It’s August and that means that the annual #RPGaDAY ‘question a day’ is here to celebrate “everything cool, memorable and amazing about our hobby.” This year we’ve decided to join in the fun and will be canvassing answers from the ENWorld crew, columnists and friends in the industry to bring you some of our answers. We hope you’ll join in, in the comments section, and share your thoughts with us too… So, without further ado, here’s Day 15 of #RPGaDAY 2017!
#RPGaDAY Question 15: Which RPG do you enjoy adapting the most?
Darryl Mott: Dungeons & Dragons 5th Edition is far more flexible for tinkering than it seems. It’s well balanced, but not so tightly balanced you can break it if you don't get the math quite right. Reskinning of items, spells, and abilities works very well. Since the SRD came out, there’s also a large number of third party products from different genres that can help out with kitbashing any campaign or setting you want. There are other systems better suited to the task like Savage Worlds, but I personally enjoy tinkering with things closer to the D20 System.
Morrus: I can't help but adapt and tinker with any game I play. It's 50% of the fun of tabletop roleplaying for me - the design behind the scenes. Depending on the game, sometimes it's the best part! I'm more of a "system" tinkerer than a "setting" tinkerer. I was making alternate magic systems for AD&D 30 years ago, and I'm still at it. Can't help myself!
Christopher Helton: Fate Accelerated for me, the simplicity of the system paired with the default idea of how characters work, and their competency within the rules, fits what I am interested in genre-wise. I'm really not interested in origins, or the heroic journey of characters. I am looking for characters that can impact their world now.
Michael J Tresca: I'm with Russ and Darryl, I love tinkering, and can't help but rewrite a game and adventure to my liking. I've had a lot of fun rewriting Call of Cthulhu adventures, Basic D&D adventures; many to D20 Modern, and then later D&D 5E.
Angus Abranson: I really only play around with system mechanics these days if it’s a system that we’re either playing very regularly or one we’re looking at using in a game we’re designing. The one I keep returning to again and again though seems to be the old TSR FASERIP system that featured in the Marvel Super Heroes RPGs they produced.
Martin Greening (Azure Keep, Ruma: Dawn of Empire): Apocalypse World. The system is so flexible and simple at its core. Creating moves and playbooks is straightforward and a great way to generate the feel and theme of a game. It’s the main reason I chose for Ruma: Dawn of Empire to be Powered by the Apocalypse.
Simon Brake (Stygian Fox): The most I’ve done in adapting a game is create playsets for Fiasco that add additional rules to be used alongside the standard ones. A ‘ghost dice’ in a King in Yellow inspired playset that can cause the player to disappear from reality altogether, or the ‘Buddy system’ in a car racing playset that allows for large groups to ‘double up’ and play Fiasco as driver and navigator.
Paul Mitchener (Age of Arthur; Hunters of Alexandria): Fate. There's still endless potential for me to use Fate in different settings and to tweak the mechanics, both in things I've published and things which have been home use only. Fate blends narrative and crunch in a way which appeals, and which I've used in Age of Arthur and Hunters of Alexandria. The tinkering is far from over; there will be more!
Mike Lafferty (BAMF Podcast; Fainting Goat Games): We’re talking about house-ruling here? I don’t really do a lot of that. I’ve played some Palladium and GURPS games that were heavily house-ruled and those were fun.
Stephanie McAlea (Stygian Fox Publishing, The Things We Leave Behind): Basic Role Playing by Chaosium. I have Blade Runner, 2300AD, Man In The High Castle, Eye In The Sky, Wallander, and many other variants. My Pendragon games are non-Mallory adventures. What Greg Stafford would call “Wild, wooly, and Welsh”.
Chris Spivey (Cthulhu Confidential; Harlem Unbound): Which RPG do you enjoy adapting the most? Call of Cthulhu (CoC) Is an incredibly versatile system that is easy to explain to new gamers and capable of challenging old hands.
