Twenty Palaces, the tabletop rpg

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It’s no secret to anyone who follows me on Twitter (@byharryconnolly) that at one time I was talking about licensing the Twenty Palaces books for a tabletop rpg. It’s also no secret that I told the company they shouldn’t bother: the series had already failed and no new books would be coming out to support the game release.

What’s more, I wanted to move on. I was pretty bummed that Twenty Palaces didn’t do well (still am, in fact) and I had no desire to go in-depth on the way the magic worked or the history of the Twenty Palace Society. It felt like dragging a dying dog outside to force him to chase a stick.

What I suggested to them and to others, was that they should just file off the serial numbers and release something similar. It’s what I did with the books themselves; I dumped the tentacles and the consonant-salad names to recreate Lovecraft after all.

I’m extremely pleased to say they did.

Now, it’s not *actually* a Twenty Palaces rpg, but it’s as close as anyone is going to come. If you pop over to that Kickstarter, you can download the game rulebook for a donation as low as $1. The only thing the core rulebook won’t have is the artwork (which is what the Kickstarter is about).

Once you have that, you can also download the “Magic System Toolkit” which has just been made available today in Update 19. The toolkit is a short demonstration of how to create different magic systems (5 of them) within the Fate rules, and the last one, Void Callers, is very similar to the Twenty Palaces system. I even played a (very small) part in spitballing ideas for one of the listed predators malign creatures who can be summoned from the void.

So, there isn’t going to be a Twenty Palaces game you can play, but this is as close as you’re likely to get, and it only costs a dollar for the pdfs. Of course, if you pledge at a higher amount, you’ll also get a Fate book called “Crime World” from LEVERAGE co-creator/writer John Rogers about grifting and stealing, along with a lot of other stuff.

Check it out.