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 16 of #RPGaDAY 2017!
#RPGaDAY Question 16: What RPG do you enjoy using as is?
Christopher Helton: I use the Cyberpunk 2020 RPG as written these days, weird tech that didn't come out the way that they excepted that it would and all. Now it is a sort of retrofuturistic, alt-history romp rather than the futurism that they thought that it would be. I would like to see an update to the game, but the system is still pretty awesome and fun to play.
Darryl Mott: I get kinda cranky when people homebrew Shadowrun stuff or break from the canon world. Mostly because it’s a game that has just so much stuff in it that I can’t see why you might need to add something else, and I know the world so well through the sourcebooks and fiction over the decades that, if a major part is changed or moved out of its place, I feel lost or like I’m not playing the right game. Because of the way the game's written with the setting tied strongly to the items and in some cases the rules mechanics, I'd rather play in the canon world with as few house rules or custom content as possible.
Angus Abranson: There’s quite a few I probably play ‘as is’ – but then for all I know we might use a house rule or two that the GM has brought in. Certainly one game that I loved playing, and which I’m pretty sure we played ‘as is’, was the original Deadlands from Pinnacle Entertainment. It was also worth mentioning as no one’s brought it up in any of the columns we’ve hosted so far and I felt it deserved a namecheck – and an excuse to post up the cover
Sean Patrick Fannon: Savage Worlds, D&D 5e.
Jason Vey (Eden Studios; Troll Lord Games): That'd be the Cinematic Unisystem games by Eden Studios. That system is the greatest system ever devised for handing just about any genre of play you could want. It's fast, easy and fun. It's been my Sunday gaming group's "go to" system for years.
Stephanie McAlea (Stygian Fox Publishing, The Things We Leave Behind): 2300AD. It’s basically Sean Connery’s ‘Outland’ as an RPG
Federico Sohns (Nibiru RPG): I think that as a games designer, it's always very hard to sit down at the table and not want to toy around with the game's "cogs". However, there are some games that have been developed to a point in which I wouldn't dare touch them a lot, like Powered by the Apocalypse. It happens to me that, the more complex a game system is, the more I want to change stuff, so generally I find myself not modding systems that are naturally simple.
Eran Aviram (Up to Four Players; City of Mist): The Star Wars games by Fantasy Flight Games are a perfect closed system that require no further intervention from me. The 2d20 games by Modiphius feel very much the same. I blame the designer of both, Jay Little.
Martin Greening (Azure Keep, Ruma: Dawn of Empire):5th Edition Dungeons and Dragons. While it lends itself well to house rules and customization, the game is enjoyable without change.
Mike Myler (EN Publishing, Legendary Games): Pathfinder, far and away. Tightest mechanics around.
Mike Lafferty (BAMF Podcast; Fainting Goat Games): I don’t really house-rule or kit-bash, so pretty much any RPG I play I use “as is”. If I’ve got to tweak a lot of rules – I’m just going to look for another game.
Simon Burley (Golden Heroes, The Super Hack) The Black Hack. I use this to introduce newbies to the hobby to "Dungeons and Dragons". I think it's important that the rules I show them are the rules they can buy, if they want to. I show them a game that's easy to play and easy to understand and, as beginners, I don't went them confused if they get the easy to read rulebook and it's different from the rules they played. They aren't perfect. The armour rules, particularly, are a bit iffy. The author has even published some alternative armour rules online which may be better. But I don't want to say "get the book bit but remember to check the website". I don't want any level of complexity getting between newbies and The Hobby.
Darren Pearce (EN Publishing; Savage Mojo): Iron Kingdoms RPG.
Ken Spencer (Rocket Age; Why Not Games): None of them. I kit bash everything, change what does not suit me, rewrite portions of setting and rules, and in general play as I think RPGs are intended to be played, as toolkits and suggestions. Most of the times that I have played a game RAW, I did not like it, and I don't often run published adventures according to their established plots.
Simon Brake (Stygian Fox): Monsterhearts and Apocalypse World are games I’ve never really had to ‘fudge’. On the one hand the results of Moves are supposed to be vague and relatively open to interpretation. On the other hand the Moves are printed on character sheets and the general Moves sheets, so it’s impossible to deviate from what is right in front of you, even if you have flexibility with how the results present themselves.
