Ever play (or own) an RPG that was well received by others but you hated?

[Duke Bushido]

1 hour ago, Christopher R Taylor said:

  "Random die roll" is just not really fun for anyone.

 

Explain to videogame developers that quicktime events-- the digital doppelganger  of the saving throw-- are just as awful:

 

Man, what a great game!  I have enjiyed the puzzles, and have gotten really involved in the story.  I have got to get this NPC back to his village, and I need to make sure to find that meteor so I can create the Cursebreaker amulet, but I don't

 

PRESS X TO NOT DIE!  X AGAIN!  CIRCLE!  L3! ..."

 

Etc, etc, ad infinitum.  

 

 

[Christopher R Taylor]

Quote

Explain to videogame developers that quicktime events-- the digital doppelganger  of the saving throw-- are just as awful

 

Especially not for older fellas like us

[Scott Ruggels]

@Duke Bushido, I must say I have missed your commentary this past summer.  As to your game dislikes, I share a lot of them (Though Tri-Tac was most assuredly NOT a Tri-Stat system. It was of that complexity that came right after D&D in terms of stats and mechanics). I kind of share the same feelings about Paranoia and CoC.  I did read a lot of H.P. Lovecraft and other pulp writers in late high school.  Same thoughts shared about Feng Shui and Bushido.  But we watched a lot of Samurai films at a rep theater, while we were in high school as well. Basically I glided through High school by being able to ace tests, so I never did any homework, Just watched movies, gamed and drew things.)

[Ninja-Bear]

9 hours ago, Christopher R Taylor said:

I’ll friendly disagree with this. However it truly isn’t everyone’s cup of tea and I do understand it. The style of older D&D of going into a dungeon and surviving is the story.  I’ve used the random die lately and the kids are on their seat of the their pants. That last roll nothing happened and they asked and I said you wont know.  One of the problems with random die rolls is that DMs have used them indiscriminately. Just because you roll that something happened shouldn’t equate a fight. 

Edited September 29, 2022 by Ninja-Bear
Somehow I triple posted the message!

[Scott Ruggels]

4 hours ago, Ninja-Bear said:

I’ll friendly disagree with this. However it truly isn’t everyone’s cup of tea and I do understand it. The style of older D&D of going into a dungeon and surviving is the story.  I’ve used the random die lately and the kids are on their seat of the their pants. That last roll nothing happened and they asked and I said you wont know.  One of the problems with random die rolls is that DMs have used them indiscriminately. Just because you roll that something happened shouldn’t equate a fight. 

I think this is why I don’t “get” the OSR movement. Random die rolls and clunky mechanics, and low damage rolls. I don’t feel nostalgic for the game systems I played prior to my adoption of Hero, except Traveller (and maybe Bushido). Lots of annoyances, like ineptly crafted riddles, puzzles, and trap after trap after trap. This is why I gravitated to the political side of campaigns. Then there were the random encounters like clockwork. Inside the dungeon I understood, but outdoors? Many years of camping taught me that the animals of the forest took a wide detour around people, even bears, as long as you suspended your food storage and kept the campsite clean.  I like travelogue. I like being a tourist in someone else’s world. But the old games just have no attraction for me.

Edited September 29, 2022 by Scott Ruggels

[Christopher R Taylor]

Quote

One of the problems with random die rolls is that DMs have used them indiscriminately. Just because you roll that something happened shouldn’t equate a fight. 

 

I don't mind random events, I mean die as in decease: roll or die.  The saving throw or you just die, or "oopsie I rolled so much damage the character was executed accidentally."

[Duke Bushido]

10 hours ago, Scott Ruggels said:

@Duke Bushido, I must say I have missed your commentary this past summer.  As to

 

 

[Truncated]

 

by being able to ace tests, so I never did any homework, Just watched movies, gamed and drew things.)

 

 

Clearly, we are the same person.

 

So how come only one of us got the World Traveler hair?

 

 

 

And Thanks for the compliment, Sir. 

 

I just got burnt out on the boards.  It happens.  I wont say "I am back" in any sense of my prior level of participation, but in small doses, it is quite pleasant to return.

