D6 System. Is it Dead Bones?

Best Selling RPGs - Available Now @ DriveThruRPG.com
Jamfke

Jamfke

Legendary Pubber
Joined
Dec 28, 2019
Messages
1,011
Reaction score
4,944
I used to play a lot of D6 Star Wars. Back when it first came out I nearly did a backflip, figuratively of course. I ran several PBP games over at the old Rancor Pit forum and on my own forums for several years. Lots of fun.

When I first started tinkering with game design I wanted to get licensed under the WEG banner, but Eric Gibson was in the final throws of calling it quits and said he wasn't doing any licenses, but had plans for making the system open. Well, that took about two or three more years from where I was sitting, so I had to put my plans on hold.

I did make a few things for D6 when the OGL was finally applied, and I am still doodling with the Mini Six rules currently. Is D6 still a thing anymore? There's 5 pages of material over at DriveThru, but most of it is old material. Has it finally kicked the bucket 'o dice and shuffled off this mortal coil? Help me RPG Pub! You're my only hope!
 
Well D6 Star Wars was re-done.

Star Wars WEB RPG (D6) - The Roleplaying Game (Reup)

There is Mythic D6, which works with Godsend Agenda. And with a bit if tinkering the elohim from GA could easily fit into Star Wars as related to The Ones from the Clone Wars cgi. The Atlanteans could easily be force wielders that use it like magic.

So you could get plenty of mileage there.
 
The most high profile D6 product I've seen is the Zorro game that came out last year. It's got the WEG logo on it. It still is only just a Copper Best Seller. So it's not dead, but neither is it thriving.

The thing about our hobby is that there is a huge gulf between D&D and second tier games, and then as big a gulf between the second tier games and the rest. So, from a certain, market-lead perspective, if you aren't at least a second tier game, you might as well be dead in terms of sales and community buzz.

But that doesn't matter. From a hobbiest point of view, the only games that matter are the ones your group are playing.
 
The most high profile D6 product I've seen is the Zorro game that came out last year. It's got the WEG logo on it. It still is only just a Copper Best Seller. So it's not dead, but neither is it thriving.
Click to expand...

hey now, Far West has been rewritten from the ground up to be using the d6 system...

are you saying that isn't high profile?
:tongue:
 
Jamfke said:
I used to play a lot of D6 Star Wars. Back when it first came out I nearly did a backflip, figuratively of course. I ran several PBP games over at the old Rancor Pit forum and on my own forums for several years. Lots of fun.

When I first started tinkering with game design I wanted to get licensed under the WEG banner, but Eric Gibson was in the final throws of calling it quits and said he wasn't doing any licenses, but had plans for making the system open. Well, that took about two or three more years from where I was sitting, so I had to put my plans on hold.

I did make a few things for D6 when the OGL was finally applied, and I am still doodling with the Mini Six rules currently. Is D6 still a thing anymore? There's 5 pages of material over at DriveThru, but most of it is old material. Has it finally kicked the bucket 'o dice and shuffled off this mortal coil? Help me RPG Pub! You're my only hope!
Click to expand...
It ain't dead what can a group entertain, somewhere on this mortal coil. And with strange aeons even D&D can die. But the tomes shall be waiting for discovery, and to entertain another group...:devil:

Jokes aside, if OD&D isn't dead, then how do you expect D6 to die?
I can name at least three d6 games released relatively recently (Heavens Shadow, Mythic d6, Tales of Gor). Those are just the ones I've got.
At least one of them gets supplements published at least semi-regularly (ToG, I'm not sure where's the line between supplements and adventures there).

So no, I doubt the system is now defunct. It's not a major line, but then most RPGs aren't. And the rest depends on how many people decide to publish material for it, after all:grin:!
 
This quietly came out a few years ago, it uses the D6 System...

1619951949704.png

You can order it thru Arion Games, or at DrivethruRPG, there are a few supplements for it (and it is also in PoD at DrivethruRPG)
Very much an 'Arabian Nights or Sumerian' kind of setting, it looks alot of fun. Relatively inexpensive, I have my eye on it at the moment :thumbsup:
 
Last edited:
Mankcam said:
This quietly came about five years ago, it uses the D6 System...

View attachment 30381

You can order it thru Arion Games, or at DrivethruRPG, there are a few supplements for it (and it is also in PoD at DrivethruRPG)
Very 'Arabian Nights' kind of setting, it looks alot of fun. Relatively inexpensive, I have my eye on it at the moment :thumbsup:
Click to expand...
I've got that one, too, from the KS:grin:! It's "Ars Magica simplified and in the ancient Ur-Turuk":thumbsup:!