T.R. Knight (Freelance Editor): I adapt Feng Shui (and now Feng Shui 2) to all different genres. In fact, I have never run the game in the world provided. Instead, I have used Feng Shui for pulp masked avengers, wild west, swashbuckling, 80s action heroes, super spies, and vampire hunters to name just a few. The system is so simple to teach and cinematic oriented the it works well for over-the-top one shots and mini campaigns.
Andrew Peregrine (Doctor Who, Victoriana, Cabal): I’m not sure I enjoy adapting games especially. Making house rules and changing the game is a chore that needs to be done so I can get playing. But having run an awful lot of 7th Sea, I’ve tweaked it a bit (both 1st and 2nd). If that’s enjoyable, it’s because I know it well enough to tweak it without having to work so hard. But both systems are simple enough to play with and that makes a big difference.
David Donachie (Solipsist, Starblazer Adventures): GURPS without a doubt. The principles of the system are simple, but there is so much room for variation. Every GURPS campaign I've run has ended up with screeds of custom rules, new spells, new magic systems, new monsters. Compared to D&D (for example), making new monsters and NPCs by eye is so easy.
Garry Harper (Modiphius Entertainment; The Role Play Haven): D&D 3.5.
August Hahn (Lone Wolf; Askfageln): FATE. Without a doubt, I enjoy using FATE for spur-of-the-moment gaming and adapting roleplaying situations to quick rolls and judgment calls. I love the fact that virtually character, creature, power, or piece of equipment can be quickly modeled with the FATE system, as this lets me get the rules out of the way of the most important thing - having fun.
Darren Pearce (EN Publishing; Savage Mojo): Without a shadow of a doubt I’d have to say 13th Age, since it’s so simple to adapt that system to suit almost anything. Next up, Shadow of the Demon Lord and Savage Worlds as a third.
Federico Sohns (Nibiru RPG): When it comes to adaptation, I think FATE is one of those powerhouses you can't go wrong with using. Aspects are always useful when adapting a setting, and the simplicity of it makes it easy to use when introducing people to the hobby (which is great in and on itself). Say I have this friend who loves Tarantino movies, and that I want to introduce to RPGs. FATE allows me to really efficiently and simply get him into the action of a Tarantino-like setting with almost no prep, which is really convenient and speaks wonders about the system's design.
Mike Myler (EN Publishing; Legendary Games): All that “GM caveat” design built into 5E makes it fun to hack with.
Marc Langworthy (Modiphius; Red Scar): I enjoy tinkering with Pathfinder, so I can adapt it for my group or design additional scenarios.
Ken Spencer (Rocket Age; Why Not Games): Savage Worlds is by far the game I most enjoy adapting to whatever setting crosses through my mind, though the venerable BRP is a close second. Both games offer flexibility, a limited framework, and ease of play. Mostly I run pulpy games, I love over the top (hell, there is no top) action, putting the characters first, and wild reckless abandon. Both systems are suited to that, though Savage Worlds does it better. For more grounded or detailed settings, I prefer BRP especially as the system's modular nature allows me to mix and match not just what factors I want to include, but offers several different ways to model them.
Simon Burley (Golden Heroes, The Super Hack): I'm not answering these questions to self-promote. However, writing what I want to play is a large part of what I do, and I have to answer honestly. So my answer to this is my own lightweight SciFi game The Code of the Spacelanes. I wrote this initially with the idea of running games based on 1950's adventure SciFi (Andre Norton, basically). Three-vaned rocket ships, blasters, neurotic whips etc. But I've since found that, because it's so lightweight (hand wavey) I can easily reskin it to do just about anything. Dr Who, Star Trek, Star Wars, Firefly, Blakes Seven - I've done them all. I'm about to do Fireball XL5. I've got this Dr Who scenario I've been hoiking around UK conventions for over three years now where I allow players to create and run characters from anywhere in Time and Space. (The only limitation being they can't have appeared on the TV series.) To date, there's been nothing and no-one the system couldn't handle - and there's been some weird characters, trust me.
