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Falconier111 posted:Probably a bit larger than you’re looking for but I’d love to see if this is as wild as it looks. It is. I love LANCER. Definitely not a single-post review though.
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Jun 10, 2020 04:03
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Yokai Hunters Society - Meiji-era Horror Yokai Hunters Society, part of the Bundle for Racial Justice and Equality (which, as of the time of writing this, has only a little over a day to go to purchase, so if you're on the fence about getting a bunch of great games for FIVE AMERICAN DOLLARS, consider this my shilling) is a rules-light pen and paper RPG about monster hunters in Meiji-era Japan. It is based on Tunnel Goons, apparently, which is a game I am not familiar with, so I will be judging this game on its own merits. It looks sharp, at least; black and white with some professional-looking illustration inside. Very nice. The game opens with a brief description of what a tabletop game is, which seems a little strange for something as niche as this but it explains itself quickly (making sure to point out that there's no right or wrong way to roleplay as long as everyone's having fun) and then gets out of the way, so that's fine. What's more interesting is the briefer write-up on tone: while Yokai Hunters Society is meant to be run as a horror game (with bonus points for "the psychological horror characteristics of many Japanese films and comics"), a prospective GM should feel free to run it as a monster-of-the-week action game, a mystery game a la Mononoke, or even a political drama about advancing through the ranks of the Society. Also up to the GM: just how faithful to the established Meiji-era Japan setting their game is, and just how openly yokai and the Society operate. The theme of 'take this and make it work for your group' pops up in the GM section later on, too, and that's something I'm always 100% behind when I see it in a game. I do wish, though, that there was a little more about how to use the framework of the rules to establish tone, either here or in the GM book. Perhaps it's a bit much to ask for such a light and short game, but even a list of inspiration to look at would have been nice. But enough about that, let's make a hunter!!! Yokai Hunters Society uses a roll or pick system for the bulk of character creation; one rolls (or picks) from a list of occupations, traits, and names to put together the framework for a character. A bit of  later and we've got a Bold, Sincere, Artisan named Yoshida Eiko; the game tells me that Eiko is a unisex name, so I choose to interpret that as the character being non-binary. After filling out their backstory a bit more - I decide they're a netsuke artisan bold enough to go the monster hunter route and use the remains of yokai they've slain as material for their crafting, which both gives them a reason to hunt yokai and the potential for plenty of trouble down the road - it's time to set some stats. Yokai Hunter Society uses four main stats - Courage (for actions that require impetuosity or anger, like running on rooftops or cutting a limb off a monster), Self-Control (self-explanatory; examples given include telling falsehoods or "using your bow to cut the rope from which a partner hangs"), Sharpness (general use of senses, like eavesdropping or detecting something hidden), and Wisdom (knowledge and prudence; knowing a yokai's weaknesses or how to find or craft quality equipment). A newly-generated character has four points to distribute to those four stats; I decide that Eiko is somewhat knowledgeable about yokai, given their line of work, but also impulsive, given their willingness to put themselves in danger for art's sake, and set their stats to Courage 1, Self-Control 0, Sharpness 1, and Wisdom 2. Next comes finding their starting Health Points (8+Courage) and Curse Resistance (2+Self Control, caps at 4). Eiko is reasonably sturdy but their lack of willpower makes them vulnerable to curses and misfortune.Next comes picking starting equipment (two pieces of equipment related to a character's occupation, and a random piece of equipment on another rolled table). Here's where I run into my first snag; the character generation rules say to roll a 3d6 to determine your random item, while the table is 2d8. Whoops. Anyway, Eiko starts with a knife for carving bone and wood (treated as a pocket knife), an oil lamp, and a set of loaded dice, which may or may not come in handy at some point. Items generally give a roll bonus when used to assist on a check; the bonus depends on how good the item is, which depends on a Wisdom check (2d6+Wisdom; 10 or less is a +1, each point above 10 is an additional +1). More follows: Eiko's oil lamp and set of loaded dice are merely average (8 and 6 respectively; neither went above 10, so +1 for each) but I roll a whopping 12 for their knife, giving them 14 total, or a +4 bonus to