ToME: the Tales of Maj'Eyal

Beware this is horribly written, full of errors and so on, but it gives a feeling of where I might go if we decide to not keep lotr setting.

https://spreadsheets.google.com/ccc?key ... 2sYG#gid=0

How does it look? Say it if you think it sucks I wont be hurt

Seems nice!

Immediate (asinine) thoughts:
United Kingdom? Heheh. I can imagine present-day Britain sat in the middle of all these mythical nations, looking very confused.
As for disconnecting with Tolkien, wouldn't that mean you'd have to change things named with his languages? Angolwen, anorithil, etc.
Having just played Fallout 2 again, I can't get the Enclave out of my head when I hear the word Conclave.
Was the west continent called Maj'Eyal on purpose so you could still call the game ToME (tales of maj'eyal)? Sneaky!

Yeah I am a sneaky bastard, it was indeed named this way to continue to have tome

About the united kingdom yeah I realised after I posted it that it could be mistaken But then I am not sure waht to name it, united kingdom does explain neatly what it is .. hum
As for the naming of things like angolwen and the anorithils, even though they were initialy named in sindar does not mean it invalidates them IMO, they can jsut be names (same for the major demons)

Instead of the centrality assumed in United Kingdom you could opt for a looser collection of kingdoms and use names like Allied Kingdoms, Goodkin Alliance, etc.

In regards to the actual timeline, it looks like a good start to me and I am intrigued by some of the possibilities of it for the Maj'Eyal portion of the game. For example, it sounds as though mages are actually distrusted rather than reclusive, and maybe the choice between magic and non-magic could be made for fundamental to the game. The anti-magic tree could be extended to play upon this distrust and create a dichotomy similar to that seen in Arcanum.

I will admit, the half-halfling struck me as a bit odd. Is that going somewhere?

Yeah antimagic/wild gifts should take an important role, but I planned for that even in the lotr setting anyway

Allied Kingdoms sounds good too yes, I'll see how it rolls.

As for tolak, the idea that is unexpressed that human/halfling hybrids always take on the physical traits of their father. As for wher it is going, this is a symbol of unity between the two races that started the allure wars way back then.

The outline looks good, or as much of it as I read. To be honest, I kind of skimmed. This is not the fault of you or your ideas; rather, I simply don't care much about back story in video games. The way I see it, the most important thing left for you to do is to avoid the temptation to use your game as a medium for telling your story. This is a terrible mistake that many game designers make. If you find yourself including walls of text detailing the history of Eyal, you should probably stop it. A great many people (me included) aren't going to read it. If, God forbid, you find yourself thinking about including a cut scene, shut down your computer and splash cold water on your face. Your audience is composed of roguelike fans. They mostly just want to pilot an @ around and bump into every o and D they see.

The ideas you're coming up with should merely be referenced casually in game, like in artifact descriptions or unique monster descriptions or locations on the map or brief quest dialogs. As long as the player feels like they're skating around on the surface of a deep, detailed world, everything is cool. If you try to dump all that detail on them, things go badly. ToME does this well already, so this is all a warning rather than a complaint. Don't let your creative high trick you into turning ToME into an interactive novel!

I just reread this and I sort of feel like a jerk telling you how to make your masterpiece. It's not like I'm a video game designer. But I am an avid player, and there are good reasons I still play roguelikes when I could be playing Dragon Age. If I want a story, I'll read a book. I play video games to blow guys up and take their stuff.

All that said, keep up the awesome work. ToME is a marvel, and the most exciting game out there. I always await the next beta breathlessly!

You are very right, I think a world with a detailed history is needed to be believable but I also know many people just want to kill stuff.
Things will not go much further than some chat dialogs as they are now and lore notes being found (and easily dismised if you dont feel like being a lore nerd :> ).

I like the ancient race thing. I know it's a common trope but it allows for lots of ancient ruins, lost cities, ie. tons of dungeons to explore.

I also like half-races. Darksun (a d and d campaign setting) had a race of half-dwarf/half-humans that were sterile and bred for gladiatorial combat and slavery (because they where very strong and tough). Point being, half races open up more racial options for players to pick and their place in the world gives you another spot to add in some flavor text.

