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View Full Version : New Fantasy: Jim Butcher and the Codex Alera



Nevermore
2007-02-17, 02:36 AM
I was reading the discussion on Salvatore and contemporary fantasy and saw a drastic oversight. This oversight is the Codex Alera novels; Furies of Calderon, Academ's Fury and Cursor's Fury. They are so good my MOTHER who generally hates and loathes anything fantasy based is addicted to.

They take place in a Roman style society where magic is so common, everyone has atleast a little ability. However, the magic is rather unique, taking an entirely different form than most contemporary fantasy. It is caused by elemental spirits known as Furies. Everyone possesses power over atleast one, except for Tavi, the 15 year old (he starts at 15 and ages throughout the books) main protagonist.

I love these book. I've had them for two and a half months and I've reread the series twice, the 3rd book Cursor's Fury even morfe so. The setting is refreshing, the antagonists rather fresh and the Empire's politics very brutal.

These books have caused me to run Werewolf: The Dark Ages in a Roman Era campaign.

oriong
2007-02-17, 02:50 AM
I'm pretty sure this isn't the place for this thread. unless you've got something RPG related you intended to bring up, sounds like it's more for the friendly banter or media discussion forum.

Nevermore
2007-02-17, 03:08 AM
Was trying to relate it to the other thread, however it is the early hours of the morning, so my judgement isn't quite as good as it normally is. I blame my insomnia lol.

Desaril
2007-02-17, 09:04 PM
i want to jump in on this becuase I've read the first two books and I love them! I would love to see a game with this setting, but I'm not sure how it would work in d20.

Essentially, everyone (except Tavi) has at least one elemental as an animal companion or they have a bunch of supernatural abilities and the Fury is just a "special effect".



BTW, please don't talk about what happens in Cursor's Fury!!!

Inyssius Tor
2007-02-17, 11:54 PM
Oh yeah, those books are awesome. The other series (the Dresden Files) by Jim Butcher is also good, in my opinion (not as unique, but all nine books are still really well done).

However... yeah. This should go in Media Discussions (unless you want to "port" it into d20, in which case it'd go in Homebrew).

clarkvalentine
2007-02-18, 12:03 AM
Jim's stuff is outstanding. Currently he's working with Evil Hat Productions ( http://www.evilhat.com/ , makers of great indie RPGs ) on an RPG based on the Dresden Files. I don't know if there's anything in the works regarding a Codex Alera RPG, but it wouldn't surprise me if he wanted to work with them again.

- Clark