Curiosity about tabletop games systems

[william12123]

I've been interested by tabletop games for a while and I recently managed to play a few games. I would like to get the perspective of players who have had the chance to experiment with more different systems.

What I've had the chance to play for the moment is D&D next and pathfinder. D&D next was my first time playing, went in with a premade character, and had some fun. However, once I started looking into the character creation, I found it rather rigid, with us being limited to pretty binary options on how to build up your character, and limited customisability of the play style.

Then I had a chance to try out pathfinder. It felt marvelous. So much liberty! They encouraged creation of backstory with character traits, and if you were ready to use some feats, any play style seemed possible. Dex based meelee fighter? Check! Want to be a diplomatic wizard? There are traits that let you use int instead of cha in some situations. Want to be a magus (spellsword) who tinkers around with constructs? Go ahead! Want to create your own special race? We have guidelines for that! I will admit the size and breadth was much more impressive than D&D next (which is pretty barebones at the moment), but I still felt that pathfinder encouraged messing around a lot more. However, that also left some gaping hole, which is why min-maxers seem to love pathfinder.

I've also had a chance to check out some D&D 4e rulebooks. They seem to offer a great amount of options, much like pathfinder, but without much flexibility. Each class is pretty much a closed book, with distinct powers and sometimes interchangeable roles. However, it looks very straightforward, and a lot have people are saying it does a good job making people feel epic from the start.

My question is, is it possible to get pathfinder's flexibility with d&d 4e's scope and direction? Pathfinder's problem is one of balance. It's too easy to create a useless/overpowered character. At the same time, I like it when we have a well defined scope. Are there other systems more open to this kinda play?
The "easy" answer would probably be to homebrew something, but I am far from having the experience for that.

I guess it doesnt help that I've been playing entirely through the net (roll20), where it is fairly difficult to roleplay and most games I've played have been very "videogame-like", as in combat focused. I think flexible character creation is a great potential roleplaying tool, but everything seems to be focused so centraly on combat skills that other skills seem to be lost...

Any comments? I'd love to hear from some more experienced players. I've had fun with what I've had for the moment, but I'd like find a way to have the liberty to role-play rather than roll-play.

 

[Mutant150]

I haven't played table-top in almost 20 years. I originally started with AD&D as it was back then, but quickly moved onto ICE's MERP and Rolemaster systems. These systems delivered much greater flexibility in terms of defining your character's abilities, skills and background - way beyond what AD&D offered at the time. I don't know if ICE are still around, but I'm sure there are other tabletop systems around now that are as superior to modern D&D as MERP/RM was then.

With regard to roleplaying and developing your character, there is nothing like playing with a regular group of mates. When I was playing tabletop, most character development (background, personality, motivation etc) was done outside of the game. It's sad to read that D&D has become so combat-focused. Sounds awfully dull.

 

[DoPo]

What I've had the chance to play for the moment is D&D next and pathfinder. D&D next was my first time playing, went in with a premade character, and had some fun. However, once I started looking into the character creation, I found it rather rigid, with us being limited to pretty binary options on how to build up your character, and limited customisability of the play style.

OK, let me clarify things a bit - D&D Next is still not released, what you played was a playtest packet, so it's understandable it won't hold up to a system with a decade of development. Now, with that said, I don't want to get your hopes up too much - from what I've glanced at surrounding the development of Next is that it's most likely going to turn out atrocious and as a recent proof, they are actually completely throwing away what they playtested. No, not because of feedback of it being bad, just because - they are going with internal playtesting now and reworking (probably) everything you've seen so far. Oh, and just now they started looking at the basic math behind it.

I've also had a chance to check out some D&D 4e rulebooks. They seem to offer a great amount of options, much like pathfinder, but without much flexibility. Each class is pretty much a closed book, with distinct powers and sometimes interchangeable roles.

OK, admittedly, I don't know much about 4e but I'm pretty sure you have the flexibility there too

My question is, is it possible to get pathfinder's flexibility with d&d 4e's scope and direction? Pathfinder's problem is one of balance. It's too easy to create a useless/overpowered character. At the same time, I like it when we have a well defined scope.

