|
This August Green Ronin is publishing Blue Rose: The Roleplaying Game of Romantic Fantasy. This is the latest game to feature the Adventure Game Engine, the rules that drive the Dragon Age and Fantasy AGE RPGs. Blue Rose is a roleplaying game about romantic fantasy, but what is that, exactly? In this excerpt from the game’s Introduction, we answer that question. What Is Romantic Fantasy? In the high fantasy quests of authors like J. R. R. Tolkien, or the larger-than-life swords and sorcery of Robert E. Howard, Fritz Leiber, and others, heroic loners or small groups of rebels, outcasts, or eccentrics perform great deeds and go on quests to obtain power and glory or to protect the world from some dire threat.
In the mid-1980s, a generation of new fantasy authors — Diane Duane, Mercedes Lackey, Tamora Pierce, and many others — wrote fantasy novels different from any that had come before. The main characters in their novels occasionally started out as loners and outcasts before finding their place in society, generally as members of some prominent group or official organization that goes on exciting adventures to protect ordinary people from danger. Developing a sense of belonging and finding comrades are central features of these stories. Most of these novels are in series, and by the end of the first book, the main character has usually discovered a community where they belong. Many of the character’s subsequent adventures involve either becoming a more fully integrated member of this group or protecting the group from harm. Few of these novels contain elves, dwarves, or similar fantasy races, and many contain few or no other humanoid species at all. Instead, humans share their world with one or more types of intelligent or semi-intelligent animals, sometimes with a few magical human subspecies. Some of the intelligent animals are simply bright psychic pets, while others are free-willed, powerful spirits with animal bodies. Romantic fantasy novels are often set in highly egalitarian societies, where people’s occupations and aspirations are not limited by fixed gender roles. In these books, cultures and individuals that are sexist or homophobic are either ignorant and see the error of their ways somewhere in the series, or they are enemies who are eventually vanquished.
The heroes of romantic fantasy novels are usually environmentally conscious. Protecting wilderness areas and animals from depredation is a common plot element. In all romantic fantasy worlds, nature is a positive magical force, and anyone who protects it is on the side of good. Attitudes about magic also differ from other fantasy novels. Instead of the scholastic magic of some stories — magic as a rare and powerful discipline involving complex rituals and arcane lore — many characters have innate psychic or arcane powers as natural to them as sight and hearing. Heroic characters can often manipulate the natural elements and use their powers with nothing more than concentration and intent. These powers are seen as both an innate and positive part of someone’s nature, and are only feared by the ignorant or evil. More traditional magic does occasionally appear in these novels, but it’s usually only practiced by villains to bind others to their will, or to summon horrific creatures and spirits from other planes of existence. The only motives given for performing such magic are a hunger for power or a desire for revenge. This type of magic is unnatural, dangerous, and often corrupting.
Blue Rose takes these elements of romantic fantasy to create a world of adventure, where you can build your own heroes and forge your own stories. •••
|
