TTRPGs & D&D

[TheSameIdiot]

Share details about your favorite TTRPG systems, questions about running or playing the game, and campaign stories.

 

[TheSameIdiot]

This will be an ongoing issue for me, so I wanted to repost my thoughts from the original Articulated Thoughts forum here:

I actively dislike D&D's rules. The character customization is great, but the combat is excruciating. I find it low-stakes and far too slow.

Much to my players' vexation, I've made it my personal quest to find a rulebook I actually like. I want a rules-lite system with quick combat and extensive character customization. I'm basically looking for a unicorn. It's easy to find two of the three, but all three is impossible.

OSR systems like Shadowdark are rules-lite and have quick, high-stakes combat. The characters aren't customizable, though. Pathfinder has excellent character customization (maybe the best?), but the rulebook is absurdly long, and combat is a slog.

I wound up running Worlds Without Number a few months ago, and that's as close as I've come. It's kind of an amalgam of heroic and realistic combat systems. The rules are reasonable, character customization is fairly extensive, and combat was fast.

I'm planning to run 13th Age in an upcoming one-shot. I'm going to run that or WWN in my next campaign.

 

[docsilence]

After years of running four interconnected campaigns I think I'm about to get it down to a manageable two and hoping to make time to run a few other systems as well. Hoping to find a system that folks latch onto--I generally average 2-3 years of campaigns with D&D and one group is on its fourth consecutive story set in the same world. There's something reassuring (and honestly, as the forever DM, relaxing) about being able to just pull from my own lore without even thinking about it. But I'm really itching to do something sci-fi. I backed the updated Expanse rules last month and I've got one player who has fully invested in Mothership, which I own but haven't run much yet.

 

[TheSameIdiot]

Having played Worlds Without Number, I feel like I can recommend Stars Without Number. Pathfinder also has a sci-fi equivalent called Starfinder.

I haven't played Mothership or Paranoia yet, but they're sci-fi systems I plan to try eventually.

 

[docsilence]

I actually downloaded Words and Stars Without Number a few weeks back. I really like Free League's ALIEN (which of course they are now kickstarting a 2nd edition to, roughly three months after I learned to run it ) but I think my players want something where you grow and expand your heroic abilities over time, and it's long-term (mechanical) character development's a bit anemic.

Been looking into Coriolis a lot lately. The lore's a bit much for me to memorize which makes me think I'll probably lean on a hombrew-friendly game like Mothership instead.

 

[Damien]

This will be an ongoing issue for me, so I wanted to repost my thoughts from the original Articulated Thoughts forum here:

I actively dislike D&D's rules. The character customization is great, but the combat is excruciating. I find it low-stakes and far too slow.

Much to my players' vexation, I've made it my personal quest to find a rulebook I actually like. I want a rules-lite system with quick combat and extensive character customization. I'm basically looking for a unicorn. It's easy to find two of the three, but all three is impossible.

OSR systems like Shadowdark are rules-lite and have quick, high-stakes combat. The characters aren't customizable, though. Pathfinder has excellent character customization (maybe the best?), but the rulebook is absurdly long, and combat is a slog.

I wound up running Worlds Without Number a few months ago, and that's as close as I've come. It's kind of an amalgam of heroic and realistic combat systems. The rules are reasonable, character customization is fairly extensive, and combat was fast.

I'm planning to run 13th Age in an upcoming one-shot. I'm going to run that or WWN in my next campaign.

I'd agree with these criticisms of D&D as a system. And I think it goes back to what I said in the previous forum about D&D trying to be something enticing to new players all the time, but also refusing to let go of its past because it doesn't want to alienate those of us that were playing in 3rd Edition, 2nd Edition, and even before that. So it has all these weird vestigial elements that are just the tabletop equivalent of junk-code which actively make the game more obtuse, more difficult to master, and less fun to play.
D&D remains at the top only because of marketing. It's managed to become the brand name of tabletop gaming. But unless what you want is to play D&D itself, there's almost certainly a completely different game out there that better accomplishes what any individual gamer actually wants out of a game.
Even Pathfinder, I would argue, actually does 'just regular D&D' better than D&D does. And I find the argument about Pathfinder being too crunchy to be kind of misleading, because I feel like D&D is just as crunchy in most ways -- but also just less transparent about it. When you sit down with the books, Pathfinder (to me) is easier to follow and, in fact, easier to adjust and tweak, because its systems are laid open to the GM. That's my take, at least.