 

 

 

[Duke Bushido]

6 hours ago, Ninja-Bear said:

I’ll. Just because you roll that something happened shouldn’t equate a fight. 

 

 

That!

 

That part right there!

 

You rolled "something happens," in the broader sense.  If the characters or the players have just gone through a massive combat slog, it might not be the beat time to throw another one at them.  Insert something, but not,necessarily what you rolled:

 

They make camp and one of the characters discovers his purse has been cut.  Maybe a rider approaches with bad news (or good news), or one or more characters has activates a trap- perhaps an ancient and rickety forgotten about trap; perhaps it was set specifically for one or more members of the party.

 

There really are inappropriate times for a fight, either for played, characters, or both.

 

[Foxiekins]

On 8/16/2022 at 9:18 AM, Scott Ruggels said:

FATE, FUDGE, Savage Worlds. Any system with only three stats is not for me ( except Melee/ Wizard).  I’ve tried them, but the modern minimalism, to me feels like my character is on the set of a low budget film or TV production, improvising dialogue to the director-GMs plot outline.  The buildings are cardboard, the props are cheap, and the mountains in the distance are painted backdrops.  The escape, and occasional immersion I desire in a game, just isn’t there for me in these minimalist systems. Any game that does not give that living world feeling, be it because of railroading in a good system, or minimalist mechanics for me is a bad experience. Savage Worlds’ exploding dice mechanic was illogical to this gun nut, where a baby with a butter knife was the most lethal entity in the universe. I am also an anti-fan of fate points fate tokens or similar te-roll mechanics. The dice rule. I wish Sean Fannon well for his system, but I won’t return easily to his minimalist Superheroes.  Basically any system that favors a narrative structure or is plot driven, I walk away from.

I have tried Savage Worlds, and much prefer the company's previous system...  We were once up against a hourde of Smart, Fast Zombies, with randomly-generated reinforcements, and completely ran out of ammo a third of the way through...  The system let me kill the remaining zombies with a shovel...  The very last zombie was about to escape, and infect the world...  I threw the shovel and took its head off...  I think the d6 is the most lethal die in the game, and PCs automatically get an extra die to roll, just because they're PCs...  And which die is it...?  An extra d6, of course...

[Cygnia]

World of Darkness games -- I just don't have fun in those sort of "edgy" settings

[Ninja-Bear]

Fwiw, there is no consensus what constitutes OSR. Its about as subjective as what art is. 

1 hour ago, Duke Bushido said:

 

 

That!

 

That part right there!

 

You rolled "something happens," in the broader sense.  If the characters or the players have just gone through a massive combat slog, it might not be the beat time to throw another one at them.  Insert something, but not,necessarily what you rolled:

 

They make camp and one of the characters discovers his purse has been cut.  Maybe a rider approaches with bad news (or good news), or one or more characters has activates a trap- perhaps an ancient and rickety forgotten about trap; perhaps it was set specifically for one or more members of the party.

 

There really are inappropriate times for a fight, either for played, characters, or both.

 

Funny thing is I thought I was different in that. Then I watched a video of Questing Beast and went over a book of monsters  and the one thing the book has is you roll randomly two out three things that you can encounter of a monster BEFORE  you encounter it. You could see tracks and maybe a smell. Or maybe see it from a distance and maybe see a scale that was dropped. 

[Christopher R Taylor]

When I think about it I didn't ever like D&D, and its super popular.  I mean I liked role playing and fantasy, and the idea of doing stuff in that world which D&D presented back when I started playing these games in 1979 but the system its self I never liked.  The single die roll, hit points, armor class, too many core features (still part of the game) were just lousy, and almost nobody alive used the standard 3d6 6 times for your character system.  We used 4d6, drop the lowest, arrange as you want system.

[Ninja-Bear]

Perhaps it the way my one friend GMs but another buddy said that the problem with Hero System is that there is no consequences for failure. We always win somehow. Looking back, my buddy has a point.  If you know that somehow you’ll  always triumph it does take something away from the victory. 

[Christopher R Taylor]

Quote

Perhaps it the way my one friend GMs but another buddy said that the problem with Hero System is that there is no consequences for failure.

