History TabletopGame / Earthdawn

* NoCampaignForTheWicked: ''Earthdawn Gamemaster Pack'', "Gamemastering Earthdawn" booklet. It is specifically stated that no PlayerCharacter may ever learn or use sacrificial BloodMagic (where an unwilling victim is harmed or killed to gain magical benefit). This is because sacrificial BloodMagic is only used by evil {{Non Player Character}}s, such as those corrupted by the [[EldritchAbomination Horrors]]. It further states that FASA will not publish any rules for using such magic.

* DarkIsNotEvil: To other Name Givers the Nethermancers are incredibly creepy, part of a magical tradition focused on death. They can be incredibly nasty... but they also have both the best magical healing abilities as well as powerful spells designed to fight [[EldritchAbomination the Horrors]]. The truth is that they actually just... [[StartXToStopX practical]], the Death plane being just another netherworld.

* DashAttack: Ground creatures perform a [[ChargeAttack Charging Attack]], flying creatures make Swooping Attacks against ground targets.

Fantasy not enough? How about some cosmic horror? Magic ebbs and flows over the millennia, you see. When it increases, the walls between the worlds grow thin, and monsters come through. They are known as Horrors, the ensuing time of darkness as the Scourge. The people built kaers, {{Underground Cit|y}}ies with powerful wards, and hid in them for centuries. The level of magic began to drop--but then it got stuck. The people emerged from the kaers into a new dawn on a new Earth (Earth-dawn, get it?).

* EarthAllAlong: As a consequence of being a prequel to ''TabletopGame/{{Shadowrun}}''.

* TheEmpire: Thera. Also could be Atlantis.

* HeWhoFightsMonsters

* HumansAreSpecial

** Averted in-universe, where dwarves, not humans are the dominant race in Barsaive.

Get a bag. Throw in a copy of Lord of the Rings and some dice. Season with Moorcock and Vance to taste. Shake well. Pour it out on a table. For a while that seemed to be how most [=FRP=]Gs got made. ''This is not one of those.''

After the success of ''TabletopGame/{{Shadowrun}},'' Creator/{{FASA}} tried their hand at a fantasy RPG - and they consciously set out to turn [[StandardFantasySetting the stereotypes]] on their heads. In the province of Barsaive, humans don't run the world, the dwarves do. Elves aren't carefree forest denizens, the thorns in their skin cause constant pain, and their forest drips blood. There are no all-powerful gods, only Passions, and some of them are crazy. Everyone uses magic, not just spellcasters.

Wait, there's more. The humans run the Theran Empire, they use blood magic, they enslave other races, and they make war in flying castles. The trolls are eight and a half foot tall {{Sky Pirate}}s in flying stone longboats. The obsidimen are over seven feet tall and made of rock. The windlings are tiny flying people. The t'skrang are [[{{Lizard Folk}} Lizardmen]] who run boats on the many rivers. The orks have been [[{{Slave Race}} enslaved by almost everybody]] and are trying to establish their own nation. All these races are called Name-Givers, on the assumption that naming a thing gives it a magical identity, a pattern that can be manipulated.

Of course there are dragons. In fact, they are behind many of the conspiracies. If you know ''TabletopGame/{{Shadowrun}},'' you may even [[BeethovenWasAnAlienSpy recognize]] some of them... but that means... it is EarthAllAlong! Yes, you may recognize Thera as the name of a Greek island--it may have inspired the myths about Atlantis when it exploded thousands of years ago. Yes, the magic level [[TheMagicGoesAway eventually goes back down to nothing]], only to go back up in our time for ''Shadowrun.'' A cosmic case of [[EternalRecurrence history repeating itself]].

