- Joined
- Mar 26, 2016
Whatever you do, don't say I didn't warn you.
Let's Sperg Randall Reads a Terrible RPG: Wraeththu - aka Bishonen: The Mary Sueing
- Thread starter Randall Fragg
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- Joined
- Jul 18, 2016
Trust me when I say it's better to read this then actually read FATAL:
https://www.rpg.net/reviews/archive/14/14567.phtml
- Joined
- Apr 15, 2014
Randall Reads a Terrible RPG
Part 9 (Mechanical Failures)
We finally begin to get to the actual mechanics of the game, but not without learning that Raytthul like to give themselves pretentious as fuck names, because of fucking course.
I'm disappointed Coldsteel didn't make the cut.
After the typical traits section (which is the boring shit like hometown, tribe, whatever) we get to Physical Attributes, and what everyone likes to see in RPG books, Calculations and Tables!
We need to know our character's exact weight, because "it's an important factor in Agmara usage, and therefor requires a numerical value".
First actual mechanics and it's equations and tables. And we haven't even gotten to stats...
There are also Merits and Flaws, which work like Advantages and Disadvantages in GURPS, again reminding us of a much better game system.
Oh yeah, all of this is still just an overview. The actual sections detailing the stuff mentioned in character creation are still far ahead.
SKILLS
Skills look like the standard shit in many game systems, but Raythoolu, with it's devotion to Hyperralistic Mechanics, adds in some wonkiness.
For example, in many other, less Realistic games, Skills get a bonus or are based on a particular stat. Not in Wrayththlu. No, each skill here is linked to two stats, and you need to take the average of your bonuses to actually know what your actual bonus is. Fuck simple, elegant mechanics, we need more pointless math to make sure our game about vampire homos with flowerdicks is more Raelistic!
Next we have combat skills, and this is where it begins to get fucking clunky.
Next time on Randall Reads a Terrible RPG:
More bad combat and Secondary Stats.
Part 9 (Mechanical Failures)
We finally begin to get to the actual mechanics of the game, but not without learning that Raytthul like to give themselves pretentious as fuck names, because of fucking course.
I'm disappointed Coldsteel didn't make the cut.
After the typical traits section (which is the boring shit like hometown, tribe, whatever) we get to Physical Attributes, and what everyone likes to see in RPG books, Calculations and Tables!
First actual mechanics and it's equations and tables. And we haven't even gotten to stats...
- There are Primary and Secondary stats (and you filthy humans don't get any secondary stats).
- Stat generation is a weird mix of point buy and random rolling, with each character starting with a 4 in all stats (3 if you're a normie), adding 1d6 to each stat, and then distributing 10 points between them.
- You can sacrifice unspent points to a "Development Pool".
- Humans get gimped yet again, as the Glam Rockers get stat bonuses from their tribe affiliation, with humans getting no corresponding bonuses.
- Your stat number gives a modifier that's added to skill levels. Said stat modifiers are a pain in the ass to remember.
There are also Merits and Flaws, which work like Advantages and Disadvantages in GURPS, again reminding us of a much better game system.
Oh yeah, all of this is still just an overview. The actual sections detailing the stuff mentioned in character creation are still far ahead.
SKILLS
Skills look like the standard shit in many game systems, but Raythoolu, with it's devotion to Hyperralistic Mechanics, adds in some wonkiness.
For example, in many other, less Realistic games, Skills get a bonus or are based on a particular stat. Not in Wrayththlu. No, each skill here is linked to two stats, and you need to take the average of your bonuses to actually know what your actual bonus is. Fuck simple, elegant mechanics, we need more pointless math to make sure our game about vampire homos with flowerdicks is more Raelistic!
Next we have combat skills, and this is where it begins to get fucking clunky.
- I think this is the longest section in this chapter, and yet I think it provided the least information. It details the basic frame of combat (without telling us what the hell the dice system used in this game is, so all the information in it has no context).
- There's a Base Combat Modifier that grants bonuses to Combat Skills based on stats (and calculating this is not brought up).
- Combat Skills are broken up into Style and Weapons skills
- The Style Skills are used for melee combat, and notably have no actual effect on combat. Instead they serve as an obnoxious cap placed on melee weapons. For example, you can't take the, say, Sword (Longsword) skill unless your weapons style skill is at the same level. Put 12 ranks into Sword (Longsword)? Nope, can't use it unless you put an equivilant amount into 1Handed Weapons Style. So, you literally have to spend double the amount of character points when getting any sort of melee ability, except for Spastic Flailing.
- A good game would perhaps make each of the styles a Skill, and use it as a base for all weapons in that category, with bonuses if a character is specialized with a certain type of weapon. However, wraethlu is not a good game.
- Of course the character in the example uses a katana. Of fucking course.
- The Weapons skill is specialized, so that taking ranks in a skill only affects 1 type of weapon. For example, taking 12 ranks in Sword(katana) means nothing if you pick up a longsword. You instantly become a flailing idiot if you do not have the grolious nippon steel in your hands, only being allowed to use your Basic Attack Bonus or whatever it's called. From a gamest perspective this is garbage because it forces a character to become incredibly specialized and punishes them if the GM decides to take away their equipment. And from a realist perspective it's kinda stupid, because even if you were specialized in one kind of sword, you would at least understand the basics how to fight with a sword of a similar kind. Hell, the Style Skill that this game forces you to take would imply a broad range of knowledge about using a category of weapons.
