Design History

[dancross]

Two gamer compatriots, named Dan Cross and Randall Petras, decided to create a new fantasy role-playing game. This is nothing startling. After all, creating variant rules for one's own style and preferences is natural enough. What is surprising is when a game turns to shape the designers. Was that why our new role-playing system was named Eldritch? Surely, the design process seemed to take on a life of its own. For Mr. Cross, its design was a compulsion that nearly drove him to madness (Mr. Petras was already slightly crazy, being a programmer, but that's beside the point). No, we didn't end up writing "Necronomicon the RPG". It turned out the compulsion wasn't something supernatural, but recognition that we were creating something that played differently. That realization drove the process of design and revision for seven years. Story and action---"fluff and crunch"---we wanted the perfect balance between the two. Our players demanded it; again and again, prompting one rewrite after another. The manuscript had more incarnations than Shiva, and yet retained a core principle. It's a "Story in Action". A narrative game that is unabashedly action-oriented. Free-form, rules-light, imagination bound (never moored to a battle-mat), and yet a vessel perfect for detail and depth.

Eldritch Role-Playing isn't about reinventing the wheel; the classic tropes of high fantasy are retained, and Gygax's original innovations duly honored. It's about striking a good balance in play, appealing to the root of what the role-playing experience is all about. It's about you, everything inevitably molded to fit your style, your imagination, your group of friends. You are Prometheus, you bring the fire---we just provide excellent kindling. You'll see for yourself.

http://www.eldritchrpg.com