Top Games you've never run/played that you're considering playing, and WHY?

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The crunch of Bushido is fine for me. It's the layout and the way noth8ng is in a coherent order that stops me runni g that one. Which I've had for nearly 30 years...
One weird side effect of having dyspraxia is that I can cope with that a lot more easily than most people. Because everything is in an odd order as far as my brain wiring is concerned, so I'm used to compensating for it.
 
Bushido. I've considered running it but that level of crunch is outside of my experience and gives me the fear.

I still think Bushido was a fine game. It was very intricate and the terminology was a bit arcane for teenage me, but looking back, it has held together a lot better than a lot of its contemporaries.
 
No real excuses... I just keep buying pdfs. So now, I have far too many games and not enough time to play them. Go me! :sad:

That said, I'm running an online steampunk horror game on sat using PDQ. I've always wanted to play it, so now at least I'll have a chance.

Really would like to play:

Advanced FF
Beyond The Wall
C&C
Blood Dark Thirst
HEX (or any ubiquity stuff!)
Talislanta Savage Land
Troika
Hostile (with Zaibatsu)
Kult Divinity Lost
Other Dust
Silent Legions

I could make this list as long as my arm, so I'll stop now...
 
Ok, let us add AFF, Stellar Adventures, Beyond the Wall and a few others for me. Talislanta: The Savage Lands will happen someday as well.
 
Lasers & Feelings, All Outta Bubblegum, Crash Pandas, and many, many other very short/ rules-lite/ free games. Why? Because lately it's so hard to get my main group together just to play our Savage Worlds campaign that if we actually can get together, I don't want to take time away from Savage Worlds to try something else.

I've half a mind to start a second group to try these sorts of games, but that's not really feasible at the moment.
 
CP red is in my short list, but I am not sure I’ll run it. I’m mostly not in need of a new system.

I really want to run a Fafhrd and the Grey Mouser buddy game. However, I don’t see it happening because our game group is kind of at its size and we have limited time to game. But I know the GM and I know the players for this. It would be good.
 
Having run it for a year I can say that most of the problems are with the exception based options, the mechanics of the core rules are perfectly solid, if minimalist* - but there are a lot of problem with the exception based options.

*As long as all players know to dump Accurate to 5.

Got any examples?
 
There's a couple games I've wanted to run, but they would have required a lot of investment on the part opf the players, so I would have had to found players interested and willing to learn the rules and do some reading beforehand, which seems to be a Feat rarer than getting struck by lightning. These include:

Mechanical Dream, Mage: The Ascension 2e, and Nobilis

I did manage to get an Ars Magica game together once, not sure if it will happen again in my lifetime

OTOH, games I'd like to play are much more numerous, as more often than not I'm stuck GMing. And don't get me wrong, I love GMing, but it's a completely different experience than getting to immerse as a character, and frankly there are some systems so crunchy it just doesn't gel with my GMing style but I'd love to find a GM that didn't mind that

Besides the aforementioned titles, this includes Pendragon, Dark Ages: Fae, Teenagers from Outer Space, Tekumel: Empire of the Petal Throne, The One Ring, Kult, World of Synnibar, Tenchi Muyo, Amber, Mythic Russia, and Castle Falkenstein,
 
Starchildren? Whats is that?
Opps, its called Velvet Generation. The orginal was called Star Children.
You play alien glam rockers.
I ran it when it came out back in the day and a new version is on the way.
 
Opps, its called Velvet Generation. The orginal was called Star Children.
You play alien glam rockers.
I ran it when it came out back in the day and a new version is on the way.
My version is better:
20190529_223904.jpg
 
I almost forgot Mage: the Ascension. I haven't read it in almost 20 years but I remember it seeming really cool but at the time I couldn't wrap my mind around the magic system. It probably makes a lot more sense now.
It's a freeform system, which is as complicated as saying 'you can do this stuff' (listed by level from nine different 'Spheres') and then you can mix up the stuff you can do to tailor it to whatever effect that you want to do. As with Champions, you can interpret these effects any way you wish to explain it - as per the character's paradigm - but the effects are standardised. The pull back is that you have to roll to be successful, and if you roll badly, you accumulate 'Paradox' which can mess up your life in different ways.

