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

[TheDarknessGrows]

It was the first "deck-building" game

Wow really? Huh.

Played it religiously with my wife

This is also my intent. Glad to hear it is wife-approved.

 

[filthypenguin]

Wow really? Huh.


This is also my intent. Glad to hear it is wife-approved.

It's only going to be wife-approved if you're at similar skill levels. It's pretty much the least random deckbuilder available, so a good player wins every time verses someone who's not as good.

Ascension is also good, and more random, so luck is a bigger factor. Also has combat instead of just points. We played it a lot, then eventually moved to playing it via the app version instead.

Mystic Vale is also good, has a neat gimmick. It's my wife's favorite, but I think it's just because she's so much better at it than I am.

 

[Brain Problems]

A tabletop ccg from 2008.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dominion_%28card_game%29

Dominion sperging below

Spoiler

It's the best deck building game ever made. Every other game that has tried to "fix" Dominion has failed, including some expansions as well. Get the base game and Nocturne and you can theoretically never play the same game twice depending no how you assemble the decks.

You'll notice what Dominion does and very few other games do for some reason is ditch the 'market row' of cards to acquire and instead opts to have every single card you can ever want sit right there in the centre of the table for you to choose from. The decision to eliminate the randomness of what cards arrive and what don't makes the game very strategic and gets rid of that piece of shit feeling of the market row being garbage for you but great for everyone else just via pure shit luck.

The other thing that's brilliant is that to get VPs you have to buy cards that dilute your deck and make getting more VPs objectively more difficult as result. Like @filthypenguin says, it's about timing when to start getting those points versus getting your engine going because the game ends very fast if you're not careful.

HOWEVER it's dry as fuck and can be very very autistic in that you're sitting there face down looking at your own cards doing some mental math and trying to create ungodly combos, and depending on deck composition, having minimal to no interaction with your opponent(s) at all. You also might want to consider sleeving the cards because you're going to be shuffling the shit out of them.

My other favourite is Valley of the Kings. It's got a tiered-market row with novel mechanics that still maintains a sense of control over what you're doing as well as difficult decisions about whether use cards for their buying power or for their abilities. And, similar to Dominion, the only cards you score are the ones you permanently discard or 'entomb' which means you have to think carefully about when you're done using a card for the rest of the game. They're brilliant and if you track down the original releases, small enough to fit into a large pocket even.

 

[ZMOT]

Every other game that has tried to "fix" Dominion has failed

tanto cuore >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> dominion, for the theme alone.

but seriously, dominion bores me to tears. it's fine in the form of aeon's end tho (there was also another co-op game using the same mechanic way back, cba to dig up the name).
I rather play something like https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/391163/forest-shuffle - worth checking out, might work with the wife (and kids) too. the name is weird, probably because the pun from the german title doesn't work in english at all...

Now, the Pathfinder subreddit will jump in at this point and be all, "Oh, you need to intimidate/bon mot/whatever the monsters!" Because there are piles of shitty -1 debuffs in the game that could, in theory, nudge probability away from the standard 50/50 over the course of enough turns. Except to apply them in the first place, you need to beat the monster with a skill check and/or it has to fail a save, neither of which are terribly likely, and a lot of the debuffs only last a round or two, so to enact this cunning plan you'd basically need a dedicated debuffer PC doing nothing aside from constantly inconveniencing a target instead of attacking or spellcasting.

that stuff stacks because of the degrees of success. +/-10 bumps the success up/down, that's why you want to stack the shit out of it. and on that level it's not just -1 anymore either. it works fine. if you really wanna "fix" it just give them runes like martials get for the same effect, although that can make them even stronger than intended having enemies trigger the crit effects more often.
casters can still be strong, they're just not the walking demigods invalidating half the encounter or plot on their turn anymore.

If you're playing pf2 and want to keep using the low level monsters, you could run "proficiency without level." There won't be any prewritten adventures for that, but you don't need it for prewritten adventures because those adventures won't be making the level 10 party fight level 1 goblins.
You could also just not let the players level out of the bounds of the adventure you've written.

or just level up the enemies. the advantage of a rigid system like that is it's easy to math out and automate it (iirc foundry even has a module for it). that won't fix "why is there a level 20 town guard watching the gate instead of running the place?", but it does keep the murderhobos in check.
that's what I like about pf2, but like I always say in the end the system is just a tool, I don't use it for everything. the way it works is a pro for me, not a con.

