Games You've Always Wanted to Play In, But Never Got the Chance

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James Gillen

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Inspired by "Games You've Always Wanted to Run": someone mentioned not being able to find players for a game of anthropomorphic animals, and I said I'd play in that.
I've never gotten to.

Other games I'd like to play but never have:
MAGE: The Ascension (which I'd also like to run)
Prime Directive
Pretty much anything GURPS
Conan (the Mongoose version)

JG
 
GURPS
Justifiers
Conan (TSR or Mongoose)
Talislanta
DragonMech
Thieves Guild
Paranoia with the right group
Probably more

Adding
Rifts
Palladium Fantasy
 
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An ancient world game... Bronze Age or before.
a conan game. I’ve run one.
leverage
fate of the Norns, though I’ve run it too.
a Mythras monster island game

kind of struggling. I’ve played a lot and run a lot at this point.
 
I've never played any of the World of Darkness Games... which, being a big fan of horror, seems like a serious oversight. A lot of my friends have played it, but for some reason I never crossed paths with an active group.
I'd like to try Rolemaster... Agone... and Anima, Beyond Fantasy (which is supposedly Rolemaster-ish).

There are other games that I've played, but I still feel like I haven't really gotten the full experience... like Traveller. The games I've been in have always felt very constrained... anti-sandbox.
 
Over the years I've had the opportunity to play most of the games I'd really like to try at least a little bit.


I'll second Gronan's Pendragon.

I've played MERP, but I'd like to play The One Ring or at least Adventures in Middle Earth. I like the idea of playing in real middle earth instead of the many kinda sorta middle earths that dominates fantasy RPGs.


Thinking about it I'd really like to play in some historical fantasy games. Not full on historical reenactments, but games based on history where the appropriate magic and myth is real, Ancient Greece, Rome, Vikings etc. Unfortunately not a particularly popular genre and it would really take a group that was into it.


Beyond that there are many games I have played that i'd like to play more of. Also games I would certainly play if the opportunity was there, but I'm not really feeling put out that I haven't played them.
 
Deadlands Noir springs to mind. I don't know much about it but I think it would be fun partly because it reminds me of the old TV moive "Cast a Deadly Spell". Come to think of it, I'd gladly play regular Deadlads too. Technically I did play ina short Deadlands campaign but it was the infamous D20 version and GM ran it a parody. It was fun, even charming, but hardly an authentic Deadlands experience.

Sticking Savage Worlds, I'd tempted to play both Mutant Chronicles and Rifts. Never played either in any guise, I can't say if I would really enjoy those games, but I'd like to find out.

It kind of sounds like I need to find me a Savage Worlds GM.
 
About to start my first Pendragon or maybe Paladin campaign, after we've completed Masks of Narlathotep. Have considered RuneQuest: Glorantha too, but it's more complex than the historical Knightly games.

I have played/run Mage: The Ascension for many a year in the past.

Would be interested in Aquelarre, now that I have it, but I suspect it will be like Ars Magica which has always been a favourite I've barely ever played.
 
Fate of the Norns and Burning Wheel. They both seem like quite different systems, though I'd put Fate of the Norns first because I'm interested in the setting there as well.

Glorantha under any version of Runequest run by somebody who really loved the world.

(These are the same as the games I'd like to run)
 
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Deadlands Noir springs to mind
A piece of advice for anybody who plays Noir. Pick one city from the Core or Companion and "play it to the end", i.e. if you cover a city to the point where the characters have played through all the supplied scenarios you'll be around the mid-Veteran mark. Noir doesn't work well when you get to Heroic or Legendary.
 
That is an embarrassingly long list.

But it aches less than the “want to run” one. As a player I am a huge opportunist. I buy into whatever anyone else is willing to run and when asked what game I’d like to play I want to grab the GM by the collar and yell “whatever gets you psyched to run!!!”

GM (and player) enthusiasm trumps most other considerations.

