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Fabula Ultima: TTJRPG Atlas - High Fantasy
Fabula Ultima's HIGH FANTASY ATLAS s takes you to a world of ancient mysteries, breathtaking locations, incredible magic and powerful entities; start from humble beginnings as the heroes of legends and myths to lead characters to an epic and glorious destiny, even trusting the gods as in the best-known JRPGs! Immerse yourself in the epic genre par excellence with 4 new Classes (Chanter, Commander, Dancer and Symbolist) and new Heroic Skills with which to create even more combinations! 10 high fantasy archetypal settings with hints and tips for playing an intense high fantasy campaign or from which to bring your own world to life. Unleash your creativity and forge your ultimate weapons with custom weapon rules. Introduce Quirks, optional rules to give your characters more depth and push their heroic abilities to the max with Zero Powers. 5 Villains, real bosses of increasing levels with which to populate your adventures and confront players with increasingly demanding and stimulating challenges! 200 full-colour pages, illustrated with manga and chibi-style images by international authors.
- GenresRole Playing Games
199 pages, Perfect Paperback
Published November 7, 2023
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Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
June 2, 2024
This is a very fun game, though this volume adds only a few interesting features. The classes are generally good, zero moves are great (they are basically limit breaks), and the weapon creation section is very cool. Some of the pre-fab material is a little simple, though others are good for inspiration.
As a religious person, I felt uncomfortable with the antagonism towards religions and the divine, especially with the sections that stress respecting other viewpoints (even on the same pages as critical views on religion). It is true that jrpgs are usually antagonistic towards religions (which is problematic), but this book doesn't handle that problem well. This makes the game world a bit less optimistic than the creator seems to want it to be.
As a religious person, I felt uncomfortable with the antagonism towards religions and the divine, especially with the sections that stress respecting other viewpoints (even on the same pages as critical views on religion). It is true that jrpgs are usually antagonistic towards religions (which is problematic), but this book doesn't handle that problem well. This makes the game world a bit less optimistic than the creator seems to want it to be.
November 8, 2023
Short review:
The Fabula Ultima: High Fantasy Atlas is an outstanding resource for Game Masters (and, much to my surprise and delight, writers of fantasy fiction). While perhaps a bit light on player-facing content, what’s there is extremely flavorful and much appreciated.
Longer review:
Overview/What’s It About?
Fabula Ultima: Atlas – High Fantasy (which I’ll refer to as the High Fantasy Atlas from here) is an expansion to the Fabula Ultima tabletop RPG. The base game is heavily inspired by classic JRPG video games, and refers to three “modes” of fantasy settings in these games: High Fantasy, Techno Fantasy, and Natural Fantasy. This book expands upon the first of these, providing guidance on matching the tone of touchstones in this subgenre, adding new classes and optional rules befitting the atmosphere, and providing sample Villain characters (major antagonists for the players).
Despite a relatively slim page count, Italian games designer Emanuele Galletto and their team of co-writers deliver a significant punch. If I had no intention of running this game, I might be a little disappointed at the limited amount of content specifically for players—but as someone who plans to do so at the next possible opportunity, I find it useful from cover to cover. What’s more, the discussions of thematic resonance through antagonists and settings was very clear and succinct—I believe this discussion and the examples provided in the High Fantasy Atlas would be useful to writers of fantastical fiction even beyond the tabletop medium.
Expanding the Toolbox
Player get the shorter end of the stick in the High Fantasy Atlas, but what’s there is excellent. The four new classes each have a distinct new identity and the potential for a lot of fun, the additional capstone abilities for classes are suitably wild, “Zero Powers” (think Final Fantasy limit breaks) and custom weapons are fun ideas, and character Quirks add oddities to characters that set them up for fun storytelling opportunities.
There are also ten sample characters showing off the wide range of what High Fantasy in a JRPG context can entail. This section can help players who aren’t as familiar with genre touchstones get a better idea of what to do, and the advice on how to handle these characters’ stories does a good job with contextualizing game mastering advice from this book and the core rules. It also segues nicely into my next point…
Story Development
When I first picked up the book, I wasn’t terribly interested in the ten High Fantasy locations promised on the back cover. As established in the core rules, locations in Fabula Ultima come about as a result of the world the game master and players create. They are a collaborative effort bespoke to a campaign, and I wasn’t sure how presenting setting archetypes would be any help. On reading the introduction to the section, however, I found myself surprised. The section wasn’t going to be a gazetteer, but more of a construction kit showcasing what certain types of locations meant in both a plot and allegorical sense—and then providing sample hooks and details to show game masters how to run a story in these locations.
The closest thing to a prescriptive section probably comes from the Antagonists section of the book, which provides five sample antagonists and sample instructions for what actions they’ll take in combat. But these instructions tend to be helpful not just for showing tactics, but for setting the mood for an encounter. Far too often in tabletop games, I end up feeling like the foes I run are just sacks of health with interchangeable names—the Villains of the High Fantasy Atlas show off different ways to run a fight, as well as some of the ways game masters can make opponents feel different.
This theme ran throughout the book. Macro-level advice on storytelling within the subgenre was often followed by examples that set the imagination racing, rather than setting something in stone. An early introduction was also sure to address common pitfalls for the genre, especially as many of the JRPG touchstones are single-player games rather than being meant for a group of equals.
