Saturnalia (PBM)
Encyclopedia
Saturnalia was one of the first single-character sword and sorcery
fantasy Play-by-Mail
role-playing game
s run in the United Kingdom
. The game started in 1984, being created by Neil Packer and Simon Letts and grew from its initial players at the University of Southampton
up to over three thousand scattered across the United Kingdom
and beyond. A company, Sloth Enterprises was formed, with many full-time GMs
running Saturnalia from offices above a tyre/brakes/exhaust garage in the red-light district
of Southampton
.
In time, the company gradually faded away, with several former players taking on the role of GM
to run either existing campaigns
or to open up new areas. Most of these successors ran through the early 2000s, and the Harlequin Games
Exile campaign in the Southern Isles remains active.
The game was named for the Roman
festival of Saturnalia
, in that making the game, forming the rules and applying for the Enterprise Allowance Scheme
, was total chaos. The word "Saturnalia" was one which turned up under the entry for "Chaos" in a thesaurus. Players took on the roles of adventurers. The game started on two sets of islands off the North and South coast of the continent, Erythria. This was named for no reason better than it sounded good. The Northern Isles included Faldeheim, Jorleheim and Tafkhim. The Southern Isles were Alagas, Krang and Ghan.
games run in the United Kingdom
. It inspired numerous other games and was important in the initiation of game pub
-meets. The game has, in various forms, remained in existence for since 1984.
Whilst there is no direct link between Saturnalia and online role-playing games
, PBM games
were their early forerunners. If it were not for PBM games showing the way, there would be no online role-playing games
.
regions of Erythria have included:
At one time in the late 1980s
the campaign
regions were designated by colour:
On initial start-up in the game, a player had 250 points to allocate between these statistics, with none given less than twenty points and none more than a hundred.
Each turn, the Games Master
would award the player bonus points to be allocated between these statistics. Points could also be lost (in most games) by injury or by using MP to cast magical spells. Bonus points would be awarded depending on how well a character performed during a turn, but also on how well the player wrote the instructions. This could be entirely subjective and at the whim of the GM
.
A character would begin as a very lowly adventurer, gaining in ability as points were added to their statistics. Their actions in the game would result in gaining renown as Fame and Infamy; the former would be awarded for positive actions and the latter for negative actions. These defined the character as Good or Evil, with an accumulation of major good or evil acts required to gain a double figure Fame or Infamy. This was the Saturnalia equivalent of Dungeons & Dragons
Alignment
.
To prevent character death resulting in the loss of a player, Saturnalia included a Karma system so that in the unfortunate event of a character dying, the player could create a new character using the standard number of points, plus a bonus derived from their dead character's points, Fame and Infamy. This meant that the paying player did not lose their entire investment in playing the game. Saturnalia was the first single character RPG and the Karma system was a way of ensuring that players who lost their character did not lose everything they had invested.
, with geographical features separating the various regions. This permitted Saturnalia to become one of the earliest shared world building
fantasy campaigns
utilising a common framework of in-game religions and early history, whilst permitting the different regions to co-exist with minimal cross-campaign
interference. Player characters could, under exceptional circumstances move from one campaign
region to another, but only with great persistence and luck, or with the agreement of the relevant Games Masters
.
Erik and his descendants were so pivotal to the history of Erythria that his name was used in the dating system: AE, After Erik.
In time the Empire fragmented, and the resurgent nomads broke many of the successor states dotted across the Northern Plains, until all that remained were isolated city states, mostly on the coast. In the south the Empire endured until it too was smashed by wars with the desert nomads.
After the fall of the Empire in the north, for a time the banner of the Ocean King was uncontested, but after leaving the inland cities as ruins his domain dissolved into many different tribes, awaiting the raising of his standard again. The remaining cities dwindled into fractious city-states, often pursuing religious conflicts between themselves.
was the quest for the fourteen swords of power, each dedicated to a deity of the Saturnalia game world.
These swords had been created by dwarven master runesmiths during the second century of the expansion of Erik's Empire. The swords served as the motive for quests and struggles between the player character heroes attempting to become a champion of one of the gods. Other, less powerful magical weapons appeared across the campaigns
.
shared a common pantheon
:
Sword and sorcery
Sword and sorcery is a sub-genre of fantasy and historical fantasy, generally characterized by sword-wielding heroes engaged in exciting and violent conflicts. An element of romance is often present, as is an element of magic and the supernatural...
fantasy Play-by-Mail
Play-by-mail game
Play-by-mail games, sometimes known as "Play-by-post", are games, of any type, played through postal mail or e-mail. One example, chess, has been played by mail for centuries . Another example, Diplomacy, has been played by mail since the 1960s, starting with a printed newsletter written by John...
