Indie & Small Press Tabletop RPGs

[bigglesworth]

Yeah, I didn't actually use stunts when I played. They seemed too complicated for everything else the rules were doing, and I couldn't be bothered to learn them. But I can't see any similarity to GURPS, in theory or praxis.

[pseudoidiot]

Luke Crane announced the retirement of Burning Wheel Revised a couple months ago. Today he announced the upcoming release of Burning Wheel Gold. Much like Burning Wheel Revised improved on Burning Wheel Classic after years of actual play and playtesting, so is Gold to Revised.

Anyhow, if you've never played it, check out the link above, Luke's made the first 74 pages of the book available for free, which is all that's absolutely required to be able to play. Included in that are sample characters. Plus the art for the new wheel on the front page is really awesome.

I'm ridiculously excited and I'm not bothering to hide the fact that I'm already a bit of a BW/Luke Crane fanboy. But, honestly, Burning Wheel has had a huge impact on how I view and play tabletop games. It was sort of my gateway game going from mainstream games into the indie/small-press/story games world.

[pseudoidiot]

So this weekend I had the opportunity to play Dread. I was kind of hoping for vanilla out-of-the box Dread since I've never played it before, but the guy running it did something pretty awesome with it.

Spoiler'd for what I understand about normal Dread

Spoiler:

So instead of dice, Dread uses a Jenga tower. When it comes time to make something happen, you have to make a pull, this is usually 1-3 blocks (one at a time). Dread is a horror game, so it's all about the suspense of the tower staying sturdy and the nerves of the player doing the pull.

My understanding is that if you cause the tower to fall for any reason -- whether you were pulling a block or you hit the table or whatever, then your character bites it in a thematically appropriate way.

Now, to the version of Dread I played in. It was based on Inception. So, the Jenga tower signified how stable the dream is. As more things changed, more blocks were pulled and the tower becomes less sturdy. Each character had different roles with different abilities, there was the Point Man, the Chemist, Architect, Counterfeiter, etc. They could do things like reduce a pull by some amount or make the dream more stable by taking blocks from the top of the tower and replacing them lower down.

The best part is there was not one, not two, but THREE Jenga towers (one tower for each dream level). Each in decreasing size. Knocking over the tower would of course, collapse the dream or some such. Luckily that didn't happen so we never had to deal with the repercussions.

It was an extremely clever way to use an already clever game mechanic. It wasn't horror, of course, but it was super-suspenseful. Of course, the first few pulls really aren't anything to worry about, but once more and more things started happening, it was pretty nerve-wracking to change the dream in anyway. Especially on that third level. I had to make the last two pulls of the game. The mark's subconscious security was bearing down on us and I had to put up mazes to slow them down. That last tower was really freaking tiny (wish I'd taken a picture), I could barely push a block with my pinky and every little move made the entire top half of the tower sway. Just as I thought there was no way I was going to pull it off (the whole time the GM kept going on, describing just how down to the wire we were going to be -- right in my ear), another player came to my rescue and stabilized the dream, which allowed me to find another block that was easier to pull and save the day. My heart was seriously pounding and I couldn't keep my hands steady.

Everyone took a huge sigh of relief. We got out safely with what we were after. A job well done!

[bigglesworth]

Heh, that sounds pretty cool! I'm not usually sold on horror games, but suspense is a good one.

I myself played the Adventures of Baron von Munchausen recently. And I must say I recommend it immensely. Huge fun and instantly accessible to people who haven't played any RPGs before.

[existential_elevator]

It also took quite a minimum amount of additional equipment, which would be a bonus if you wanted to spontaneously play an RPG.

I was always interested in the Jenga mechanic in Dread. Would you say it added to the game better than the conventional methods?

[clockworkmonk]

The Smallville game published by Margaret Weis is possibly my most favorite thing ever. It replaces stats with values such as Truth, Justice, Love and what have you that have a statement describing how your character feels about that value and a dice value that you roll.

This is rolled with a relationship, which again has a statement describing how your character feels about that person, and a dice value again showing how strongly you feel about it.