checks using it. Eiko is now a very, very good artisan and probably also very much above average at taking yokai down, if they can use their trusty carving knife to do it. Fortunately, there's rules in place to prevent you from just getting a bunch of random items for their bonuses and becoming yokai-hunting Batman; you can carry up to 8 items on your person before you start getting weighed down, taking a -1 to all Courage and Self-Control rolls for each item you're carrying over that limit.When you've got your stats and equipment settled, you then describe your character's looks and the mask that they wear while hunting yokai that signifies their status as a member of the Society, and sum up your character with the following template: "I am a [trait] and [trait] [occupation] who [something from your past] and seeks [a goal].". Eiko is a bold and sincere artisan who fell into hunting to find the perfect materials for their netsuke and seeks to establish themselves as not only rich, but renowned. All of these things can have mechanical effects, so writing them down and keeping them handy is important. After chargen is a list of items that might end up being used in the game, everything from rice balls (recover 1 hp) to cars (GO FAST, a blazing 16 km/h), and then it's off to the gameplay section! The actual gameplay is fairly straightforward. The gm describes the scene, the players say what they're doing and how, and if the GM decides a roll is necessary (i.e. that it's not an automatic success or failure, and that success and failure would both be interesting), the players roll 2d6+their chosen stat, with 8- as a failure, 10+ as a success, and 9 as a failure with consequences. A side bar at this point mentions that the number 9 is unlucky in Japan, because it sounds like the world "suffering". This is pretty familiar from PbtA-alikes, though the odds are... distinctly less in the player's favor. How can they change that? We've covered item bonuses before, but players can also invoke their characters' background traits, experiences, or goals and/or use another hunter's aid or the circumstances surrounding the check to roll with advantage- rolling 3d6 and taking the highest two results. Conversely, if a character's in an unfavorable situation, they roll with disadvantage, rolling 3d6 and taking the lowest two results. If a player has both advantage and disadvantage, it's up to the GM to decide if they cancel each other out or if one is more relevant than the other. If the odds still aren't in your favor despite everything, and you do not have advantage on your check you can decide to add a cursed dice to your roll. If you do, you roll an additional 1d8 and discard the lowest roll you've made - but, if the cursed dice rolls a higher number than your current Curse Resistance, you reduce your Curse Resistance by one. When Curse Resistance hits 0, you've sucumbed to a curse, and make every roll with disadvantage until such time as you're able to visit a sacred place and recover. Combat is run like any other series of checks. The GM does not roll for enemies, though; the players just roll against the enemy's difficulty score, which is 10+their level (0 or less for the weakest yokai, up to 8 or more for the DO NOT gently caress AROUND types like dragons). Even against invincible foes, though, a 9 still guarantees success - and dire consequences* (*consequences and success up to the GM). Otherwise, a character deals or takes damage equal to the difference between their roll and the enemy's, taking damage if their roll was lower and dealing it if it was higher. Reaching 0 HP means death, and recovering hp can only be done with rest, food, or certain one-use magic items. Overall I appreciate how fast and straightforward the system is, but I'm not entirely sure whether the fairly broad range of bonuses or maluses you can have on any given check can be balanced in such a simple system. Remember, for example, that +4 knife Eiko had? That's a massive bonus straight out of the gate at character generation that most characters won't be able to match. There's also a lot of 'make your own stuff up' in regards to failure which, again, I get that this is a rules-light game, but maybe some more guidance would have been nice here. Following the rules is a very brief rundown of Meiji Japan 1889 (a time of great change and upheaval, samurai banned from carrying swords, crises everywhere, xenophobia happening at the same time modernization marches on, etc etc etc). The most mechanically relevant thing here is that the lifestyle of a yokai hunter is not cheap; on an artisan's wages (1d6*10 sen per day, where 100 sen equals 1 yen), Eiko would have to save for a month on average to buy even a basic (+1) weapon, talisman, or similar. That's less of an issue than one might think, though; the world of the Society runs on favors, and what can't be bought can usually be acquired by doing the right things for the right people. There's even a couple