From D&D to Savage Worlds: What am I missing?

[fuzzlewump]

My current gaming group that I've had for many years at home has only played D&D together, from 2e on up to 4e. Most of us have had brief stints of playing other popular games in other groups (Vampire, Exalted, Spirit of the Century) but in our group it has really only been D&D. That is, until I recently bought Savage Worlds and played two sessions with my group.

So, we are all generally more mechanically focused with a strong bias for combat. And, after running about 6 combats in Savage Worlds I am not impressed. I can see how the simplicity of the system can be an Edge, but for me it's a Major Hindrance. For a group that already knows and loves D&D 4e, a much more complex (more pages) game than Savage Worlds, is there any benefit to playing the lighter Savage Worlds?

What we enjoyed most about the couple sessions of Savage Worlds is the modern, quirky setting heavily inspired and stolen from the "Mother" series of video game RPG's as well as the characters. The mechanics worked really well, but it felt like more had to be put into the game to have fun. A game like 4e, while you have a lot more fun with good roleplaying and setting immersion, you still have a bare amount of fun just mechanically playing it like a wargame or board game or whatever. With Savage Worlds, I do not get the same vibe.

So, given these circumstances, is there any reason we should be playing Savage Worlds instead of D&D? Something about the rules or... something that I should sorely miss? My fellow players and I seem to agree that what we had fun with the most in Savage Worlds, roleplaying and investigation, could easily be done in D&D while also having a very robust combat system we enjoy. Is the answer simply different strokes: some people like Savage Worlds combat much more than D&D but find them both to be complex and interesting?

Let me know what you think.

 

[Desdichado]

Is the answer simply different strokes: some people like Savage Worlds combat much more than D&D but find them both to be complex and interesting?

Yes, absolutely. D&D combat is not objectively better, and many gamers find it fiddly, obsessive, wargamey or otherwise not what they want from an RPG. I personally know several gamers who strongly prefer the SW mechanics to the D&D mechanics. In fact, in some ways, I do to, although I stick with D&D for other reasons.

 

[Umbran]

So, given these circumstances, is there any reason we should be playing Savage Worlds instead of D&D? Something about the rules or... something that I should sorely miss? My fellow players and I seem to agree that what we had fun with the most in Savage Worlds, roleplaying and investigation, could easily be done in D&D while also having a very robust combat system we enjoy. Is the answer simply different strokes: some people like Savage Worlds combat much more than D&D but find them both to be complex and interesting?

Definitely different strokes for different folks.

I think it may be more correct to say some folks like Savage Worlds (in its entirety, not just the combat) more than D&D (in its entirety, not just the combat).

 

[amerigoV]

I recently switched. SW works very well in D&D's place, in my opinion. What I liked:

• From the player side, it still kinda feels like 3.5. Wizards feel like wizards, characters with Sweep feel like fighters with cleave. Yeah, they are different, but SW feels closer to older versions than 4.0 (not saying anything bad about 4.0, just acknowledging 4.0 plays different than older editions)
• From the GM side, it feels like 4.0 - quick to build creatures, Extras and Wilds can play like Minions -> Solos. Prep times is much improved over 3.5.
• Acing/exploding dice are just pure fun (well, until it happens to you ). The game has more "swing" with exploding dice and bennies to offset them. Some people love this, some people hate it
• Love the Hindraces - I have noticed an uptick in inter-party roleplay. While some of it is to play for bennies, some of it is just a different hook on the character than they may have thought up under D&D.

One of the biggest selling points for me is that the core system runs well under different genres. In the past, I did not want to do anything else - I was not interested in fussing with a new system. Now, I can jump into Deadlands or Weird War II without having to drag the group along with new rules.

 

[Rel]

I'm a very big fan of both systems. My current campaign is a Deadlands Savage Worlds game and my previous campaign was a 4e D&D game.

Savage Worlds is unquestionably more rules light (though not nearly as light as some systems) than D&D and if you want more "crunch" then D&D is definitely the way to go. Personally I've been in the mood lately for a lighter game and I'm loving Savage Worlds for what it brings to the table.

There are a few things in particular that I think it does extremely well:

Prep is EASY - As easy as 4e made prepping for my games, I find that Savage Worlds is even a bit easier due to the granularity of the system. It is (for me) very easy to envision where a bad guy falls on the spectrum of stats and skills and so I very rarely need to flesh anything out about the bad guys and can more or less "wing it". The "special abilities" of monsters are likewise easy to throw together quickly and adjudicate easily on the fly.