The basic mechanic, I think, originated from the Maelstrom RPG from the mid 1980s - which was sold in trade style paperpack books. In that game, however, there was just one 'sphere' (the eponymous Maelstrom), so you didn't get a chance to mix and match it, and it was broadly an influence on luck rather than anything more specialised. Ars Magica also had 'spontaneous magic' incorporated into a broader system - which again amounted to a freeform interpretation of levels of ability in different categories of expertise. In that game, they divided up into verbs and nouns, so it was built in mix those particular words to create effects. Another freeform system was that used in Amber, so again, we can see antecedants before Mage did it.

I do think it's an under-utilised approach to powers in gaming generally though - I think a lot of Supers games could make use of the approach. Indeed, looking at the Marvel movies' take on the Infinity Stones, you have a built in backstory to have 'spheres' of Mind, Power, Reality, Soul, Space and Time built into gameplay.
 
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Pit me down for that, too.

Only it's intimidating by it's sheer size and depth. Plus I never had a group willing to embrace Pendragon the way it needs.
I'm sensing a challenge/opportunity here. We have many fine knights on this forum. Who will rise to the challenge of running it and who will join the Court at Camelot?
 
Got any examples?
Symbaroum's core issue lies in the way characters scale (or don't scale). Toughness (HP) pretty much never increases over the course of the game other than via extremely limited ability increases or a one-off ability that can grant a +5. However, as PCs get more experience they quickly accumulate exception based abilities - because the game is really pretty simple one of the most common things these abilities do is grant more damage.

This leads to the situation in which PCs quicky, or eventually (depending on how much they're optimising - or to be more accurate - anti-optimising) leads to PCs putting out considerably more damage than they themselves are able to soak. This wouldn't be so bad if monsters and and PCs weren't built using largely the same set of rules - but since they are it means combat risks turning into rocket tag.

Throwing heavily armoured foes at PCs can limit this a little - as armour soaks damage - but it also means that any PC that hasn't sufficiently increased their damage can't hurt their enemies at all.

I know I said that the core rules are solid and the exception based rules are poor - but I think since I posted earlier, I've been looking at revising rules elements and largely come around to the opinion that the problems are deeper rooted than that. If HP are capped damamge also needs to be capped - but this means there is little for the exception based powers to do without increasing the complexity of the system.

It's really hard to give clear examples of the problems with the exception based rules unless you know the system well - but to give you one example - with Two-handed Great Weapons its possible to get an ability that guarantees attacks completely bypass armour (which is important for reasons outlines above). If the PC was chose to use a different weapon - such as a pole-arm - they can never do that. Basically if you build your whole combat system around armour reducing damage as a key pillar of that system you shouldn't create an ability that completely bypasses that.

Basically to make the system work at all, it requires really careful encounter design.

It's a good solid system for PCs with less than 50 XP (although you won't necessarily end up with baland characters - but that's just the perils of a point buy system). It's probably ok up to about 100XP if you don't let PCs take abilities at Master (Part of the issue is that a lot of them are written like they're capstone abilities but really it doesn't take that long to get them). After that's you'd need to open up the Master ablities or PCs will start running out of choices - there's only so many abilities to choose from and even less than any individual PC would want

That's probably I suspect 10 to 20 sessions at the minimum (assuming no less than 5xp per session - because if you're playing a game which has PCs accumulating exception based options then they need the opportunity to actually get them.
 
Talislanta.

I've never given the mechanics a serious look but the fluff appeals so much to me. Secchi is a fucking legend and if there was any justice in the world he should be fucking swimming in money. Talislanta should have had Bakshi-style animated features, plural, a serialized Heavy Metal comic, a concept album (my heart says stoner rock, my brain says prog) and be in tattoos and shirts everywhere.

