It doesn't seem right to my brain that it's been 20 years but I was intrigued to see that the World's Largest Dungeon is coming back in a new, updated edition.

https://www.worldslargestrpgs.com/follow/

I can't make Gen Con this year, but it looks like they're giving away a sick mini at their booth.

Hello everyone! I'm one of the developers behind Samwise (https://samwise.pirilampomestre.com), a new virtual tabletop that we built to address some problems we see in other VTTs, such as their mobile apps (when they exist) having way less features than their desktop/web counterparts and their interfaces being usually outdated and cluttered.

These problems were both fun and challenging to tackle! Here's a little breakdown of what we did:

1. Samwise can be used for both online and in-person games, on any device. Mobile platforms offer the same features as desktop/web, so players can just bring their phones to the GM's place and even GMs can run a game from anywhere.
2. Knowing VTTs are complex tools, one of our key goals was making Samwise as intuitive and accessible as possible.
3. A VTT should be blazing fast so it doesn't disrupt the user experience. Samwise is available on all major platforms: natively for Android, iOS and macOS, and the web app is well optimized to run smoothly on Windows/Linux.

Now, talking about pricing: it's free for players, while Game Masters get a free month to try it out, then it's $3 per month or $24 per year (4 months free).

We'd love to hear your thoughts, and if you have any questions feel free to ask them here! We also have a Discord server and a subreddit (although our Discord server is way more active), feel free to join us there too!

And as promised, if you enjoy Samwise, use the code REDDIT20 until September 26th on the web app for 20% off the annual plan!

Website: https://samwise.pirilampomestre.com

Discord Server: https://discord.gg/5qEMMHHsGw

Subreddit: https://www.reddit.com/r/SamwiseApp

Pretty much the title. I'm looking to run a Lockwood and Co. inspired game set in London. I was thinking of using CoC or maybe a Vaesen hack but wanted to see if anyone had other ideas for system (anything but Candela Obscura).

Coming from D&D and Pathfinder. Have never really looked much into sci-fi TTRPGs. Broad strokes, what are the big ones? And what are the big differences between them?

I keep getting ads for a TTRPG without dice. To me, that's a bit like advertising a concert without music: could still be fun, but you've taken out one of the best elements. Is there anyone out there who actually thinks "These RPGs are great, but if only we could get rid of the dice"?

I don't want my RPG without my little random endorphin math rocks

We recently decided to that my kids needed a break from screen time. I downloaded mausritter and stumbled through the rulebook. I borrowed some of the basic mechanics and then the fun began. We used ai to design their characters and a few images of cities. I also discovered that ai can help me with descriptive writing (storytelling) that rivals something you’d read in a Tolkien novel.

To make a long story short, my kids are having a blast. They told me it’s better than any video game they have ever played. Keep in mind we have great party games like Mario kart and we have a projector in the living room. My kids have never been so motivated to do their chores.

https://imgur.com/a/7hGKLYP

Norse TTRPG is always a good addition!

Berserkr, via @Kickstarter https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/slightlyreckless/berserkr?ref=android_project_share

For anyone who owns Sinless already or anyone who missed out on the first kickstarter. This is an adventure/campaign setting for the Sinless RPG kickstarter published previously and available on DriveThru. It also includes some QuickStart guides and other handy tools. You can also get the game at what I believe is a discount through this kickstarter if you missed out the last time. Before anyone asks, I backed the previous kickstarter and this one, so I am a fan of the content.

It's already funded and I copied some summary text below from the creator's kickstarter page.

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/agonarchartist/sinless-billionaire-bounty/description

Sinless: Billionaire Bounty is the Mammon campaign setting. It has quick-start instructions and operation chains that lead to twelve billionaires being trapped in the city of Mammon during an inter-dimensional invasion. 

Sinless: Billionaire Bounty contains approximately sixty-four black and white pages in A4. It provides descriptions and illustrations of each billionaire; a dozen mission chains; three two-page spread sector maps; at least six additional guns; a new martial art; additional drone and vehicle upgrades; four pages on managing sectors and designing missions; six quickstart sheets to provide an overview of Sinless rules, allowing your group to have a handle on the entire play loop in 15 minutes; six pages of dungeon and site maps (Underground Sunkens, Dagon's Temple, Space elevator areas, and corporate target sites); and a game-tracker/cheat sheet for the sandbox.