Superpowers, genius, knowing a guy, and other various powers and abilities are traits that are invoked for special effects.

[pseudoidiot]

I was always interested in the Jenga mechanic in Dread. Would you say it added to the game better than the conventional methods?

Absolutely. Standing up, leaning over the table, trying to delicately extract a block from the middle of the tower, trying to control my breathing, & steady my hands. There's no way picking up a few dice will ever match that physical response.

Don't get me wrong, I've had plenty of characters I was quite attached to and I've watched as a die tumbles across the table hoping that natural 20 comes up plenty of times, but I can't remember ever having such a physical response to playing a game like I did when trying to get that last damn block out and not let everyone down.

[hatten]

I'm having a gaming group and we've been playing EON quite a lot. But many of the players in the group does not cater to the huge amount of rules, and this last scenario when one of them were GM'ing it was dead boring until he threw the rulebook out of the window. It became a storytelling from having been a reading-fest. "You fell 5 meters? Take this amount of damage." Before throwing the rulebook it was "You fell 5 meters? Wait a second... hmm... which rulebook was it now again..."

Can you guys recommend a simple game, maybe even free, where battles aren't dead boring because people don't know how to fight. I had a fight-only session once, and it was really fun, but only because I had read up on the rules and learned them all in my head pretty much.

[clockworkmonk]

how light do you want?

On the one side, you have Risus which is about as light as you can get and still have rules. its quick and easy and free.

if you want games with some more meat, the Fate/fudge system does a pretty good job of keeping combat light.

Personally, I've been in love with the system used in the Smallville game for how it handles conflict and am working on adapting it for other settings that are less combat oriented.

[pseudoidiot]

Yeah it really depends what else you want out of the game.

Like above, Fate/Fudge is a good system.

Savage Worlds is a lot of fun. It's not terribly crunchy, but it still has some fun pieces.

I've only played one-shots of the above, though, so I can't speak to how fun they are past 1 session.

Another one that comes to mind is In A Wicked Age by D. Vincent Baker. Super simple and has created some fantastic actual play for me & my group -- we just finished a few month run of it.

You might like games that use the One Roll Engine -- Godlike, Wild Talents, & Monsters and Other Childish Things. Personally, I'm not a huge fan of ORE, but I like how it handles combat.

[Metaphysician]

It's long out of print but I really enjoyed 7th Sea

[hatten]

I don't know how light I want actually, as I'm into the rules enough to make it funny most of the time. I'll have a look at everything mentioned and see if anything looks promising.

[bigglesworth]

The Warhammer games are actually quite good on the fighting part, many more rules than some of the super-light ones that have been suggested, but less than EON. And all the rules will be in one book.

Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay (2nd Ed)
Dark Heresy
Rogue Trader
Deathwatch

[pseudoidiot]

I don't know how light I want actually, as I'm into the rules enough to make it funny most of the time. I'll have a look at everything mentioned and see if anything looks promising.

In that case, you might check out Spirit of the Century (which uses the FATE system).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spirit_of_the_Century

[bigglesworth]

I think the specific pulp trappings of SotC are kinda off-putting sometimes, but I've been meaning to look at Diaspora and... Starblazer, I think. They're sci-fi of the hard or space opera variety.

[existential_elevator]

I had a lot of fun with Spirit of the Century, and I'd love to give it another go. I remember it being straightforward and fun, and I quite enjoyed the pulp atmosphere.

[pseudoidiot]

Oh I definitely enjoy the pulp atmosphere of SotC. It's also the only FATE game I've tried, but I'm definitely a fan of the engine.

I love that the GM can bribe you into letting your traits get you into trouble. "Hmm. You have the curious trait, right? I'll give you a benny (I think that's what FATE calls them?) if you push that big red button over there." Then again, I'm a huge fan of getting characters into sticky situations and seeing how they come out of it.

--------------------
So, changing topics because I can. I mentioned above my group just finished a few month run of In A Wicked Age. We just switched gears and now we're playing FreeMarket, which is a transhuman rpg. I've gotten to play it twice before. I was a little wary of running it at first -- mostly because I'm not real familiar with the genre and I'd been running IAWA. But noone was stepping up (and someone else promised to run from time to time). Anyhow, wow I have a blast every time I play this game and running it was way smoother than I was expecting.