In other words, if they make it a PF2 splatbook, they might get PF2 players on board, but they lose any reason for people who want a sci-fi game to buy it.

I'd argue for people into that specific kind of gonzo scifi (which doesn't click with everyone) pf2 is a better foundation than 1 for new players, and even then sf1 is still around like 3.pf was when 4e came out. but if people really want to play golarion in space the rules would be secondary anyway.
pozzo also said compatible, not balanced. haven't looked at the latest stuff (or most ttrpg stuff these days) but I'd be surprised if you can just move it between pf2 and sf2 without a hitch, even if the system is the same.

I don't think there was any third party stuff for Starfinder, and very little for PF2 outside of shovelware (or whatever the TTRPG term for that is). Maybe I'm not looking in the right place.

starfinder is way smaller, pf2 has some stuff up on infinite, but since pf2 works better ootb that 5e, there's lot less space to sell your own "fixes". "content" like adventures you'll make more money making it 5e compatible first.

After the first book, it goes off the rails a bit and expects very specific actions on the PCs part. A PF2 adventure path I wanted to run had a similar problem.

that's the problem any prewritten stuff has unless it's purposely written as a toolbox to use however you see fit. that saves some time, but you'd still need to invest more prep than "open book, plot happens". it's simply not feasible to have any possible permutation or antics laid out beforehand, especially not if you're trying to sell it as a physical book each month (that being said some plots are really dumb/shitty paced).
that's why I only run stuff like that for people I know can understand they're supposed to play along a story. imagine you base an adventure on little red riding hood, and the resident druid furry rather wants to marry the wolf - no one is gonna have a good time in that case.

 

[robobobo]

Bounded accuracy is an inherent weakness to d20 and similar systems with levels. A designer sits down and thinks, "Okay, well when a party levels up they need a challenge, so I'll just make these bigger, tougher monsters. Problem solved!" Except in practice that dooms players to monotony, because they go from fighting a couple orcs and getting roughed up to fighting some gnolls and getting roughed up to fighting a lich and getting roughed up. The flow of a fight never appreciably changes, because the math has been chained up in a gimp suit in the corner. You have 10% more HP? They hit 10% harder. Your attack bonus goes up? Their armor goes up. You get a better spell? They get better saves.

Compare with Shadowrun, for example. You make a character better with guns, buy a nicer gun, get some cyber, now you have four more dice to roll and do better base damage. You're flatly better at what you're doing. Is the gang down in the slums now less of a challenge to you? Sure is. But the corporate hit squad rolling down the street at you with assault cannons, heavy drones, and a couple mages is never going to be something you can just sneer at. It's expected that the players will opt for higher-challenge targets to make more cash as they progress, but the world does not realign on its own to suddenly keep up with their every move.

 

[LovisXVI]

Compare with Shadowrun, for example. You make a character better with guns, buy a nicer gun, get some cyber, now you have four more dice to roll and do better base damage. You're flatly better at what you're doing. Is the gang down in the slums now less of a challenge to you? Sure is. But the corporate hit squad rolling down the street at you with assault cannons, heavy drones, and a couple mages is never going to be something you can just sneer at. It's expected that the players will opt for higher-challenge targets to make more cash as they progress, but the world does not realign on its own to suddenly keep up with their every move.

Most importantly, there is no point where the street gang become totally impotent either. Your condition boxes are unlikely to significantly increase even by dumping karma into body or will and you can give them tools to make them more threatening, have them pack stronger weapons, use automatic fire more to make it harder to dodge, buff up the numbers. There will never be a point where they lose all capability to be a threat to the players since there will never be a point where their defence rolls will be beyond someone with a machine gun.

Further, players won't always be packing the best stuff anyway. Yeah sure if you are assaulting a secret base in the middle of the ocean, you are going to be wearing your full armour suit and packing a light machinegun with 300 rounds of APDS loaded and a gyro-mount, but most of the time when you are just walking around, a heavy pistol is the strongest thing you are going to be packing 9/10.