role-playing game
Role-playing game
A role-playing game is a game in which players assume the roles of characters in a fictional setting. Players take responsibility for acting out these roles within a narrative, either through literal acting, or through a process of structured decision-making or character development...
s run in the United Kingdom
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
. The game started in 1984, being created by Neil Packer and Simon Letts and grew from its initial players at the University of Southampton
University of Southampton
The University of Southampton is a British public university located in the city of Southampton, England, a member of the Russell Group. The origins of the university can be dated back to the founding of the Hartley Institution in 1862 by Henry Robertson Hartley. In 1902, the Institution developed...
up to over three thousand scattered across the United Kingdom
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
and beyond. A company, Sloth Enterprises was formed, with many full-time GMs
Gamemaster
A gamemaster is a person who acts as an organizer, officiant for questions regarding rules, arbitrator, and moderator for a multiplayer game...
running Saturnalia from offices above a tyre/brakes/exhaust garage in the red-light district
Red-light district
A red-light district is a part of an urban area where there is a concentration of prostitution and sex-oriented businesses, such as sex shops, strip clubs, adult theaters, etc...
of Southampton
Southampton
Southampton is the largest city in the county of Hampshire on the south coast of England, and is situated south-west of London and north-west of Portsmouth. Southampton is a major port and the closest city to the New Forest...
.
In time, the company gradually faded away, with several former players taking on the role of GM
Gamemaster
A gamemaster is a person who acts as an organizer, officiant for questions regarding rules, arbitrator, and moderator for a multiplayer game...
to run either existing campaigns
Campaign setting
A campaign setting is usually a fictional world which serves as a setting for a role-playing game or wargame campaign. A campaign is a series of individual adventures, and a campaign setting is the world in which such adventures and campaigns take place...
or to open up new areas. Most of these successors ran through the early 2000s, and the Harlequin Games
Harlequin Games
Harlequin Games is a business which designs and moderates PBM games by email of which there Legends engine is the most recognized. From there "" page - "We fuse wild imagination with good game-play in everything we produce and do so with professionalism and love for the hobby...
Exile campaign in the Southern Isles remains active.
The game was named for the Roman
Ancient Rome
Ancient Rome was a thriving civilization that grew on the Italian Peninsula as early as the 8th century BC. Located along the Mediterranean Sea and centered on the city of Rome, it expanded to one of the largest empires in the ancient world....
festival of Saturnalia
Saturnalia
Saturnalia is an Ancient Roman festival/ celebration held in honour of Saturn , the youngest of the Titans, father of the major gods of the Greeks and Romans, and son of Uranus and Gaia...
, in that making the game, forming the rules and applying for the Enterprise Allowance Scheme
Enterprise Allowance Scheme
The Enterprise Allowance Scheme was an initiative set up by Margaret Thatcher's Conservative UK government which gave a guaranteed income of £40 per week to unemployed people who set up their own business. It was first announced on 13th November 1981, and piloted between January 1982 and July 1983,...
, was total chaos. The word "Saturnalia" was one which turned up under the entry for "Chaos" in a thesaurus. Players took on the roles of adventurers. The game started on two sets of islands off the North and South coast of the continent, Erythria. This was named for no reason better than it sounded good. The Northern Isles included Faldeheim, Jorleheim and Tafkhim. The Southern Isles were Alagas, Krang and Ghan.
Importance
Saturnalia was one of the first and certainly one of the largest PBMPlay-by-mail game
Play-by-mail games, sometimes known as "Play-by-post", are games, of any type, played through postal mail or e-mail. One example, chess, has been played by mail for centuries . Another example, Diplomacy, has been played by mail since the 1960s, starting with a printed newsletter written by John...
games run in the United Kingdom
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
. It inspired numerous other games and was important in the initiation of game pub
Public house
A public house, informally known as a pub, is a drinking establishment fundamental to the culture of Britain, Ireland, Australia and New Zealand. There are approximately 53,500 public houses in the United Kingdom. This number has been declining every year, so that nearly half of the smaller...
-meets. The game has, in various forms, remained in existence for since 1984.
Whilst there is no direct link between Saturnalia and online role-playing games
Massively multiplayer online role-playing game
Massively multiplayer online role-playing game is a genre of role-playing video games in which a very large number of players interact with one another within a virtual game world....
, PBM games
Play-by-mail game
Play-by-mail games, sometimes known as "Play-by-post", are games, of any type, played through postal mail or e-mail. One example, chess, has been played by mail for centuries . Another example, Diplomacy, has been played by mail since the 1960s, starting with a printed newsletter written by John...
were their early forerunners. If it were not for PBM games showing the way, there would be no online role-playing games
Massively multiplayer online role-playing game
Massively multiplayer online role-playing game is a genre of role-playing video games in which a very large number of players interact with one another within a virtual game world....