What are some of your favorite ways to create bonds between player characters when starting a game? Whether it's something mechanically encouraged/required by the game or sets of questions that you ask to create the bonds?

I recall watching a video recently (I think it might have been a Quinns Quest) that referenced characters getting a bonus when using their bond, but can't recall it off-hand. Let me know if that sounds familiar from Wildsea/Vaesen/Lancer/Mothership that he's reviewed so far!

not the kingdom management type of authority like in reign mind you but the corrupt cop kind of authority. like players being able to get away with a lot of things because(lore wise and perhaps mechanic wise) they are both judges and executioners and beyond that they have very specific roles and codes (that comes with the role) that they should always consider (they cant just do whatever they want)? I'm thinking something like judges from judge dredd universe? is there a game that scratches that itch ?

Has anyone run the Old Gods of Appalachia ttrpg? I can't seem to find any info on it without having to download the pdf, and I'd rather know what the general opinion of it is before I invest.

I'm playing kult and I'm really upset... The book only has information about 4 types of enlightened archetypes, but I really need some other ideas. Does anyone recommend smth?

Sorry ab my eng...

With the new 5.5 PHB book and the new art dump through DD Beyond YT channel, I was asking myself what TTRPG book has the best art for you? By best I kind of mean evocative art but I am obviously aware that beauty is subjective by its nature.

To me some TTRPGs which have the best Art:

• The One Ring 2nd ed
• Dolmenwood
• D&D 4th Ed
• Forbidden Lands
• Vaesen
• Into the Bastionland

Yeah I'm a sucker for FL games.

Hey folks, I volunteered to DM a oneshot for a getaway weekend with our regular DND group and their partners. There are many investigation and horror investigation oneshots but most are geared towards 2-4 players. I'm willing to hack a oneshot to make it work for a big group or split the players into two groups but I'm having troubles finding a good one. I'd like the investigation to be a "follow the crumbs" style thing, with clues tied to certain people and locations but most oneshots I find only provide the narrative and no clues.

From ENWorld: WotC Removes Digital Content Team Credits From D&D Beyond

At some point recently, those credits pages have been edited to remove the credits for me and the content team. Nobody reached out to let me know - it just happened at some point, and I only just noticed.

We've even been removed from the digital-only releases, that only released on D&D Beyond, such as the Spelljammer Academy drops.

I'm not angry or upset, just yet again, really disappointed, as somehow I expected better.

Does anyone know of a system that excels at spells and counter-spells in a strategic but cinematic way, like something out of the wizard duels in Harry Potter or Frieren?

The magic systems I've seen (ie 5e, Mage, and Worlds Without Number) all lack the interactivity that I am looking for (at most having simple counterspells).

Had this random thought lying in bed last night.

2 "good" dice with low numbers (4's or 6's) but with some kind of added benefit. 2 "evil" dice with better numbers (8's or 10's depending on what you did with the good dice) but with an equal or possibly even worse consequence. You could roll one of each with no consequence or benefit but if your good dice value is half or less than the evil dice value you get the consequence anyway. That's what can happen when you play with fire.

Any thoughts? Does a similar mechanic exist? Does it sound fair/balanced?

Weird 2am thought either way.

Earlier, I saw a trailer for a certain video game character with the profession of "sword hunter." She seeks out and destroys cursed, often intelligent swords. I found it to be flavorful worldbuilding because it implied that cursed swords are sufficiently common and society-threatening that there are people specifically trained to address such supernatural dangers.

In the 13th Age RPG, each PC has "One Unique Thing," a unique backstory element that makes them a spectacular oddity unlike anyone else in the game world. I am wondering, though, if the opposite might be just as interesting: a "Strange Yet Not Too Uncommon Thing." If the setting and the campaign are open to player contributions, then someone can pitch a backstory like "Before setting off for the adventuring life, my character was the village's local angel-harvester: someone trained to scavenge the organs of dead celestials fallen from the sky" or "My character left the Imperial Corps of Heliobehemoth Hunters," adding something cool to the game world.

Sometimes, what distinguishes a fictional setting is not what the characters find novel or bizarre, but rather, what the characters consider normal.

What do you personally think about allowing each PC to have a "Strange Yet Not Too Uncommon Thing"?

