Crows, James Introcasos MCDM Dungeon Crawler RPG

[Reynard]

Even Hall of Fame quarterbacks throw bad passes.

I knew exactly what Draw Steel! was intended to be before that project even had a name, when it was just called MCDM RPG, and I was excited about it from the start. I know the name of Crows and all sorts of miscellaneous stuff about it, but don't have the foggiest idea what it actually is, other than yet another vaguely retro ruleset in a market already overrun with those. I continue to worry that's putting the cart before the horse. I'm positive they'll correct that by the time the Kickstarter launches, but why not do that from the start?

To be clear, I hope I'm wrong. I like MCDM's stuff so I'm rooting for Crows. But I wish I had some idea what I'm rooting for.

I don't think there is any indication that Crows is "retro." It is always dungeon crawler with gear based advancement using a modern game engine as a foundation. Unless you just call any dungeon crawler "retro" that assessment doesn't make any sense. Just by way of example, there are as many modern video game dungeon crawlers as there are retro ones, maybe more.

 

[Staffan]

I definitely don't agree with that at all lol but YMMV.

It's got a more-or-less medieval tech level, with elves and humans and dwarves and hobbitspolders and castles and knights and towns and dungeons. If your definition of "generic fantasy" is "Greyhawk with a slightly different map", it's not that, but it's pretty close. And the monster book is definitely if not identical to the D&D MM pretty close, with things like reptilian kobolds, semi-fiendish gnolls, purplekingfissure worms, and regenerating green-skinned trolls. We're not talking Jorune here, or even Glorantha.

 

[Reynard]

It's got a more-or-less medieval tech level, with elves and humans and dwarves and hobbitspolders and castles and knights and towns and dungeons. If your definition of "generic fantasy" is "Greyhawk with a slightly different map", it's not that, but it's pretty close. And the monster book is definitely if not identical to the D&D MM pretty close, with things like reptilian kobolds, semi-fiendish gnolls, purplekingfissure worms, and regenerating green-skinned trolls. We're not talking Jorune here, or even Glorantha.

While this description isn't inaccurate, it does cherry pick the more traditional elements and completely ignores the very long list of weird elements.

 

[Staffan]

While this description isn't inaccurate, it does cherry pick the more traditional elements and completely ignores the very long list of weird elements.

Are e.g. time raiders more weird than e.g. githyanki? Or are you just more familiar with githyanki since they've been in D&D since the 80s (or whenever Fiend Folio was released)?

Orden is at its core a pretty traditional vanilla fantasyland. On the periphery there's some weird stuff, but that's not more weird than the stuff that's in traditional D&D. It's just differently weird. And that may or may not make it incompatible with things written assuming D&D's flavor of weird.

 

[zakael19]

It’s definitely got a lot of Warcraft-vibes vs FR vibes.