I've been re-reading the AA core rulebook and Robert E Howard's name is mentioned a time or so as being influential in the pulp era. REH is one of my all-time favorite authors and it occurs to me that I'd love to see an "all REH" sourcebook for Amazing Adventures.

If you don't know REH's works beyond Conan, he also wrote quite a few westerns, supernatural stories, detective stories, pirate yarns, and so on. (He wrote a bunch of boxing stories, but I haven't read most of those as the subject doesn't grab my interest. They may be great stories, however.) His iconic characters include Francis X Gordon (adventures in Afghanastan during the 1920's) and Solomon Kane (a dark paladin adventuring in Africa) as well as many others. He wrote about all sorts of eras of fiction, from Kull (age of Atlantis), through Conan (20,000 years ago), Bran Mak Morn (Roman era), Black Vumela (pirates of 1600's) and Solomin Kane, to the "modern" era detectives and Cthulhu mythos style horror. (Keeping in mind that "modern" was 1930's, the time when he died.)

As best as I can tell, all of Howard's characters were supposed to be co-existing in the same historical timeline of our Earth. I think it would be fun to have AA material specific to a "REH Earth" campaign, where one could battle Cthulhu-style evil while searching for historical artifacts, or even one where time travel was possible and one could adventure back to encounter Kull in Atlantis or some other figure in REH's timeline.

If only someone would write this book!

I've been hit and miss on Conan, but always loved Kane ... I've missed Gordon (as you said his setting is Afghanistan I'm inherently interested in that) so will have to give it a read.

That said, I agree a REH source book would be great.

Just curious if you have read "real" Robert E Howard Conan or some of the stuff cranked out by other authors?

I ask because my exposure to Conan in the 1970's wa through the old Ace line of paperbacks, edited by DeCamp and Carter, and then through a bunch of new novels by Robert Jordan and others. To me, the original Howard stories blow this stuff away.

You can now buy real Howard stories through a series of Dell trade paperbacks, but that's a somewhat recent thing (last 10 years or so...) but before that it was nearly impossible to find the original text.

I am far more partial to the Soloman Kane short stories than Conan, etc... they are far more packed with drama and tension, but that may simply be because they are short stories versus full stories.

Most of the original Conan stories are short stories, not full-length novels.

Have you checked out the AA Companion? I've got discussions in there for Swords and Sorcery, 16th-17th century swashbuckling (a la Kane), weird westerns, Victorian horror, and weird tales. The magic system gets a complete (optional) overhaul specifically to more closely tie it to madness and corruptions

And yes, I do have plans to write "genre books" for AA which will detail these things even more. Right now in the planning stages are a Swashbuckling Stories book, a Space Opera Stories one, and an Alien Conspiracy Codex (all basic working titles). Future ones will include Weird West, Lovecraftian Horror and Gothic Horror...possibly also zombie apocalypse and post-apocalyptic (Mad Max/Blood of Heroes stuff). I really want to do a swords and sorcery setting that crosses over C&C and AA as well...so all of that is on my wish / to do list.

Fin, I think, though, that you'll really dig another mini campaign I'm planning. It doesn't have a name yet but it is VERY Howardian and involves stopping a fanatical cult worshipping dark gods. It'll be a globetrotting game of high action, adventure and horror. You might also dig Rise of the Red God, which expands the original Temple of the Red God along the same lines.

Here's the catch: for all of this to happen, sales of AA HAVE to remain strong, so the best thing you can do is spread the word and get other people playing and buying the product!!!

This thread has a lot of crossover with another one, so apologies if my answers in both seem similar. I should put everything REH-based in this thread, but I replied to the other one first....
Have it, haven't had time to read it in much depth.

All of these sound, well ... Amazing. If you want some playtesters, I think my group can find time in our schedule....

Looking forward to it. Howard had a style of action-horror that I just can't find in many authors. Sort of an Indiana Jones meets Cthulhu...

Yeah, I didn't realize there were two similar modules until I had already bought the Temple module through Noble Knight. Then, when I found the expanded setting module at a local game store, I knew I had to have that one as well!

I'm trying to spread the word. Maybe I'll get some chatter going at DF and/or OD&D Discussion. AA is a great game!

Finarvyn,

I could not agree more about REH style stuff for AA! Howard is my favorite pulp adventure writer, easily, and likely would have written some incredible novels had he lived longer. (I truly love his only Conan novel.) Also, Howard had a way of placing a ton of description and mood in only a sentence or two, something that makes his short stories so fun to read and can also inspire a GM in his/her in-game descriptions. Some of Howard's short stories read like RPG adventures, with their dark dungeons, caves, and mysterious towers. I prefer the Conan tales, but Howard wrote many other great stories with a variety of other character types, as you point out.

Sadly, while a lot of Howard's stories are in the public domain, a number of them aren't yet, and there are trademark issues in that Paradox Entertainment (Conan Properties LLC) has trademarked just about everything Howard under the sun. So that means you need a license to publish Howard-specific stuff, and those aren't cheap.