Tabletop Roleplaying Games (D&D, Pathfinder, CoC, ETC.)

[MazonLabs Recruitment Rep]

What happened to giving a shit about using minis and playing on a battle mat?

I don't knock people who do it and I'm cool with some good crunchy mechanics (lord knows I put up with FUCKIN SPACE OPERA), but if I've got to devote another glass display cabinet or case for miniatures and terrain, hard pass. My wargaming takes up enough space.

Still, you've got an appreciation for the vintage, and that's a good thing.

As for recently designed stuff, about as recent my RPG's get is perhaps Mothership, which would probably draw your ire given it's not all that crunchy.

 

[Sneedfully and Peacefully]

Posted on the Pathfinder official Discord a few minutes ago. They removed negative reacts including laughing.
View attachment 8474103

lol you made me curious so I looked around a bit and not 20 minutes ago. this is the admin (head janitor):

They seem to have a rule about no modern politics in the server generally speaking, except when it's bad evil trump ICE nazis I guess.
Remember when the server was about a good (but ultimately pozzed to fuck by the company) RPG system?
Bonus: This is their primary tranny janny:

interesting, interesting. Let's look at some of his other poostings:





and the Troonsky linked in bio for good measure:

okay I'll be here all day if I look more up and don't want to detract from how this place is for TTRPGs and not explicitly laughing at tranny retards in a discord related to it. Suffice it to say this dude wants to skinwalk being a super HOT 7 foot tall muscle mommy GF because maybe then he'll "pass" when he's probably a gangly 6+ foot ogre troon. HRT and porn (and BG3 it seems) has consumed this man's brain. He might not be worthy of a lolcow, but maybe in tranny sideshows/obscure laughingstocks or a discord community watch. I can smell potential here but maybe he's just a dime a dozen troon gooner.

 

[Uzumaki]

If you like Shadowdark, Old School Essentials is going to blow your face right off.

And no, everything written after the 5e boom is made by tourists with no history with the hobby repeating all the mistakes of TheForge circa 2006.

 

[LovisXVI]

lol you made me curious so I looked around a bit and not 20 minutes ago. this is the admin (head janitor):
View attachment 8477243
They seem to have a rule about no modern politics in the server generally speaking, except when it's bad evil trump ICE nazis I guess.
Remember when the server was about a good (but ultimately pozzed to fuck by the company) RPG system?
Bonus: This is their primary tranny janny:
View attachment 8477271
interesting, interesting. Let's look at some of his other poostings:

View attachment 8477253
View attachment 8477254
View attachment 8477256
View attachment 8477258
and the Troonsky linked in bio for good measure:
View attachment 8477278
okay I'll be here all day if I look more up and don't want to detract from how this place is for TTRPGs and not explicitly laughing at tranny retards in a discord related to it. Suffice it to say this dude wants to skinwalk being a super HOT 7 foot tall muscle mommy GF because maybe then he'll "pass" when he's probably a gangly 6+ foot ogre troon. HRT and porn (and BG3 it seems) has consumed this man's brain. He might not be worthy of a lolcow, but maybe in tranny sideshows/obscure laughingstocks or a discord community watch. I can smell potential here but maybe he's just a dime a dozen troon gooner.

The most offensive part is being a rust developer, awful language for bad coders.

 

[Blarmed&Dangerous]

and the Troonsky linked in bio for good measure:

I cannot tell people enough times to please start noticing that they're all communists.

 

[Sunflower Samurai]

lol you made me curious so I looked around a bit and not 20 minutes ago. this is the admin (head janitor):
View attachment 8477243
They seem to have a rule about no modern politics in the server generally speaking, except when it's bad evil trump ICE nazis I guess.
Remember when the server was about a good (but ultimately pozzed to fuck by the company) RPG system?
Bonus: This is their primary tranny janny:
View attachment 8477271
interesting, interesting. Let's look at some of his other poostings:

View attachment 8477253
View attachment 8477254
View attachment 8477256
View attachment 8477258
and the Troonsky linked in bio for good measure:
View attachment 8477278
okay I'll be here all day if I look more up and don't want to detract from how this place is for TTRPGs and not explicitly laughing at tranny retards in a discord related to it. Suffice it to say this dude wants to skinwalk being a super HOT 7 foot tall muscle mommy GF because maybe then he'll "pass" when he's probably a gangly 6+ foot ogre troon. HRT and porn (and BG3 it seems) has consumed this man's brain. He might not be worthy of a lolcow, but maybe in tranny sideshows/obscure laughingstocks or a discord community watch. I can smell potential here but maybe he's just a dime a dozen troon gooner.

