What makes it your favorite? Do you want to play it? If so, what’s keeping you from doing it?
For me, it’s Burning Wheel.
I bought it purely based on aesthetics back in 2008ish, then got the supplements, then Gold, then Gold Revised, with the Codex, and the anthology…
I blame it for my weakness for chunky, digest-sized, hardcover RPGs. :P I also like the graphic design, I like the prose (even if it’s divisive), and it has both interesting lessons you can plug into other games (like “let it ride,” letting success or failure stand instead of making lots of little rolls) and arcane systems that pique my interest (like the Artha cycle, which makes roleplay, metacurrency, skill rolls, and advancement all intersect). I genuinely like reading it for its own sake.
I haven’t played it because… well, since it’s not D&D, that immediately makes it harder to get people interested, sadly. It’s also a bit daunting, given its reputation as a crunchy system. But I have a group of players interested in trying new things, and fewer other games calling for my attention, so hopefully I’ll get a chance soon. :)
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From way back in the days, Valley of the Pharaohs. While not my first game that attempted to be historically accurate (that honour falls to Chivalry & Sorcery) it was the first such game I found that not only tried to be historically accurate but also supplied loads of supporting material for it. (This was more important pre-Internet than it is now because it was both time-consuming and hard to find good, solid historical information that was usable in play.)
But I could never interest anybody in playing it.
So there’s this Spanish rpg called The Door of Ishtar, which takes place in Mesopotamia after Zargon the Great defeats the Sumerians and founds Akkad. Such a rich world that I had to buy. I know I’ll never get to play it though.
@acockworkorange @ZDL Not with that attitude.
My Spanish is limited, there’s no translation into any other language, the book uses its own game system… If I can’t find people to play Bulldogs Fate, what are my chances of finding people for this, even better good game master and players?
I’m not sure what “attitude” you’re projecting onto me.
I owned Valley of the Pharaohs. I tried to get people to give it a shot. Nobody took me up on it.
Where’s the “attitude”?
@ZDL Not you. Mastodon just @ you by default.
I have so many that I’ve come across over the years but never had a chance to try. Many of them have been mentioned by others so I’ll just throw in a fresh one: Mouseguard.
The setting just feels so cozy but also heroic. Something akin to a video game like Tunic. The rules are actually quite dense though, so I’ve never gotten buy-in from any players. But it’s one of those golden egg games that I’d really love to play some day
I actually want to check that out too, since it’s in the Burning Wheel orbit. :P
That and Torchbearer, but as much as I loved the books, I think it’s the last among the three. (Though I still really want to play it.)
Yeah, Burning Wheel is high up on my list as well. I know the games are related, but I don’t know enough about either of them to know exactly how similar they are
I’m not an expert on the three either, but here’s my understanding:
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Burning Wheel is the oldest of the three, the most complicated, and geared towards dramatic fantasy stories. It’s replicating classic fantasy novels and the like.
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Mouseguard came out next, is significantly simpler, and obviously made to evoke the feeling of the comics it’s based on.
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Torchbearer is the newest of the three, is an intermediate level of complexity, and geared towards dungeon crawling and the like. Think old-school RPG with a Burning Wheel chassis.
I still haven’t got my hands on Mouseguard, and I’d love to try all of them at some point. It just breaks towards Burning Wheel for me, to begin at the beginning—but they all have a unique appeal. :)
@Lianodel @pikasaurX4 I own all three and have played one con slot of Torchbearer of which I remember none of the interactions with the mechanics, and pretty much none of the story.
You can actually do some really cool low-magic / low-power games with Burning Wheel there is a pretty good let’s play channel (can’t recall the name, think it’s Patronage) that uses Burning Wheel to explore the players as artisans in a Renaissance analog.
