Recent content by Retreater

While no game is "perfect," I can find some that work for what I want. Daggerheart is really good for a narrative experience with enough tactical depth to stay interesting for a moderate-length campaign of 20-ish sessions. Dragonbane is a great "beer and pretzels" style, OSR-feeling game. Good...

I mean, have y'all ever seen a game that's not D&D or a derivative? Here are game systems other than SD with more rules, design, and advice for non combat play, including exploration and investigation: Forbidden Lands, Vaesen, Dragonbane, Call of Cthulhu. I guess the appeal of SD is "fruitful...

Ok. And just let me play devil's advocate for a minute. What is the bulk of the page content? Rules about fighting monsters. So I've got my hard copy of the SD rulebook right here. Monster stat blocks for about 1/3rd of the page count. Weapon and armor stats. Class descriptions with level up...

Sorry if that's unclear. I wrote it while getting ready for work this morning. Let me try to elaborate on the point... When rules are balanced and the game has a sense of "fairness," I think that put players on an even playing field where they can test the abilities of their characters and...

Hey, I'm glad you folks (and many others) enjoy the system. You're not wrong for liking it. It's not for me. I have very specific reasons about design why I don't like it. I state that so emphatically so my dislike for the system is not mistaken for a dislike of the creator. And if this were a...

If you're referring to me, let me explain. I have been running games since 1989. I own and have played dozens of systems that aren't 5E. Would you guess that I haven't played 5E in about two years? I'm a published RPG writer. I spend hours every week watching videos about game design and...

I made my point earlier. But the basic is OSE is balanced with OSE. Swords and Wizardry is balanced with itself. TSR-era D&D is balanced with itself. All of those can be interchanged because the ability scores are generated the same way and have the same meaning. Shadowdark is based off 5E...

I can see what you mean. I haven't applied this idea to D&D 5E yet. My thought experiment with it would be a chance at a permanent disadvantage in one of your ability scores. What that chance is, I don't know. Maybe 50%?

Daggerheart has changed the way I run games. I've never felt more free as a GM than I do when Daggerheart takes character death out of my hands and gives them to the players. It might not be for everyone, and it probably sounds extreme, but I'm removing standard character death from campaign...

The same players keep coming, week after week. We often play the same system. The majority of my campaigns that never finish end due to TPKs. Or "enough of the party is killed" - where it just doesn't make sense to continue after 50% or more of the characters die in a way that means the game...

I haven't read or run the originals from the 80s, but I remember reading that the last two books are very different from what came out before.

Well, I'm not interested in another Ravenloft sourcebook. I think the original point of Ravenloft that has gotten lost on modern design is that you were supposed to be regular characters subjected to horrible situations. Van Richten's Guide and everything else has made the PCs the monsters...

Oh yes. There were cards in the 4E era. For Gamma World there were random packs of Omega Tech and Alpha Mutations. It was recommended that GMs and Players each make their own decks so you could draw from a player deck or GM deck as appropriate. (This is all fresh in my mind because I ran Gamma...

Yeah. I guess there are just some iconic ones in other systems that get more use because powers/spells are more limited? In the core game, social enemies are way underbaked. HP and thresholds are too low, their powers too weak. As they are, it would be better just to wing the encounters. Also...

The encounter economy is the main issue. Most powers require no resources to use. In D&D, characters give up spell slots. Much like the 4e skill challenges, they feel very artificial. And unlike their 4e counterparts, they are balanced too much on the "easy side" - which makes it difficult to...