****
Originally created by Dave Chapman (Doctor Who: Adventures in Time & Space; Conspiracy X) #RPGaDAY os now being caretakered by the crew over at RPGBrigade. We hope you’ll join in, in the comments section, and share your thoughts with us too!
#RPGaDAY Question 15: Which RPG do you enjoy adapting the most?
Darryl Mott: Dungeons & Dragons 5th Edition is far more flexible for tinkering than it seems. It’s well balanced, but not so tightly balanced you can break it if you don't get the math quite right. Reskinning of items, spells, and abilities works very well. Since the SRD came out, there’s also a large number of third party products from different genres that can help out with kitbashing any campaign or setting you want. There are other systems better suited to the task like Savage Worlds, but I personally enjoy tinkering with things closer to the D20 System.
Morrus: I can't help but adapt and tinker with any game I play. It's 50% of the fun of tabletop roleplaying for me - the design behind the scenes. Depending on the game, sometimes it's the best part! I'm more of a "system" tinkerer than a "setting" tinkerer. I was making alternate magic systems for AD&D 30 years ago, and I'm still at it. Can't help myself!
Christopher Helton: Fate Accelerated for me, the simplicity of the system paired with the default idea of how characters work, and their competency within the rules, fits what I am interested in genre-wise. I'm really not interested in origins, or the heroic journey of characters. I am looking for characters that can impact their world now.
Michael J Tresca: I'm with Russ and Darryl, I love tinkering, and can't help but rewrite a game and adventure to my liking. I've had a lot of fun rewriting Call of Cthulhu adventures, Basic D&D adventures; many to D20 Modern, and then later D&D 5E.
Angus Abranson: I really only play around with system mechanics these days if it’s a system that we’re either playing very regularly or one we’re looking at using in a game we’re designing. The one I keep returning to again and again though seems to be the old TSR FASERIP system that featured in the Marvel Super Heroes RPGs they produced.
Martin Greening (Azure Keep, Ruma: Dawn of Empire): Apocalypse World. The system is so flexible and simple at its core. Creating moves and playbooks is straightforward and a great way to generate the feel and theme of a game. It’s the main reason I chose for Ruma: Dawn of Empire to be Powered by the Apocalypse.
Simon Brake (Stygian Fox): The most I’ve done in adapting a game is create playsets for Fiasco that add additional rules to be used alongside the standard ones. A ‘ghost dice’ in a King in Yellow inspired playset that can cause the player to disappear from reality altogether, or the ‘Buddy system’ in a car racing playset that allows for large groups to ‘double up’ and play Fiasco as driver and navigator.
Paul Mitchener (Age of Arthur; Hunters of Alexandria): Fate. There's still endless potential for me to use Fate in different settings and to tweak the mechanics, both in things I've published and things which have been home use only. Fate blends narrative and crunch in a way which appeals, and which I've used in Age of Arthur and Hunters of Alexandria. The tinkering is far from over; there will be more!
Mike Lafferty (BAMF Podcast; Fainting Goat Games): We’re talking about house-ruling here? I don’t really do a lot of that. I’ve played some Palladium and GURPS games that were heavily house-ruled and those were fun.
Stephanie McAlea (Stygian Fox Publishing, The Things We Leave Behind): Basic Role Playing by Chaosium. I have Blade Runner, 2300AD, Man In The High Castle, Eye In The Sky, Wallander, and many other variants. My Pendragon games are non-Mallory adventures. What Greg Stafford would call “Wild, wooly, and Welsh”.
Chris Spivey (Cthulhu Confidential; Harlem Unbound): Which RPG do you enjoy adapting the most? Call of Cthulhu (CoC) Is an incredibly versatile system that is easy to explain to new gamers and capable of challenging old hands.
T.R. Knight (Freelance Editor): I adapt Feng Shui (and now Feng Shui 2) to all different genres. In fact, I have never run the game in the world provided. Instead, I have used Feng Shui for pulp masked avengers, wild west, swashbuckling, 80s action heroes, super spies, and vampire hunters to name just a few. The system is so simple to teach and cinematic oriented the it works well for over-the-top one shots and mini campaigns.
