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Ok, so TGD has lots and lots of threads about Dungeons, Dragons, White Wolf, and so on. However, there is a lot of stuff out there that does not fall into those categories. There seems to be very little in TGD about that, which is kinda sad, because there is a ton of neat stuff that people need to be exposed to. So this is a thread to ask questions about rulesets you haven't played with, talk about ones you have, whine about how Ron Edwards was mean to you that one time at GenCon, and so on. One thing I would really not like this thread to devolve into is telling people who like one 'kind' of game over the other how bad they are for enjoying rolling dice, or not rolling dice, or how the concept of a Gamemaster is like white slavery. There are better forums for that. I know 'Indie' Games is a really broad label - I figure it is best if we take it in the loosest sense of the word, pretty much anything that is not the 'Big' releases, like WOTC, WW, Shadowrun, L5R, etc. Anything from Runequest to Montesgur 1244. This is just a sample of what I want to talk about. If anyone wants me to cook up a little write up for the OP I will happily edit it in. Mainly, I am posting these because they are the last few I bought, and I am HYPED about them. Strands of Fate  Published by Void Star Games Rules Synopsis: Strands of Fate is the first commercial release of the underlying FATE system behind Spirit of the Century and the Dresden Files RPG. For those of you who have played both, it bears a much greater similarity to the DFRPG than it does to SotC, in a lot of ways. FATE is a modified version of the FUDGE system that focuses heavily on what it calls 'Aspects.' Aspects are short phrases, quotes, or sentences that describe some facet of a thing - be it a character, an item, a room, or even a campagain. You can 'Invoke' (use for a favorable benefit), or have the GM 'Compel' (Use for a negative penalty) aspects - and you reverse that as well. E.X. I am playing Johnny Rico, Mobile Infantry Lieutenant. My defining aspect is called Lieutenant of Rico's Roughnecks - a nice aspect that talks about my nature as a commanding officer, and as general Mobile Infantry badass. The adventure starts, and sooner or later I get in a firefight with a bunch of Bugs - in addition to rolling my ability (Agility, for shooting something) and getting any bonuses from my Equipment, I spend a 'fate point' to invoke my aspect, and get a bonus to the roll. Useful! E.X. 2. Later on that same day, Lt. Rico is getting the fifth degree from his commanding officer for going off mission. I want to stay quiet and take it on the chin - getting in a fight with the General will only prove trouble down the road. However, my GM decides to do something about that - he decides to try and Compel my 'Hot Headed Young Gun' Aspect. He offers me a fate chip for it - I can refuse, and let the Fate Chip go, or I can take the Fate Chip and take a penalty to my social roll, or some other kind of negative effect. Fate Chips cannot just be used for bonuses! You can also 'declare' things about scenes, discern things, activate Powers, and so on - you can also spend them to Compel others aspects, or aspects from the environment/items. Characters are also defined by Abilities - which are more static definition of a characters abilities, and apply bonuses to all the dice rolls linked with them. This is a really, really weak summary of the rules - there are great rules for Social/Mental combat, setting up Organizations, Vehicles, and so on. I cannot really recreate the rulebook, or do it justice, here. Everyone should check it out! It is fantastic, that is my point. Fiasco!  Published by Bully Pulpit Games Synopsis: Fiasco is a fantastic, fantastic game. Imagine creating an entire Coen brothers movie in about three hours of play - and you have a rough approximation of Fiasco, in all its glory. Its a GM-less, collaborative game - with one scene resolution mechanic. The rules are a very quick read, and Bully Pulpit has offered fantastic support for the game - I really recommend dropping the $10, and spending three hours with some friends to try it out. It's pretty much the perfect 'Frank can't show up to game night tonight, what do you guys wanna do' kind of thing. If you like juicy narrative creating games, this is for you. 'Character creation' is really the most fascinating part of the game for me. If you've ever played In a Wicked Age, that is the closest thing I can think of. First, you a playset - what is essentially a big list of kinds of relationships, locations, needs, objects and so on, themed around a certain location/time. If you want an example of one of these, Bully Pulpit has been releasing one free one a month since Fiasco has come out. Making your own is also easy! Then you roll four dice for each player, and you take turns going around the table, using the dice to select options about relationships / connections between players from the Playset list. By the end, each player is connected to two others in a bunch of cool ways, there are some needs ready to start problems, and you can start your unfortunate series of events. Fiasco is only recommended for 3-5 players apparently more than 5, and things start taking too long/breaking down. I wouldn't know, as I've never tried. That is just two of the many games that are out there for people to try out and post about. Tell me about your favorites, or upgrade my horrible horrible descriptions!
