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Disclaimer for anyone interested in Persona: P3's male protagonist, the guy in Davin's avatar, is a horrible parasitic monster and doesn't have much characterization. Persona 3 Portable, the PSP version, is really a lot better in nearly every way, and the female MC has much better S-links. Play that if you have it available to you through any means.
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Feb 11, 2015 01:04
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Harrow posted:So what's Jacket's starter Persona? Cockatrice, the rooster-headed beast that kills with a look? Give him a bunch of physical skills and the Mudo line and we're good to go. Yeah, that's probably the best fit for the character. Mudo for the executions and stealth kills, right? But seriously, I called my own number on a dare, 'cause there's this rumour going around about the Midnight Hotline. You know how it goes, favor for a favor, you perform a task and the blessings rain down. Don't, and...well, you know how this goes.
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Feb 11, 2015 01:21
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The Vosgian Beast posted:A Mazes and Monsters TRPG would be a game where you're an insane nerd who thinks they are their M&M character, and have to survive as long as possible in college without getting taken away to a sanitarium/prison/death. Davin Valkri posted:That just sounds depressing, and possibly offensive Here's the game you were looking for.
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Feb 11, 2015 01:37
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grassy gnoll posted:Disclaimer for anyone interested in Persona: P3's male protagonist, the guy in Davin's avatar, is a horrible parasitic monster and doesn't have much characterization. Persona 3 Portable, the PSP version, is really a lot better in nearly every way, and the female MC has much better S-links. Play that if you have it available to you through any means. Honestly I felt it was refreshing for a JRPG to admit its protagonist was a sociopath who manipulated people for magical powers. Serious comment: I didn't really feel like there was a lot of positive characterization in either 3 or 4's MC, but the 4 MC was at least preternaturally wise if you took the 'correct' routes that rewarded you most efficiently in S-Link gains. 4 was also funnier and/or had more human responses. But for both of them it felt like they did more to illuminate other characters than having character themselves. My experience is the PS2 FES and regular 4 version respectively--but I finished and enjoyed both and I am normally one of those people who really hates both the US and Japan's obsession with teenagers. If someone is wanting to play a Persona game, or read an LP (not an LP reader myself) then 3 or 4 really convey what is unique about those two. The earlier Personas were interesting but much more bogged down with grindy garbage.
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Feb 11, 2015 01:38
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I would certainly recommend LPs for those without a solid tolerance for grinding, even the modern Persona games contain dozens of hours of murdering a thing, then murdering it fifty more times. Well, maybe more, but that's as high as I'm counting.
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Feb 11, 2015 01:43
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Rockopolis posted:*muffle grunts of assent* Well, now I know what my first campaign will be with this system.
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Feb 11, 2015 01:58
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Alien Rope Burn posted:I would certainly recommend LPs for those without a solid tolerance for grinding, even the modern Persona games contain dozens of hours of murdering a thing, then murdering it fifty more times. Well, maybe more, but that's as high as I'm counting. On Persona 3 PSP I'd do marathon runs on Tartarus b/c your tired condition wouldn't kick in midway through the dungeon like it did in the original. That way I could spend all month between the 12 major Arcana bosses doing fun Social Link events. I'd also like to point out that Persona 3's a very good source of inspiration for games. I pretty much based my Pathfinder magic school campaign on it (although with less standard dungeon crawls and more climatic superhero fight scenes).
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Feb 11, 2015 02:14
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Harrow posted:Well, now I know what my first campaign will be with this system. And hey, you've already got music for the game. It'd even fit in with the Persona 3 soundtrack. Thou art I, I art thou... *muffled breathing intensifies*
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Feb 11, 2015 02:57
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Man, it's so depressing seeing someone trying to learn how to run a PbtA game for the first time, and they immediately try to hammer an initiative system and whole monster attack mechanic into things. 
