What system for...

[Reynard]

Cortex is similar to Fudge in my opinion - it’s closer to a collection of mechanics and suggestions on how to use them than it is a game you could just sit down and run. It does require a lot more pre-work to get to the table than a genre flexible system such as Savage Worlds but it has some really good worked examples for how to handle things which other games can struggle with.

Relationship maps is a great example of something Cortex can handle well, though other games could do that too. I can see how you might do it in Fate or Fudge but those are also (IMO) toolkits rather than genre flexible systems. (I often think of Fate as a ’core system’ which is kind of half way between a genre flexible system and a toolkit system).

yeah. Fudge left me baffled when it bought the Big Book decades ago. Fate made much more sense, which I put in the same category as SWADE as far as where it sits on the "Generic RPG" to "Toolkit" continuum.

 

[Aldarc]

The idea I am trying to find a system for right now is a publication project, so off the bat I need a system that is Open or at least has easy and free license.

Working Title: Cold Open

Broad Strokes: all the PCs are individuals that chose cryogenic preservation. In the far future, they awake from their frozen sleep deep in the bowels of the facility. They are hunted by the cannibal Thawed, must contend with weird mutations and terrible security malfunction, and find their way out of the facility into an unknown future.

Key features: This adventure must be completely self contained, rule wise. It is meant to be opened by the GM and for play to start immediately. Characters will be generated or revealed during play, as players assigns stats and skills and define who their survivor was (as their memoires slowly return). Plus mutations! In the end, characters that curvive and escape would be level 1 (or the equivalent thereof) in a theoretical follow up adventure on the surface.

This is an idea of I have used a couple times in a much more limited fashion, but I am finally ready to make it into a product -- mostly because I want to see how the "completely self contained" thing goes.

What system do you think would work? I am considering Sahdowdark, Mork Borg, LevelUp, 5E, BRP and Dragonbane, but I am sure there are other appropriate ideas. Is DCC/MCC an Open game?

MCC sounds fun for this though I don't know if it's an Open game.

Fate would be pretty easy to fun for this as well. Players can assign their skills and aspects as they go along.

 

[Thomas Shey]

I'm saying I could not use Cortex (or any toolkit system I am not familiar with to build a regular fantasy campaign. The difference is that a toolkit system asks you to pick and choose pieces and/or turn dials. that is a LOT harder in a system you have never used than simply reading a system and trying to grok it.

For example, if I said I wanted to run a game about cowboys fighting aliens, you could tell me to use Cortex, or Deadlands. Deadlands does not have aliens, but it does have cowboys and weird stuff. You con't have to build anything in Deadlands, just curate the possible options a little. But to use Cortex, you would have to build that game.

Again, I am not bagging on Cortex or toolkit games in general. I am just saying that unless the particular game happens to be very easy to understand, toolkit games ask a lot more of the GM than other types of games do -- and for good reason. If you DO know the toolkit game, you can use it for a lot of possible games/campaigns.

I use SWADE a lot for these random weirdo ideas I have. SWADE is what I would call half of a toolkit. it isn't really "build your own game" like HERO or presumable Cortex (only going off what I have read), but you can curate options and use subsystems to get the game you are aiming for. But even that isn't as easy as finding a game that really embraces whatever nonsense you came up with.

But my argument is you can do that because those concepts aren't that far off the beaten path. The more something is, the more its A) Hope someone already did something close, B) Hack some other system into it, or C) Use a toolkit. You simply can't assume A will be the case, and B may be less work if you're familiar with the other system but there's no assurance the result will be particularly satisfactory because it may be absolutely the wrong tool for the job (C can sometimes be too, but its possible to assess that up front by looking at what areas it does cover).

 

[Reynard]

But my argument is you can do that because those concepts aren't that far off the beaten path. The more something is, the more its A) Hope someone already did something close, B) Hack some other system into it, or C) Use a toolkit. You simply can't assume A will be the case, and B may be less work if you're familiar with the other system but there's no assurance the result will be particularly satisfactory because it may be absolutely the wrong tool for the job (C can sometimes be too, but its possible to assess that up front by looking at what areas it does cover).

Maybe I'm not being clear. A toolkit system one is not familiar with is an order of magnitude harder to use to get what you want than a game that is "pretty close." A toolkit game with which you are familiar is the best choice.

 

[Kannik]

Maybe I'm not being clear. A toolkit system one is not familiar with is an order of magnitude harder to use to get what you want than a game that is "pretty close." A toolkit game with which you are familiar is the best choice.

Which is often the chicken/egg hurdle for new toolkit systems for their adoption or increase in mind/game share. Lots of examples can help there, as those examples can provide the "pretty close" base needed to nudge people towards using it.

(Which is why the Cortex Prime Spotlights not seeing a PDF release is unfortunate as it limits the number of those (official) "pretty close-s". There's a bunch of fan made ones, but they're harder to find and by their nature they will vary in presentation and quality.)

 

[Reynard]

Which is often the chicken/egg hurdle for new toolkit systems for their adoption or increase in mind/game share. Lots of examples can help there, as those examples can provide the "pretty close" base needed to nudge people towards using it.

(Which is why the Cortex Prime Spotlights not seeing a PDF release is unfortunate as it limits the number of those (official) "pretty close-s". There's a bunch of fan made ones, but they're harder to find and by their nature they will vary in presentation and quality.)

Again, I don't know Cortex, but I understand that at least for a while it was used for a number of mid to high profile licensed games. Familiarity with those, I assume, would prime one to be able to use Cortex as a toolkit.

 

[Thomas Shey]

Again, I don't know Cortex, but I understand that at least for a while it was used for a number of mid to high profile licensed games. Familiarity with those, I assume, would prime one to be able to use Cortex as a toolkit.

The problem is a lot of those used Cortex Classic which is, in a way, a much more traditional game in how it worked than Plus or Prime were/are.

 

[dbm]

Smallville, Leverage, Marvel Heroic, and Firefly are the big ones made with Cortex+. Unfortunately as they were IP based they are no longer available (not even in PDF).

Its big strengths are completely customisable stats and skills (to put the focus on whatever you feel is key to a game concept) and an escalating scene resolution system. The modelling of character relationships is also very cool.

Thinking about it a bit more, I’d say that the escalating dice mechanic is probably its most distinguishing feature. Fate also has completely customisable stats and / or skills for example, but I don’t recall a mechanism similar to the scene resolution for Cortex + / Cortex Prime.

 

[Aldarc]

Again, I don't know Cortex, but I understand that at least for a while it was used for a number of mid to high profile licensed games. Familiarity with those, I assume, would prime one to be able to use Cortex as a toolkit.

IMHO, Cortex Prime is incredibly niche. It's a toolkit that is mostly targeted at people who already played Cortex through its prior games, which are no longer available. Prime was late in development and had a number of changes of ownership, which also killed some of its licensing deals (e.g., Masters of the Universe), and Cortex Prime doesn't really have any games associated with it other than Dragon Prince. From what I recall, the current publisher still hasn't publicly published the Spotlights, which are meant to be micro-games that highlight the versatility of the system.*

Moreover, I personally found the game does a bad job of explaining why and how you would use certain rules. A frequent question that I would see on the Cortex Prime Discord was "how do I do magic in this game?" The answer was usually something to the effect of "it depends on what you want magic to do," which while true is also something of a non-answer that doesn't really help people trying to grok the system.

* In contrast, Fate has a LOT of these (and for cheap) so you can see different ways that people have utilized the system.

 

[Reynard]

Just to drag the thread kicking screaming back on topic:

What system would you use to run a campaign inspired by something like Them or 8 Legged Freaks or other atomic horror giant bugs?