Here, let me try - as I said, I've got limited experience so I'm going off from the top of my head but my knowledge isn't much deeper, still, I know it can be done better:

Dex based meelee fighter? Check!

Not sure on this one, but I think you also have that in 4e.

Want to be a diplomatic wizard? There are traits that let you use int instead of cha in some situations.

You can pick up Diplomacy as a Wizard and/or there was an utility spell that allowed you to use an Arcana check instead of Diplomacy (or Intimidate, or...whatever the lying was).

Want to be a magus (spellsword) who tinkers around with constructs? Go ahead!

Can't say I know much of constructs, but you have the druid class that summons spirits and they fight for him or something, it'd be a simple job to refluff it into a golem master, then throw in some fighting power thus making it a hybrid class.

Want to create your own special race? We have guidelines for that!

If there aren't guidelines for new races in 4e, then it's no big deal, since you can see the pattern right away - they have an encounter power, +2 to two attributes and a total of...I think +3 or around there something to skills. You're done. You can then make feats for them, if you wish, by basing them on existing race feats. I'm pretty sure I'll be able to do make a bunch of races in a pinch, I just need to glance at a PHB.

Are there other systems more open to this kinda play?

Anyway, for your actual question - FATE. Go. Get it. Why are you waiting? It's free! [http://www.evilhat.com/home/fate-core-downloads/] Ok, it's pay what you want including free but please support Evil Hat - they are good people and they deserve it. Anyway, I usually stand by the principle that it's not the job of the roleplaying system to encourage roleplaying - if it does that, it fails (by definition, you don't need rules for that) and it's one thing I like about 4e - it's straight to the point, when you have conflict resolution, here are the mechanics for that (and those are mostly stable) - everything else is up to you. With that said, FATE is awesome and it really doesn't encourage rollplaying at all. There are some RPGs that already use FATE and slightly altered it for their world (there is a Dresden Files RPG which is amazing, for example), but the core packet should be able to run any game - it's context free.

My second mention would be World of Darkness - the mechanics work, the game is easily customisable and you generally don't get as many min-maxers there. Still, it's better suited for a grittier feel, so even though you could run a dungeon adventure, it's not going to be as good as D&D, for example. And actually, it's more about using their setting, if, so you can play vampires, werewolves, mages, and other supernatural beings (or just a mortal in such a world), still if you want something different, you only need the core book (called World of Darkness) and you're set, you can paly whatever then (though, I can also suggest picking up Mirrors, as that has system hacks and tips specifically if you want a different game). You can see some free samples here [http://rpg.drivethrustuff.com/index.php?&keywords=world%20of%20darkness&pfrom=0&pto=0&manufacturers_id=1] (look for the Quckstarts and demos).

And then there is GURPS. You know how I said 4e gives you stable mechanics but leaves everything else up to you? And you know how you wanted being able to customize your character a lot? Well, this is THE system for it. It has THE stable mechanics. GURPS is able to run any game ever (well, still not as good as specialised systems but well enough) and you can infinitely customize your chars. All those checks you mentioned from before are absolutely 100% present and you have more - want to run a futuristic setting with lasers and stuff? Check. Want to run a space opera where you play as entire ships? Check. Want to play as something entirely alien, like 17 legs and 1 arm, 15 eyes and floats in mid air? Check. It literally has the options to make that character. Want to run a game with pandimensional hopping every session where you are facing entirely new setting every time but still have the same characters across sessions? Check. Everything. It can run everything. Here [http://www.sjgames.com/gurps/lite/] is a free glimpse of the system just to show off what kinds of options are available.

 

[PedroSteckecilo]

Are there other systems more open to this kinda play?