From what I understand, a big difference of BW compared to a lot of fantasy is that it is fantastic at character forward play, with the game looking like a series of vignettes with each character as opposed to a singular scene of the adventuring party. Which can be great when you want to do a political intrigue a la GoT where one player is a magically inclined daughter of a farmer, one player is the bastard son of the corrupt and ailing king, and the third is a veteran captain of the guard to the king. With BW, you can have each character’s Beliefs / Instincts help guide the game towards the ascent of the bastard to the throne, but for a good chunk of the game each player’s “scenes” may not connect the other players. Some good advice I’ve seen on this is to have the players whose characters are not in the scene actually RP the NPCs, which I’ve yet to do but sounds great in theory.
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Vampire the Masquerade, if only because I’m not into being bad guys. Love the vibes, vamps are fun, but I find it just a little too dark to want to RP as or write about.
It also kind of sucks that 5e apparently makes it mandatory to be bad guys. One of the announcements pretty much said that if you’re not playing miserable and truly irredeemable monsters, you’re having bad wrong fun.
For what it’s worth, apparently the older editions can be played as “goth superheroes.” You’d still grapple with dark themes, but get to, you know… succeed against them.
You could look into Hunter: the Reckoning same vibes but you are a urban fantasy / paranormal investigator fighting the evil while trying to keep hold of your humanity / reason to hunt.
I’ve run VtM a good bit and it can be difficult hence the important of a session zero to establish lines/veils, for me I had to say I’m going to veil the hunt scenes.
Why is it so hard for people to read the blurb on the right?:
This community is for meaningful discussions of tabletop/pen & paper RPGs
Do not submit video game content unless the game is based on a tabletop RPG property and is newsworthy.
(Emphasis entirely mine.)
I’ve watched people play MOTW and Paranoia. Both look plenty fun.
I’d also love to try one of the WH40K RPGs, but they seem like a big commitment. And like you said, it’s a lot harder to find people who want to go beyond D&D
I’ve had ambivalent feelings about Paranoia for a long time. I love the setting and it’s inspirations (especially Terry Gilligan’s Brazil). I have the XP edition, and the rules were confusing to the point of causing me drowsiness. I think they just put a rules section because they had to, and the GM is supposed to fly by the seat of their pants based on what is the most fun.
That said, I’d love to try it.
I’ve had the change to play Paranoia, actually! It was a ton of fun, and one of my favorite gaming memories. It ran great as a fun one shot.
Satasupe. It’s a Japanese ttrpg. The name is a shortening of Saturday Night Special, and the game focuses on zany crime capers. I did a translation of it for a friend but nothing much came of it. If your character ever became too good or evil, they became an NPC, which was a nice mechanic to keep players from acting like saints or demons. https://d66roc.wordpress.com/2011/08/24/happy-15th-anniversary-satasupe/
Ah, that reminds me of City of Mist, where leaning too hard towards your mundane or supernatural side would do the same.
I’ve also found it interesting how vibrant the Japanese tabletop RPG scene seems to be, but how little of it makes its way over here. It seems like there’d be a huge market for it.
Alien, that’s a game that caught my attention.
And also Aquelarre, is a game set in medieval Spain, where legends and gods are real. The game describes itself as a “Demonic medieval rpg”, and their rules are based on BRP, so it’s quite familiar on the basics.
Shadowrun. I love the idea and most of the mechanics. But all of these editions, all of them confusing and too crunchy for the lack of competent editing… Except Anarchy. I’ll probably get around playing that one. Now if I could only get my hands on a physical copy…
Also Amber Diceless Roleplaying Game. I love the source novels, while the mechanics of the game seem like a lot of fun. But physical copies are worth a fortune and it’s not easy finding a group who would be down with the setting. I might be able to give Lords of Gossamer & Shadow (Diceless) a go, though.
Anarchy is the only version I play now. I can recommend to read it.
