Recent content by dbm

I’m talking about my group. Do you know my group better than I do?

The vast majority of our gaming is fantasy, so any genre-flexible system needs to have that covered. The sub-genre of fantasy is a bit less well defined - we do pulp, gritty, and high fantasy with a fairly even distribution. That can be more tricky for a genre-flexible system as they have...

We use a version of this in our current campaign. The GM has pegs with character names on them, and others that say ‘Monster A’ and so on; sometimes there are pegs for environmental effects that trigger cyclically, too. When a person takes their turn, their peg is rotated 180 degrees. If they...

As to what I personally want from faction rules? I guess that depends on how they relate to the game; are the PCs going to run the factions, be in the factions, or stand outside (oppose?) the factions? I’d want different kinds of representation for them in each case. Ultimately it’s about...

The love that dares not speak its name…

I think Sine Nomine’s Silent Legions deserves a mention for its GM tools. If your players are a bit too knowledgeable about the Mythos and it’s lost it’s wonder / terror inducing awe then the tools in Silent Legions can be used to make your own pantheon of elder gods. There are also rules to...

Fate is possibly closest to it. You could certainly use Fate to run a Wild West game and put the emphasise wherever you wanted to. Fudge as the progenitor of Fate would also be an option. Cortex Prime would also potentially qualify and could undoubtedly do the job.

Have you played / read either Shadow of the Demon Lord / Weird Wizard? Their career based character development is very interesting.

Could Gumshoe be added, please? (Games like Trail of Cthulhu, Night’s Black Agents, Swords of the Serpentine etc.)

GURPS has a lot of tools for Wild West gaming. The core rules give you pretty much everything you need. If you want more pre-built stuff or specific guidance on how to implement Wild West elements there was a 3rd edition Old West book, and for 4th edition Pyramid 3 Issue 74 is on the Wild West...

Phoenix Dawn Command is a fully card driven RPG, co-written by Keith Baker of Eberron fame. As characters advance they get to do some deck building, adding and removing cards from their deck.

That is your right, of course. It’s about the right tools for the job. If you have a lesser power which can take out orcs but not dragons and a bigger power that can take out dragons or below then surely you would pick the right tool for the fight with the orcs? It’s not about soft balling...

I don’t see it that way myself. I see this as an efficiency challenge, and that is a completely real-world consideration. For example: I have x fuel in the tank of my car and need to get from A to a vaguely defined B (since the end goal is not precisely known) - how do I balance speed versus...

Interesting, I’ve not read that one previously. There are some similar but opposite systems like ‘mana accumulation’. In the GURPS version of this, a spell needs a certain amount of mana and mana is aspected (think elements but other classifications can be used) and the caster makes skill rolls...