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Or the german market because "Eh, not big enough", thus allowing others like german dnd-copies to dominate and essentially create a market where they failed?
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Sep 13, 2017 07:25
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Newest Bundle of Holding is a bunch of GURPS Traveller stuff. I know nothing about Traveller besides having a weird interest in the concept: is that the lovely version? Traveller's like the one franchise where I have no idea which version of anything to get, splatbook or otherwise.
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Sep 13, 2017 10:26
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Drone posted:Newest Bundle of Holding is a bunch of GURPS Traveller stuff. I know nothing about Traveller besides having a weird interest in the concept: is that the lovely version? I'm tempted by it, since it looks like GURPS Traveller just uses the GURPS Lite rules - but I could be wrong. In terms of storyline GURPS Traveller ignores the "death of the Emperor" plot that started in MegaTraveller, making it more a continuation of the Classic Traveller Golden Age 1105 timeline. Haven't played the rules set but I've heard positive things about the splats. Traveller: The New Era (TNE) is considered the lovely version by most, maybe followed by Traveller 4 and Traveller20.
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Sep 13, 2017 11:44
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Mr.Misfit posted:Or the german market because "Eh, not big enough", thus allowing others like german dnd-copies to dominate and essentially create a market where they failed? Trust me - the Japan one is way, way funnier. So, Record of Lodoss War! That was a thing. A really POPULAR thing. And so the people who made it tried to approach TSR to sell them the setting and to talk about distribution, since, hey, there's this super popular thing that was made using D&D! TSR of course responded by telling them to gently caress off and never use D&D again, to uh, paraphrase. So they didn't. They made their own game using those houserules, Sword World, and it went on to more or less boot D&D out of the country. TSR didn't just fail to expand into the Japanese market, they failed so insultingly that the very people trying to help them created the game that dethroned them for good in the country.
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Sep 13, 2017 11:44
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Also, Sword World, from what I've gathered, is basically a D&D modified to be sufficiently legally distinct from D&D to win a infringement lawsuit in Japanese court. With 80's anime artwork, so it's superior to the original in that regard, I guess.
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Sep 13, 2017 11:51
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Yeah, that's a lot funnier than TSR asking too much money for licensing from Schmidt Spiele that they just turn around and tell the guy they wanted to translate D&D to just write his own game for them.
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Sep 13, 2017 11:53
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ProfessorCirno posted:Trust me - the Japan one is way, way funnier. Apparently there hasn't been an official English translation of Sword World in the vein of a lot of recent games (Golden Sky Stories, Ryuutama, TBZ, Double Cross, etc.) because the Sword World rights holders are demanding a large sum to license the game, so I guess they learned something from TSR  Also it's an interesting Japanese adaption of D&D but still ultimately a basic high fantasy RPG. The rules on the second edition are simple, too, but the books are a lot lower on art than Western audiences expect nowadays. A fan translation of the main rule book was put together on a wikia here if anyone wants an idea of the rules. Nuns with Guns fucked around with this message at 12:45 on Sep 13, 2017 |
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Sep 13, 2017 12:29
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Ratoslov posted:Also, Sword World, from what I've gathered, is basically a D&D modified to be sufficiently legally distinct from D&D to win a infringement lawsuit in Japanese court. With 80's anime artwork, so it's superior to the original in that regard, I guess. The fragmentary fan-translations I've seen make SW 2.0 out to be fairly influenced by the intervening decades of JRPGs. You can play a robot-person or a rabbit-person and the classes look Final Fantasy Tactics inspired to me. Is the system really traditional, really groggy, really unbalanced? I have no idea.
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Sep 13, 2017 14:47
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That's a shame about localization because I'm really curious about Sword World 2.0's system and setting. Also the d6 thing is because the Big Die Lobby hasn't managed to force their way into Japan.
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Sep 13, 2017 14:50
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Also it looks like Kususaga Rin/Genji Asai made the art and I really liked their drawings.
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Sep 13, 2017 14:55
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Halloween Jack posted:Well, it's always used 2d6 instead of d20 AFAIK. Though based on that wiki that got linked earlier, the rabbit people are less 'bunny girls' and more 'we scratched the serial numbers off halflings and made them the White Rabbit/March Hare from Alice in Wonderland' which is at least a slightly fresher take on both concepts.
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Sep 13, 2017 15:03
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I thought that Tabbits were the hoppity folks and GrassRunners were the hobbity folks.
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Sep 13, 2017 15:13
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Most japanese games use 2d6 because the other polyhedrons are a bitch to find sometimes in Japan. It's not like they have FLGS over there.