tables in the GM section of favors that people might ask for or missions that the players may otherwise be asked to take on, everything from playing a game of shogi with a bored monk to investigating rumors connecting a US Navy officer with strange disappearances. This is a fun way of handling the fact that characters won't really be able to afford much just on the basis of their occupation's wages. At the end of the book comes the GM's section, which reiterates that everyone's here to have fun and to make poo poo up if you need to before settling into some questions concerning the role of yokai and the Society in your setting (how intense is the yokai activity? Is the Society known to anyone not involved in it, or is there some sort of masquerade in place? What kind of place is the Society operating out of?). After that is some explanation of the chosen difficulty for the game and suggestions for making things easier or harder on the players as necessary, and some tables to roll on for plot and npc ideas, including the aforementioned favor and mission tables. Fairly standard stuff, but I do appreciate that monks are weirdos and their request table has some weirdo options like reciting poetry with them or seeking out rare flowers. Rounding out the GM's section (and the book) is a brief bestiary and suggestions for creating your own antagonists as well. Here, we do get a suggestion for further research - the authors of the book cite yokai.com as a fantastic source of inspiration. The sample bestiary has a pretty wide range of yokai - not only do you have the well-known kappa, nekomata, and oni, but also more obscure yokai like the disease-spreading amazake baba and the monkey yokai sarugami. Each yokai is nicely illustrated, and while 'not everything is foxes and dragons' is a pretty low bar to clear, the writers clear it with aplomb. Overall, while I'm not 100% convinced on the soundness of the game's math, Yokai Hunters Society is a worthwhile read and a game that packs plenty of inspiration into 36 pages. Even if I didn't use the system as presented in the book, I could easily see myself running a Society game in some PbtA game or similar rules-light framework, and thus it's a game I highly recommend if you pick it up as part of the itch.io bundle.
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Jun 15, 2020 05:45
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Geese at the Beach It's a lovely day at the beach, and you are a horrible goose. Geese at the Beach is a very simple Powered by the Apocalypse game, part of the itch.io Bundle for Racial Justice and Equality in which you play minions of the Goose King - a creature of magnificent power and powerful magnificence, who may be an eldritch beast from beyond time and space or may simply be a very large goose with a crown on his head. Doesn't matter. What does matter is that He has awakened, as He wakes every year, and He has summoned his most trusted followers to go out and find for Him Shinies, so that He may be appeased and His life-decimating wrath be kept at bay for another year. And what place on Earth has more Shinies (and more danger) than The Beach? But beware! The Beach is dangerous, for there dwells creatures and travails most foul - among them Tourists, Crabs, Harsh Sand, Sharks, Mecha-Squid, The Hot Sun, and, worst of all, the unyielding, undying Seagull Armada. The followers of the Goose King will have to brave all these things and more to retrieve Shinies, gain the Goose King's Favor, and satisfy their liege before His angry honks shake the earth and heavens. The Beach is the most dangerous place on earth, and the GM (Goose Master) is encouraged to make sure everything the players (geese) encounter reflects that... but also that The Beach is where the most wondrous Shinies are, more treasures than any goose could ever steal in their lives. The GM is encouraged to go hog wild with their portrayal of the environment and the Goose King. (here, in the middle of the section about the beach's dangers, is a note that silly as it is, this is still a game about playing animals that can take harm, both from other animals and possibly humans, and making sure to discuss with your players just what form that harm should take and what their comfort levels are is important. This is a bit of thoughtfulness I wasn't necessarily expecting in a silly game about being a horrible goose, but it's appreciated.) There are many ways to be a minion of the Goose King, but every one of His minions is similar in certain ways: Every playbook has five Harm Blocks (HP, essentially) and three sets of abilities: Goose Abilities are free to use at any time, and generally represent some innate characteristic of the playbook (you do not need to be a goose to be a Goose; more on that later) which can either help or cause problems for you; King Abilities, which require you to expend a point of the Goose King's Favor to use and are unambiguously positive - things like avoiding Harm