Andrew Peregrine (Doctor Who, Victoriana, Cabal): I’m not sure I enjoy adapting games especially. Making house rules and changing the game is a chore that needs to be done so I can get playing. But having run an awful lot of 7th Sea, I’ve tweaked it a bit (both 1st and 2nd). If that’s enjoyable, it’s because I know it well enough to tweak it without having to work so hard. But both systems are simple enough to play with and that makes a big difference.
David Donachie (Solipsist, Starblazer Adventures): GURPS without a doubt. The principles of the system are simple, but there is so much room for variation. Every GURPS campaign I've run has ended up with screeds of custom rules, new spells, new magic systems, new monsters. Compared to D&D (for example), making new monsters and NPCs by eye is so easy.
Garry Harper (Modiphius Entertainment; The Role Play Haven): D&D 3.5.
August Hahn (Lone Wolf; Askfageln): FATE. Without a doubt, I enjoy using FATE for spur-of-the-moment gaming and adapting roleplaying situations to quick rolls and judgment calls. I love the fact that virtually character, creature, power, or piece of equipment can be quickly modeled with the FATE system, as this lets me get the rules out of the way of the most important thing - having fun.
Darren Pearce (EN Publishing; Savage Mojo): Without a shadow of a doubt I’d have to say 13th Age, since it’s so simple to adapt that system to suit almost anything. Next up, Shadow of the Demon Lord and Savage Worlds as a third.
Federico Sohns (Nibiru RPG): When it comes to adaptation, I think FATE is one of those powerhouses you can't go wrong with using. Aspects are always useful when adapting a setting, and the simplicity of it makes it easy to use when introducing people to the hobby (which is great in and on itself). Say I have this friend who loves Tarantino movies, and that I want to introduce to RPGs. FATE allows me to really efficiently and simply get him into the action of a Tarantino-like setting with almost no prep, which is really convenient and speaks wonders about the system's design.
Mike Myler (EN Publishing; Legendary Games): All that “GM caveat” design built into 5E makes it fun to hack with.
Marc Langworthy (Modiphius; Red Scar): I enjoy tinkering with Pathfinder, so I can adapt it for my group or design additional scenarios.
Ken Spencer (Rocket Age; Why Not Games): Savage Worlds is by far the game I most enjoy adapting to whatever setting crosses through my mind, though the venerable BRP is a close second. Both games offer flexibility, a limited framework, and ease of play. Mostly I run pulpy games, I love over the top (hell, there is no top) action, putting the characters first, and wild reckless abandon. Both systems are suited to that, though Savage Worlds does it better. For more grounded or detailed settings, I prefer BRP especially as the system's modular nature allows me to mix and match not just what factors I want to include, but offers several different ways to model them.
Simon Burley (Golden Heroes, The Super Hack): I'm not answering these questions to self-promote. However, writing what I want to play is a large part of what I do, and I have to answer honestly. So my answer to this is my own lightweight SciFi game The Code of the Spacelanes. I wrote this initially with the idea of running games based on 1950's adventure SciFi (Andre Norton, basically). Three-vaned rocket ships, blasters, neurotic whips etc. But I've since found that, because it's so lightweight (hand wavey) I can easily reskin it to do just about anything. Dr Who, Star Trek, Star Wars, Firefly, Blakes Seven - I've done them all. I'm about to do Fireball XL5. I've got this Dr Who scenario I've been hoiking around UK conventions for over three years now where I allow players to create and run characters from anywhere in Time and Space. (The only limitation being they can't have appeared on the TV series.) To date, there's been nothing and no-one the system couldn't handle - and there's been some weird characters, trust me.
****
Originally created by Dave Chapman (Doctor Who: Adventures in Time & Space; Conspiracy X) #RPGaDAY os now being caretakered by the crew over at RPGBrigade. We hope you’ll join in, in the comments section, and share your thoughts with us too!