Something deeply amusing to see a pathfinder discord janny repping a company that's more or less a competitor solely because he likes gooning to one of their characters

 

[Sneedfully and Peacefully]

Something deeply amusing to see a pathfinder discord janny repping a company that's more or less a competitor solely because he likes gooning to one of their characters

From what I can tell it's associated with the PFRPG subreddit (making everything witnessed check out) so it's not owned or really partnered with Paizo, but it's the biggest one so there are Paizo people in there.

Either way yeah, dude just wants to be pegged by muscular devil mommy GF and he's so pissed he can never actually get that.

 

[Manly_Brony]

All that is to say what more recently designed games have you guys been enjoying?

I nearly always choose setting over system so I wouldn't mind 5e but it really feels like a superhero game to someone who dabbled in the older editions. I'd also like to try Alien.

 

[Imperial Citizen]

Listen Dice Scum regale the Glory of Megatron and the Decepticon Empire from the Transformers RPG Decepticon Sourcebook!

 

[Lightning's Heraldry]

snip

I really try to use it as a chance to also use my wargaming stuff. In my experience most ttrpg gamers don't know what the hell a khorne champion is and so are just happy to see something interesting on the board.

But I have also just run games using tokens of characters on a typical grid dungeon and it's nice that players can see their environment and make real decisions regarding tactics.

As for mothership, yeah I looked into it because it was very hyped but it wasn't for me. I have found I rarely get into sci fi unless someone else wants to play it themselves for some reason.

snip

Well you certainly pinned me correctly, I already own the complete physical double boxed set of OSE lol. The reformatting of AD&D is pretty good and any real rules changes are generally for the best. Hard to get a group who wants to play genuine classic D&D anymore though.

snip

A friend sent me the alien core rules and I just remembered I never got around to reading them on account of them being sci fi. Maybe I should take another look.

Overall maybe I have more comparative system experience than I anticipated. If anyone else is curious I will drop a list of stuff I have read, played or run below. If you see something missing that you like just reply with it.