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Oct 29, 2010 23:51
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I will start off my own thread by talking about Strands of Fate. I've been playing around with the idea of a quick-start tutorialish game, and wondering what people thought would work best. A.) Strands of Eberron - Everyone I would run this for knows the setting pretty well, and a traditional fantasy game would be able to showcase the whole range of advantages, up through magical powers. The main downside would seem to be that magic in Strands of Fate, especially at lower power levels, does not really 'feel' like traditional D&D magic, but I think that can be dealt with. B.) Army of Shadows - A just below action movie powered kind of French Resistance games. Lots of interesting uses for the social/mental combat mechanics that SoF does so well, and it avoids the downfall of confusing players with the added complication of the Power System. However, it doesn't educate players about it either! C.) Something different. If someone has a great idea for a good tutorial setting / set-up, I'd love to hear it.
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Oct 29, 2010 23:56
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I would definitely be interested in that French Resistance game, though I'm more in favor of having powers if they're part of the system. Maybe they could be introduced, somehow? I'm not sure what sort of tone you're going for (or how powers work, for that matter), but that could mean anything from silver age comics superscience to World of Darkness-esque supernatural conspiracies to the PCs just being THAT MANLY. I was personally sort of intrigued by the writeup of Misspent Youth,but the game is a bit too much on the narrative side for my tastes insofar as there aren't really any meaningful 'crunch' actions or decisions for the players to take.
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Oct 30, 2010 00:34
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Mostly I play or participate in games with a little more emphasis on stuff that isn't this! I have heard things about systems like this, but I haven't played any of them, so I'd be interested in, like, doing so. Someone pointed out that octaNe was a kind of game that was similar to this, as is Houses of the Blooded, but it is not a 'roll your own Coen Brothers' movie! Isn't there some game where you play as a Cathar???
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Oct 30, 2010 06:01
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aldantefax posted:Mostly I play or participate in games with a little more emphasis on stuff that isn't this! I have heard things about systems like this, but I haven't played any of them, so I'd be interested in, like, doing so. Someone pointed out that octaNe was a kind of game that was similar to this, as is Houses of the Blooded, but it is not a 'roll your own Coen Brothers' movie! Yes there is Montsegur 1244 by Thoughtful Games. It is another one session game, based on the later Cathar persecutions! By all accounts it is pretty fantastic, but I have yet to buy a copy of the rules. If someone who has played them is around they should post, and talk about it.
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Oct 30, 2010 06:24
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Androc posted:I was personally sort of intrigued by the writeup of Misspent Youth,but the game is a bit too much on the narrative side for my tastes insofar as there aren't really any meaningful 'crunch' actions or decisions for the players to take. I wasn't amazed with Misspent Youth, unless you count when I learned that it was in development for so long that someone published a complete RPG inspired by their character from a MY playtest. That game, Annalise, I was really impressed with. It did subtle horror and mystery amazingly well, and it created characters and situations that I just wanted to luxuriate in and explore for months and months. Which I wasn't able to, because I played it with a group that has a million games they want to play, and not enough time to play them all. But them's the breaks! I'll have another chance some day.