- Heavens help you if you're forced to use a weapon that doesn't fall under whatever skill you chose, because not only are you stuck with your basic attack modifiers, you take a -5 penalty on all attacks, turning from a trained warrior to a gibbering idiot because you grabbed a mace instead of a sword.
- It gets even dumber when it gets to the guns. Specoilize in using a
? Congrats, with any other type of pistol you suddenly lose all skills at using pistols. Pick up an 
? Congrats, you are now an idiot firing wildly in the wrong direction.
Next time on Randall Reads a Terrible RPG:
More bad combat and Secondary Stats.
- Joined
- Jul 18, 2016
Oh for fuck's sake, we were just talking about Fatal and all this business with averaging bonuses and hyper-specialized skills is the EXACT same bullshit that insanity pulled.
Also, why the fuck this crazy mix of random rolls and point buy? All it serves is to fuck over the guy who rolled shit on the random part. Either go full random, or full point buy, trying to do both is stupid.
Also, why the fuck this crazy mix of random rolls and point buy? All it serves is to fuck over the guy who rolled shit on the random part. Either go full random, or full point buy, trying to do both is stupid.
- Joined
- Apr 15, 2014
To be fair, it does give full point buy as a "Variant Rule", but still it's pretty fucking stupid that this system is considered the default option.
- Joined
- Jul 18, 2016
(I'm about to say some very mean things, so before anyone gets confused, I agree. Now endure my autism about game design)
"Variant Rules" are not a fucking band-aid for shit design. Variant rules should be used to enhance and augment the game, not fix the broken shit. D&D 3rd and by extension Pathfinder have "Variant Rules" that change up the gameplay, with some being houserules that somehow became official and such, but in the end, a pure game following the strict core book is a functional game that everyone can be happy with.
Now to move on to why this combination is shit: For starters, the rolled amount is entirely too low for the scale we're working at (1d6+4 on a scale of 1-15, where you don't get bonuses until 10), and in a way, so is the points. Essentially the game asks us to roll 6d6, so the average amount of points rolled will be 21. Distributing that as evenly as possible results in three of the primary stats getting 3 points and 3 others getting 4, meaning each stat will, on average, start at 7 or 8. This means that most stats will start off average, with a bonus of +0, which is fine, but this ends up doing nothing but fuck over the guy who rolled below the curve. It is somewhat forgiving in that you can assign which d6 roll goes to which stat, but here's a better solution: Everyone's primary stats starts at 8 (or 7 for humans if you want to continue to fuck them over), and everyone then gets 10 points to develop their primary stats. No one has to worry about rolling what we like to call "scrap paper" (a character so shit that you toss him before game start).
Then we get to skills, which are apparently all bought using development points? Are there any "skill points" we get to start with, or is it all dev points, because motherfucker, with that table I'm going to slap whoever thought this was a smart design choice. At least Bellum Maga had the right idea, you just got 30 points and raising shit was one point per thingy you wanted to raise, you got five free skill points and whatever you put your starting Intelligence at gave you more skill points. To further increase how stupid this is, 2d6 is going to end up on a 7 most of the time (if you take all the combinations you can make with two six siders, 7 has the most "combinations"). So, let's assume you get 27 dev points. That's 9 skill ranks. With how hyperspecialized the skills are, this is inexcusable. Let's take a better system, Exalted, and see how they do it: In Errata, the Second Edition printing gives you something ridiculous, like 35 skill points I want to say, to spend on 25 different skills plus specialties. You also get a pile of 15 bonus points (Something I feel the dev table is trying to copy but failing horribly at) and raising a skill only requires ONE, FUCKING ONE bonus point out of 15 to raise, so if you didn't quite get to do what you wanted with the initial pile or have a couple floating after getting all you want, buy a couple skills!
I have a feeling the dev table is also the "experience" table, which is where it at least makes sense. Paying that much for character advancement, while fucking retarded still for skill points, at least makes sense for the rest. While this whole thing is a shitshow, it at least lets me recommend much better games for you to peruse at your leisure, ones that will reward you acquiring them with hours of entertainment. Fuck this game, fuck the creators, and fuck the author's parents for blighting the world with the one who made this abomination.
- Joined
- Apr 15, 2014
There are actually dedicated Skill Points, which buy skill levels at a 1-1 ratio, which are determined with another goofy mechanic, which is
anyway, back to
Randall Reads a Terrible RPG
Part 10 (Klunky Kombat Katastrophes)
Our first Secondary Stat is Energy, which, contrary to what was stated earlier, humans also need to calculate. Good job game.
Energy works like Fatigue in GURPS, in that doing strenuous activities will lower it, and recuperation and rest is needed to restore it.
And of course the way this is calculated is overcomplicated and gimps humans, just as we'd expect.
Unlike in other games, characters don't start out with Gold, Credits, or whatever the equivilant is to buy shit with. Instead, characters with Resources between 0 and 2 just get a shitty dagger, and whatever the GM feels like handing them. But you need to go to the Resources section all the way in the Appendix to actually know what you can buy.
Yes, there's an Attacks Per Combat Phase number, which is found with (Speed Combat Action + Base Actions)/ Weapon Speed. I hope you like fractions, because sample weapon speeds are things like 1.3 (for a club), 2.8 (for a Halbard), 1.8 (for a Claymore), 3.5 (for a Long Bow), and .152 (for a 
)
Oh, yeah, Base Actions, which is how many times in a Phase of combat you can act, which is found by 5 + DEX mod.
