TROS for A Song of Ice and Fire?

[Umberhulk]

Has anyone done TROS for the George R.R. Martin setting?  They seem to be a prefect fit to me; character-centric with lots of conflicted allegiances and very brutal/Machiavellian.

[anonymouse]

This seems to come up somewhat regularly (and I may in fact be running such a game myself soon); use the Search function for phrases like "game of thrones", "martin", "grrm", and "fire and ice" and "fire & ice". Should get a good half-dozen threads at least.

[Umberhulk]

yeah, you get tons of irrelevant links.  I was hoping someone here might already have spent the time parsing through the pages of hits that google returns and already has the good stuff bookmarked...

[DevP]

The forumwise Search function would probably work better.

It does seem to work, from what I've heard (especially w/ the brutal and unforgiving nature of violence in Martin). What sorts of aspects of TRoS/GRR Martin are you hoping to make more in sync?

[Lance D. Allen]

You would also be much better off posting this in the TRoS boards. This board is intended for discussion of games which are actually in development, so unless you've got a TRoS mini-supplement for "A Song of Fire and Ice" in the works, this is really off-topic.

[Umberhulk]

Sorry, if I am off topic.  I figured that this must have been done already, but if it hasn't I think that the TROS magic system would need some tweaking to fit better with the source material.

[Jake Norwood]

Hi Umberhulk.

It really is a very common thread topic around here. I put in a search for "martin fire ice TROS" on the TROS forum only, with "search for all terms" instead of "any terms", and I got 4 threads that aren't this one. That might be a good place to start.

Jake

[Umberhulk]

Well, I just skimmed those threads and pretty much it is universally accepted that A Song of Ice and Fire is a good setting for TRoS, but none of those threads have meat to them of what that would look like.  What I'm looking for is actual work on game stats for the main characters of the storeis, like The Imp, Catelyn Stark, or creatures in the books like the Others.  Also, the TRoS magic system would need to be tweaked a bit to fit in with the source material.  I guess I could take on the project, but it will have to go into my hobby work queue for a while to I get to it.  I was hoping to just use someone else's work, if you know what I mean ...

[anonymouse]

In which case it looks like no one has actually done the conversion work (the way stat lists have popped up for, say, Dark Sun or Dune) and that should answer your question. ;p

Does a quantified magic system ever come up at all in the books? I'm only about halfway through Clash of Kings at this point, but what magic there's been was very foreign and not related to Westeros at all (and thus pretty ignorable).

[Umberhulk]

I'm just starting the third book (A Storm of Swords).  Anyway, it seems to me that the magic is one of the coolest aspect of Martin's story because it carries a moral cost for using it.

[anonymouse]

Price isn't the question at all. If it makes the conversation more useful, then spoil away; I take my pleasure from the act of reading, not "plot twists" that are painfully obvious from half a book away..

Let's try and cite the specific instances of magic use:

* Maegi woman bringing Drogo back.
* Mellissandre and her poison-thwarting, which is probably just magic item and not anything active she did herself.
* Been hinting that Varys maybe has some magic, but very likely not.

..got anything else?

My point is that while there may be magic-y things (Mellis' gem, the Others, the Starks' dreams) there is almost nothing in the way of active spell slinging.

So: why does magic need to be changed if it never even comes into play? Limit the characters to Westeros, say they're of native blood (so no Asshai shadowdancers or whatever), and there is no need to muck with it at all, cos it simply won't come up.

[contracycle]

I've not finished 'em either, but there is a clear current that magic is being re-introduced; that is, the trough that magic has been in for a while is passing.  This sets up an expectation for things that happen in the future of the world.

All that said though, it seems to me that a perfectly good "historical" campaign could be set in the civil war that preceeds the novels, the deposing of mad king Aerys and the battle on the Trident.  This would hopefully hook those who have read the books, eliminates the magic problem, and offer s alot of freedom as this period is referred to rather than described in too much detail.

[The Heretic]

There is some information about magic in aSoIaF here:

http://www.westeros.org/Citadel/Concordance/Concordance14.html

[Sigurth]

Thanks Heretic for the link...now you gots me thinkin' about a TROS campaign in Westeros....

I have been wanting to run there for a long time and thought about using Hero 5th, but now, having discovered TROS it seems like a perfect fit.

[Tywin Lannister]

As my nickname suggests, I'm a big fan of the "A Song of Ice and Fire" series.
In a Dragon issue there were some tips on creating campaigns for this setting (#307 I think). The one that sounded coolest (the one I'd like to be a player in), is a Night's Watch campaign. Walking the wall, ranging...cool stuff.