 

[filthypenguin]

Bounded accuracy is an inherent weakness to d20 and similar systems with levels. A designer sits down and thinks, "Okay, well when a party levels up they need a challenge, so I'll just make these bigger, tougher monsters. Problem solved!" Except in practice that dooms players to monotony, because they go from fighting a couple orcs and getting roughed up to fighting some gnolls and getting roughed up to fighting a lich and getting roughed up. The flow of a fight never appreciably changes, because the math has been chained up in a gimp suit in the corner. You have 10% more HP? They hit 10% harder. Your attack bonus goes up? Their armor goes up. You get a better spell? They get better saves.

Compare with Shadowrun, for example. You make a character better with guns, buy a nicer gun, get some cyber, now you have four more dice to roll and do better base damage. You're flatly better at what you're doing. Is the gang down in the slums now less of a challenge to you? Sure is. But the corporate hit squad rolling down the street at you with assault cannons, heavy drones, and a couple mages is never going to be something you can just sneer at. It's expected that the players will opt for higher-challenge targets to make more cash as they progress, but the world does not realign on its own to suddenly keep up with their every move.

I don't see how this is different. I've not played shadow run, but how is the corporate hit squad different from the lich? How is the gang in the slums different from the goblins?

 

[Corn Flakes]

I don't see how this is different. I've not played shadow run, but how is the corporate hit squad different from the lich? How is the gang in the slums different from the goblins?

A lucky shot (and unlucky dodge/soak) can wound or drop even a well-equipped runner pretty much instantly, whether it's coming from the corpo goon or the ganger with a heavy pistol. It's just the goon gets to take a lot more shots (full auto is lots of fun) and has better aim. Meanwhile, in D&D or Pathfinder, that goblin has to hack away at a level 10+ character for five minutes before it can whittle their HP down to 0, even with critical hits.

 

[robobobo]

I don't see how this is different. I've not played shadow run, but how is the corporate hit squad different from the lich? How is the gang in the slums different from the goblins?

Others already chimed in here, but like they mentioned, it's basically impossible for some goblins to drop a mid to high level character. They flatly cannot saw their way through the HP pool of the PCs even with the best possible rolls, while the PCs hit on anything better than a 1 and possibly one-shot the goblins. In some cases this is desirable, like minions in 4e that are designed to die on any hit; you may want a cinematic feel where the PCs are cutting through a horde of disposable nobodies, but in other instances it's simply pointless to fight something above or below your level because you either cannot possibly win or cannot possibly lose.

Could a street-level Shadowrun team beat a locked and loaded group of military pros? Probably not, much like a bunch of randos today wouldn't do well against professional killers. But it's not utterly inconceivable like you get in games with levels and always-rising ablative HP pools. And a team sauntering into some gang's territory couldn't just T-pose their way to victory; there's always a chance of a bullet going somewhere unfortunate.

 

[Ghostse]

B/X has this problem pretty well solved as well. 1HD goblins are still a threat to the unwary but are likely to be murked en-masse by anyone of decent level and ability. And sort of like the street toughs, its more likely the Goblins opt not to engage the PCs unless they can get some sort of advantage. And sort of like the military stomp-squad, low level PCs are unlikely to be worth the time of the higher-level mobs; even if they find themselves the subject unwanted attention if they're smart they can probably some combination of talk, bribe, or bluff their way out.

Bounded Accuracy is good for building scalable encounters, especially with players who like to solve things with dice (which usually means their imaginary fists). Its generally not very good for players who try to exit the sandbox, or an open world where the threats are truly varied.

My usual issue with bounded accuracy isn't bounded accuracy but how its implemented and to less extent the degree; I think its complete bullshit that the world levels up around the players just because; the players come back from a year of harrowing adventure to find the town guard has also gained 10 levels in their absence due to fuck you that's how.
But if after fucking up several of his lairs the local lich has decided that the party is now enough of a threat that they need to beef up their undead, or the local Orc warlord has decided to stop hoarding the loot and pass out the sharper pointy sticks/get them blessed by his shaman because his raiders are getting wrecked by a bunch of assholes, that's fine and makes sense.
And you can adjust this with modifiers, but then you run into the usual PF1e muchkin problem of players spending all session chaining up 800 different modifiers.