What makes me enthusiastic? PC agency, freedom to pursue goals, a lifelike world where actions have consequences... oh, and a group that is chill, has a sense of humor and abides by regular scheduling. Anything else would be icing on the cake.

That being said, I’d love to try:
  • More PbtA stuff. Urban Shadows, The Hood and The Sword, The Crown & The Unspeakable Power.
  • Fate. Never got it to work for me as a GM; maybe playing with an experienced GM to guide me might make it click.
  • Any OSR-ish game with a megadungeon and/or domain play. These are some of my favorite things as a GM and I’d have a field day with either.
  • Savage Worlds just so I could show my players that Combat Tricks are a thing.
  • Just about anything CoD (I did play Requiem and Lost, first editions, but I’d jump at the chance to play Forsaken or Awakening.)
  • A functional supers game that doesn’t devolve into super-murderhoboes grindhouse.
  • Any system, set in Tékumel, Talislanta or Glorantha.
  • Anything set in Azeroth (the Warcraft setting) just so I can mess that world up the way WoW never let me.
 
though I'd put Fate of the Norns first because I'm interested in the setting there as well.
If we have a few hours in the same town sometime I’ll happily show and talk about it. It’s an interesting system. Not without its warts but maybe the single most flavorful system I’ve ever run.
 
Hmm, are we counting games that we did technically get to play in... for like five minutes and then the GM disappeared without a trace? :tongue:

In which case:

Nobilis
Rifts
Demon: the Fallen
Golden Sky Stories
Mage: the Ascension
Wolf Packs & Winter Snow

Probably more I can't remember.
 
On the subject, I have come to believe that if there could be developed an equation for determining a game's likely duration, there are two factors that would drastically reduce said estimated duration.

Firstly: the game having an interesting, evocative premise that makes you want to play it in preference of something more generic.

Secondly: chargen being especially long, convoluted and requiring either great creativity, extensive calculations, or both.

As such, it amazes me that anyone ever gets to play Rifts for more than thirty seconds or so before the GM spontaneously blinks out of existence (the original, that is; I suppose I can believe that the Savage Worlds version might be theoretically possible to play), and it seems highly improbable to me that anyone has ever gotten to play Nobilis for any amount of time at all. :tongue:
 
As a player I am a huge opportunist. I buy into whatever anyone else is willing to run and when asked what game I’d like to play I want to grab the GM by the collar and yell “whatever gets you psyched to run!!!”
Yeah, I'm pretty much the same way. I'll show up to play just about any Rpg that a friend is eager to run.

Not to be a contrarian, but there aren't really any Rpgs that I'm dying to play that I wouldn't prefer to run as a GM. If one of my friends got amped to run Jovian Chronicles, Conspiracy X, or Dark Streets I would be all over that. But that's only because I have yet to run them myself - and they're "Rpgs I've wanted to run" for years.
 
All of them, most of the time the closest I get to playing a game I'd like to play is to run the game for my group. Pendragon, L5R, Dungeon World, everything except D&D and starwars which are run by someone else.
 
Star Trek

I got into RPGs because I wanted to play Star Trek. Here I am nearly 40 years later and I still haven't gotten to play Star Trek. I keep getting told "it's too hard to run a Star Trek game" and "there's nothing to do in Star Trek."

Star Wars

Similar to the above, this is the other half of what I got into RPGs for. Unlike Trek, I've been able to play a mini campaign which was allegedly Star Wars. It wasn't close enough that I feel I played Star Wars, but I suppose I have to say that I've technically played a Star Wars game. It was pretty much just a railroad where it was just GM fiat all the time.

Hero System

I'd like to play it. After I read the rules of the game, I realized that the "Champions" game I played back in the late 80s was someone's bad homebrew and not Hero System.
 
I would like to play or run Rifts, I think it looks like a blast (in its native non-Savage Worlds system, as opposed to running it in GURPS or whatever despite having considered that as well along with plenty of conversion material floating around out there).

