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Seepage reminds me a lot of Unknown Armies's anthropocentric universe, and its 'demons' in particular. It's definitely interesting in its own right, too.quote:...the Score being their big religious deal. I can't help imagining a tent revival where the leader calls out, "Brothers and sisters! Do you know the Score?"
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Mar 23, 2017 18:13
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Seepage is my cousin. Doesn't she look just like Laura Palmer?
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Mar 23, 2017 18:19
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Halloween Jack posted:Seepage is my cousin. Doesn't she look just like Laura Palmer? Are....are you secretly David Lynch?
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Mar 23, 2017 22:16
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Since I'm almost finished with the core book of Conspiracy X Second Edition, I figured it was time to put up an interest poll on just which of the three sourcebooks I should cover first, allowing me to get a bit of a headstart on writing. The Paranormal Sourcebook covers the Conspiracy X 1E sourcebooks on cryptids (Cryptozoology), psychic powers (Shadows of the Mind), and the occult (Forsaken Rites). Some of the materials included inside are more psychic powers and magic rituals, specific corruption Archetypes and Seepage phenomena, Nazi wizards obsessed with Ragnarok, conflicting stories of cryptids, and John Wayne's ghost.  The Extraterrestrials Sourcebook delves into further detail on the Gray, Reptoid, and Atlantean alien species, including their various plots and experiments. Find out about such topics as alien gods, reptilian dream magic, the war in the stars, and psychic dolphins.  The Conspiracies Sourcebook is all about the human element in the tangled shadow war. Unveil things like the double-secret-extra-true True History of the world, Aztec cultists in Texas, a pro-extraterrestrial group oblivious enough to name itself PUPPET, a secret superPAC, and of course the Knights Templar.
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Mar 24, 2017 20:23
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I'd go with the Aliens book, it kinda explains a good deal about the rest of the world and just why they're such a big deal.
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Mar 24, 2017 21:26
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That there was even a vote after "Aztec cultists in Texas" disappoints me.
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Mar 24, 2017 21:34
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Hard pick between aliens and conspiracies, but I do love me some aliens.
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Mar 24, 2017 21:44
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For no particular reason: 13th Age is a D&D 4th edition-based heartbreaker developed by Rob Heinsoo and Jonathan Tweet. It fully embraces D&D 4e's focus on a detailed, tactical wargame, ditching much of the crufty non-combat systems. This half of 13th Age is designed with criticisms of 4e firmly in mind. Outside of combat, it uses narrative-focused, player-GM-collaborative storytelling methods, many of them clearly borrowed from games like FATE and PBTA. The end product appealed only to a subset of 4e fans, who already had the crunchy tactical wargame they wanted, but I do think it contains in it some interesting ideas worth looting. I like 13A, but I can't say I'd ever actually play it. 13th Age's duality is striking right from the beginning: the obligatory "intro to roleplaying" page doesn't have an example of play, but straight up says that you want an experienced GM for this ship. It assumes that you already know what a "d20" game is - and that it's a euphemism for D&D - and similarly alludes to World of Darkness and Exalted as inspirations. They emphasize that this is D&D but with greater player investment in affecting the story, drawing specific comparisons between 13th Age and the third and fourth editions of an unspecified game system. Before character creation, however, comes the Icons.  Not pictured: the Crusader's closed, spiked gauntlet and the Great Gold Wyrm's downward-pointing arrowhead-shaped dragon head Icons - We Resemble But Are Legally Distinct From The Bahamut Guild The thirteen Icons are a mashup of organizations, nations, big-dick canon NPCs, and pantheons; they're the kind of people who get "the" before their name whenever you talk about them. They aren't gods, but they serve the same role that the gods do in, say, Forgotten Realms. They're not unkillable, but they don't have stats in the same way that PCs or monsters do. Each of them is the head of some sort of massive organization, so not only are they individual people, but they're general affiliations. PCs align with or against them at character creation, the same way you'd write "Chaotic Good" on your character sheet in other D&D clones. (More on that later.) Now, 13th Age introduces the Icons just in vaguely alphabetical order to introduce you to the setting with a bunch of out-of-universe gazeteer material, but since I'm summarizing, I'm going to borrow the organization from later in the book. (More on how these are divided and how the divisions are kinda flexible later.) The heroic icons are the enthusiastic supporters of the mostly-human Dragon Empire, part of 13th Age's implicit setting. Incidentally these are all the icons that correspond strongly with classes that aren't "rogue".