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Feb 11, 2015 05:50
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The whole "I've never played this RPG before but I'm immediately going to try to houserule it before I start" thing is so ridiculously dumb. Like, aside from Monopoly do people ever do this with board games? "Oh, this new XCOM board game looks fun buuuuuut I'm gonna change how this rule and this rule works based on nothing but gut instinct. Galaxy Truckers, sounds like fun! But before we get started, let me just tack on this homebrew MIRROR UNIVERSE expansion I made based on a My Little Pony fanfic that inspired me."
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Feb 11, 2015 05:53
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Some people are just too used to the old ways.
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Feb 11, 2015 05:54
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Kai Tave posted:The whole "I've never played this RPG before but I'm immediately going to try to houserule it before I start" thing is so ridiculously dumb. Like, aside from Monopoly do people ever do this with board games? "Oh, this new XCOM board game looks fun buuuuuut I'm gonna change how this rule and this rule works based on nothing but gut instinct. Galaxy Truckers, sounds like fun! But before we get started, let me just tack on this homebrew MIRROR UNIVERSE expansion I made based on a My Little Pony fanfic that inspired me." While tinkering with poo poo you don't understand and haven't played is indisputably dumb, I feel like I should stick up for people who like loving with systems because it can be fun in its own right.
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Feb 11, 2015 06:00
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Oh I've got no problem with system tinkering or houseruling. It's just bizarre that someone's doing that to completely rework a core rules assumption rather than try to adjust their thinking.
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Feb 11, 2015 06:03
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Evil Mastermind posted:Oh I've got no problem with system tinkering or houseruling. It's just bizarre that someone's doing that to completely rework a core rules assumption rather than try to adjust their thinking. In fairness, the first time I tried to run something PbtA without anything but the hack's document (when I ran TitanWorld as a one-shot) I didn't really understand it either and sort of alternated between 'players act, GM introduces awful poo poo' without necessarily waiting for a failure. Maybe they just haven't seen the base book?
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Feb 11, 2015 06:10
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Error 404 posted:While tinkering with poo poo you don't understand and haven't played is indisputably dumb, I feel like I should stick up for people who like loving with systems because it can be fun in its own right. loving with systems is fun and fine, more power to you if that's what floats your boat, but virtually every single class, lecture, anecdote, or lesson I've ever had with regards to creating something, whether it's a story or a piece of musical composition or visual art or whatever, almost always start out with teaching you the generally accepted fundamental rules so you understand them before you go about breaking them. It's not that breaking the rules is bad, it's that whenever someone gets it in their head "pfff, I don't need to know this poo poo, I'm just gonna create the next great American whatever" they always flounder because 99% of the time they aren't a super secret prodigy that can get away with that. If you want to tinker with a game then great, but why not actually play it using the rules someone else made first so you at least understand what you're tinkering with? I saw this all the time back when D&D 4E was in full swing. "I like my D&D gritty and lethal but I've never played 4E before soooooo I took out healing surges, what do you guys think?" and then they'd always get pissy when people told them "that's dumb and won't do what you want it to do, why not just try playing it like normal for a while and get a feel for it?"
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Feb 11, 2015 06:10
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Kai Tave posted:loving with systems is fun and fine, more power to you if that's what floats your boat, but virtually every single class, lecture, anecdote, or lesson I've ever had with regards to creating something, whether it's a story or a piece of musical composition or visual art or whatever, almost always start out with teaching you the generally accepted fundamental rules so you understand them before you go about breaking them. It's not that breaking the rules is bad, it's that whenever someone gets it in their head "pfff, I don't need to know this poo poo, I'm just gonna create the next great American whatever" they always flounder because 99% of the time they aren't a super secret prodigy that can get away with that. I don't think we're actually disagreeing here.
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Feb 11, 2015 06:12
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That's never stopped arguments around here before.
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Feb 11, 2015 06:18
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Well I didn't feel like I was dogging on "people who enjoy tinkering with systems in general because it's fun" so I felt I should clarify.
