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

[The Rockafire Explosion]

The best story I ever heard about LARP was where they tried to interact with one of the other tabletop gaming groups.

Unfortunately, it was a Battletech group, and they weren't having ANY of their shit.

I played SOLAR a bit in the early 00's, they were a split between nerdy rednecks who wanted to use boffers instead of going hunting, and goths who hated living in the Bible Belt and went super duper hard on being "Raven Moonshadow Blackleaf the Super Special." It was definitely an odd mix, and I'm vaguely curious to see how that group has evolved in the current year of our wokeness considering the region.

However, the only real funny story I have about LARPing I told in the WoD thread, but I'll repeat here. When I was in high school I'd only really played D&D, Shadowrun, and a smattering of Palladium systems, so when I was first introduced to a con with the Vampire crowd having a weekend long LARP on the grounds I naturally thought it was gay as all hell; roleplaying is one thing, but being a "spoooooky" vampire who has to use sign language to kill someone or use your powers just seemed lame to me at 14 and still does. However, when my buddy and I discovered that the symbol for going invisible involved crossing your arms over your chest, ohhh boy. We made it a point to find any of them doing that that we could and body check them, then say "oops! Didn't see you there!" It got to the point that one of them, who we must have bumped into about half a dozen times, finally flipped his shit on us, shouting "if you know about the Masquerade you shouldn't be breaking the Masquerade! Respect the Masquerade!" I'll give him props for staying in character but he also was wearing mascara so fuck him. Every White Wolf game that's any good is really just dark supernatural superheroes with a side order of politics, and I'll take no arguments otherwise.

So, not to change the subject but a couple of buddies and me want to do Shadowrun. I liked 5th well enough, should I just use those or is 6th Edition the way to go? Keep in mind about half the group is going to be new.

Like @Jet Fuel Johnny said, 2e/3e or bust. It's a bit simpler than the newer editions, the Matrix rules are still a fucker (but that's true for every edition), but magic hasn't been nerfed, combat doesn't take forever with all the extra rolls and you just have to decide what initiative system you prefer.

 

[Brain Problems]

What is funny is that Satyr's are often portrayed as rapists of women and nymphs' in Greek mythology which I think is a great metaphor for what Wizards is doing to D&D.

There's a reason that hypersexuality in males is called satyriasis. Like you say, anyone with a slightly deeper understanding of myths should know that these were some debauched hombres that frequently got into trouble and were bad news and got along so well with Dionysus, his violent, drunken, sex-crazed followers and the bacchanals.

 

[Mr. Manchester]

It gets worse for DnD 5e.
View attachment 2864095
Why play a game where I fight evil dragons and demon worshiping cultists when I can role play as a wage slave at a dead end job. "But its so quirky!" People can fuck off right there with that.

There's a part of Gehenna I used that was just a bland lifeless office processing things for no reason. It was a one off gag on the way to fighting evil dragons and demon worshiping cultists but I'm sure this would fit right in. Thanks Wizards, very helpful.

 

[PaladinBoo]

I have a feeling that this was a way for WotC to pander to the Far East given that the slice of life genre is very popular over there, especially with women. Problem that these Western companies don't seem to understand is that Far East Asians don't like Western entertainment. They mostly like stuff that was made by their own countrymen because Western companies like Disney and WotC don't really understand the cultural difference between East and West. They think they can insert all the crap they do for Western audiences and also do it for the Eastern but it just doesn't work. Also, the Far Easterns that do like things like D&D like it because of the adventure, gameplay and big titty elves. They don't want the slice of life crap just as much as their Western counterparts.

 

[Adamska]

I have a feeling that this was a way for WotC to pander to the Far East given that the splice of life genre is very popular over there, especially with women. Problem that these Western companies don't seem to understand is that Far East Asians don't like Western entertainment. They mostly like stuff that was made by their own countrymen because Western companies like Disney and WotC don't really understand the cultural difference between East and West. They think they can insert all the crap they do for Western audiences and also do it for the Eastern but it just doesn't work. Also, the Far Easterns that do like things like D&D like it because of the adventure, gameplay and big titty elves. They don't want the splice of life crap just as much as their Western counterparts.

Also China has no experience really with Pen and Paper as far as I can tell, and even then Winnie's closing down western venues anyway so. And Japan has entirely different games for it too and likely the pool is stupidly small. It's kind of why the Dark Eye did a decent job at cucking DnD for a good while in Europe; the scene has a game already or it just plain isn't interested in that game.