The ambiguous icons aren't trying to drown the world in demons or zombies, but they aren't properly on the side of the Empire either. They're non-human and sometimes kind of inhuman, or they're using the power of darkness against the power of worse darkness, or they've got a secret agenda that isn't bad in an obvious what but you kinda never know.
The villainous icons are planning to overthrow the Empire and/or eat anyone who displeases them. They aren't antisocial, but all of them are bad people (at least insofar as they can be called people).
13th Age uses the icons instead of alignment - there's no supernatural Good or Chaotic tag (and no actual Protection From Evil 10' Radius spell, for that matter). That said, it's a D&D clone, so their one single concession to alignment is an Icon Alignment Chart because you were going to make one anyway.  Next: My One Unique Thing is that I'm Batman Cease to Hope fucked around with this message at 00:53 on Mar 25, 2017 |
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Mar 24, 2017 22:45
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13th Age is the only D20 stab-monsters-and-take-their-stuff game I can bring myself to play or run anymore thanks to the streamlined rules and emphasis on playing cool fantasy heroes instead of Wizard #9762.
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Mar 24, 2017 23:12
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13th age has a strange problem where it's best ideas are really portable. It doesn't take much effort to add stuff like the escalation die, OUT, backgrounds and Icons to other systems, which makes you wonder why you'd want to stick with it's D&D trappings and clunky class design.
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Mar 24, 2017 23:44
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At the same time it barely actually uses Icons for anything mechanical. Just enough that it's annoying to rip them out or replace them (though not hard). Also its default setting is really only good for running a comedy about how terrible its default setting is. Still, it's really easy to reskin and the tone fit perfectly for replacing a game I'd been running that ended because holy poo poo did we hate using d20 for it.
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Mar 24, 2017 23:53
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13th Age is cool, but I was pretty impressed with Shadow of the Demon Lord. About how do the two stack up with each other vis a vis tactical options? Yeah, I'm one of those guys whose first question for any D&Dalike is "How does the Fighter play?" I love me some paranormal poo poo but if the Aliens book gives better overall background on the setting, I'm not saying it's Aliens, but, Aliens.
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Mar 25, 2017 00:04
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The Fighter has...technically, a lot of options, but they're largely tied to what numbers you roll on your attack, so it's less 'tactical options' and more 'roulette wheel.' E: There's also some really nasty trap options, though I don't remember much about the Fighter's potential traps - I focused more on the Sorcerer's when I played 13th Age. And oh boy does the Sorcerer have 'em. Also, the Three are my favorites and I love them as more ambiguous than evil because, like, the city of monsters and the mysterious and inhuman but not necessarily horrible dragons are a cool thing! And then the draft that had stuff on more nuance for the Icons was removed and it's just...flat boring non-nuance.
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Mar 25, 2017 00:06
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Mors Rattus posted:And then the draft that had stuff on more nuance for the Icons was removed and it's just...flat boring non-nuance. This is the big reason I don't see the default setting as worthwhile for anything but parody. It doesn't have enough actual interesting stuff left to be worthwhile for serious stories. It's also really...I think the word I'd use is 'loud'? Like it's really convinced it's very, very epic despite reading like a 15 year old's first home brew D&D setting but with less tits?
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Mar 25, 2017 00:11
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Well I don't mean to crap on a game that I haven't played or read myself, especially when someone is in the middle of trying to give us a nice review of it. I'm just curious because that's the main complaint I've heard about 13th Age: that the warriors and spellcasters are balanced, but that the warriors still don't have much diversity in what they do. And hell, Basic D&D fighters are not badly balanced.