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Nov 2, 2010 07:02
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What about Apocalypse World by Vincent Baker, it's the best indie game I've ever played. The mechanics feel like a refinement of every brilliant thing he's done over his entire career placed into a toolbox that drives impeccable gameplay based on scarcity and hard choices. The custom moves are brilliant, the writing is smart, cool, and concise, and it's dripping with personal style that instead of obfuscating manages to be this hybrid of minimalism with depth. I'd say the emphasis is on character and conflict development but in a mechanically strong exciting way that doesn't rely on the hand-wavey indie soppiness. The basic setting is post-apocalypse Mad Max style but the system is extremely hackable and loads of different things are being kitted up for it.
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Nov 2, 2010 20:15
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Team Black Zion posted:What about Apocalypse World by Vincent Baker, it's the best indie game I've ever played. The mechanics feel like a refinement of every brilliant thing he's done over his entire career placed into a toolbox that drives impeccable gameplay based on scarcity and hard choices. The custom moves are brilliant, the writing is smart, cool, and concise, and it's dripping with personal style that instead of obfuscating manages to be this hybrid of minimalism with depth. I'd say the emphasis is on character and conflict development but in a mechanically strong exciting way that doesn't rely on the hand-wavey indie soppiness. I haven't had a chance to play Apocalypse World yet, but I've been reading it and it's a really exciting game. I can see how it would produce an awesome play experience. Plus I'm thinking about hacking it to Rifts...
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Nov 8, 2010 04:26
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I'm a bit spoiled for choice in this thread; I haven't really known where to begin. I've played about six sessions of Polaris, the nearly-diceless game of epic tragedy set in icebound kingdoms riven by the wound of a Mistake so horrific that no one but true knights even acknowledge it exists. "But that was all long ago, and there are none alive that remember it." You have to say that when you end your game. In fact, almost everything that happens in the fiction is determined by careful negotiation via "ritual phrases." The end result is a gradual, almost dainty discovery of your character's nature and ultimate fate. It's essentially a post-modern Morte d'Arthur with a unique fancy-ice-elf setting (although you could probably play it as a straight Camelot thing, but it would lose some of the anything-goes spectralness). I remember I tried to break the game a little. This happened a lot: Me: "I kill all the demons!" Mistaken Player (guy sitting across from you, whose goal is to provide antagonism and a descent into madness): "But only if... this seems morally questionable to us at the table!" Me: "And that was how it happened! My character is the coolest!" Really, she kicked trans-finite amounts of rear end. Who cares that her power was a gulf between her and those she protected, or that she could see evil in the hearts of everyone around her, or that demons fell in service to her out of mixed fear and love? (I mean, everyone cared, but in the sense that it was awesome and entertaining.) Polaris, along with In a Wicked Age..., proved to me that the stories of games could be more than the sum of their parts: it's possible for the story to be a surprise to the people telling it, to find out things about fictional characters you are collectively creating. Edit: More on the other characters. The player character to my left descended into corruption instantly, inviting demons into his library and heart, playing the society like a violin, only to get crazy comeuppance, Don Giovanni-style. The player character to my right started off in the shadow of his father, supposedly the greatest of knights, but in fact one who had descended to the utter depths of depravity, and kept on trying to shield his brother (who became an incredibly promising knight) from this revelation, believing that he could take the curse on himself, even though his brother loved and idolized him to the point of threatening violence to people who said word one against him. The player character across from me eventually discovered that he could love and be loved by his own daughter, and by the demon he had sealed away in his own sword and ended the mini-campaign by diving into a volcano with. Doc Hawkins fucked around with this message at 00:13 on Nov 9, 2010 |
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Nov 9, 2010 00:07
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Why is the new edition of Fate over 400 pages? I remember the original free online .pdf was like 20 pages or so total. I can understand some increase in length for a commercial release, but that seems like a lot of material.
