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

[AnOminous]

Oh, and female scientists and LEOs existed, they were just rare and really, really good at their jobs. It wasn't until Hoover became head of the FBI and booted the woman agents in 1923 (causing all LEO agencies, even local PDs) to follow suit was it considered "men only."

Hoover mainly did that because he was a misogynistic homosexual. He'd have probably outright trooned out if he lived in current year.

That's not to say games using either this one or PbtA can't be good; I recently found a good PbtA game in the form of RVMA which does a fine job with the dogshit system it chose to use. It's just I'd probably just suggest say... Call of Cthulhu over Blades, since I feel it nails the same vibe just as well.

CoC is better just for the super flexible Chaosium system which made it really easy to borrow mechanics from any other Chaosium game. You could play it like a straight Lovecraftian cosmic horror game, i.e. almost any enemy was so dangerous you'd have to go full stealth mechanics and use eldritch knowledge to avoid the worst possible outcome, but my longest-lived campaign was a super gun heavy Roaring '20s type game with gangster protagonists of the "I may be a criminal lunatic, but I'm an AMERICAN criminal lunatic!" type.

So a lot of early scenarios were basically invading some cult compound and Hotline Miami'ing everyone in it.

Now, obviously, while guns are an excellent problem solver against human enemies, and they had to change tactics to deal with the eldritch bad boys, I wanted the game to have lots of action. This was right after I had switched from straight dungeon crawling, and people liked that, so I went with it (at least until most of the original crew had died because of said gunplay).

Anyway, I'd specifically recommend a system like CoC because it's a lot more easy to evolve playstyle in long campaigns as the general focus changes. These newer systems (and it really seems to be a wokeshit thing) often forcefully channel the RPG into some specific kind of play and it's basically baked in to the point you can't easily change it without scrapping much of the basic mechanics, in which case why not just play something else entirely?

 

[Wherethereisawhip]

Hey with SFDebris recently continuing his series into the Lorraine Williams era of books I've come to get interested in the topic surrounding TSR's financial situation and I wonder if the company hadn't been one big vessel for corporate embezzling since the Blumes got in charge of the business until WoTC finally took over. From paying their nieces college fund and giving her every luxury they could think of to the lady of pain mandating the mass of buck rodgers shit that conviently she didn't need to sell to make money off of, it seems they were treated more like a piggy bank for the majority share holder until they thought it was hollowed out and dead.

 

[Tri-Tachyon'sClown]

Hey with SFDebris recently continuing his series into the Lorraine Williams era of books I've come to get interested in the topic surrounding TSR's financial situation and I wonder if the company hadn't been one big vessel for corporate embezzling since the Blumes got in charge of the business until WoTC finally took over. From paying their nieces college fund and giving her every luxury they could think of to the lady of pain mandating the mass of buck rodgers shit that conviently she didn't need to sell to make money off of, it seems they were treated more like a piggy bank for the majority share holder until they thought it was hollowed out and dead.

Ahh, Lorraine Williams. It's amazing how a single person can bring a beloved company to its knees, then again there are many such cases.

 

[Tri-Tachyon'sClown]

If anyone is interested.

 

[ZMOT]

People mentioning Blades in the Dark has activated me. I found the Space Opera version "Scum and Villainy" at a game shop for cheap and gave it a shot. I liked it, but the more I learned about how gamey the system is the less I liked it. It almost has the freedom to make it more freeform but not quite and all the rules want to lock you into the Minor bit of faffing > Preparing for heist/adventure > Heist/Adventure > Payout and consequences. It has a lot of little things in it I like, but every time I've gotten to play in a game of Blades/SaV it feels more gamey than I personally like.

haven't read it, but the usual caveat with BITD recommendations is "great for heists, for anything else play something else", which is probably part of the reason for some bad taste afterwards when people try to re-tool it for other shit (like "5e but X" or "ptba for long-term campaigns").

 

[The Bogwater Rises]

haven't read it, but the usual caveat with BITD recommendations is "great for heists, for anything else play something else", which is probably part of the reason for some bad taste afterwards when people try to re-tool it for other shit (like "5e but X" or "ptba for long-term campaigns").

Yeah it feels like the epitome of "take what you want and fix the rest system" which buying the space version for cheap doesn't make me upset, but seeing BiTD for full price makes me upset.

I know Mork Borg being an unfinished mess that basically begged for "house rule to fix it" in this thread or the Community Watch thread once. I will give the BiTD system this: I have had enjoyable sessions with it and it hasn't actively pissed me off. Mork Borg actively pissed me off with its systems (I also had a bad GM).

 

[Adamska]

haven't read it, but the usual caveat with BITD recommendations is "great for heists, for anything else play something else", which is probably part of the reason for some bad taste afterwards when people try to re-tool it for other shit (like "5e but X" or "ptba for long-term campaigns").

I don't even think it's that great for this niche, given that the planning phase is RNG too, rather than based on your players thinking through the scenario as the thieves themselves.

Shadowrun and even Call of Cthulhu cover it way better, since the RNG should be specifically on the players attempts to enact the scheme, and complications arise from failing a step or missing a detail that they did not plan out.

 

[ZMOT]

seeing BiTD for full price makes me upset.

to be fair it's only 20 bucks, and they have a SRD available, so it's not too bad imo.

I don't even think it's that great for this niche, given that the planning phase is RNG too, rather than based on your players thinking through the scenario as the thieves themselves.