.
Campaign Regions
The campaignCampaign setting
A campaign setting is usually a fictional world which serves as a setting for a role-playing game or wargame campaign. A campaign is a series of individual adventures, and a campaign setting is the world in which such adventures and campaigns take place...
regions of Erythria have included:
- Central - Narquoron
- Distant Isles.
- North East Erythria.
- North West Erythria.
- Northern Isles
- Serpent Isles.
- South Erythria.
- Southern Isles.
- Exile. The last remaining active region.
At one time in the late 1980s
1980s
File:1980s decade montage.png|thumb|400px|From left, clockwise: The first Space Shuttle, Columbia, lifted off in 1981; American President Ronald Reagan and Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev eased tensions between the two superpowers, leading to the end of the Cold War; The Fall of the Berlin Wall in...
the campaign
Campaign setting
A campaign setting is usually a fictional world which serves as a setting for a role-playing game or wargame campaign. A campaign is a series of individual adventures, and a campaign setting is the world in which such adventures and campaigns take place...
regions were designated by colour:
- Central/Narquoron (Pink)
- North East Erythria (Red)
- Northern Isles (White)
- Southern Isles (Blue)
- South Erythria (Yellow)
Character Statistics
Characters were defined by the following statistics:- Combat Ability (CA).
- Magic Points (MP).
- Stealth and Agility (SA).
- Perception (PER).
- Vitality (VIT).
On initial start-up in the game, a player had 250 points to allocate between these statistics, with none given less than twenty points and none more than a hundred.
Each turn, the Games Master
Gamemaster
A gamemaster is a person who acts as an organizer, officiant for questions regarding rules, arbitrator, and moderator for a multiplayer game...
would award the player bonus points to be allocated between these statistics. Points could also be lost (in most games) by injury or by using MP to cast magical spells. Bonus points would be awarded depending on how well a character performed during a turn, but also on how well the player wrote the instructions. This could be entirely subjective and at the whim of the GM
Gamemaster
A gamemaster is a person who acts as an organizer, officiant for questions regarding rules, arbitrator, and moderator for a multiplayer game...
.
A character would begin as a very lowly adventurer, gaining in ability as points were added to their statistics. Their actions in the game would result in gaining renown as Fame and Infamy; the former would be awarded for positive actions and the latter for negative actions. These defined the character as Good or Evil, with an accumulation of major good or evil acts required to gain a double figure Fame or Infamy. This was the Saturnalia equivalent of Dungeons & Dragons
Dungeons & Dragons
Dungeons & Dragons is a fantasy role-playing game originally designed by Gary Gygax and Dave Arneson, and first published in 1974 by Tactical Studies Rules, Inc. . The game has been published by Wizards of the Coast since 1997...
Alignment
Alignment (role-playing games)
In some role-playing games, alignment is a categorisation of the moral and ethical perspective of the player characters, non-player characters, monsters, and societies in the game....
.
To prevent character death resulting in the loss of a player, Saturnalia included a Karma system so that in the unfortunate event of a character dying, the player could create a new character using the standard number of points, plus a bonus derived from their dead character's points, Fame and Infamy. This meant that the paying player did not lose their entire investment in playing the game. Saturnalia was the first single character RPG and the Karma system was a way of ensuring that players who lost their character did not lose everything they had invested.
Setting
The game was set on and around Erythria, a massive continent approximately two thousand miles east-west and four thousand north-south, plus the island chains to the north and south. Different regions of the continent and surrounding islands were divided between different Games MastersGamemaster
A gamemaster is a person who acts as an organizer, officiant for questions regarding rules, arbitrator, and moderator for a multiplayer game...
, with geographical features separating the various regions. This permitted Saturnalia to become one of the earliest shared world building
Worldbuilding
Worldbuilding is the process of constructing an imaginary world, sometimes associated with a fictional universe. The result may sometimes be called a constructed world, conworld or sub-creation. The term world-building was popularized at science fiction writer's workshops during the 1970s...
fantasy campaigns
Campaign setting
A campaign setting is usually a fictional world which serves as a setting for a role-playing game or wargame campaign. A campaign is a series of individual adventures, and a campaign setting is the world in which such adventures and campaigns take place...
utilising a common framework of in-game religions and early history, whilst permitting the different regions to co-exist with minimal cross-campaign
Campaign setting
A campaign setting is usually a fictional world which serves as a setting for a role-playing game or wargame campaign. A campaign is a series of individual adventures, and a campaign setting is the world in which such adventures and campaigns take place...
interference. Player characters could, under exceptional circumstances move from one campaign
Campaign (role-playing games)
In role-playing games, a campaign is a continuing storyline or set of adventures, typically involving the same characters. The purpose of the continuing storyline is to introduce a further aspect into the game: that of development, improvement, and growth of the characters. In a campaign, a...
region to another, but only with great persistence and luck, or with the agreement of the relevant Games Masters
Gamemaster
A gamemaster is a person who acts as an organizer, officiant for questions regarding rules, arbitrator, and moderator for a multiplayer game...