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Nov 9, 2010 04:36
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Doc Hawkins posted:I'm a bit spoiled for choice in this thread; I haven't really known where to begin. Disclaimer: I'm going to be saying "I love this game! But... I haven't played it..." a lot. This happens for two reasons. One is that when I did have a player-base, they never wanted to play these games. The second is that I'm now between gaming groups. Ok so I do love Polaris. It's got this beautiful air of tragedy, it's the the 'just enough' substance of the mechanics to guide and help you without limiting you in any way. I've also got the alternate setting/hack Thou Art But a Warrior in which you play Muslim knights in Spain at the start of the Crusades, and it's also pure sex. From the same guy who did Polaris, Ben Lehman, you have Bliss Stage. Bliss Stage is a game where basically aliens have invaded the world, every adult has gone to sleep and the surviving kids and teenagers have figured out how to go into dreams (because that's where the aliens live, although they come through into the real world in mecha-sorta things), and to build mecha out of their relationships with others and fight the good fight. It's got a very heavy Neon Genesis Evangelion vibe, to me at least, and is equal parts kicking alien rear end and exploring crumbling relationships in a world gone to poo poo. Haven't played that either 
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Nov 9, 2010 06:18
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Something pretty loving cool about Bliss Stage: the mechanics enforce...
...but they don't enforce the super-depressing, sometimes horrific mood of the text. So you can actually play it as an awesome over-the-top young folks strike back anime instead of an ultra-tragic hollowing out of modern Japan anime. Less Evangelion and more Gurren Lagan.
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Nov 10, 2010 00:54
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Doc Hawkins posted:Something pretty loving cool about Bliss Stage: the mechanics enforce... I cannot wait for the Bliss Stage video game, as I really think the way it is set up would actually work better as an Interactive Fiction/Visual Novel game with just you and a computer.
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Nov 10, 2010 01:13
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Sortof a serious Sakura Wars? Adaptations from analog RPG to digital always lose the flexibility of the imagination, and the emotional impact of being face to face with people, but I think there's a gang of Indie stuff that could be the basis for some loving fantastic computer games. I mean, the day someone convinces Luke Crane to make a Burning Empires facebook game, that poo poo will blow up.
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Nov 10, 2010 01:22
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Doc Hawkins posted:Sortof a serious Sakura Wars? Luke is absolutely interested in going mainstream. At the 10/10/10 "BurningCon" he said that one of their main goals in the next year is putting out a new core set in one-book format which they hope to get into book stores and the like. Sadly, he's always maintained that Burning system games can't be made into any kind of game other than what they are. Maybe one day he and Moeller will get behind an Iron Empires game, possibly a turn-based strategy game with something vaguely like World Burning and the Infection mechanics, but I wouldn't count on it. I dearly want to play through a Burning Empires campaign after talking to the guys who did the BE Sprint at 10/10/10. They described it as "weight training for roleplaying" and I absolutely believe it.
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Nov 10, 2010 01:47
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Kestral posted:Luke is absolutely interested in going mainstream. At the 10/10/10 "BurningCon" he said that one of their main goals in the next year is putting out a new core set in one-book format which they hope to get into book stores and the like. So put one together here? Either via PbP or Maptools or (ugh) IRC. I wouldn't be surprised if there's 4-5 interested people here. Hell, I bought a second BE book so that I could loan it out. 
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Nov 10, 2010 02:20
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Tolan posted:So put one together here? Either via PbP or Maptools or (ugh) IRC. I wouldn't be surprised if there's 4-5 interested people here. Hell, I bought a second BE book so that I could loan it out. The idea of doing a Burning Empires game over anything but tabletop is mindboggling. PbP would take literally years, and Maptools is no better than IRC for the purposes of Burning games since there's no miniatures or anything other than highly abstracted positioning. Even Skype would be rough. Besides, I'm already running a Burning Wheel game which is going to take up most of my GMing energies for the foreseeable future. On that topic, Burning Wheel is my fantasy game of choice these days. It's got enough indie narrativist elements to keep me interested and enough crunch to satisfy the players in my groups who aren't satisfied by rules-light systems. I find it almost painful to run games without robust social mechanics like Duel of Wits and Circles these days after running BW for a few years, and having explicit flags from my players in the form of Beliefs makes GMing very satisfying because I know exactly what marks I'm aiming for.