Shadowrun and even Call of Cthulhu cover it way better, since the RNG should be specifically on the players attempts to enact the scheme, and complications arise from failing a step or missing a detail that they did not plan out.

reminds of a discussion I had a while back, without tangenting too hard the point was that some people don't care even if they know. for example you have a murder mystery and the point is not to find THE culprit, but A culprit. I didn't like it because it's not you reacting to an actual case, but the case reacting to you (if that makes any sense), while the other one didn't have an issue with it. in fact he preferred it because this way the players will always successfully solve A mystery, knowingly or unknowingly. or in exploration terms, you generate a map and it will always have feature X/Y/Z, just the location changes. so it's not about the "is something there and what is it" but "where is X/Y/Z".

from what I've seen of bitd I assume basically the latter where it's not "let's make a plan for a specific heist and see what actually happens", but more "just let have A heist" and go from there, with the "plan" built while playing depending what happens in the present via flashbacks ("did I make a copy of this key yes/no") as a "complete" heist at the end. kinda like narrative wargaming where the "story" evolves from what's happening as a result of dice rolls.

I can see why some people like it (for what it is and what it does), but probably wouldn't work for me either.

 

[The Bogwater Rises]

to be fair it's only 20 bucks, and they have a SRD available, so it's not too bad imo.

I meant physical copy. At every location I've seen it sold physically it's like $40+. I'm sure the PDF price is fine as MOST PDF's are priced within the $20 range. At least most the PDFs I see are priced around that.

I bought a physical copy of SAV for like $20.

Edit: Typo.

 

[Ghostse]

for example you have a murder mystery and the point is not to find THE culprit, but A culprit. I didn't like it because it's not you reacting to an actual case, but the case reacting to you

I wouldn't mind that for like a card game or other completely RNG thing; something like Gloom where the random stuff happens and you can sort of make up a story to try to bring it together.
But if I'm playing a TTRPG where I've got to think and try stuff, I'm with you on that being being bullshit. Nothing you do matters, so why am I burning braincells trying to figure out something that can't be figured out?

I can sort of see that other player's stance where "I just want to be involved in a story about how I would investigate this crime and it doesn't matter if anything I did had a point or was logically sound"; definitely not for me, and it makes me think about that Copypasta re:Sherlock about modern writers are retards and because they are retards they can't imagine how smart people think so its all just magic to them.

It makes me think of some British FMV murder mystery videogame where you have to figure out which of three suspects is the killer, but 'investigation' part the game is the exact same, because who the killer is just RNG and only changes the final 5-10 minutes of the game. And people going on about "oh its so great it means you can't be sure until the very end" - no that's retarded. I should be given at least the option of figuring out who it was.

Anyway that sort of thing is where I like 4e style skill challenge or a CoC investigation thing where the players are assumed to solve the problem & get the needed information, its just a question of how costly it is. And while the GM is given tools to reward clever play/ideas, also there's a degree of random chance to even the most clever plan.

 

[Battlefield2142EU]

I can't tell if Sundays and Dragons are satire or not. He is too boring to be funny, but he is like a perfect parody of a punchable centerist defending corporations yet never wanting to call out the left. He defends Gary Gygax yet approves of the trigger warning, calling him a racist at the same time. He defended WOTC/Hasbro changing race to species and said removing racial bonuses makes the D&D more realistic. Yet with zero irony implied, non-white people are Gnolls.

 

[40 Year Old Boomer]

@Battlefield2142EU Are you aware of this thread's existence?

 

[Imperial Citizen]

Tonight, Dice Scum will begin their review of Degenesis. I'm a fan of the game, but will @Adamska enjoy the 300+ pages of lore before we get to the rules?

 

[anti SJW]

This is another page from Forge of Foes, the third party Dungeons and Dragons book that preaches about colonialism being bad.

If I'm ever playing a TTRPG, and another person says "Goblin men's-rights activist" anything, I'm out.

 

[Henri Barbusse]

Goblin men's rights activists are attacking the village to get supplies to escape from the matriarchs that use males as disposable cannon fodder in their eternal feuds.

What do you mean that's wrong? The goblins have a unique culture now and also aren't portrayed as one monolithic block.

 

[God of Nothing]

Gobbos rise up!

 

[Blarmed&Dangerous]

"Other people have things I want - be it food, land, shelter, wealth, etc - and I have the means of doing violence, so I will take it from them by force" has been the defining motivation in the overwhelming majority of human conflicts since before recorded history. It is the default state of affairs. The last century is - only barely - an exception to millenia of natural order.

 

[Ghostse]

"Other people have things I want - be it food, land, shelter, wealth, etc - and I have the means of doing violence, so I will take it from them by force" has been the defining motivation in the overwhelming majority of human conflicts since before recorded history. It is the default state of affairs. The last century is - only barely - an exception to millenia of natural order.

and that's only because in most cases "Using violence to take it" is prevented by a larger more violent entity. When an individual/group/nation no longer fears that violent intervention, things go right back.

See: Africa, violent muslim yoofs in europe, ISIS.

 

[Revelator]

Goblin men's rights activists are attacking the village to get supplies to escape from the matriarchs that use males as disposable cannon fodder in their eternal feuds.

What do you mean that's wrong? The goblins have a unique culture now and also aren't portrayed as one monolithic block.

If I ran that scenario I'd be willing to bet my players would immediately turn and help the goblins out. Working as intended, leftist retard.

 

[Moral Decay]

They aren't the agents of conflict simply because they exist to create conflict.

It's not the goblins creating the conflict, it's the humans' for valuing "their" possessions over the lives of the pure, innocent goblins (who graciously allowed the humies to use what is rightfully the gobbos'). They should simply allow us the goblins to take what they want; cities can rebuild, Zach.

You're all with me, am I right fellow humans? Especially the part about giving the goblins your stuff.