The issue with 4e's (and 5e, and maybe PF2e though I haven't run number there) bounded accuracy when you step outside of everyone being of the same level often isn't the AC, it is the massive tank of HP that sits behind that AC so you have to not just hit, but hit again and again.

 

[East_Clintwood]

A lucky shot (and unlucky dodge/soak) can wound or drop even a well-equipped runner pretty much instantly, whether it's coming from the corpo goon or the ganger with a heavy pistol

Funnily enough I almost lost a character over the weekend this exact way. Made it all the way through a run against a local AA corp with no issues, almost died while buying a burger at the local Stuffer Shack after some gangbangers he'd embarrassed recently were cruising past, saw him, and decided to take a couple of potshots.

 

[EleventySeven]

Possible to play without writing anything down? No my friend, your are not thinking correctly.
You make it MANDATORY to play without writing anything down.
Friend computer believes anyone touching grass a pen is at best a communist, but most likely a mutant communist traitor, and must be dealt with accordingly.

However be sure to give them character sheets and pens, and don't inform them that touching a writing implement instantly IDs them as communist mutant traitors.

Is Paranoia the world where Francis E Dec was right? Or is it the world where he won and made a new computer god that wasn't a communist but was Polish?

Also, as the Rogue Trade in @Alabama Gamer 's rogue trader game, I can, with a heavy heart, say that Operation Eldar Sex is off to a poor start and we have likely made enemies of the local system's elves, especially because they are pirates and my RT fucking hates pirates.

 

[TheDarknessGrows]

You also might want to consider sleeving the cards because you're going to be shuffling the shit out of them.

Cards that come into my house get the royal treatment. They live very well, double-sleeved in perfect fits and promats.

You had mentioned expansions. Should I just ignore most of them if I enjoy the game and stick with what you suggested? Also what's up with the promo cards? Can you still get the whole set if you wanted?

Any of you guys like Android: Netrunner? Found my old boxes and started playing again.

 

[Alabama Gamer]

Is Paranoia the world where Francis E Dec was right? Or is it the world where he won and made a new computer god that wasn't a communist but was Polish?

Also, as the Rogue Trade in @Alabama Gamer 's rogue trader game, I can, with a heavy heart, say that Operation Eldar Sex is off to a poor start and we have likely made enemies of the local system's elves, especially because they are pirates and my RT fucking hates pirates.

There's other space elves out there. You might even meet the kind who have drawn a connection between the fact they let their kids go off and play pirates for a few decades and the fact that the Imperium accuses them of piracy.

 

[Judge Dredd]

By cannibalize, I mean woo players from one system to another, but the systems they are targeting are already their customers.
If you can turn a 5e player to your system, that's a new customer & player base. If you just get them to go from one version of your product to another, your customer base isn't expanding. And that's the only people I've talked to who have been excited for PF2e which are Pozzo/PF1e fanboys.

Ah, then I agree.

Their plan is to pull in people from PF2 and leech off that games success. It might work if the PF2 fanbase is strong enough, but they're risking alienating SF fans to appeal to wider PF2/Paizo fans.

A tabletop ccg from 2008.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dominion_%28card_game%29

I like it. Though I somewhat disagree with people here as the knock offs can be great, better than the original. Since it's been brought up, I might as well mention the lack of player interaction is cited as a big flaw. Another, less talked about flaw is the claim that some players have solved the game. Basically a strat involving buying silver and dutchies is considered OP.

I can recommend the clones however. Machi Koro is a favourite of mine. 1 or 2, both are great in their own ways. Not really a deck builder, but close enough and a lot of fun. You're not building a deck, but a city. The same general idea applies.

If you're into "Ameri-trash" as my local scene used to call it. I can recommend Legendary: Aliens. I like it, though you might have to house rule face huggers a bit, and don't be shy about adding trash mobs to the deck.

Finally, if you can find it, Firefly. It's sort of a deck builder, and has the same complaint that the base game lacks player interaction. The gist is you're flying around doing jobs. Buying cards with key words on to round out your crew. One rule in the game is "lawful" and "moral" as separate keywords, which confuses normies.