Our first session, the players made their characters and MRCZ (think guild). Then based on some things on everyone's character sheets I threw some notes together and came up with some ideas for that night's game.

We managed to see quite a lot of cool stuff in half a session of play. It started out with the group having annoying musician roommates, so one guy printed (3D matter printing!) a sound dampener. Then they tried to get a couple of the musicians' old broken instruments that they could use to recycle into something new; they had to compromise down to one instrument and ended up using that plus some existing technology on their character sheet to make a steamwork puppy (it was for a very insistent little girl and her friends).

Then one character ran into his long dead mother. Except it wasn't her and she didn't know how he was, but she looked just like her (this is the sort of thing that can happen when you can make Blanks, which are basically printed biological people that you implant with memories -- I think next time I might have a blank that has a specific person's memories, but looks nothing like them). The session ended off with an NPC bleeding (you can steal/erase memories from people through touch. Memories are part of advancement) one of the PCs. I succeeded in the bleed, and the PC retaliated by stealing something from the NPC.

I'm really excited to keep going and new ideas of things to explore keep popping in my head.

Also, I think I've probably mentioned it before, but by far one of my favorite things in any game ever is in Freemarket: if you want to create art or put on a show, or whatever, it all falls under Ephemera. And in an Ephemera challenge the PC is going against the Superuser (GM). And the Superuser embodies all of a character's flaws & insecurities. So the character has to overcome those to create something with a lasting impression. Fucking. Brilliant.

[bigglesworth]

Oh, EON is a fantasy RPG! I assumed from the name that it was sci-fi, which is why I recommended the sci-fi FATE games.

The benchmark FATE fantasy game is, I believe, Legends of Anglerre, by the same people that did Starblazer Adventures.

If desired, you could recreate your EON game and characters within the FATE system.

Kurt Wiegel reviewed the game, also.

[andrewxc]

How about Richthofen's War? http://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/1711/richthofens-war
My brother bought a copy back in '92 or so from someone's yard sale. I think it's missing parts, but it looks like an interesting idea.

[clockworkmonk]

Have ya'll ever read or looked at Atomic Highway?

Its a post-apocalyptic game that has a somewhat generic setting, but has very simple mechanics. The book is very thin, but provides everything necessary to start immediately, as well as a good amount of advice on crafting your world.

[pseudoidiot]

Here's a perfect chance to donate to a great cause and get some fantastic rpg's in the process:

http://ryanmacklin.com/projects/rke-bundle/

I've been meaning to get Blowback for some time (picture it as Burn Notice the rpg).
I playtested Murderous Ghosts and absolutely love it.
I own Shock although I've never gotten to play it.
I haven't played Emily Care Boss' game but I've heard great things about her other work.
I also own Dungeon World (a fantasy hack of Apocalypse World) and it's some of the best dungeon-delving adventuring fun I've ever had in an rpg.
I'm not familiar with Maschine Zeit or Rooksbridge or those designers, but I'm sure they're pretty cool.
I've seen some of Ben Lehman's other stuff (though not Clover) and he's certainly a talented game designer.

That's a lot a great talent and for a minimum for $10 -- more if you're generous!

Not to mention if there's enough donations Ryan Macklin is promising to finish Mythender and will throw that in, too.

EDIT: Aaand Ryan just posted to say that Jason Blair's Little Fears Nightmare Edition has been added to the bundle. It's another fantastic game.

[Jesse]

Juuust donated.

So now I own all these, anyone want to play some online sometime?

[pseudoidiot]

The addition of Little Fears has reminded me of the one and only time I've ever played it. The basic premise is that you play a child and those monsters in the closet are real. And if you believe hard enough things like your favorite stuffed animal coming to life to protect you can happen (also stepping on a crack really could break your mother's back).

Anyhow, the one time I played was near Halloween (this was probably 2005). The GM answered the door in one of those creepy Burger King masks. He also made a pot of hot chocolate for the players to share. Then, before the game he handed out pages from a coloring book and told us to color it however we wanted it and to put our name and ages on the pages. All of that really got us in a great mindset to play children (ages 4 to 6 or thereabout). It was pretty fantastic. The climax of the game involved journeying to some sort of nightmare world and confronting the bad guy. His bodyguard was a 6 foot tall Teddy Ruxpin doll with pointy fangs.

I really need to try that out again sometime.

[Solo]

Would anyone mind if I plugged the Legend Game System in this thread?

To quote from the website, it is

Legend is a tabletop RPG developed by an independent team of gamers over the course of two years. Building on the foundations of the Open Gaming License, Legend has created a new and novel system dedicated to cinematic combat and a smoother gameplay experience. Legend takes familiar core mechanics and incorporates them into a new system emphasizing versatility, balance and fun.

[Vaniver]

Do you develop it? Have you played it? I've found play experiences or after action reports to be way more helpful than descriptions or taglines.

Especially when they talk about design choices: versatility and balance are both values, but there's a tradeoff between the two. What choices does Legend make?

[clockworkmonk]

Got my package! had in it Hellcats and Hockeysticks!

[Solo]

Do you develop it? Have you played it? I've found play experiences or after action reports to be way more helpful than descriptions or taglines.

Especially when they talk about design choices: versatility and balance are both values, but there's a tradeoff between the two. What choices does Legend make?

I helped edit for it. If you want a playtest review, one can be found on RPGNet here.

[pseudoidiot]

Do you love legos?

Do you like building lego robots and staging battles?

BAM: http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/Jos ... pid-attack

From Joshua A.C. Newman (author of Shock:Social Science Fiction), Vincent Baker (Dogs in the Vineyard, Apocalypse World), & Vincent's son Sebastian. It's a 10th annivesary edition of Vincent's original Mechaton. I haven't had the chance to play it myself, but I've heard good things from a number of friends and Mobile Frame Zero sounds like it'll be even better.

[Enokh]

Do you develop it? Have you played it? I've found play experiences or after action reports to be way more helpful than descriptions or taglines.

Especially when they talk about design choices: versatility and balance are both values, but there's a tradeoff between the two. What choices does Legend make?

I I spent an. . .unhealthy amount of my workday looking at the PDF, and the best way I could sum it up is that it is everything 4th edition tried to be, with a little Exalted sprinkled on top. As that makes about zero sense, here are some things that stood out to me.

1) Classes are divided up into three Paths, or Tracks. For instance, the Barbarian has the Paths of Rage(which grants the rage abilities), Destruction (where you get Cleave, Whirlwind, and other such goodies like doing autodamage to anyone who casts a spell next to you), and Ancestors (general toughness and hardiness). Some classes have a Track where you have to choose between two bonuses -- the Ranger chooses between ranged and melee, for instance. This is where it gets interesting/awesome: if you want to multiclass, you still have to have a primary class, but you give up one of your tracks for the track of another class. So you can have a Fighter that takes the Rage track, Rogue that can cast magic by taking a Shaman track, etc. The same thing applies with special/powerful races. Want to be a demon? Give up a track to your demonic heritage to gain the Demon track (plus some racial bonuses)!

2) The characters are pretty powerful compared to vanilla 3.5, as you get a new class ability every level -- and very few are low-powered ones. The developers even specifically note that a character should have a non-walking movement ability by level 5. There's even a feat (with NO prerequisites!) that lets you spend a swift action to give your movements the [teleport] descriptor, though you still take attacks of opportunity from the first square you leave. Also, spells are per-encounter instead of per-day. You can get to the point where you crit on a 10.

3) Each class has a specific thing called a Key Offense Modifier, and a Key Defense Modifier. There are the stats you add to your attacks and AC, respectively, regardless of how you are attacking or being attacked. Yes, wizards stab people intelligently, and Paladins defend themselves charismatic-ly.

