Here's an idea: Take a D&D (mostly 2e) setting and combine it with a non-D&D rpg also published by TSR. Here are a few:
Spelljammer XXVc (Spelljammer + Buck Rogers XXVc)
Buck Rogers is thrown into suspended animation and awakens in a world where magic is ascendant, and Earth is an occupied territory. This winds up being a bit like Shadowrun with rockets (XXVc already had a hint of cyberpunk to it), but the difference is genetic engineering and other high-tech feats would actually be accomplished via magic.
Another Spelljammer combo: Add the Buck Rogers Adventure Game for a pulpier approach.
All Alone in the Night (Ravenloft + Metamorphosis Alpha)
When the generation ship Warden left earth, the monsters went with it, and Dracula takes his real estate schemes to the stars! Like The Starlost, you would need isolated habitats, but here they would be ruled by various horrors. Vampire Hunter D could also be an influence here.
Another Ravenloft option: Mix in Gangbusters with the monsters as mob bosses.
Hmmm...Council of Wyrms mashed up with the Gammarauders - technically a boardgame, but they did publish some super-minimalist RPG rules for the setting in the short-lived comics. You could always just use Gamma World instead/as well. Countless millennia in the future the Io's Blood archipelago is being invaded by high-tech dragon hunters with bioborgs and popcorn support units, but the dragons have developed their own technology using data from wandering factoids and the PCs are part of the new cyber-dragon defense force.
ReplyDeleteThat Buck Rogers boardgame would be just about ideal for a Spelljammer setting, now that I think about it.
Forgotten Realms mashed with Gamma World seems obvious too. The Spell Plague was much, much worse this time around, and mutants are everywhere along with weird automatons and bizarre "magic" items dragged in from some alternate multiverse by the damage to the Weave.
ReplyDeletePlanescape/Top Secret mash, where Sigil is akin to Cold War Berlin or maybe Vienna in older days and the emphasis of the game is on espionage and manipulating the city's Factions and the Blood War beyond it. Change the Factols to be obvious James Bond villains, maybe?
Birthright + Marvel Super-Heroes. The royals in each kingdom are (or are descended from) supers from another universe, as are some of their abomination opponents. You don't even need to change some of them much - Victor von Doom just renames his kingdom Latveria and rolls with it.
Boot Hill + Savage Coast seems too obvious to mention.
And because someone needs to say it - Hollow World mashed with the Bullwinkle & Rocky RPG. Turns out one of the Time Immortals was a big fan of the cartoon (part of a bad habit of watching anachronistic media from other timelines) and decided to preserve it in the Hollow World after its cancellation. Actually a dark horror game where the characters only gradually realize that they're repeating the same "adventures" over and over again, trapped in an endless loop of reruns for the amusement of a deity that barely perceives them as real. Can they break the 4th wall and recruit enough of the semi-mythical "viewers" to achieve their own Immortality and freedom?
@Dick - Good ideas. I if a Cold War Planescape riff is cool to you, check this out.
ReplyDelete@Trey Heh. Spot on. Now how did I miss that?
ReplyDeleteDark Sun plus Gamma World is almost too obvious.
ReplyDeleteGamma Sun -- Dark Sun plus Gamma World seems pretty obvious.
ReplyDeleteGamMarvel World -- actually a campaign I ran briefly, where the post-apocalypse world was the Marvel universe. I was using Gamma World rules, but maybe running it with Marvel Superheroes would be fun, too. Breaks the rules of not using a 2E AD&D campaign setting, but still mixing two TSR games rules/settings.
Eberron mashed with FREELancers (a low powered supers setting for Top Secret/S.I.). Elemental magics, dragonmarks, and warforged meet individuals with strange abilities more psychic than magic. Plenty of fun to be had with intrigue, weird magitechnology, and the possibility of weird planar travel
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