As I was reading the storytelling advice, I nodded along in recognition that most of the things described made sense or came straight out of a beloved video game—then it struck me that a fair amount of the advice was applicable not just to game masters, but to genre writers in general. The way that Galletto and their team connect what’s on the page (or, on the table) to the emotional throughlines of a story is sensible and clear with plenty of examples. Looking at how the team built sample characters and connected them to their traits made me go back to my own fiction and reverse engineer the characters through the lens presented in the High Fantasy Atlas. What’s more—doing so helped untangle some struggles I was having with these characters.
Conclusion
The Fabula Ultima: Atlas – High Fantasy has resonance outside of just Fabula Ultima. Game masters for other fantasy tabletop games could probably learn a thing or two from the examples and discussions of storytelling in the book. More broadly, writers of fantastical fiction might also pick up a few lessons from the book—something I never anticipated saying about an RPG manual.
Most importantly, though, the High Fantasy Atlas is an outstanding supplemental book for a tabletop RPG that I am extremely excited to play.
The Fabula Ultima: High Fantasy Atlas is an outstanding resource for Game Masters (and, much to my surprise and delight, writers of fantasy fiction). While perhaps a bit light on player-facing content, what’s there is extremely flavorful and much appreciated.
Longer review:
Overview/What’s It About?
Fabula Ultima: Atlas – High Fantasy (which I’ll refer to as the High Fantasy Atlas from here) is an expansion to the Fabula Ultima tabletop RPG. The base game is heavily inspired by classic JRPG video games, and refers to three “modes” of fantasy settings in these games: High Fantasy, Techno Fantasy, and Natural Fantasy. This book expands upon the first of these, providing guidance on matching the tone of touchstones in this subgenre, adding new classes and optional rules befitting the atmosphere, and providing sample Villain characters (major antagonists for the players).
Despite a relatively slim page count, Italian games designer Emanuele Galletto and their team of co-writers deliver a significant punch. If I had no intention of running this game, I might be a little disappointed at the limited amount of content specifically for players—but as someone who plans to do so at the next possible opportunity, I find it useful from cover to cover. What’s more, the discussions of thematic resonance through antagonists and settings was very clear and succinct—I believe this discussion and the examples provided in the High Fantasy Atlas would be useful to writers of fantastical fiction even beyond the tabletop medium.
Expanding the Toolbox
Player get the shorter end of the stick in the High Fantasy Atlas, but what’s there is excellent. The four new classes each have a distinct new identity and the potential for a lot of fun, the additional capstone abilities for classes are suitably wild, “Zero Powers” (think Final Fantasy limit breaks) and custom weapons are fun ideas, and character Quirks add oddities to characters that set them up for fun storytelling opportunities.
There are also ten sample characters showing off the wide range of what High Fantasy in a JRPG context can entail. This section can help players who aren’t as familiar with genre touchstones get a better idea of what to do, and the advice on how to handle these characters’ stories does a good job with contextualizing game mastering advice from this book and the core rules. It also segues nicely into my next point…
Story Development
When I first picked up the book, I wasn’t terribly interested in the ten High Fantasy locations promised on the back cover. As established in the core rules, locations in Fabula Ultima come about as a result of the world the game master and players create. They are a collaborative effort bespoke to a campaign, and I wasn’t sure how presenting setting archetypes would be any help. On reading the introduction to the section, however, I found myself surprised. The section wasn’t going to be a gazetteer, but more of a construction kit showcasing what certain types of locations meant in both a plot and allegorical sense—and then providing sample hooks and details to show game masters how to run a story in these locations.
The closest thing to a prescriptive section probably comes from the Antagonists section of the book, which provides five sample antagonists and sample instructions for what actions they’ll take in combat. But these instructions tend to be helpful not just for showing tactics, but for setting the mood for an encounter. Far too often in tabletop games, I end up feeling like the foes I run are just sacks of health with interchangeable names—the Villains of the High Fantasy Atlas show off different ways to run a fight, as well as some of the ways game masters can make opponents feel different.
This theme ran throughout the book. Macro-level advice on storytelling within the subgenre was often followed by examples that set the imagination racing, rather than setting something in stone. An early introduction was also sure to address common pitfalls for the genre, especially as many of the JRPG touchstones are single-player games rather than being meant for a group of equals.
As I was reading the storytelling advice, I nodded along in recognition that most of the things described made sense or came straight out of a beloved video game—then it struck me that a fair amount of the advice was applicable not just to game masters, but to genre writers in general. The way that Galletto and their team connect what’s on the page (or, on the table) to the emotional throughlines of a story is sensible and clear with plenty of examples. Looking at how the team built sample characters and connected them to their traits made me go back to my own fiction and reverse engineer the characters through the lens presented in the High Fantasy Atlas. What’s more—doing so helped untangle some struggles I was having with these characters.
Conclusion
The Fabula Ultima: Atlas – High Fantasy has resonance outside of just Fabula Ultima. Game masters for other fantasy tabletop games could probably learn a thing or two from the examples and discussions of storytelling in the book. More broadly, writers of fantastical fiction might also pick up a few lessons from the book—something I never anticipated saying about an RPG manual.
Most importantly, though, the High Fantasy Atlas is an outstanding supplemental book for a tabletop RPG that I am extremely excited to play.
January 19, 2025
I've been reading or rereading through these books lately and I'm still struck by how insightful they are. They convey things I know that I might not have the words to describe. Fun new optional rules, interesting well-fleshed out locales and all in all a well designed product.
May 30, 2025
Fabula Ultima’s first supplement completely knocks it out the park. 4 great new classes, evocative high fantasy locations, expanded bestiary, zero limit abilities - Fabula Ultima has a bright future indeed.
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews