All about Pen & Paper rpgs and their relation to video games.

[Frostyfirefly]

As much *****ing as I've done in this thread, it's because I've discovered some really cool stuff lately that's just a little soured by bad game experiences in recent years.

Thanks for the Podcast Monkey; that's the salvageable thing about bad experiences, they help you identify the good stuff more easily.

 

[Scythuz]

Before I start, I should probably point out that I have very limited experience with pen and paper rpgs, it's something I've always wanted to have as a hobby, but, due to the attitudes of people in my area, never truly got to sink my teeth into.

Anyway moving on, for anybody who's played it, what do you think of Talisman?  I had a go of Talisman Prologue, a pc version of the game and it's made me think of a bigger question.

What do you think of pen and paper games that have (in one form or another) been ported to pc?  Do you think they replicate the experience well?

 

[Frostyfirefly]

Before I start, I should probably point out that I have very limited experience with pen and paper rpgs, it's something I've always wanted to have as a hobby, but, due to the attitudes of people in my area, never truly got to sink my teeth into.

Anyway moving on, for anybody who's played it, what do you think of Talisman?  I had a go of Talisman Prologue, a pc version of the game and it's made me think of a bigger question.

What do you think of pen and paper games that have (in one form or another) been ported to pc?  Do you think they replicate the experience well?

My area is pretty similar, I've had to grab groups as they come and go, but nothing really permanent; we had great games while it lasted though. If you want to play more pen & paper, you should consider what I said in a post above, about playing by forum, chat, etc. It's really cool once you get the hang of it. I'm currently running a few games at rpggeek, but it would be cool if I could organize something with people from this forum if there's enough interest.

I've only watched how others play Talisman, it seems fun, but I always hear people complaining about too much randomness and the length of the game. The Warhammer 40k version, Relic (that's why I said the Emperor thing in Iriili's update) seems to have solved some of the issues.

I think p&p games ported to PC are fairly decent, but still lacking in a lot of areas. For example, skills like climbing, swiming, jumping, etc. are rarely integrated into the system, and most skill based characters get the short end of the stick because of it; it's no wonder most players choose a Warrior or Caster type in those games

 

[Scythuz]

@Frostyfirefly - I'm not sure how we'd get over the hurdles of: getting enough people (include availability as well as general interest here), getting said people set up (particularly me with my lack of knowledge of all things p&p) and the biggest one of all... time zones.  I'd probably be up for giving it a shot if we could somehow fit it all together though.

About the additional skills...  Have any games thought of creating classes where their combat abilities (and possibly disable trap/ anything relating to saving throws and the like) are directly affected by their level of climbing, swimming, jumping, running etc?  It could be interesting if done right don't you think?

 

[Frostyfirefly]

@ Scythuz: If it's play by forum, it's incredibly easy. We create a forum post for that game, rpggeek.com is amazing for that, and we post once every one or two days, so that pretty much solves the time zone issue. We would only need 2 - 4 more people, and the rules can be explained in a very simple way in most games. Here, let me give you a few examples,

My Carcosa game (in character and out of character/rules threads):

http://rpggeek.com/thread/910516/lotfp-carcosa-the-bone-sorcerer-ic-mature

http://rpggeek.com/thread/909014/lotfp-carcosa-the-bone-sorcerer-ooc

My EPOCH game (in character and rules threads):

http://rpggeek.com/thread/1079999/red-gold-one-shot-mature-ic-thread

http://rpggeek.com/thread/1078594/epoch-one-shot-red-gold-rules-thread

The carcosa game is semi complex, and EPOCH is very light on rules, both were played with people with no knowledge of the rules whatsoever. And we have slightly more complex games like Mutant Epoch using all the optional rules:

http://rpggeek.com/thread/1006913/the-mutant-epoch-the-crevice-pbf-ic-thread-mature

In that last example, players control 2 or more characters at the same time, and frankly, it's quite easy. 

