Powered by the Apocalypse

[Fenris-77]

I figured it was a choice and that makes sense.

That's a cool move, like the madness is spreading the closer you get.

My original writeup (which isn't quite the same as the one I posted here) really leant into the 'turn to nightmare' aspect and was a lot more reality bending. The 2500 word count limit puts a damper on that sadly, as I don't think I have enough space. I'm going to lean into the nightmare thing in the faces and clues thing really hard though, so we'll see how it goes. I'm going to roll out a couple of magic shops as locations, plus some upscale gentlemen's clubs, and a couple of tatty brothels where anything can be done for a price. The side characters are going to a be a motley collection of high society dilettantes, street psychics and charlatans with no moral compass, and some ancillary madmen.

 

[Picaroon Jack]

My original writeup (which isn't quite the same as the one I posted here) really leant into the 'turn to nightmare' aspect and was a lot more reality bending. The 2500 word count limit puts a damper on that sadly, as I don't think I have enough space. I'm going to lean into the nightmare thing in the faces and clues thing really hard though, so we'll see how it goes. I'm going to roll out a couple of magic shops as locations, plus some upscale gentlemen's clubs, and a couple of tatty brothels where anything can be done for a price. The side characters are going to a be a motley collection of high society dilettantes, street psychics and charlatans with no moral compass, and some ancillary madmen.

Nightmares and hallucinations could easily be clues especially for players who have marked that Cosmic Passage mask. Load up the insanity!

 

[Picaroon Jack]

My original writeup (which isn't quite the same as the one I posted here) really leant into the 'turn to nightmare' aspect and was a lot more reality bending. The 2500 word count limit puts a damper on that sadly, as I don't think I have enough space. I'm going to lean into the nightmare thing in the faces and clues thing really hard though, so we'll see how it goes. I'm going to roll out a couple of magic shops as locations, plus some upscale gentlemen's clubs, and a couple of tatty brothels where anything can be done for a price. The side characters are going to a be a motley collection of high society dilettantes, street psychics and charlatans with no moral compass, and some ancillary madmen.

Speaking of gentlemen's club, one of the two I submitted was based on the Hellfire Club and they are trying to recruit one of the hunters (for wicked reasons) and the other is a murder at the Royal College of Science.

 

[Fenris-77]

I've had the Kerberos Club open pretty much the entire time I've been reading and writing. I'm with you.

 

[Picaroon Jack]

I've had the Kerberos Club open pretty much the entire time I've been reading and writing. I'm with you.

Totally fits. The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen were definitely Victorian superheroes.

 

[Fenris-77]

I just finished writing a side character who's very much Hyde from LoEG except that he's not a monster, but rather an enforcer for special branch, tasked with protecting the reputations of certain families from the actions for some black sheep.

 

[Picaroon Jack]

I go back and forth on whether Hyde would be a good playbook or new Mastermind threat. Probably both! The cursed American has the role of violent beast so it is kind of redundant as a playbook.

 

[Fenris-77]

I go back and forth on whether Hyde would be a good playbook or new Mastermind threat. Probably both! The cursed American has the role of violent beast so it is kind of redundant as a playbook.

Well the guy isn't Hyde precisely, more like if Hyde were just an enormous fucking regular and psychotically violent guy. With a little tiny derby hat.

I'm really striving for a Dickensian kind of humour, one that's contained within the descriptions and narration, rather than anything more overt, which wouldn't really suit the tone.

 

[Skywalker]

So what are peoples who like PbtA games favorite PbtA games? I'm really fond of Monster of the Week, and Farflung (even if it is crunchier than most.)

Masks, Hearts of Wulin, and Voidheart Symphony.

Root looks to be excellent as well and I am highly anticipating Avatar.

 

[hawkeyefan]

So what are peoples who like PbtA games favorite PbtA games? I'm really fond of Monster of the Week, and Farflung (even if it is
crunchier than most.)

Other than Apocalypse World, I think I'd say that my favorites are Masks and City of Mists. I've played Worlds in Peril and Dungeon World a bit, too. And I'm planning to run Legacy: Life Among the Ruins at some point, but haven't actually played it yet.

Honestly, my PbtA experience is fairly limited, in the grand scheme. There are so many games that use the system.