- AD&D 1e: Read, Played, Ran a lot. Needs no introduction. Good game but doesn't hold up to modern rewrites like OSE, Rules can be hard to learn for newbies. 7.5/10
- Battle Century G: Read, Played, Ran. Mech pilot game, modern, more rules lite, easy to learn. 6/10.
- Black Sword Hack: Read, Played, Ran. Elric-style weird fantasy. Very rules lite and about as lite as I can stand. Still pretty decent and works with old AD&D module conversions pretty well. Has Doom Die mechanic which is a neat system. 7,5/10.
- Burning Wheel Gold: Read, Played, Ran a lot. Middle Earth style fantasy game. Luke Crane was a tool for not releasing a searchable PDF version of the core rules during the time where I ran it because the rules are a PitA to find in the book when you need them and the entire game needs an editor to go clean up the book. 7/10 despite that I enjoyed running it just because it's such a chore to find something when you need it.
- Cyberpunk 2020: Read. Needs no introduction. Pretty rules dense by even modern standards. Never had an opportunity to run it. No rating.
- Shadow of the Demon Lord/Weird Wizard: Read. Grimdark Fantasy d20 game. Interesting levelling and class system with some novel ideas. Never end up getting to run it due to something else always taking away priority. No rating.
- Fleaux: Don't, it's Mork Borg.
- Mork Borg. lol/10
- GURPS: Read, Played, Ran. The Universal RPG. I have only used it to run classic fantasy games, but it did a reasonable job at that. Rules are easier than people make them out to be and the game is really quite good infinite official material with which to tune your game. 8/10.
- Knave 2e: Read. Dungeon Delver Fantasy. Seems fine, nothing especially novel here but it doesn't seem to be a bad game. Probably not a bad option for solo gamers out there. 6/10.
- Mythic Bastionland: Read, Running. High Fantasy game about playing Weird Knights. Rules are very lite, probably much too lite for my taste. Lots of pretty art, really wish the game had another 2 pages of combat rules. No rating for now.
- OSE: Its 1e but better. 8.5/10
- Palladium +/- RIFTS: Read. Weird fantasy cyberpunk grab bag. Has a dedicated fantasy setting. I have tried and failed multiple times to get people to try it. Cool art, crunch is unreadable to the average mind I think. 5/10 never getting ran.
- Shadowdark: Dungeon Delver Fantasy. Read, Running. It's not 5e, mostly. Rules are very streamlined. I don't get the obsession with everything being level 10 or less in modern games? At least you can run classic modules. Wish classes had a bit more crunch considering how cut down everything else is. 7.5/10
- D&D 3.x (+pathfinder 1): Read, Ran, Played thousands of hours. It's D&D. At this point I still don't know who 3.x appeals to. If you want to play character optimizer the game breaks instantly, but if you don't optimize some then the balance is so shit half the group ends up feeling useless. You don't even have to go out of your way to make something broken most of the time, players can end up with stupid shit on accident. martials suck/10.
- Stars Without Number: OSR Sci Fi. Read, Played. Has just enough rules to have a character "build" but has small system quirks I found would pop up like unpleasant moles. Good examples are inventory space, or ship design, focus powers. 7/10.
- Swyvers: Read. You play a band of thieves in a pratchett style city of scum. Has an interesting magic system if you live long enough to see it. Hope to run it someday soon.
- Ironsworn: Read, Played. Viking Fantasy hexcrawl/dungeon delver. I don't think the game actually works as intended. 3/10.
- MASKS: Read, Played. Teen Titans PbtA. It's PbtA, you just paid for less than a quarter of a ruleset. Scammed/10.
- Apocalypse World. Read, Played. The origin of a lot of the scamming in this hobby. Scammed/10.
- Blades in the Dark: Read, Played. The only okay PbtA on the entire market. Steampunk style heist game where you play as a gang of dirtbags. 6/10 would be better in a more respectable core ruleset.
- Wildsea: Read, Played. The world is a jungle ocean. Scammed/10
- Pathfinder 2e: See this thread
- D&D 2e, 4e, 5e. Read, Played, Ran. Not for me, they get lumped into the D&D bucket. D&D/10.

Getting Eventually: His Majesty the Worm, Black Hack

Have not read enough to talk about; Earthdawn 4e, Mekton, Cairn, Alien

Do not own but know of and should try: Call of Cthulhu, Dark Heresy, Rogue Trader, Warhammer RPG/Zweihander

 

[LovisXVI]

Do not own but know of and should try: Call of Cthulhu, Dark Heresy, Rogue Trader, Warhammer RPG/Zweihander

I think Black Crusade is more interesting as far as the FFG 40k rpgs go, as it has a more freeform character advancement based on your alignment and compacts, which gives playing a treacherous, self-interested chaos cultist that extra bite.

 

[Tennessee Trash]

Overall maybe I have more comparative system experience than I anticipated. If anyone else is curious I will drop a list of stuff I have read, played or run below. If you see something missing that you like just reply with it.

I will shill for Dragonbane. It's DnD for people that do not like DnD or who value their free time, or just have actual jobs. Also cheap to get into. It's not brain-dead but definitely easy to get into. Very low barrier to entry. You could have a session up and running quickly and have fun.

Also easy to gatekeep because the normies not in our group at the store have no idea what it is

 

[Adamska]

I think Black Crusade is more interesting as far as the FFG 40k rpgs go, as it has a more freeform character advancement based on your alignment and compacts, which gives playing a treacherous, self-interested chaos cultist that extra bite.

It's also a pain in the ass to run for longer than a few sessions compared to its peers because of that backstabbing nature. I was able to do so but that's because it's with my usual gaming group who I've gamed with for years and we cottoned on to the idea of working together... for now. It's not something I'd start with out of the lot personally, though when done well it can become a long running game.

