Potsticker posted:

Have you tried the Fabled Lands gamebook series? That's my personal go-to suggestion for people looking for good/interesting CYOA w/ Dice Rolling books.

ShutteredIn posted:

Five Parsecs is a solo minis based wargame more than RPG. It’s a whole different animal really.

StarkRavingMad posted:

Starforged just came out, by the same people that did Ironsworn.

wizzardstaff posted:

If you are writing a more crunchy system, walk through the core mechanical loop of the game without all the narrative bits. Is it frustratingly repetitive to roll so many dice or shuffle so many cards? Do you feel like you're actually playing a game with interesting outcomes or just a dressed up version of flipping a coin?

Fat Samurai posted:

How does the Legacy bit work? Do you have an end goal for the entire set of characters? Do you go with something like Legacy: Life among the Ruins where you lead a family in "strategic mode" and then zoom in to particular characters for particular climatic scenes?

Subjunctive posted:

this is good poo poo, please keep posting about it!

Runa posted:

I like this idea a lot but I feel like I should probably tell you that gammon has some other definitions

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gammon_(insult)

Mercury Hat posted:

Project ECCO just released today and I've played a few prompts already. I'm digging it so far! I was mainly drawn to it because I have a lot of empty dated planners to use up, but I think I'm gonna get some good enjoyment out of it. I'm more of a "discover the character as you write" kind of player so I'm having fun figuring out what kind of agent I want to be and what my Agency is like. I haven't really dug into the meat of the prompts yet, but I'm excited, I wasn't expecting the physical side of "you may have to destroy a page" but that's a neat feature.

GDE's brain posted:

Delve Variant Rule - Ancient Ruin
An optional houserule to provide luck mitigation during the early game.

No special setup is needed for this rule, and it can even be included into a game already in progress.

Whenever you draw a non-Ace card for any reason except simulating a dice roll, if you don't like the result, you can instead set the card aside and draw again. You can have up to three cards set aside this way at once. These set-aside cards are locked away, deep underground. The next time you draw A♥ or A♦ while exploring, apply the effects of all the set-aside cards to the room as if you'd drawn them while exploring. If this would create a seemingly impossible or contradictory result, such as with multiple Remnants or Natural Formations, use your best judgment on how to incorporate them into a single concept.

This rule ceases to function once the Jokers are shuffled into the deck.

New Rooms posted:

Trade Depot - 20♥ + 10♦ (2 Grid Spaces)
A place to welcome foreign merchants who want to buy our poo poo.
This room counts as an Entrance for all purposes. For each Trade Depot you have, you may trade one additional time per turn.

Workshop - 15♥
This room is filled with the sounds of artisans hard at work making useless crap to sell to tourists.
When building a workshop, you must choose a purpose, Stonecutting or Gemcutting.
A Stonecutting Workshop allows you to trade 1 Resource (1♥) for 1 Trade Good (1♦), instead of half a Trade Good.
A Gemcutting Workshop allows you to trade 1 Trade Good (1♦) for 3 Resources (3♥), instead of two Resources.
Even if you can trade multiple times per turn (such as from Trade Depots), you can only use each effect once per Workshop per turn.

Modified Rooms posted:

Kitchen
Units allocated to a room connected to a kitchen get +50% STR during combat, regardless of their current location. Does not function for Golems, Cannons, or Skull Dwarves.

Overseer's Office
When exploring in the same column as this building, draw two cards and pick one. Shuffle the other back into the deck, then resolve the picked card normally. Jokers must be picked, if possible.

Shrine Room
Your first Shrine of Fortune increases the value of all ♥ and ♦ cards during exploration by 3 for the first shrine, your second increases them by an additional 2, and your third by an additional 1. Further Shrines of Fortune have no effect.

Pump
Liquid and gas cannot move through or damage this room. Pumps can be placed in existing rooms.

Barricades
Enemy units must destroy the barricade before being able to damage any other units in the room. Barricades that have been damaged or destroyed can be repaired after combat for half their building cost. If you choose not to repair a barricade, make a note somewhere of how much STR it has left. You can still repair it later if you choose to.

Modified Inventions posted:

Ace: It's alive! Your inventors have created a monster, a twisted amalgamation of metal and flesh. And yet... it can think. You can either respect it or condemn it. If you respect it, it takes over the Inventor's Lab as its lair, attacking anything that enters. If you condemn it, it seeks to escape by force, begin combat immediately. In either case, treat it as an Ancient Monstrosity with 200 STR but no traits. If it dies in any way except lava, gain 50♥ and 50♦.