We’re using Starforged as a base, and we’re wanting to add alien species. Are there any oracles out there that would be good for this, or are we best making our own?

Drivethru RPG is currently having its Christmas in July sale. I'm curious about the best RPGs for sale, particularly less-known items. This could be rules, settings, monsters, items, treasures, or adventure books. Not exactly lesser known, but Dragonbane is a great value right now at 5$.

Some others on sale are Whitehack, Worlds Without Numbers, Five Torches Deep, and Hyperborea.

Title says it all. Trying to build a very well-crafted and unique world/story for my well-versed (wink) in the lore players. What have y'all's experiences been? Do you have any tips, fun stories, or perhaps already crafted missions and scenes to share? Should I take a look at the Serenity Game for flavor mining? more specific questions below---

also, please don't tell me to play Traveler or Apocalypse World instead...I already bought the expensive book lol

SPECIFIC QUERIES IF THAT FLOATS YOUR BOAT:

What time period was your setting in? Pre or Post "Serenity"?

Did you color outside the lines of the tech or cultures depicted in the show/movie?

What did you try to improve on from the source material? What did you not do as well?

Did you add any house rules or mechanics, or play the game as-intended?

How did you keep combat and interactions spicy? Did PCs ever die?

How large scale of a story did you run? did your PCs ever do anything BIG?

might add more idk

Some games can get really crazy with their dice. Personally, the most unusual dice mechanics I've heard of would be the custom dice for Genesys systems and its related RPGs (like Star Wars: Edge of the Empire). It's not bad in any way, but it takes some getting used to.

What are some other interesting dice mechanics? Doesn't have to involve custom dice; you can get plenty weird with traditional numbered dice.

Whether you're a GM or a player, I want to know how you sustain your gaming groups. What are your tips for overcoming the perils of adult scheduling? Any social nuances you keep in mind?

Hi everyone,

I've been reading through some of my unplayed games recently and something has caught my attention about Blades in the Dark (BitD). Without having played it, I'm struck by a slew of systems that I don't really know how to describe: the stuff about reputation, heat, entanglements, claims, faction webs, contacts/allies, etc. (Side question: what should I call this 'stuff'?)

Edit: I realized I should give a basic overview of what is going on with these systems. To give some examples: player sheets provide options for contacts/allies. and the allies themselves have some information which serves as a kind of 'spark' table for what kind of mission they might provide. After a mission, there is basically a random table that generates higher-order complications/threats for the party to deal with. The crew sheet has a kind of 'mission board' for the party to act upon. Everything is always already owned by someone in the fiction, so actions generate reactions from specific characters/factions. Roughly, its like a sandbox campaign frame hardcoded into the system.

This material is interesting to me because it seems to provide explicit levers that the players can pull to independently generate answers to the question: so what will we do next?

Do any other games (not FitD hacks) offer this kind of player-facing 'jungle gym' for guiding and structuring play? If so, what do you like/dislike about their approaches? Thanks everyone in advance!

So I'm not here to hate on 5e... honestly I feel like most people who hate on it for likes miss the point. Really the only people I instinctually sympathize with are the burnt out GMs since that game is not GM friendly.

I really enjoy 5e, especially in 'video games' where I can rapidly prototype parties and characters and breeze through combat. See BG3 and the underrated Solasta.

But... I think 5e D&D is a collection of bad choices which the 2024 core books will not fix.

For one subclasses plain suck. A typical subclass is level 3 get some flavor and a bonus, 7 finally start doing your subclasses thing.

Heroes AND monsters are superheroes. A lot of OSR folk complain that 5e characters are 'superheroes' but all they battle are supervillains. A 5e skeleton is an OSR boss monster. One orc too many will lead to a total party wipe. If anything 5e is like wrestling... a slow match with big HP pools with both sides surviving big hits.

Dump stats mean nothing: there is almost always a way to use your main stat for everything... be it a feat, a class feature, magic or something. You can hit harder with charisma, you can think hard with your muscles like Flex Mentalo, you can outsmart the poison in your veins.

Feats feel too optional: I strike through this one because it is like the one thing I think the 2024 books fix.