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Mar 25, 2017 00:20
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Basically, yeah. The Fighter can actually accomplish stuff, unlike in most D20 stuff. Just the stuff the fighter accomplishes is rolling dice to see which moves are available this round. The Ranger and Barbarian don't even get that. They're mechanically viable and useful, just kinda dull. The developers figured they'd be good 'beginner' classes.
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Mar 25, 2017 00:22
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icons are neat because they frontload a clear reason both to adventure and for players to get involved in writing the plot along with the gm, and they do a decent job of giving pcs possibly conflicting team affiliations that are not Murder Each Other On Sight. but in and of themselves they're mostly super bland. the Three are the biggest standout, although the Great Gold Wyrm is fun for the fact that he lives in a place that's an adventure to visit and is set up as someone the pcs will have to replace somehow Halloween Jack posted:I'm just curious because that's the main complaint I've heard about 13th Age: that the warriors and spellcasters are balanced don't worry, i'm about to do some crapping, including on class balance. this game is fascinating but it has Problems
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Mar 25, 2017 00:26
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People were really sour on the idea when I suggested it a long time ago in a design thread, but: I think there's a lot of potential in Secret of Zir'An's system, where you use the margin of success in your attack roll to "pay" for inflicting extra damage and/or status effects.
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Mar 25, 2017 00:27
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HerraS posted:13th Age is the only D20 stab-monsters-and-take-their-stuff game I can bring myself to play or run anymore thanks to the streamlined rules and emphasis on playing cool fantasy heroes instead of Wizard #9762. After having played in a 13A campaign for a couple of years I am inclined to agree. Playing in a D&D5 campaign now and I'm kinda irked by it at times. Even when I'm playing a wizard in this case. Been wanting to run a Warcraft campaign using the 13A system myself and I even went as far as writing up icons, races and class changes for it. It's just that I've never GMed before and still just kinda balk at the prospect. Even if 13A is one those few rule systems I feel that I can get without too much issue.
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Mar 25, 2017 00:40
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the racial leaders plus characters like arthas and azshara and the old gods collectively or individually are a good warcraft-style replacement for 13a's icons
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Mar 25, 2017 00:48
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Cease to Hope posted:the racial leaders plus characters like arthas and azshara and the old gods collectively or individually are a good warcraft-style replacement for 13a's icons Oh yeah, the hardest part in my case was just picking the right ones that would be more thematically fitting as the campaign I want to do is set around the first MMO release. I just went with the major factions present around that time and added the option that using the faction leaders as icons was perfectly valid too. Should be noted this really is the first time I've ever done homebrewing like this.
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Mar 25, 2017 01:17
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Cease to Hope posted:don't worry, i'm about to do some crapping, including on class balance. this game is fascinating but it has Problems
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Mar 25, 2017 01:20
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Chernobyl Peace Prize posted:Climb onto the tallest ladder you can find for when you poo poo on 13a wood elves please and thank you. "You know what would be a great idea? EXTRA ACTIONS!" Any time a designer says this without very, very careful caveats they should be smacked with a newspaper like a naughty puppy.
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Mar 25, 2017 01:29
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My weird personal issue with the 13A icons is that they're simultaneously too specific and too generic. Like if wanted to do a setting like, say, Dark Sun let alone anything even more esoteric then half or more of them would be useless, or at least need to be reskinned to the point where you're basically making new ones anyway. But at the same time they're just so... open in their niche that they don't provide any real interesting hooks to work off of. It's totally a petty sort of gripe that doesn't affect the game much, I know, but it always amazes me that people keep pointing to them as one of the highlights of the game or something.
