Hard Backs

[Marko]

... Personally, I'd be more than happy to offer my services to reorganising the TOR core-books to make them easier to read etc. I'd do it for free in fact!

I’d be on board, too.

[Hermes Serpent]

There are two ways (at least) of laying out a book (any book) and one is making it easy to read and the other is making it easy to use as a reference book. It's the job (partly) of the editor and layout person to impose the appropriate sort of structure on the authors work. A novel is not laid out as a reference work and an encyclopaedia is not laid out to be easy to read through, just in sections.

TOR is laid out to be easy to read through and probably was done so in order to make it accessible to people who may not have much experience is using a role playing book. As the material in TOR errs on the side of less rigid rules and leaves much open to interpretation by the LM the layout may not have been the best design choice for a readable over a reference work, which is what most RPG books are used for once they've been read through the first time.

What I've done (for my own use) is take the material from the books and made several 'reference sheets' of one or more pages. I've got one for Social Encounters, one for Combat, one for Travel, one for awarding AP and XP and one for spending AP and XP. In addition I have the excellent Traits Usage file from here (thank you JRRB IIRC). These are placed in a folder and used in play to avoid having to open the books unless absolutely necessary. Players have access to these sheets if they need to check how things are supposed to be played. Each player has, in addition to their character sheet, a combat quick reference sheet and a couple of culture specific sheets, one for rewards and one for virtues to refer to during Adventure and Fellowship Phases.

All these play aids plus the excellent screen make for a much improved play experience for both me as LM and the players allowing us to concentrate on the game rather than finding something in the rules.

[Aiwendil]

Hermes Serpent, would you consider sharing these reference sheets, assuming they are in an easily uploadable format?

[Hermes Serpent]

Sorry no, they contain material from the books and after the recent withdrawal of fan-made material at the request of C7 I'm not even thinking of infringing on their copyright.

[Aiwendil]

Sorry no, they contain material from the books and after the recent withdrawal of fan-made material at the request of C7 I'm not even thinking of infringing on their copyright.

Would you be willing to run it by C7 and, assuming they are ok with it, sharing these reference sheets with the community? It sounds like the material in question would be of tremendous assistance to all LMs.

[Hermes Serpent]

Basically I've pulled material from the books, added some explanations based on forum discussion and errata and included the appropriate charts and tables. Someone with this sort of material almost has no need to buy the books to get most of the meat of the rules except character generation. True all the flavour and background stuff is not included but it's still too much to put out there 'in the wild'. We have four copies of the rules amongst the players so we're not doing anything more than the equivalent of sharing those books around the table without the need to open fragile copies (I know of at least four copies of the rules needing replacements due to binding issues in our club alone).

If anyone gets the books and uses the Bits and Mortar system to get the pdf's or even buys the pdfs alone they can do exactly what I have so sorry I'm not going to 'give away' C7's IP by releasing my cheat sheets and potentially having them distributed all over the 'net.

If C7 want's to put out a TOR Quick-Start pdf package then I'd be happy to work with them by offering these sheets but that's up to them and may not even be in their business plan.

[Vlue]

I love this game, but I also think that a second edition will be necessary. Some rules could be written in a clearer way and the new ones from the supplements and the revised ones should be incorporated in the core manuals.

[Gweinel]

If there will be a revised edition i would accept it only if there will be minor changes. It would be great if it will be presented in the upcoming and much awaited Rivendell book instead to the reprints of the existing sourcebooks.

[Hermes Serpent]

Everyone wanting to see revised rules/second editions or hard bound copies should tell all their friends to buy up the current stock of the first edition so that C7 have to do a reprint. Hopefully C7 can easily incorporate the changes everyone is asking for like incorporating the revised index, the alternative journey rules as well as the originals, the line or two of errata and rewriting whole paragraphs to make it easier for LM's to understand the right way to play.

Everyone who purchased the first edition as recommended by their friends to help get a new version published can then buy the rules again when the revised version is printed.

All the while C7 must increase the release of adventures, campaigns and background supplements to rival that of ICE of old as well as continue to satisfy the fans of all of their other game lines.

Note: There is a certain amount of tongue inserted firmly in cheek in this post.

[MadTrapper]

Well the front page of Cubicle 7 gives me hope that one day we WILL see a hardback book for The One Ring core rules. Hopefully people will be all over this (although personally I've never seen DW) and they will take it as an indicator to do the same with TOR. We can always hope...

"A limited edition, single volume, hardback core rulebook for Doctor Who Adventures in Time and Space. Coming soon."