The XP economy: Woe upon those who do not use milestone XP, because default XP assumes a certain number of daily combat encounters. You clock in, fight, fight, eat lunch, fight, fight, set up camp. A DM can give XP for anything but playing by the book he is probably balancing the broken CR rating, XP per monster values and getting in enough 1 hour combats to keep players leveling at a brisk pace. One beefy monster too many... everyone gets downed once or twice. Too few? Alpha strike, low XP, dud encounter.

Proficiency is both unneeded and everywhere: It reeks of 'making the math work' like 'well if you always add 2 it comes out right' but it is rare you are not getting a bonus from it and it levels up in jumps when it could be something as easy as character level. One more thing to check, and now it is used all over the place like proficiency times per day or add your proficiency to the damage.

Now let's compare it to a couple of games built from 5e bones:

5 Torches Deep: Instead of a large number of character classes that step on each other's toes which then split into disappointing subclasses, 5 torches gives you very few core classes that then split into the other classes you would expect. There are no 'baby Paladins' rather it is a choice at level 3 from Zealot. This makes the classes feel more impactful and you do not always have to think 'how does this affect 12+ classes' when you modify one of them.

Shadowdark: Actually a great example of just using only the 5e engine and taking everything else from OSR, popular house rules and blogs. By dropping a lot of the 5e D&D baggage it a 'perfectly fine' OSR option, it is a much better 5e option.

I wanted to run a campaign set in a world ravaged by magic. I like the concept of spells as a powerful but dangerous tool.

I thought Desolation was the rpg for me until I got to the magic section. I'm not a fan of freeform magic.

What other games can be a good alternative to Desolation?

So im looking to run a Modern / Near Future Game, along the lines of Fringe, WH13, Xfiles. That low lever creepy paranormal that dosent deep dive into the Elder God Its self. IAs much of a fan of CoC i am i just dont want that game. I want a game that has some cool creepy psi ops eques stuff but not deep diving. I want them to be normal joes like the characters of Fringe or WH13. Maybe investigate CIA black Sites where they may have been experimenting with stuff. I want some paranormal but i don't really want it to be the Focus every time. Maybe they need to kill the Head Scientist for a Foreign private research company. Stuff like that.

Would Every Day Hero work for this? Keep in mind i have played D20 Modern and is my first choice for this game. But i was hoping for something different, Id also like to note that while gurps would do this nicely im not investing in the books id need to run it. Also i want to keep the tactical combat feel of d20 and not opt for a PBtA game that i know a few settings like this exist for. I just never see any one talking about this system so I'm curious and willing to try something different

*EDIT* i love PBtA and my favorite system is FitD. I just want something more crunchy for this.

My table is getting ready to run through a TTRPG Roulette to try out systems other than D&D 5e. We've created a list of systems we've been wanting to try and are gonna spend about 3 weeks per system. I was wondering what other people thought about the systems (good and bad) because I kinda want to cut the list down a little.

Elder Scrolls. The Witcher. Shadowrun. City of Mists. Dishonored. Mutants & Masterminds. OpenLegends. Cyberpunk. The new FFXIV. Pokemon Tabletop United. Big Eyes Small Mouth. Candela. Call of Cthulhu. Daggerheart. Hc Svnt Dracon. Vampire the Masquerade. DragonAge.

So I was reading a discussion about Savage Worlds (my currently favorite system) and its flaws.

One of the flaws listed was slow initiative. In Savage Worlds players and the GM draw cards from a regular playing card deck every round and then go in descending order.

And I thought "hmm. it is slow, especially comparing to systems with static initiative".

Then I started thinking about other areas where modern systems try to streamline and make the combat faster:

• Single roll for attack and damage
• No attack roll
• Static damage

And I thought: yes, drawing a card each turn is slow, but boy, is it fun and exciting! Especially with the possibility of drawing a Joker which gives every player a benny (basically a luck/inspiration token).

Without rolling to hit there is no disappointment of missing, but also there is no excitement of hitting and critting.

You get faster combats, sure, but for many players combat is the most fun part of the game, so those players are not exactly sitting bored waiting for the combat to be over.

Are modern game designers streamlining the fun out of the games?

EDIT

Ok, so apparently people thought that I was talking about narrative-focused games.

I was not. I was talking about various "like 5E but better" games that often boast how faster and more streamlined they are than 5e.

I understand very well that if the game is not about combat, then streamlining combat is the right thing to do.

But I very much doubt that streamlining will always lead to more fun experience, hence the discussion.