 

[Scythuz]

@Frostyfirefly - Yep this is what I was worried about.  It's like a whole new world and nothing makes sense to me haha.  I do want to try and get into it but I think I need to start really small.  I think to do that I'm gonna need to start off with playing the games in person with friends.  

Are there any games that you'd recommend for difficulties from easy to hard (in terms of learning curve).  3 per difficulty: easy, medium, hard... would be perfect.  I have this master plan involving getting some friends to play it once I move to their house.  

They're the type of people who are very open-minded and already play video games that require some learning to play so I think I have a good chance of pulling this off, but I need some enticing games to do so.

 

[Frostyfirefly]

Ok Scythuz, in my opinion:

The easiest and most economic game is Labyrinth Lord, you can get it for free at drivethrurpg.com, download the basic version first, there is a free advanced version there too for when you master the basic game. You only need the classic 7 polyhedral dice, or a good virtual free roller like this one:

 http://purplesorcerer.com/news/?page_id=215

The medium difficulty rpg could be Savage Worlds, but that turns into easy after a few plays.

A hard difficulty (for beginners) would be Pathfinder with all it's rules and feats.

I'm planning on opening a Dungeon Crawl Classics play by forum game mid January - early February, I will let you know in case you want to take the plunge.

 

[Touchfuzzy]

My core RPG group is the same people I've been playing with since like, Elementary school. I kid you not. The main 4 are my brother, my best friend from Kindergarten through high school, his brother, and me. The rest of my group is people tangential to the rest of us. My wife, my brother's girlfriend, coworkers, stuff like that. I've always found that making gamers out of friends makes for better games than trying to befriend existing gamers .

 

[Frostyfirefly]

I've always found that making gamers out of friends makes for better games than trying to befriend existing gamers .

That sounds great! For me it's been the other way around, my family and closest friends are not very much into the rpg vibe; they love to play board games though. I guess it's the whole having to play as someone else thing (roleplay in it's purest sense), they are very reserved people that find it difficult to inhabit an imaginary persona.

Most of my newest friends I've met through forum and online play.

 

[Scythuz]

@Frostyfirefly - Forgot to say thank you.  I'll be starting to convince my main friend from the group soon, once he's convinced the rest shall fall.  Also I noticed some medieval history games for free on there.  I'll definitely be checking them out and you should too being a fellow history enthusiast

@Touchfuzzy - That's so lucky, one game of D&D with my family and they never wanted to play it again.  Even monopoly got more chances, I guess I'm a harsh dungeon master.  Luckily I did manage to get all my friends into video games so it's not all bad.  Do you have any recommendations of your own?

 

[Frostyfirefly]

@ Scythuz: No problem, I love talking about games (hence, the name of my channel). Yes, so many cool historical games to try, and some with cool weird twists as well, for example, Weird Wars is a World War II game with a supernatural twist; that one isn't free though, but it's certainly worth keeping in mind. 

 

[Omnimental]

I'm currently groupless, myself.  Not enough people in this area to advertise for a group, and most of my regular players have conflicting schedules. 

 

[Frostyfirefly]

I'm currently groupless, myself.  Not enough people in this area to advertise for a group, and most of my regular players have conflicting schedules. 

As I was telling Scythuz earlier, I plan on opening a new play by forum group at rpggeek.com mid January, we would play Dungeon Crawl Classics, maybe you've heard about it, a wacky dungeon crawl in the spirit of 1st Ed Dungeons and Dragons (if not, check out my review on Youtube).

If you are interested, I can save you a spot.

 

[Touchfuzzy]

My suggestions are usually for lighter systems with less overhead, tipping somewhat into rulesmedium. Stuff like Fate Core or Savage Worlds. I could run ALMOST everything with just those two systems. (and Savage Worlds core is like 10 dollars). I'm also looking forward to the generic Cortex+ Heroic (its first incarnation was Marvel Heroic Roleplaying, which was AWESOME, but unfortunately short lived).