Generally speaking though, I can say I'm a bit blessed as most anything I've ever wanted to run I've always had an easy time getting players for; even if it meant converting some fresh initiates into the hobby in the process.
 
Mostly I've been the GM. But games I'd like to play rather than run include:

GURPS in various flavours
Call of Cthulhu
Bushido
D&D
Pendragon
13th Age
Golden Heroes
Fantasy Craft
Traveller
Legend if the Five Rings, but not the current one
 
On the subject, I have come to believe that if there could be developed an equation for determining a game's likely duration, there are two factors that would drastically reduce said estimated duration.

Firstly: the game having an interesting, evocative premise that makes you want to play it in preference of something more generic.

Secondly: chargen being especially long, convoluted and requiring either great creativity, extensive calculations, or both.

As such, it amazes me that anyone ever gets to play Rifts for more than thirty seconds or so before the GM spontaneously blinks out of existence (the original, that is; I suppose I can believe that the Savage Worlds version might be theoretically possible to play), and it seems highly improbable to me that anyone has ever gotten to play Nobilis for any amount of time at all. :tongue:

There’s an interesting point in there — I think many designers are aware of this on some level and it’s no accident so many of these highly-focuses storygames have brisk character generation — but I’d dispute the assumption that Rifts is not “generic”; it’s as close as you can get to an excuse to use a generic system with all the bells and whistles on.

The Palladium system’s weak link is indeed the tedious character creation, mostly because of the skill system, which is unnecessarily granular and operates on completely arbitrary values; there are other gewgaws to note down but picking guns, implants, spells etc. is fun. Savage Rifts seems to partly ameliorate the issue, though to which degree I have yet to test for myself.
 
There’s an interesting point in there — I think many designers are aware of this on some level and it’s no accident so many of these highly-focuses storygames have brisk character generation

Indeed. This, I must conclude, is why I have in point of fact succeeded in playing in a Kult - Divinity Lost that lasted, if not for a long time, then at least for a long enough time that I got to get a solid feel for it. The absolute simplicity of the chargen cancelled out the bizarreness of the premise. :grin:

but I’d dispute the assumption that Rifts is not “generic”; it’s as close as you can get to an excuse to use a generic system with all the bells and whistles on.

The system is certainly generic (albeit convoluted). The setting, though? I'd say that one has a very distinct flavour to it. There are parts of it that are generic, but the parts everyone remembers (glitter boys, leyline walkers, juicers, literacy-hating Nazis in power armour who put skulls on everything, etc, etc) are definitely the products of a unique vision.
 
Star Trek

I got into RPGs because I wanted to play Star Trek. Here I am nearly 40 years later and I still haven't gotten to play Star Trek. I keep getting told "it's too hard to run a Star Trek game" and "there's nothing to do in Star Trek."
Along those lines, I want to play the 2d20 game system. Star Trek, John Carter, either or both. I agree that Star Trek role playing would be super cool, but most of the Trek RPGs I've seen just don't scratch that particular itch. I ran an OD&D Star Trek for a while back in the 1970's, but I never got to play it.
 
Paladium TMNT. I made a Wolverine badass in prep but the campaign never took off. No one could figure out the rules from the book.
 
Star Trek

I got into RPGs because I wanted to play Star Trek. Here I am nearly 40 years later and I still haven't gotten to play Star Trek. I keep getting told "it's too hard to run a Star Trek game" and "there's nothing to do in Star Trek."

Star Wars

Similar to the above, this is the other half of what I got into RPGs for. Unlike Trek, I've been able to play a mini campaign which was allegedly Star Wars. It wasn't close enough that I feel I played Star Wars, but I suppose I have to say that I've technically played a Star Wars game. It was pretty much just a railroad where it was just GM fiat all the time.

Hero System

I'd like to play it. After I read the rules of the game, I realized that the "Champions" game I played back in the late 80s was someone's bad homebrew and not Hero System.