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Mar 25, 2017 02:13
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Yeah, the idea of the Icons is nice, but the execution is lackluster. Even the stuff they add later doesn't really make up for it. And holy poo poo is the fighter boring. It's nice that everyone's base damage is sort of kept on par, but that really doesn't make up for the difference between "rolled a natural even? Trip your foe!" versus "summon a powerful elemental while shooting lightning from your hands and also casting knock." It's still one of the only D&D's I'm willing to play without house rules, though. It's "good enough."
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Mar 25, 2017 03:33
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It's also a hell of a lot less bloated and overcomplicated. 13th Age is a game that could be really, really great with a second edition.
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Mar 25, 2017 03:39
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I find the big turnaround on attitude re: 13th Age interesting. It's one of those games that was really warmly received but as time went on dissatisfaction just kinda grew on it over time, kind of like Dungeon World (though it didn't go as south as Dungeon World did). I don't think we're going to get a perfect version of D&D and it's about as good as we're getting at the moment. I'm not sure some platonic flawless version will ever arise and it makes me curious as to how attitudes towards games like this shift over time.
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Mar 25, 2017 03:49
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I think it's because a lot of its flaws feel fixable. Or are places where it stuck a little too much to old tradition or didn't quite stick the landing. People tend to come off harsher on something that's really close to being great. Also seriously the setting is awful.
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Mar 25, 2017 03:56
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Halloween Jack posted:13th Age is cool, but I was pretty impressed with Shadow of the Demon Lord. About how do the two stack up with each other vis a vis tactical options? Fighters in SotDL mostly provide the basic framework for how martial-type characters play. And even then, when you start picking up Expert and Master Paths you aren't locked in to martial stuff. The Warrior is solid, and provides bonuses in the form of boons, which you can trade in (essentially) for lots of special maneuvers. This isn't specifically called out, but most players can put it together in a way that I think Schwalb intended. The actual Fighter Expert Path is a little lackluster. It makes you drat good at fighting, but doesn't offer enough customization for me, and doesn't measure up to the flexibility of similar Paths like the Thief. But since you can pick other Paths and build however you like, the issue isn't as pronounced as it is in 13th Age, where you have lots of tricks but no control over when you can use them.
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Mar 25, 2017 03:59
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In SOTDL most non-combat stuff is really stat-based as well, so Fighters don't have to worry about their Climb skill, they just Strength their way up. There's also a lot less variance in stats, so you can draw upon your intellect and will easily enough. There's a pretty simple system with Boons and Banes for doing stunts or modifying difficulty (add or minus a d6 or 2) that's a lot more player-facing and built in for doing trip attacks or whatever. The amount of access you have to spells is pretty limited as well, so Wizards don't have a particularly broad set of tools (that everyone can kind of access anyway). I haven't played it but it seems to function pretty well in theory.
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Mar 25, 2017 04:33
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This is technically a question for the design thread, but hell, I figure this is the thread where the readership is familiar with multiple D&Dalikes: So there are several games that have come out post-4e, and I wouldn't say they're all inspired by 4e, but they were clearly built with its innovations in mind, rather than reverting to 3e-era design. 13A, SotDL, Empire of Dust...and Fragged Empire is one that sticks out, because it uses a neat 3d6 die mechanic. Is it generally true that doing a tactical combat, combat encounter focused game with a 3d6 mechanic as opposed to d20 is going to make the PCs more consistently dominate weaker enemies, and have less of a chance of pulling it off against more powerful ones, since the mechanic is less swingy?
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Mar 25, 2017 05:04
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Halloween Jack posted:This is technically a question for the design thread, but hell, I figure this is the thread where the readership is familiar with multiple D&Dalikes: If weakness and strength of monster is mostly measured in their defensive stat, then yeah, basically. 3D6 is very likely to hover around 10.5, while D20 hovers around 1-20. That means that 10 is more or less your break even point. You have a 50% chance to roll above a 10 on either set of dice. Move the number to 5 and 3D6 hits it 90% of the time or so, while D20 goes to 75%.