4) Magic Items are handled. . .interestingly. Basically, to use a magic item, you have to attune yourself to it -- and you can only attune a very small amount of them, though the number progresses as you level up (and allows you to attune more powerful ones). You can HAVE a lot of them, but only USE a certain number. BONUS: Don't dig magic items all that much? Want to do Vow of Poverty? You can basically completely neuter your ability to attune magic items for a free track in a class. Alternately, you could be a Demon whose connection to the outer planes prevents attunement, thus giving up the majority of magic items to gain the Demon Track.

5) You have social combat. You say what you want to say to someone, decide which skill most represents that, and make the roll. If you win, you get a barter chip. The catch is that the other person gets to roll as well, and no matter how well YOU do, they can succeed as well and get a chip of their own. At any point, you can start a bidding contest, where you say the other person should do something. The person being "convinced" only has to match the convincer's barter chips 1:1 to avoid having to do it. Or they can outbid you, and then make a counter-offer. The following could happen: you walk up to a shopkeeper, chat him up, and you both end up with a barter chip. You tell him to sell his wares at a discount, since you're such an awesome goodguy. He thinks, holds his chip, and agrees. Then, he plays HIS chip, and says that -- being such a great goodguy -- you should go retrieve this stolen item. Note: You can, at any point, just walk away from the social combat, but there can be repercussions. The Devs openly state that some people want pure roleplay and won't use the system, and that some will just roll dice and not actually talk, and that both are fine.

6) Like I said, this game feels a little like Exalted, in that it's slightly over-the-top and VERY cinematic. In addition, the developers went out of their way to state that they intend for this game to be COOPERATIVE storytelling.

7)This was WAY longer than intended.

[Woopate]

Session 1 with Serenity RPG went quite well. Haven't had many dice rolls yet so I haven't seen much of the problems others online talked about with failure being a large possibility on ANY difficulty roll.

My dad and I have begun writing a combat system using playing cards that hopefully feels very "martial-artsy". The intent is for a homebrew Avatar: The last Airbender system, so we have each suit represent an element.

The basic idea is you draw four cards, choose three (attack, defense, and ki growth) to play and keep one in your hand. There's no hp, only ki (to keep it cartoony). You gain ki based on the value of the card you selected, without regard for element. You pay the value of your attack card. You do not pay for defense cards. If the element of the card matches your bending element, 1.5x the value, if it's the opposing element, 0.5x.

Cards are revealed at the same time. Damage is equal to your_attack-his_defense+10(if your_attack-his_defense>0).

Royal cards will correspond to special abilities, and what each royal means will be written on a character sheet.

Right now it's very rough, but our goals are to keep combat down to under 5 rounds. So far what we have is pretty fun to play, and until we pin down the balance, we haven't touched special abilities(royals just count as a 15 value card) or out-of-combat skill checks.

[pseudoidiot]

So this weekend I went to a small con in Des Moines that some friends had put together. Saturday I finally got the opportunity to play Dread. I was expecting to enjoy it because I'd played a hack version once so I was looking forward to playing the vanilla version. Wow, I had an amazing time with it.

Using a Jenga tower as a resolution mechanic is brilliant. Dread is a game of horror, suspense, and hope and there's nothing like pulling (and watching others pull) blocks from a Jenga tower to set your heart racing. Every time someone would have to make a pull from the tower I'd be on the edge of my seat holding my breath. It was absolutely amazing. Having that sort of physiological reaction to a game was just awesome. Every pull was tense. Towards the end we had an impressive 30 levels (Jenga starts with 18, so that means we'd managed between 4 people to pull 36 separate blocks out and place them back on top without the tower falling).

It's also worth noting that this was in a con environment. One with 3 or 4 other games going on in the same room. And it was still super tense for most of the game. I can only imagine if we'd been able to secure a quiet room by ourselves where we had more control over the environment -- low light, quiet, etc.

I really can't recommend it enough. If you're interested in stories of horror and suspense it's definitely worth checking out.

[Woopate]

So I've completed session two of Serenity RPG. For my first non-DnD system, things are going stellar. I can't believe the improvement in speed and pacing. Normally the recaps I write are a paragraph or two, but for last session it took the better part of a page. And we were two hours late in starting! The improvements to speed have also allowed me to increase the crew size. I cap DnD at 6 players (and that's very hectic for me) but we're at 8 players now and things are still quite manageable.

