Most Obscure D20 Game You've Ever Played

[HolyCouncilMagi]

Hey, guys! Since this is the section for d20 games, I figured it'd be the best place to ask, what's the most obscure d20 game any of you guys has played, your favorite class/race in said game, and a little bit about the game you're mentioning? I thought it would be cool if the members here got an opportunity to hear about some of the cool things people have managed to do with the d20 system that they perhaps hadn't heard of before.

For me, it's the Bleach d20 Classless system, based on the anime/manga Bleach. It's really cool and pretty well-made, but so far outside of its website itself (which has only like 30ish members) I haven't met a single person who has even heard of it. Darn shame. Based on the name, I imagine you've figured out that it doesn't have any classes, but my favorite race to play in that game is the Quincy, a monk-type subrace of humans that primarily use bows and arrows made out of spirit energy. The game, being one based on an existing franchise, allows you to reconstruct favorite characters from the anime/manga or use a combination of stuff from the series and stuff original to the game to create your own original character, though while *usually* staying true to the source material in terms of the types of powers and feats available. The coolest part about this system, to me, is that it's the first tabletop game that I've seen to actually do a good job of removing classes from the mix, since most attempts of that end up in things that are either classes in disguise or base your entire function on the race you pick, both of which aren't that much fun. Admittedly, this uses a straightforward system of customization (lots o' feats), but it actually works out really well.

So, what obscure d20 games have you guys found and/or played, did you enjoy them, what's your favorite class/race combo in them, and can you give a short description of the game? It'll be cool to see what kinds of d20 games people have made that I haven't come across yet, and I hope everybody here learns about something new (and who knows, maybe you'll even find something new you actually want to try!).

[TrollCapAmerica]

Blood in Space-A D20 Sci-Fi space adventure game which can range from realistic to space opera crazy goodness.I used thew system to basically play the game Star Control 2 with a bunch of players that have never heard of it.The ruleset was pretty solid with just a few minor glitches [Mostly "Why wouldnt I have this already as a starship Captain/Officer" sort of thing},Even the more sedate players in the campaign also had alot of fun with customizeable spaceships which was a big plus

Sitting on the shelf waiting to be used I also have

Testament-A guide for running an Old Testament Biblical setting.Its really one of the best developed and interesting D20 books ive seen.Theres a great optional rules for tracking a character religious dedication that would fit fantastically into any campaign and help round out a character as a Priest rather than just being a tier one guy with X collection of super-powers.They really did alot of research into making the setting work as well and the rules are pretty adaptable for any Bronze age game [In particularly you could easily run an Egyptian or Babylonian based game due to the large sections of the book they get as well].Theres some pretty neat new magical things ranging from simple Egyptian magical charms to really helpful magical gear for the new classes [A Levite with a proper Torah scroll is beastly] to crazy artifacts like the Scrolls of Thoth or the Ark of the Covenant [Cue Indiana Jones theme].The only thing that might cause issues would be that the Mythic feats can be somewhat OP and theres really nothing to stop all your PCs from getting +8 to a primary stat because they dont cut their hair

Finally I got the Pokemon RPG.I love the concept and I have been checking on it as they have developed this thing over the years.Ive never played it and dont know if I would ever get the chance but the dedication of the people putting it together is pretty intense.They try and fit every single thing thats ever been in Pokemon into the game even the mathematically awkward stuff like EV training Pokemon breeding and contests

[HolyCouncilMagi]

Oh wow, cool! I've never heard of any of those! I'm not the biggest Pokemon fan and space games aren't my style, but Testament sounds really cool, and they all sound pretty well-made! Thank you for sharing!

[Pluto!]

Testament-A guide for running an Old Testament Biblical setting.Its really one of the best developed and interesting D20 books ive seen.Theres a great optional rules for tracking a character religious dedication that would fit fantastically into any campaign and help round out a character as a Priest rather than just being a tier one guy with X collection of super-powers.They really did alot of research into making the setting work as well and the rules are pretty adaptable for any Bronze age game [In particularly you could easily run an Egyptian or Babylonian based game due to the large sections of the book they get as well].Theres some pretty neat new magical things ranging from simple Egyptian magical charms to really helpful magical gear for the new classes [A Levite with a proper Torah scroll is beastly] to crazy artifacts like the Scrolls of Thoth or the Ark of the Covenant [Cue Indiana Jones theme].The only thing that might cause issues would be that the Mythic feats can be somewhat OP and theres really nothing to stop all your PCs from getting +8 to a primary stat because they dont cut their hair


Green Ronin has a bunch of those for different time periods and environments, and all were very fun books in the same spirit as the old AD&D greenbooks, iirc. The Medieval one of those was the one that impressed me most, not in small part due to the ridiculous subsystems they added to the game for creating artistic masterpieces and scholarly publications.

I haven't played a lot of really obscure d20 games, but I did a lot of the early-2000s "Everything, d20" games like Deadlands and Star Wars RPG that were basically just bad clunky D&D games with the serial numbers filed off, and some of the stand-out later d20 games like Spycraft 2, Mutants and Masterminds and Star Wars Saga, which actually changed the system to adequately model their particular flavors of fiction, and which did fun and entertaining jobs doing it.