Just a few pointers:

- There's need to be a good explanation to the fate of the Shar'tul, although the knowledge may have been lost to the ages you have the chance to create the ultimate antagonist here. The 'Wheel of Time' series, which also featured a post-apocalyptic magic setting, used an evil entity locked away in a dimensional pocket for example. Personally I always liked the revisited Doom story where teleportation research opens a gateway to hell .

- The Age of Dusk and Pyre has really poor cause and effect. So people hate the mages because they won the war and hunt them down, civilization diminishes, plagues kill millions and then, BOOM, the world explodes because of the magic the elves used 2000 years ago.
The sensible way to do this would be:
- Wraping up the 2nd age Shaloren elves use Farportal (evil) magic to war
- They decimate the orc armies with their awesome power
- Everyone cheers then on
- Uh oh
- Something's not right here
- 3rd age - BOOM, cataclysm
- WTF? The elves and the mages did this, get them
- All the mages are killed or go into hiding
All of the age of Pyre lore now:
- Most of the elves died as direct consequence of the Spellblaze, the survivors and forced to flee and hide
- The leftovers of the Orc armies rise again, taking advantage of the chaos
- The dwarves hide in the mountains, leaving humans and halflings to their luck
- The humans and halflings manage to beat the remaining orc army by the skin of their teeth
- In the aftermath of war, the civilization is in shambles
- The wild magics caused by the Spellblaze are too much for the 'poor magic' humans and halflings to handle. Civilization diminishes due to their helplessness.
- The secret bastion of Angolwen, after centuries of research and effort, manages to control the wild magics
- Age of Ascendency begins.

Hum interresting ideas there

And yes the Sher'Tul are obviously not gone for good they'll play their part

I am in the category that is not interested in the world background for games. I read as little as possible of long descriptions. Personally I see little need to link items, say artifacts, to a world history and feel that the name "The Crown of Power" is as good or better than the name "The Crown of Aasarkirerrerra". But I know that there are some computer rpg player who find a world lore fascinating and like to read long texts regarding this. But I am not sure that there are that many such players among those liking roguelikes.

If the Tolkien estate should send out a cease and desist, then I think this complying with this could be accomplished temporarily, quickly and with little effort, by removing/changing certain names and making some dramatic but simple changes to world map such as filling in the oceans and changing the directions of the mountain ranges. There is no need to create to complex new world history for complying with a cease and desist.

I am a little worried that much effort will be spent on creating yet another fantasy setting and that this will diminish creating good gameplay.

Ah worry not you should know I do things quickly by now

I have only one thing to add.

Sterile half-dwarves!!

Oh.. make that two things.

Playable dwarven females.

I have also one thing to add:

Slavery of half-dwarves.
I always liked the idea of fantasy being able to show, in an exaggerate and exploitative way, humankind's failed concept of society. So imagine a breed conceived mainly as cheap manpower, then treated as gladiators (like someone before mentioned, referencing Darksun) and then outcasted when not needed.

Just read through your notes, and I can see the LotR parallels quite clearly. Arwen is now a hobbit and Gandalf has breasts? Lovely :P Certainly original enough to avoid any rights issues, of course.

I'd personally like to see more fleshed out ancient tales, Silmarillion-style. I've put some brain-cells together and here's an idea for a bit more lore:


In the beginning were the gods, fashioned of the elements of Eyal. They split the lands into their own dominions and each changed their own portion to their likings. But the gods were not themselves equal in gifts, and soon prides and jealousies arose. Battles began, and alliances were made and broken, and the world became a maelstrom of chaotic energies. Then the gods began to make creations of their own to fight their battles. With some there were desires to create races they could teach and inspire, whilst others had more base thoughts of the joys of rulership and holding empires of lesser creatures under their control; and the difference in the races indeed shows all the greeds and petty conceits of their creators.

The greatest of all the races was made by Amakthel, who named himself "Ru'Eyal" or "Lord of All Lands". He was indeed the most powerful of the gods, who of pride held no alliances, and of strength had no enemies. His creations, whom he imbued with all his powers, were named the Sher'Tul or "Holy Children". Whilst the elves made huts in the trees, the halflings dug holes in the ground and the humans etched paintings on the walls of caves, the Sher'Tul built towering cities of crystal and mastered all crafts and magic to perfection. Portals they made that allowed them to travel across the world, and their knowledge and gifts gave them mastery of all things they put their mind to.

