schism over exactly who or what was turning up at the ritual. At the climax of the campaign, the players ended up having to decide whether to free a being - god or demon? - from captivity, in the knowledge that doing so risked bringing down the religion that several of the PCs belonged to ... It all comes down to what you prefer as a GM, and what your story needs were. cheers, Mark

Clothes? Well, everyone except for the barbarians of course.

Oh, no argument there: we've just hit 11th level in our GestaltD20 game and my Cleric/warlock has become a flying, invisible, acid-spraying, magically-enhanced engine o' doom. In our pathfinder game, we've reached the point where we are designing our own personal demiplane, and discussing what speed we want time to run at. I was just pointing out that that was where you're going. If that's the game style you want, go for it! cheers, Mark

I do use the current encumbrance rules, but don't obsess too much about every last jot and tittle - a decent estimate of weight is enough, with some extra penalties tossed on for carrying ridiculously large or odd-shaped objects. The rules actually get most use when I look at what people are carrying and work out LTE cost: players quickly work out that if they carry heavy loads for very long, they get really tired, and it slows them down. At that point, they usually start dumping all but the essentials. cheers, Mark

See my other post in response to your question. The short version here is that I have allowed spell multipowers (with quite large reserves - over 90 points in my last campaign) without problem. On eimportant factor is not allowing players to build their own spells, because otherwise you will - guaranteed - get exactly what you described: a mage with better protection than the heavy fighter (and that's even if he doesn't use plate armour himself: nothing directly prevents him doing so, unless you as GM put some ground rules in place) who can also one-shot monsters. You haven't even plumbed the depths of despair yet. Think about that same mage, with Plate armour, a greatsword and both a force field AND a strength-boosting spell. Not only can he one-shot monsters that the big guy would have a hard time hurting, he can kick sand in fighter-guy's face at the same time. Basically, it's bad enough that mages get a wide range of powers that (in a fantasy game) are only available to them, but they can really rock the game when they also take the same toys the other guys get and then enhance them with magic. cheers, Mark

Just based on my own experience. 1, Yeah, it's relatively easy to overpower defences: combat in FH can be pretty deadly and I think that's OK. That said, you don't want to go overboard. In 5th Ed. Deadly Blow was way, way overpowering, and as a GM, I banned it as soon as I read the rules and saw how it worked. It's OK to allow extra damage (in my mind, mandatory, if you want meleers to be able to compete with spell-slingers), but it should not be so cheap and useful that it becomes a must-have. 6th Ed. Deadly Blow works the way I have been doing it for years and is good and balanced. 2. Combat luck is good - but you don't want to go overboard with that either: it's relatively cheap to make yourself nigh-invulnerable to mundane weapons - especially if you let it stack with armour (as a GM, I no longer allow that). Think about it: when the city guard shouts "Stop or we'll shoot!" do you want your PCs to just flip them the bird because they know that a boring old crossbow has little chance of doing more than stun them? 3. Neither of those changes affect spellcasters. You say you want a lot of magic - but do you want all PCs to be spellcasters? If you don't tie magic down somehow, that's where you'll most likely end up. I allow multipowers (in fact, other power frameworks as well, like VPPs) and I don't set active point limits. But OTOH, I use other means to prevent spell-casters ruling the roost. It's important to remember that Hero system started off as Champions. If you let the players design their own spells, and give them free rein to cast spells off their own END, what you are going to end up with is a bunch of mini-superheroes flying around, not anything that looks like a traditional fantasy game. If that's what you want - cool! I've run games like that sometimes. But if that's not what you have in mind .... beware. As an example, a 45 point multipower will give your spell caster enough oomph to cast a 3d6 RKA. Why use a bow, when this outclasses almost any archer (and you can use a shield while casting it)? And you can build much gnarlier attacks if you want to get fussy. It'll also give enough oomph to build a 20 PD/10 ED, 0END forcefield, which will stop pretty much any mundane attack cold - and you can have it up all day! Add to that the fact that with 45 points you can fly, turn invisible, entangle your opponent, etc all for a fairly small investment to add each extra power ... Sure, you can't do all of those things at once, but you can usually do any two or three of them at a reduced level of effectiveness (for example, 2 points in flight to hover out of reach of those pesky melee types, a 6PD forcefield over the top of your mundane armour to blunt any stray arrows, and a 2d6RKA, +1 STUN multiple attack), with the option to go nova whenever you want. Unless you are a masochist, why play a melee or rogue type? All you are going to end up doing is being blinded, entangled, zapped, etc. Unless you set grounds that provide some limit to magic, you have the problem that D&D has, only it's exacerbated by the fact that there is no practical limit to how many spells the casters can use each day. cheers, Mark

