I’m not sure if I’d describe Talislanta exactly how Rick Swan did, but I like the quote—and it does express the eccentricity and originality of the world. The second quote is as good of a one-sentence description that I can think of.

Talislanta is “exotic fantasy”, it doesn’t use the standard fantasy stereotypes, although you will find (despite its perennial declaration of “still no elves”) elvish-like wizards (Cymrillians), dragons, dwarf-esque races, et cetera. But these aren’t merely “different versions”—they are outright new and original and fresh manifestations of these basic archetypes of our primordial consciousness. In other words, Talislanta digs deeply into our mythic past and psycho-spiritual depths, and brings to life the most exquisite multiplicity of ideas.

The word “Talislanta” refers to the major continent of the world Archaeus (although I haven’t seen the world name mentioned in the 4th edition book), a planet with seven moons, that orbits around two suns. The current era is many centuries after the Great Disaster, which destroyed the Archaen civilization---“A Golden Age of magical achievement and discovery”. After the Age of Confusion, Talislanta re-organized itself and the New Age dawned, which is some 600-years old. You’ve probably heard some variation of this before--this is archetypal stuff. Now what makes Talislanta so impressive, in my mind, is that it blends the archetypal with the original and exotic—and comes up with a truly fresh setting.

The Book Itself
As I mentioned before, this is a huge book—probably the meatiest tome of its ilk in-print. However, it doesn’t necessarily have more words than say the Forgotten Realms Campaign Setting as the font-size is significantly larger. Not too big, but I probably would have preferred a slightly smaller font (and a slightly slimmer tome).

It is bound well (a big plus), a hardcover with a very nice blue-toned picture by the artist most often associated with Talislanta, P.D. Breeding-Black. Skimming through the book, there is a lot of terrific greyscale artwork, although most of it a diehard Talislanta-fan has seen before, but with some new stuff as well. It is a pleasing book to look through, although one can tell that there wasn’t a ton of money to throw around for layout and printing (How I define this is whether or not I feel like I could have done something similar on my home computer—I could have, if not as well). Overall, very well done—if not stunningly designed.

502 pages, you say? What’s in them? Well, the first 100 pages are devoted to the rules (more on that later), the next 250 to the setting itself (the continent of Talislanta); 60 pages to “character archetypes”, the last 80-ish pages to gamemastering, equipment and an appendix.

The Rules
Some folks (Talislanta fans) like to call Talislanta the “original d20 system,” because its simple die mechanic is a d20 role modifiers, from which opposed modifiers are subtracted—and the number compared on the Action Table, which is as follows:

For example, let’s say you, a Cymrilian Swordsmage, have a longsword rating of 6 ( 3 Combat Rating and 3 longssword skill), and you attack a Kang Warrior with a falchion rating of 10 ( 6 CR, 4 falchion skill)—you roll d20 add 6 and subtract 10 and consult the Action Table.

Simple, easy and effective.

Talislanta 4th edition is a solely ‘skill-based’ system—unlike the 3rd edition, which was level and skill-based. I sort of liked the combination of skill and levels, but this does stream-line things a lot—which is what the 4th edition does in general.

Your character has Eleven Attributes: the ten Ratings--Strength, Dexterity, Constitution, Speed, Perception, Charisma, Will, Intelligence, Combat and Magic—plus Hit Points. A note about HP—unlike previous additions, Hit Points do not go up (as there are no levels). Makes it kind of interesting.

The rest of a character’s statistics are skills and special abilities, the latter of which are specific to race and culture. When gaining a experience points, one can spend them on either increasing skills are gaining new ones—the system is very open-ended.