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Sep 13, 2017 15:15
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unseenlibrarian posted:Gygax -also- railed against 'killer GMs' which, uh...I don't want to consider what the dude who suggested 'have random bolts of blue lightning hit people for being dumb' would consider a killer GM. Fun fact - I came up with the idea to have a semi-random bolt of blue lightning hit people for being dumb (semi-random because it was a Lightning Bolt at Caster Level 6 being read from a scroll by a fragile old man who would die in a single hit) in an adventure module (a bad one) I developed in fifth grade based on a flawed understanding of D&D that I developed from the Fast-Play rules (meaning the adventure was for Level 1-3 characters). That is not meant to be complimentary to me and especially not to Gygax. If a fifth grader thinks that's a good idea in a D&D module, that means it's a very bad idea in general.
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Sep 13, 2017 16:15
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Kwyndig posted:Most japanese games use 2d6 because the other polyhedrons are a bitch to find sometimes in Japan. It's not like they have FLGS over there. Other fun fact - I know that it was brought up earlier (by Ewen, I think), but the Japanese-language version of Call of Cthulhu is Chaosium's best-selling version (including U.S. sales). Overall, TSR's reluctance to really move into foreign markets created a vacuum for other RPGs. As a result I think how foreign RPG scenes developed in D&D's absence is absolutely fascinating (although I'm sure Ewen can provide much more detail about the Japanese RPG scene) and it would make for a really cool book. We're so focused on Gygax and D&D in the US that we really lose sight of the forest for the trees.
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Sep 13, 2017 16:20
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Neither Dungeons Nor Dragons: An Examination of Foreign RPG Markets
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Sep 13, 2017 16:23
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ProfessorCirno posted:Trust me - the Japan one is way, way funnier. Hobby Japan licensed D&D 3rd and 4th Editions, and put in a lot of work to make them a success in a country where they don't get to dominate by virtue of having the words "Dungeons & Dragons" on the cover, so of course WotC canceled all of the licensing agreements for foreign language editions and then after multiple years of silence on the issue told everyone to negotiate new contracts with Gale Force Nine from scratch, which is how Pathfinder started getting more foreign-language editions. Ratoslov posted:Also, Sword World, from what I've gathered, is basically a D&D modified to be sufficiently legally distinct from D&D to win a infringement lawsuit in Japanese court. With 80's anime artwork, so it's superior to the original in that regard, I guess. Kwyndig posted:Most japanese games use 2d6 because the other polyhedrons are a bitch to find sometimes in Japan. It's not like they have FLGS over there.
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Sep 13, 2017 17:09
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https://www.humblebundle.com/books/warhammer-rpg-books Dang, thats a pretty good bundle
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Sep 13, 2017 20:40
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LuiCypher posted:Other fun fact - I know that it was brought up earlier (by Ewen, I think), but the Japanese-language version of Call of Cthulhu is Chaosium's best-selling version (including U.S. sales). In Finland both RuneQuest (a hybrid of 1nd and 2nd edition, from what I know of them) and MERP (and Rolemaster) were as big, if not bigger than, red box D&D. All of them were translated, but the quality in both RQ and MERP was better than D&D and a promised translation of AD&D never materialized. Also Cyberpunk 2020 and Twilight 2000 2nd edition were translated and were popular, especially the Cyberpunk translation was rock solid, ways ahead of its time. For me D&D was really only something I played at the last legs of AD&D 2nd ed, Players Option and all and then 3.0 and I never really enjoyed it. I started with Cyberpunk, Twilight and MERP and for me D&D with its passive combat and a lack of interesting martial options was never that attractive, aside from 4th ed. Also, the major Finnish rpg, miniatures etc magazine was run by people who wrote lots of interesting stuff for both MERP and RQ, and also Call of Cthulhu, which was also translated. That magazine ran for something like 12 years (about 4 issues every year), with its D&D focused competitor petering out after about 4 issues. Both Steve Jackson and Greg Stafford visited the country several times, with Stafford having visited our major con several times. Also, our scene is very mixed, with most people who started tabletop rpg's in the 90's (like myself) havin propably tried larping, miniature wargames, ccg's etc and not just sticking to one of them. Gygaxian style deathtraps had their own fans, but they were not the majority and the scene here was not shaped only by D&D. That's probably the reason people play so many different games here and why the locally produced stuff doesn't really derive from D&D, personally I play 5th ed (though with every class, power and spell etc replaced with robots), Savage Worlds and HarnMaster right now.