And that's the outline of character creation for Wraethlu, which was not helpful at all and in fact just exposed the game's glaring design problems.
Next Time on Randall Read a Terrible RPG: We get the Big List of Skills, and learn which ones are completely worthless.
anyway, back to
Randall Reads a Terrible RPG
Part 10 (Klunky Kombat Katastrophes)
- If there's one thing I'll give this credit for, it's ambition. A detailed combat system with things like parry, rolls, and dodges could be interesting. Although, I'm going to guess that a better system already did it and this is a crude ripoff.
- You start off with finding the basic combat modifiers for each one of these damn things. And it's not something simple like "Dodge is equal to your bonus from Dexterity". No, that would be good game design. Instead we get shit like "Dodge is the bonus from dexterity, unless it's against ranged weapons, which makes it the average of intelligence and perception."
- Oh, yeah, there's two rows of these Basic Combat Action Mods for both melee and ranged combat, with different calculations.
- We finally learn just what the fuck the specialization thing does. It gives a bonus based on a table way back in the skills section (because of course) to combat actions with that specific weapon.
- Again, the actual rules for combat are several chapters ahead. Which means all this information has no context.
Energy works like Fatigue in GURPS, in that doing strenuous activities will lower it, and recuperation and rest is needed to restore it.
And of course the way this is calculated is overcomplicated and gimps humans, just as we'd expect.
- Psyche is a measure of the Waythtoos innate psychic abilities, and is used for the magic system bullshit.
- There's pointless shittalking about the internet in this section. Wonder if the authors knew that one day their work would be viciously mocked on sites like this?
- Composure is basically a Wraeththlu's Heart Level. If it gets low by a wraethtoo not having flowersex, the Raythlu becomes a Virgin With Rage and will have to roll to avoid chimping out. Getting laid will regain Heart Level, and stave off the effects of Inceldom.
- Much like combat, the actual rules about magic are covered by a completely different chapter.
- There's the standard elemental magic system, as well as Chaos vs Order, Forces such as Attraction and Plasmatic (?), and Temporal, Phase, and Destruction.
- Spells cost
manaAgmara to cast. The amount of Agmara you have to work with is based on weight in kilograms x2. - This would mean that the Slaton Sisters would be the most powerful wizards in this universe.
Unlike in other games, characters don't start out with Gold, Credits, or whatever the equivilant is to buy shit with. Instead, characters with Resources between 0 and 2 just get a shitty dagger, and whatever the GM feels like handing them. But you need to go to the Resources section all the way in the Appendix to actually know what you can buy.
- Hit points feature in most RPGs, because they're a good way to abstract the messy details of real life injury and combat into something that's easy to understand and use. "The raider fires a round into you, dealing 15 damage" is much easier to mechanically run and model than "the raider fires into your torso, hitting the ribs and left lung. Roll to see if any arteries were severed by the shot. Oh no, the thoracic aorta has been hit, you now have (body weight / number of wounds) minutes before you die of bloodloss". Less realistic, yes, but much, much easier.
- There's a few systems, such as the excellent Savage Worlds, that forgo hitpoints in favor of Wounds. In Savage Worlds, if an attack's damage breaks a character's Toughness, it inflicts a Wound, which imposes penalties based on the number of Wounds a character has. Three Wounds and a character begins to die. As Savage World's design is based on swiftness of play and a more Pulpy, Action Movie combat style instead of realism, this works fantastically.
- Now we come to Wraeththlu, which kludges together both systems in a rather awkward fashion. Characters have a variable amount of Minor Wounds, which is used to represent painful but non-life threatening damage, and 15 (10 if you're a normie) Major Wounds, which represent serious damage to internal organs and bone. 10 points of Minor Wound damage cause 1 point of Major Wound damage.
- Of course, as they helpfully explain over 100 pages later, getting to 0 Minor Wounds knocks a character unconscious, effectively making it a HP limit. There doesn't seem to be rules on what happens if a character who is unconscious like this is damaged, so either a character magically becomes invincible or it does some kind of wraparound, where 10 points of damage inflicted on a unconscious character becomes 1 Major Wound. Which would mean that all characters effectively have the same amount of HP (150), the only difference being at what point a character falls unconscious. Jesus, taking one of these stupid subsystems out and refining the other would improve this so goddamn much.
) Oh, yeah, Base Actions, which is how many times in a Phase of combat you can act, which is found by 5 + DEX mod.
And that's the outline of character creation for Wraethlu, which was not helpful at all and in fact just exposed the game's glaring design problems.
Next Time on Randall Read a Terrible RPG: We get the Big List of Skills, and learn which ones are completely worthless.
- Joined
- Jul 18, 2016
Well, I was all set to like this game for being nice and giving skill points, and then they made it retarded again.
So it's time for Adventures in Good Game Design. I'm going to start with the roll maneuver: Deadlands allows for something similar with "Vamoosin'", allowing you to drop your highest card (Deadlands uses a deck of cards to determine when players go in the init, Ace of Spades beats everything except the Red Joker) in exchange for making a dodge roll to GTFO. It's the only way to dodge bullets, as the base TN to hit you with a shooting roll is a 5, meaning that some prick with just a 1d6 has a decent chance of hitting you. It is entirely possible to use a "vamoose" to get behind cover. I do not believe that this game is ripping off Deadlands, that would require reading.