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Nov 10, 2010 03:32
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Regarding Burning Wheel, I played a few IRC games of Mouse Guard, and we had fun with the system. I think there's enough interest that if someone would run a Burning game, it'd go.
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Nov 10, 2010 03:50
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For something that's a bit more structured freeform, I like Archipelago II, which is free online http://norwegianstyle.files.wordpress.com/2009/07/archipelago_2009.pdf It's just this casual sort of exploration of a world and leading characters to their destinies, all worked around ritual phrases similar to Polaris but a bit more relaxed and not focused on individual conflicts. I kinds think this one would work really well in a stretched out pbp game.
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Nov 10, 2010 08:21
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Dedman Walkin posted:Regarding Burning Wheel, I played a few IRC games of Mouse Guard, and we had fun with the system. I think there's enough interest that if someone would run a Burning game, it'd go. Important: Burning Wheel is not Mouse Guard, or vice versa. My friends and I joke about how it's called Burning Wheel because trying to learn it feels like you're being crushed by mindless inhuman forces. I greatly admire it! It is not for everyone! Mouse Guard is more accessible, and Burning Empires rations out the difficult parts in pleasing ways. Also, the Burning community as a whole has their heads so far up their own asses you need new branches of mathematics to map their topology.
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Nov 10, 2010 21:58
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Doc Hawkins posted:Sortof a serious Sakura Wars? See the thing about bliss stage is it is a game of Hope and Loss. Hope is the only way you will progress, but loss is the inevitable conclusion. Loss of relationships, loss of the things you care about, and finally, loss of yourself. Bliss Stage is basically the hedgehog's dilemma as an RPG. If I wanted to run a game about child soldiers in Africa, or The Hurt Locker, I would run an adaptation of bliss stage, it is good at what it sets out to do. That being said, I don't think I would play bliss stage with my regular friends. Certain hooks that the game uses to get you emotionally invested are not necessarily things you would want to share with others. Any game where a core concept is become attached to another character, be it a PC or an NPC, requires a certain level of openness, one I can honestly say I am not at with, like, my D&D group. On the other hand, those same hooks to get you invested would work fantastically in a single player video game. Especially if they were presented slightly innocuously. Earthbound does this well, asking you a set of personal preferences in the beginning that pay off in the finale. Ideally you could run with something like Radical Dreamers in the front, especially in the alien fights, where your actions in combat are limited but you can either play safe or take risks, all the while running Bliss Stage's whole mission consequences system in the more Visual Novel type sections.
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Nov 10, 2010 22:24
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Doc Hawkins posted:Also, the Burning community as a whole has their heads so far up their own asses you need new branches of mathematics to map their topology. I registered on their forums to yell at someone who suggested (without consequence!) that perhaps a good plot hook would be fistfuls of child rape. In Mouse Guard.
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Nov 10, 2010 22:38
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What's the difference between Burning Empire and Burning Wheel?
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Nov 10, 2010 23:18
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Burning Empires is based on the Iron Empires comics by Christopher Moeller, which are basically space opera with mind controlling slugs and is vaguely board game-like in that it has fixed phases of play. Burning Wheel is a fantasy thing with a sort of implied setting and is more like a standard RPG in play. Both are written by Luke Crane, though, whose online persona I find hugely grating because it's basically this:  .