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Feb 11, 2015 06:27
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Kai Tave posted:The whole "I've never played this RPG before but I'm immediately going to try to houserule it before I start" thing is so ridiculously dumb. Like, aside from Monopoly do people ever do this with board games? "Oh, this new XCOM board game looks fun buuuuuut I'm gonna change how this rule and this rule works based on nothing but gut instinct. Galaxy Truckers, sounds like fun! But before we get started, let me just tack on this homebrew MIRROR UNIVERSE expansion I made based on a My Little Pony fanfic that inspired me." I'd qualify it further with houseruling it without at least familiarizing oneself with the system first. As in, I don't think you necessarily have to play a system raw and cold before you can houserule it, as long as you have an understanding of how the system works and how your change fits into that. I've never run 4E, but I don't think it'd be so out of line to start implementing Inherent Bonuses and MM3 math right off the bat if other people have done the legwork for me. I do agree that shoehorning in initiative and monster-turns into PbtA is dumb.
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Feb 11, 2015 06:30
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gradenko_2000 posted:I'd qualify it further with houseruling it without at least familiarizing oneself with the system first. As in, I don't think you necessarily have to play a system raw and cold before you can houserule it, as long as you have an understanding of how the system works and how your change fits into that. I've never run 4E, but I don't think it'd be so out of line to start implementing Inherent Bonuses and MM3 math right off the bat if other people have done the legwork for me. Okay, but those examples you give (Inherent Bonuses and MM3 math) aren't really "tinkering with the rules" in the "I'm gonna make my own homebrew amendments" sense. One of those is simply flipping a toggle and the other is...using the rules in the Monster Manual 3 as presented. Like yes, at some point in their conception both examples were the result of someone tinkering with 4E's rules but presumably that someone was someone intimately familiar with how 4E's system worked and wasn't just eyeballing it. I think you do need to actually play games to have more than, at best, semi-informed gut impressions of how they might maybe work. Sure, you can look at a game that has a skill list 100 entries deep and go "woah poo poo, this is way too much" and you'll probably be right, pattern recognition is a useful thing, but just reading through an RPG is rarely enough to give you a fully accurate impression of how it actually works in practice.
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Feb 11, 2015 06:39
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Another option found here.
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Feb 11, 2015 10:10
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Evil Mastermind posted:I remember some blog that was reverse-engineering the M&M "rules" from how it was depicted in the movie. I wish I could find it again. I remember that too: think it's this one.
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Feb 11, 2015 18:33
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Night10194 posted:In fairness, the first time I tried to run something PbtA without anything but the hack's document (when I ran TitanWorld as a one-shot) I didn't really understand it either and sort of alternated between 'players act, GM introduces awful poo poo' without necessarily waiting for a failure. Maybe they just haven't seen the base book? That's basically Mouse Guard, honestly.
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Feb 11, 2015 18:45
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Kai Tave posted:The whole "I've never played this RPG before but I'm immediately going to try to houserule it before I start" thing is so ridiculously dumb. Like, aside from Monopoly do people ever do this with board games? "Oh, this new XCOM board game looks fun buuuuuut I'm gonna change how this rule and this rule works based on nothing but gut instinct. Galaxy Truckers, sounds like fun! But before we get started, let me just tack on this homebrew MIRROR UNIVERSE expansion I made based on a My Little Pony fanfic that inspired me."
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Feb 11, 2015 18:54
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Parkreiner posted:I remember that too: think it's this one. Yup, that was it. Thanks!
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Feb 11, 2015 18:59
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Guilty Spork posted:D&D in particular came out of a tradition of wargaming where you were basically expected to have to houserule to make the game really work. Some people apparently missed the memo that we started expecting game designers to sell us functional games, and take houseruling as a default rather than an option. Was it really? I mean people accept this as a sort of received wisdom, that D&D has basically forced you to houserule since the dawn of time, but the impression I got from OD&D is that it was actually a focused game with a fairly tight ruleset that arose from the fact that Gygax and his gaming buddies basically played it to exhaustion, indirectly playtesting the hell out of it. The idea of "well it's an RPG, of course you have to houserule it to make it work" always struck me as one of those things people convinced themselves of to justify their sunk costs when they bought games that were less vigorous about that sort of thing.