Then FASA went out of business. Living Room Games brought out a [[TheyChangedItNowItSucks second edition]]. Then LRG went out of business. [=RedBrick=] brought out two virtual editions, a third and an alternate second. [=RedBrick=] worked on a D&D-compatible edition for a while, but the project was ultimately shelved and nothing came out of it. Then FASA was revived and [=RedBrick=] gave the Earthdawn license back to them. FASA published a revised edition of the game that was nevertheless completely compatible with [=RedBrick=]'s 3rd edition. As you can see, this game's meta-history is rather complicated.

Wait, you want to ''play'' Earthdawn? That's a different thing altogether. To use a skill, you have to work out your step number, which is your skill level plus modifiers. Now refer to your Step Table, which tells you how many dice of which types to roll. That's right, using the same skill, you may roll different types of dice from one use to the next. It beats using calculus to simulate swinging on a rope, but there are simpler systems - including d20 and Savage Worlds which have seen the conversions of Earthdawn recently.

This has recently been solved, as an Earthdawn fan asked himself "[[IWantMyJetpack I'm living in the Future, why aren't I Gaming like it?]]" and coded a [[NoPaperFuture Virtual Tabletop System]] for Earthdawn: [[http://bit.ly/earthdawnVirtualTabletop MapTool Earthdawn Framework]]

* IKnowYourTrueName: Played with. Namegiver races (ie, PC ones) can do this...and Horrors do not naturally ''have'' names. By cajoling a Namegiver into naming them, they gain the weaknesses of having a true name...and individuality, and with ''that'', strength.

* LuckManipulationMechanic: The [[EldritchAbomination Horror]] power of "Cursed Luck" and the dragon power of "Disrupt Fate." Also, Karma - especially for Windlings.

* MagicKnight: ''[[EveryoneIsASuper Everyone]].'' All [=PCs=] are magicians - Adepts. Wizards could have some kind of basic martial capability, Warriors had their share of elemental magic, and Weaponsmiths at very very high levels learned how to cast Elementalist spells.

* PrequelInTheLostAge: ''TabletopGame/{{Earthdawn}}'' is set in the Fourth World and is a prequel to ''TabletopGame/{{Shadowrun}}'', which is set in the Sixth World.

* SlidingScaleOfGameplayAndStoryIntegration: Deliberate, approaching Perfect; every element was specifically designed to [[JustifiedTrope justify]] traditional fantasy role playing tropes. Earthdawn is perhaps the only setting where you can talk about your "Class" and "Level" without breaking character in the least. "I'm a Sixth Circle Thief," for example, simply means "I'm a magician who practices a school of magic specialized in hiding and freeing others from the burden of ownership, and I have undergone five advancement rituals."

* PrequelInTheLostAge: ''Earthdawn'' is a prequel to ''TabletopGame/{{Shadowrun}}'', set in the Fourth World.

* {{Orichalcum}}: in this game, there are five elements: earth, air, fire, water, and wood. You get the golden metal orichalcum by combining all five.

* InertialImpalement: In the combat chapter, one of the techniques in the Mounted Combat section is "Setting Against A Charge". If a character knows a Charging Attack is coming and has a spear or lance available, he can make a Melee Weapons Test. If he succeeds, he hits the charging opponent and does damage before the opponent can attack. If he succeeds really well he can knock the opponent off his steed.

* EarthAllAlong: As a consequence of being a prequel to TabletopGame/{{Shadowrun}}.

** The main rules had a picture of the signboard of an inn called "The Gilded Toad".

** ''Sky Point & Vivane' boxed set, Book 2 "Theran Vivane". The Theran section of Vivane has a tavern called the Blackguard Duck. It's a regular meeting place for the t'skrang who work in the Vivane boat yard.

* NoCampaignForTheWicked: ''Earthdawn Gamemaster Pack'', "Gamemmastering Earthdawn" booklet. It is specifically stated that no PlayerCharacter may ever learn or use sacrificial BloodMagic (where an unwilling victim is harmed or killed to gain magical benefit). This is because sacrificial BloodMagic is only used by evil {{Non Player Character}}s, such as those corrupted by the [[EldritchAbomination Horrors]]. It further states that FASA will not publish any rules for using such magic.