The combat mods, a curse be upon whoever thought averaging two stats was a good idea, are unfavorably balanced towards Dex and Perception. Therefore, I should pour my points into Dex and Perception and become un-fucking-touchable in combat, as these base mods don't seem to take any sort of skills into account, so being Unskilled yet Fast is a good way to break this game over your fucking knee. Perception and Intelligence being used for Ranged combat just means that dedicated archers/snipers are going to be skill monkeys, which makes a weird sort of sense if you think about how skilled real world snipers actually are.
Energy is kind of interesting. I'll give them credit for having some interesting ideas.
I have no idea what "sharing breath" means, I'm going to assume it's some sort of euphemism for incredibly gay make-out sessions.
As for magic and the mana system, I had a similar idea with my own Chrono Custodi set up (which, by the way, if the Chrono Custodi ever hears about or finds these guys, the Wraeththu will be immediately placed on the "Kill On Sight" list). It's a novel, not a game system, but the idea is that everyone has a reserve of "Aether" in their bodies that powers magic, and while no one can say for certain what actually raises a person's reserve, it's generally accepted that physical fitness tends to expand the reserves. Of course, Randall already pointed out that this system rewards fatasses, though I shudder to think was a 300 pound bodybuilder could do in this setup.
The Attacks Per Combat, with all of its fractions, can go suck the biggest dick it can possibly find.
So it's time for Adventures in Good Game Design. I'm going to start with the roll maneuver: Deadlands allows for something similar with "Vamoosin'", allowing you to drop your highest card (Deadlands uses a deck of cards to determine when players go in the init, Ace of Spades beats everything except the Red Joker) in exchange for making a dodge roll to GTFO. It's the only way to dodge bullets, as the base TN to hit you with a shooting roll is a 5, meaning that some prick with just a 1d6 has a decent chance of hitting you. It is entirely possible to use a "vamoose" to get behind cover. I do not believe that this game is ripping off Deadlands, that would require reading.
The combat mods, a curse be upon whoever thought averaging two stats was a good idea, are unfavorably balanced towards Dex and Perception. Therefore, I should pour my points into Dex and Perception and become un-fucking-touchable in combat, as these base mods don't seem to take any sort of skills into account, so being Unskilled yet Fast is a good way to break this game over your fucking knee. Perception and Intelligence being used for Ranged combat just means that dedicated archers/snipers are going to be skill monkeys, which makes a weird sort of sense if you think about how skilled real world snipers actually are.
Energy is kind of interesting. I'll give them credit for having some interesting ideas.
I have no idea what "sharing breath" means, I'm going to assume it's some sort of euphemism for incredibly gay make-out sessions.
As for magic and the mana system, I had a similar idea with my own Chrono Custodi set up (which, by the way, if the Chrono Custodi ever hears about or finds these guys, the Wraeththu will be immediately placed on the "Kill On Sight" list). It's a novel, not a game system, but the idea is that everyone has a reserve of "Aether" in their bodies that powers magic, and while no one can say for certain what actually raises a person's reserve, it's generally accepted that physical fitness tends to expand the reserves. Of course, Randall already pointed out that this system rewards fatasses, though I shudder to think was a 300 pound bodybuilder could do in this setup.
The Attacks Per Combat, with all of its fractions, can go suck the biggest dick it can possibly find.
Emperor Julian
kiwifarms.net
- Joined
- Dec 20, 2015
All I keep thinking is how much fun purging these things would be in a game
The sentance for pissing in the human gene pool is death. Hopefully the hairspray will help the fire going you rapist bowie knock off.
The sentance for pissing in the human gene pool is death. Hopefully the hairspray will help the fire going you rapist bowie knock off.
- Joined
- Apr 15, 2014
After a rather long intermission, we're back with
Randall Reads a Terrible RPG
Part 11 (The Big List of Skills)
Merits and Flaws (aka waaah, I wish I was a wraeththu)
Randall Reads a Terrible RPG
Part 11 (The Big List of Skills)
- So, we have a GURPS-style list of skills. Of course, skills are linked to two different attributes, and you gain the default bonus to them based on the average of those attributes, so fuck that.
- Mechanical Repair is based on Strength and Strength... apparently you can fix a engine block by hitting it really hard.
- You have separate skills for each type of rifle, pistol, or whatever. So, using an AK-47 and using a M4 are two separate skills.
- Dat fucking animu pose.
- Biology is apparently needed to shoot out people's kneecaps, but has no effect on medicine.
- Even a Mad Max wasteland is plagued by bureaucracy. Somewhere, a Sov-Cit doomsday prepper is crying.
Merits and Flaws (aka waaah, I wish I was a wraeththu)
- Joined
- Mar 6, 2016
- Joined
- May 30, 2014
Just use a madmax style RPG and make the bad guys an Iron Maiden expy. Same effect and it's more cool. I mean you even have music set for when they murder the shit out of your hometown.
- Joined
- Apr 15, 2014
And back to our infrequently scheduled posting
Randall Reads a Terrible RPG
Part 12 (Waaahh waaaah i want to be an alien twink waaah)
Like many other systems, Wraethlu has an Advantage/Disadvantage system that allows characters to have certain talents or flaws, allowing for a greater depth of customization.
Of course, it's not easy to fuck up a system like that, but I'm sure Raythlu finds a way.
Flaws are divied up into three categories. Human-only flaws, Raythlu-only flaws, and crossovers (which both can have).
Let's look at some of the Human flaws, shall we?
So, sample human-only flaws include being blind, deaf, or crippled. And the descriptions for all of these are basically "waaah waaah, woe is me, i need to become Flower-Dicked David Bowie to cure any physical problems."
