I need a great role playing game that is played in short bursts.

[GameOgre]

My son is in the navy and loves rpg's. He and his wife want to play a game with me over Google hangouts or something else. We have tried several times to play 5E and it works fine but.....his play times are very irregular and it might be weeks or months before we can play again. we might get two sessions in and not play again for weeks or months.

So What I would like is a game without levels really. A short game where we could play the entire adventure in one night and finish. This way if we can play again soon we can just do another adventure but if not well.....then they don't have to feel frustrated at not finishing and don't have to struggle to remember what was going on last time.

I'm thinking something like Feng Shui 2- Love the idea of powerful heroes and the cinematic play sounds neat or something like Savage Worlds Rifts- I'm sure i could design shorter adventures.

I have not had a lot of experience with these types of games however and am really not sure of how they play.

What do you guys think?

 

[Warrior Poet]

The original Stormbringer from Chaosium, if you can get your hands on it. (It's successor, Elric! was a little more rules intensive.)

Percentile-based skill advancement, fairly static hit points, very mortal game, takes place in a highly chaotic world. Almost by definition perfect for short burst play.

Add in that it's a largely maritime world and inevitably play requires taking a boat someplace, which is then attacked by pirates, and very few people have much of a Swim skill percentage.

Simple adventures like: Find and Explore a Three-Storey Tower can occupy two hours and be the complete session (if for no other reason than the beast lurking in the tower will eat everyone for lunch, assuming the players don't get a good roll and utterly slay it in three seconds. Did I mention it's a fairly deadly game?)

Fair seas to your son! (Even if he's stationed on land )

Still learning,

Robert

 

[DEFCON 1]

If you do not need to have a continuing story or to play the same characters each and every session... I'd say pick up Fiasco. Each game lasts for about two hours, is purely roleplaying, and if you download the special sets from the Bully Pulpit website, you have a good three dozen different genres and scenarios to choose from each game. I think Fiasco is an awesome 'one-session' game and can not recommend it enough.

 

[ccs]

Why can't you just play 5e like that?

Write an adventure aimed at a run time of several hours. Or even just a portion of an adventure accompanied by a few paragraphs Star Wars style that fills you in on how you've arrived at this point. This represents the last portion of the XP needed to hit the next lv. At the end of the session you just lv up to the next lv. Wash rinse repeat.

 

[Psikerlord#]

Low Fantasy Gaming with some mini adventures would work nicely ....

(free PDF: https://lowfantasygaming.com/ )

 

[GMMichael]

Why can't you just play 5e like that?

You can. But 5e is written with lots of ranges-in-feet, relatively complex character sheets, and three large core books, all of which tend to emphasize book referencing and an around-the-table playstyle that doesn't always translate well online.

Now, if you had a game with abstract positioning, light rules, and an action economy system without an emphasis on sequential turns, then you'd have something that might play well on Google...

 

[ccs]

You can. But 5e is written with lots of ranges-in-feet, relatively complex character sheets, and three large core books, all of which tend to emphasize book referencing and an around-the-table playstyle that doesn't always translate well online.

Now, if you had a game with abstract positioning, light rules, and an action economy system without an emphasis on sequential turns, then you'd have something that might play well on Google...

Well that - the detail - wasn't really the problem the OP is having. It was even stated that 5e is working fine.
their sporadic sessions and length of the adventures is. And the amount of XP each session yields.

The solution to that, no matter what the system, is to write shorter adventures. Things that can be played through in about 3 hours. And ditching xp so that your not stuck on 1 lv until the next of never

 

[innerdude]

Have you looked at Risus? It's pretty much the epitome of "fast, rules light, designed to be played in short bursts."

 

[JeffB]

Now, if you had a game with abstract positioning, light rules, and an action economy system without an emphasis on sequential turns, then you'd have something that might play well on Google...

Dungeon World.

 

[GameOgre]

I read up on Dungeon World and decided to order the book on amazon so thanks!

I almost tried Fate Core but...Dungeon World would be a smoother change.