Advanced FF
Beyond The Wall
C&C
Blood Dark Thirst
HEX (or any ubiquity stuff!)
Talislanta Savage Land
Troika
Hostile (with Zaibatsu)
Kult Divinity Lost
Other Dust
Silent Legions

I could make this list as long as my arm, so I'll stop now...

I know how it feels! Such a great list, too. Wish I could help you with it.

The only one I've played there is C&C and it was a really, really cool campaign.

BtW is on my list too but I feel there are some people in my gaming group better equipped than I to run it. I fear I might be too much of a Conan-head to do proper high fantasy.

And Hostile/Zaibatsu... gaah, so good. Paul Elliott is one of these guys I'd bankroll if I was a billionaire. "Here's ten million, make me a game. Get some nice art."
 
Symbaroum's core issue lies in the way characters scale (or don't scale). Toughness (HP) pretty much never increases over the course of the game other than via extremely limited ability increases or a one-off ability that can grant a +5. However, as PCs get more experience they quickly accumulate exception based abilities - because the game is really pretty simple one of the most common things these abilities do is grant more damage.

This leads to the situation in which PCs quicky, or eventually (depending on how much they're optimising - or to be more accurate - anti-optimising) leads to PCs putting out considerably more damage than they themselves are able to soak. This wouldn't be so bad if monsters and and PCs weren't built using largely the same set of rules - but since they are it means combat risks turning into rocket tag.

Throwing heavily armoured foes at PCs can limit this a little - as armour soaks damage - but it also means that any PC that hasn't sufficiently increased their damage can't hurt their enemies at all.

I know I said that the core rules are solid and the exception based rules are poor - but I think since I posted earlier, I've been looking at revising rules elements and largely come around to the opinion that the problems are deeper rooted than that. If HP are capped damamge also needs to be capped - but this means there is little for the exception based powers to do without increasing the complexity of the system.

It's really hard to give clear examples of the problems with the exception based rules unless you know the system well - but to give you one example - with Two-handed Great Weapons its possible to get an ability that guarantees attacks completely bypass armour (which is important for reasons outlines above). If the PC was chose to use a different weapon - such as a pole-arm - they can never do that. Basically if you build your whole combat system around armour reducing damage as a key pillar of that system you shouldn't create an ability that completely bypasses that.

Basically to make the system work at all, it requires really careful encounter design.

It's a good solid system for PCs with less than 50 XP (although you won't necessarily end up with baland characters - but that's just the perils of a point buy system). It's probably ok up to about 100XP if you don't let PCs take abilities at Master (Part of the issue is that a lot of them are written like they're capstone abilities but really it doesn't take that long to get them). After that's you'd need to open up the Master ablities or PCs will start running out of choices - there's only so many abilities to choose from and even less than any individual PC would want

That's probably I suspect 10 to 20 sessions at the minimum (assuming no less than 5xp per session - because if you're playing a game which has PCs accumulating exception based options then they need the opportunity to actually get them.

Cheers for the examples. I have the game and one of the modules and have been slowly going through it. I've noticed the 'power-ups' have nothing to mitigate them, but wasn;t sure how it would affect play.

Rather than hacking the whole system, maybe it would just be better to make increasing Toughness easier?

One very simple way to do this would be to give +1 to Toughness for each new Ability you gain and again at each new ability level. I would then change the options for starting character to either 4 Novice abilities or 2 Novice abilities and 1 Adept ability.

Tot up the totals for each of the monsters and change them accordingly.

This way, the more abilities something has (and thus the more xps and/or harder resistance rating for monsters) the higher their Toughness - thus mitigating some of the glass-canonness of the system.
 
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I've never given the mechanics a serious look but the fluff appeals so much to me. Secchi is a fucking legend and if there was any justice in the world he should be fucking swimming in money. Talislanta should have had Bakshi-style animated features, plural, a serialized Heavy Metal comic, a concept album (my heart says stoner rock, my brain says prog) and be in tattoos and shirts everywhere.