 

[Lessa]

So what are peoples who like PbtA games favorite PbtA games? I'm really fond of Monster of the Week, and Farflung (even if it is
crunchier than most.)

Hard for me to answer, as I enjoyed all the games I've played.

Overall, I would probably pick the original Apocalypse World as it's the most "broad" in aplication in my experience, going from full action to full drama/PvP, short to lenghty games and everything between and keeping good.

For pure action, The Sprawl makes some really nice tricks with Gear & Intel and it's my pick (specially with my Shadowrun hack ).

For pure drama/PvP, it's a toss between Undying or Monsterhearts for me.

Honorable mention to Masks, which got the best moves and playbooks I've seen, but I just played a single session (where I struggled with it's crunch - it's got so many moving parts!) and can't make a fair assessment.

 

[Voros]

So what are peoples who like PbtA games favorite PbtA games? I'm really fond of Monster of the Week, and Farflung (even if it is
crunchier than most.)

1%er (motorcycle 'outlaws'), The 'Hood (street level criminals), Spirit of 77' (70s exploitation films) and Undying (diceless vampires) are the ones that come immediately to mind.

 

[Voros]

This PbtA game has an interesting sf premise.

 

[Lessa]

This PbtA game has an interesting sf premise.

Curious premise. How does it work? What are moves like? I imagine there must be different kinds of AI?

 

[daniel_ream]

Superhero comics that display some sense of self consistency are ones that make it into my pullbox.

I recall a thread some years ago about how incredibly detailed and internally consistent depictions of the superhero team's home city was totally a thing comic books do, guys. This despite the fact that a few minutes of Googling was enough to turn up six different officially published maps of Metropolis, none of which can be reconciled with another. And don't even get me started on Happy Harbor, RI.

I expect you have a very, very small pull list.

Well, I'm a bit too old to be trying to disabuse someone this sold on the Forgey notion that all mechanics fall into 3 bins and you can't mix them.

So what you're saying is, I'm a lobster?

 

[Fenris-77]

In a lot of games, Supers games among them, it's astonishingly unimportant for the most part that one has an accurate city map. In a lot of cases the characters arrive and depart scenes without the need for intervening travel. Even when you see travel it's often just an excuse for a personal interlude of info dump conversation. It depends on how cinematic your table style is IMO.

 

[Voros]

Curious premise. How does it work? What are moves like? I imagine there must be different kinds of AI?

Here is a quick summary:

Your role as an Artificial Intelligence is to inhabit an interplanetary vessel, manage your resources, and direct your crew. You’ll deploy your ship’s officers into the field, hunt down criminals, engage in interstellar combat, and deliver supplies and colonists to remote settlements.
You must rely on your resources to complete missions by acting through your ship, tech, and crew. Three different AI types – Combat, Command, and Support – lend themselves to varied and interesting game play, but it’s when an AI is paired with a ship that the real diversity in character creation comes to the fore.

 

[Picaroon Jack]

Here are character portraits of my current players for the Between. Things are still in the early stages with only two games into the campaign, but the Explorer, Ghost, and the Vessel are really into it.

 

[Lessa]

Interesting article by Vincent Baker touching on something I like in pbtas, that is the special attention given to relationships and other types of interactions beyond combat.. [Edit: Ladybird , I think it was you who also praised this aspect of the games? If so, you may find it interesting]

Powered by the Apocalypse, Part 6 – lumpley games

lumpley.games

His upcoming Under Hollow Hills does some cool things with its Bindings (its version of Hx): they prompt what moves you can or can't use against the recipient character and other conditions. Couple examples (bolded text are actual moves in the game):

• (Boondoggle Hob) One of you finds yourself consistently on my bad side, all undeserving. Who? Every session, I must find some reason to confront you, if I can.
• (Chieftain Mouse) One of you, though not a mouse, has sworn allegiance to me. Who? I can never lie to you or deny to sit counsel with you.

The game seems to go deeper in this aspect, while simplifying others (it does away with Stats, for eg).

 

[Voros]

This game has been getting playtested for a long time, finally available on Drivethru.

 

[Skywalker]

Hearts of Wulin is amazing. I personally rank it as the best PbtA RPG I have come across, having pipped out Masks for the top spot. It really showcases the power of PbtA design in a simple and elegant fashion.