I just thought it's older than Heavens' Shadow, and I was on the verge of not including that one...

BTW, when was Septimus' published? I kinda dig that setting, but it was definitely older.


Also, this reminds me, I've got another Arion Games that uses d6, too. It's called Vikingr (exactly like that) and is, you guessed it, about going a-viking!
 
Last edited:
AsenRG said:
I haven't seen those, but now I'm interested:shade:!
Click to expand...

Every Star is SW D6 based, but only contains about 12 pages before jumping right into about five adventures. There are some add ons to go with it, but they are essentially character sheets. But it does mean this could be integrated into Star wars if you so chose.

Magitech uses D6's, but is not using the main D6 SW WEG system. Just to check and clarify this for you.

This is WEG 2ed SW

rpggeek.com

Star Wars REUP (Revised, Expanded, Updated) (PDF Version - 2nd Printing)

A 2nd printing with all the collected errata applied. New cover. From the Forward Welcome to the fourth, and likely the final iteration of the D6 system Star Wars Roleplaying Game. For many decades this game has brought players and gamemasters many adventures and stories. The D6 system has a...
rpggeek.com rpggeek.com

it is over 500 pages, the art is updated and much improved. If you want SW updates, use this.
 
I think that the d6 system could have been as popular as Savage Worlds currently is if it had been properly managed the past 20 years. It certainly had enough fans from the Star Wars days to build a solid core of players. When Eric allowed it to become open I took the chance to ask him for permission to convert the old Star Wars miniature rules to Open D6 sans the IP elements. He granted that request but to my knowledge nobody has really done anything with them since I released them for free on the old forums over a decade ago.
 
I started this other thread because of a perceived issue with the D6 system:
www.rpgpub.com

Is adding up a handful of D6s a chore to you?

Here's a quote from a guy talking about his design work on Mini Six*, a stripped down version of the old WEG D6 System: There are a few sacred cows I've grown to dislike in Mini Six. The first one is adding dice. Rolling 7D+3 can be tedious. It's too much math. I've played hundreds of hours of...
www.rpgpub.com www.rpgpub.com

The discussion was rather discouraging. I tested myself afterward, and I did indeed have trouble adding up 7+ dice at an acceptable speed.

TristramEvans said:
Star Wars Re-Up is kinda an abomination
Click to expand...

Could you elaborate for my curiosity? I have no dog in this race.
 
Spellslinging Sellsword said:
I think that the d6 system could have been as popular as Savage Worlds currently is if it had been properly managed the past 20 years. It certainly had enough fans from the Star Wars days to build a solid core of players. When Eric allowed it to become open I took the chance to ask him for permission to convert the old Star Wars miniature rules to Open D6 sans the IP elements. He granted that request but to my knowledge nobody has really done anything with them since I released them for free on the old forums over a decade ago.
Click to expand...
Do you have a link to those rules? I'd love to check them out.
TristramEvans said:
Star Wars Re-Up is kinda an abomination
Click to expand...
Too many extras? 500+ pages does sound like bloat, but Star Wars does have a lot of material to cover.
 
Shipyard Locked said:
Could you elaborate for my curiosity? I have no dog in this race.
Click to expand...

Oh it's just a "throw in everything and the kitchen sink" fanwork. It isn't designed so much as just compiled, full of crunch for the sheer sake of crunch with no eye to playability, and essentially getting rid of everything that made the original Star Wars D6 such an amazingly streamlined and concise emulation of the source.

It'd be like if someone compiled a "Fan Version" of D&D 3rd edition and just threw in every single feat, prestige class, and alternate rule from every single 3rd party D20 product and presented it as one giant mass of rules.
 
TristramEvans said:
Star Wars Re-Up is kinda an abomination
Click to expand...
Well, the authors acted like it was the “fourth and likely final” edition. It’s a fan work for crying out loud. Somebody could come out tomorrow with a Star Wars D6 game and call it “fifth edition”. It’s meaningless.
 
Shipyard Locked said:
I started this other thread because of a perceived issue with the D6 system:
www.rpgpub.com

Is adding up a handful of D6s a chore to you?

Here's a quote from a guy talking about his design work on Mini Six*, a stripped down version of the old WEG D6 System: There are a few sacred cows I've grown to dislike in Mini Six. The first one is adding dice. Rolling 7D+3 can be tedious. It's too much math. I've played hundreds of hours of...
www.rpgpub.com www.rpgpub.com

The discussion was rather discouraging. I tested myself afterward, and I did indeed have trouble adding up 7+ dice at an acceptable speed.
Click to expand...
Yes, large numbers of dice can be quite tedious to deal with, but there's something about tossing a large handful of, or buckets 'o dice during a crucial scene during the adventure, especially after spending a Force Point, that just makes one giddy. Still I have been mining Mini Six in one of my current projects to help keep the numbers down a bit.
 