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Feb 11, 2015 19:51
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Kai Tave posted:The whole "I've never played this RPG before but I'm immediately going to try to houserule it before I start" thing is so ridiculously dumb. Like, aside from Monopoly do people ever do this with board games? "Oh, this new XCOM board game looks fun buuuuuut I'm gonna change how this rule and this rule works based on nothing but gut instinct. Galaxy Truckers, sounds like fun! But before we get started, let me just tack on this homebrew MIRROR UNIVERSE expansion I made based on a My Little Pony fanfic that inspired me." Hilariously, yes. All the time. Check out the 'variants' boards on boardgamegeek some time, and check out how many majorly game-changing house rules are thrown out there by people who admit they haven't played the game yet. Kai Tave posted:Was it really? I mean people accept this as a sort of received wisdom, that D&D has basically forced you to houserule since the dawn of time, but the impression I got from OD&D is that it was actually a focused game with a fairly tight ruleset that arose from the fact that Gygax and his gaming buddies basically played it to exhaustion, indirectly playtesting the hell out of it. The idea of "well it's an RPG, of course you have to houserule it to make it work" always struck me as one of those things people convinced themselves of to justify their sunk costs when they bought games that were less vigorous about that sort of thing. Gygax was a huge rules stickler, Arneson rather famously didn't have any rules for his campaigns at all. There's always been a wide spectrum.
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Feb 11, 2015 20:11
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Kai Tave posted:Was it really? I mean people accept this as a sort of received wisdom, that D&D has basically forced you to houserule since the dawn of time, but the impression I got from OD&D is that it was actually a focused game with a fairly tight ruleset that arose from the fact that Gygax and his gaming buddies basically played it to exhaustion, indirectly playtesting the hell out of it. The idea of "well it's an RPG, of course you have to houserule it to make it work" always struck me as one of those things people convinced themselves of to justify their sunk costs when they bought games that were less vigorous about that sort of thing. I mean, there are houserules and then there are rulings. People coming up with their own subsystems for determining how likely it is that a sage can identify your magic sword or not have definitely been around from the start of D&D, but that doesn't mess with any existing systems.
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Feb 11, 2015 20:14
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Tendales posted:Hilariously, yes. All the time. Check out the 'variants' boards on boardgamegeek some time, and check out how many majorly game-changing house rules are thrown out there by people who admit they haven't played the game yet. 90% of the time they are "I think this kind of game should work like <this>" or "I didn't like that <my pet feature> was missing, so I bolted it on" and they are always bad.
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Feb 11, 2015 20:21
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You know what, I completely forgot about BGG's million lovely homebrews so I stand thoroughly corrected. It's still super dumb though.Tendales posted:Gygax was a huge rules stickler, Arneson rather famously didn't have any rules for his campaigns at all. There's always been a wide spectrum. The way I've seen it broken down before is that Gygax was much more concerned with the "game" side of things while Arneson was the one who sort of pushed the "roleplaying" idea, but I could be wrong.
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Feb 11, 2015 20:30
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Kai Tave posted:Was it really? I mean people accept this as a sort of received wisdom, that D&D has basically forced you to houserule since the dawn of time, but the impression I got from OD&D is that it was actually a focused game with a fairly tight ruleset that arose from the fact that Gygax and his gaming buddies basically played it to exhaustion, indirectly playtesting the hell out of it. The idea of "well it's an RPG, of course you have to houserule it to make it work" always struck me as one of those things people convinced themselves of to justify their sunk costs when they bought games that were less vigorous about that sort of thing. It did have a tight ruleset, but especially from AD&D on, a lot of people dropped or disregarded parts of it and there was also an enthusiastic homebrew community from shortly into D&D's existence. EDIT: Or they lacked the Chainmail rules for context and ended up improvising.