 

[Lessa]

How is that? Any interesting moves to showcase what you like in it?

I don't know this kind of fiction much. Is it that kind of 80s kunf fu movies where peoples speech is desynced with their mouths? XD I never finished Hidden Tiger Croucing Dragon as I found it kinda boring at the time, but I loved Hero (the one with Jet Li).

 

[Skywalker]

How is that? Any interesting moves to showcase what you like in it?

Its from 3 concepts:

1. Instead of bonds/strings, each PC has 2 entanglements. These are effectively a bonds that are directed at a PC/NPC but another PC/NPC is in conflict with it i.e. PC1 loves another PC2 but PC3 does not not approve, or PC1 feels guilty about doing something secretly to hurt PC2 and PC3 knows about it. This is essentially the triangles that Masks talks about alot in the GM section. Having them in PC creation basically generates PC focused story and drama from the get go.

2. Each PC and NPC has a scale. If you fight someone above or below your scale your lose or win respectively and only roll dice to determine the nature of the loss or victory. Stories as a default are about the PCs identifying the big bad and then needing to find a way to raise their scale so they can have a chance at beating them. This again provides for instant story and drama and can be used by the GM to define the duration of the story. For a one-off, PCs working together may be enough to raise the scale, but in a campaign it may be training or an item obtained by a quest.

3. The last is the Inner Conflict move. This is triggered when a PC is confronted by their entanglements. You get XP for rolling it. On a 10+ you keep it together, on a 7-9 you must flee or mark an element (damage), on a 6- the GM makes a move. This is the central move of the whole game and basically initiates the cascading effect of PbtA's "yes but" dice system and gets you to play to find out what happens early and easily.

I also like how the PC has 5 elements for attributes and if you mark them (take damage) you can no longer use that element. This includes the element that the PC uses for combat. This also triggers a cycle of the PC needing to seek ways of recovery through certain other moves that helps generate drama and story smoothly.

 

[Skywalker]

I don't know this kind of fiction much. Is it that kind of 80s kunf fu movies where peoples speech is desynced with their mouths? XD I never finished Hidden Tiger Croucing Dragon as I found it kinda boring at the time, but I loved Hero (the one with Jet Li).

Its less based on fiction and more based on movies and TV shows. It tends to more modern wuxia than the 80s Shaw Brothers movies you refer to. The focus is more on the drama and less on the action, though it still handles action well.

The touchstone movie would be Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon (I also prefer Hero but CTHD is very good IMO). The touchstone TV show would be Untamed, which is on Netflix. The touchstone book would be Jin Yong (Louis Cha)’s Legend of Condor Heroes.

If you don't like the genre, then Hearts of Wulin will likely not be for you, though you may still appreciate the mechanics.

 

[Skywalker]

Its also really good that the rulebook has two variants in it. The first is for courtly wuxia (think Game of Thrones) and the other for supernatural wuxia (Chinese Ghost Story). Each variant gets 1 or 2 new moves that are quite powerful. Courtly wuxia has social duels and supernatural wuxia has confronting the unnatural. Each playbook also has a new archetype option and a new move that adapts the concept to that variant.

For a 230 page journal sized rulebook, its gives the source material impressive coverage.

 

[Lessa]

Thanks Skywalker. You picked my interest. I'll take a look in it.

 

[Lessa]

Just so you boys & girls know, Franko77 opened a thread about the new A|State 2e kickstarter, which will use the Blades in the Dark system:

a|state 2nd edition - who would have figured?

Gringnr posted in the stickied Kickstarter's thread that the second edition of the old a|state RPG is now up on KS. It's a game that wasn't one would ever see a second edition, as the original designer quit games design I'm actually very excited by this. The old percentile system was pretty bad...

www.rpgpub.com

 

[Picaroon Jack]

I was looking for an up to date, generic PbtA set of rules. I've found these free contenders:

• Simple World
• Universal World
• The Bureau (sort of)

Has anyone heard of others?

 

[Stumpydave]

I was looking at the Neverwhere rpg by Grim and wondering how that would work with the <6, 7-9, 10 results of PbtA.

Characters have approx 1-10 descriptive traits, from which they pick the most relevant to the task at hand. The rules as written has them roll a d6 and combine the totals against a difficulty number. 1's implode (subtract from the pool and get rerolled). 6's explode.

