DrunkonDuty
he/him
For RPGs, anyone said Hero System yet? I know it's not Phoenix Command but is actually playable. And it does a good job of simulating supers.
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What game is the best simulationist game?
- Thread starter Morrus
- Start date
Bilharzia
Fish Priest
I challenge your definition of best! In as much I would say "best" should include "playable" as a consideration. There were and I suppose are many RPGs that went down the realism path to a dead end of tedious detail which very few people played. It is possible that GURPS will never be equalled in terms of its breadth - why would anyone want to cover so much again? I am unsure if it is that attractive a system, for long term grogs I know it is.
From the Basic Roleplaying family, it is hard to beat Mythras. For me it has replaced whatever you might consider the "latest" iteration of BRP. Mythras has now built up a pretty big selection of supplements, so while its not as broad as GURPS, it does better at providing a system and settings that have a feeling of 'realism' even when they are fanciful.
The core rules are good for sword & sorcery games, and the supplement Monster Island goes very Clark Ashton Smith with weird and weirder sorcery, creatures and peoples.
The Mythic Earth now covers Britain and Logres (Dark Ages), Rome, Constantinople, and Babylon.
Jack Vance's Lyonesse and Mark Shirley's Perceforest go for a more fairytale medieval-fantasy Britain.
The Luther Arkwright supplement and adventures is a low-powered SF trans-dimensional superhero setting.
After the Vampire Wars is urban fantasy.
Thennla is an ancient-world setting series which is a fantasy Persia/Rome/Greece lookalike.
The recent Destined is a return to superheroes, which is a self-contained book not needing the core Mythras rules.
M-Space is a 3rd party rulebook, setting, and adventures for a d100 SF game from Frostbyte books.
Classic Fantasy is a d100 Mythras take on 2nd edition D&D, with the classes, monsters and magic adapted to the system.
The core game and the supplements all start with some notion of realism - with the player characters and how they are generated (from cultural background, profession and personal interests), to the organisations a character might be a member of whether it's a religion or a thieves guild, or the combat system, even the treatment of magic feels as though it is rooted in a consistent world, using a consistent set of rules and not arbitrary systems, with meta-currencies and endless talents.
aia_2
Custom title
Could you pls point me out this book? I miss it and would like to identify it as i am a great fan of CA Smith.
The definition merely defined the question I was asking.
Thomas Shey
Legend
Note the specific use of "simulation" at hand, which is "modelling reality". I know its sometimes used with the same term, but genre emulation is a different (though not completely unrelated) beast.
Thomas Shey
Legend
You can make an argument for it being too detailed for the rank-and-file, but that's liable to be true to one degree or another of any serious simulation system. You certainly have to be very selective in arguing its not playable given the number of people who've done so over the years. As an example, a lot of people who would consider GURPS too much, feel the same way about Mythras.
Bilharzia
Fish Priest
Yup.
Bilharzia
Fish Priest
As @uzirath posted it is this one:
DriveThruRPG
www.drivethrurpg.com
It is essentially a stealth-tribute to CAS. All the "colonist" gods are drawn from his settings, the sorcery is re-flavoured and extended to emulate a Smith setting, almost everything is cursed, the Serpent high folk are the decadent sorcery users, the creatures are as bizarre as you would expect.
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