and just absolutely ruining poo poo are King Abilities; and Beach Abilities, which play to the less positive stereotypes of your chosen playbook, hold the potential for getting you (or the other Geese) into danger, and grant you a point of the Goose King's Favor for using them. Each playbook also starts with one point of Favor and the Basic Move take something as an offering for the Goose King. To use it, roll 2d8; on a Hit (7+) you add a Shiny to your hoard. With better success comes the ability to pick the positive outcomes of your Shiny theft; anything from creating an opening for you allies to ensuring the Goose King will be pleased with your chosen Shiny is possible. On a 7-9, or on a failed roll, the GM also chooses from a list of negative outcomes: some possible choices include losing another Shiny in the process of taking this one, attracting the attention of the Seagull Armada, or displeasing the Goose King enough that He decides to make His displeasure known. Once acquired, Shinies can either be taken to the Goose King's nest for Favor or healing, or they can be spent and permanently lost to avoid one Harm or interrupt the GM's move to make any other action instead. If the Geese gather Enough Shinies, the King is mollified, and He slips into slumber for another year. If every Goose is reduced to 0 Harm, they are driven away from the Beach, the Seagull Armada swoops in, claims all the Shinies for themselves, and the world is, quite possibly, lost. There are five playbooks for Geese at the Beach: The Buff Goose, also the only actual goose, is built around being fierce and dangerous. These are some of the moves a Buff Goose can use: Goose Abilities (+/-0): Remind people that you are the apex predator. Pick up the knife.  King Abilities (-1): Tank a hit, preventing all Harm done. Use the knife effectively. Obliterate your current obstacle. Beach Abilities (+1) You gain a favor when you: Throw Yourself into danger. Pick a fight all evidence says you should lose. Affirm the power of the Goose King. The Duck is a sneaky sort, excelling at getting ahead by any means necessary. They can: Goose Abilities: Find bread. Pinpoint an obvious weakness. Quack. King Abilities: Effortlessly Retreat away from danger. Navigate into someplace you're not wanted. Become the richest duck in the world. Beach Abilities: Demand to be loved. Convince someone you are a rubber toy. Manipulate the humans into breaking the Don't Feed the Birds policy. The Pelican is uhhhh... you got a gross beak, and you're good at using it. I don't think the author is too fond of pelicans. Goose Abilities: Scoop up something you realistically shouldn't. Endanger everybody else's lives selfishly. Bark. King Abilities: Reveal a secret object you've had stashed away. Ride a crocodile. Scoop up something everyone knows you shouldn't be able to. Beach abilities: Be gross with your weird giant beak. Joust another bird. Get distracted by preening yourself. The Cat is somewhere between the Buff Goose and the Duck, capable of great grace and great harm in equal measure. Goose Abilities: Appear somewhere that you definitely weren't a second ago. Sits if you fits. Scream. King Abilities: Gracefully avoid Harm. Squeeze into an opening you shouldn't be able to, reminding everyone you're a liquid. Become a claw-filled death machine, trapping or Harming your target. Beach Abilities: Interfere with something that isn't your business. Lash out against anyone trying to love you. Complain for literally, objectively, no reason. The Fish is... a fish. Someone's gotta be Aquaman, I guess. Or Dory. Goose Abilities: Commune with the starfish. Just keep swimming. Glub. King Abilities: Summon your school to overwhelm the enemy. Heal yourself or a friend with your calming oil secretions. Pay attention to something for more than a minute. Beach Abilities: Swarm the humans' feet. Forget about your objective immediately and move to a new one. Say something someone else has already said, confident it's your idea. Never let it be said that this game about being a horrible goose at the beach does not give you options. Would I play it? Hell yeah! Is it another game that's so light it'd require a lot of ad-hoc and in the end you're basially freeforming being the terror of some tourist town? Well, yeah. Still, it's probably the very best horrible goose simulator tabletop game that you can currently purchase, and it looks like a great way to spend a beer-and-pretzels type evening. Leraika fucked around with this message at 03:04 on Jun 16, 2020 |
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Jun 16, 2020 02:51
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Joe Slowboat posted:Something crucial to Troika! fluff is that a lot of it references the Book of the New Sun, which is one of the best works of science fantasy ever written and just plain one of the best works of 20th Century imaginative fiction, and it’s nice to see. Welp, I've got something to add to my reading list. Thanks!
