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Seems like D&D is easiest to get a group started on. I would like a Cyberpunk theme with brutal combat mechanics and an assumption of DM controls on things like the physical weapons scaling (availability restrictions more than price, ie you can set off a 200 d6 pile of c4 if you can get it) Unfortunately, aside from finding a good game, half the people I would play with only want fantasy.
idk i think its a bad analogy. Its more like calling all rts games starcraft or something. They can be thematically different and even play very differently but the underlying structure is the same. And its not unreasonable when talking with someone who isnt knowledgable to start with something similar and if they care to hear more to explain the differences and if they dont then the conversation can end
All rts are Dune.
But yeah. Or how anything hack and slash is now “Souls like”
—Do you like TV series?
—You mean like Games of Thrones?
—Yeah, or any other
—I watched the first season some years ago
—And have you watched any other than GoT?
—What do you mean
—IDK, like Breaking Bad
—That’s like a more crime centered GoT right?
—No, it’s a different one, is not fantasy
—Mmm but it’s still about dragons and stuff, right?
—No, it has nothing to do with GoT, it takes place in current USA actually
—Ok, well I guess people try to adapt magic and fantasy armies to anything now
—No, it’s not about fantas…
—I think I’ll stick to the original one
—Ok 😒
Having played several systems I have no idea why anyone chooses d&d other than it seems like the default.
I’m in a d&d group and every time they’re flipping through the books I want to shake them and show them literally anything else. Even just vibe up your own system on the spot.
This was Fallout 4 for me— which is basically Skyrim, but set in a post-apocalyptic future. Same game engine, even.
My settlements were built up into cities. I practically rebuilt the wasteland. Over and over and over. I passed 15,000 hours of playtime sometime during Covid.
Fallout:Skylines
“But why roll 1 d20 when you could be rolling 20 d6?”
I just want to go back to the time it was considered rude to play at a table more than a month or two without cracking the book and learning the rules on your own time.
I can’t even make a character without consulting three different rule books to optimize for role play.
How do you optimize for role play? And why would it need rules consultation?
I like in-universe explanations and using game mechanics that support my character choices. For example, say I’m building a rogue character that’s an experienced assassin, but why would they still be at level 1, or even 3? Maybe they’ve never actually killed anyone but they’re very good at “disappearing” people with poisons and potions, so they’d take medicine and/or nature as a skill. So maybe now we have an “assassin” that secretly helps people flee town by faking their deaths and I see what can be done with potions, herbs, medicines, magic, etc.
God, it might just be the autism, but before my first ever session I learned so much about the rules I was helping the gm remember them in the session. I can’t imagine going in to it, much less continuing to play, without having a firm grasp of at least the basic rules of encounters and skill checks
you don’t skim the book before your first session!?
I hate the 21st century.
“Video games - you mean like Space Invaders?”
TennisForTwo-Likes
My experience with cyberpunk is that most actions are “stat+skill+d10” so I really don’t know what you’re on
Cries in Cyberpunk
I finally bought it this summer when it went on sale, and I already am on my 7th playthrough. I think I’m somewhere around 750 hrs of playtime already.
Edit: oof, that’s a lot for 3 1/2 months
Oh you mean Shadowrun without magic and dragons?
Cyberpunk has magic. They just call it things like “ice”, or “virus”, or whatever, and use some technobable to explain why it technically isn’t actually magic.
Funny story, they added magic and dragon to shadowrun because cyberpunk released first, and they knew they were cooked without a USP.
My group tried Shadowrun, but we kept falling asleep. Counting dozens of dice for every fart you do was just too relaxing for us.
Shadowrun has consistently had a great setting and a terrible system
You just need to know how to use a marker and then you throw two handful fo dice and can see the successes instantly…
I picked up Cyberpunk when RED came out. Mostly because my table was into it. Compare to the lore and flavour of Shadowrun, it feels anemic.
I mean hacking is basically like magic and nothing stops you from making a cyber dragon or robo dragon or whatever.
I had a friend’s son come to me asking to learn to program so he could make video games. I started teaching him C#, and he thought it was too hard. He said he just wants to learn to make Roblox mods. It was very disappointing.
I mean, people have different paths of entry into programming, lots of them started by making mods for their favorite game. And Lua is a great lightning-fast language with minimal footprint, excellent for interactive use-cases, that folks keep dismissing for no good reason.
It was more that he just wanted something easy. He didn’t want to work for it. He thought that making Roblox mods would mean he didn’t need to learn to program.
I used to teach programming to young kids (like 8-12) as a summer job and never had a single kid complain about the difficulty or fail to learn. This was about a decade ago.
I recently tried teaching my cousin (9) using the same curriculum and it was nearly impossible. He didn’t know how to turn his computer on or off and he didn’t know what a file was or what “text” means. I basically had to root his Chromebook to install a competent text editor on it. Then every time the “computer” booted it said something like “press G to revert” in huge text for like a minute straight and I told him never to press it. Took like 2 hours to put the computer in a state where you could code on it, and next session after that it was reset. I was like “what happened to the computer?” and he said “it said to press G so I did”
Kids are fucked bro. I blame Google, Apple, and Microsoft for intentionally designing their software to prevent you from learning how computers work or how to use them. They don’t want you developing any transferrable skills whatsoever. You used to learn all about computers just by using them and it was impossible not to…
This has been a thorn in my side at least as far back as Windows 8, and the LLM craze has only thrown jet fuel on the damn fire
EDIT: I don’t have to deal with kids that much but I’ve noticed that it’s wrapped around to affecting older adults and that’s maybe worse since they’re the same generation as the politicians making decisions for all of us involving technology
I hate this problem so much.
There’s a whole game studio here that just makes games and mods for Roblox. It really is kind of the example in the OP.
I don’t really understand the metaphor in the post, but i really enjoyed Dimension 20 playing Vampire the Masquerade.
I am not looking Viva La Dirt League’s Daggerheart - Beast Feast campaign though. So much focus on ingredients and trade and cooking. I think characters are more fun.
It’s not your fault. It’s an incredibly bad metaphor.
I played so much VtM and werewolf in high school and college. It was way better than 3.5. I even liked playing a human mortal vs vampires. Tricky to do it right, but I could hold my own
This is definitely something I’ve been frustrated about more so over time. I have a bunch of game books sitting on my shelf just ready to play as soon as I can convince my players that there is something more.
He’s a strategy: get a copy of Microscope by Ben Robbins, and tell them you’re going to use it to create the world/setting for your next campaign (this is something many people do). Once they’ve played, ask them to do a stars and wishes, see what they say (I would be extremely surprised if they don’t love it).
Then point out that Microscope is a ttrpg, just a wildly different one to D&D, and that there are thousands of other games that do weird and interesting things with mechanics that most trad games can’t even dream of doing (e.g. some examples: Everyone is John, Ten Candles, Fiasco, Wanderhome, We Are But Worms).
Viditya Voleti’s A Land Once Magic is another good option that you can do this with, and it’s a bit quicker and easier than Microscope.
I’ve been actively trying to get a group together in person for some World of Darkness for at least 5 years.
I have never managed to get a group to finish a WoD campaign. Most dont last more than a couple sessions. And i can’t even get started on Legend of the Five Rings. Or Star Trek d6.
I’m convinced!
Doing everything in D&D
Doing everything in GURPS
Shoutout to Death in Space for being my primary TTRPG going forward.
I want space ships and lovecraftian horrors that lurk between the stars. And I love that it treats the party’s ship/space station as a shared character.
Only War had the party’s imperial guard regiment as a full on ‘character’ that they made together, complete with stats and traits. Really cool system.
