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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Greg K" data-source="post: 5957060" data-attributes="member: 5038">I don't know if they would fit what you are talking about by narrativst rather than sim, but Barony (a.k.a Conrad's Fantasy/Rogue Swords of the Empire),  Crimson Cutlass, and Avengers of Justice ("Good Guys Finish Last" and "Villains Finish First") all by Better Games might fit the bill. These were free form role playing games that have been described as rpgs built as if they evolved from non-rpg roots.Jim Pinto wrote that Better Games "produced four striking RPGs, albeit the sci-fi game (Battle Born) was just another version of their FANTASY game. Barony, Crimson Cutlass, and Good Guys Finish Last may be a decade ahead of their time. And as a result, died early deaths." "if you ever get a chance, sit down and play some of the best games that while they didn't directly affect the present movement of indie games, certainly paved the way." (Jim Pinto at Story-games.com in 2011")Crimson Cutlass: Regarding this game Jim Pinto wrote: "Finally. There was Crimson Cutlass. The pinnacle of pirate rpgs with an entire book of tarot-card related references to events and intrigue played out over the course of ANY adventure you design." "Crimson Cutlass remains the only pirate game worth playing (that's right, I worked on 7th Sea and I'm still saying that). It came in three books, one of which was for resolving story threads and forks. It used a tarot deck for success, which was keyed against player aspects like "swimming" or "captaining." It drew heavily from the Tales of the Arabian Nights board game or vice versa. And because of the book design, you could play without a GM (not that the designers considered this) or rotated the GM around the table so players could take turns steering the adventure (just like Inspectres).Good Guys Finish Last: Good Guys Finish Last which was one of two games making up Avengers of Justice, Jim Pinto wrote, "Good Guys Finish Last" is now and will always be the best super hero game ever made. If you could find a way to make it GMless, it would be the single best RPG ever made." When asked to elaborate, he wrote: "Good Guys Finished Last was an innovative comic book emulator. The players were writers and editors of the comic, as well as the characters in the story.The grid of powers was innovative too. You had some 8 or 10 power groups to choose from (Chemical, Electrical, Power, etc.) and you would cross-reference those to create vague power descriptions (Chemical + Ballistic meant doing Lethal Chemical damage at Range). Depending on the campaign, you would select 2, 3, or 4 groups as your starting power level and experience points would increase your power in a given area. Granted the game was long before "framing scenes" but the innovative initiative system was designed for conflict resolution, even though that wasn't a term yet."Advancement in these games was done via earning various Ignobles.(Adventure, Bard's Tale, Battle, Crafty Deeds, Desires Fulfilled, Exercising Prudence, Growth, Heroics, and Magical Events) in play. Earning these Ignobles allowed you to enter new exit paths (kind of like how Warhammer Fantasy FRP has career Paths) with each path having its own pre-requisites.Jonathan Tweet stated that, in 4e, they were trying to make a game that was free-form like Conrad's Fantasy/ Rogue Swords of the Empire.</blockquote>

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