Naar fucked around with this message at 00:58 on Nov 11, 2010 |
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Nov 11, 2010 00:55
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Naar posted:Burning Empires is based on the Iron Empires comics by Christopher Moeller, which are basically space opera with mind controlling slugs and is vaguely board game-like in that it has fixed phases of play. Burning Wheel is a fantasy thing with a sort of implied setting and is more like a standard RPG in play. Both are written by Luke Crane, though, whose online persona I find hugely grating because it's basically this: He publicly berates people on RPG.net for not "getting" his work. He basically the dude who made braid but a million times worse.
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Nov 11, 2010 01:19
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So do either of them not suck too much to play?
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Nov 11, 2010 01:35
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Cyrai posted:So do either of them not suck too much to play? Burning Wheel is pretty awesome.
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Nov 11, 2010 01:37
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Normally, I would be down for a game with mechanically interesting decisions but Burning Wheel is written in such an annoying way that I would never consider playing it, and Burning Empires isn't far behind. Other people love them though, so maybe try to read some threads about them on rpg.net or Story Games and see if it sounds interesting.
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Nov 11, 2010 01:38
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Naar posted:Burning Wheel is written in such an annoying way that I would never consider playing it, and Burning Empires isn't far behind. As someone who's writing a game with an eye toward self-publication I have to ask/am curious; what is it that you don't like about Burning Wheel's writing? Personally I've always thought it was quite a good read, written in the conversational tone that I like, but I know some people don't like that.
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Nov 11, 2010 01:54
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I love every word in Mouse Guard, but my group hates the combat rules. They like them for journeys and debates and stuff, but combat left them cold.
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Nov 11, 2010 02:42
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Maddman posted:I love every word in Mouse Guard, but my group hates the combat rules. They like them for journeys and debates and stuff, but combat left them cold. They REALLY like tactical choices of choosing which orc baby to stab?
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Nov 11, 2010 03:35
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Leave it to Burning Wheel to double the thread's postcount through the power of Luke Crane-related controversy. He certainly has cultivated a certain persona in the community, but I've met the guy several times now, and he's nowhere near that in person. He's a big gaming geek like the rest of us and is actually a pretty nice guy. His partner on the (admittedly brilliant) FreeMarket, Jared Sorensen, does seem that smug, but I can't hold that against the guy who wrote InSpectres and Action Castle. Naar posted:Normally, I would be down for a game with mechanically interesting decisions but Burning Wheel is written in such an annoying way that I would never consider playing it, and Burning Empires isn't far behind. Other people love them though, so maybe try to read some threads about them on rpg.net or Story Games and see if it sounds interesting. I've never gotten this objection. Burning Wheel books definitely have Luke Crane's authorial voice coming through loud and clear, but even the "imps" who appear now and then in the corebook - and only the corebook - are pretty mild in comparison to, say, everything Ron Edwards has ever written. The BW core feels like Luke's attempt to grab people who've never played a "story game" before by the lapels, shake them vigorously and make them play the game in a certain mode they may not have encountered before. It doesn't do much for people with a lot of indie gaming under their belt, but it doesn't detract from the strength of the mechanics in play. I've run Burning Wheel for going on twenty people now across several groups, and the only person who wasn't hooked was the kind of player who readily admits that he plays D&D as a hack-and-slash experience and doesn't see the point of things like characters with motivations. On the non-Burning front, if any of you are looking for hard sci-fi and have any tolerance at all for the FATE system, give Diaspora a look. The genre emulation is superb, and the mechanics are totally deserving of the awards they've won. The 'social' mechanics in particular are not only excellent for their stated purpose but are also easily hackable into practically any kind of extended conflict you can think of: I used them for a planet-wide investigation / espionage / counter-espionage sequence spanning months of in-game time, for a chase sequence, and for an anime-inspired armored suit versus capital ship attack run. Brilliant game.
