Crunchy Tactical RPG like 4e/pf2e but for Urban Fantasy?

[John Dallman]

Most of the groups using GURPS I've encountered don't break out the maps, and generally use the minimum options... Most of them really reduce it to TOTM and D&D style "Did I hit him?" mode.

For us, that depends on what we're playing. If most of the fighting is with guns, then TotM is just fine. But if it's melee, especially in fantasy games, the maps and positioning are quite important, and there are quite a lot of Martial Arts rules in use.

What is the finest thing in life Conan? I think it's actually to watch your self-proclaimed enemies immediately hoist by their own petards!

The most fun version of that is to see the hole in their plan and exploit that to wreck it. This can be very simple: I recall an AD&D fight where the self-styled BBEG had set up a Heath Robinson machine that would be triggered if we frightened the ferrets in the cage at the top, and poison the whole of the district water supply.

The lowest-level party member said "I cast Sleep on the ferrets." and got herself straight to the top of the BBEG's list of enemies, before he fled.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

The most fun version of that is to see the hole in their plan and exploit that to wreck it.

That is the absolute top version of this yes! Wonderful example!

I think most DMs have been on the wrong end of it sooner or later! I know I have been. To be honestly I absolutely love it when the players really just totally nuke an idea like that, as much as it can derail a session. It tends to be memorable and really fun for them, and I get to learn something!

 

[Theory of Games]

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[Larnievc]

I might be missing something but when I read crunchy urban fantasy I thought immediately of Shadowrun.

 

[Thomas Shey]

Yeah, Streetfighter did well with martial arts - I've run a couple short campaigns of it... Note that WoD Combat is the de-Capcom'd version.

WoD Combat was what I was thinking of earlier in the thread when I said the prior WoD wasn't automatically a poor combat emulation game.

 

[Thomas Shey]

I might be missing something but when I read crunchy urban fantasy I thought immediately of Shadowrun.

I actually mentioned that earlier, but I suspect most people don't picture the futuristic/cyberpunk elements when they use that term.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

I actually mentioned that earlier, but I suspect most people don't picture the futuristic/cyberpunk elements when they use that term.

Hmmmm I bounced over that but honestly you could strip the cyberware and bioware and so on out of Shadowrun pretty easily, and just have effectively non-magical characters (with varied races), various kinds of caster, and phys adepts, and honestly that really would probably work pretty great for an urban fantasy game. I dunno which edition would be best to use for the base rules - 2nd or 3rd, I'd guess.

 

[Thomas Shey]

Hmmmm I bounced over that but honestly you could strip the cyberware and bioware and so on out of Shadowrun pretty easily, and just have effectively non-magical characters (with varied races), various kinds of caster, and phys adepts, and honestly that really would probably work pretty great for an urban fantasy game. I dunno which edition would be best to use for the base rules - 2nd or 3rd, I'd guess.

Maybe, but I never assume someone wants to do that degree of surgery when looking for a system recommendation.

 

[aramis erak]

Maybe, but I never assume someone wants to do that degree of surgery when looking for a system recommendation.

At least in 1st and 3rd, it's trivial to ignore the cybertech and bioware mechanically...

 

[Thomas Shey]

At least in 1st and 3rd, it's trivial to ignore the cybertech and bioware mechanically...

Except it'd throw off the extent character generation because it assumes most people who aren't mages would be investing in those, which is why the resource column is the way it is.