As for sword and board? Eh, I just rock with DnD 3.x/Pathfinder or Warhams Fantasy RPG 2e. Does the job fine and easy to find players. I just don't care to relearn the many homebrew tweaks to B/X that most OSR is to do again.

 

[LovisXVI]

It's also a pain in the ass to run for longer than a few sessions compared to its peers because of that backstabbing nature. I was able to do so but that's because it's with my usual gaming group who I've gamed with for years and we cottoned on to the idea of working together... for now. It's not something I'd start with out of the lot personally, though when done well it can become a long running game.

Well the Infamy/Corruption trackers do make BC campaigns a limited affair, as long as everyone goes into it with the mindset to take none of the betrayal or one-upmanship personally. it works out fine. Obviously with randos, it is much harder.

 

[Lightning's Heraldry]

I will shill for Dragonbane

Yeah that's a new one. d20 roll under skill system with no level ups and classes are only "starting points" seems cool. How does advancement feel and is there options in levelling outside of skills like feats, talents or abilities? Art direction seems very strong though, the production value is definitely there. Wonder why I hadn't heard of it.

Also if I wanted to pick it up what should I be looking to get? Core Ruleset for $50 on amazon or does someone have a better USA based distributor? Any splatbooks that are really good or is the rest of the stuff adventure modules?

 

[Ghostse]

Random question here, but; what are you guys' thoughts on "reskinning" races in DND? Not talking about simply making a race look different (i.e., humans can be whatever ethnicity, tabaxi can be almost any type of feline, etc.), I'm talking about turning races into a completely different monster (turning tabaxi into wolves, which is weirdly popular on Reddit). Not exactly the most sure on it myself; only suggestion that I like was using the official "Halfling = Mousefolk" suggestion in the 2014 DMG.

Anyone here ever had a player ask about this?

SUFFER.
NOT.
THE FURRY.
TO.
LIVE.

Why do I have to repeat this?

Yes I've had players want me bring in species from their magical realms and and they were all terrible players I should have fired at the suggestion instead of later of shitting up a session and/or campaign.

I have seen people do a full Donut Steel reskin on D&D where the D&D races become aliens or stats go over to various human subgroups. I did a 3.5 "There are no dwarves but there are short, sturdy humans that have a base movement speed of 25 but suffer no penalties from encumbrance" reskin campaign once as a sort of fanfic campaign.

That’s one of the great things about ttrpgs; something can go from being a crossbow to a six shooter just because you say so. If existing rules fit lore you want to implement, why reinvent the wheel? I’d be doxing myself if revealed the shit I’ve reskinned but it’s a very effective way of changing the world/tone of a game without touching the rules.

Agreed. I'll work with players I know and trust, especially if its just "we are crossing out 'cross bow' and writing in 'musket' and instead of bolts you need to have a powder horn which we'll treat like a reagent pouch and bullets which we are treating like sling ammo. And of course its gonna be loud and give up a cloud of smoke so instant stealth check fails.

That said mousefolk sounds like gay furry shit and I hate it.

I'm #1 for yiff in hell
I'm going for a solid depends as people wanting to be talking mice are approximately the only people I've encountered who actually want to do something with their character other than gooning (I guess also enhanced lab-gorilla? But that wasn't a game I was in directly). But it wouldn only be in a setting of "all humanoid animals". If they want a mousekin in Greyhawk they play halfling who are pretty much mice anyway or go goon at another table.

And I want to be clear: Mice not Rats.

I guess technically talking cats but then "I'm a cat! Its my duty to be a total sociopath" puts them in back in line to the showers with with the rest of the furries even if they aren't gooning.

If the system doesn't have rules for a race the player wants to play, but you can agree on something that's close enough within the book, just do it. Like saomeone said as long as they aren't trying to use some "DM may I" shit for an advantage later instead of just using the stats and abilities or whatever race was re-skinned, there shouldn't be an issue.

If it's for some weird furry fetish bullshit, then the answer should be no. But if these are regulars at your table, you should be able to judge if this is going to be an issue.

