So, go take a look at Urban Shadows, from Magpie Games, and The Dresden Files RPG, from Evil Hat Productions.
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Urban fantasy? (that isn't WoD)
- Thread starter VelvetViolet
- Start date
So, go take a look at Urban Shadows, from Magpie Games, and The Dresden Files RPG, from Evil Hat Productions.
Jaeger
That someone better
Well the problem with those games is that while they did try to compete with Vamp/WoD - They did so during its heyday, and did not stick around long enough to take advantage of its current slide.
Being a technically better rules set is not enough to overcome the first mover advantage. Especially since I don't think they had sufficient supplement output to build their player base. And now to a man they are all gone.
The right idea, but are they going to be able to put out 3-4 supplements a year to be a 'supported' game system that will draw market share?
Probably not... So Chronicles of Darkness and V5 will continue keep the remaining fanbase by retreading the WW WoD back catalogue.
Urban Shadows is not a bad take at all. Its take on the supernatural is a really good way to 'reimagine' the WoD.
The problem it has is the inherent limitations of the PbTA system, and lack of supplements to really compete with CoD.
Grendel_Khan
Hero
I'm near the tail end of a two-year urban fantasy campaign that uses Shadowrun 5 rules, but without the tech. It's a homebrew setting in 1980's NYC, so no Awakening, no orcs and elves (except in other planes), using all of the Shadowrun magic concepts and mechanics and lots of critters, without the associated lore.
Not trying to "tell you about my campaign" here, just pointing out that there are lots of systems out there that can do urban fantasy, if you supply the setting.
Not trying to "tell you about my campaign" here, just pointing out that there are lots of systems out there that can do urban fantasy, if you supply the setting.
When you don't identify what constitutes "real traction", this isn't a meaningful statement.
Interesting you should say that.
Monte Cook games just had a million-dollar kickstarter for their Cypher System game, Old Gods of Appalachia.
Magpie Games has a $10 million kickstarter for a PBTA game in Avatar Legends.
Fandom, Inc has the Cortex-based Tales of Xadia out.
Pelgrane Press has the Gumshoe-based Swords of the Serpentine books arrived and about to ship.
Grendel_Khan
Hero
Being real pedantic here, I know, but just want to point out that PbtA really isn't a system, but a design approach. Avatar Legends plays very differently from a lot of other PbtA games, including ones by Magpie. Bluebeard's Bride, for example, isn't just different because of the setting and premise, but mechanically really, really different.
But there are definitely companies and designers who call PbtA an "engine," and we don't have a great way to talk about a design approach without it sounding confusing, so I think your point generally stands. And overall, yeah, there are a lot of core mechanics being adapted to all sorts of different games.
VelvetViolet
Adventurer
I find it really frustrating that a ttrpg game needs to follow the supplement treadmill model in order to maintain a player base. The only reason to play ttrpg over video games is the freedom to use your imagination, not being told what to do.
Yeah, I really liked how the Monsterhearts community would constantly produce new skins back when G+ was still around. I'm sure they still do but I don't know where they're collected.
That's pretty much how I think nowadays. I have a bunch of ideas for stuff, some of them mutually exclusive (which I find particularly engaging). I'm just not satisfied with a single canonical setting for an entire genre. I love toolkit games like Urban Shadows, Night's Black Agents or Feed.
That huge list of dead and dying genres you listed before just fills me with sadness. The Mutant Future wiki has this page providing an overview of the sheer diversity of the post-apocalypse genre with the intent of inspiring groups. There's so much potential and diversity in the various genres and it's just not being explored because... gamers aren't adventurous, I guess? The ttrpg rules are just so prohibitively costly to learn that the only option is make 5e-compatible products even if the rules don't convincingly support the intended atmosphere?
The ttrpg medium frustrates me in a way that I've only ever been frustrated before with the RTS genre. Both are stagnant and dead because of a combination of niche audience, overly complicated rules, and the players getting married to the first game they play and never try anything else, all of which feed into one another... even tho both have unique huge potential that other mediums and genres can't shake a stick at.
I feel like I'm basically screwed as a creative and a consumer of ttrpgs until we reach the point where algorithms can create convincing virtual reality worlds on the fly based on our input. Barring life extension, I'm probably not going to live long enough to see that happen and the cultural shifts in that time will probably render current pop culture tastes quaint and obsolete.
Yes, but Ashen Stars plays differently from Timewatch, which plays differently from Swords of the Serpentine, though they all stem from the common Gumshoe root. "Plays differently" is not a clear indicator of what's under the hood.
When the play process and structures are so similar across systems, I don't really think distinguishing between "system" and "design approach" is important for our purposes in this thread. I do not believe hashing out this distinction will serve to make the discussion better, so I'm not going to engage in that.