But the Sher'Tul were unhappy with their position in the world. Being made with the same passions of Amakthel they had no desire to be simple pawns in the wars of gods. And so they resolved that they would destroy the gods, and become masters of the world themselves. In this they recruited the help of the other races, whom they pitied, and also enlisted the aid of Arawe, Lady of the Waters. Arawe, unlike the other gods, took no part in all the battles and wars and made no creations of her own beyond fish and other sea animals. She agreed that she would aid the Sher'Tul in stopping the other gods, and that she herself would retreat to the farthest depths of the seas, never to interfere in the affairs of mortals. Aye, and it is said that the oceans have since doubled in size, with the tears of Arawe's regret.

With the help of Arawe and through their own mastery of magics the Sher'Tul fashioned nine almighty weapons, that were called the Godslayers. Nine men and women were chosen to wield them, and one by one the gods were hunted down and killed. Many hundreds of years it took, and great was the bloodshed in achieving it. But at last the only gods remaining were Arawe, who had fled to the deepest oceans, and Amakthel, their creator.

And here the Sher'Tul were brought to stop, for they could not unmake the very force who had brought them into being, else they themselves would be slain in the process. But they resolved to conquer and imprison Amakthel, and stop him from controlling them forever more. And so the last great Godhunt began, and many centuries it took, for there were divisions amongst the Sher'Tul, and the might of Amakthel surpassed all they had faced before. But at last the nine Godslayers, leading armies of the mightiest warriors and mages, broke through the fastness of his fortress and scoured its depths of all his servants. And lo they came to Amakthel himself, and thousands were killed in the assault on his throne, and three of the Godslayers were broken beneath his feet. But Falion with his dying breath pierced the great god on his knee with the icy sword Arkil, and seeing his opportunity Caldizar, leader of the Godslayers, advanced with the Staff of Absorption and struck a terrifying blow against Amakthel. So fell the greatest of the gods by the hands of his own children, and his face was forced into the dust.

Then the remaining Godslayers hewed his hands and feet from their limbs, and gouged his eyes and ears from his head, and sealed shut his mouth that he might never again issue commands to any living being. They bound him in unbreakable bonds, and lay over him spells of sealing that would last till the end of time. And they rent open a great chasm to the depths of the earth, and thrust his body beyond mortal knowledge.

So the war against the gods ended. But alas, there was to be no peace. For we are made in the images of gods, and their follies are our follies too. Soon amongst the Sher'Tul wars broke out in rivalries of power. The Godslayers, wielders of the most powerful weapons ever made, and imbued with the fortitude and long life needed to conquer the gods, now fought for dominion of their own race. Some forsook the war and disappeared beyond knowledge, but the others raised armies and took control of the lands. The civil war was intense but horribly short, for the great magics of the Sher'Tul were their own undoing. Fiery conflagrations engulfed their beautiful cities and scintillating pillars of arcane energy danced over the bodies of millions. They utterly annihilated themselves, leaving nothing but broken ruins and scars across the lands. Now they are naught but a distant legend amongst the lesser races, and a reminder of the terrors that are unleashed when magic is used for war.


This fits in well enough with what you've already written, with the exception that the modern races were in existence earlier, though in a primeval stage. Not sure what role the Staff of Absorption has in the game, but I figured it's worth including as an almighty weapon in the backstory. Things can be tweaked anyway. Also included a possible source of the blue wizards in the game (I think they're in the game anyway, from some thread headings I've seen) - now they are former Sher'Tul Godslayers who forsook the civil war, possibly become cultists of Ra'Eyal over time, who want the Staff of Absorption to free their father from his earthen prison. Or something like that - no idea what the real game story is at present...

The parallels with Tolkien's work should be reasonably clear. Amakthel is similar to Melkor, though less pure evil, but possibly a bit peeved these days. He could also have some of the influence on the world that it's said Melkor still possesses in The Void. Falion is a tribute to Fingolfin and his icy sword is renamed Arkil. Arawe is based a little on Ulmo, and could maybe be a bit more involved in the world these days. There's lots of opportunity for backstory expansion too - more about the original gods, and the nine Godslayers (and their weapons), and the various wars over time. This could all be included in optional bits of lore found during the game.

I know others aren't that keen on lots of backstory, but personally I love it, and it would be great if Tales of Maj'Eyal could have the similar feeling of depth as Tales of Middle-Earth. All optional of course - there could for instance be a library in the Sun Wall town or chambers filled with ancient texts in certain dungeons.