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Mar 25, 2017 05:31
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Halloween Jack posted:Is it generally true that doing a tactical combat, combat encounter focused game with a 3d6 mechanic as opposed to d20 is going to make the PCs more consistently dominate weaker enemies, and have less of a chance of pulling it off against more powerful ones, since the mechanic is less swingy? players have to deal with long-term consequences of bad luck and monsters don't. so less bad luck overall - rarer bad outcomes and weaker bad outcomes - is good for the players. so if the only change is that rare outcomes happen less, than 3d6 versus d20 favors the players. that's less bad luck. but usually more important than less bad luck is weaker bad luck. if 3d6 is an excuse to make crits crittier and fumbles fumblier, then the 3d6 game could definitely be worse for players because absorbing worse bad luck spikes is generally harder in the abstract than absorbing more bad luck spikes. Alien Rope Burn posted:I find the big turnaround on attitude re: 13th Age interesting. It's one of those games that was really warmly received but as time went on dissatisfaction just kinda grew on it over time, i have a theory on why this is. it's one of the main reasons i wanted to do 13a, and I'll be getting to it soon.
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Mar 25, 2017 07:58
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Alien Rope Burn posted:I find the big turnaround on attitude re: 13th Age interesting. It's one of those games that was really warmly received but as time went on dissatisfaction just kinda grew on it over time, kind of like Dungeon World (though it didn't go as south as Dungeon World did). I don't think we're going to get a perfect version of D&D and it's about as good as we're getting at the moment. I'm not sure some platonic flawless version will ever arise and it makes me curious as to how attitudes towards games like this shift over time. What happened with Dungeon World? This is the first time I've read opinions turned on it.
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Mar 25, 2017 08:00
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Berkshire Hunts posted:What happened with Dungeon World? This is the first time I've read opinions turned on it. As I see it, Dungeon World has the same problem that all Apocalypse World variant stuff has: it's too hard to know when a move applies and when it doesn't, and often which move to use. On top of that, they all insist on using their stupid insular nomenclature. "Hold 3", for example, is dumb -- the health system for Apoc World is downright stupid. Yes, many of these arguments don't apply to those experienced with a system, but it's the designer's job to get players started with a system, and too many people were turned off by the stench of the in-crowd.
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Mar 25, 2017 08:12
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As people kept playing Dungeon World it became apparent the system's biggest problem is trying too hard to emulate the mechanics of D&D instead of the feel and so you get stupid poo poo like attribute scores, spell lists and damage rolls that really don't belong in a PbtA game. At least that's my biggest beef with it.
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Mar 25, 2017 08:35
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wiegieman posted:As I see it, Dungeon World has the same problem that all Apocalypse World variant stuff has: it's too hard to know when a move applies and when it doesn't, and often which move to use. On top of that, they all insist on using their stupid insular nomenclature. "Hold 3", for example, is dumb -- the health system for Apoc World is downright stupid.
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Mar 25, 2017 09:50
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For those who might be interested enough in Aethera to snag it, Legendary Games has it for about a week before it goes into wide release. Also their product synopsis does a better job of covering the salient points than I have. That's slightly embarrassing.
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Mar 25, 2017 13:16
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wiegieman posted:the health system for Apoc World is downright stupid. Are we talking about the health clock Apocalypse World itself uses? Or the HP system Dungeon World ported from D&D? Because the health clock is fine and good. "Hold" as a concept also make sense if you read the rules, and it isn't any harder than figuring out what the mechanics are between a blast/burst in 4e D&D or the many keywords in Magic: the Gathering. Nuns with Guns fucked around with this message at 14:44 on Mar 25, 2017 |
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Mar 25, 2017 14:39
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| # ? Apr 23, 2024 22:39 |
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I'm really looking forward to seeing the 13th Age Glorantha when it comes out. I love me some Glorantha as a setting but I'm not a huge fan of the systems. I find Heroquest to abstract and Runequest not Heroic enough. 4th edition Dnd wuxia classes might just be the middle ground I'm looking for.
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Mar 25, 2017 15:32
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