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fool_of_sound posted:The problems with D&D 5e have very little to do with it being hard for new players to grasp. Hell, to a lesser extent the same is true for 3e. Simplicity doesn’t directly correlate with with comprehensibility. Anyone with a backing in video game RPGs will be able to grasp the crunch of D&D. Similarly, anyone with a backing in doing improvs or chat room role play will be able to grasp most story games. I mean this is 100% a valid reason, running D&D is genuinely a shitload of work to have to it function well.
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Sep 7, 2018 01:19
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kingcom posted:I mean this is 100% a valid reason, running D&D is genuinely a shitload of work to have to it function well. Yeah, for sure. People just tend to beat around the bush about it.
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Sep 7, 2018 01:22
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fool_of_sound posted:Yeah, for sure. People just tend to beat around the bush about it. I mean there are other things that are pretty loving good to have in DW over D&D. Like gently caress is it a pain to teach people that failing can be a good thing and DW gives you xp for it. Its unironically one of the most difficult things to explain and get across to players in general, that fail is good and cool and you should just try things. If you do it in D&D you almost universally get hosed and/or die which makes people not play in a fun way.
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Sep 7, 2018 01:40
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Pollyanna posted:Confession time: I like Dungeon World as a GM because the way it's set up makes it really easy for me to GM a game with minimal prep while keeping it interesting. I do less work and still make something good. That's why I like PbtA. Pulling things out of my rear end at the last second is a lot easier than spending hours writing out how Encounter #4 will happen. If you still have decision paralysis about system you can make a table and roll on it.
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Sep 7, 2018 01:44
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I agree that Dungeon World is a flawed game but I don't think the people who enjoy it beat around the bush that they like it because it scratches the D&D itch for them without all of D&D's bullshit. I also agree that the notion that new players to RPGs won't be able to grasp rules mechanics is frequently overstated and that the problems with a lot of crunchy games have less to do with the nature of rules in general and more to do with flaws inherent to those games (and also extremely poor layout and editing which plagues a lot of games regardless of complexity).
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Sep 7, 2018 01:55
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Shadow of the Demon Lord is a very pleasant alternative to DnD5e complete with plenty of adventures and support and actually having a solid mechanical base, and it scratches the DnD itch for people who love character building. The blood'n'guts aesthetic can turn off some people, but it's easy to get rid of that and run a more heroic game on an aesthetic level, and not much trouble at all to remove it on a mechanical level. Get rid of Corruption, and replace 'Insanity Points' with 'Stress Points' that reset to zero after maxing out and you're already there. And naturally don't let players pick the evil magics.
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Sep 7, 2018 02:28
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bewilderment posted:Shadow of the Demon Lord is a very pleasant alternative to DnD5e complete with plenty of adventures and support and actually having a solid mechanical base, and it scratches the DnD itch for people who love character building. sotdl has some solid mechanics and some "why??" fluff on par with some of worst
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Sep 7, 2018 02:39
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bewilderment posted:Shadow of the Demon Lord is a very pleasant alternative to DnD5e complete with plenty of adventures and support and actually having a solid mechanical base, and it scratches the DnD itch for people who love character building. Absolutely do let the players pick the evil magics, though. Curse is a good tradition and a lot of fun (and not gross in any significant way) and while Death magic has the same problem as any summoning-based tradition (it bogs down turns way too much and undervalues the way summons break action economy) the things that make Death bad/dangerous are more true of non-evil summoning magic. Forbidden is the only one full of "you poop yourself to death and your balls fall off" stuff and frankly even those spells have reasonable effect lines, just with bad flavor.
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Sep 7, 2018 03:17
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Doorknob Slobber posted:sotdl has some solid mechanics and some "why??" fluff on par with some of worst Unless you're talking about, like, the Forbidden spell line or the Hell-supplements I dunno what you're referring to. The illustration for the Wizard path, on the other hand, totally deserves to be there as is Schwalb knew exactly what he was telling the illustrator. "Yeah, here's your powerful wizard class, you fat goon."
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Sep 7, 2018 05:59
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dwarf74 posted:I mean, for B/X prep is literally "grab one of about a million pre-made low-level adventures." Basic and the rule sheet from Keep on the Borderlands is a complete D&D game in what, 25 pages?
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Sep 7, 2018 06:52
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Kinda makes me want to try a retroclone or something. There any good ones that have post-2e classes and races backported to them, like Sorcerer, Warlord and so on?