.
Geography
The major geographical features of Erythria included:- The Northern Ocean – A scattering of islands including:
- The Serpent Isles, a small chain comprising four main islands: Bromo, Formo, Trefato and Sepakak.
- The Northern Isles in arctic waters including Jorleheim, dominated by fierce clans, Faldeheim, dominated by Royalists, and Tafkhim, an isle of city states.
- The Northern Plains – Extending across the entire northern portion of the continent, ranging from near featureless grasslands to stretches of arid desert or steppe.
- The Great Divide - A monstrous range of mountains splitting Erythria into north and south, and impossible to cross. Compared with this mountain chain the rare hills and mountains of the Northern Plains were mere ridges.
- The Great River – A gigantic river system flowing northwards from the Great Divide towards the Northern ocean splitting the northern extent of the continent into the campaign regions of the North East and North West. The Great River at places was more than a hundred miles wide.
- The Southern Desert – A vast desert below the southern edge of the Great Divide. Away from the centre the land became more fertile with forests on the eastern and western coasts and jungle further south.
- The Southern Ocean – including the tropical Southern Isles, an archipelago of sixty islands including Alagas, Ghan and Krang.
History
The recorded history of Erthyria begins with the invasion of the Northmen of the Northern Isles, with their greatest leader being Erik the Forger. Their tide of conquest swept over the continent, clashing with the native tribes and defeating the nomads of the Great Plains, breaking the power of the Ocean King, the overlord of the tribes of the sea of grass. Reaching the Great Divide, the Northmen extended their conquest by sea, ultimately dominating the entire continent and uniting it under the rule of the Empire. In the far south the Northmen conquered the civilised Sahmen worshipping Mordish, driving them to the southern coast of Erythyria and across the ocean to the Southern Isles.Erik and his descendants were so pivotal to the history of Erythria that his name was used in the dating system: AE, After Erik.
In time the Empire fragmented, and the resurgent nomads broke many of the successor states dotted across the Northern Plains, until all that remained were isolated city states, mostly on the coast. In the south the Empire endured until it too was smashed by wars with the desert nomads.
After the fall of the Empire in the north, for a time the banner of the Ocean King was uncontested, but after leaving the inland cities as ruins his domain dissolved into many different tribes, awaiting the raising of his standard again. The remaining cities dwindled into fractious city-states, often pursuing religious conflicts between themselves.
Campaign Dating
The game dating system was derived from AE 901 in 1984, and incremented annually, so 2009 relates to AE 925.Common Themes
One of the common themes shared by the different regional campaignsCampaign setting
A campaign setting is usually a fictional world which serves as a setting for a role-playing game or wargame campaign. A campaign is a series of individual adventures, and a campaign setting is the world in which such adventures and campaigns take place...
was the quest for the fourteen swords of power, each dedicated to a deity of the Saturnalia game world.
These swords had been created by dwarven master runesmiths during the second century of the expansion of Erik's Empire. The swords served as the motive for quests and struggles between the player character heroes attempting to become a champion of one of the gods. Other, less powerful magical weapons appeared across the campaigns
Campaign setting
A campaign setting is usually a fictional world which serves as a setting for a role-playing game or wargame campaign. A campaign is a series of individual adventures, and a campaign setting is the world in which such adventures and campaigns take place...
.
Currency
All of the Saturnalia games used a common currency. The whole currency system was based around the crucial facts that:- The gold cadoc. A cadoc was worth ten phymeres.
- The silver phymere. A phymere was worth ten ogrods.
- The bronze ogrod. Ogrods were many, Cadocs were few.
Pantheon
The Saturnalia campaignsCampaign setting
A campaign setting is usually a fictional world which serves as a setting for a role-playing game or wargame campaign. A campaign is a series of individual adventures, and a campaign setting is the world in which such adventures and campaigns take place...
shared a common pantheon
Pantheon (gods)
A pantheon is a set of all the gods of a particular polytheistic religion or mythology.Max Weber's 1922 opus, Economy and Society discusses the link between a...
:
- Corgul: God of Law.
- Destu: God of Darkness.
- Dianodus: God of Balance.
- Drasci: Thief God.
- Egar-Colmetch: God of Wealth.
- Haquar: Goddess of Magic.
- Morana: Life Goddess.
- Orth: War God.
- Renchu: Death God.
- Sahmen: Sun God.
- Somol: Weather God.
- Suocona: Love Goddess.
- Trolin: Healing Goddess.
- Trorindar: Moon Goddess.