Another possibility is demons gain power from the suffering of a soul. You can squeeze a bit out from earthly suffering which is why demons just generally promote it, but think how much more you can get, if you can ensnare a soul, drag it off to hell and then torture it eternally! Sorry about the fire, bub, it's nothin' personal, but I've got places to go, things to do, and I need the power. Angels, on the other hand gain power from beauty and joy - with the catch that unlike Demons, they can't imprison souls, because, really, that's not so joyful. They have to collaborate with souls - which means the good gods (and the angels that serve them) work with volunteers in the great divine war, not slaves or servants. cheers, Mark

As for the original poster, being a combat monster is a good thing , but it's a thing with a built-in ceiling. If you are already hitting most targets, adding extra points into combat skill levels does not get you very much. If you are already one-shotting most targets, boosting your damage output is not going to add much utility either. It might be worth thinking about your character and what else you could see as relevant. It doesn't have to be non-combat, if combat is your shtick. One thing I am fond of is combat tricks - think of them as "feats" like in that other game system. So for example, buying an autofire attack, allowing you to hit multiple foes at once, or a triggered attack allowing you to block an attack and immediately counter with an attack ... that sort of thing. Other useful skills are defensive talents like blindsense - an innate combat sense that allows you to respond to attackers, even if you can't see them They build on your character's strengths, but also add a little flexibility. Options are always good. cheers, Mark

Actually, I'd disagree. Many people think that high SPD is appropriate for rogues or swashbucklers (and it is) but it's just as appropriate for mages or other archetypes (and just as useful). Yeah, you tire out faster in a fight if your build doesn't take END use into account, but more actions typically mean the fight is over faster. I'd rather run out of END than BOD any day. This is especially true in Fantasy Hero where fights are often over quite quickly, and taking BOD damage a very likely outcome. In my last campaign, it was rare for fights to last more than a couple of turns (though, of course, there were always exceptions). In the campaign before that it was rare for fights to go more than one turn (pitched battles being an exception). Running out of END was rarely a problem, outside those few cases that involved prolonged chases, etc., or characters with prodigious END use. I think the connection of SPD with rogue/swashbuckler types is a hangover from the days when DEX was directly connected to SPD. Now that they are uncoupled, extra SPD could just as easily reflect a cool, swift intellect, as swift springy limbs. cheers, Mark

The propheciomat - drop a gold coin in, and see if you are the chosen one!

No, it doesn't work out any differently (cost or effectiveness-wise) if the power is bought as an advantage on STR, because the way the system works now, you simply take the cost out of what was paid for STR, so to speak (or for that matter, any other power). Basically, when adding an advantaged power to an unadvantaged power, you prorate the advantages across both. So essentially, if you use the 5E method or the alternate 6E method, you are already adding the advantage to STR This is really only an issue in-game with STR, since typically you don't add other powers together, but in theory you could. It's perfectly legal to buy a partially limited or advantaged power. For example, I've seen powers like 8d6 EB and +8d6 EB only vs undead. That's pretty straightforward - it's an 8d6 EB normally and 16d6 vs undead. But what if it was bought as: 8d6 EB and +5d6 AP EB (only vs undead) ? The standard response is to convert the whole thing into a 10 1/2 d6 AP EB. That's not perfect, but trying to apply the attack partially against defences is just a nightmare. I know, I've tried As for volatility, you are right: it's only really important when you have to get through defences. If there are no defences, and only the total rolled counts then low rolls balance out high rolls and very low rolls balance out very high rolls. I've just added a quick sketch graph to make the point. This shows the effect of defence on effect. A normal attack with low volatility is shown in blue, and a high volatility attack is shown in red. The area under the graph represents your average damage (DPS, if you want to think of it that way). I've indicated possible defences with dotted lines - low defences in the upper graph (slightly below average damage for both attacks), higher defences in the lower graph (slightly above average damage for both attacks). Once you take defences into account only the area under the graph and to the right of the dotted line count for damage. What people tend to think is that the effect of volatility really only matters at the extreme end of the scale. That's not true. As you can see from the graphs, when defences are low, both attacks get a lot of damage through, but the attack with low volatility gets more. But as soon as defences move into the mid to high range, the difference shrinks dramatically - defences don't have to go up very much for the more volatile attack to be more effective. It happens long before the point where the normal attack is struggling to get through defences. It seems counterintuitive, but the math is fairly straightforward. Basically, volatile attacks are simply less sensitive to the amount of defences, and this is true across a broad range. cheers, Mark