I think though it's more that the purse puppies they hire and fire are incompetent drooling idiots who don't read or care about anything but slice of life bullshit. They wouldn't know crunch or plotting if the Captain fired full broadside at them, and designing modules are hard, so just make up bullshit.

 

[Mr. Manchester]

I have a feeling that this was a way for WotC to pander to the Far East given that the splice of life genre is very popular over there, especially with women. Problem that these Western companies don't seem to understand is that Far East Asians don't like Western entertainment. They mostly like stuff that was made by their own countrymen because Western companies like Disney and WotC don't really understand the cultural difference between East and West. They think they can insert all the crap they do for Western audiences and also do it for the Eastern but it just doesn't work. Also, the Far Easterns that do like things like D&D like it because of the adventure, gameplay and big titty elves. They don't want the splice of life crap just as much as their Western counterparts.

It also feels like its a push for market diversification. The goal for the Dungeons and Dragons brand has been to increase their consumer base for a long time. It's possible that this is a push to appeal toward the Far East, but I think it's more likely that it's there to get women to play. Keep in mind all this PC nonsense is just a another marketing strategy to get people to pay for things, underneath they know how shit works.

I think the way they hope it plays out is that you have a couple, the guy plays D&D and the girl doesn't. The guy wants to get his girlfriend into his hobby because he's an idiot, or the girl wants to get into his hobby but thinks fighting monsters is kind of boring. Either way here we have a nice middle ground. Guy gamer can see this dumb coffee shop adventure and tell the girlfriend about it, or the girlfriend sees the listing when they go to a convention or some shit. Either way the hope is that the girl plays and has fun with roleplaying and gets really into it.

Should this plan work all of a sudden you have a brand new customer base, a way better one than the one you have now. I don't like to spend fucking money, I don't like to run published adventures, and I don't like to pay for services. I'm an awful customer and I think a lot of men are. Women on the other hand love spending money and are likely new to the hobby, so Strixhaven is a perfect little setting to go to when starting out. D&D beyond is great for new players too and it's a nominal fee that can become zombie income should your new woman gamer becomes bored with the hobby.

Long story short, Wizards doesn't care about fags and troons playing, if they're into fantasy they're already playing. They want women to play and give them money. Simple as.

 

[Fialovy]

Why play a game where I fight evil dragons and demon worshiping cultists when I can role play as a wage slave at a dead end job. "But its so quirky!" People can fuck off right there with that.

I will be honest, if I was somewhere between the ages of 8-12, I would like a game where you could pretend you are in a high school or something since that is usually the age where girls tend to glorify high school and stuff. Here is the thing, though, this isn't made for 8-12 year old girls, this is made for people past high school age who have peaked since then or are bitter about their bad experiences and won't let go of them. Also, here is the the biggest problem of all...

It's not D&D

That is also a problem with that scenario working at essentially Starbucks, I could see a fun humorous game about working somewhere like a grocery store or some other business where you are all coworkers taking on different role working and having fun with it with friends, but D&D is not the system to play it with. Games like that require their own system that is better suited for non-combat scenarios.

Of course, definitely the reason why they are still using the D&D brand rather than making something else entirely is because most normie consoomers think all ttrpgs are D&D and they wouldn't buy it if it is something else.

 

[Adamska]

Yeah, I finally found the perfect medium for PbtA games; slice of life games or stuff in the vein of Everyone is John. It works a lot better in that medium than using the d20 system.

I could see Wizards trying to slurp the teat of the Kickstarter funded trash, but the problem is they're expecting these idiots to pay for it. Jokes on Wizards; they only ever do that if it's on Kickstarter since they often invest on each other's scams IMO.

 

[Pentex]

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[PaladinBoo]

It also feels like its a push for market diversification. The goal for the Dungeons and Dragons brand has been to increase their consumer base for a long time. It's possible that this is a push to appeal toward the Far East, but I think it's more likely that it's there to get women to play. Keep in mind all this PC nonsense is just a another marketing strategy to get people to pay for things, underneath they know how shit works.

I think the way they hope it plays out is that you have a couple, the guy plays D&D and the girl doesn't. The guy wants to get his girlfriend into his hobby because he's an idiot, or the girl wants to get into his hobby but thinks fighting monsters is kind of boring. Either way here we have a nice middle ground. Guy gamer can see this dumb coffee shop adventure and tell the girlfriend about it, or the girlfriend sees the listing when they go to a convention or some shit. Either way the hope is that the girl plays and has fun with roleplaying and gets really into it.