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Nov 11, 2010 05:10
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I also loved burning wheel and didn't find it hard to learn at all. The core book is broken up in such a way as to tell you, "These are the important bits - that's ALL you need to know - now go play!" and then give out the "optional" crunchy bits afterwards. The crunchy bits are great, and none of them are individually particularly difficult, but you REALLY wouldn't want to try learn them all at once! Mouse Guard was also a very good read, and I liked it a lot. I didn't catch any smugness in either game at all, but then I went into them without having read the RPG.net dramathreads and so I wasn't looking for any. I can't comment on Burning Empires because I haven't mustered up the strength of will to go through such a big rulebook without being interested in the setting. Maybe if I read the comics first... it worked for Mouse Guard!
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Nov 11, 2010 05:26
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CNN Sports Ticker posted:Burning Wheel is pretty awesome. I don't want to disagree with this...so I won't! I do like Burning Empires better, and I think that there are lots of people who would not enjoy either. More than, say, Fiasco, which can be understood and enjoyed by anyone legally human (hey someone post more about Fiasco). I don't have a problem with the tone of the text of Burning Wheel, I just think the game is pretty god-drat complicated, and the books don't do the best possible job of explaining that complexity. Burning Empires is more complicated, but explains it better, I think. But try making any even remotely reasonable complaint in the internet presence of the Burning Fanbase, and they (including Crane) will rapidly make you like the game a lot less. You get ostracized for even admitting that you'd like to understand something better. If you have a question about something unclear, then you will get shat on for days rather than receive an actual straight answer (possibly, the answer is "Luke didn't make that clear," which would of course be impossible to admit"). I remember reading Burning Wheel and thinking, "Well! There's certainly no reason for people to play D&D anymore, because this does all of that better, at a similar level of complexity!" This was way before 4th Edition, which was a focused design on tactical greatness, but if you want dramatic yet dangerous fantasy (or just medieval) games without inherent premise, I really have no idea what would be a better game than Burning Wheel. Of course, if you don't mind things being more dramatic than dangerous, and your friends prefer less complicated diversions, then I can think of several...number one would be The Shadow of Yesterday.
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Nov 11, 2010 05:42
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Jimbozig posted:I can't comment on Burning Empires because I haven't mustered up the strength of will to go through such a big rulebook without being interested in the setting. Maybe if I read the comics first... it worked for Mouse Guard! I think they are (very) good. Kinda like a (much) more serious Warhammer 40k. Doc Hawkins fucked around with this message at 05:48 on Nov 11, 2010 |
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Nov 11, 2010 05:45
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Doc Hawkins posted:More than, say, Fiasco, which can be understood and enjoyed by anyone legally human (hey someone post more about Fiasco). Fiasco! I love Fiasco. Fiasco is a game by Jason Morningstar, and it has been described by the author and others as The Coen Brothers RPG. It's a game about dangerous ambition and poor impulse control, it's a game about a caper or a plan gone horribly horribly wrong or horribly horribly right. It's tremendous fun and I agree that there's something about it that sets it aside from your standard roleplaying game, be it 'indie' or otherwise. I was surprised that people take to it so well because there's basically nothing by way of a 'traditional' resolution mechanic, everything is resolved in a freeform fashion and by the person whose turn it is being given either a black die for a 'bad' ending in that scene for their character or a white one for a 'good ending', both of which are still open to their interpretation. One thing I do like about this game is that more than a lot of others, it really encourages table-talk, discussion, editing, throwing out cool ideas, and being an active participant even when your character isn't in a scene. You should always be engaged with it and be excited about it, and trying to make it awesome and cool and suit the mood. The game is divided up into a bunch of different phases: Setup, Act One, The Tilt, Act Two, The Aftermath. In Setup, you choose a playset, which is a particular time and place and moment to set this session in, and you roll a bunch of dice which will help you generate a messed up situation, relationships between the character and general craziness. No character stats, just discussion and choosing what you think would be appropriate based on your relationships with the other characters. The lists