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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Grendel_Khan" data-source="post: 9409960" data-attributes="member: 7028554">I'm running Spire now, and there's a lot to love. I think my only issues are that:-For a game that seems more narrative than trad, most rolls are actually still very binary as far as moving the narrative forward. If you succeed at a cost (an intentionally very common result) you get what you want but take Stress. If that Stress doesn't trigger a Fallout result, then you just did the thing. Compare that to something like FitD or PbtA, where if you get a mixed success you generally have an immediate consequence, some shift in the current situation that heightens things. In Spire, that shift often doesn't happen, and instead you get the threat of something bad happening down the line, should you take more Stress. But even if that later Stress hits and Fallout results from it, most of the example Fallouts are very specific to the character. You're now wanted for questioning, you've taken out a loan you can't repay, etc. Compare that, again, to FitD or PbtA, where a consequence might be the car the entire group was using breaking down, a storm rolling in, or an enemy learning what the group is up to. Those are shifts in the narrative, as opposed to narative damage, essentially that a specific PC is generally taking. In that sense, the game doesn't give the GM as many tools to keep things spicy—they have to go back to their trad bag of tricks, of just introducing threats and complications as they please, instead of as a result of the game engine chugging along.-Combat's not very fun, for some of the reasons above, but especially because it adds damage rolls to the core mechanics. So you can very often get a hard-earned full success (meaning you inflict Stress on an enemy but take none in return) and then roll a 1 for damage. And if you get a critical success when attacking? That's +1 damage. Even people on the RRD Discord who love Spire often talk about house-ruling combat to make it more interesting. That's a design flaw, no getting around it.Those gripes are major ones for me. But if you're willing to inject things with more FitD/PbtA-ish principles, play a bit fast and loose with the rules, they aren't dealbreakers. And the flexibility the system gives you, as far as putting lots of different kinds of Stress on the line, is genuinely cool and pretty unique. But my recommendation for anything checking it out is to either really deemphasize big, face-to-face brawls, or else be ready to tweak those mechanics after you see how fights work in the system. And the setting and premise—especially if you ignore the more traditional "good guys stopping a random threat" adventures and lean into the resistance/revolution framing—are work some system problems, imo.</blockquote>

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