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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 16: What RPG do you enjoy using as is?
Christopher Helton: I use the Cyberpunk 2020 RPG as written these days, weird tech that didn't come out the way that they excepted that it would and all. Now it is a sort of retrofuturistic, alt-history romp rather than the futurism that they thought that it would be. I would like to see an update to the game, but the system is still pretty awesome and fun to play.
Darryl Mott: I get kinda cranky when people homebrew Shadowrun stuff or break from the canon world. Mostly because it’s a game that has just so much stuff in it that I can’t see why you might need to add something else, and I know the world so well through the sourcebooks and fiction over the decades that, if a major part is changed or moved out of its place, I feel lost or like I’m not playing the right game. Because of the way the game's written with the setting tied strongly to the items and in some cases the rules mechanics, I'd rather play in the canon world with as few house rules or custom content as possible.
Angus Abranson: There’s quite a few I probably play ‘as is’ – but then for all I know we might use a house rule or two that the GM has brought in. Certainly one game that I loved playing, and which I’m pretty sure we played ‘as is’, was the original Deadlands from Pinnacle Entertainment. It was also worth mentioning as no one’s brought it up in any of the columns we’ve hosted so far and I felt it deserved a namecheck – and an excuse to post up the cover
Sean Patrick Fannon: Savage Worlds, D&D 5e.
Jason Vey (Eden Studios; Troll Lord Games): That'd be the Cinematic Unisystem games by Eden Studios. That system is the greatest system ever devised for handing just about any genre of play you could want. It's fast, easy and fun. It's been my Sunday gaming group's "go to" system for years.
Stephanie McAlea (Stygian Fox Publishing, The Things We Leave Behind): 2300AD. It’s basically Sean Connery’s ‘Outland’ as an RPG
Federico Sohns (Nibiru RPG): I think that as a games designer, it's always very hard to sit down at the table and not want to toy around with the game's "cogs". However, there are some games that have been developed to a point in which I wouldn't dare touch them a lot, like Powered by the Apocalypse. It happens to me that, the more complex a game system is, the more I want to change stuff, so generally I find myself not modding systems that are naturally simple.
Eran Aviram (Up to Four Players; City of Mist): The Star Wars games by Fantasy Flight Games are a perfect closed system that require no further intervention from me. The 2d20 games by Modiphius feel very much the same. I blame the designer of both, Jay Little.
Martin Greening (Azure Keep, Ruma: Dawn of Empire):5th Edition Dungeons and Dragons. While it lends itself well to house rules and customization, the game is enjoyable without change.
Mike Myler (EN Publishing, Legendary Games): Pathfinder, far and away. Tightest mechanics around.
Mike Lafferty (BAMF Podcast; Fainting Goat Games): I don’t really house-rule or kit-bash, so pretty much any RPG I play I use “as is”. If I’ve got to tweak a lot of rules – I’m just going to look for another game.
Simon Burley (Golden Heroes, The Super Hack) The Black Hack. I use this to introduce newbies to the hobby to "Dungeons and Dragons". I think it's important that the rules I show them are the rules they can buy, if they want to. I show them a game that's easy to play and easy to understand and, as beginners, I don't went them confused if they get the easy to read rulebook and it's different from the rules they played. They aren't perfect. The armour rules, particularly, are a bit iffy. The author has even published some alternative armour rules online which may be better. But I don't want to say "get the book bit but remember to check the website". I don't want any level of complexity getting between newbies and The Hobby.
Darren Pearce (EN Publishing; Savage Mojo): Iron Kingdoms RPG.
Ken Spencer (Rocket Age; Why Not Games): None of them. I kit bash everything, change what does not suit me, rewrite portions of setting and rules, and in general play as I think RPGs are intended to be played, as toolkits and suggestions. Most of the times that I have played a game RAW, I did not like it, and I don't often run published adventures according to their established plots.
Simon Brake (Stygian Fox): Monsterhearts and Apocalypse World are games I’ve never really had to ‘fudge’. On the one hand the results of Moves are supposed to be vague and relatively open to interpretation. On the other hand the Moves are printed on character sheets and the general Moves sheets, so it’s impossible to deviate from what is right in front of you, even if you have flexibility with how the results present themselves.
****
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!