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Sep 7, 2018 06:57
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I'm sure there are 1000's of B/X classes by now. Labyrinth Lord, Dark Dungeons, Mutant Future, Black Streams: Solo Heroes and most of Keith Crawford's output are good and compatible with little to no adapting. It would be a dick to move to tell you to pick up hundreds of bucks in RPG hardbacks, but those are all free. The DD softcover book is a beast though. Everything I found bad about the pdf actually makes the print edition easier to read. It's frequently on sale for like 15 bucks at lulu.com. You can get complete rule books for every player for the cost of a D&D hardback. I like the box set's rules a little more in places, such as the d6 resolution mechanic showcased in the retroclone "There's Always a Chance." I prefer the escalating d6's because it's more visceral and easy to understand. Got something that isn't covered in the rules? DM picks the stat appropriate and assigns a number of d6's based on difficulty. Roll them under your ability score to win. Now you actually have a curve, and you'll always know what a success is. The curve gets rid of the moments where the world's strongest hero becomes Moe Howard one in twenty times. You can actually plan. Imagine that. Getting hosed every time you roll a 1, or realistically, 1 to 10, on a d20 is demented. It makes you play a weird creepy guy instead of a dungeon hero. So in Dark Dungeons and BECMI, combat begins by rolling 6D6. Wandering monster, distance, surprise, reaction, initiative. So much weight is lifted from the DM by the reaction roll. A d6 with a 1 on it, saves you from being asked about a creature's disposition every single encounter. I'm done with saying "they growl" or "they're kind of standing around kicking gravel or something." gently caress off, I'm not coming up with body language cues for every drat sponge mold and fungus. If I'm amped to describe something cool, nothing is stopping me. I like to roll initiative every round, some don't like it, I think it makes it more dramatic.It's practically mandatory in Dark Dungeons because Dark Dungeons has a very interesting initiative mechanic that came straight from Dave Arneson: you can state what you are doing to get a plus to your initiative, or wait and see what the monster's intent is and take a minus. Holy poo poo does this make combat more clear and more dramatic. Does announcing and rolling every turn make the game take longer? Not really. D&D is rocket tag. BECMI especially, because the players are using save or suck/ save or die effects from the get go, every single round. I've found everyone announcing what they are going to do before rolling for initiative actually speeds up the game, because everyone is clear and on the same page and the system is already more amicable to non-violent conflict resolution than any edition I know of. The combat does not need to take forever. The secret to everything else is the paper plate. Time tracking is extremely important to Basic D&D. If you don't track time and roll for wandering monsters, you are stuck with running modules, and even then, you're stiffing them on the loot. Loot is most of your XP FFS. Basic D&D can fit on a note card it's so piss easy. It is compatible with everything named Dungeons & Dragons through simple conversion. Babylon Astronaut fucked around with this message at 08:11 on Sep 7, 2018 |
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Sep 7, 2018 07:59
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Anyone play Ten Candles and have any thoughts on it? Thinking of grabbing it to play around Halloween.
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Sep 7, 2018 09:20
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occamsnailfile posted:So, I don't fundamentally disagree with a lot of your statements above, but I have a different experience with this. Namely, I tried to bring a few different "freeform" roleplayers into using a system, and they just bounced straight off the crunch. These were people who were entirely accustomed to making their own fun, developing arcs, cooperating in developing a story and all that--but when confronted with the idea of an ability score they had no idea what to do. A lot of people who consider themselves "gamers" will probably approach from the crunch side more effectively, but if you're dealing with say, theater nerds or other folks who haven't met that tradition, narrative games may still be the way to go. Mandatory making GBS threads on 5e and D&D in general: Whenever you actually interact with D&D's rules they tend to be more about what you can't do than what you can do. With the exception of spells the resolution system does very little to help prompt how you succeed, only whether you fail. Having high diplomacy doesn't give you a bunch of extra talky prompts so much as make it harder for you to gently caress up talking if the GM calls for a roll. D&D's brand recognition and (perceived, incorrect) assumptions of familiarity from watching streams and playing derived games makes it a good way to get into the hobby, but everything about actually interacting with the system and what it teaches you about RPGs is poison. Mandatory lauding of Danger Patrol: Danger Patrol's character sheets are covered in prompts that encourage you to solve problems within your style while not preventing you from acting outside your wheelhouse. Success has easily adjudicated mechanical results and the whole system is built around having fun with failures. It needs an experienced GM with a good familiarity with the system to flow smoothly but it's great for introducing new players. Splicer fucked around with this message at 09:22 on Sep 7, 2018 |
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Sep 7, 2018 09:20
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"There's Always a Chance" has Alchemists, Assassins, Barbarians, Bards, "Devilborn" (as in Tieflings), Paladins, Shaman, Warforged, Warlocks (as in the 3e class with invocations and Eldritch Blast), and Warlords
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Sep 7, 2018 09:33