Oh, yeah, because these flaws magically go away if a character gets Turned. So, those points you gain by taking them are essentially free. To its (minimum) credit, the game does say that you can't take more than 10 points of Flaws. Although, if you wanted to go for cheese, you could make a crippled, brittle-boned, deaf guy with bad vision, find one of the Waifumonsters, and be magically cured from all of that. Free 10 character creation points!
(also note that the game designers were too lazy to separate the merits and flaws into individual sections, and just kind of mixed them in together)
Okay, it looks like I was wrong. Becoming a Magical Fag doesn't make your arm/eyes grow back. Then why even make a separate flaw? And how does "missing your fucking legs" not cause any penalties besides "social"?
Also "sexual perversion" is a mechanical flaw
You can fucking play as a BDSM gear-clad furry dragging his animu bodypillow across the wasteland, and be mechanically supported. That mental image just fucking turned this game around.
Not giving a shit is apparently a wrathloo only ability. Actually, several of these things could easily be human flaws/merits, but had to be reserved for the Mary Sues.
The "Impaired Immunity" flaw is pretty much "you aren't a super magical uberman, and can get a cold".
Next time on Randall Reads a Terrible RPG:
"Some of these rules are not 100% realistic"
Randall Reads a Terrible RPG
Part 12 (Waaahh waaaah i want to be an alien twink waaah)
Like many other systems, Wraethlu has an Advantage/Disadvantage system that allows characters to have certain talents or flaws, allowing for a greater depth of customization.
Of course, it's not easy to fuck up a system like that, but I'm sure Raythlu finds a way.
Let's look at some of the Human flaws, shall we?
Oh, yeah, because these flaws magically go away if a character gets Turned. So, those points you gain by taking them are essentially free. To its (minimum) credit, the game does say that you can't take more than 10 points of Flaws. Although, if you wanted to go for cheese, you could make a crippled, brittle-boned, deaf guy with bad vision, find one of the Waifumonsters, and be magically cured from all of that. Free 10 character creation points!
(also note that the game designers were too lazy to separate the merits and flaws into individual sections, and just kind of mixed them in together)
Okay, it looks like I was wrong. Becoming a Magical Fag doesn't make your arm/eyes grow back. Then why even make a separate flaw? And how does "missing your fucking legs" not cause any penalties besides "social"?
Also "sexual perversion" is a mechanical flaw
You can fucking play as a BDSM gear-clad furry dragging his animu bodypillow across the wasteland, and be mechanically supported. That mental image just fucking turned this game around.
The "Impaired Immunity" flaw is pretty much "you aren't a super magical uberman, and can get a cold".
Next time on Randall Reads a Terrible RPG:
"Some of these rules are not 100% realistic"
- Joined
- Apr 15, 2014
RANDALL READS A TERRIBLE RPG (LIFE AFTER DEATH EDITION):
Part 13 (We're back baby!)
I haven't updated this thread in months due tohaving the attention span of a ADD-riddled hamster important real life issues that I needed to deal with.
Now that I have some more free time, I present you with the rules on how to play Twink Hatred Guy
We start off with a decent enough introduction to the idea of Rule 0: That it's supposed to be a game, and the GM can fudge the rules to ensure that things are fun.
The first thing the rules bring up is Game Time vs Real Time, and how that influences combat rounds. This is something that pretty much every RPG deals with. D&D has each round of combat being equal to 6 "game time" seconds, while GURPS just has every round be a second. Wraethulu decides to go the "stupid game design method" and breaks things up into Phases which consist of 5 one-second "Slices". Character's Base Action rating seems to do something with how many actions a character can make during a phase. Oh, but in situations where that doesn't apply, use some bullshit on the table up there. WHY THE FUCK IS THIS NECESSARY?
Also faster weapons allow you to make more attacks per round, but it's tots balanced because slower weapons do more damage.
Spoiler: it's a simple "Roll Under" mechanic. Thank god, because while they'll fuck it up, they can't fuck it up too badly.
Wraethlu uses a Roll Under with a 1d20 mechanic, a system that dates back to early D&D. It has a similar Action Modifier system that can adjust the level a character's stat is for a roll. Okay, basic stuff. It also has a Success Level system, where the difference between a character's skill and the roll of the dice is the Success Level becomes the Action Modifier for anyone attempting to fuck with whatever the character was doing. Okay, here's how this is supposed to work:
I do like the big list of modifiers, and the descriptions of what would cause them. It's one of the few things that this game actually did okay with.
Next Time on Randall Reads a Terrible RPG:
"Virgin Experience Points"
Part 13 (We're back baby!)
I haven't updated this thread in months due to
Now that I have some more free time, I present you with the rules on how to play Twink Hatred Guy
Also faster weapons allow you to make more attacks per round, but it's tots balanced because slower weapons do more damage.
Wraethlu uses a Roll Under with a 1d20 mechanic, a system that dates back to early D&D. It has a similar Action Modifier system that can adjust the level a character's stat is for a roll. Okay, basic stuff. It also has a Success Level system, where the difference between a character's skill and the roll of the dice is the Success Level becomes the Action Modifier for anyone attempting to fuck with whatever the character was doing. Okay, here's how this is supposed to work:
Of course, as you may immediately recognize, this means that someone with a decent enough skill level (or a lot of modifiers) and a lucky roll could make a Success Threshold so high that it's literally impossible for anyone save the most skilled or prepared people to mess with it.