Avoid the Resident Evil deck builder. It's shit. I liked the idea of Race for the Galaxy, but I'm the only person I know that understands it, so don't bother with that one.

All ttrpgs are going to have a treadmill of some kind if there's a level system.

You know what actually is fun? Being able to give a larger, threatening enemy some minions that die in 1-2 hits but are not utterly, completely useless. Being able to use a high-level monster as a boss which the players can actually hit instead of relying on some kind deus ex machina.

Compare with Shadowrun,

it is the massive tank of HP that sits behind that AC so you have to not just hit, but hit again and again.

...Savage Worlds...

 

[Henri Barbusse]

Operation Eldar Sex is off to a poor start and we have likely made enemies of the local system's elves, especially because they are pirates and my RT fucking hates pirates.

Operation Eldar Sex is off to a poor start, but operation Eldar Sex Slave Trafficking is proceeding great.

 

[TheDarknessGrows]

Since it's been brought up, I might as well mention the lack of player interaction is cited as a big flaw. Another, less talked about flaw is the claim that some players have solved the game. Basically a strat involving buying silver and dutchies is considered OP.

This is a good thing to highlight. My friends that are "no fun" (the types that will literally play the same strategy every time even if that strategy is just them buying a bunch of shit at the store nobody else can afford and pretending that makes them "good") are kept separate from my "fun" friends that just play or are willing and enjoy trying new things for the fun of it.

Even then, most of my "no fun" friends are tolerable. Though one guy I don't even talk to anymore because he doesn't have fun unless he's putting other people into a position where they are clearly bored and not having fun. Those guys are the worst. It's a card game with plastic bits and a female repulsion field. Chill out.

One time I wanted to test out a new game and try several decks out. Bought it and set it up. He went online and bought his own cards before we started learning the game and assembled a competition deck to play against the tutorial decks. We go to play and he says he'll use that. Obviously I never even came close to winning when we had gotten the mechanics down; and while he's camping on his deck, I am trying to play all the tutorial decks to learn the cards and strategies. I looked up how to potentially beat his deck but I would have had to spend a lot of money on expansions and promos and at that point I wasn't even sure I liked the game. Ultimately he refused to try any of the tutorial decks against each other because "this one is great I don't need anything else!" And even when I asked him to do it so I could learn, he said no.

Those sorts of players ruin games and communities. Oh and when there is a game in which they can't acquire OP decks and cards easily like a LCG or a board game, suddenly these people find the game boring or bad and won't play.

Gee. Wow.

 

[Ghostse]

Since it's been brought up, I might as well mention the lack of player interaction is cited as a big flaw. Another, less talked about flaw is the claim that some players have solved the game. Basically a strat involving buying silver and dutchies is considered OP.

Yeah, the sperg crowd is really bad with the game. And because there is limited ways to interact with other players, effectively just limited to if a deck get bought out, when you have players with austistically tuned internet aided strategies its back down to just a RNG race.

One time I wanted to test out a new game and try several decks out. Bought it and set it up. He went online and bought his own cards before we started learning the game and assembled a competition deck to play against the tutorial decks. We go to play and he says he'll use that. Obviously I never even came close to winning when we had gotten the mechanics down; and while he's camping on his deck, I am trying to play all the tutorial decks to learn the cards and strategies. I lookes up how to beat his deck but I would have had to spend a lot of money on expansions and promos and at that point I wasn't even sure I liked the game. Ultimately he refused to try any of the tutorial decks against each other because "this one is great I don't need anything else!" And even when I asked him to do it so I could learn, he said no.

My gaming friend group I did dominion with would just set up random internet deck combos - though often the internet was up its own fucking ass and they were terrible.

Mainly we just didn't play it a bunch because it was a lot of work to set up/tear down and as discussed it was a lot of being in your own head and not interacting with people all that much.

Also god fucking damn, I would have just stopped inviting the guy to game night after an incident like that.

...Savage Worlds...

Sorry bro I'm not gay.

 

[Judge Dredd]

It's a card game with plastic bits and a female repulsion field. Chill out.

I don't know if it's real, but on Tabletop Simulator there's a MLP version of Dominion. Same game, just the art is different.

