Baptism of Fire, RPG set in Medieval Poland

[Necron 99]

Might be of interest to some folks.

Baptism of Fire is an OSR RPG set in the dawn of the Polish monarchy in the early medieval period. It is a complete rulebook and setting. As a setting, it is “medieval authentic,” meaning that it is set in our own historical Earth rather than a fantasy world, but this is the world as the people living in the setting imagined and envisioned it. That is to say, religion, magic, and monsters all exist and function as the paradigm of the early medieval world imagined.

The default setting of Baptism of Fire is a society that is transforming from a Dark Age culture to an early Medieval culture. Poland, in the early 11th Century, was moving from a sedentary tribal system of “barbarians” to the beginnings of a feudal society united under a monarchy. As part of the process of successfully making this shift, the Piast rulers had introduced the unifying force of Christianity to the land.

The process of unifying disparate people into a single nation was predictably met with resistance. But the Piast dukes were clever enough to make good alliances, including with the more powerful Christian kingdoms that had risen up from the ruins of the Roman Empire. Christianity would help cement a common culture for many local tribes, smoothing over countless ancient divisions and rivalries and legitimizing the crown. But while Christianity had many progressive ideas that appealed to many people, there would nevertheless be a great many who would refuse to give up their age-old gods and heathen traditions without a fight.

All of this was taking place in a setting that was wild and magical. After the fall of Rome, the population of Europe had declined dramatically and failed to grow for five centuries. Monsters, fairies, demons, and dark magic ran wild outside of the safety of human cities. The Christianization of Poland was also the taming of that land, purifying it of the dangers of the dark wild and bringing the light of civilization and its accompanying stability and prosperity. In the standard Baptism of Fire campaign, the player characters are agents of that civilizing force.

[Ancalagon]

Some good info and it looks intriguing... but holy crap - the gent conducting the review was just about intolerable to listen to with all the spit-smacking he performed.

Baptism of Fire is an OSR RPG set in the dawn of the Polish monarchy in the early medieval period.

That has potential. I've not studied that location and era so no preconceived notions.

I own the author's Lion & Dragon rules set in the late medieval period. A lot of the rules are good but the author failed spectacularly with regard to religion in a "medieval-authentic" game. Rather than incorporate The Church (Catholicism), the author used "The Church of the Unconquered Sun" which, IMO, was a very lame cop out that severely tarnished the game. I hope he doesn't take a similar cop out regarding Christianity in the Baptism of Fire game.

I saw in DTRPG that Baptism of Fire was added on 27-Apr-24 and it already has 27 reviews and 10 discussions. I think I'll go check out what the reviewers have to say...

[sbaldrick]

It could certainly work as a setting. Tons of potential. I have also thought about running Pundit's Silk Road setting with Castles and Crusades where the PCs are exiled Mongols whose tribe/clan was wiped out by Genghis Khan's early campaigns to unite the Mongols. They would have adventures on the Silk Road as they work as agents of a Macedonian Vampire that had been a general under Alexander the Great.

[Ancalagon]

It could certainly work as a setting. Tons of potential. I have also thought about running Pundit's Silk Road setting with Castles and Crusades where the PCs are exiled Mongols whose tribe/clan was wiped out by Genghis Khan's early campaigns to unite the Mongols. They would have adventures on the Silk Road as they work as agents of a Macedonian Vampire that had been a general under Alexander the Great.

That has a lot of potential with good pacing (i.e. not revealing too much too soon).