Should this plan work all of a sudden you have a brand new customer base, a way better one than the one you have now. I don't like to spend fucking money, I don't like to run published adventures, and I don't like to pay for services. I'm an awful customer and I think a lot of men are. Women on the other hand love spending money and are likely new to the hobby, so Strixhaven is a perfect little setting to go to when starting out. D&D beyond is great for new players too and it's a nominal fee that can become zombie income should your new woman gamer becomes bored with the hobby.

Long story short, Wizards doesn't care about fags and troons playing, if they're into fantasy they're already playing. They want women to play and give them money. Simple as.

I was thinking about that as I was taking chickens out of my works deli oven. I recall Gygax himself talking about how he tried to get his daughter and her friends into D&D but they didn't like it. When he asked them what they liked and didn't like they told him that they liked the role playing and social aspects of the game but didn't like the gameplay or fighting monsters. You see that a lot with women in regards to video games as well. Most women don't like violence or monsters. A lot of them like slice of life stuff mixed with some quirkiness like The Sims. There is nothing wrong with that. Problem is that companies like WotC and others are trying to cater to this market with their products. They think; "Oh! We'll just add coffee shops, bake offs, schools and romances into the game and girls will eat it up!" (Funnily enough D&D did try to pander to a female audience in the past by making romance adventures set in their worlds. They didn't sell too well but are collector items now.)
Problem is that these brands like D&D have been around for over 40 years and there is a general conception with these brands and that is that they are mostly geared to boys and have a bunch of stuff that puts off most girls like violence and monsters. No matter how hard they try, WotC can not shake those beliefs off the public towards their brands. No amount of cook books, slice of life adventures or pepper shakers can change that.

 

[SheerHeartAttack]

Maybe WotC should try and make a separate roll playing game for a female audience or something like that. But then again, they wouldn't have the brand recognition and would probably fuck it up with their current team. It'd probably also explode the heads of twitter users with the fact that there can be systems other than DnD.

 

[Wormy]

It gets worse for D&D 5e.
View attachment 2864095
Why play a game where I fight evil dragons and demon worshiping cultists when I can role play as a wage slave at a dead end job. "But its so quirky!" People can fuck off right there with that.

I remember in an old issue of Murphy's Rules there being a one panel comic joke about this becoming a thing.

A JOKE.

It'd probably also explode the heads of twitter users with the fact that there can be systems other than DnD.

And spoil the fun of doing that myself.

Women don't like violence or monsters. A lot of them like splice of life stuff mixed with some quirkiness like The Sims. There is nothing wrong with that. Problem is that companies like WotC and others are trying to cater to this market with their products.

I can't recall the names right off, especially since they were originally Japanese and then translated, but there are in fact RPG's that do this exact premise, and from what I understand, do it quite well. Far better than trying to square peg D&D to try doing it.

 

[Godzilla1984]

Maybe WotC should try and make a separate roll playing game for a female audience or something like that. But then again, they wouldn't have the brand recognition and would probably fuck it up with their current team. It'd probably also explode the heads of twitter users with the fact that there can be systems other than DnD.

WotC's marketing is garbage.
Someone from Hasbro proper should come in and slap them upside the head.
Make a village/SIMS-tier module with a focus on the role-playing and not a dungeon crawl.
Play up the social gathering get-together-ness of it to high heavens.
Print money.

 

[BScCollateral]

Why play a game where I fight evil dragons and demon worshiping cultists when I can role play as a wage slave at a dead end job. "But its so quirky!" People can fuck off right there with that.

As I commented before in another thread, when I play a game I want to command a squad of marines fighting aliens, or run a space program. I cannot imaging wanting to play a retail employee, and I suspect anyone who would want to try is an unemployable charity case.
I'll admit, though, that in my retail days I only fought one or two monsters.

 

[Adamska]

As I commented before in another thread, when I play a game I want to command a squad of marines fighting aliens, or run a space program. I cannot imaging wanting to play a retail employee, and I suspect anyone who would want to try is an unemployable charity case.
I'll admit, though, that in my retail days I only fought one or two monsters.

Oh no, I ran a wacky game like that; this bad book called Doikayt: A Jewish RPG has a game where you work at a Jewish Deli (the game proper is called Lunch Rush). It actually was quite fun but that's mainly because they go very madcap in how you run it.

Some actual example scenarios in the book include having a demon portal in the basement; customers declaring a fight to the death against you over ancestral vows, consulting ghosts to solve problems in the deli, having controlled panic attacks, finding out you actually don't exist except as a play character, and last but not least staging the Proletariat Revolution there and getting cucked by Neolibs who just want some babkas.