I know how it feels! Such a great list, too. Wish I could help you with it.

The only one I've played there is C&C and it was a really, really cool campaign.

BtW is on my list too but I feel there are some people in my gaming group better equipped than I to run it. I fear I might be too much of a Conan-head to do proper high fantasy.

And Hostile/Zaibatsu... gaah, so good. Paul Elliott is one of these guys I'd bankroll if I was a billionaire. "Here's ten million, make me a game. Get some nice art."
I really wish you lived near me.
 
I've never given the mechanics a serious look but the fluff appeals so much to me. Secchi is a fucking legend and if there was any justice in the world he should be fucking swimming in money. Talislanta should have had Bakshi-style animated features, plural, a serialized Heavy Metal comic, a concept album (my heart says stoner rock, my brain says prog) and be in tattoos and shirts everywhere.



I know how it feels! Such a great list, too. Wish I could help you with it.

The only one I've played there is C&C and it was a really, really cool campaign.

BtW is on my list too but I feel there are some people in my gaming group better equipped than I to run it. I fear I might be too much of a Conan-head to do proper high fantasy.

And Hostile/Zaibatsu... gaah, so good. Paul Elliott is one of these guys I'd bankroll if I was a billionaire. "Here's ten million, make me a game. Get some nice art."
You'll be pleased to know that Secchi has composed three different albums of instrumental music for Talislanta, plus I think one song for The Savage Land. It's not stoner rock, but it's quite appropriate.

 
Pit me down for that, too.

Only it's intimidating by it's sheer size and depth. Plus I never had a group willing to embrace Pendragon the way it needs.
We're currently near the end of the Tournament period at 549, so sixty nine years in. We do take breaks though. It's something else, the amount of NPCs and the geography to keep track of can be overwhelming and the details of all the minor NPCs created within each knight's manor (bread maker, random villagers they've gotten to know, etc).

Well worth it though.
 
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Just as a follow up to my post about Mage, which I have played a lot over the years, a game that has always piqued my interest but never played was White Wolf's johnny-come-lately game - Scion. I think, ultimately, it came about too late for White Wolf to really give it a push, but I sometimes wonder that had they released it earlier, then the game could have gotten more of a hold on their market. Indeed, in retrospect, rather than creating a self competing 'New World of Darkness' they could have simply maintained their Classic World of Darkness games, and then released a Scion "World of Myth" as a counterpoint IP to the Word of Darkness and Exalted series, and they may have ultimately made better business plans overall. Pure speculation of course.

The IP is now owned by The Onyx Path outright, but it was a game that I felt rationalised a certain aspect of the Mage game - that of playing divine beings who gradually ascend to godlike status - in such a way that was much more focussed in a high concept kinda way. Rather than a particular interpretation of magical practices, it builds the game on cultural pantheons of Gods all competing in 'The World' where all myths are real. As such, it was a game that was more accessible and a bit more grounded than the holy hot guargantuan mess (albeit brilliant at times) that is the Mage background and game. It's mechanics are also simpler, with a few nods to things like Fate in the more recent edition.

I've never played it, but as a sort of American Gods/Lord of Light type of setting, I could get into it.
 
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Just as a follow up to my post about Mage, which I have played a lot over the years, a game that has always piqued my interest but never played was White Wolf's johnny-come-lately game - Scion. I think, ultimately, it came about too late for White Wolf to really give it a push, but I sometimes wonder that had they released it earlier, then the game could have gotten more of a hold on their market. Indeed, in retrospect, rather than creating a self competing 'New World of Darkness' they could have simply maintained their Classic World of Darkness games, and then released a Scion "World of Myth" as a counterpoint IP to the Word of Darkness and Exalted series, and they may have ultimately made better business plans overall. Pure speculation of course.