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Ghost Leviathan posted:Kinda makes me want to try a retroclone or something. There any good ones that have post-2e classes and races backported to them, like Sorcerer, Warlord and so on? I've been contemplating making something like this, originally as it's own game, but I decided that was a bit much, so if I did do it it probably would be a supplement for an existing game(leaning towards Labyrinth Lord* but not set in stone) Was thinking it would be two volumes, one would cover a bunch of more modern and/or oddball classes for humans(so stuff like Warlord or Sword Mage), while the other would be Racial Class writeups for a wide array of different races, but rather than the standard BX thing where it's just Elf or Dwarf, most races would get at least two to three different ones(so basically in the vein of how ACKS handles nonhuman classes), so kinda a mix of Orcs of Thar, Complete Book of Humanoids, and the Creature Crucible books *although I'd need to get physical copies of that game first before I could make an absolute decision, as it's easier for me to decide on such things if I have a physical book in front of me
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Sep 7, 2018 09:54
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Tuxedo Catfish posted:Absolutely do let the players pick the evil magics, though. Curse is a good tradition and a lot of fun (and not gross in any significant way) and while Death magic has the same problem as any summoning-based tradition (it bogs down turns way too much and undervalues the way summons break action economy) the things that make Death bad/dangerous are more true of non-evil summoning magic. the only time I've seen Hateful Defecation cast was when i had the NPC big bad use it on one of the PCs, who happened to be a cyborg. so that was a lot of fun to describe. the NPC was then killed a few rounds later by a combination of the techno-mage using a flamethrower and the other wizard teaming up with the warrior to use Hole of Glory (lol) to stab the NPC with a lance from 30 feet away. also the whole adventure took place on the moon. Shadow of the Demon Lord owns.
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Sep 7, 2018 11:21
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Serf posted:the only time I've seen Hateful Defecation cast was when i had the NPC big bad use it on one of the PCs, who happened to be a cyborg. so that was a lot of fun to describe. the NPC was then killed a few rounds later by a combination of the techno-mage using a flamethrower and the other wizard teaming up with the warrior to use Hole of Glory (lol) to stab the NPC with a lance from 30 feet away. also the whole adventure took place on the moon. Shadow of the Demon Lord owns. Please tell me they pointed to their chromed nether regions, sneered, and simply stated 'I've got no balls of steel' in response to the ineffective spell.
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Sep 7, 2018 16:49
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bewilderment posted:Unless you're talking about, like, the Forbidden spell line or the Hell-supplements I dunno what you're referring to.  ok..  thanks i guess?  Yah I'm done, but there is more like this in the other stuff. And that's not some supplement written by a third party or anything its an official supplement Doorknob Slobber fucked around with this message at 16:57 on Sep 7, 2018 |
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Sep 7, 2018 16:54
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Doorknob Slobber posted:
hey, if you hit 5 and then 16 you're back to normal! LuiCypher posted:Please tell me they pointed to their chromed nether regions, sneered, and simply stated 'I've got no balls of steel' in response to the ineffective spell. sadly we ruled that the cyborg poo poo machine oil and loose bolts
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Sep 7, 2018 16:56
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Doorknob Slobber posted:
That's what the Templar Satanists (according to the French king that wanted their gold) did so it's historical!
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Sep 7, 2018 16:59
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fool_of_sound posted:The problems with D&D 5e have very little to do with it being hard for new players to grasp. Hell, to a lesser extent the same is true for 3e. Simplicity doesn’t directly correlate with with comprehensibility. Anyone with a backing in video game RPGs will be able to grasp the crunch of D&D. Similarly, anyone with a backing in doing improvs or chat room role play will be able to grasp most story games.
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Sep 7, 2018 17:00
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Yeah, 3.x seems to mostly be about jank held up by supplement support.
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Sep 7, 2018 17:06
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My favorite bit of SotDL grimderp is that it states that families are terrified of their children being changelings, and will even drown them or throw them in the fire if they are suspected to be such. (This is actually historically accurate to some extent...) However, the Changeling PC race says that they lose their transformation if in contact with cold iron. Bringing to mind the image of families throwing their screaming babies in the fire when they could have just gone to the local blacksmith, touched them against something and said "Nah, he's good."
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Sep 7, 2018 17:08
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Moriatti posted:Yeah, 3.x seems to mostly be about jank held up by supplement support. Core is plenty janky. 3e is interesting because unlike a lot of bad games it’s not a result of a lack of deliberate design. 3e made a conscious effort to think through most of its systems; the problems arise where those systems intersect, because of a lack of proper overarching design principles.
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Sep 7, 2018 17:08
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Edit: ^ Yeah, though I think that lack of clear design is it's selling appeal. I mean: 1) Hysteria is not commonly rational and 2) the common person probably doesn't know about thw cold iron trick.