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Sep 13, 2017 20:58
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As a consequence of me getting into Valiant comics, I picked up their official RPG to give it a look. It's an interesting system and is clearly inspired by Marvel Heroic Roleplaying. It's rules light and quick, but clunky in some ways. You got four stats (Might, Intellect, Charisma, Action) and those are rated in dice (D6, D8, D8, D10 or D4, D8, D8, D12). You roll 1d12 + Stat + modifier (rare) vs 1d20. Your powers are point buy, but it isn't a list. There is just a few generic effects (replace stat, add with stat, roll+x, roll both stat and power and discard lowest) you buy with points as well as buying the dice size for the power with the same points. You add (Might+Action/2)+10 to get Armor, which is what gets hurt before your actual track. Might influences your health track. There are cues, which look like fate aspects, but actually are only really meant to help you remember what your character is about (a bit of a missed opportunity). Damage is basically a "meh, just choose 2, 4, 6, D4, or D6, based on what you think the weapon is like). You can get plot points, but they have a minor effect: useful, but not a game changer. That's pretty much most of the rules. There is more, but not much. The big draw and what I think it gets right is that it's GM-Less. The "Lead Narrator" changes to the person to the current LN's right every scene. Which, as a forever-GM, is helpful as it can be annoying to run a superhero game, but never get to play a superhero, only the villains. So, being able to play your favorite hero (Armstrong coming at you) and GM only when its your turn is helpful. It's actually oddly hands-off with the GM seat in a surprising way. With how it sets things up, it kind of reveals how easily you can just, well, negate the need of a GM. It also has character advancement which, while not vital to me, is useful as some of my players were turned off MHR in the past due to dislike of how you can never advance. It's biggest problem, for me, is it has tiers in it and some heroes are on different tiers, meaning, unlike MHR, you can't just mash everyone together. Given how lite it is, I don't think it will be as bad as if you did a mash-up in M&M 3rd Ed where mixing different powerlevels is a nightmare, but it does mean you can't just make whatever team and expect everyone on equal footing. Like I said, it's clunky in places, it's probably not all that balanced, and all that, but it's an okay rules-lite supers game and it does a good job summarizing valiant comics, which you should be reading. Thought I'd bring it up for any Supers game fans here. Zoro fucked around with this message at 00:50 on Sep 14, 2017 |
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Sep 14, 2017 00:48
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Yo there's a Valiant RPG and it's not garbage? Can you break down how the tiering works a bit more, because that's the only thing leaving me cool here.
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Sep 14, 2017 00:56
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Mr. Maltose posted:Yo there's a Valiant RPG and it's not garbage? Can you break down how the tiering works a bit more, because that's the only thing leaving me cool here. Tier is literally how many points you have to spend on powers and how many "powers" you can have. I put it in quotes because powers can be things like flight or things like ninja shurikens. The way it works is you can narrate anything your hero can do, but spending points makes your powers matter by giving them a die effect. Sidekick has 15 points and a max of 2 powers. Hero has 30 points and a max of 3 powers. Super has 45 points and a max of 4 powers. Legend has 60 points and a max of 5 powers. Die Point Cost x Power Type Point Cost is how much a power costs. D4 costs 2 D6 costs 3 D8 costs 4 D10 costs 5 D12 costs 6 Replace stat die costs 1 point. Discard Lowest costs 2 points. Keep Both costs 3 points. Add + X modifier costs 1 +X points. So, a d6 power with Keep both costs 9 points. (3x3) So, it just changes how potent your powers are. It's not the end of the world. Faith is Super Level and X-O is Legend level, but I feel the overall difference isn't TOO noticeable. Sidekick to Legend, however, might be more in your face. You can advance your character, though, with event points. Oh, one mechanic I forgot is Luck. Basically, when making your character, roll 1d12. Regardless of the final result, if your base, stat, or power die equals that number, you automatically succeed at your action. Here is an example character, Armstrong:  As you might notice, he has a unique power: self-healing. The powers rules basically go "if you want a unique effect, use the above effects anyway and then increase the cost multiplier with what everyone thinks is fair." As you can see, healing is technically a "Add+X" power, but with something added. It's hand-wavey, but the entire book is based on being handwave-y. If it matters, this apparently uses the same system as something called "cosmic patrol." Edit: Also, some of the pregens seem off. Like, here, he should have a d4 if he has a d12. I can't tell if it's because they decided to "fudge" their own rules to make them closer to the comics or if they spent some event points without saying so. Probably the former, though. Oh, I guess it could also be an updating error, like some were made with older rules, but I think it is just fudging to make them close to the comics. Edit: Or, thinking about it, they may have gone into this with "licensed characters are made as accurate as possible, strict chargen rules only apply to players making new characters." Which, hey, wouldn't be the first time I've seen a game do this, it's just easier that way and leads to less complaints of "X character is not bad at Y or Z character is better than A than this!" Zoro fucked around with this message at 01:41 on Sep 14, 2017 |
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Sep 14, 2017 01:15
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Yeah that looks like the nadir between crunch and narrative where "Just figure it out at the table" lives and I'm very much not a fan of that. Pity.
