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

[Quintus]

Looking for game recs:

Is there such a thing as a crunch-light (or crunch-medium), character-drama-heavy/"cinematic"/"theater kid" type TRPG whose community is not pozzed?

Unless you're looking to run some of the older stuff, the game probably won't matter. Best bet is to find a group of good people and hang on them as long as possible.

 

[Bâtard Consanguine]

Unless you're looking to run some of the older stuff, the game probably won't matter. Best bet is to find a group of good people and hang on them as long as possible.

Yeah, I play GURPS mainly, and I saw that the Steve Jackson Games profile on Twitter has the fag flag colors year round. There's a forum on the official website, but it requires a login to browse it, so I don't know how woke the sponsored community it. Regardless, the group I play with is running a campaign where we're a squad of Waffen SS who went through a portal to explore a magic fantasy land. We're currently genociding drow in the underdark, lol.

 

[Overly Serious]

Why is this hobby, which has so much to recommend it, overwhelmed with furries and social outcasts? RPGs bring in language skills, mathematics, tactical planning, social activity and imagination. They're a great hobby. Why can I not run a game without men with anime backpacks and women who clearly hate themselves appearing, thinking I am their people?

How to solve this problem? I've all but quit the hobby due to the sorts of people who show up.

 

[p1138]

Why is this hobby, which has so much to recommend it, overwhelmed with furries and social outcasts? RPGs bring in language skills, mathematics, tactical planning, social activity and imagination. They're a great hobby. Why can I not run a game without men with anime backpacks and women who clearly hate themselves, thinking I am their people?

How to solve this problem? I've all but quit the hobby due to the sorts of people who show up.

Reality is it's always been full of social outcasts. It was the "nerdy" thing for decades until stuff like Stranger Things, Big Bang Theory, and all of the crap in the past 15 years or so have made it more mainstream. The difference is that the people who would have been rejected even by a group of nerds back in the 90s finally realized they could just buy the damned books themselves and play but then they spread out and like everything else "current year" demanded everyone else change to meet their absurd lists of demands rather than just make their own games(and they do that as well but no one plays them because they want to be playing D&D).

This clip is from 2019, but was a symptom of what had already been happening for a couple years by that point.

https://x.com/BBC/status/1183397244403441667

That bitch never wanted a damned thing to do with D&D until it was "cool". No one was ever patrolling bookstores to slap D&D books out of the hands of people that they thought shouldn't be playing. Instead once it became cool, the next step was to just villainize the entire history of it and the player base so they could screech about anything they didn't like with impunity because let's face it... a lot of nerds that were playing were non confrontational and some fat bitch yelling at them about being evil nazi chuds would make most of them go quietly sit in the corner. No one in a D&D group would have rejected some chick wanting to join without getting called a faggot by the rest of the group because at the time such a person would have wanted to do what the other players were doing, not chastise them and tell them to change their behavior. Some of the replies sum it up pretty well

1980s "Beardy boys": Want to play D&D with us? Women: No
1990s "Beardy boys": Want to play D&D with us? Women: No
2000s "Beardy boys ": Want to play D&D with us? Women: No
2019 BBC: Hey nerds D&D is for everyone

 

[Jhonny Jhon]

Every time I had slavery as a major element in a campaign, it was viewed as utterly repulsive, paladins (who were usually the leaders of the party) absolutely detested it and absolutely forbade it.

It's the mere existence in your universe that means you somehow support slavery. Idiots.

Lol, my players are the exact opposite. If there isn't slavery in a setting, they will try to start a market for it, usually by attacking tribals. I lost count of how many times they tried to kickstart the slave market. In my current Rogue Trader game, the Rogue Trader is a suave, kind negotiator... who is just trying to trick whole worlds into signing themselves off into slavery, so he can sell them off to Nobles, Navy, and Xenos.

Their plans keep going wrong, but they don't give up on slavery. It makes for a whole lot of interesting plot-hooks.

 

[Gingervitis]

There's a forum on the official website, but it requires a login to browse it, so I don't know how woke the sponsored community it.

Put it this way- they hired Jay Dragon as an employee.

 

[Bâtard Consanguine]

Put it this way- they hired Jay Dragon as an employee.

Never heard of him, a cursory search yielded 'they/them' faggotry and whingeing that City Skylines doesn't simulate the plight of homelessness beyond an abstract number on your stat screen. But yeah, it's best to avoid the offical communities for anything and stick with a niche circle of friends. If you want to own physical copies of the books, buy them second hand.

 

[Overly Serious]

Reality is it's always been full of social outcasts. It was the "nerdy" thing for decades until stuff like Stranger Things, Big Bang Theory, and all of the crap in the past 15 years or so have made it more mainstream.