Next Time on Randall Reads a Terrible RPG:
"Virgin Experience Points"
- Joined
- Dec 11, 2017
This game sound like fun to watch others play with while drunk. The people who played it might experience excruciating mental pain but hey, the gay rockers will magically make it all go away.
- Joined
- Apr 15, 2014
RANDALL READS A TERRIBLE RPG
Part 14: The Virgin Experience Point vs The Chad XP
Now we get the standard section on Experience Points, something that just about every RPG needs because if you aren't ripping off D&D you're not doing it right.
The "Virgin Experience points" here relate specifically to a system where the GM is supposed to give out double XP to characters when the first preform a specific act. So, murdering a random human would be worth 2 XP. But if the human is a black guy, and the Waythtoo in question never killed a black person before, then they get 4 XP. Of course, you can easily see how this could lead to characters fucking off from the main story and wandering around the wasteland doing random things they've never done before in search of those sweet sweet virgin XPs. Which would make for a much better game than misanthropic magical faggot quest.
The rest of the experience section is just standard boring shit on how to upgrade your character, so I'm skipping that.
Next up is Fate Points. Yay.
This works pretty much the same as any "spend one of these to not die/not fuck up this roll" system, with the one difference being that you can buy Fate points with XP here.
Also there's some stuff on how to mechanically model a human character who got assfucked with the acid jizz and turned into a Homo Demon
Also, you can play as a women, because the bishie faggots only convert dudes and because all men are evil die cis scum.
After some boring shit about optional energy rules (basically the amount of points you have before you crash into slumber) we get the Psyche abilities, which are totally not magic except they are.
So, Rayholu get telepathy, the ability to ignore hot and cold, and healing magic. The Mary Sue bullshit powers increase!
We also get info on Composure, which is basically how whigged out your Mary Sue faggot is.
Basically, if you go against the Way of The Marysuethulhu, you lose composure, making you become an uggo and stressed out and shit. Man, fuck this shit, I need a drink.
Part 14: The Virgin Experience Point vs The Chad XP
Now we get the standard section on Experience Points, something that just about every RPG needs because if you aren't ripping off D&D you're not doing it right.
The rest of the experience section is just standard boring shit on how to upgrade your character, so I'm skipping that.
Next up is Fate Points. Yay.
Also there's some stuff on how to mechanically model a human character who got assfucked with the acid jizz and turned into a Homo Demon
We also get info on Composure, which is basically how whigged out your Mary Sue faggot is.
- Joined
- Jun 27, 2014
RANDALL READS A TERRIBLE RPG
Part 14: The Virgin Experience Point vs The Chad XP
Now we get the standard section on Experience Points, something that just about every RPG needs because if you aren't ripping off D&D you're not doing it right.
The "Virgin Experience points" here relate specifically to a system where the GM is supposed to give out double XP to characters when the first preform a specific act. So, murdering a random human would be worth 2 XP. But if the human is a black guy, and the Waythtoo in question never killed a black person before, then they get 4 XP. Of course, you can easily see how this could lead to characters fucking off from the main story and wandering around the wasteland doing random things they've never done before in search of those sweet sweet virgin XPs. Which would make for a much better game than misanthropic magical faggot quest.
The rest of the experience section is just standard boring shit on how to upgrade your character, so I'm skipping that.
Next up is Fate Points. Yay.
This works pretty much the same as any "spend one of these to not die/not fuck up this roll" system, with the one difference being that you can buy Fate points with XP here.
Also there's some stuff on how to mechanically model a human character who got assfucked with the acid jizz and turned into a Homo Demon
Also, you can play as a women, because the bishie faggots only convert dudes and because all men are evil die cis scum.
After some boring shit about optional energy rules (basically the amount of points you have before you crash into slumber) we get the Psyche abilities, which are totally not magic except they are.
So, Rayholu get telepathy, the ability to ignore hot and cold, and healing magic. The Mary Sue bullshit powers increase!
We also get info on Composure, which is basically how whigged out your Mary Sue faggot is.
Basically, if you go against the Way of The Marysuethulhu, you lose composure, making you become an uggo and stressed out and shit. Man, fuck this shit, I need a drink.
One of the fucking funniest things is that due to the fucking font they use I keep misreading "inception" as "inceldom" for like a split-second, and it makes me laugh every time.
Seriously, watch what happens when you replace "incept" with "incel" and "inception" with "inceldom":
- Joined
- Apr 15, 2014
Holy shit I never noticed that. Someone needs to go back to the earlier parts and do the same thing, this is fucking amazing.One of the fucking funniest things is that due to the fucking font they use I keep misreading "inception" as "inceldom" for like a split-second, and it makes me laugh every time.
Seriously, watch what happens when you replace "incept" with "incel" and "inception" with "inceldom":
- Joined
- Apr 15, 2014
After a nearly 2 month hiatus, we're back with
RANDALL READS A TERRIBLE RPG
Part 15: The Fart of War (because any joke more creative would be too good for this game)
Time to actually learn how combat in this system works
So according to this, combat in this system is tots accurate to how weapons fuck people up in the real world, and should be avoided at all costs. We'll see why that's bullshit in a bit.
But first off, we need to talk about Combat Styles
Quick things of note
HAVE A COMBAT SYSTEM THAT ACTUALLY FUCKING FUNCTIONS!
