Sunday, January 13, 2019

Savage Sorcerers of Sungor: Or how I embraced my derivative nature



For a long time now I've wanted to run a sword & sorcery campaign, but a number of things have held me back, and all of them were crap.  First, I couldn't decide on a systems to use.  The Hero System?  GURPS? Fate Core?  Savage Worlds?   The truth is that the system doesn't matter much, so it turns out that decision was just a stall tactic.  The next obstacle was that I needed a world to run my campaign in.  I didn't want to use an existing world such as Howard's Hyborian Age, or Leiber's Nehwon, because I wanted something different.  Well, maybe "different" is the wrong word.  What I wanted was a combination of a lot of things.  Some Conan, with some Elric, with some Heavy Metal, a bit of Nehwon, a dash of the Roman Empire, a sprinkling of Warhammer Fantasy, at little Thundarr the Barbarian, and maybe even a little He-Man, plus some Yor Hunter from the Future.  Essentially, I wanted a derivative soup made from the stuff that I loved as a kid and still love today, but I didn't want it to be derivative, because being derivative is lame. 

Or is it?

Let's face facts.  I'm not here to do some totally original game world that I plan to publish.  I'm not trying to be a game developer.  I want to run a game for my friends in a world that is fun.  If people call it derivative, then so be it.  I want barbarians, and ancient ruins.  I want ancient technology, and dark sorcery.  I want evil chaos gods and gladiator fights.  I want pirates and witches.  I want dudes flying on insects, and dudes riding on snakes. 

So I took all of those things that I liked, stuck them in a bowl and mixed.  What I wound up with was my setting for Savage Sorcerers of Sungor, and it will be good enough for me, I think.  I came to this point by finally embracing my love for the derivative and just going with it, and I feel a whole lot better now.  I was holding myself back by trying to be original and missing out on the fun.