If this topic doesn't get me kicked off these forums, nothing will. ;)

It's not that I don't like Hyperborea -- quite the contrary! -- it's that I like the AS&SH system bits well enough that I want to use them with just about everything.

Case in point: if I used AS&SH to run, say, a Forgotten Realms campaign, how'd you handle demihuman characters? I'm inclined to extrapolate from AD&D 1e but I'd love to know whether anyone's done it in the past and how'd you handle the Half-Orc Cataphracts and Gnome Pyromancers.

Hello everyone, I'm still around.

I'm a big fan of the stronghold/domain endgame as detailed in BECMI/RC D&D and more recently, ACKS. Probably harkens back to the emulation of Conan's career from thief and reaver to warlord and king, but I digress.

One of the things I love about AS&SH, like AD&D 1e, is that it makes provisions for PCs building strongholds and attracting followers at high levels. There's even a mass combat system and a projected income for each inhabitant of your budding domain.

However, also like AD&D 1e, there are no explicit guidelines for actually building, running and mantaining a stronghold and/or the surrounding domain.

I'd love to know, first, whether anyone's actually had high-level PCs build their mighty steadfasts in Hyperborea.

Second, regardless of whether that's happened or not, how'd you handle this. Would you extrapolate from an existing system (like BECMI/RC, ACKS or An Echo, Resounding from Sine Nomine Publishing), or would you just wing it as needed?

I'm going full Beyond The Black River with AS&SH orcs. Orcust is a ruined temple, a placed of worship for the ancient, boar-headed god of hate and murder, Gru'umsh, whose name and worship is taboo amidst all other Pict tribes. One down-on-its-luck tribe stumbled into the ruins and erected boar-headed totems; when they started sacrificing captives, their shaman started growing fat and porcine; the first Demon Boar. Others joined his horrific metamorphosis and within a yeah the first of the Orc were born.

mabon5127 wrote:

Too funny. I just introduced Mitra to my campaign.

I mostly substitute Apollo for Mitra because of the Howardian resonance. Seriously considering having an enclave founded by a lost Roman legion somewhere in my Hyperborea, and have them be Mithraic worshippers. Now that'd be a nice breeding ground for Paladins; trained by Roman centurions and called to purge Hyperborea of its evil by the Unconquered Sun!

Maezar wrote:

A strange artifact could create paladins, reconstituting in them a knowledge which engenders ultimate dedication tenets of a forgotten faith. I'm envisioning beams of golden light scintillating from within as one is inducted into the Fellowship of the Found.

Maybe a knightly order of Keltic warriors who guard and drink from a mythic chalice, from which a martyred prophet from a distant land drank on the eve of his execution?

What races do they hail from?

What gods do they worship?

I love the Paladin class across every edition of D&D and related RPGs, but I have a hard time wrapping my head around the concept of a do-gooder warrior empowered by gods of light and justice, in a world as grim and gods-forsaken as Hyperborea.

Hi everyone, I'm Gus. I use this nickname (The Butcher) over at RPGnet and theRPGsite also.

I live in Brazil, which means I'll probably never get a boxed set at a sane price (shipping is more expensive than the boxed set itself), and I hate myself for it.  I'm currently looking for excuses to visit the US and pick up a boxed set without paying $60 shipping for a $50 game. Meanwhile, I make do with the PDF.

I started out as a wide-eyed 12-year-old with the 1991 D&D Introductory Game (black box with red dragon vs. lone axe-swinging barbarian type), moved on to the D&D RC three months later, and I haven't really stopped gaming ever since.

Besides AS&SH, I'm partial to B/X and BECMI/RC D&D, LL, ACKS, AD&D 1e and Castles & Crusades. Outside the D&D-sphere I've read, played and enjoyed Call of Cthulhu, Runequest (6e rocks!), Traveller (Classic and Mongoose), WFRP (1e and 2e), World of Darkness (old and new), Conan (Mongoose d20), Savage Worlds (several great settings) and Eclipse Phase. And right now Numenera's looking really good too... as you can imagine, I spend a fair bit of my free time and disposable outcome reading, playing and debating RPGs.

I have yet to run AS&SH but I'm really looking forward to. I should be wrapping up an OD&D/S&W dungeon crawl within the next few weeks and starting a long-promised CoC game. After that, who knows? I may yet drag my players' asses towards the jagged black peaks and mist-shrouded canopies of ancient, wicked Hyperborea.

There's an interesting.

For Samurai in Hyperborea I'd use Cataphract (samurai, I believe I've read somewhere, were quite adept at horseback fighting) or Fighter (lots of Weapon Mastery, plus Weapon Grand Mastery and Heroic Fighting, all do a very nice job of capturing samurai as portrayed in both Western and Japanese cinema).

I'm a huge fan of Fighters, but I have a hard time justifying it to myself to play a Fighter in AS&SH when the subclasses (a) cover nearly every archetype I can think of (except maybe a disciplined, civilized professional footman, like a rank-and-file Roman legionnaire or myrmidon), (b) get so many neat toys to play with and (c) can cover plenty of ground themselves. A Cataphract can be a Western European knight, a Mongol raider, a Roman equites, a Persian skirmisher or even a samurai.

Nevertheless, I can still see a role for Fighters in my game world and at the game table. The XP progression is a decent incentive and the Weapon Mastery rules make for a fairly versatile and powerful class at relatively low levels.