are just plain fun. The four in the book are The Suburbs, The Ice (the arctic), Boomtown (western) and A Nice Quiet Southern Town, but there are a heap more on the Bully Pulpit website http://www.bullypulpitgames.com/downloads/ Once you've set everything up and the whole situation is nicely screwy, you move on to Act One. In Act One, you take turns. On your turn you either get to Establish (meaning you describe when and where it happens and such) or you get to Resolve (meaning the other players get to describe when and where it happens and such). If you Establish, you don't get to choose the colour of the die or the outcome of the scene, everybody else chooses whether it's good or bad for you. If you Resolve, you get to choose the outcome but you have no control over the initial situation. It's genius and it's wicked. So you have all these dice in the middle of the table and they're getting assigned to people as they do scenes, and Act One lasts until you're halfway through the dice (oh and in the first Act, you don't keep the dice you're given/you choose, you give them away). Once you finish Act One, you hit The Tilt. Everybody rolls the dice in front of them, does a little bit of math and two people are selected to pick the Tilt elements, by rolling the dice still left in the middle and using the numbers like in setup, but using the generic Tilt table instead (which includes stuff like "Confusion followed by pain", "Greed leads to killing", "Something precious is on fire", and "Pain followed by confusion"). These Tilt elements are put on the table for everybody to use and keep in mind during Act Two. Act Two plays out much like Act One except you probably have an idea of where it's all headed, have some idea of whether you're aiming for black dice or white dice (which is relevant to The Aftermath) and everything has gone to hell. You keep the dice you get in Act Two as well. Once the remaining dice have all been assigned, you hit The Aftermath. This is where everybody does some more rolling of the dice in front of them, a little bit more dice math and looks at a table to find their character's ultimate fate, which ranges from The Worst Thing In The Universe (total of 0) all the way up to Awesome (total of 13+). The colour of the dice flavour it a bit, but it's possible to get either extreme with either colour. Then people take turns describing what happens to their character one after another in little mini-vignettes. Then you're done and you all sit back and grin like devils at each other, recounting the cool moments until someone suggests playing again. I've played Fiasco a bunch of times and have never not enjoyed it. It generates an awesome experience for all and really allows you let your hair down since it's written right in there to encourage you to do horrible things to your and other people's characters.
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Nov 11, 2010 06:26
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Kestral posted:On the non-Burning front, if any of you are looking for hard sci-fi and have any tolerance at all for the FATE system, give Diaspora a look. The genre emulation is superb, and the mechanics are totally deserving of the awards they've won. The 'social' mechanics in particular are not only excellent for their stated purpose but are also easily hackable into practically any kind of extended conflict you can think of: I used them for a planet-wide investigation / espionage / counter-espionage sequence spanning months of in-game time, for a chase sequence, and for an anime-inspired armored suit versus capital ship attack run. Brilliant game. This right here. Strands of Fate is cool but only Diaspora beat them to the punch as a crunch-light rigorously balanced FATE engine. If you enjoyed Spirit of the Century or Dresden Files, Diaspora belongs on your shelf.
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Nov 11, 2010 06:42
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CNN Sports Ticker posted:Fiasco! I love Fiasco. God I want to play this game. Have any of you Fiasco! players had a chance to do the All the drat Time playset? It looks like genius.
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Nov 11, 2010 06:42
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I haven't yet, but I really want to! The playsets I've played were the basic four, plus the touring rock band. I want to try out Lucky Strike (a WWII supply depot, very Catch 22-ish), All the drat Time and the new London 1593 one. Edit: And Reconstruction! I'm not american and I don't know a lot of stuff about the Civil War, but I know I love stuff set just after it (like the comic Loveless). I never got a chance to try it out though.
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Nov 11, 2010 06:45
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Thanks, I bought Fiasco just because of this thread. I'm pretty pumped about it because it's exclusively one shots, and you get to play out a Cohen brothers movie. I also like the .pdf system for RPG sales, is there a way to buy Dread as a .pdf? Shipping a $25 book is apparently $21  .
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Nov 11, 2010 07:32
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