 

There's nothing about the system that ensures that.  Champions heavily leans that way in scenario design and mood because that's what comic books (used to be).  But there's no get out of jail free mechanic or "you always win" rule in Hero.  There's just a lot of layers in place to make sure if someone dies, its on purpose and for a story meaning not "I rolled a 1".

[Ninja-Bear]

2 hours ago, Christopher R Taylor said:

 

There's nothing about the system that ensures that.  Champions heavily leans that way in scenario design and mood because that's what comic books (used to be).  But there's no get out of jail free mechanic or "you always win" rule in Hero.  There's just a lot of layers in place to make sure if someone dies, its on purpose and for a story meaning not "I rolled a 1".

Sorry, I should’ve been more clear. The friend wasn’t referring to death of character per se just failure in general. As in he could tell the GM did things so the module was completed as written. A railroad if you will. Instead of well you didn’t do X so now there is Y consequence.

[Christopher R Taylor]

Well that sounds like a GM thing more than a Hero Games thing to me, but its going to depend a lot on the adventure.  Champions Begins is super linear and on rails because its a tutorial, for instance.

[Old Man]

On 9/29/2022 at 11:40 AM, Ninja-Bear said:

Perhaps it the way my one friend GMs but another buddy said that the problem with Hero System is that there is no consequences for failure.

 

Of all the weird misconceptions about Hero, this one is new.  The best thing about FH is how unforgiving it is.  I've lost a number of characters and participated in several TPKs using FH and it was glorious.  D&D is the system with no consequences for failure, where your paladin with sixty HP and loads of healing can wade into combat without fear, secure in the knowledge that it'll take at least five hits to bring him down.  Fights like that are boring.  In FH, every fight carries significant risk.  

[Ninja-Bear]

On 9/29/2022 at 11:51 PM, Christopher R Taylor said:

Well that sounds like a GM thing more than a Hero Games thing to me, but its going to depend a lot on the adventure.  Champions Begins is super linear and on rails because its a tutorial, for instance.

Yeah, looking back, I believe you’re right.

[Ninja-Bear]

5 hours ago, Old Man said:

 

Of all the weird misconceptions about Hero, this one is new.  The best thing about FH is how unforgiving it is.  I've lost a number of characters and participated in several TPKs using FH and it was glorious.  D&D is the system with no consequences for failure, where your paladin with sixty HP and loads of healing can wade into combat without fear, secure in the knowledge that it'll take at least five hits to bring him down.  Fights like that are boring.  In FH, every fight carries significant risk.  

I wasn’t clear. The original comment wasn’t directed at FH but Champions the Superhero genre. Somehow we always made it in time. No, if Viper isn’t stopped by x then y happens. The threat is there but never happened.  But, the last Fantasy game he ran (and why I think C. Taylor is right), my son and I were both dying and he had a magical being come to save us. I told him later that we both didn’t care that we died.  We were using premades and I was trying stuff just to see how the rules would work.  slamming my dying body against the wizard so his body got rammed into the axe that I missed him earlier by was epic!

 

And for an aside, my favorite FH character I created had 20 Body. 😁

[Old Man]

13 hours ago, Ninja-Bear said:

I wasn’t clear. The original comment wasn’t directed at FH but Champions the Superhero genre. Somehow we always made it in time. No, if Viper isn’t stopped by x then y happens. The threat is there but never happened.  But, the last Fantasy game he ran (and why I think C. Taylor is right), my son and I were both dying and he had a magical being come to save us. I told him later that we both didn’t care that we died.  We were using premades and I was trying stuff just to see how the rules would work.  slamming my dying body against the wizard so his body got rammed into the axe that I missed him earlier by was epic!

 

And for an aside, my favorite FH character I created had 20 Body. 😁

 

I had characters get killed in Champions too.  In our case, the GM played with open dice, so there was no way he could fudge rolls, and he was relatively disinclined to send in the cavalry to save the PCs if the dice were against us.  But the point is that Champions is only somewhat less consequential than heroic Hero; if there's a perception to the contrary, that's on the GM, not the system.