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Jun 18, 2020 17:31
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Pick something at random from the itch.io bundle if you got it?
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Jun 19, 2020 21:48
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If I got at least one person to purchase the itch.io bundle with my reviews, they'll have been worth it. 
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Jun 24, 2020 18:34
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Kaza42 posted:I bought the itch.io bundle because of your reviews 
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Jun 24, 2020 19:22
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I'm reminded of the cast/miscast in Ctech, where it's 'you cast a spell to make people heal slightly faster' versus 'you miscast to rip a screaming tear in the world and your entire party dies instantly'. gently caress cthulhutech!
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Jun 29, 2020 18:17
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I had a discussion elsewhere about just what made a magical girl show (versus, say, any other genre of anime) and this is a very good encapsulation of what we'd settled on. I'll be watching this review with interest. edit: I also REALLY LIKE that the game emphasizes that you don't have to be a girl to be a magical girl - I'm thinking back on how other games in the genre have fumbled that in the past.
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Jun 29, 2020 19:41
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I'm wondering how it'd handle someone like Utena, so there's my request.
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Jun 30, 2020 06:38
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Falconier111 posted:Jesus Christ, this is an embarrassment of riches. Thanks everyone, I’ll be hybridizing these concepts into both characters. That's fair. It's a very good show, but it's also a very uncomfortable show at times. Joe Slowboat posted:My take remains that while it can probably generate Utena Tenjou, the game is 100% not meant to handle Revolutionary Girl Utena the show. That's why I asked; I wanted to see just how flexible it was, since Utena is a far stretch from a lot of other magical girl shows.
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Jun 30, 2020 18:32
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Subtle Knife seems to be a reference to the book of the same name.
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Jul 1, 2020 19:42
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How about a spell made by an ancient human sorcerer that conjures a desired object... or a whole bunch of desired objects? what I'm saying is: gate of babylon
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Jul 15, 2020 04:44
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Oh man, those spells are hella cool.
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Jul 15, 2020 15:56
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BinaryDoubts posted:Overall, it's pretty much on the GM to invent magic that is so cruel and requires such a steep cost that a PC would never even contemplate using it. Looking back at the two spells I rolled up, I think you could make an argument for a PC using the Scripture spell and not being irredeemably destroyed by it (is there a significant difference between using a spell to kill people and just, like, buying a gun?) I mean if you make it into a BLIT there is. Mail it to your enemies. Upload it to imgur. etc.
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Jul 16, 2020 05:06
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The poll appears to only be counting the first vote made instead of a number of votes per person.
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Jul 21, 2020 00:46
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I don't think 'woman alone in the wilderness who only exists to get slaughtered' is much of an improvement, honestly. Hard pass from me.
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Jul 22, 2020 17:58
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Ultiville posted:I agree with you, but also don't think I've ever played with a group that wouldn't instantly follow this woman under the assumption that doing so has a far higher chance of adventure than anything else they're going to do, so in actual play her chances of getting killed by the gnoll are near-zero. I'd probably keep the card under that assumption, and just plan to alter it if for once PCs don't decide to meddle. The card itself says you can't help her.
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Jul 22, 2020 22:08
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Dallbun posted:Well, it says she's not interested in help, but in practice it would depend on what idea the PCS get stuck in their head. If the PCs want to engage I would hope the DM wouldn't be like, no, you can't derail this DOOM TRAIN To put it another way, I've no real interest in a card that introduces a woman and then expects her to get murdered because that's what the card's about (per the synopsis; I certainly don't have it in front of me).