The magic system has undergone a complete overhaul—a spellcaster has one or more of the eleven Orders (“a field of magic or magical tradition”)—which include Cartomancy, Cryptomancy, Crystalomancy, Elemental Magic, Invocation, Mysticism, Natural Magic, Necromancy, Shamanism, Witchcraft and Wizardry. There are also twelve Modes—reminiscient of Ars Magica’s Forms—Alter, Attack, Conjure, Defend, Heal, Illusion, Influence, Move, Reveal, Summon, Transform, Ward. The Modes act as magical skills—a character will generally start with one or two Orders, and 2—6 Modes in each, every Order having certain Modes that are restricted. Each Mode has a guideline for the effect that it can produce; spell level is dependent upon how powerful (and thus difficult) the caster wishes the spell to be. For example, if you wanted to cast a 15th level spell it would be an additional –15 to your roll on the Action Table. The Attack Mode, for example, is quite simple—it causes 1 Hit Point per Spell Level, with varying range, duration and area, depending upon how much the caster wishes to subtract from the roll.

There are example spellbooks for each Order, which include about 15-20 spells, although the rules really encourage player creativity—when you cast a spell you describe the effect you wish to occur. An example for Attack that they give is: “I call upon Borean, god of the North Wind, to blast my foes with razor-sharp shards of ice.”

The Setting
While the rules system is excellent, the real gem of Talislanta is Talislanta itself. Without going into the setting in detail (this review is becoming longer than I expected), it reminds a bit of the cantina in the Stars Wars movie--although far more interesting, and not as cheesy. There are dozens of different races and cultures that are--in case you are worried--all well thought out and 'make sense'. Somehow, despite the incredible multiplicity, Talislanta manages to have a strong internal logic, a high degree of VERISIMILITUDE...yes, that word that diehard gamers love to throw about; Talislanta is about as exotic and alien as you can get while still being verisimilar.

There is pretty much a bit of everything--from the green-skinned high elvish-like Cymrilians (can you say Silmarillion?) to the red-skinned war-like Kang; from the Batreans, whose males are large, brutish and ugly, and females are beautiful and nubile (and sought after as courtesans), to the Ariane, a black-skinned mystic race who ponder the ways of Transcendence...and it goes on. It is simply an amazing work of creative genius.

On the other hand, if you don't feel like stretching your imagination, or if you just want to play lowest common denominator fantasy, stick to one of the more popular settings (Disclaimer: If you read one of my other reviews about one of these 'more popular settings', you'll realize I like them for what they are...I just don't believe they are on the same level of creativity and pure imagination).

The Character Archetypes
This might be my favorite part of the book, as it combines the rules with the density and color of the setting. Every player chooses a character archetype, which is a template combination of race/culture and profession--so you've got archetypes such as the Ariane Mystic, the Cymrilian Rogue Magician, the Gao Sea Rogue, Jaka Beastmaster, Kang Warrior-Priest...et cetera. There are over a hundred of them, and all include both starting stats (which can be slightly modified to suit the player as well as style of campaign), a picture, and a description in second person to give the player an idea of what it is like to be a, say, Batrean Courtesan.

My favorite archetype is the Xambrian Wizard Hunter. The Xambrians are a people who were brought to edge of extinction by a race of spell casters, who ended up extinct, but whose spirits manifest as "reincarnators", a sort of soul-vampire. The Xambrians are a dour and moody bunch who spend their entire lives seeking out--and destroying--reincarnators.

Gamemastering, Equipment, Appendix
Again, good stuff all around--the gamemastering section is helpful, with numerous interesting adventure hooks, but unfortunately a lack of an example adventure--one of the few negatives of the book. The equipment reflects the diversity of the setting--all sorts of interesting goodies; and the appendix has lots of helpful charts, like master skill and archetype lists, a pronunciation guide, and a good character sheet.

In Summary
What else is there to say? As you probably know by now, I love Talislanta--in fact, it is my favorite game. The rules system is one of the best out there, in my opinion--simple enough that it really allows the focus of the setting to shine, but flexible and detailed enough to provide for good gaming fun. And the setting...well, lots of moments of "Damn, I wish I thought of that!"

The only downfalls--the lack of an adventure and a fair number of spelling errors--are easily outshined by the brilliance of the work. I would, however, have liked a nice big full color map (the black and white map is pretty good, however, appearing in both a two and one page format).

More than anything else, Talislanta inspires a deep sense of wonder, which in my eyes, is why I roleplay (and write, and world design, etc) in the first place.