Solid agree here too. If someone has an interesting, non-retarded character idea that works with the setting, I will work with them to accomodate and get them close enough. If they are just going to be a power gamer mistaking kindness for weakness they will be most displeased.

I forgot quote the guy who said no "Well as a Wolf I should..." but yes, the first attempt to power game, they get a warning to not do that. The next attempt to power game, they roll a new character.

I cannot tell people enough times to please start noticing that they're all communists.

No but you see MY table isn't pozzed and we just ignore any pozz lore from the company so its literally impossible any issues will arrive on my doorstep.

 

[Tennessee Trash]

How does advancement feel and is there options in levelling outside of skills like feats, talents or abilities?

There are various ways you can earn 'heroic abilities' throughout the campaign, like defeating a powerful enemy or finding a rare object, or you get one when you max out a skill. These mostly all require Willpower to use, which is based on your ability scores. I like the skill advancement system because you improve what you actually use. So if you make a lot of Myth and Legends rolls, any time you roll a Dragon or a Demon you get to roll to improve that skill at the end of the session. You also earn points to improve whatever you want based on what you accomplished in the session. But you have to roll higher than your current skill level so it is risk to spend those points to try to max out a skill when you could instead improve one you are bad at, which is in interesting dynamic. For example, a point if you overcame an obstacle without fighting, or giving into your weakness, you get 2 rolls you can use to improve whichever skill you want. You can chose to take the risky route and try to max out one that is sitting at 17 or try to improve one of your lower skills which is a 10, which requires only a lower roll. It's pretty simple, but I think effective and enjoyable.

Also if I wanted to pick it up what should I be looking to get? Core Ruleset for $50 on amazon or does someone have a better USA based distributor? Any splatbooks that are really good or is the rest of the stuff adventure modules?

I got my core rule book on Amazon for just $30 USD. I think you can pick up the complete set from their website for about $60 USD, which contains the rulebook, several adventure modules, a map of the main 'Misty Vale' setting, carboard standee figures, and more. It's actually a pretty good deal for all of that I think.
Not sure if there is a cheaper U.S. Distributer. You could also pick up the Bestiary supplemental book as well which has a lot more content.

 

[MazonLabs Recruitment Rep]

I think Black Crusade is more interesting as far as the FFG 40k rpgs go, as it has a more freeform character advancement based on your alignment and compacts, which gives playing a treacherous, self-interested chaos cultist that extra bite.

Only War is my choice. Frame it like a Vietnam or World War 2-sploitation film with the right group and you got an absolute rollicking good time.

 

[Gingervitis]

MASKS: Read, Played. Teen Titans PbtA. It's PbtA, you just paid for less than a quarter of a ruleset. Scammed/10.

I feel like MASKS has the same issue as every other PBTA game. They tend to have really solid ideas to them, like teen superheroes or monster hunters. The issue is that they’re games made by idea guys who couldn’t make a system to save their lives. So instead of hiring someone or learning game design, they take the fat lazy man option and use PbtA the same way they used the d20 system in the 2000s. On top of that, the writers of these systems are all either woke, fetishists, or woke fetishists.

I’d even extend this backhanded compliment of a post to, of all things, Thirsty Sword Lesbians. There are some good ideas in that book. In particular, I like the one setting from the TSL sourcebook, Advanced Lesbians and Lovers, that’s an intergalactic empire where politics are decided by joshi puroresu. If that’s too Magical Realmy for you, you can even just make them men instead. The issue is that it’s made by lazy leftists with a lesbian fetish for a mediocre system not even made for pro wrestling. It just needed someone actually motivated to make something good.

 

[LovisXVI]

Only War is my choice. Frame it like a Vietnam or World War 2-sploitation film with the right group and you got an absolute rollicking good time.

OW is probably the least distinct in gameplay, and I feel like you can meld it with any other of the FFGs without much work. Combine BC and OW together to get a LatD game, where you can combine those elements with comical self-interest and the extra survivability afforded by infamy. Just playing shitters doesn't appeal to me, but going from shitters to moderately influential heretics does.