Hi Lucius, I'll answer both those posts in one go. First, the "nuclear tip" option. Yes, as it stands, a big STR and a small HKA is the way to go (efficiency-wise). Earlier versions reduced this problem by prorating attacks and adding in extra rules (like" you can't do more than double the KA" etc) That's still an option in 6E, but was dropped as the standard approach, because it was more complicated - and the complications is in part an outgrowth of the fact that we have two different mechanisms in play. Make "killing" an advantage and all those extra rules, and special situations go away. The difference between the guy who spent 10 points on a killing attack + 50 points on STR vs the guy who spent 50 points on a killing attack and 10 points on STR would not go away, but that's buried deeply in the Hero system: you have the same effect if you had two characters with 10 points on an AP attack + 50 points on STR vs 50 points on an AP attack and 10 points on STR. In this case, the only benefit of "killing as an advantage" is simplified calculations and fewer odd problems with things like skills and DCs. You do get differences once you start to add limitations, etc to the ancillary attack, but at core, an advantage is an advantage. As to the other point, allowing normal attacks to use the killing attack die roll, I've actually considered this in the past (and, of course, done the math ) The simple summary, is that the more volatile approach is almost always better: you'd have to be a mug not to choose it. If it were an option, essentially all attacks would be rolled that way. The reason for this, as Treb pointed out before, is that volatility is good (plus, you'd get more BOD, on average and therefore better KNB, more smashiness, etc). Part of the reason for the superiority of volatile attacks is easy enough to see: you get a better chance at a high effect number. But there's a second part to the equation, which is not so easily seen (and therefore often overlooked): that your effect number (ie: damage) has to cross a certain threshold to mean anything at all. Doing 35 STUN sounds like it's better than 30, right? Except if you are facing off against a foe with 40 defence, 35 is exactly as good as 30: both attacks do nothing. The key point to understand is that it's not how much damage you do: it's how much damage goes over defences. What that means in actual play terms is that attacks with a higher average and low volatility are good for whacking foes whose defenses you easily penetrate, but fare worse against tougher targets than attacks with lower average damage, but higher volatility. If you graph the outcomes, the differences become instantly obvious, but you can sum up the effect by saying "Attacks with higher averages and lower volatility are good against opponents that you can easily beat". cheers, Mark

I agree it's a matter of taste. I dislike the fact that as it works now, KA is the go-to tool for stunning tough enemies. I also dislike the fact that it has a game mechanic unlike everything else in the game, but that more philosophical than practical . But I think it's a matter of perspective: I don't really see that killing attacks should be a way of doing BOD, so much as an attack that should mess up soft targets. If they do that, then they certainly have a role in the toolbox. It's a pretty specialized role, but given that most people don't naturally have rDEF, one with broad applicability. Of course I also like the idea of allowing generally applicable modifiers for "Does more STUN" and "Does more BOD", to allow us to fine-tune attacks even more. cheers, Mark

You're right - the average stun from a KA *is* lower. But the volatility is so much greater - even at 3x multiple - than a normal attack, that your chance of getting a Stunned result or a KO is very often higher - and that math's been done repeatedly also. Basically, the average STUN output of a normal attack is higher than a KA, but the maximum reliable output is much lower. The actual numbers are in the post above. So under current rules, if your target's defences are low enough that a normal attack is getting a good amount of stun through, there's a pretty good chance that it's a better bet than an equivalent DC killing attack. But if you are only getting a little STUN through or none, with a normal attack then you are much, much better off with a KA, because your upper range is much higher. Does that matter? Well, look at the example I gave above - if you're firing a 12 DC normal attack at guy with 30 DEF, you're going to be routinely leaking 12 STUN through on each hit. With a killing attack, you're not actually going to get any through on an average roll. So the normal attack looks pretty good. But unless the guy has a puny CON, you are never going to stun him. Even if he has a 20 CON, your chance of rolling enough to stun him is about 0.015%, meaning maybe 1 time in 6500. With a 12DC killing attack your average damage is lower - but you'll stun the guy about 8% of the time or about 1 time in 12. That's the Stun lottery in action - except unlike real lotteries, you actually have a pretty good chance of pulling out a winner: because if your target gets stunned and spends a phase at 0 DCV, that's often a fight-ender. cheers, Mark

