Search results

  1. P

    What Do You Think Of As "Modern TTRPG Mechanics"?

    Yes, this. I've tried to convey a similar idea upthread. I don't know Apocalypse Keys other than your posts about it. But drawing on RPGs that I do know, I can say that Prince Valiant, Burning Wheel and Torchbearer 2e are not just tools for exploring a particular genre or fictional situation. I...
  2. P

    What Do You Think Of As "Modern TTRPG Mechanics"?

    A few more RPGs that are not narrowly focused on a single thing: *Burning Wheel *Torchbearer 2e *Cortex+ Maybe also 4e D&D. But I would think of the above being "modern" in a way that (say) GURPS, or 3E D&D, are not.
  3. P

    What Do You Think Of As "Modern TTRPG Mechanics"?

    I can tell you what I took away from your "aimless" comment (and some of the elaboration/discussion it prompted, eg from @Campbell): A system is aimless, in this sense, if it adds on elements intended to represent this and that component of the fiction - eg encumbrance rules to represent how...
  4. P

    What Do You Think Of As "Modern TTRPG Mechanics"?

    What are the "meta-mechanics" in Apocalypse World?
  5. P

    What Do You Think Of As "Modern TTRPG Mechanics"?

    I'm not sure what you mean by "style". But your first sentence in the second quote seems to identify the theme/goal of GURPS. It expresses a certain way of thinking about the world, and how action within the world produces results.
  6. P

    What Do You Think Of As "Modern TTRPG Mechanics"?

    Wilderness play, in OD&D and early AD&D, is structured fairly similarly to dungeon-crawling (map-and-key framing and resolution of movement) but with a different resource clock. I don't think it's all that well designed. I also think it's secondary to dungeon-crawling. I don't think differences...
  7. P

    What Do You Think Of As "Modern TTRPG Mechanics"?

    I'm on the side that thinks that OD&D (and Gygax's AD&D, at least up until the end of the PHB and for good chunks of the DMG) had a clear focus and associated intention: namely, skilled-play dungeon-crawling, with map-and-key as the core method for establishing what scenes the GM presents to the...
  8. P

    What Do You Think Of As "Modern TTRPG Mechanics"?

    I think of "modern" more as pertaining to a RPG's overall design, rather than its mechanics. To me, a game feels "modern" if (i) it is clearly not a wargame or wargame variant, but (ii) it does not rely on unmediated GM curation/decision-making to ensure that the game "goes". The earliest RPG I...
  9. P

    D&D 5E (2024) How can I do a Charisma-Investigation (or a Strength/Dexterity-Investigation if I can't use Charisma) to find a secret door?

    There are other FRPGs that use a "fade away"-style rule. For instance, ere is the Torchbearer 2e rule for an absent player (from the Scholar's Guide, p 25): If your group plays an ongoing game and a player misses a session, they get a little boost to help them catch up when they come back...
  10. P

    D&D General How Much D&D Stuff Is There Anyway? Part 3: Magazines

    I've got the Dragon Archive - I think I know where the CDs are, but all the PDFs are on a hard drive too. But Dragon had the most influence on me in the mid 80s (issues from around about 90 to about 110 or thereabouts). I remember the Gygax article on demi-human level limits; Tables and Tables...
  11. P

    D&D General Beginning under the Dark Sun (How to approach the setting ?)

    To add a bit to what's been posted: I see Dark Sun as D&D's version of sword-and-planet fantasy. The overall vibe is S&S, but the substantial foregrounding of psionics adds a sci-fi twist. Sorcerer-Kings, their Templar servitors, etc can (in my view) be portrayed as if they just stepped out of...
  12. P

    D&D General The Great Railroad Thread

    There can also be more to it than the quality of performance. When watching a film or a theatrical performance, I don't have the opportunity to intervene and diffuse whatever tension might be rising. The performance may generate pathos, or may incline towards bathos, but either way I have to...
  13. P

    D&D General The Great Railroad Thread

    Agreed! One technique that I use as GM - and it's hardly revolutionary - is to ask each player how their PC came to be in <the situation>. I'll work with them to help, if useful/necessary. This can help establish a bit more backstory, and also connections between the PCs.
  14. P

    D&D General The Great Railroad Thread

    Crooks gather in back rooms, sure. But they're generally already known to one another.
  15. P

    D&D General The Great Railroad Thread

    To me, it seems that a lot of RPGers identify resemblances based on features like names, appearances, and the like, rather than by reference to theme, the way events are framed and resolved, etc.
  16. P

    D&D General The Great Railroad Thread

    I don't know sci-fi literature well enough to know how many sci-fi stories start with the PCs as mercenary-types who are hired in a starport dive. I don't think I've ever seen it in a sci-fi film, but maybe I've forgotten some example of it. I don't know how important inns are to the...
  17. P

    D&D General The Great Railroad Thread

    Keep on the Borderlands is an example of a module where the intended play is pawn stance, and the starting point is low(ish) stakes. But the players are still given the full set-up from the outset: they know that they are at the Keep to defeat the humanoids of the Caves. Acquiring further...
  18. P

    D&D General The Great Railroad Thread

    The only meeting in an inn, in LotR, is Strider meeting the Hobbits. And that is not a "quest-giver" looking for doughty adventurers. The Hobbits are already well-known to one another, and friends/relatives/staff. Gandalf is well-known to them. And they meet Gimli, Legolas and Boromir at the...
  19. P

    D&D General The Great Railroad Thread

    This seems like a description of what I called "pantomime play", and/or what @TwoSix has called "thespian play: everyone knows where it's heading - namely, to the players having their PCs take up the GM's proffered opportunity for adventure - but it is played out, rather than everyone just...
Top