Alas, I think you're probably bang on the money with this. Where and when I grew up there was no local community of gamers. The nearest "gaming" shop was at least 30 miles away (which is a long way to cycle) and even then it was just a more general place that happened to stock a few RPGs like WHFRP 1e and things on a shelf at the back. My first experiences with RPGs were entirely just a thing I did from a book with just regular friends I hung out with. I was aware of no "culture" with it. And I actually think a lot of that culture came from the USA. "Nerds", "Geeks", it's largely a cultural export of the States and I hate it. When I got older I came across a gaming club, fronted by a dude dressed as a rather chubby vampire. I completely disregarded them and formed my own little group of, again, non-gamers. So for me there have been two waves of change. The first is the loss of local friend groups who I play with replaced by this weird foreign culture who are all proud of being "geeks" and who watch "geek media". And the second real wave that you're talking about.

I feel like I'm in a group of one because culturally I'm more inline with the "normie" types who have invaded the hobby. But what draws me to the hobby is the original appeal of the imagination, the maths, the artistry of language and story. Like I'm in this narrow overlap of the two circles in the Venn Diagram.

It's depressing.

The difference is that the people who would have been rejected even by a group of nerds back in the 90s finally realized they could just buy the damned books themselves and play but then they spread out and like everything else "current year" demanded everyone else change to meet their absurd lists of demands rather than just make their own games(and they do that as well but no one plays them because they want to be playing D&D).

This clip is from 2019, but was a symptom of what had already been happening for a couple years by that point.
https://x.com/BBC/status/1183397244403441667

That's depressing too. Entryists changing the hobby deliberately. You're right - I never saw people being exclusionary back in the old days based on sex, race, or much else. And yet ironically, the new crowd gate-keep in a way the old grognards never did. Didn't matter to us if you were Black, White, Male, Female... If you want to play, come on in. Now, you're tested for if you're a good fit and cast out, banned and cancelled if they deem you not. Exclusion in the name of inclusion.

 

[The Ugly One]

Why is this hobby, which has so much to recommend it, overwhelmed with furries and social outcasts? RPGs bring in language skills, mathematics, tactical planning, social activity and imagination. They're a great hobby. Why can I not run a game without men with anime backpacks and women who clearly hate themselves appearing, thinking I am their people?

Because it's a hobby where you devote yourself to imagining yourself in a fictional world where you can be attractive, accomplished, and admired. It naturally appeals to losers.

 

[Overly Serious]

Because it's a hobby where you devote yourself to imagining yourself in a fictional world where you can be attractive, accomplished, and admired. It naturally appeals to losers.

I guess that makes sense. It would also explain why PCs die like flies in my games because they're treating it as a power fantasy. Whereas the fun for me is to have exciting challenges and dangers to overcome. Nothing is more boring to me than a "level-appropriate encounter."

 

[The Ugly One]

I guess that makes sense. It would also explain why PCs die like flies in my games because they're treating it as a power fantasy. Whereas the fun for me is to have exciting challenges and dangers to overcome. Nothing is more boring to me than a "level-appropriate encounter."

You gotta mix it up. Sometimes, your 6th-level party should get to go HAM on zombies and skeletons so they can feel good about how badass they are. Other times, they run into a drake who can 1-shot the group with his acid breath, and you warn them, "You see a Corrosive Drake. You've heard of such creatures feasting on warriors of far more renown than yourselves."

 

[Overly Serious]

You gotta mix it up. Sometimes, your 6th-level party should get to go HAM on zombies and skeletons so they can feel good about how badass they are. Other times, they run into a drake who can 1-shot the group with his acid breath, and you warn them, "You see a Corrosive Drake. You've heard of such creatures feasting on warriors of far more renown than yourselves."

I don't usually run fantasy settings though your point stands. The thing is that I like to run semi-sandbox games with intrigues and powerful factions. I believe I do give hints but they appear invisible to the players. What to me is basic common sense appears default behaviour for them. Unless I put them in some kind of railroad of an adventure they immediately gravitate to whoever the most powerful figure in the campaign is and either try to rob him or suck up to him. It literally doesn't matter who.

In fact, this is actually a separate problem that extends from the problem of them coming with preconceptions. They will always attempt to sell out and side with the enemy. It doesn't matter who that enemy is, they will attempt to betray everyone else in favour of whoever they see as more powerful. I can make the enemy Dark Lord Hatred, of the land of Hate, Hater of All Life, and they will say "this person is more powerful than our employer, we should be on his side." I genuinely think - no have pretty much tried this - that even if the person they're sucking up to literally beats them unconscious, they will still try to Neville Chamberlain their way through it.

