Your table is YOUR table.

[dragoner]

This place is heavily D&D oriented, or adjacent; and low impact for all that I can see.

 

[MGibster]

I'm currently gaming with a group who are around my age, men and women in the 40s and 50s. During our last session, the PCs were killing gnolls left and right. They approached some gnolls who were singing and dancing in a tower, when their leader, who I named after our own @Charlaquin, invited them to join in the dance. One of the PCs, the paladin, jokingly said, "Well, shoot. I can't just indiscriminately kill something that tries to talk to me."

I can't speak for anyone else, but my group, many of whom cut their teeth on 1st or second edition AD&D, will not just kill most humanoid creatures on sight regardless of what the Monster Manual says about them. (I'm not using WotC's definition of humanoid here.) The only reason my players were even killing gnolls in the first place is because they found evidence of an upcoming raid on a nearby town.

I imagine at other tables things are different. And that's okay. There are lots of different ways people might play their games and most of the time that's okay.

 

[Charlaquin]

I'm currently gaming with a group who are around my age, men and women in the 40s and 50s. During our last session, the PCs were killing gnolls left and right. They approached some gnolls who were singing and dancing in a tower, when their leader, who I named after our own @Charlaquin, invited them to join in the dance. One of the PCs, the paladin, jokingly said, "Well, shoot. I can't just indiscriminately kill something that tries to talk to me."

I can't speak for anyone else, but my group, many of whom cut their teeth on 1st or second edition AD&D, will not just kill most humanoid creatures on sight regardless of what the Monster Manual says about them. (I'm not using WotC's definition of humanoid here.) The only reason my players were even killing gnolls in the first place is because they found evidence of an upcoming raid on a nearby town.

I imagine at other tables things are different. And that's okay. There are lots of different ways people might play their games and most of the time that's okay.

I assumed you were joking when you said you were going to name a gnoll leader after me. I’m flattered you actually did it!

 

[MGibster]

I assumed you were joking when you said you were going to name a gnoll leader after me. I’m flattered you actually did it!

She's a Bard and during our next session she'll sing songs by Kesha, Lady Gaga, Dead or Alive, etc., etc. when casting spells.

Charm Person is is Unhealthy Obsession by the Blake Robinson Synthetic Orchestra

You just don’t know it yet, but you love me and I love you the same
One day we’ll have a pretty wedding, and I’ll be your everything
We’ll be together, yes forever, we will never ever part
Oh, you don’t know it yet, but baby I’ve already got your heart

At some tables the GM sings to their players and at other tables the GM is wrong.

 

[Lanefan]

At some tables the GM sings to their players and at other tables the GM is wrong.

At some tables, the GM singing to the players would quickly relieve the GM of having any players to sing to.

 

[Gradine]

At some tables, the GM singing to the players would quickly relieve the GM of having any players to sing to.

The trick here is to either (a) actually have a good singing voice, or (b) lean heavily into the spirit of karaoke.

 

[Bohandas]

I think that people take less issue with the changes as they do with the spurious accusation of racism implicit in the change

 

[Celebrim]

In the history of D&D, TSR/WotC have spent far more time taking the game away from directions I wanted the game to go than they have spent taking it in a direction I wanted to go.

As such, they've gotten a lot less money from me than they might have considering the amount of time I've spent playing a game inspired by the game they make but which isn't compatible with so many of their ideas.

For my part, I'd love to have companies that made things that catered to my tastes and I buy products from those that do, but I'd rather buy more than I do because it would imply that I've saved my own time in favor of paying someone else for theirs and I'd consider that a worthwhile trade.

But, well, I'm out of luck. WotC left me behind somewhere around 3.5e and not even full hand of things they've published since then have appealed to me or been purchased.

 

[Micah Sweet]

In the history of D&D, TSR/WotC have spent far more time taking the game away from directions I wanted the game to go than they have spent taking it in a direction I wanted to go.

As such, they've gotten a lot less money from me than they might have considering the amount of time I've spent playing a game inspired by the game they make but which isn't compatible with so many of their ideas.

For my part, I'd love to have companies that made things that catered to my tastes and I buy products from those that do, but I'd rather buy more than I do because it would imply that I've saved my own time in favor of paying someone else for theirs and I'd consider that a worthwhile trade.

But, well, I'm out of luck. WotC left me behind somewhere around 3.5e and not even full hand of things they've published since then have appealed to me or been purchased.

What's your go-to game? Based on what I've heard from you it should be worth checking out.

 

[Celebrim]

What's your go-to game? Based on what I've heard from you it should be worth checking out.

Right now I play a homebrew version of D&D 3.0e (3.25?) with rebalanced classes and combat rules, Star Wars D6 with heavily rebalanced equipment (and a few house rules handling astronavigation, capital ship combat, etc.), and CoC Pulp (mostly) 5e with a few 7e inspired changes. BRP, D20, and D6 are I think pretty solid systems.

Most games I would play are based on those core systems.

I own and admire Classic Traveller and particularly the Mongoose update of it and 5e Pendragon, but haven't had a chance to run/play them and I have serious doubts about elements of both of them, but don't want to fiddle too much until I've had enough play experience to really understand the rules. I own and admire DOGS (the generic DITV system) but haven't had a chance to run or play it. (If I were to ever run Star Trek, I'd run it in DOGS.) I have worries about it as a generic game system, but I think it would be great for settings where they have a clear progression of "Trying to solve the problem with talking" => "Trying to solve the problem with fists" => "Solving the problem with guns".

Past positive experiences with Chill 2e.

Generally I prefer systems with a strong core fortune mechanic and add on minigames to handle different situations that would arise and which are largely free form in social play but detailed in physical simulation. For example, you can't with the same rules have a fast-handling tactical skirmish game and a fast-handling chase simulation, but you can have common fortune resolution between the two different situations and just abstract different situations in different ways and use your GM authority as a story teller to try to seamlessly move between the two situations.

If I had to pick one system it would be D20 and particularly games in the 3e D&D/D20 Modern mold of early D20 and derived games. They just are the easiest to fix because they have the most solid core mechanics as long experience has made me appreciate classes, levels, and hit points as good things. You could also shear those systems down to a very rules light sort of thing if you wanted to. In D6 is balancing challenges is hard without some sort of narrative buffer and as you watch the system evolve they develop jankier and jankier solutions to this. And the concept of speed in D6 is poorly handled, as evidence by the waffling between 1e and 2e and the fact they never really solved the problem. And in BRP to really make the system work generically, then you have to start doing a lot of too heavy math because the BRP mechanic however elegant is fundamentally broken on the subject of difficulty.

Strong rules are good things, but ultimately the story (however it is created) is what makes an RPG fun and rules are just there to facilitate that. I personally prefer emergent story driven by characters over self-aware mechanics that are actively trying to create "the right story" but I think that's just a preference.