It shouldn't have to actually. I can see why that model works from a publisher and retailer end (though it only works for a while - and suffers from diminishing returns over time) but as far as player bases go the supplement treadmill model only seems to matter in the sense that it keeps the fact that the game exists in people's minds. The idea that once a game stops publishing new supplements it's "dead" is weird from a player perspective because if you have the game it shouldn't matter if they're still making it or not (though I fall into that thinking too - I was shocked this summer to discover that Buffy the Vampire Slayer is still being published and you can still buy the print books new). Especially because most players only buy the core book anyway (which is part of why supplement treadmills have diminishing returns and eventually lead to new editions to try to get the whole player base to spend some money again).
But other models suffer from a monetization problem - how do you keep a player base active in a way that doesn't involve selling them supplements every month/few months and a new edition every few years? Who's going to do it? Long ago I thought Organized Play programs would be the thing that could do that, but they're expensive to run and have the chicken-and-egg problem that you need to have a player base of sufficient size to get enough of a subset of those players to show up regularly to make it work. And you still have to be producing content for them consistently to make sure your OP GMs have adventures to run so in a way the need for a supplement treadmill problem is just moved around rather than solved.
Grendel_Khan
Hero
Welp, I tried to extend some courtesy, but you're not doing the same, so here we go!
From Meg and Vincent Baker's note about calling something PbtA and using the logo:
"Again, "Powered by the Apocalypse" isn't the name of a kind of game, set of game elements, or even the core design thrust of a coherent movement. (Ha! This last, the least so.) Its use in a game's trade dress signifies ONLY that the game was inspired by Apocalypse World in a way that the designer considers significant..."
Even Wikipedia doesn't call PbtA a system, but "a tabletop role playing game design framework."
Some PbtA games don't even use the same type or number of dice—Flying Circus, for example, uses 2d10 rather than the more typical 2d6. Some PbtA games have HP or equivalent, others don't. Some, like Avatar Legends or Monster of the Week, stat up NPCs, and others don't. That every PbtA game is different, sometimes drastically so, from others, isn't some minor point or marketing speak. They are all unique games, including down to what your rolls mean. And the differences are often much greater than variations within a system. Fall of Delta Green and Night's Black Agents have some different skills and setting-based tweaks, but they are both Gumshoe games, as much as a GURPS Transhuman and GURPS CthulhuPunk campaign are both GURPS games.
Put another way, if someone was playing a fantasy RPG with no statblocks for enemies, and they were rolling a d10 instead of a d20, and had no HP...would you say they were playing 5e, because the classes were D&D-like? Or, a less extreme example, would you say that all OSR games are 5e?
You might not be interested in having this discussion, but I think it's important for how the larger community thinks about and discusses PbtA. It really is a framework for various kinds of designs, not a system.
And if you still want to say, meh, words or distinctions don't matter, it's a system, remember that Bluebeard's Bride is a game where you play different aspects of the same character's personality—not as Inside Out-style individual embodiments, but literally guiding the protagonist through the situation together. Meanwhile, World of Dungeons is D&D-style fantasy using storygame mechanics. Those aren't the same system, no matter how hard you squint.
Jaeger
That someone better
It's just the way it is dude.
RPG's are all about their player network effect. They need to constantly bring in casual players to filter through to the hobbyist GM's that will keep the gaming network going. The supplement treadmill serves to constantly keep the game visible, and keep current and potential new players engaged by new offerings.
It is all about continually engaging people's interest. And for various reasons if a game line isn't actively supported, the majority of gamers just aren't interested.
Even D&D has to edition treadmill every 10-15 years to reinvigorate its ranks...
Your guess is correct. Because...
In General:
Most gamers do not go out of their way for anything; they talk about what they talk about because it got shoved into their face by virtue of being the mainstream thing, and anything that isn't shoved in their face might as well not exist.
Most gamers don't like to 'work' for their entertainment; they like to just sit down and play. The game that gives them the best odds of being able to do that is the one with the dominant network effect. Once they find a game that allows them to just sit down and play, that satisfaction is met. End. Of. Search.
Because most gamers don't like to 'work' for their entertainment; they aren't curious, so they don't seek things out. Which means that if you don't toil to thrust what you have to offer into their faces, then they will not even consider the possibility that an alternative even exists.
You can see this effect in many threads on this forum of gamers and GM's refusing to look beyond D&D/5e/d20 based games because they do not have the time, or want: "to learn new rules"...
It goes without saying that many people here, myself included, are exceptions to the general rule, and are outliers in the overall hobby.
Everything listed is a one stop shop complete RPG.
None of them are following the old Gurps/Hero model of 'super-system tome' + genre/setting supplement. Those are all very much following the d20/OGL, or 3pp license model: "I think my system can be used for various genre's - here's my OGL, or hit me up to be a 3pp."
Oftentimes those games are modding the base system in ways the Gurps/Hero IP holders would consider anathema if done to their systems.
Yes, Cortex and Cypher have their pro forma tomes (The way other systems have an OGL or SRD). But those systems real bread and butter is offering complete, genre specific, RPG's.
No one is following in the footsteps of the 'Universal RPG' Gurps/Hero model, and with good reason.