And D&D is a fun game in most respects. I don't mean to shit on it. But it's just the worst version of itself that it can be. When something is a better you than you, something's been lost and a refocusing is warranted.

I've said it before but I am really curious how Matt Colville's Draw Steel turns out. It -sounds- like it's going to deal with a lot of the D&Disms people don't like, such as convoluted ability trees and sloggy combat. BUT, the impression I get is that it's not going to be as customizable as D&D or Pathfinder in the interests of avoiding the pitfall of having so many combat options that you can't possibly balance it all properly and it becomes a nightmare to keep track of. Can't wait to read it, even if I don't get to play it.

Maybe that's why 'great customization' and 'rules-lite' is such a unicorn. They're almost base-level incompatible ideas. Either the customization has to be all in your flavour text, or you need to expand your crunch for every new bit of customization. I'm not really sure what the solution there is - especially if you want a traditional fantasy game, which will naturally have tons more inherent customization options than something like a historical game.

 

[TheSameIdiot]

The "junk code" analogy is apt.

I agree with you about Pathfinder. I ran my first campaign in Pathfinder, and while the rules are complex, they're not that different than D&D's rulebook. D&D has become like Monopoly where everyone plays their own house rules and ignores what's in the text. It's become so ubiquitous in part because of that. Character customization is what it is, but everyone runs the game their own way anyway. We all roll the same D20 for perception checks, but how many people check the rulebook for information on flanking rules? It's based on what the DM and their players like.

You're right that I'll likely never get great customization and rules-lite in the same package. The likeliest course of action is to run Shadowdark and add house rules to allow for more combat flexibility or run WWN/13th Age and nerf the health numbers.

Draw Steel sounds promising, but a few of the reviews I've seen have complained about the tanky health blocks. That aspect makes me nervous. I'm curious to see how it plays when the final game comes out. If I could make one change to D&D, it'd be to lower player and enemy HP blocks. That shit makes combat interminable. Great, I hit the dragon. Now we all have to do it over and over again for six rounds because it has 300 HP for some godforesaken reason.

I don't think I ever posted an overview of my first campaign. I'll try to hit the highlights once I finish tweaking this site.

 

[Damien]

You're not wrong. It's definitely true that everyone plays D&D their own specific way. Probably a reason why it's so hard to find a group you feel compatible with fully. Everyone I talk to seems to always feel like they're making concessions to play D&D with their group - even if they love their group. Because everyone is, on some level, picking and choosing which rules they care about and even how/when to apply them.

Even in my games that I DM'd, for D&D and Pathfinder, my most common two houserules were an across the board reduction in HP, and some variation of 'mook' rules. Because a paladin shouldn't have to slam his holy magic sword into a goblin more than one time to kill it. Period. If he does have to, your game has probably failed at a core conceit of heroic fantasy.

I saw the same complaint about Draw Steel, but I'd say the important thing here is that it's not even finished and Matt & Co. seem extremely receptive to criticism and feedback. The downside of that is that I could see it being a LONG time before that game is printed and in-hand for that exact reason.


I wish I still had all my old campaign notes/diaries. A bunch of my old 3.5 floppy disks (yes, really) got corrupted quite a few years ago, and then I had a computer problem maybe 5 years later. Between the two things, I basically lost everything I ever had that was TTRPG-related. Super bummer.

 

[Damien]

As an addendum to this; I was actually just listening to an old interview with James from MCDM about rewards in Draw Steel.

This makes the game sound even better. Somehow, in all the conversations/interviews I've watched/heard, this ended up mostly being new information and I'm pretty excited by it. I may even pick the game up when it does release and run it for my wife and son.

 

[Fletch]

I haven't actually *played* any TTRPGs in ages, but I still collect some books because I'm an absolute nerd.

My fantasy game of choice is ACKS, but I hear there's some drama about the writer that I don't care about but might keep people from wanting to invest in the line.

I think a lot of the slogginess of modern day RPGs comes from newer games being *about* combat and adding a bunch of character options and status effects to liven it up. ACKS is based on the old Basic D&D engine from when combat was considered an equal (if not lesser) element of game play to exploration, resource management, and loot recovery.

The game also features a sort of menu option to creating your own class. It's not exactly the same as character options because you're not choosing new abilities at each level, but more like setting your path at the start where you're deciding your character will be a religious assassin with some thief, cleric and fighter abilities. Or whatever.


I can also come close to recommending Savage Worlds for anyone looking for fast combat and character customization. My only experience with the game system is from the original Deadlands rules and those weren't exactly fast, but all reviews of the current Savage Worlds system is that it's streamed way back to make encounters quicker and more exciting. It's a universal system so can easily be used for a fantasy game.