I was thinking that instead of difficulty numbers, use the <6, 7-9, 10 results and let them roll 1d6. Keep the imploding 1's but lose the exploding 6s. Do you think that would work or at least give similar results to PbtA?

 

[Stumpydave]

I was looking for an up to date, generic PbtA set of rules. I've found these free contenders:

• Simple World
• Universal World
• The Bureau (sort of)

Has anyone heard of others?

I've printed off SImple World but my first skim read is that its a bit...vague.
The stats put me off because there's no description of what forceful or assertive even mean? Is a strong character assertive? Is Graceful a social skill or physical?

 

[AsenRG]

Hearts of Wulin gets my interest as well, but...where's the option for "wandering heroes" campaign? I mean, not all wuxia has either courtly intrigues or supernatural elements in it!

I never finished Hidden Tiger Croucing Dragon as I found it kinda boring at the time, but I loved Hero (the one with Jet Li).

Hidden Tiger Croucing Dragon...boring...Error 404!

 

[Picaroon Jack]

I've printed off SImple World but my first skim read is that its a bit...vague.
The stats put me off because there's no description of what forceful or assertive even mean? Is a strong character assertive? Is Graceful a social skill or physical?

I think they listed examples of what they could be and was basically saying, "Here are the basic PbtA stat categories" but I agree it is way more vague than I need. It's loosely based on Universal World that has more details.

 

[Stumpydave]

I just had a look at U.W. and to be honest I think Spirit of 77 is the most straightforward version of PbtA I've come across.
Everything else just feels hidebound and overcomplicated for the sake of having more rules.

 

[chuckdee]

I was looking for an up to date, generic PbtA set of rules. I've found these free contenders:

• Simple World
• Universal World
• The Bureau (sort of)

Has anyone heard of others?

Depends on how universal you want it and if genre takes it out of that consideration.

With that disclaimer out of the way, I'd thoroughly recommend Urban/Modern/Fantasy. Playbooks are stat-based rather than being based on a particular theme, which I found nice. The only thing is, it has the modern assumption baked in.

 

[Stumpydave]

Do we really need set lists of moves? What do we, or PbtA games, gain by adopting this approach?
Are we not imaginative enough that we can't adjudicate players actions without a drop down list of approved techniques?

 

[Skywalker]

Hearts of Wulin gets my interest as well, but...where's the option for "wandering heroes" campaign? I mean, not all wuxia has either courtly intrigues or supernatural elements in it!

Courtly intrigue and supernatural elements are additional modules you add to the base game of Hearts of Wulin. The base game can easily handle wandering heroes, assuming they do feel obligations and bonds such as those found in Confucianism. One of the touchstones is Legend of Condor Heroes which is effectively wandering heroes.

 

[Picaroon Jack]

Do we really need set lists of moves? What do we, or PbtA games, gain by adopting this approach?
Are we not imaginative enough that we can't adjudicate players actions without a drop down list of approved techniques?

No, I'm fine with a short, broad list, then the roll is modified by appropriate stat based on the situation. Something like:

• Taking Action Move, (possibly divided up into Risky & Dangerous to ramp up the consequences)
• Investigative Move
• Help/Hinder Move

I'm sure there are others, but that's the bare minimum. (I think).

 

[Skywalker]

The idea of moves to to communicate to everyone at the table what is important in the game and what’s not. It frees up the adjudication of many actions from the rules and only brings in the use of rules where it matters. It makes for more cleaner and focussed gameplay IME.

 

[Picaroon Jack]

The idea of moves to to communicate to everyone at the table what is important in the game and what’s not. It frees up the adjudication of many actions from the rules and only brings in the use of rules where it matters. It makes for more cleaner and focussed gameplay IME.

Right, like if it was a western you would have gunslinger specific moves maybe or if it involved flying vehicles then moves associated with that.

 

[Skywalker]

Yep. Rather than having rules for use in every situation that may come up, PbtA only has rules for things central the game play. This frees up a good chunk of the game, whilst also encouraging players to play towards those central areas. Rolling dice and triggering moves is both fun and also a definite way to impact the narrative.

One of PbtA’s main advantages is getting a table to the fun part of the game as quickly and cleanly as possible. This is one part of how it does that.