Treb.s' suggestion of simply making "killing" a modifier on normal attacks similar to AVAD (and rolling normal d6's) has a lot of merit, I think. I (and others in the past) floated it back in the pre-6E threads, but it's solidified due to changes made in 6E, and I am going to play test it in my next campaign: we're moving from 5E to 6E, so one more small change won't make much difference. Here's the plan. 1. Drop "killing attack" as a seperate power. "Killing attack" simply becomes "applies vs resistant defence" - which is already covered by the advantage AVAD. 2. Rejig the costs of AVAD, so that they actually reflect utility, and simplify the rules. Many of the odd things in the way AVAD works are due to the need to deal with the fact that killing attacks are already a "sort of, but not quite AVAD": if you remove KA as a separate power, AVAD suddenly gets much simpler. The numbers I have played around with are: Move up one step on the table: +1/2 Move up two steps on the table: +1 Move three steps up on the table: +2 NND goes back to being a special advantage: +1, all or nothing, does stun only. It was always an awkward fit in AVAD, anyway, since it often applies to "defences" that are not actually defences ... which was kind of the point of NND All of the "special rules" about how AVAD attacks become stun only, that killing attacks don't follow the AVAD rule exactly, etc, ... go away. AVAD attacks don't become STUN only, and they apply both STUN and BOD vs their chosen defence. So a "killing attack" simply applies against a resistant form of the same defence (a +1/2 advantage). I've run the math with attacks of up to 100 active points, vs defences from 0-20 non-resistant, + 0-20 resistant. If we look at blast, "killing" attacks since they now use the "roll a d6, total is stun, 1 is 0 BOD, 2-5 is 1, 6 is 2" always do less STUN and less BOD in total than a normal attack of the same active points. They are exactly as volatile as normal attacks (because they are normal attacks). That doesn't sound like a winner. However, when you run the math, the results are interesting. When the ratio of resistant to non-resistant defences is low, "killing" blast usually does more BOD through defences than a normal blast, and sometimes more STUN, but as resistant defences increase normal is better at getting stun through. Basically, if you make "killing" a +1/2 advantage, it comes to the same cost as AP, and performs similarly. But how about other attacks than just blast? Well, STR costs the same and works against the same defences as Blast, so no problems there. HA and TK also work against the same defences, so again, the outcome will be the same. Mental blast is not the same - it does no BOD and it already acts against an uncommon defence. So this change does not affect it. All the other attack powers either don't work against defences at all (Change environment, Entangle, etc) or work against uncommon defences and don't in any case do BOD damage. It would cost (for example) the same for Flash attack to go up against resistant Flash Defence than against Flash Defence to an unusual sense group, and frankly, that's not a significant change in my opinion. Finally what about moving a normal blast to work against uncommon or rare defence? That would cost +2 for for a rare defence, but under my suggestion, it does BOD. So compared to current rules, it would be slightly more expensive than to do STUN damage, and slightly cheaper to do BOD damage. However, if doing BOD to your target is the goal, it's exactly the same price as adding penetrating under the current rules. That just by itself, seems to suggest we are in the right ballpark. Since Penetrating killing attacks have not been a problem in most games, it also suggests to me that it's not unbalanced. With regard to moving Blast to working against Mental Defence, that would be +1, making the basic cost the same as Mental Blast. Unlike Mental blast, it does BOD, which seems like a clear advantage, but also unlike mental blast, it works against DCV (a limitation) and doesn't get the no range and partially indirect advantages. It seems reasonably balanced. In short, this approach offers several advantages (from my point of view). 1. It removes the problem of killing attacks being best if you want to stun the target. With this approach, it's mostly good for attacking targets with less resistant defence and doing BOD to them: ie: for killing. 2. It simplifies the whole adding KA to normal attacks thing: now they use the same mechanism - you treat "killing" like any other advantage. You can pro-rate damage, you can have attacks which mix killing and normal damage. 3. It simplifies the system as a whole: there's no need to have two completely different mechanisms for "I hit him with a club". and 4. Especially for Hugh - it offers the flexibility to do something he asked about a while back - to be able to convert a single power between normal and killing damage. With this approach, a simple variable special effect would do it. The one potential negative that I can see is that it becomes slightly easier to bypass high PD/ED and inflict BOD damage via this approach with a few dice of attack vs an uncommon defence. I don't see that as outweighing the advantages for the following reasons: a: It compensates somewhat for removing the ability to do more BOD via the volatile killing mechanism - I've seen a 9DC KA roll 16 or more BOD plenty of times. I've never seen anyone roll 16 BOD on a 9DC normal attack. b: It's relatively cheap to counter powers using AVAD to deliver BOD: 5 points of non-resistant mental defence would largely eliminate the BOD from a 50-point Blast vs mental defence. My suggested change might lead to a few more PCs having a few points in Mental defence and Power defence, though. c: AVAD is already an exclamation point power - I'd watch out for any powers using it just as carefully as I already do. So, what do you think? Is there anything I've missed? cheers, Mark