I don't think it's possible to win with these people. One the one hand they show up with a bunch of preconceptions I never grew up with - that it's some story in which they will win because they're the PCs and are then shocked to die. And at the same time, exploit any hint of sandbox to avoid conflict.

I hate it. In fact, I think this has just made up my mind to ditch things. I like the hobby in theory. In practice, I can't play with anybody I find to game with.

 

[Ghostse]

That bitch never wanted a damned thing to do with D&D until it was "cool".

Disagree here. I can take one look at that shrill, tubby bitch and tell She never wanted a damn thing to do with D&D until she realized it was a pathway to the male attention she couldn't otherwise get. A 6 is a Con 9. It being "cool" is secondary to that. The guys are weird and cringey but she's the only piece of ass for 500 yards.
She wants to make it "cool" by forcing her feminist book club ideal son the poor beady boys.

 

[The Ugly One]

In fact, this is actually a separate problem that extends from the problem of them coming with preconceptions. They will always attempt to sell out and side with the enemy. It doesn't matter who that enemy is, they will attempt to betray everyone else in favour of whoever they see as more powerful. I can make the enemy Dark Lord Hatred, of the land of Hate, Hater of All Life, and they will say "this person is more powerful than our employer, we should be on his side."

Why is this a problem? You've now got an evil campaign where the law/the Knights of Light/the Space Marines/etc are their sworn enemies. Plus, their new boss is an absolute dick.

Or is the issue that they get their feelings hurt that, once they've sold their souls to the Dark Lord of Hatred, he expects them to go collect villager hearts, and if they disobey, he binds their souls into Torture Crystals until they decide to comply?

 

[Overly Serious]

Why is this a problem? You've now got an evil campaign where the law/the Knights of Light/the Space Marines/etc are their sworn enemies. Plus, their new boss is an absolute dick.

Because it's the evil of weakness. It's the evil of petty treachery. If they wanted to have a campaign where they go out to conquer the world and bring it under their iron fist, fine by me - I've got whole governments and armies for them to overthrow and rivals to contest with for power.

That's not what they want. They want to suck up and be rewarded. I am uninterested in running a game without challenge or dangerous opponents for them to face. If I create a dangerous opponent for them, their instinct is to roll over on their bellies and beg for treats. And yes, he can then tread on them and crush them but that is in itself the problem. I have waning interest in being put in the position over and over of kill everybody or turn the game into Lickspittle: The Servilling.

And regards your implied solution to this, unfortunately there are two problems that result. The first is that the moment the situation changes they will now try to sell him out to whoever he's sent them against. And if their souls are bound to torture crystals or whatever the equivalent might be in my genre, I no longer have a game of intrigue and player agency, I have "you enter the dungeon..."

The hostage in this equation is the time and effort I have put into making interesting characters and setting. I don't want to throw out what I've created or the style of play I enjoy, for players that don't understand that at some point (and farily early) treachery will get you TPK'd.

EDIT: Tone gets lost on the Internet. It may sound as if I reject your suggestion out of hand. In fact, your suggestion would work fine with others, maybe. But alas I don't think it can with this lot.

 

[The Ugly One]

time and effort

Wait, what are those?

To be fair, my players are all coolguys who like saving the princess, so I don't have to corall them into wanting to play the game. The best I can give you is that in situations where the players fuck up, I close off any avenue to saving the princess, so to speak, and now, depending on their actions, the princess either gets eaten by a troll or married off to a bandit lord. You don't get to die, that would be too easy. But my players aren't annoying faggots, which sounds like the real problem here. So I'm guessing things getting progressively worse until eventually, Gorlaar, Lord of Rape, manifests in this dimensions and turns all humanity into fuck-puppets for the Dick Demons, ending the campaign, wouldn't be any fun, either. My players would find that to be a riot.

 

[Mr. Manchester]

Why is this hobby, which has so much to recommend it, overwhelmed with furries and social outcasts? RPGs bring in language skills, mathematics, tactical planning, social activity and imagination. They're a great hobby. Why can I not run a game without men with anime backpacks and women who clearly hate themselves appearing, thinking I am their people?

How to solve this problem? I've all but quit the hobby due to the sorts of people who show up.

It comes down to playing pretend. That's what furries, trannies and people who just don't want to be themselves do and RPGs are an outlet for that. It's an unfortunate side effect of the genre and has been since it's started.

The solution is slow and methodical. You keep in touch with the people you like, you ignore the ones you don't. I've found that you don't so much find a new group and settle in, you build one over time by making friends with the people you like and quietly getting the fuck away from the one's you don't. Offering to GM helps a lot.