The IP is now owned by The Onyx Path outright, but it was a game that I felt rationalised a certain aspect of the Mage game - that of playing divine beings who gradually ascend to godlike status - in such a way that was much more focussed in a high concept kinda way. Rather than a particular interpretation of magical practices, it builds the game on cultural pantheons of Gods all competing in 'The World' where all myths are real. As such, it was a game that was more accessible and a bit more grounded than the holy hot guargantuan mess (albeit brilliant at times) that is the Mage background and game. It's mechanics are also simpler, with a few nods to things like Fate in the more recent edition.

I've never played it, but as a sort of American Gods/Lord of Light type of setting, I could get into it.
You've never seen the mechanics, right:evil:?
 
Cheers for the examples. I have the game and one of the modules and have been slowly going through it. I've noticed the 'power-ups' have nothing to mitigate them, but wasn;t sure how it would affect play.

Rather than hacking the whole system, maybe it would just be better to make increasing Toughness easier?

One very simple way to do this would be to give +1 to Toughness for each new Ability you gain and again at each new ability level. I would then change the options for starting character to either 4 Novice abilities or 2 Novice abilities and 1 Adept ability.

Tot up the totals for each of the monsters and change them accordingly.

This way, the more abilities something has (and thus the more xps and/or harder resistance rating for monsters) the higher their Toughness - thus mitigating some of the glass-canonness of the system.
That could work.

Another option would be to give Toughness increases at certain experience point 'tiers'. The game itself sets these tiers in its tables for combat encounters (which are really pretty useless). This is introducing a defacto level sytem into the game. It also would mean that you could just adjust the monsters' Toughness by a number according to their challenge level (eg. 'weak', 'ordinary', 'strong', mighty') which are already given in the game.

The issue here is that, as the game is not really based on any clear maths, it's a bit hit and miss by how much to increase PC Toughness.

There's also the case that, once you start hacking the game to be more like D&D, it might in fact be easier to just use some variation of D&D to run the setting. (Especially if you want to run an exploration, sandbox style game rather than the official adventure path as the existing scene based corruption rules work quite poorly for supporting exploration).
 
We're currently near the end of the Tournament period at 549, so sixty nine years in. We do take breaks though. It's something else, the amount of NPCs and the geography to keep track of can be overwhelming and the details of all the minor NPCs created within each knight's manor (bread maker, random villagers they've gotten to know, etc).

Well worth it though.

I'm a mere 12 or so years in and I tend to outsource the keeping of detailed manor records to the players. He's your breadmaker, you look after his details, remember his name and what he does.
 
I'm a mere 12 or so years in and I tend to outsource the keeping of detailed manor records to the players. He's your breadmaker, you look after his details, remember his name and what he does.
Oh they do remember them and keep track of them. Mostly for Estate management. It's just I do as well because we've all enjoyed little stories in the manors. In one case a Cadfael-like story of the son of the Stabler going missing, stuff like that.
 
I have. What's wrong with them?
Ahem I'm talking about the first edition. The one widely acknowledged to be brokener than Exalted:smile:.
If you're wondering why Scion did not become a big property, I'd posit that at least part of the blame lies there:wink:!
 
I almost forgot Mage: the Ascension. I haven't read it in almost 20 years but I remember it seeming really cool but at the time I couldn't wrap my mind around the magic system. It probably makes a lot more sense now.
I was the same, looking for spell lists versus altering reality via different spheres of influence. It's my favorite magic system to date.
 
Ahem I'm talking about the first edition. The one widely acknowledged to be brokener than Exalted:smile:.
If you're wondering why Scion did not become a big property, I'd posit that at least part of the blame lies there:wink:!
Ah right. I didn't experience the 1st edition rules. That said, when had clunky rules ever held back any other WW game?
 
I've never run the James Bond 007 rpg before. I think probably because when it first came I was heavily into Hero stuff and I went with Espionage! to meet my modern spy needs. It's odd because I was a massive James Bond fan as a kid (and still am). And a lot of the boxed sets that came out for the 007 game were very, very nice.

Anyway, I've been itching for some modern black ops action and, after looking at just about every modern military/espionage game ever published I've pretty much decided to go with Classified, the 007 clone.
 
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