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Feb 11, 2015 20:31
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Early D&D/AD&D's official support magazine (The Dragon) was chock full of additional unofficial rules and classes and systems and monsters and magic items, which always made for a fun bit of cognitive dissonance when you'd read a Gygax editorial about how tweaking the game or adding houserules or applying third-party supplements ruined the game and made it not D&D.
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Feb 11, 2015 20:42
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Gygax was a weird dude. You could read one essay from him and it's full of reasonable advice (i.e. keeping things from becoming the "weird wizard show" is a good idea) then turn around and read something from him that's like the ur-grog from which other grog was formed.
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Feb 11, 2015 20:47
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Kai Tave posted:The whole "I've never played this RPG before but I'm immediately going to try to houserule it before I start" thing is so ridiculously dumb.
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Feb 11, 2015 21:13
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Kai Tave posted:Gygax was a weird dude. You could read one essay from him and it's full of reasonable advice (i.e. keeping things from becoming the "weird wizard show" is a good idea) then turn around and read something from him that's like the ur-grog from which other grog was formed. His response to the perennial Orc Noncombatant Issue was like 'The best thing to do is take the children in, raise them to be Good, then murder them so they go to heaven.'
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Feb 11, 2015 21:17
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Kai Tave posted:Gygax was a weird dude. You could read one essay from him and it's full of reasonable advice (i.e. keeping things from becoming the "weird wizard show" is a good idea) then turn around and read something from him that's like the ur-grog from which other grog was formed. Not really weird so much as people change their opinions on many things on their own game 40 years down the line.
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Feb 11, 2015 23:26
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Libertad! posted:Not really weird so much as people change their opinions on many things on their own game 40 years down the line. But, and correct me if I'm wrong, aren't some of these wildly disparate essays pretty close together, like within months or years?
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Feb 11, 2015 23:50
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Megaman's Jockstrap posted:90% of the time they are "I think this kind of game should work like <this>" or "I didn't like that <my pet feature> was missing, so I bolted it on" and they are always bad. Actually, my favorite example is that FFG's Arkham Horror includes some optional rules from the creator of the original GW version; and those rules basically don't work at all the context of the FFG game's gameplay. (Yes I know AH is bad anyway that is not the point) And yet people still point to those broken 'we let the dude have some page space as a courtesy' rules as gospel.
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Feb 11, 2015 23:52
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Night10194 posted:His response to the perennial Orc Noncombatant Issue was like 'The best thing to do is take the children in, raise them to be Good, then murder them so they go to heaven.' Dear Rule of Three, I accidentally raised some Orc children to be Chaotic Good. If I kill them now they will ascend to Asgard where they will surely be murdered by pissed off Elves every day for the rest of eternity. What should I do?
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Feb 12, 2015 02:01
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Lynx Winters posted:I reviewed it for the FATAL & Friends thread. Short version, it's terrible and someone will actually cause the game to lock up on accident. It's also the only tabletop RPG I've seen where it's possible to freeze the game. Halloween Jack posted:She is reported to have called him an "adequately excellent lover" Kai Tave posted:The whole "I've never played this RPG before but I'm immediately going to try to houserule it before I start" thing is so ridiculously dumb. Like, aside from Monopoly do people ever do this with board games? "Oh, this new XCOM board game looks fun buuuuuut I'm gonna change how this rule and this rule works based on nothing but gut instinct. Galaxy Truckers, sounds like fun! But before we get started, let me just tack on this homebrew MIRROR UNIVERSE expansion I made based on a My Little Pony fanfic that inspired me." Error 404 posted:But, and correct me if I'm wrong, aren't some of these wildly disparate essays pretty close together, like within months or years? (And then a few weeks later saying "well, if you want to do this thing, that is fine, but do not call it Dungeons & Dragons." Sometimes I wonder if he intentionally contradicted himself just to ensure people on any side of a gaming argument could use him as proof of their viewpoint, haha)
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