 

[docsilence]

Free League got me for their updated ALIEN game. I've never been disappointed in their stuff and while I really liked the first edition, it was a lil anemic in a spot or two so I'm hoping they jazzed it up just a bit. Kickstarter ends tomorrow. (Best part about Free League is those guys turn their crowdfunding projects around crazy fast, so I bet I'll be able to run it sooner than expected.)

I'm plotting a 5e one-shot for a friend's husband's 50th birthday - he's a lifelong gamer who is shy with new groups, his wife was in my weekly game for three years and really wants to be able to game with him. My partner (who said she never learned out to play pretend til this friend of ours got her to play D&D with us) is going to join in for a three person game. I kinda want to make this one magical cos they're all people who enjoy RPGs but haven't had time to engage for a few years.

 

[TheSameIdiot]

I ran my 13th Age one-shot last week. It's an excellent system. I'm not sure I'd call it rules-lite, but the rules are digestible and make for compelling gameplay. For anyone looking to run it themselves, note that I'm ignoring the Icon system. I homebrew 95% of my TTRPG content so I don't need extra lore getting in the way. My players loved 13A, as well, so we'll be running that for the campaign.

Unfortunately, I've become infatuated with running a sci-fi campaign over the last few weeks. I'm not sure where it came from. I wouldn't call myself a big science fiction fan. I love Firefly and Cowboy Bebop (which will serve as the inspiration for this eventual sci-fi campaign), and I like Star Trek and Star Wars, but I often struggle my way through sci-fi novels. This passing fancy has derailed my desire to plan for my imminent fantasy campaign. It's a problem.

I'm planning to run either Traveller or Stars Without Number for the sci-fi campaign.

 

[docsilence]

I actually really love the design of the recent Cowboy Bebop TTRPG that came out - has some really fascinating elements. Haven't run it fully but it leans in on the noir/musical queues aspect of the original. I keep looking at Coriolis as a potential system to run for a sci-fi game when I have time.

I was signing books at an event this morning and one of the audience members walked up to me and said "do you play D&D? You seem like the type" and I was like: a) accurate, and b) way to call me out, dude! (Gonna be laughing about it for days.)

 

[TheSameIdiot]

My friends and I have played for over a year and a half. If you're wondering: yes, BG3 inspired us. We ran a short-lived game pre-pandemic, but it didn't last more than five sessions.

Last weekend, we finished the game we started more than 18 months ago. It took nearly 50 sessions.

When I finished my own campaign last fall, my players mentioned how bittersweet it was. (I forced them to manage two different campaigns per week, but my campaign was only 18 sessions and took less than three months. In retrospect, it was an insane ask. Still, I'm glad I did it.) I didn't understand how they could feel melancholy about the end of the campaign. Despite my ups and downs with my character and this campaign, I'm feeling the same now.

Both campaigns taught me a lot. My takeaways:

• Have a session zero. Seriously! We thought we'd get by without one in both campaigns.
• Because we didn't have a session zero, we had no party balance. We were mostly lucked out, but that last fight was a doozy without a dedicated healer.
• Pay attention. I live across the country, so we play online by necessity. In an ideal world, we'd play in person. Because we're online, players can peruse the internet or multitask as they see fit. I don't think you need to have 100% focus on the game at all times, but you're rewarded for paying attention more often than not. Combat usually makes my eyes glaze over, but I paid attention for the full five hours of combat during our final session. I was making smarter tactical decisions and having more fun because I was paying attention. I'm not a fiddle-with-action-figures collector, but having a toy in my hands killed the desire to check off an item on my to-do list while playing. If you have other suggestions for what else I can do to focus on the game, I'm all ears.
• For me, playing one character that long was torturous. It didn't help that it was my first character and I made a lot of bad backstory and build choices, but I can't imagine I'd enjoy playing any character for that long.
• The campaign was too long. I could've told you that 50 sessions was too many before we started. My GM heard that feedback a lot. I hope he keeps it in mind for his next campaign.

Next, we have two first-time GMs running their first campaigns. Then I'm up again.

I promise I'll write up the plot for this campaign, my first campaign, and my next campaign at some point. My best ideas come from stealing and tweaking other GMs' ideas, so I'd love to start that up here.

 

[docsilence]

Perhaps the single greatest line in any D&D game I have ever DMed was uttered tonight:
"Even the necromancer won't have sex with a puppet in a church."