Jack: One of your inventors has gone mad and disappeared into the hold, screaming something about “destroying us all”. The next time you draw a Black Joker, the madman's ravings prove to be true. Generate the Ancient Monstrosity and give it an additional trait, but delay its appearance until the end of your next Explore Phase (even if you don't explore that turn).

Subjunctive posted:

Oh poo poo, I thought this was the Ironsworn Delve. I gotta pick this up to read at least.

90s Cringe Rock posted:

will it have Kana, the best friend?

world of horror is so cool and a tabletop version sounds amazing

girl dick energy posted:

Playtest Rules, The Adversaries posted:

Horror from Beyond (Ace of Clubs)
You’ve been having strange dreams lately, of a vast underwater city, filled with bizarre symbols and statues, and an impossibly-large creature rousing from its eons-long slumber.
Forbidden Knowledge: There are things man was not meant to know. Whenever one of your stats is increased above its starting value, gain 2 Doom.
The Stars Are Aligned: Your insignificance in the face of such a horrible reality weighs heavy on your mind. Double all Doom gained during the process of resolving Clubs events.

Enemy Within (Ace of Diamonds)
You keep waking up in strange places with blood on your hands and no memory of how you got there. What were you doing, and why don’t you remember…?
Don’t Know Your Own Strength: That wasn’t… that’s not what you meant to do! Whenever you choose an O result on a dXO, gain 1 Doom.
Strange Compulsions: Why did you say that? This isn’t like you. When told to make a choice during a Diamonds event, instead randomly determine which option to pick.

Serial Killer (Ace of Hearts)
Someone dear to you has gone missing. Your only clue is that the last time you spoke to them, they were nervous about an upcoming date with someone ‘way out of their league’.
Mounting Casualties: People are dying, and you can’t help but wonder if you could have done more. Whenever you discard an ally for any reason, gain 2 Doom.
Compassion Fatigue: And yet, the more it happens, the harder it becomes to care. Ignore all effects on Hearts events that would increase any of your stats.

The Beast (Ace of Spades)
You’re being hunted by something. What, you can’t be sure, but you’ve seen it in the corner of your eye, watching you from the shadows. Why can’t anyone else see it?
The Scent of Blood: You cut your finger while cooking, and felt the Beast’s gaze boring into you. At the end of each event, if any of your stats are below their starting value, gain 1 Doom.
I’m Not Crazy!: No one can see the Beast but you, and people are starting to question your sanity. While resolving Spades events, ignore your Abilities and those of your Allies.

XenoCrab posted:

Now that I've put a few dozen hours into playing a number of systems solo* I've come to a few realizations:
1) It's fun! It may not be for everybody, but there is a lot of entertainment to be had
2) It takes some work, but the work is really play. Don't think of creating the backstory, setting, possible events, etc... as getting in the way of adventuring; just as a different phase of the game
3) Some form of journal is necessary. Rolling dice and moving characters around on an overworld or dungeon map is meaningless without context and keeping a record of events makes them real
4) Using regular pre-written adventures works well and is preferable to solo adventures, which tend to be too limited, but putting the time into world & campaign building is great too
5) Running both sides of a combat encounter (especially in a more tactical system like PF2e) is fun & rewarding as long as there is a way to balance the cognitive load (e.g., smaller party size)
6) Random tables can be very helpful, but having too many is a recipe for indecision
7) All of that money buying a bunch of rulebooks and adventures wasn't a waste!

I've also tried running systems both physically and digitally and for PF2e I think using FoundryVTT is a huge advantage because it takes care of so much of the optimization, but for lighter systems using a pencil and paper and dice offers a great way to get away from the computer.


* Ironsworn, Pathfinder 2e & various OSR/NSR systems (OSE, Basic Fantasy, Cairn, Mork Borg, Scarlet Heroes, Broken Shores)

Chakan posted:

Yeah, you want gamebooks. There are a lot of them, but everyone thinks of Fighting Fantasy first because it’s one of the oldest series and there’s a lot of them. One of the authors, Steve Jackson, did a series called Sorcery that retains your character through the books, and everyone says it’s good.

Chakan posted:

This is great, thanks! I taught Talisman at a few conventions when FFG released their edition a while ago and I still distinctly recall some people learning 3rd ed and yearning for the old days of 1st ed, lol. I love some RNG jank more than most, but woof that game sometimes.