Roleplay has definitely cranked up a notch, people just naturally started calling each other by character names, noticing and taking opportunities themselves to improve the drama, and generally work better as a team.

Originally I suspected that transit between planets would be pretty much "list your downtime activities" but there's actually been strong roleplay there too.

There are still a few kinks to work out. There were a few places where I missed plot point rewards, so I issued them at the end. This resulted in a massive argument regarding character advancement, and I can definitely see how the vanilla system is counterintuitive, only receiving advancement points if you have more than 6 plot points you didn't use, when you can start a session with a maximum of 6, and being encouraged to spend them on other things.

A few solutions we are going to try:
Earn an advancement point every time you earn x(2 or 3) plot points, if you are over 6 plot points at the end of a session, they vanish to the great beyond. If I have to give out plot points at the end of play, they still at least get advancement points for them.

Earn an advancement Point every time you spend 2 plot points on a task and succeed!(this stacks). Also earn an advancement point if you have 9 plot points at the end or 2 if you have 12.

I may end up separating the types of points entirely, or allowing advancement for pure roleplay instead of roleplay and advancement points.

[clockworkmonk]

I have recently been facilitating several games of Fiasco.

It is a GM-less rpg that takes about two hours to play, and is designed to lead to catastrophes caused by stupid characters. It is a lot of fun.

Anyone else have experience with this system?

And Woopate, regarding character advancement I suggest looking at other games Margret Weiss has published and seeing how those games handle it. For example, Leverage separates Plot points from advancement points and just rewards an advancement point every session. Smallville does something very different, and advancement happens through the resolving of stress on your character at the end of a session.

There are lots of good systems available, and a good portion of Margret Weiss' earlier stuff has some trouble in character advancement. find something everyone is comfortable with and go with it.

I would like to hear about how you handled your specific issues, and if the solution works for you.

[pseudoidiot]

Oh man, I love Fiasco!

Which playsets have you played?

I've only gotten to play twice: Regina's Wedding, & the Suburbia one. I'm planning to play at a local con soon and I'm going to have a few playsets to choose from -- The Dresden one, the new white hole one (or something like that), the Antartica one, and the Dragon's Hoard one

[clockworkmonk]

I've played several different times useing many playsets including Dragon's Hoard (involved a bounty hunter and his bounty, the bounty using the name "AnAlias"), Suburbia several times (has involved a priest who killed birds on the endangered species list), The old West (One-armed opium-addicted Chinese Confederate Soldier), and many others.

Most have been light hearted and silly, though one ended up being a weird horror thing.

The one I am most interested in is All The Damn Time, as it has all the players play the same time-traveller.

[pseudoidiot]

I don't think I've seen the time traveller one. I'll have to check it out. Sounds like it'd involve scenes jumping in time a lot? I like that, but probably not easy for first-timers.

In Regina's wedding there was a stash of guns that lead to a Mexican stand-off and I, as the groom's father, had sex with Regina in the bridal suite.

In the suburbia one, we had a pedophile priest and his brother that helped him hide his deeds and the accountant with mob connections.

[clockworkmonk]

Oh fiasco, Responsible for so very many absurd stories. I played last night, it involved a probation officer with multiple personalities, a van filled with bales of marijuana, a Bat'leth, a strip club called the Chicken Hut, and of course, The Knights of Columbus.

that one ended in arson. It seems several games of Fiasco I have played ended in arson.

[pseudoidiot]

I love that even before you actually start playing, when you're putting out all the relationships and such just how awesome the story already is. There's all these fucked-up cross purposes as things get paired up. It's awesome. Hell, that as something stand-alone is pretty sweet.

Then playing out those fucked up situations? So awesome.

[clockworkmonk]

So there was an RPG I've heard about that I cannot remember the name of, if anyone can identify it, i would be rather appreciative.

From what I've heard, it is a fantasy RPG that as a central mechanic has character growth occur through character death.

and that is what I remember about it.

[pseudoidiot]

It doesn't sound familiar, but I know a number of game designers. Certainly one of them will know. Crowd-source time!