What is the deal with Earthdawn Age of Legend?

Question

I was quite surprised to see a book by Vagrant named "Age of Legend" pop up seemingly out of nowhere roughly around the same time Fourth Edition by FASA was released.

What is this book about ? I can't remember it being mentioned during the KS campaign or development (though I DID kinda lose track a few months in) and find the simultaneous launch really confusing about either editor's intentions.

In essence, the core of the question is "what are the differences between this book and the KS-funded 4th edition and do they justify the existence / purchase of this one ?" (are they significant enough ?)

Answer 1

From the preview at http://www.vagrantworkshop.com/files/preview_ed_age_of_legend.pdf:

This storygame is based on the FU game engine by Nathan Russell.

What you will find in the Age of Legend is first and foremost an easy game. It is intended as a lightweight alternative to Earthdawn’s own Step System (which has been around in in various editions since 1992). Setting and character creation in the Age of Legend is fairly quick and intuitive, allowing you to play powerful adepts in this ancient era of heroes, and the game system itself is easy to learn and very simple to use.

Basically, the Age of Legend is an alternative way to play in the Earthdawn setting, one which eschews the original core mechanic and is intended for "those who want a simple and story-oriented game system" in place of the more complicated Step System that Earthdawn uses. It still offers rules for advancement and a variety of power levels, and one of its focuses is to be played at conventions and with novice players.

Now, I'm just working off the preview of the book here, so I might be wrong, but the Age of Legend seems to take a more heroic tone than Earthdawn does: where I'd describe Earthdawn as having more of a grim tone. Some of this might be my personal impressions.

Answer 2

Age of Legend uses a more "narrative" system for games in the Earthdawn setting.

There have been plenty of examples over the years of people who really enjoy Barsaive (the default setting), but don't like the Step System (for whatever reason). AoL gives them a rules-lite alternative (at least compared to the Step System).

Different flavors for different folks. In my opinion, more Earthdawn exposure is a good thing, and a lot of the setting material is system-agnostic, meaning it shouldn't be too difficult to use classic (or newer) sourcebooks with either set of rules.