Shadowrun really has been mishandled by Catalyst. :/ You also get big Shadowrun fans who genuinely love the setting actively discouraging people from using the rules sometimes. “Shadowrun is great, but it sucks, so if you want to play Shadowrun (which you should!) avoid using Shadowrun.” :P
I’ve also heard Amber come up a bunch over the years. I keep meaning to check it out.
I want to play a lot more Chronicles of Darkness, but most people prefer fantasy or sci-fi and those who want urban horror prefer World of Darkness. They don’t market it well.
I’ve also never played Blades in the Dark game. I think I need someone else to DM it for me first. I don’t really have PBTA down, my mind hasn’t quite grasped it yet.
I’m curious… what is it about CofD that you feel is missing from WoD? I’m actually on the other boat but since I’m often the storyteller, I get to decide. And my choice is mostly because I like WoD’s lore more and because I don’t own CofD books.
Regarding PbtA, I thought I’d recommend the Dungeon World Guide. The early sections apply for any PbtA:
That’s a good question. I think I’m just more familiar with the CofD lore and rules having first come in to these lines around nWoD. But I do like a lot of their mechanics, the themes, and feel of it all. It’s very mysterious and X-Files to me, versus WoD which always felt more punk. I’m sure I’d enjoy playing in a WoD game, too, but I’ve got all these CofD books I need to use if I got the chance to ST lol.
I never stopped to think that they have a different feel. Worth pondering. Thanks for the insight.
I also want to check out a BitD game, or at least one of the other genres that make use of the system. I’ve read it, and it does break new ground in TTRPG design but it just hasn’t happened yet.
I’ve heard so many crazy stories about RIFTS that I’ve always wanted to play it. But none of my friends wanna play it, and I’ve also heard it’s an absolute nightmare of a game system to actually play it.
Yeah, it’s rough. I never liked the mechanics. I love the different settings and world building. However, it’s not balanced in the slightest. You can play a glitter boy pilot or a Russian peasant in poverty. Same starting points. It takes a strong gm hand to balance it.
I collected nearly all the books for a long time and love the setting, but I’ve rarely been able to play it. I have heard there’s a version called Savage Rifts that has better mechanics, but I’ve never looked into it myself.
That was converted to Savage Worlds and it’s a great high adventure system.
Friends of mine have played both and prefer Savage by farrrrrr.
@Lianodel Spire. We we’re like 80% close twice to set up a group though.
Ars Magica but Burning wheel is a close second. I run and play modern/sci-fi 90% of the time as I got burned out on fantasy setting but I hold a candle for running/playing a theme campaign of a Mage Guild in ars Magica or a Theives guild in Burning Wheel.
Ah, Ars Magica is another one. I found it as a teenager browsing the internet. I even downloaded the free PDF they offered and started printing it out, before realizing just how much paper that would be. :P
There is a ttrpg youtuber that did a video on Harnmaster mentioning he uses the Ars Magica magic system in that game which sounds like an absolute delight. Me, Myself & Die is the channel name. I love crunchy systems (I’ve been gamemastering Shadowrun since 3rd edition) and I’ve wanted to get into a fantasy crunchy system but stars have not aligned … yet. I’ve played and ran PF2e a lot and while the three action economy is fantastic and the world-building is delightful (Golarian’s kingdomds of Geb & Nex are so unique) I really don’t care for Vancian magic or class systems.
Blade of Arcana, an untranslated japanese game with a tarot card gimmick. From my understanding it’s a mostly standard d20 only game but I’m really curious how they managed to incorporate the cards into its gameplay. Unfortunately I don’t speak Japanese so I can’t read it.
I’ve mentioned this elsewhere, but I find it wild how few Japanese RPGs make it over with a translation. It seems like there’s a vibrant tabletop RPG scene there, and I’d bet there’s a huge market here, but it just rarely happens.
Star wars FFG and Deadlands. I love the flavor of both. I doubt I’ll ever play star wars, but some of my current groups will probably give deadlands a try.
Deadlands is so cool, the Weird West genre has such potential!
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