[Hugh Neilson]

This could be the GM or the Genre.  Character death is pretty rare in four-color Supers.  It's more common in fantasy games, and even more so in horror games, traditionally.  You can vary the DCs to Defenses ratio, or use other tricks to make a game more (AP, Penetrating) or less (higher rDEF) lethal.

 

Back in the day, I recall a player describing Champions as "if you play half decent, you're unlikely to die, and if you play well, you likely win in the scenario."  D&D was "if you play well, you're unlikely to die, and you have a decent shot at winning in the scenario."   Call of Cthulhu was "if you play more or less perfectly, explore every research and preparatory option and get fairly lucky, you probably have a better than 50% shot at living to see the next scenario."

 

He also made the observation that CoC characters were extremely rapid to create, Hero was a very complex and time-consuming character creation process and D&D fell somewhere in the middle, closer to CoC.  The more work it requires to create a character, the more they need to be survivors if players are going to keep playing.  Investing an evening in building a character who dies in the first encounter does not endear the game.

[Duke Bushido]

38 minutes ago, Hugh Neilson said:

.  Investing an evening in building a character who dies in the first encounter does not endear the game.

 

 

Lookin' at _you_, Aftermath.....

 

 

[Christopher R Taylor]

Quote

D&D was "if you play well, you're unlikely to die, and you have a decent shot at winning in the scenario."

 

Again, that depended on the scenario.  That sample dungeon level in the AD&D DM Guide sticks with me.  Level one characters exploring and one character cleverly figures out how to get up to the upper opening where there used to be steps and is rewarded by the GM by... a level 3 monster killing and eating him.  That's what Gygax thought adventures should be like.

 

I think initially, game designers did not realize how attached people would get to their characters so they were much more lethal in their scenario designs.

 

Quote

Call of Cthulhu was "if you play more or less perfectly, explore every research and preparatory option and get fairly lucky, you probably have a better than 50% shot at living to see the next scenario."

 

And in Warhammer, if you play perfectly and get really lucky, you might live most of the way through the scenario

[Joe Walsh]

I don't think I've ever hated an RPG.

 

There was a time that I sneered at D&D and its derivatives, but that was decades ago. I have fond memories of B/X D&D and (to a limited extent) AD&D 1e, but otherwise I'm only interested in D&D from an intellectual perspective (how it impacts the industry, the trends it's riding/influencing, etc.) and as a path people can take to the broader world of RPGs.

 

Over the decades there have been popular RPGs that, despite trying my best, haven't proven to be a good fit for me, such as Fudge/Fate/Fate Accelerated. That style was interesting to me for a brief time, but despite trying I haven't been able to maintain enough interest in any of them to learn to love playing and/or running them. Cortex Prime is the closest fit in this broad category, but it too isn't quite right for me.

 

And there have been popular RPGs that initially seemed like a good fit but didn't work out over the long haul: GURPS, BRP, Savage Worlds, D6 System. All four are *this close* to being great fits, but all have one or more serious flaws (from my perspective) that make me wish I was playing/running a different game.

 

These days, I know I'm highly unlikely to enjoy any RPG that uses a flat distribution curve. Same for games with specialty dice (like the FFG Star Wars system). Honestly, any RPG that uses dice other than bog standard six-siders is unlikely to be very interesting to me at this point. Might be worth a one-shot or as a curiosity, but not for anything serious or long-lasting.

 

So I mostly stick to HERO System, Classic Traveller (and Cepheus Engine/Sword of Cepheus/etc.), and Tunnels & Trolls (and Mercenaries, Spies, and Private Eyes as well as Monster! Monster!).

[Duke Bushido]

7 hours ago, Christopher R Taylor said:

 

I think initially, game designers did not realize how attached people would get to their characters so they were much more lethal in their scenario designs.

 

Temple of Elemental Evil, anyone?

 

 

that thing might as well have been a Paranoia adventure; at least yoy'd have five back-up characters.

 

 

 

7 hours ago, Christopher R Taylor said:

 

And in Warhammer, if you play perfectly and get really lucky, you might live most of the way through the scenario

 

 

40k or FRP?   I only ask because I have some faitly fond memories of the few times I played Warhammer FRP.