16 February 2014

Elric has left the building

Or should I say the 'plane of existence'?

I just noticed that no Elric or Stormbringer RPG-related materials (or anything related to the Moorcockian multiverse, for that matter) are now available for sale … anywhere.

It looks like Mongoose has dropped their Elric of Melniboné RPG line entirely (the announcement is in this thread).  And the PDFs of the classic Chaosium Stormbringer (1e and 4e) and Elric! products are no longer available for sale at RPGnow or DrivthruRPG.

Even though I have most of these materials, in either print or PDF (sometimes both), I'm quite disappointed to learn of this development.  (After all, one of the best campaigns I ever played in was set in the Young Kingdoms.)

*sigh*

15 comments:

  1. I just noticed this yesterday! Was going to get the old companion...

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  2. Well a new RPG called MOURNBLADE based on the Young Kingdoms has been edited , if only in french at least for now. I dont't know if it may have something to do...

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    1. I'm not sure, but I think it would only be relevant if the company is planning on an English language version of the game.

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  3. I asked MM for the status of the licenses, will report back what I hear :D

    Allan.

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  4. Here's the link to the new Mournblade RPG:
    http://www.black-book-editions.fr/produit.php?id=349
    And a few reviews (in French):
    http://www.legrog.org/jeux/mournblade/mournblade-fr

    The new system is not BRP but "Choose Your Die" where the player must roll high and can choose to roll either a d10 (with no chance of complete fumble) or d20 (which can be riskier).

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    1. That looks interesting, thanks for the link. (However, I doubt I'll get it. Not only is my French quite rusty, but I'm quite happy with the BRP and MRQII versions.)

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  5. Well I read somewhere that Chaosium had stopped paying Moorcock royalties years ago...while still selling the books in print and pdf. Not sure how Mongoose fits into the picture.

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    1. mikemonaco: that had been sorted out recently, and the old Chaosium PDFs had been put back on sale (through Mongoose, at RPGnow and Drivethru) sometime in 2011 (iirc). Now, alas, they're gone again.

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  6. It looks like the Stormbringer stuff is still available on the Chaosium website...haven't tried ordering it yet.

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    1. Do you mean the books in Chaosium's "Boo Boo Books" store, Stuart? That's the only SB/Elric stuff that I could find there (no core rulebooks). Still, it's something. And I recommend the 'Corum' book to all fans of the original trilogy.

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  7. That is a rather sad state of affairs. The most memorable campaign I experienced as a player back in the day was an epic Stormbringer adventure inspired by the Rodney Matthews painting "Safe and Sound on the Sundial".

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  8. Just a note... I run a site that supports stormbringer in all its guises over the years (www.stormbringerrpg.com). Nothing concrete, but I'm trying to arrange to have the older Chaosium books available in some form or another.

    No promises as I offer nothing but my good intentions :P

    Marcus

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    1. Hi Marcus! I've had a link to stormbringerrpg.com at this blog for years (it's under "BRP misc." on the right), and have downloaded some of the materials available there (e.g., 'Old Hrolmar' and 'Gods of Law'). It's a great resource, and thanks for providing it.

      Best of luck in your efforts to make the old Chaosium books available again!

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  9. This is usually the point where I start thinking "Just make my own scan of the damned thing".

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I'm a Canadian political philosopher who lives primarily in Toronto but teaches in Milwaukee (sometimes in person, sometimes online).