Draw Steel General Thread [+]

[Thomas Shey]

Yep, but I have dinner one day at a time. That doesn’t mean I have “left” steak for pizza. I will have steak again next week. I’m not married to my dinner!

Yeah, but I bet you haven't previously had steak night after night, which is the equivalent to what some groups have done with D&D (i.e. one D&D campaign is just followed by a different D&D campaign). If that's been the pattern, I can see someone talking about them "leaving" D&D for Draw Steel.

 

[Morrus]

Yeah, but I bet you haven't previously had steak night after night,

How dare you, sir!

 

[Zaukrie]

Strong

The in-game mechanics are likely easier to handle than D&D 5ed. If there is a player that struggles with mechanics, offer them pregen/heavy help out of session to set up the character; but in actual play you can distil the mechanics quite a bit. For instance having a personalised cheat sheet with only the most likely maneuvers and actions for when they have their turn.

I am trying out that to introduce my brothers. I have prepared such cheat sheets, with a basic version (2 most likely maneuvers and actions, no heroic resources), and a more advanced version (~4 most likely maneuver/main actions including heroic resources) - alongside a seperate "card" with what they need to keep track of outside their turn (triggers/heroic resource income, 3 things each). Each of them personalised.

If there are no stigma connected to it (the player know who they are) playing a retainer might also be an option?

Out of combat should be very similar to 5ed in complexity.

Disagree. There is way more to track in DS than 5e. I have no idea how anyone can think this is easier than 5e.

 

[gnarlygninja]

@gnarlygninja
How do you track individual enemy stats and stamina? Are there tokens ready? PC sheets?

Ah, we have different ideas about what counts as a ton of work. If you want the VTT to do all that for you, Owlbear won't cut it for you.

 

[BigZebra]

That's called Adultery.

You find a game you love and yalls git married and live happily ever after. Unless something better comes along, then you fire up the divorce papers and marry your new significant other. There can only be one. Having more than one means neither is truly loved.


Draw Steel is nice, especially the social interaction sub-system, but my love for GURPS Dungeon Fantasy knows no limit.

Wow - I imagine GURPS Dungeon Fantasy is a niche within a niche within a niche. I know this is a tangen, but what is awesome about that game? I have the Dungeon Fantasy Box and I'm curious but also sure it's to archaic for me.

 

[CommodoreKong]

Version .8 of the Foundry module is now available.

 

[Thomas Shey]

Wow - I imagine GURPS Dungeon Fantasy is a niche within a niche within a niche. I know this is a tangen, but what is awesome about that game? I have the Dungeon Fantasy Box and I'm curious but also sure it's to archaic for me.

I have extremely mixed feelings about GURPS, but found for fantasy it had far fewer of my issues and far more of what I saw as its virtues. A lot of it turns on where you land on the gritty/quasi-realistic line of what you want in your fantasy. I can roll both ways (my recent fantasy games have been PF2e and 13A, but I also spent years running RuneQuest and playing in same, so...)

 

[dbm]

I created a new thread to talk about GURPS and fantasy

 

[Distracted DM]

Why do people have to "leave" one game for another? They're not spouses. You can play more than one game. Or alternate them, or whatever. We have a rotating GM/rotating game table.

If your group plays once every week or two, and you want to play a long-term campaign, then you're probably going to pick a game and stick to it for the length of that campaign, say a year.

If your group is playing multiple times per week, yeah switching games etc. isn't much of a disruption in the flow of a campaign.

 

[Enrahim]

Strong

Disagree. There is way more to track in DS than 5e. I have no idea how anyone can think this is easier than 5e.

I think I understand where you come from. When it come to things that can be interesting to track, I agree DS appear to have more of that for most players than 5e. The classroom example of this is the resource gain trigger. I also think there are likely to be more complex scenarios in DS, as the system supports it better - which mean there will be more to keep track of for the GM, and players trying to optimize.

However my answer was from the viewpoint of the kind of player that is not very interested in mechanics, but just want to do "cool stuff". I grant you that pure fighter in 5ed seem easier to play than even the simplest DS hero. But once you get spells into the mix, I think the scale tips in the other direction. In particular I think keeping track of a single heroic resource is likely easier than keeping track of multiple different resources, which is common in D&D. Duration of effects also is quite a bit more streamlined.

The thing I am most uncertain about is how much conditions come into play. 4ed was infamous for being hard to keep track of because of all the conditions in play. Lingering buffs like bless and bardic inspiration is infamous in 5ed. There seem to me to be less buff of allies in DS, but there might be more monsters with debuffs. Not sure how that will play out in practice.