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Sep 7, 2018 17:10
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Doorknob Slobber posted:And that's not some supplement written by a third party or anything its an official supplement Yeah, it's not like everything contains it, but it's not cleanly segmented off in a chapter you can ignore either. And insofar as it is, it's in the "dark cults, forbidden magic, demons etc." sections which I wouldn't really want to ignore normally. Schwalb's actual play podcast makes it pretty clear where all this stuff comes from - he has a 15yo boy's sensibilities when it comes to describing guts and poop (which IMO makes the podcast unlistenable)
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Sep 7, 2018 17:11
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oriongates posted:Because this is not a thing people are looking for when they join the hobby. I feel like you really hit the nail on the head with this observation. Amusingly, the McElroys sort of stumbled onto this progression themselves organically, and probably without intending to.
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Sep 7, 2018 17:11
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Serf posted:hey, if you hit 5 and then 16 you're back to normal! Jeb Bush 2012 posted:Yeah, it's not like everything contains it, but it's not cleanly segmented off in a chapter you can ignore either. And insofar as it is, it's in the "dark cults, forbidden magic, demons etc." sections which I wouldn't really want to ignore normally.
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Sep 7, 2018 17:16
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i find the grimdark poo poo in sotdl to be dumb, but in a goofy way. when i run the stock adventures, i lean more towards evil dead and play up the slapstick elements of it because personally i'm not good at evoking horror in games, and i've never come across anyone who is but it can be quite easily excised from the mechanics if you just get rid of insanity and corruption. i think maybe also disallow the inquisitor path, but i don't have my book in front of me. i think that was the only mechanics thing in the paths section that made me smh Splicer posted:The exact nature of the 16 result sex organs are a bit too vague for me to find comforting. Though a solid premise for an oglaf comic. the one time it happened in one of my games, i let the player tell me what happened
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Sep 7, 2018 17:22
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Reene posted:Anyone play Ten Candles and have any thoughts on it? Thinking of grabbing it to play around Halloween. I'd also be interested in hearing some Actual Play re: Ten Candles.
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Sep 7, 2018 17:54
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Jeb Bush 2012 posted:Schwalb's actual play podcast makes it pretty clear where all this stuff comes from - he has a 15yo boy's sensibilities when it comes to describing guts and poop (which IMO makes the podcast unlistenable) I also found that AP podcast unlistenable. I really love SotDL, though. Weird.
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Sep 7, 2018 18:19
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Serf posted:hey, if you hit 5 and then 16 you're back to normal!
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Sep 7, 2018 18:24
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dwarf74 posted:He is his own game's worst advocate. I cancelled my pledge to the original kickstarter after he got on a podcast and really played up the "poo poo yourself to death" spell and something about orcs with giant boners. the true crime of the podcast is that its just one mic on omnidirectional sitting in the middle of the table picking up absolutely every sound in the room also in the first episode in the first fight the clockwork is killed instantly on the first attack and that's just lame My Lovely Horse posted:Not if you hit 16 first, because 5 doesn't specify you only lose one set. right, you want to get 5 first so you have a spare
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Sep 7, 2018 18:28
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I saw a few posts about eclipse phase in this thread and some questions about volume 2. My friend is one of the developers/creators of the game and he usually streams himself working on it a couple times a week. Would anybody be interested in a link to that?
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Sep 7, 2018 18:44
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Moriatti posted:Yeah, 3.x seems to mostly be about jank held up by supplement support. I would argue that 3.x starts easy and gets bad. Creating a character isn't hard. Creating an effective level 1 character isn't hard. Leveling up level by level isn't hard. But then, all of a sudden, I suck eggs and Bill the wizard is running circles around everyone else, what the gently caress happened? Oh look at that, this easy if verbose game turned out to be all about system mastery and now, 6 months into play, I found out out that I chose my options poorly.
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Sep 7, 2018 18:52
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Doorknob Slobber posted:
Exciting stuff, very reminiscent of works like Lamentations of the Flame Princess, or FATAL. I can see why it has such has a devoted following on our own forums! 
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Sep 7, 2018 19:29
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My Lovely Horse posted:Not if you hit 16 first, because 5 doesn't specify you only lose one set.
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Sep 7, 2018 19:40
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Splicer posted:16 also doesn't specify they're your sex organs.
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Sep 7, 2018 20:45
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Yawgmoth posted:5 doesn't specify the sex organs you lose are the ones attached to your body. there actually is an adventure for sotdl called "the measure of a man" where the PCs take on a cult of macho dudes who are MRA parodies who all have poo poo stats and are led by a musclebound guy with a magic ribbon he wears on his dick. when he is killed, the ribbon rips his dick free and continues the fight, actually becoming a difficult encounter at the end of what is a joke adventure. if any of the PCs are incredibly stupid they can take the ribbon for themselves with predictable consequences
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Sep 7, 2018 20:54
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