Drop me a PM with your email then, and I can send you the whole package in a couple of .pdf's. cheers, Mark

Well, it's a bit embarrassing to pimp my own work, but I wrote up and posted a complete campaign a while back that might help. The basic storyline is that the PCs are a bunch of minor retianers of a local lord, who's having border problems with his neighbours. The game starts with them having several minor jobs, uncovering some minor plots, and gaining teh eye of the lord. Then then war breaks out: in the final pitched battle, the lord is defeated (and killed) along with almost all of his senior retainers. It falls to the PCs to get the lord's young heir to safety, and then later, to help him raise an army and reconquer his fief. The game was intentionally low magic, though magic does crop up more and more often as the game goes on. Once the fief is reconquered, the PCs - now the lord's senior retainers - uncover the fact that the whole thing was part of a larger plot, that threatens the whole land, and they have to go off and stop it. It was designed as a campaign to take PCs from 100 point starting characters through to 300 point Big Damn Heroes, and is written up to be usable straight out of the metaphorical box, with NPCs, maps, etc. There's two catches: it's set in fantasy feudal Japan, and it's written for 4th Ed. It's not hard to scrub the serial numbers off however, especially since the first story arc in the campaign originated in my fantasy campaign anyway, where the setting was pseudo-viking (just assume Huscarl = Samurai, and off you go ). Changing from 4th Ed. to 6th Ed. is trivial - most of the NPCs can simply be used as-is. So it should be easy enough to adapt to a pseudo-medieval setting. Anyway, if that sounds interesting, just say.

I think it's important not to over-think this too much: I don't think it's good idea to add complexity for the same of complexity. We also want to beware restrictions/additions that don't add extra realism, but actually detract from it. For example, a rule suggesting that a buckler gives no protection against ranged attacks, goes directly against contemporary accounts stating flatly that they were. Those of us growing up in the firearms age easily forget that an arrow (or even a sling bullet) in flight travels slowly enough to be seen (and deflected). I've watched people doing it and it's a heck of lot easier to deflect an arrow with a buckler than with a spear or sword. A buckler doesn't give great passive defence against missiles, but it's still much better than nothing - a very small, buckler-like shield, was after all, the primary defence against missiles for many ancient light infantry. The shield wall idea is interesting, but the primary advantage of a shield wall is that it stopped an opponent getting at your unshielded side. One possible house rule (already mentioned above) is that a shield only protects to the front and left/front side: I already use this in my own games. However, we know in some cases that people overlapped shields (and closed up ranks) to provide greater protection - particularly against missiles - so some sort of bonus seems appropriate. On the other hand, we know also that they didn't habitually fight like that - presumably because it was too crowded - so there should be some sort of off-setting penalty. cheers, Mark

