Realms of Arkania

May the Twelve be with you, wanderer of the Limbus, or should I say the transcendent mass that spans between all the spheres of our precious Arkania...

Okay, quite too much for the beginning, these pages are designed to convey a recent part of german culture to the world, that has already spread to some computer screens and got stuck there a while ago in the computer game trilogy called the Realms of Arkania. What you are going to be presented in the next pages is a complete translation of the main rule book of the most successful role-playing game (RPG) in Germany ever and yes, you understood it in the right way, not only the most successful german role-playing game, but the most successful in Germany throughout the years.

Before I go further, I want to tell a little bit more about its history. The propagation of the word of mouth, that a german role-playing game was developed, started way back at the beginning of the decade which is now known as the poppy Eighties, that first game, however, was not "Das Schwarze Auge" (engl. The Black Eye) , as Realms of Arkania is called in its original, but Midgard. Now, do not bother about Midgard, because Midgard lost track of the new competitor soon after its release shortly after the first german RPG. The inventor of the success was Uli Kiesow, which some of you might know as the writer of the novel "The Charlatan", which was also translated into english. This great creator of the most-popular german fantasy continent Arkania died last year, i.e. 1997. His game never made it to the island, nowadays known as the United Kingdom or the promised lands nowadays called the United States of America. As far as I am concerned, I think, this was partly due to the failure of the game in Italy (released as ...), in France (released al "L'Oeil Noir") and the Netherlands (released as "Het oog des meesters") and partly to its inherent avoidance of english influence, so that in inner circles of the Realms of Arkania a single english sounding name was like a pact with the Nameless - the devil-equivalent of Arkania. Only Attic Entertainment with their release of the Destiny Blade broke through this barrier and finally, Star Trail, the second part, was a major success world-wide. Its fame spread, but the role-playing scene of Germany did not wake up, till now...

So this WWW-page tries to tear down another wall to open up the cosmopolitan mind for the invention of "real storytelling" and simple, but all the way well-calculated rules, that could still be a strong competitor in any choice of role-playing games worldwide.

Nobody wants to force you into anything, but think about it...

Arkania needs you!

So, you decided to give it a try, hm ? Good idea, or better very good idea.

If you just tried to access this, because you do not know, what a role-playing game is all about, there will be a short description of that on a near page in the near future, because Realms of Arkania is very easy to master as a beginner, since it has a modular structure, which allows you to embody rules for every stage of your career in role-playing.

If you already know what role-playing game is all about and this is just a way of getting to know what those bloody germans keep playing all the time, then, please begin to read the first simple description of the character and the rules of the game in the preliminary rules chapter. You will need these very basic rules, because you will only be able to access the rule book 2, which is the main rule book and explains 95% of all the rules with the exception of these very few basic rules. I did not translate rule book 1, because the history of Arkania is developing quickly these times and much of what it says is simply wrong, today.

If you already read the preliminary rules, go on to the dull direct translation and index of rule book 2, which is different from the german edition only at the end, equally, because of the fast-moving history of the enchanted continent.