Anyway, for your actual question - FATE. Go. Get it. Why are you waiting? It's free! [http://www.evilhat.com/home/fate-core-downloads/] Ok, it's pay what you want including free but please support Evil Hat - they are good people and they deserve it. Anyway, I usually stand by the principle that it's not the job of the roleplaying system to encourage roleplaying - if it does that, it fails (by definition, you don't need rules for that) and it's one thing I like about 4e - it's straight to the point, when you have conflict resolution, here are the mechanics for that (and those are mostly stable) - everything else is up to you. With that said, FATE is awesome and it really doesn't encourage rollplaying at all. There are some RPGs that already use FATE and slightly altered it for their world (there is a Dresden Files RPG which is amazing, for example), but the core packet should be able to run any game - it's context free.

I'll second FATE and supporting Evil Hat. Fred Hicks, Lenny Balsara and Rob Donoghue are fantastic folks. Also because FATE Core is an open system there are tons of different setting options available for it, officially and unofficially. Already you've got...

Nova Praxis, Transhuman Sci-Fi
Apotheosis Drive X, "humanist" Mecha Roleplaying
Ehdrigohr, an "Aboriginal Fantasy" game based on mythology from various non-european sources.

And that's just for the recently released FATE Core Edition of the rules, if you want to dig back you've got...

Bulldogs, Sci-Fi that kicks ass. It's essentially Futurama starring the crew from Firefly.
Agents of SWING, 60's Spy-Fi with a vague League of Extraordinary Gentlemen Bent (James Bond, John Pertwee Era Dr. Who, The Avengers, The Man From Uncle and even Get Smart are all at home here)
The Kerberos Club, Victorian Era Superheroes (It's important to note that it's not Steampunk, it's Superheroes)

In terms of other systems there's The Ubiquity System which feels like a combination of World of Darkness, FATE and d20. It's got Open Character Creation, Roleplaying Enticement Rules and Dice Pools but generally more traditional play. Games in that system include...

All For One: Regime Diabolique, essentially The Three Musketeers battling Werewolves, Demons and Vampires.
Leagues of Adventure, a Victorian Pulp Adventure Game
Hollow Earth Expedition, The Original Game for this system, fight Nazi's and Dinosaurs in The Hollow Earth.

There's also Savage Worlds, which is what a lot of folks who don't like D20 play. It's tagline is "Fast, Furious and Fun" and it certainly lives up to that moniker as it is exceedingly easy to learn and play. It also has a setting for everything under the sun.

 

[Mylinkay Asdara]

There are lots of different systems - at varying price points - that I am sure everyone will supply you with shortly (they have already begun I see). What I have found is that no matter what you are playing (or how many different shapes of dice you need or how many pieces of paper it actually requires - which is always more than the character sheet if you actually want to be doing it right - you end up shuffling around and obsessing over between sessions) what makes a good game are two key components: 1) the group you are playing with and 2) the person in charge.

Let's look at these two key elements separately. You want to be playing with friends if possible (or at least people who might become friends over time) and that's pretty much a given. Things people tend to forget to think about are also important though. Are these friends who have a regular (or at the very least semi-regular) time slot to play that is sufficient for the task? Games that only meet every third month because no one can get everyone into the same room for three hours at a stretch don't tend to last and don't tend to be very enjoyable after the first few sessions. More frustration than its worth is certainly something to be avoided. Are your fellow players into the same type of play you are? Just like video games - there are different styles for different tastes. Some people like a lot of dialog with other players and every NPC gets interrogated and every location needs a detailed explanation - "Can I lift the table and see if there is anything under here?" "Is the lock rusty?" "How low are the sconces set into the wall" Etc. etc. Some people fall asleep at the table if another person is doing this, because they are all about rolling those shiny new polygons they bought just for this so they can own every encounter and show off their character's stats by carving them into a boss's torso. Now, a really good storyteller / gamerunner can balance this out, but it becomes a ton of work for them, and it can become a problem. So aim for a group that's not at opposite extremes in every chair around the table.

Secondly, but possibly more importantly, you have to have someone in charge of running that story that is going to be so epic and satisfying that makes the game experience great. Someone imaginative and someone organized is obviously pretty important, but additionally they need to have and understanding of the players around the table and what their wants, needs, and expectations are - and be willing to work to meet them, while also enjoying themselves. Trust me, if your storyteller is not enjoying themselves, you won't be either - sooner or later that frustration will get worked out on either the party in game or out of game by a sudden falling off of times you get together.