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Sep 14, 2017 01:29
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Yeah, looks like it's the same system as Shadowrun Anarchy, and I didn't hear a lot of good things about that one either.
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Sep 14, 2017 01:55
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Mitama posted:Yeah, looks like it's the same system as Shadowrun Anarchy, and I didn't hear a lot of good things about that one either. Looks like it was made by the same people so it sounds like they just used their same engine on it. Also, I never bothered to check, but it's made by the Shadowrun people. Kind of surprised to see a game like this from them, considering their love of gearporn.
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Sep 14, 2017 02:00
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Mitama posted:Yeah, looks like it's the same system as Shadowrun Anarchy, and I didn't hear a lot of good things about that one either. Shadowrun Anarchy is great for groups (like mine!) where players don't want to play Full On Shadowrun but still want the Shadowrun Experience. We didn't use the Cue super narrative system exactly, but it works as a standard RPG, lighter crunch version of Shadowrun. It's just that Shadowrun fans don't really want light crunch. I think there's some house rules for Anarchy posted in the Shadowrun 5e thread; I would cross post but 
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Sep 14, 2017 02:19
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PrinnySquadron posted:https://www.humblebundle.com/books/warhammer-rpg-books I wish I could justify buying even more rpg systems I'll never get a chance to play because that is a really good sounding bundle.
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Sep 14, 2017 03:01
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Len posted:I wish I could justify buying even more rpg systems I'll never get a chance to play because that is a really good sounding bundle.  The Warhammer RPG sound neat but I don't think this version breaks a lot of new ground in fantasy play except for by having you start as pig farmers and beggars.
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Sep 14, 2017 03:07
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Kwyndig posted:
IIRC, the 3rd edition is the ground breaking one and was the prototype for the FFG SW game. The 2nd one was once described to me, earnestly, as "THE GAME WHERE YOU ROLL UP A PIG FARMER, GO OUT OF YOUR VILLAGE, AND DIE COVERED IN poo poo AND POOP!" It personally doesn't interest me. Mr. Maltose posted:Yeah that looks like the nadir between crunch and narrative where "Just figure it out at the table" lives and I'm very much not a fan of that. Pity. I'd be willing to give it a whril. I'm currently working my way through Valiant thanks to comixology. These comic books are loving great and the system seems okay enough to me. As far as I'm concerned, I think "fudge it" is pretty appropriate way to handle a RPG based on comic books since fudging reality is certainly a constant in comics.
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Sep 14, 2017 03:10
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Zoro posted:The 2nd one was once described to me, earnestly, as "THE GAME WHERE YOU ROLL UP A PIG FARMER, GO OUT OF YOUR VILLAGE, AND DIE COVERED IN poo poo AND POOP!" It personally doesn't interest me. That's only sortof the case. It's more like 'a bunch of shmucks get in over their heads, and black comedy hijinx ensues'. It's not as deadly as people pretend, though it's definitely not a heroic system at all. You characters are mildly competent at best and never want to be fighting fair if they can help it. It's kinda a proto-OSR game, except it takes itself way less seriously.
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Sep 14, 2017 03:30
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Yeah 2e is pretty neat. There's probably math problems but I didn't get into it enough to identify them. It's definitely not trying to be a hack and slash despite how some of the adventures pan out.
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Sep 14, 2017 03:32
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Zoro posted:IIRC, the 3rd edition is the ground breaking one and was the prototype for the FFG SW game. The 2nd one was once described to me, earnestly, as "THE GAME WHERE YOU ROLL UP A PIG FARMER, GO OUT OF YOUR VILLAGE, AND DIE COVERED IN poo poo AND POOP!" It personally doesn't interest me. It's really not like that. "Schmucks in over their heads" is more like it, and your PCs can become legit badasses.What people like about the setting is that it features much more emphasis on life in early modern not-Europe than you'd expect from either a Tolkienesque fantasy or the extremely 80s power metal high fantasy that the wargame is renowned for.
