"Got EPT?" Topic

Did you ever play, or had you even ever heard of the RPG, "Empire of the Petal Throne"?

I converted my playing club from D&D to EPT around 1980. It's a shame it never took off. It had a highly developed background.

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Heard of it, bookmarked a few websites to start reading about it, never actually read any of them.

Had it years ago, had a hard time getting wrapped around the world

Played it for a bit years ago – but the players where I was never had enough of an interest other than to let me run a night or two of a side adventure there

Heard of? Yes.
Read the fluff? Yes.
Liked the fluff? Yes.
Played the game? No.
Got Early Prostate Tingling? Yes.

Strydog, there is a 5 paperback series in the EPT universe. I put the Amazon link to book one under my original post above. Might be a nice change of pace to the usual Fantasy stuff.

Never played the RPG but I have played a LARP set in the EPT world.

Robert

The world of EPT was its biggest appeal and its worst turnoff at the same time. If you dig that sort of stuff and have allergies for classic northern europe-based medieval fantasy games, it's a treasure trove of adventure and discovery. But if you don't feel like learning an alien culture let alone a whole bunch of them, complete with weird languages it's not going to help you derive any fun.

had the DAW edition of Man of gold years ago

FYI Raymond Feist's Rift Wars series was basically EPT invades a D&D world several of the books dealt with the not EPT side complete with the alien races and the metal poor aspects

I played a few times way back in the 1970s, and then again recently at local conventions in the last few years. It's a very interesting world.

Heard of, read some of the fiction, and considered the box set RPG (but it was a bit pricey).

It was always held up as the "superior" RPG.

Jeff Dee lecture on Roleplaying Tekumel:
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celesticon seminars:
celesticon.com/seminars.php

No, but I read the first novel.

The game had its own limited run of human faction miniatures. I'm not sure they are still in production but they had a nice "not Western European" feel to them. They made me think of Bronze Age Mediterranean combined with pre-Colombian Central American.

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Played it a bit but didn't much like it.

Never had the slightest interest.

I bought the PDF last year after wabting to see the gane since the late '70s. It is everything I expected and more!

I think the biggest limitation is the amount of buy-in from the whole playing group, not in terms of financial, but in mental investment. Litetally having to learn alien cultures and languages from the ground up. It's like playing with K'kree in Traveller!

Played it a lot when it first came out-still have the maps and language books. Later used it to redo the martians in Space 1889.

I have some of the figures somewhere I painted but I never actually played it.

Played it a couple of times somewhen in the '80s – I was an Ahoggya at one point, I think after reincarnation.

I ran some game just last month at Gary Con.

I opened it up to give it another solid reading last night… wound up reading Runequest 2nd edition and Apple Lane instead.

Quack.

thetekumelproject.blogspot.ca

There is also, currently, a Black Hack for Tekumel out on the internet as a free download. It's a simplified system and is still being built.

That said, I've never been able to get past the juvenile silliness/drawings of the alien races. It's just been a large turnoff

Also, Man of Gold is an ebook now and worth an evenings reading (and rereading.)

I had the RPG and all the other books when it first came out, even a subscription to the magazine. I set up an adventure and had several volunteers to try it. At the end of the evening the summation was "wargaming with the Aztecs" by the players. That was the end of it.
I kept everything for a while, but eventually sold it all. I have always liked it, but would never get back into it. I might buy some of the figures to use for something else.

Was way beyond my budget back in the 70's.

"…juvenile silliness/drawings of the alien races"

I don't understand this comment. The quality of the drawing is juvenile? (=poor?) Or they races themselves are juvenile and silly? And drawn badly?

Are you saying it is juvenile to consider non-bipedal aliens?

In addition to the Black Hack, there is a Fantasy Trip version by the same person. There's also a RuneQuest conversion out there! Plus a new RPG set called Bethorm. And a newly published "Kurt's Hills Atlas" that is really nicely done (despite adhering to the traditional hex mapping format).