Seriously, I'm going over this shit after being gone a while, and the combat system is just fucking awful. Just figuring out your basic skills takes about 30 minutes of flipping between the relevant sections to get the information on Combat Skills, General Action whatever, and Combat Styles (WHICH DON'T ACTUALLY SEEM TO DO ANYTHING OTHER THAN SERVE AS AN ARBITRARY SKILL CAP/ANNOYANCE).
Seriously, go read that shit in the "Using Combat Styles" section. Style has no functional purpose that couldn't be merged in with weapon skill. It's just there to serve as an annoying thing to dump character points into.
And it only gets worse. Much, much worse.
How combat time works varies greatly system to system. D&D tends to simplify it into "One round of in game combat is equal to 6 seconds/1 minute of real time). GURPS simply resolves it on a second-by-second basis, with each round being a one second action.
This being Wraethlu, they just kludged the two systems together into an awkward mess. When you have to preface your combat round rules with "this next section is complex", maybe your system is shit.
Where to begin? Well, there are Combat Phases and Action Slices. Initiative is rolled at the start of each Combat Phase. Each Combat Phase is made up of 5 Action Slices, which are each 1 second. Based on your character speed and weapons speed on the table (which is helpfully not provided in this section), you can have 5 attacks per Combat Phase (or more!) Of course, you're probably going to have less, which means you get to look on another table (yay) to determine in what action slices your character can act. That's right, EVERYBODY MOVES IN EVERY ACTION SLICE, and initiative is to determine what action happens first. So if you're too slow, you have to wait for four rounds of RPG combat before you can actually do anything. And then once you swing and miss with your mace, ROLL INITIATIVE AGAIN AND WAIT FOUR MORE TURNS TO MISS!
The next few sections aren't particularly interesting, and just seem to be your standard shitty RPG mechanics. Combat is a roll under your score on a d20 dealy-o, the only kinda stupid thing being that every attack on another character is a contested role, with success (if you both rolled well) being determined by who rolled under their score the most. But you don't want to hear about that shit! Let's get to the stupid stuff!
In D&D and Savage Worlds, armor is abstracted by increasing the die roll needed to actually hit and deal damage, a simplified but elegant system that puts ease of play over realism. Other systems simply have armor reduce the damage a character takes from a weapon by a given amount.
Wraethulhu takes the second option, and manages to fuck it up.
Each suit of armor has an Armour Value, and each weapon has an Armour Penetration. The AV is the number needed by the AP to fully penetrate the armor.
If the AP is less than the AV, but more than half, than the character (and armor, need that REALISM) takes half damage. So, in a sense it's the D&D system and the Damage Reduction system kludged into one, retarded thing. But what's this? More than half the AV?
Yes, because if the AP is less than half (but the other part says more than half it's like they didn't edit this because they were too busy jerking off to their magic mutant vampire Griffith look-alikes) than All damage is negated. Including the damage to the armor.
Oh, and what's this? You can layer armor? Which means that the AP of any weapon that penetrates the first layer is reduced by the AV of the first layer? Hmm, let's see how we can abuse this.
Let's say that our example, Fagules McMunkin, has himself a nice fancy set of plate mail (10 AV). But wait, there's more! He also has a set of chainmail underneath that (8 AV).
Fagules is attacked by a rape bandit with a katana. The katana's AP of 6 bypasses the plate armor, but deals half damage. But what's this? The AP of the weapon is reduced to 0, meaning that it clangs harmlessly off the chainmail.
Next, Fagules is hit by a guy with a tomahawk. The 13 AP easily bypasses the plate mail. However, the reduced AP of 3 is completely blocked by the chainmail. In fact, there are only 3 melee weapons listed that actually could deal damage!
Let's ramp it up a notch.
A rape bandit with a open fires! It's not very effective, as the bullets cannot penetrate that chainmail.
Next up, the sniper in the clock tower! And again, nothing fucking happens! In fact, the only guns that can do anything are the .50 Browning and grenade launchers.
Ladies and gentlemen, we have created The Wall
The penalty for this is the massive -9 to all combat actions, meaning that for all 5 rounds Fagules flail ineffectually trying to land a blow. But that doesn't really matter when you're fucking invincible.
Now, let's make it even more stupid. Right now we're still mortal, as the plate mail can take damage and will eventually break.
By replacing the regular steel in the Plate armor with Silvered Steel, the AV of the plate is doubled to 20, for the same weight and bulk penalty. Now pretty much everything is bouncing off the outer layer of armor, to say nothing of the chainmail.
But wait, there's more! Armor can be upgraded, up to a 100% increase statwise. While this would take 400 hours of in-game time to complete, an AV of 40 is more than worth it. At this point, the chainmail isn't even needed, as there's only 2 weapons that can actually harm The Wall. Heavy machine guns and grenade launchers.
Let's add the cherry on top of the layer of rule abuse. The best armor in the system is the Carbon Composite, with a whopping 23 AV. Let's switch out the chainmail with that.
The Wall is now completely immune to any-fucking-thing. Machine gun fire just bounces off. Grenades do nothing. Flamethrowers?
Well, let me just cap off this whole parade of ineptitude by noting that the AP of a flamethrower is 3. Which means that slapping a set of chainmail on yourself will make you immune to fucking flamethrowers.
"Some of these rules may not be 100% realistic" should be on the fucking cover of the game.
NEXT TIME ON RANDALL READS A TERRIBLE RPG:
"Wait, we're still not done with combat rules?"