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Sep 14, 2017 03:58
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Halloween Jack posted:This is one of those cases where the worst advertisement for any movement is its adherents. I see this a lot on forums: fans focus on what makes a game unique and exaggerate it to the point that it turns a lot of people off. I wish there was a concise term for this behavior because I've seen it all over the place for any number of games and it's kind of annoying to have to tell someone that no actually the game isn't just about rolling to see which color of poo poo you die in.
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Sep 14, 2017 04:05
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Cascade Jones posted:I'm tempted by it, since it looks like GURPS Traveller just uses the GURPS Lite rules - but I could be wrong. In terms of storyline GURPS Traveller ignores the "death of the Emperor" plot that started in MegaTraveller, making it more a continuation of the Classic Traveller Golden Age 1105 timeline. This Traveller bundle isn't a starter set, it's all military or mercenary stuff. If you already have some Traveller stuff, they're good books and the Solomani Rim splat has a good rep. If not, this only gets you into a very narrow slice of the Traveller experience. PrinnySquadron posted:https://www.humblebundle.com/books/warhammer-rpg-books 1e stuff but no Death on the Reik ? For shame.
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Sep 14, 2017 04:06
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Kai Tave posted:I wish there was a concise term for this behavior because I've seen it all over the place for any number of games and it's kind of annoying to have to tell someone that no actually the game isn't just about rolling to see which color of poo poo you die in. I think the whole D&D-dominance and heartbreaker dynamic has a lot to do with it. When the hobby has been so long defined by D&D, and that every other competitor has to then define themselves as "it's D&D, but ...", you then develop a laser-sharp focus on the "but ..." part It's kind of like in the early 90s when every game was a Doom-clone-but-with-a-gimmick, or the late 90s when every game was a Command-&-Conquer-clone-but-with-a-gimmick. I do agree that it's kind of obnoxious though. I really appreciated Cease to Hope's recent F&F of 13th Age because it was an actual in-depth look at 13th Age not just as a comparison to D&D, but as a work in and of itself, which revealed a number of flaws that often get glossed over in the fawning discussion of "it's a compromise between 3e and 4e, but good!"
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Sep 14, 2017 04:14
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Man I really miss the the days of Doom and C&C clones instead of today's Hero Shooter and MOBA hellscape
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Sep 14, 2017 04:17
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The extreme advertising meme except it's for RPGs.
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Sep 14, 2017 04:25
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Kai Tave posted:I wish there was a concise term for this behavior because I've seen it all over the place for any number of games Is "RPGnet Darling" still a thing? It was more a thing when the D20 boom was still going on, I think.
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Sep 14, 2017 04:39
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Zoro posted:IIRC, the 3rd edition is the ground breaking one and was the prototype for the FFG SW game. The 2nd one was once described to me, earnestly, as "THE GAME WHERE YOU ROLL UP A PIG FARMER, GO OUT OF YOUR VILLAGE, AND DIE COVERED IN poo poo AND POOP!" It personally doesn't interest me. That's Dungeon Crawl Classics. Combat can be pretty fast and deadly in WFRPG but if it's balanced correctly, and there's no reason why a competent party of adventurers shouldn't be making it to their 3rd or 4th careers. The system isn't bad either, it's just broken in the 40K games because it wasn't designed for automatic weapons.
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Sep 14, 2017 05:07
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Kai Tave posted:I wish there was a concise term for this behavior because I've seen it all over the place for any number of games and it's kind of annoying to have to tell someone that no actually the game isn't just about rolling to see which color of poo poo you die in. The two other examples (besides with WFRP's "hopelessly outmatched shitfamers") I can think of are: 1) Paranoia is the game where everyone dies a half dozen times just walking to the briefing room, it's hilarious! and 2) Call of Cthulhu is where everybody goes horribly insane from reading books and then the whole party gets eaten by eldritch monsters! Which are, y'know, one way to play those games, and an interesting (if reductionist) shorthand to contrast them to D&D, but it becomes a problem when people start thinking those are the only ways to play Paranoia/CoC/WFRP, and if you don't play it that way you're doing it wrong. And since that's how people who aren't familiar with those games tend to think of them, it can be a great obstacle to getting people to try them. The CoC one always pisses me off because in the titular story, the character goes one-on-one with the big C, defeats him by driving a speedboat through him, and manages to escape. In Dunwich Horror, which is the closest thing to a story about a group of PC investigators, the protagonist manage to triumph over the cultists and their monster. The idea that Lovecraft is all about hopeless doom isn't supported at all in the fiction, but people who consider themselves purists seem to think the only proper way to play CoC is for everyone to understand they're all screwed from the start.
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Sep 14, 2017 05:20
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