Long post short: plenty of good games out there, but the people are what make a table top situation a great one, no matter the game. That's been my experience.

 

[Forobryt]

I played quite a few 3rd ed D+D games through university and in the last year of uni tried out 4e, all of the group were disappointed in 4e because they seemed to remove alot of the characterisation. One of the games we had was an Evil campaign, going around being the bad guys in 3e, nope not in 4e since evil gods werent mentioned because that would be wrong (d+d makes people satanists or some crap).
it seemed to bring it closer to computer based RPGs in that you had certain types of attacks you could use instead of just "i hit it", things like rangers having an arrow that did a knockback effect (which combined with another class that could attack and stun if someone moved away from them made for very silly combat where the enemy couldnt even attack).

Some of this may have been that 4e simply didnt have that much in it compared to all the sourcebooks 3e had at the time.

Also played some games of BESM, Big eyes, small mouth. Based around anime and was prone to hilariously overpowered characters if a player had a smidge of imagination. Whats that? make an enemy do a will save versus 90 or be mind controlled....at level 10, well i guess you better roll a 20 then.

Oh and there was a mutants and masterminds game set in victorian london. Now that was a fun one. The crazy types of characters we came up with were beautiful. I made a lucky chimney sweep orphan ....called "Sweepstakes". Also had one guy play a Nicola Tesla clone who had inventions that only worked because he thought they would.

The main draw of all the games though was the guys i played with, without a good group chemistry games go bad fast (I'm looking at you Stargate DM who railroaded the game harder than a dude who builds railroads).

 

[DoPo]

the other advantage of gurps is that the sourcebooks are good for pretty much any game system as background info

That's true - I'm pretty sure at least one of their supplements won some sort of award or at least recognition, because of the high level of quality (I believe it might have been Bio-Tech), so they are good even if you don't even want them for a setting.

There's also Savage Worlds, which is what a lot of folks who don't like D20 play. It's tagline is "Fast, Furious and Fun" and it certainly lives up to that moniker as it is exceedingly easy to learn and play. It also has a setting for everything under the sun.

I've heard good things about Savage Worlds but for some reason I keep delaying getting my hands on it to check it out myself. But yeah, I'd recommend it based on second hand accounts alone.

What I have found is that no matter what you are playing [...] what makes a good game are two key components: 1) the group you are playing with and 2) the person in charge.
[...]
Long post short: plenty of good games out there, but the people are what make a table top situation a great one, no matter the game. That's been my experience.

Well, you are correct. One of the most enjoyable play sessions I had used no actual system and only...2 rolls I believe. It was a Discworld based adventure where the GM just told us to play what we wanted to, so I rolled a student at the Unseen University, another one decided he wanted to be a lecturer there, we also had a talking ninja mouse and a werewolf who shapeshifted when he sneezed (and had severe allergies, too). It was simply great and it was the GM and the group that made it so - the actual system (which was none but anyway) wouldn't matter in the enjoyment we got. Well, technically a system like d20 would have only hindered us as we would have needed to take at least half an hour for character creation.

 

[davidmc1158_v1legacy]

There are lots of different systems - at varying price points - that I am sure everyone will supply you with shortly (they have already begun I see). What I have found is that no matter what you are playing (or how many different shapes of dice you need or how many pieces of paper it actually requires - which is always more than the character sheet if you actually want to be doing it right - you end up shuffling around and obsessing over between sessions) what makes a good game are two key components: 1) the group you are playing with and 2) the person in charge.

