How do you feel about learning new rule systems?

[Retreater]

Ticket to Ride New York. 5 minutes to explain. 20 minutes to play, 5 each setup/takedown. Simple in the mechanics. The strategies, however, are as in depth as the 1-2 hours of the larger TTR games.

Carcassonne - most can be played (using only the basic set) in 30-40 minutes, and the rules can be explained in 5 min.

Great Khan Game: plenty of depth - 7-10 min explanation, 20-60 min play time.

8 Minute Empires. 5-10 min explain time, 20-40 min playtime. (the name is hyperbole...)

Photosafari - 5 min explain, 15 min play time. much replay value.

Odin's Ravens: 3 min explain. 15 to 30 min play time. "It's candyland for adults"

Elkfest: 3 min to explain, 5 to 60 min, depending upon relative skills. (Dexterity game)

Any of a dozen whist variants. 5-7 min to explain.

plenty of short, non-shallow, simple to teach games available.

Monopoly: 5 min to setup. 2 min to explain. 1 min to throw that game on the floor because it's awful.

 

[aramis erak]

Monopoly: 5 min to setup. 2 min to explain. 1 min to throw that game on the floor because it's awful.

To explain the game as written, 10 min. To beat it into the others' heads that money on free parking isn't in the rules, and that auctioning unbought property immediately is, usually twice that or more.
Played by the actual rules, it's a mediocre game, not a poor one, and plays in about 1-2 hours.
Most people have never actually read and played by the rules.

Worse, the common house rules that people use are in some editions' rulebooks as options.

 

[Jd Smith1]

To explain the game as written, 10 min. To beat it into the others' heads that money on free parking isn't in the rules, and that auctioning unbought property immediately is, usually twice that or more.
Played by the actual rules, it's a mediocre game, not a poor one, and plays in about 1-2 hours.
Most people have never actually read and played by the rules.

Worse, the common house rules that people use are in some editions' rulebooks as options.

As kids, we never read the rules. Fighting over how the game was played was part of the charm. We could kill an entire Saturday that way.

 

[pemerton]

Riddle of Steel is newer, but I don't think it pushes the envelope all that much.

Unfortunately I never got a copy of TROS, but i don't think your assessment of it is accruate.

I think Ron Edwards's review gives a pretty good feel for it.

And i think it's not a coincidence that Jake Norwood (author of TROS) wrote the foreword to Burning Wheel Gold!

 

[Campbell]

I think if you are gauging RPG design only in terms of dice mechanisms most games will look almost exactly the same. The differentiation between most games largely comes down to the procedures of play. What makes Sorcerer, Apocalypse World, Dogs in the Vineyard, and Riddle of Steel compelling games are the reward mechanisms and procedures of how you prep and run them. If you are accustomed to viewing those instructions as polite suggestions you probably will not see anything special in them.

I view this like getting a new board game, throwing away the rules, yet still using the pieces.

 

[Crusadius]

Now? At my age which is... ahhh, 21, yes, 21.

I hate it. Too many new things to remember and likely the rules aren't presented in a coherent manner...... unless the game somehow makes me want to read it e.g. Warhammer Age of Sigmar: Soulbound.

 

[hawkeyefan]

Unfortunately I never got a copy of TROS, but i don't think your assessment of it is accruate.

I think Ron Edwards's review gives a pretty good feel for it.

And i think it's not a coincidence that Jake Norwood (author of TROS) wrote the foreword to Burning Wheel Gold!

It’s entirely possible I was thinking of another game. I thought Riddle of Steel was heavy on combat and fighting styles and the like, but otherwise not much different from more traditional games. Taking a look at the link you sent and it definitely seems I was mistaking it for some other game....though I can’t think of what game....

 

[pemerton]

It’s entirely possible I was thinking of another game. I thought Riddle of Steel was heavy on combat and fighting styles and the like, but otherwise not much different from more traditional games. Taking a look at the link you sent and it definitely seems I was mistaking it for some other game....though I can’t think of what game....

It has a rock/paper/scissors system of positioning etc for combat (I downloaded a free bit of software for running this back in the day). That is a resemblance to BW, though TRoS is more intricate (eg I think it cares about the difference between, say, a thrust and a strike with the edge of the blade).

But the spiritual attributes are central to the game. I think the difference from BW is interesting - in BW playing for or against your Beliefs etc earns you points that you can then spend for buffs. Whereas in TRoS you get to call on your buffs when you're doing stuff that pertains to them. Which is actually closer to Prince Valiant (!), though the latter caps the buffs from morale/emotion at +2 (where pools are often 5+ dice) and has not formal system of when you're entitled to a morale/emotional/spiritual buff other than player and GM both agree.

I think @Campbell is right to say that it is the ethos and play procedures of many of these games that makes them innovative rather than their resolution systems per se.

EDIT: To respond more directly to your post, I think you probably are thinking of the right game but that when you encountered it the key and distinctive features probably weren't brought to your attention.

 

[smcc360]

I used to switch systems all the time--I enjoyed learning and tweaking different rule sets. But now that I've found a generic universal roleplaying game system (no, not that one) that I really like, I stick with it. If I hear about a game with a premise or setting that sounds intriguing, my first thought nowadays is how to do it with a system I already know and enjoy.

 

[Doc_Klueless]

Are you less likely to try a new game if it's a system you aren't familiar with?

Once upon a time, I was a system junky. I'd play games just to try new systems. As the years passed, it happened less and less as I found fewer and fewer groups who either 1) played a different system or b) were willing to play another system.

When 5e came out, it was a chore for me to slog through it even though it's just a variant of a rule system that I know and have played since 1981!

Within the last few months, I've dropped even that (though mostly for family and work reasons). I doubt I'd even pick up 5e again.

Basically, if it's not based on Savage Worlds, I'm just not interested. Not because I think SW is the end-all, be-all of systems. But because I know it inside and out and don't have to think when I play it, if you get what I mean.