And because there is limited ways to interact with other players, effectively just buying out a deck, when you have players with austistically tuned internet aided strategies its back down to just a RNG race.

This is another benefit of the clones. There isn't nearly the autistic fanbase to have solved the game beforehand.

There was a clone I vaguely remember playing a lot. I forget what it was, but it was Dominion with some attack rules tacked on. Whatever it was, I liked it because it was Dominion, with juuuuust enough changed that people who had "solved" it couldn't just look up strats on the internet.

One deck builder I thought I mentioned, but I guess I didn't. Automobiles. I liked this a lot, even though no one else does. It's coloured cubes instead of cards, but the game is basically the same since the cubes represent cards in the shop everyone can see. You play cubes to make the car go, and you try to win the race.

 

[Brain Problems]

Not trying to hijack the thread with board game stuff but this feels as appropriate a spot as any so...

There's this site: https://dominion.games/ and you can play base game for free against a bot to get a feel for the game. It's quite a nice implementation. I think there's a Steam version as well but the expansions start to grind on you via nickle-and-diming but wait for sales? I don't know.

Cards that come into my house get the royal treatment. They live very well, double-sleeved in perfect fits and promats.

You had mentioned expansions. Should I just ignore most of them if I enjoy the game and stick with what you suggested? Also what's up with the promo cards? Can you still get the whole set if you wanted?

Any of you guys like Android: Netrunner? Found my old boxes and started playing again.

You can safely ignore most of them but Nocturne is quite good and between it and base game you've got a shitload of content that I'd be worried if you're getting bored of already. Do your research on which ones are better or not if you start to crave more and more. Don't worry about promos in general, they're typically one offs for conventions or magazines or whatever that you can usually acquire via the boardgamegeek store at a later date (again, wait for sales unless you don't mind the current prices).

Is Netrunner even around anymore? For some reason I thought FFG/Asmodee/Embracer killed that IP.

I like it. Though I somewhat disagree with people here as the knock offs can be great, better than the original. Since it's been brought up, I might as well mention the lack of player interaction is cited as a big flaw. Another, less talked about flaw is the claim that some players have solved the game. Basically a strat involving buying silver and dutchies is considered OP.

I can recommend the clones however. Machi Koro is a favourite of mine. 1 or 2, both are great in their own ways. Not really a deck builder, but close enough and a lot of fun. You're not building a deck, but a city. The same general idea applies.

If you're into "Ameri-trash" as my local scene used to call it. I can recommend Legendary: Aliens. I like it, though you might have to house rule face huggers a bit, and don't be shy about adding trash mobs to the deck.

Finally, if you can find it, Firefly. It's sort of a deck builder, and has the same complaint that the base game lacks player interaction. The gist is you're flying around doing jobs. Buying cards with key words on to round out your crew. One rule in the game is "lawful" and "moral" as separate keywords, which confuses normies.


Avoid the Resident Evil deck builder. It's shit. I liked the idea of Race for the Galaxy, but I'm the only person I know that understands it, so don't bother with that one.

I've played a shitload of deckbuilders so I'm a bit biased when it comes to this sub-sub-genre but when it comes to sheer technical mechanics Dominion is the best. Yes, it's dry. Yes, it's got minimal interaction. Yes, it's autistic. What you're describing is the "big Money" strategy and that's the general baseline for if what you're doing is working or not. If you do something and your opponent big monies you, your strat sucks because if you know what you're doing you should be making way more cash and actions than someone just slowly buying more and more silvers and golds.

Dune Imperium isn't half-bad minus my issues with the market row. The first expansion is necessary because the base game is too rote. The deck building aspect isn't as important as other more "pure" versions out there but the game makes up for it by combining it with a pretty good worker placement/action selection system and area control. I know a lot of people that adore this game.

I've heard good things about Legendary actually but never played it.

Race for the Galaxy/Roll for the Galaxy are tremendous games. You can play these online quite easily (the digital version of Race is great and Roll is on Board Game Arena).

Machi Koro is cute but hyper annoying since you're relying on dice rolls and there's a ton of "take that" stuff that just feels off. I think someone said the Bright Lights Big City is the best version of it for whatever reason. I think my kids will love it when they're old enough.