RANDALL READS A TERRIBLE RPG
Part 15: The Fart of War (because any joke more creative would be too good for this game)
Time to actually learn how combat in this system works
But first off, we need to talk about Combat Styles
- What the actual fuck is that character art? Cowboy boots, plad pants, hoop earings, and fucking Predator dreds.
- How Sung Ping sounds like a 1920s Vaudeville character played by a Jewish guy in yellowface.
- "You have seen nothing until you have watched a thousand white horses race across the sky while your fellow hara chant in the background". I'm sure this sentence had some form of meaning to someone, but damned if I know.
- Snowbane is a big guy for you.
HAVE A COMBAT SYSTEM THAT ACTUALLY FUCKING FUNCTIONS!
Seriously, I'm going over this shit after being gone a while, and the combat system is just fucking awful. Just figuring out your basic skills takes about 30 minutes of flipping between the relevant sections to get the information on Combat Skills, General Action whatever, and Combat Styles (WHICH DON'T ACTUALLY SEEM TO DO ANYTHING OTHER THAN SERVE AS AN ARBITRARY SKILL CAP/ANNOYANCE).
Seriously, go read that shit in the "Using Combat Styles" section. Style has no functional purpose that couldn't be merged in with weapon skill. It's just there to serve as an annoying thing to dump character points into.
And it only gets worse. Much, much worse.
This being Wraethlu, they just kludged the two systems together into an awkward mess. When you have to preface your combat round rules with "this next section is complex", maybe your system is shit.
Where to begin? Well, there are Combat Phases and Action Slices. Initiative is rolled at the start of each Combat Phase. Each Combat Phase is made up of 5 Action Slices, which are each 1 second. Based on your character speed and weapons speed on the table (which is helpfully not provided in this section), you can have 5 attacks per Combat Phase (or more!) Of course, you're probably going to have less, which means you get to look on another table (yay) to determine in what action slices your character can act. That's right, EVERYBODY MOVES IN EVERY ACTION SLICE, and initiative is to determine what action happens first. So if you're too slow, you have to wait for four rounds of RPG combat before you can actually do anything. And then once you swing and miss with your mace, ROLL INITIATIVE AGAIN AND WAIT FOUR MORE TURNS TO MISS!
The next few sections aren't particularly interesting, and just seem to be your standard shitty RPG mechanics. Combat is a roll under your score on a d20 dealy-o, the only kinda stupid thing being that every attack on another character is a contested role, with success (if you both rolled well) being determined by who rolled under their score the most. But you don't want to hear about that shit! Let's get to the stupid stuff!
Wraethulhu takes the second option, and manages to fuck it up.
Each suit of armor has an Armour Value, and each weapon has an Armour Penetration. The AV is the number needed by the AP to fully penetrate the armor.
If the AP is less than the AV, but more than half, than the character (and armor, need that REALISM) takes half damage. So, in a sense it's the D&D system and the Damage Reduction system kludged into one, retarded thing. But what's this? More than half the AV?
Yes, because if the AP is less than half (but the other part says more than half it's like they didn't edit this because they were too busy jerking off to their magic mutant vampire Griffith look-alikes) than All damage is negated. Including the damage to the armor.
Oh, and what's this? You can layer armor? Which means that the AP of any weapon that penetrates the first layer is reduced by the AV of the first layer? Hmm, let's see how we can abuse this.
Fagules is attacked by a rape bandit with a katana. The katana's AP of 6 bypasses the plate armor, but deals half damage. But what's this? The AP of the weapon is reduced to 0, meaning that it clangs harmlessly off the chainmail.
Next, Fagules is hit by a guy with a tomahawk. The 13 AP easily bypasses the plate mail. However, the reduced AP of 3 is completely blocked by the chainmail. In fact, there are only 3 melee weapons listed that actually could deal damage!
Let's ramp it up a notch.
A rape bandit with a
open fires! It's not very effective, as the bullets cannot penetrate that chainmail.Next up, the sniper in the clock tower! And again, nothing fucking happens! In fact, the only guns that can do anything are the .50 Browning and grenade launchers.
Ladies and gentlemen, we have created The Wall
The penalty for this is the massive -9 to all combat actions, meaning that for all 5 rounds Fagules flail ineffectually trying to land a blow. But that doesn't really matter when you're fucking invincible.
Now, let's make it even more stupid. Right now we're still mortal, as the plate mail can take damage and will eventually break.
By replacing the regular steel in the Plate armor with Silvered Steel, the AV of the plate is doubled to 20, for the same weight and bulk penalty. Now pretty much everything is bouncing off the outer layer of armor, to say nothing of the chainmail.
But wait, there's more! Armor can be upgraded, up to a 100% increase statwise. While this would take 400 hours of in-game time to complete, an AV of 40 is more than worth it. At this point, the chainmail isn't even needed, as there's only 2 weapons that can actually harm The Wall. Heavy machine guns and grenade launchers.
Let's add the cherry on top of the layer of rule abuse. The best armor in the system is the Carbon Composite, with a whopping 23 AV. Let's switch out the chainmail with that.
The Wall is now completely immune to any-fucking-thing. Machine gun fire just bounces off. Grenades do nothing. Flamethrowers?
Well, let me just cap off this whole parade of ineptitude by noting that the AP of a flamethrower is 3. Which means that slapping a set of chainmail on yourself will make you immune to fucking flamethrowers.
"Some of these rules may not be 100% realistic" should be on the fucking cover of the game.
NEXT TIME ON RANDALL READS A TERRIBLE RPG:
"Wait, we're still not done with combat rules?"