** ''Skypoint & Vivane' boxed set, Book 2 "Theran Vivane". The Theran section of Vivane has a tavern called the Blackguard Duck. It's a regular meeting place for the t'skrang who work in the Vivane boat yard.

* [[BerserkButton/TabletopGames Berserk Button]]: An ork's gahad, which can cause berserk rage and violence.

* RainbowMotif: A creature using Heat Sight sees the difference between background temperature and an object's temperature as a color. As the difference increases the color goes up the ROYGBIV scale (red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, violet).

* DashAttack: Ground creatures perform a ChargeAttack, flying creatures make Swooping Attacks against ground targets.

* DashAttack: Ground creatures perform ChargingAttacks, flying creatures make Swooping Attacks against ground targets.

Of course there are dragons. In fact, they are behind many of the conspiracies. If you know ''TabletopGame/{{Shadowrun}},'' you may even [[BeethovenWasAnAlienSpy recognize]] some of them ... but that means ... it is EarthAllAlong! Yes, you may recognize Thera as the name of a Greek island--it may have inspired the myths about Atlantis when it exploded thousands of years ago. Yes, the magic level [[TheMagicGoesAway eventually goes back down to nothing]], only to go back up in our time for ''Shadowrun.'' A cosmic case of [[EternalRecurrence history repeating itself]].

* ArtisticLicenseStatistics: Part of the problem with the dice mechanics. At each "step", the step number is supposed to represent an average roll, so if you are at Step 15, for example, the average roll should be a 15. This was supposed to make it easy for the GameMaster to determine target numbers based on how likely he wants it to be for the character to succeed. Unfortunately, no one explained to the designers about score distributions, and some of the steps have distributions that are very strange. The net result is that for certain target numbers, characters with a lower score in a talent are more likely to succeed than those with higher numbers. Third edition partly fixed that by removing 4-sided and 20-sided dice. (you still got the 6,8,10 and 12 ones. Enjoy your bag of dice.) The main problem being exploding dice on the highest value (step 3/1D4 has a 25% to reach 5, so is a theorical step 11/1D20, in practice, step 11 is 1D8+1D6).

** SlidingScaleOfGameplayAndStoryIntegration: Deliberate, approaching Perfect; every element was specifically designed to [[JustifiedTrope justify]] traditional fantasy role playing tropes. Earthdawn is perhaps the only setting where you can talk about your "Class" and "Level" without breaking character in the least. "I'm a Sixth Circle Thief," for example, simply means "I'm a magician who practices a school of magic specialized in hiding and freeing others from the burden of ownership, and I have undergone five advancement rituals."

* JustifiedTrope: The entire RPGMechanicsVerse was specifically designed to justify traditional fantasy role playing tropes.
** DungeonBasedEconomy: Why are there dungeons filled with monsters and treasure lying around everywhere? They are kaers that are breached.
** CharacterLevel: Why do characters have discrete levels where they get better at things? Because each discipline (aka character class) is tapping into the "true pattern" of that discipline, and your level represents how well you have learned to do this.
** ExperiencePoints: Why is that fighting monsters gives you points that you can then spend to get better at, for example, foreign language? Because all abilities are magical, and the greater your legend, the stronger your magical power grows. There is no question that they are all justified by the nature of the setting.
** SlidingScaleOfGameplayAndStoryIntegration: Deliberate, approaching Perfect; All this makes Earthdawn perhaps the only setting where you can talk about your "Class" and "Level" without breaking character in the least. "I'm a Sixth Circle Thief," for example, simply means "I'm a magician who practices a school of magic specialized in hiding and freeing others from the burden of ownership, and I have undergone five advancement rituals."

* JustifiedTrope: Every one of the RPGMechanics was specifically designed to justify traditional fantasy role playing tropes.