Probably the most obscure d20 game I've run with good results was Cascade Failure (http://www.chubbyfunster.com/blog/project/cascade-failure-2/), which did a reasonably good impression of a game that's both rules-light and d20 based. It gives a very easy rule set for Post Apocalyptic Space Opera games that requires very little time for setup or adjudications. The biggest downside was that it's a pretty minimalistic system, so when I ran it, I dipped into other games for space ships and monsters. The other obstacle I ran into was that it's definitely for space opera, so when I tried using it in my hard scifi game with horror themes, I had to wing pretty major details like how space suits and gravity work.

But it's still one of the games I'd definitely consider running again with new gamers, just maybe not with players who are fluent with more complex rulesets or the dynamics of more player-reliant games like Fate.

[ArqArturo]

Not really a game on itself, but D20 Modern had a third-party remaking of Martial Arts and how to incorporate them into the game.

[graeylin]

ChainMail.

Although, I don't really remember anymore if that was actually a D20 game, or a D6 game. Not sure D20's had been invented yet.

[Bullet06320]

Sitting on the shelf waiting to be used I also have

Testament-A guide for running an Old Testament Biblical setting.Its really one of the best developed and interesting D20 books ive seen.Theres a great optional rules for tracking a character religious dedication that would fit fantastically into any campaign and help round out a character as a Priest rather than just being a tier one guy with X collection of super-powers.They really did alot of research into making the setting work as well and the rules are pretty adaptable for any Bronze age game [In particularly you could easily run an Egyptian or Babylonian based game due to the large sections of the book they get as well].Theres some pretty neat new magical things ranging from simple Egyptian magical charms to really helpful magical gear for the new classes [A Levite with a proper Torah scroll is beastly] to crazy artifacts like the Scrolls of Thoth or the Ark of the Covenant [Cue Indiana Jones theme].The only thing that might cause issues would be that the Mythic feats can be somewhat OP and theres really nothing to stop all your PCs from getting +8 to a primary stat because they dont cut their hair



mmmm..I have this sitting on a shelf too, don't think I ever even opened it to look at it, I picked it up when one of the local shops was clearing out sum shelf space and put everything out for sale, 2$ a book or sumthing, I was picking up anything d20 I didn't have. I geuss I will have to take a look at that one to see whats in it, sounds like some interesting stuff

[TrollCapAmerica]

mmmm..I have this sitting on a shelf too, don't think I ever even opened it to look at it, I picked it up when one of the local shops was clearing out sum shelf space and put everything out for sale, 2$ a book or sumthing, I was picking up anything d20 I didn't have. I geuss I will have to take a look at that one to see whats in it, sounds like some interesting stuff

I actually really like it but its a hard sell for some people.They expect the book to magically hop up and start preaching to them like a disapproving parent or something.

Looking over the boards I kinda wish this book got alot more attention because id love to see what people like Emperor Tippy and other optimizers could do with the stuff presented in it

[HolyCouncilMagi]

I actually really like it but its a hard sell for some people.They expect the book to magically hop up and start preaching to them like a disapproving parent or something.

Looking over the boards I kinda wish this book got alot more attention because id love to see what people like Emperor Tippy and other optimizers could do with the stuff presented in it

Lots of bad religious jokes and probably people attempting to become an actual deity, which would spark religious debates and the system itself would probably be banned from being spoken about on the site. Eh, I'm not particularly excited for that scenario, even though the system sounds super awesome.

[Glimbur]

Testament

I own this also, and I ran a one-shot where a multi-cultural party had to steal the Ark of the Covenant. One group did it quite easily, and then opened it after they were out of town. One group got caught in the act and TPK'd. The rules set is interesting, but consider that the Levite Priest can spontaneously cast any spell. Yes, he might need a Faith check, and it is nontrivial to refill spell slots, but spontaneous casting of any spell.

I once made a character using the d20 Call of Cthulu rules set. It was for the Test of Spite, and I demonstrated that the book needed to be banned. Took a feat chain from Races of Destiny that let me 1/day not die, tied an arbitrary amount of dynamite together, and set it off. (hilarious)d6 damage in (hilarious) range ensued.

[avr]

Gamma World d20 is a reasonably obscure post-apocalypse game. Our game didn't go beyond 1 session though due to the silly material / serious material conflict.

The mutant stuff can be silly - there's a bunch of violent, crazy cannibalistic nomads. They're also mutated, humanoid rabbits. Dealing with weird ancient tech can be fun and silly.

OTOH there's a serious game buried in there about survival and stuff which is probably dug out of sociology textbooks.

[Captnq]

FLATLAND (http://www.minmaxboards.com/index.php?topic=4967.msg70691#msg70691) d20 3.5 - Homebrew

Got a bunch of notes on it, but it's way down the list of projects to finish. But here's the teaser.

[malonkey1]

Farscape (tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Series/Farscape) D20, based on the series of the same name. It pretty faithfully reproduces the abilities of the races and characters seen in the show, and is actually a darn fun game.

[CRtwenty]

Probably the Call of Cthulhu d20 version. Though that's not super obscure.