There are other systems that I like, but they are very very specialized things:

Numenera is a really really cool setting, and the mechanics are pretty neat.

Mutant City Blues is a great concept, not completely sold on the GUMSHOE mechanics its tied to, but I'm determined to still use them. The chart for buying Superpowers on the other hand is stellar.

Leverage is another Cortex+ game, the base of the Cortex+ Action system, but its so very specialized towards basically heist movies/show style. Which is awesome though. Seriously, even if you don't like the show its licensed from, its a GREAT system.

On a parting note: If you like Star Wars, and its not all about Jedi to you, Go right now and check out Edge of the Empire and the upcoming Age of Rebellion games. They are both SUPERB and run off of compatible systems and revolve around Smugglers/Bounty Hunters/Fringers and Empire vs Rebellion respectively.

 

[Scythuz]

@Touchfuzzy - Thanks a lot for the recommendations!  The Star Wars ones sound particularly intriguing.  I'm gonna take a wild guess and say the empire vs rebellion one is based around squads?  I sure hope so as it makes me think of xcom for some reason...

Quick edit: Just noticed Leverage properly as well, I can't imagine how a heist would go with a p&p game but I imagine it's pretty awesome.

 

[Touchfuzzy]

The mechanics in Leverage are awesome. There is a lot of mechanics for doing things that are very in genre, like the flashback mechanic, that lets you establish something that happened "off screen" that gives you some kind of advantage in what you are doing. "Oh you lost track of that mark who is running away. Don't worry, I dropped a cellphone in his pocket when we were scuffling earlier, we'll track the GPS" "Oh no, that guy is going to search me and find the item that incriminates me, wait no, there was a handoff in the hallway where I gave it to the thief in the airducts that happened between scenes"

 

[Frostyfirefly]

Just a word of caution about Edge of the Empire, in my most humble opinion, Fantasy Flight Games is notorious for selling "incomplete" products, take a look at this mock topic I posted on rpggeek.com:

http://rpggeek.com/thread/1086110/what-if-fantastic-flower-games-designed-the-new

The basic premise of that post, is the abuse of the ol' carrot haning from a stick approach or business model. Still, if you have the money, Edge of the Empire is a good option, but if you are looking for more bang for your buck, Edge of the Empire may leave you feeling bit empty.

I know not all share this opinion, and FFG does deliver great physical quality in most of their products, but it's always good to know the other side of the story.

 

[Touchfuzzy]

I personally think Edge of the Empire is better for not trying to be the entire galaxy in one book. It had a tighter focus, and it does that focus better than any Star Wars game before it. At this time, if you want to play a Star Wars game that was smugglers and spies and soldiers and Jedi, I would suggest going with the Saga system, but in all honesty, the FFG Star Wars system is much much more fun, and other than Jedi, you could still do almost anything out of the box just with EotE. Once the last core book drops in... probably 2015 (beta probably in 2014), I wouldn't even suggest looking back to any previous Star Wars RPG.

Edge of the Empire is the Star Wars game about being smugglers and bounty hunters and fringers. It isn't just another try to fit the entire Star Wars universe in a single book game.

(Also, the FFG Star Wars line isn't a "buy the entire line" type thing unless you really want to. Its buy what you want. If you complain about trying to buy the entire line, I would point out you said you liked Pathfinder, and if you tried to buy the entire line of Pathfinder that would be absurd).

 

[AstoXx]

A game I recommend checking out (which sadly is a Japanese game and even more sadly only partially translated) is Nechronica. It is still playable regardless of the incomplete translation. The setting is post-apocalyptic and the players all play as moe zombie girls trying to recover their happy memories from the before times. If that description alone doesn't make you want to play it, then I think you must be dead inside. 

 

[Touchfuzzy]

Another Japanese Tabletop game that is worth checking out is Tenra Bansho Zero(which actually has been translated).