It had strong crazy energy and it is how those kind of games actually succeed. It's also the only PbtA game I've seen so far that validates the system due to how "Everyone is John" it felt running it.

It's to the point I'm tempted to actually make a PbtA booklet at some point due to that and an idea I had for it.

 

[PaladinBoo]

Well now, isn't this interesting.


Could the D&D fad with normies be coming to an end? The reason that D&D got as big as it did was because of a perfect storm. You had Hollywood using D&D in hit shows like Stranger Things, you had COVID which caused a lot of people to stay inside and find other ways to interact with people, you had Critical Role which people watched to also pass the time as they were stuck at home due to COVID. Now though it looks like things are starting to hit a decline. I can't fathom why. It couldn't be because of the bonehead decisions that WotC is making and many of these new players now checking out other TTRPG's, especially OSR.

 

[Ghostse]

It gets worse for D&D 5e.
View attachment 2864095
Why play a game where I fight evil dragons and demon worshiping cultists when I can role play as a wage slave at a dead end job. "But its so quirky!" People can fuck off right there with that.

Jesus christ what the fuck did I just read.
Non-combat isn't bad (though its usually poorly implemented) but non-exploration? Jesus fucking christ.
Also, if you're doing Slice-of-life, why the fuck is it boring-ass barista shit?

Maybe WotC should try and make a separate roll playing game for a female audience or something like that. But then again, they wouldn't have the brand recognition and would probably fuck it up with their current team. It'd probably also explode the heads of twitter users with the fact that there can be systems other than DnD.

The real issue is that they might realize there are systems other than D&D made by companies that aren't them. They have market domination to the point "Playing D&D" is pretty much synonymous with TTRPG. They aren't going to erode their own pedastal like that despite

There's a part of Gehenna I used that was just a bland lifeless office processing things for no reason. It was a one off gag on the way to fighting evil dragons and demon worshiping cultists but I'm sure this would fit right in. Thanks Wizards, very helpful.

That's how I usually run my version of the ShadowFell.
The Shadowfell is where your soul enters into the Bureaucratic hell of the afterlife. This is why you do your deeds great and terrible in service of the gods: If you're devout enough Pelor will intercede in the bureaucratic process and take your soul to his realm. If you were a Pelormas/Solistace only Pelor worshipper, you're going to be navigating the the afterlife DMV for a few centuries.

 

[Andthensomeguy]

It gets worse for D&D 5e.
View attachment 2864095
Why play a game where I fight evil dragons and demon worshiping cultists when I can role play as a wage slave at a dead end job. "But its so quirky!" People can fuck off right there with that.

That adventure just sounds like a bunch of skill checks occasionally broken up by RP, which isn't bad on paper when my character is, you know, exploring a lost tomb or trying to rally scared townsfolk into fighting back against a horde of monsters coming to wipe them out.

But running a cafe'? That sounds dull as Hell, unless it's a sort of satire and they dial up certain aspects of customer service upto 11, like let people blast karens in the face with Magic Missile because I added 1/2 of whip cream too much to their drink, or sneaking into a competitor's shop to pour dragon piss into a batch of their coffee. That wouldn't be too bad.

 

[Fictional Character]

Also China has no experience really with Pen and Paper as far as I can tell, and even then Winnie's closing down western venues anyway so. And Japan has entirely different games for it too and likely the pool is stupidly small. It's kind of why the Dark Eye did a decent job at cucking DnD for a good while in Europe; the scene has a game already or it just plain isn't interested in that game.

This is purely anecdotal, but an overwhelming majority the listings for online TTRPG games in Japan I see are for local systems or Call of Cthulhu. (And CoC is big enough in Japan there's several Japan-only sourcebooks. (And they're pretty good.)) There's actually a large TTRPG scene in Japan, but it's completely different since the work culture makes stable long-term groups an exception, so it's geared towards one-shot play. It can be seen in a lot of Japanese TTRPGs where the progression mechanics are rudimentary and usually fall completely apart if you play more than three sessions.

 

[Adamska]

In other news, I went solo to finish Testament.

If you want to have fun analyzing how to murder Moses or Elijah or David, this back half has them statted out. It also has the fucking Behemoth and some of the stronger divine entities I've seen.

Good book if you need fluff or details on Bronze/Iron Age societies and if you want a new take on Alignment that isn't woke bullshit. Just ignore the pregnancy fetish.