Running it is EASY - Savage Worlds has almost zero fat on the system. I am virtually never left wondering how I should resolve a particular action or circumstance because the core mechanic is strong and there is nearly always an obvious answer. There is very little in the way of looking stuff up in a book (though I think this is true of 4e too but for different reasons).

The dice mechanic is FUN - What I've noticed about any game that uses "exploding dice" is that whenever anybody rolls for any reason, everybody at the table takes interest in the roll. When they see those boxcars coming up on the d6's then they start to cheer because they know that the PC in question is about to be wildly successful at whatever they are doing. This sort of group "cheerleading" seems to raise the excitement and fun level for everybody at the table. (I also note that I stole an exploding dice mechanic from an ENWorlder to use for skills in my 4e game and it had the same effect. But that's a topic for another thread probably.)

It is FAST - I really enjoy the tactical combats of 4e. But there is no question in my mind that they take up considerable time. I'm in no way suggesting that that time isn't fun but it does dictate the pace of the game in some ways. I can generally get through more plot in a Savage Worlds session than I can a 4e session because the combats are quicker (and often deadlier).

I love the damage mechanic - I'm actually fairly bullish on the damage mechanic of 4e too. But I really like the Savage Worlds damage mechanic which results in combat sometimes feeling very dangerous without the PC's ever even taking any lasting damage. Being Shaken while next to some big bad guy who might kill you in one hit feels dangerous and exciting. But you might get hit several times by that baddie and come out of the combat without ever having taken a Wound. I also note that, while Shaken is a sort of "stun" mechanic which may cost you your turn, the turns go quickly in Savage Worlds and so it doesn't feel like that great a punishment.

Range of settings - This is probably one of the single biggest things in favor of Savage Worlds. 4e does an extremely good job in my opinion of emulating "Heroic Fantasy". But I think you've really got to work at it to make it do much else. Savage Worlds has a wide range of settings available to it that range all over the place. At the heart of it I feel like it's a Pulp game first. But there are a lot of settings that feel right with Pulp and I love Pulp anyway so what the hell.


So bottom line is that you should play whatever works best for your group and what makes you happy. But I happen to think that Savage Worlds makes a great "unisystem" for those times when somebody has an idea for a setting or game that isn't already in print.

One final thing I'll say in favor of Savage Worlds over D&D 4e is that SW is a better one-shot game for Cons and Game Days IMHO. The learning curve for 4e isn't so much about the system. It's about the character. Especially if you are giving the players PC's above 10th level, it can take quite a while before a player gets a good grasp on exactly what their character can do. And even once that happens then you have the issue of the combats running longer to make use of that range of abilities, leaving less room for "plot".

Savage Worlds characters are generally easy to grasp and have only a few special rules to add complexity. So it's easier to hit the ground running. And the faster combats mean that more involved plots are easier to work through during a typical 4 hour session.

 

[D'karr]

Definitely different strokes for different folks.

I think it may be more correct to say some folks like Savage Worlds (in its entirety, not just the combat) more than D&D (in its entirety, not just the combat).

Definitely agree. We've played SW several times and our group has mixed feelings. 2-3 like/love it, 2-4 don't mind it, 1 hates it.

So it is a matter of preference. We've used SW for short one-shot games and it works very well for those. The group prefers D&D for the long term campaign.

 

[Umbran]

I'm a very big fan of both systems. My current campaign is a Deadlands Savage Worlds game and my previous campaign was a 4e D&D game.

Hm. I'm running classic Deadlands. We ought to start trading plotlines...

 

[Rel]

Hm. I'm running classic Deadlands. We ought to start trading plotlines...

I'm running Deadlands: Reloaded.

Mine is currently set in Deadwood and is vulgar beyond belief.

 

[Umbran]

My players are currently hanging around Dodge. Not so much on the vulgarity - unless the Jupiter Cannon isn't what the players think it is

 

[Votan]

[*] Acing/exploding dice are just pure fun (well, until it happens to you ). The game has more "swing" with exploding dice and bennies to offset them. Some people love this, some people hate it.

I've noticed that, contrary to my expectations, people seem to like an occasional unexpected result (to groan over or celebrate). I have seen the same thing in Rolemaster where the open ended dice seem to greatly increase the excitement of combat by adding that element of risk.

4E has a very different design where it takes a lot of bad rolls or an extremely tough encounter to generate the same sense of risk.