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Jul 22, 2020 22:19
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Using a program like Vulgar for your fantasy god names (just refresh until you get something that feels right, then pick words off the provided list) might be a better way to handle weird cthulhu names,
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Jul 24, 2020 17:14
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I could see the crawling claw be an excuse for a silly b-movie romp through the wizard's tower but that's a quest anyway.
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Jul 26, 2020 18:57
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the reason is because currency is fake as hell
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Jul 29, 2020 06:17
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There are better ways of giving sweet magical weapons to your players than introducing rape monsters into your game, though.
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Jul 30, 2020 18:27
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quote:percieved realism, a fetishisation of how much early medival life sucked, and really powerful wizards being the best at things l5r is at least two of those things, maybe three depending on how charitable you are in your thoughts about how it handles honor. edit to actually provide helpful commentary: ars magica is one of those games I've heard about and been vaguely interested in reading about, but not enough to do it because I've heard it's a bit too complex.
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Aug 1, 2020 01:16
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Aaaaaand there goes any interest I might ever have had in Ars Magica. Poof! It's magic!
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Aug 2, 2020 02:06
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I mean just look at how A Wrinkle in Time handles travel in nonlinearity for an example of how to do it right, imho. Also, add M:TG to the list of things ol' Cook ripped off.
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Aug 5, 2020 01:22
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I feel like Deja Vu would have been more interesting as the opposite; that these two doppelgangers are just following them around and constantly swapping to strangers but continuing on as if they knew them instead of person they were talking to randomly pretends to forget the conversation. Still kind of eh though.
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Aug 5, 2020 15:28
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Thank you for that post about Star Wars: Life! It's neat to see a licensed board game that actually does something with the premise.
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Aug 7, 2020 03:55
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Everyone posted:Agreed, though something like this is unsurprising since the loving thing was published over 25 years years (March 1, 1995 according to Amazon). Figure quite a few older RPG items will require updating/surgery to be more suitable to modern consumers. por que no los dos
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Aug 8, 2020 03:50
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I'd love to see a theater ship. Be Tantalus.
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Aug 15, 2020 00:46
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I what god dammit why
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Aug 15, 2020 03:45
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Everyone posted:It's a warning flag but to me more of a "use carefully as intended" warning. The dude (and it's almost always a dude) who lets his dick talk him into trouble is a pretty standard adventure trope. It doesn't mean "license/requirement to rape." Played correctly it should give somebody the same general difficulty as something like "Greed." You're Greedy. You like getting money. That can distract in difficult situations or give an NPC a way to manipulate you tht they otherwise wouldn't have. That doesn't (or shouldn't) mean you're committing robbery-homicide all over the place. Sexual harassment is not actually a fun character quirk and I really wish you would stop excusing people including it in their games.
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Aug 15, 2020 19:54
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Ghost with two pistols.
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Aug 18, 2020 04:23
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I feel like if most of the people I know played this, they'd kick off the monopoly shitstorm by arguing over who got to be the tommy gun.
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Aug 26, 2020 02:20
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I have to say, I like the idea of a card that's just 'here are some things that can go wrong'. Whether it has a place in a deck of encounters like this is a bit more debatable.
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Aug 28, 2020 21:28
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Hey now, Cincinnati is a lovely place.  I'm really appreciating these reviews, Falconier! Keep 'em up.
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Aug 28, 2020 23:23
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If you're doing side things, please please please talk about Barkham Horror.
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Aug 28, 2020 23:35
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Oh, I thought it'd been out for a bit now; I remember when they announced it in... december.... oh.
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Aug 28, 2020 23:56
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How do you tell what level a card is?
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Aug 30, 2020 21:33
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| # ¿ Apr 23, 2024 23:12 |
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megane posted:It's the number of little white dots in the arc under the circle at top left. Signature cards have the whole arc filled in, which means they don't have a level. I spent way too long looking at literally everything else whooooops
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Aug 30, 2020 22:22
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