I played in several short lived FASA Star Trek campaigns -- 3 or 4 sessions each -- and one excellent long term one.

The difference is that in the one that worked, the players and the ref all had a congruent vision of what "Star Trek" meant.
 
Paladium TMNT. I made a Wolverine badass in prep but the campaign never took off. No one could figure out the rules from the book.

It takes everyone a while. Back in the late 80s, I don't think we got it right until we glommed onto a copy of Ninjas & Superspies. Between TMNT, Robotech, and N&SS we somehow figured out how combat worked.
 
Paladium TMNT. I made a Wolverine badass in prep but the campaign never took off. No one could figure out the rules from the book.

Big problem with TMNT that we found was the game isn't well balanced and there is a huge bias to playing turtles. It was rather frustrating if you wanted to play something else like a Frog, or a Weasel. Not too bad if you went with something massive like a grizzly bear or rhino, but turtles were clearly the go to choice. I guess not surprising given the name of the game.
 
Star Trek

I got into RPGs because I wanted to play Star Trek. Here I am nearly 40 years later and I still haven't gotten to play Star Trek. I keep getting told "it's too hard to run a Star Trek game" and "there's nothing to do in Star Trek."

Star Wars

Similar to the above, this is the other half of what I got into RPGs for. Unlike Trek, I've been able to play a mini campaign which was allegedly Star Wars. It wasn't close enough that I feel I played Star Wars, but I suppose I have to say that I've technically played a Star Wars game. It was pretty much just a railroad where it was just GM fiat all the time.

Hero System

I'd like to play it. After I read the rules of the game, I realized that the "Champions" game I played back in the late 80s was someone's bad homebrew and not Hero System.
The reason why I don’t play either Traveller or Star Trek is because I play Traveller, basically. I may have played Star Wars at some points (the D6 version and the funky dice version), but the Traveller subsystems are just more fun for me. Star Trek also just doesn’t carry interest because the mechanics seem bland. Moreover, I feel less restricted by canon with Traveller (even though it has an official setting).

In the case of Hero/Champions, I haven’t played it despite being interested in the game, because the convolutions in the system are a turn off.
 
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I always was interested in seeing how MERP played and I've never had any of the books.
 
I always was interested in seeing how MERP played and I've never had any of the books.

Same here. Back in the days of shopping for RPGs at Waldenbooks, they'd always have a copy or two of MERP on the shelves. I was always curious, but never curious enough to purchase it. But ever after I've been curious as to what it was like.
 
It takes everyone a while. Back in the late 80s, I don't think we got it right until we glommed onto a copy of Ninjas & Superspies. Between TMNT, Robotech, and N&SS we somehow figured out how combat worked.
We ended up getting shown twilight 2000 and then went down the Shadowrun rabbit hole.
We all kind of avoided paladium after that. I still have a few Paladium books but they are all a mess in format and hard to learn without someone running a game for us.
 
Big problem with TMNT that we found was the game isn't well balanced and there is a huge bias to playing turtles. It was rather frustrating if you wanted to play something else like a Frog...

I'm suddenly imagining a Battletoads campaign, with all those crazy body-morphing attacks and bizarre action set-pieces. That could have been cool back in the day, assuming you even wanted to play with the kind of sociopath who had enjoyed that torture chamber of a game enough to want to roleplay it further.

6adjY8P.gif
 
Looking back I seem to have played most games that I wanted (recently I finally had the chance to run the Blake's 7 Roleplaying Game!), and quite a lot that I didn't ... about the only ones I would still love to try are Cyberpunk 2020, Space Opera, and The Morrow Project.
 
I'm suddenly imagining a Battletoads campaign, with all those crazy body-morphing attacks and bizarre action set-pieces. That could have been cool back in the day, assuming you even wanted to play with the kind of sociopath who had enjoyed that torture chamber of a game enough to want to roleplay it further.

6adjY8P.gif
Omg Battletoads. That game is responsible for the one and only time I punched a friend in anger.
 
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