In April 2016, West End Games (including the D6 system), was purchased by Nocturnal Media, (founded by Stewart Wieck). You can read the press release here. Unfortunately, Mr. Wieck passed away in June 2017, unable to do anything with the system. Then in October 2017, it was announced that the D6 system had been licensed out to Gallant Knight Games, who plan on making a second edition of the OpenD6 titles, (D6 Adventures, D6 Fantasy, and D6 Space). The last update in regards to D6 2E is here, made over two years ago.

They've released the new Zorro RPG using an early rendition of the D6 2E rules several months ago, but there's been nothing since.

So I wouldn't call the D6 system dead, but it is in hibernation. I certainly do hope that we do eventually get the D6 2E system.
 
TristramEvans said:
As I said, setting information isn't an issue, I'm talking about extreme rules bloat.
Click to expand...
I am not sure it has rules bloat, but I generally do not use a majority of the rules in most games - I tend to play narratively so I guess this is more for those skilled in system intricacies.
 
I don’t like Gallant’s changes to the system in Zorro, so I don’t have much faith in their future D6 materials.
 
To answer the original question posed in the OP...

The D6 is one of the most revolutionary systems of the 80s, and remains a very solid framework that can be adapted to model a lot of different IPs. And I think the lack of it's current popuarity is simply in the execution and choice of IPs it's currently associated with. The system s under an open icense, so anyone could make a very good D6 game if they so chose, but that's a double-edged sword as it's mostly been relegated to obscure IPs or fanwork RPGs. Mini-Six has gotten frequent discussion on RPG forums intermittently throughout the last decade, but beyond that, no one is taking the system and doing anything special with it at the moment.
 
Yeah, Zorro was d6. I didn't get it, though, and I also went for the original edition rules of Talislanta, because I like degrees of success.

And I just remembered I have Ninja High School, too. Yes, it's a d6 game:grin:!
I should have just begun by checking my D6 folder, I guess:shade:!
 
Speaking for myself, I mostly moved on from D6 not because I don't like the system, but because Ubiquity gets close enough to D6 Legend, my preferred version of the game, to scratch that itch. And it solves a number of minor annoyances such that it's become my game of choice when I or my group feels the need to roll fistfuls of dice.
 
Savage Schemer said:
Speaking for myself, I mostly moved on from D6 not because I don't like the system, but because Ubiquity gets close enough to D6 Legend, my preferred version of the game, to scratch that itch. And it solves a number of minor annoyances such that it's become my game of choice when I or my group feels the need to roll fistfuls of dice.
Click to expand...
Ubiquity is rather cool...but I've been moving away from success-counting systems, lately. The pendulum might swing again some day, though.
 
Barsoom, because it lit the fire of my imagination in a way no medieval fantasy ever had a chance of replicating. Because it's swashbuckling high adventure in a world both wondrous and familiar. And because Deja and Thuvia were way hotter than any elf chic!

The Hyborian Age. Because it's goddamn Conan.
 
Savage Schemer said:
Barsoom, because it lit the fire of my imagination in a way no medieval fantasy ever had a chance of replicating. Because it's swashbuckling high adventure in a world both wondrous and familiar. And because Deja and Thuvia were way hotter than any elf chic!

The Hyborian Age. Because it's goddamn Conan.
Click to expand...
I fully agree with this post!
But I also suspect you wanted to post in the settings thread:shade:!
 
Didn't the REUP people also do a Star Wars Classic Adventures version which was 1E rules? I seem to recall people talking about that at one point.
 
I own a game called Breachworld. It's a pretty neat game, but I am not doing anything with it so it's up for sale. Anyway, I believe it uses some variant of WEG's D6 system, either Mini Six or OpenD6. It was published by Jason Richards Publishing.
 
3rik said:
I own a game called Breachworld. It's a pretty neat game, but I am not doing anything with it so it's up for sale. Anyway, I believe it uses some variant of WEG's D6 system, either Mini Six or OpenD6. It was published by Jason Richards Publishing.
Click to expand...

I have that one. I think it was adapted from Mini Six, which is itself a version of OpenD6. Mini Six is a nice system.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Banner: The best cosmic horror & Cthulhu Mythos @ DriveThruRPG.com
Back
Top