One simple solution that came up last time we discussed this, is that you could split up the DCV/OCV bonuses for shields. My suggestion was that the total was +3 CSL but distributed differently for different shields. So buckler-type-shields give only +1 DCV, but a +2 OCV when actively blocking: a buckler's not that good for passive protection against incoming arrows. It's actually designed for active defence. In contrast, a big heavy shield like a Hoplon or Scutum gives a +3 DCV, but +0 OCV when blocking - it's too heavy and cumbersome to move swiftly in response to a specific attack, but it gives you a pretty big bonus to passive defence, even in melee. A shield like a viking-style shield which combined both functions, gave you a +2 to DCV and a +1 OCV when actively blocking. In addition, the DCV bonus can be applied as penalty when shield bashing (I can't recall if that's an actual rule or one of our long-term house rules ....) As for other things, like materials, I haven't bothered to do more than use DEF/BOD for breaking things with the proviso that (like armour) shields are designed to take punishment and thus have 2x the BOD that you would expect from their mass. It's still not unusual in our games for some guy with a big axe to smash your shield to flinders in pretty short order. Likewise the chance that your weapon can get stuck in a shield: that's not unique to persian wicker shields. We know it happened with Roman Scuta, Korean tower shields, Viking shields, and (I am guessing) every other kind of shield. One thing I would strongly, strongly recommend against is allowing shields to add to armour. We actually played with this rule for a while and it turned out that an armoured guy with a shield was almost impossible to hurt, unless you had significantly enhanced attacks (magic swords, big-ass energy blasts, giant-hurled boulders, etc). We allowed heavy shields to add up to 6 DEF (on an activation roll), which doesn't sound completely unreasonable ... until you realise that if the shield's in play, a guy in plate with a heavy shield and moderate human PD won't take any BOD from a 20d6 EB and odds are good he'll bounce a 5d6 killing attack with little harm. We found that stopping a PC with plate armour, a heavy shield and 8 PD (not uncommon) was like dealing with someone in terminator armour: most ordinary weapon attacks simply bounced off. Forget pathetic weapons like arbalests or heavy longbows ... if shields add to PD, you need ballistas to reliably take down armoured infantry and every fight ends with lots of unconscious but unwounded enemy. Unless you plan on increasing damage from all weapons as well, it's just not a good idea. cheers, Mark

Sure - but there's a huge difference between a mountain environment in a tropical, temperate or northern region (there's even a difference in what constitutes a mountain environment at different latitudes). Beach sand dunes? Even though you can get some whopping big beach dune areas, the largest of those barely qualifies as an ecosystem (sure it does for bugs, small mammals and microbes, but we're talking "large enough to sustain things the PCs will interact with") Lord Liaden has a point. A beach - even a good beach with swimming - and a snowy mountain can both exist within an easy drive of each other, but that does not create a pair of climates or environments capable of sustaining wholly different cultures and life forms (or at least it doesn't on Earth). I think the confusion between terrain and climate is maybe what caused some games to have stuff all mashed together really close without any thought of how they interact with each other. That's why I said that California has the same range of climates as Greece - which also has sunny beaches, thick woods and snowcapped mountains - plus desert (Greece has bare dry rocky places where almost nothing grows, but nothing big enough to be called a desert). It cuts both ways: there's no reason for "the Desert Kingdom" not to have snowy mountains or lush jungles within its boundaries (as well as plenty of desert), but typically the RPG desert kingdom is all-desert, all the time. Of course, the jungle kingdom, is all jungle, all the time, and sometimes they're right next to each other, with no intervening environmental zones. Doesn't that strike you as odd? What's really odd, is that it's so unnecessary: I've never encountered a game world that mandated the world be physically small outside an on-line MMORPG (there it obviously has to be small enough to cross in real-time, if you don't utilize portals, etc. I can't see people paying a monthly fee to spend months crossing the steppes, for example). Why not space things out? Of course, if you want weird magical terrain, that's a whole 'nother ball game. Indeed, in our current D20 game, we've just about reached the point where the PCs can start to create their own small universes (something that apparently caught our GM off guard: it seems that she's never had PCs want to do that before). But heck, if you could make your own private universe, who wouldn't? But that's not the problem here. Of course, the same thought patterns (or lack of thought patterns) that goes into fantasy geography also goes into fantasy cultures, with the same results. You get monolithic cultures spanning huge areas, which abruptly cut over into totally different cultures sitting right alongside. All very strange. cheers, Mark