 

[Sargon's wife's son]

Every time I had slavery as a major element in a campaign, it was viewed as utterly repulsive, paladins (who were usually the leaders of the party) absolutely detested it and absolutely forbade it.

It's the mere existence in your universe that means you somehow support slavery. Idiots.

No I have a continent in my homeboy setting that is ruled by a bunch of Dragons who literally enslave less oasis because in no words if you were born helpless and unable to fend for yourself why shouldn't you be treated as a lesser being.
Also these dragons aren't evil the lawful good slavery can exist in a lawful good society as long as you're not mistreating the slaves.

What really tickles me about the whole Orc-Mex debacle is that the "ponchos, maracas and sombreros" kind of Mexican (or the closest you'll actually see in real life) is either a grifter exploiting tourist traps (so, a criminal) or a turbo-conservative who's deeply religious and bearing an almost genetic hatred of queers and/or hair dye. Neither stereotype is anywhere near positive in their books but, as you said, they didn't do any research.

These people wouldn't last 5 seconds working with Mexicans those guys if they don't speak good English always know how to call you a homosexual and insinuate you like having sex with men.
It's like when they talk about women in the trades the women I've been in the trades are nastier than the men when it comes to crass humor.

I created a great encounter once in ad&d. It was the groups first beholder. I created a labyrinth, there was no disarmable traps

I'd be completely honest I hate traps in any system they literally just slow down play for absolutely no reason look if it doesn't look like some

Why is this hobby, which has so much to recommend it, overwhelmed with furries and social outcasts? RPGs bring in language skills, mathematics, tactical planning, social activity and imagination. They're a great hobby. Why can I not run a game without men with anime backpacks and women who clearly hate themselves appearingkind of perverte

You gotta have like a group of people who your games revolve around basically a Cory group you're going to run through a lot of people before you find those guys
D and D's always been a group of weirdos it's just we used to have much more lovable weirdos and less sex pervents.

 

[Jhonny Jhon]

Because it's the evil of weakness. It's the evil of petty treachery. If they wanted to have a campaign where they go out to conquer the world and bring it under their iron fist, fine by me - I've got whole governments and armies for them to overthrow and rivals to contest with for power.

That's not what they want. They want to suck up and be rewarded. I am uninterested in running a game without challenge or dangerous opponents for them to face. If I create a dangerous opponent for them, their instinct is to roll over on their bellies and beg for treats. And yes, he can then tread on them and crush them but that is in itself the problem. I have waning interest in being put in the position over and over of kill everybody or turn the game into Lickspittle: The Servilling.

And regards your implied solution to this, unfortunately there are two problems that result. The first is that the moment the situation changes they will now try to sell him out to whoever he's sent them against. And if their souls are bound to torture crystals or whatever the equivalent might be in my genre, I no longer have a game of intrigue and player agency, I have "you enter the dungeon..."

The hostage in this equation is the time and effort I have put into making interesting characters and setting. I don't want to throw out what I've created or the style of play I enjoy, for players that don't understand that at some point (and farily early) treachery will get you TPK'd.

EDIT: Tone gets lost on the Internet. It may sound as if I reject your suggestion out of hand. In fact, your suggestion would work fine with others, maybe. But alas I don't think it can with this lot.

I think there are only two possible solutions to this.
1: Find better players.
2: Make more unreasonable antagonists. If the villain has a deep-seated reason to hate the players, a reason that literally cannot be changed, they will be forced to side against him. That way there is no chance of them sucking up to Big Bad, because the Big Bad explicitly wants them all dead.

In fact, let's go even further. What you should do is give your players an opportunity to suck up to the enemy, an opportunity that will seemingly land them in the enemy's inner circle. Then, once they fulfill whatever task they have to do, have the enemy attack them, teaching them that no matter what they do, the enemy hates them and wants them dead.

Spoiler: Example

Let's say that the Big Bad, the Duke of Mannhid, wants a special sword, one that will offer him greater legitimacy in his upcoming coup attempt. I would then show the players that he wants that sword, and when they think about getting it, I would also allow them to do so. After a long and grueling questline, filled with many adventures and difficult fights, they would get that sword.

Then, once they decide to bring it to the Duke, I would separate the group through some contrived method. One player goes up to the Big Bad with the sword, while the others watch from afar. The Big Bad accepts the sword, thanks the player, and then kills him with it while rambling about how no descendants of House Conforrs can remain, not if he wants to have the throne.

That way only one Player dies, and the whole table will want vengeance on the Big Bad.

 

[Imperial Citizen]

We review Flying Circus tonight on Dice Scum. It's an interesting setting of a fantasy world of WW1 aerial warfare with magic, unfortunately compromised with Tumblr-inspired art and a PbtA system. Ready to see queer romance with fish people?!