Let's look at these two key elements separately. You want to be playing with friends if possible (or at least people who might become friends over time) and that's pretty much a given. Things people tend to forget to think about are also important though. Are these friends who have a regular (or at the very least semi-regular) time slot to play that is sufficient for the task? Games that only meet every third month because no one can get everyone into the same room for three hours at a stretch don't tend to last and don't tend to be very enjoyable after the first few sessions. More frustration than its worth is certainly something to be avoided. Are your fellow players into the same type of play you are? Just like video games - there are different styles for different tastes. Some people like a lot of dialog with other players and every NPC gets interrogated and every location needs a detailed explanation - "Can I lift the table and see if there is anything under here?" "Is the lock rusty?" "How low are the sconces set into the wall" Etc. etc. Some people fall asleep at the table if another person is doing this, because they are all about rolling those shiny new polygons they bought just for this so they can own every encounter and show off their character's stats by carving them into a boss's torso. Now, a really good storyteller / gamerunner can balance this out, but it becomes a ton of work for them, and it can become a problem. So aim for a group that's not at opposite extremes in every chair around the table.

Secondly, but possibly more importantly, you have to have someone in charge of running that story that is going to be so epic and satisfying that makes the game experience great. Someone imaginative and someone organized is obviously pretty important, but additionally they need to have and understanding of the players around the table and what their wants, needs, and expectations are - and be willing to work to meet them, while also enjoying themselves. Trust me, if your storyteller is not enjoying themselves, you won't be either - sooner or later that frustration will get worked out on either the party in game or out of game by a sudden falling off of times you get together.

Long post short: plenty of good games out there, but the people are what make a table top situation a great one, no matter the game. That's been my experience.

I just wanted to second this. I've played dice/paper RPGs for years under a lot of systems. It's not the game mechanics that are the deciding factor. Almost always, it's the group and the referee.

Beyond that, a great deal of what you'll find comes down to a matter of personal preference. Speaking for myself, I found the older editions of D&D (AD&D and 2nd Ed) to be the most fun while 4th Ed holds no appeal to me. I've played the ICE Rolemaster system under good GMs and bad, which really made all the difference there. I've played games using White Wolf's rules which have varied in quality mightily depending on who was the storyteller. And on and on and on.

Over the years, the cardinal rule which has provided my friends and myself the best experience has always been "We are here to get together and have fun with friends. If you are playing for any other reason, there's the door."

 

[Little Woodsman]

Long post short: plenty of good games out there, but the people are what make a table top situation a great one, no matter the game. That's been my experience.

Basically this. One of the key things that a GM/DM/Gamerunner---whatever your flavor of person who is running the game has to do is evaluate what every person who attends wants from the sessions and make sure they are all getting it.
Person #1--wants to hang out w/friends & order pizza. Easily satisfied, total win.
Person #2--wants epic battles where the outcome is in question to the very end--Ok, a good person in charge can do that.
Person #3--significant other of person #2 and just wants to spend time with person #2--ok but keep an eye on the situation.
Person #4--wants to experience a sweeping epic storyline in a detailed fantasy world--will take work but doable.
Person #5--wants to experiment with character builds to find the *ultimate*--Ok, but keep an eye on this one too...

There are of course many, many more types of players, and unfortunately some of those types will ruin everything for everyone....
The real trick is making sure that everyone in the group is getting what they want from the sessions often enough for everyone to be happy.
So if you've found good people to play with, experiment with a few different systems, find out what works well for your group and roll with it.
And always remember. *Have* *Fun*.

 

[SerithVC]

I'd recommend the D6 system, the PDFs are available for free since the publisher is no longer in existence. your best option with it is to let everyone use the class/character creation system which lets them customize their character how they want to. http://games.whitesaber.com/west-end-games-open-d6.html is the link if your interested.

 

[william12123]

Big props to Dopo: You gave me a hell of a lot to think about. I'll admit a Dresden files RPG sound pretty sweet. There are a lot of really good recomendations in there, and I thank all of you for the info.

One of the biggest difficulties always seems to be finding the right group. Unfortunately, the few friends I have arent terribly interested (or have sworn off the dice completely because of previous experiences). I've been using roll20, which is mostly random people. I havent met any awful trolls, but it's not ideal. I think role-playing would be a lot easier around a table in person. I'll have to start looking around my new city for people to play with.

In any case, thanks for everybodies advice, it's always useful.