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View Full Version : Ever play "nude" D&D?



Donnadogsoth
2016-11-09, 11:16 PM
No, not that sort of nudity, I mean playing D&D or any other TRPG by stripping off the colour of description, leaving only numbers. Kind of like playing on a black-and-white Monopoly board minus the hotels, houses, colourful money, twee metal tokens, and property names. So, roll 2d6, land on space E, pay 1200 to obtain article E, etc..

Or in the dungeon, you advance 35 units, meet entity A which has 14 hit points and is worth 90 xp. 300 units later you meet entities B, C, and D which have 3 hit points each and are worth 15 xp. You win, and later, in an enclosure you roll 1d6 to locate an access to a new area, which contains a trap which costs you 1d6 hit points. Etc.

What brought this to mind was the play style I witnessed on a board game, where the players were these old grognards who seemed to take no joy in the colour of the game (Avalon Hill's DUNE), as if they were like Neo in the Matrix seeing only green descending numbers where I saw gaiety and story. It was isolating. Anyone else feel like this sometimes?

Knaight
2016-11-09, 11:53 PM
No. I've played a few sessions under lackluster GMs, but it never got that bad.

hymer
2016-11-10, 02:56 AM
The closest I get to that is sometimes feeling like I get caught in the grind. We fight monsters to get loot and XP, so that we can fight bigger monsters and get more loot and XP, just so that we can fight even bigger monsters, and get ever larger heaps of loot and XP.
Come to think of it, I'm sorta describing the opposite, there.

Delusion
2016-11-10, 03:47 AM
I have few times. Few times when friend and I were bored we both made level 1 characters for the 4e and took turns trying to solo the kobold cave adventure at the back of the DMG.

Doorhandle
2016-11-10, 04:47 AM
The closest I get to that is sometimes feeling like I get caught in the grind. We fight monsters to get loot and XP, so that we can fight bigger monsters and get more loot and XP, just so that we can fight even bigger monsters, and get ever larger heaps of loot and XP.
Come to think of it, I'm sorta describing the opposite, there.

There's a Living campaign/Mega-dungeon where I am called Die with Honor that's a lot like that; but it was made a lot more colorful due to the weirdness of a lot of rooms. There was druid you could train under to get stat boosts, a room that was one big spike trap, A massive adamantine door that you had to dig under to pass, ect.

RazorChain
2016-11-10, 08:57 AM
No only strip dnd. When you lost a character you removed an article of clothing. Rolling 1 or 20 then you drank a shot.

Wasnt much fun, six sweaty, drunk and half naked guys in my moms basement.

Stealth Marmot
2016-11-10, 09:07 AM
I imagine that some people do play games like this when designing games.

The mechanics of a game, or a board game, have to be hammered out first before they can add any sort of flavor text to them.

kyoryu
2016-11-10, 11:42 AM
If you want that, I suggest Descent: Journeys In The Dark.

Ceiling_Squid
2016-11-11, 07:40 PM
If you want that, I suggest Descent: Journeys In The Dark.

Seconded.

Maybe it's just me (other people in the group seemed to love it), but Descent bored me to tears the one time I played it, and general lack of flavor was the reason.

Dr_Dinosaur
2016-11-11, 08:41 PM
The closest I get to that is sometimes feeling like I get caught in the grind. We fight monsters to get loot and XP, so that we can fight bigger monsters and get more loot and XP, just so that we can fight even bigger monsters, and get ever larger heaps of loot and XP.
Come to think of it, I'm sorta describing the opposite, there.

This is why I've pretty much done away with the concepts of "loot" and XP. You'll find things that the place you're in would reasonably have in it, and you level up when it makes sense to for whatever reason.

AnBe
2016-11-11, 09:20 PM
There's a friend of mine who doesn't seem to care much for the "fluff" and RP of things. He more just cares about being the King of the Hill and messing with people in really annoying ways. He gets really upset if he doesn't get Dat Loot, even more so if his items get stolen or if another PC gets Dat Loot before he does. He's a power gamer for sure. A power gamer who is so poor at math that he often needs the other players and GM to do it for him. He's so picky and narrow-minded that if the game is anything but weird Medieval Fantasy, he flat-out won't play it or even give it a chance. And by weird Medieval Fantasy I mean a totally crazy, out-of-control type game where he can do whatever he wants. Douche

gkathellar
2016-11-12, 05:04 PM
No only strip dnd. When you lost a character you removed an article of clothing. Rolling 1 or 20 then you drank a shot.

Wasnt much fun, six sweaty, drunk and half naked guys in my moms basement.

Sounds like a good time to me.

Solaris
2016-11-12, 10:14 PM
No. I've played a few sessions under lackluster GMs, but it never got that bad.

[/thread]

Joking aside, Warhammer Fantasy felt this way a lot of the time... especially as Games Workshop seemed to be working really, really hard at stripping out the character and flavor of the armies.

Pex
2016-11-13, 01:11 AM
Despite the stereotype there are a few D&D players I play with who would look good nude, but don't tell them I said that. :smallwink:

Anonymouswizard
2016-11-13, 07:30 AM
No only strip dnd. When you lost a character you removed an article of clothing. Rolling 1 or 20 then you drank a shot.

Wasnt much fun, six sweaty, drunk and half naked guys in my moms basement.

Well done sir, you literally made me laugh on a train. Have an awesome point and a half.


Despite the stereotype there are a few D&D players I play with who would look good nude, but don't tell them I said that. :smallwink:

A few? At least half my uni group, and about half of my home group. It seems to attract attractive people with about the same frequency as other hobbies.

For the thread topic I've never played in a game like that, but it's about how I play half the board games I play. Looking at the story is fun, but sometimes I find the strategy much more inter (it's why I enjoy chess). Also you sometimes get really weird stories, in one game of Dominion my brother seemed to be playing the royal treasury (only ever buying money and provinces, managed to win too).

I've played in flavourless settings though, one GM ran the most flavourless zombie apocalypse game possible, after he'd run a game with the blandest version of the Warhammer 40,000 setting ever.

Kurald Galain
2016-11-13, 09:03 AM
No, not that sort of nudity, I mean playing D&D or any other TRPG by stripping off the colour of description, leaving only numbers. Kind of like playing on a black-and-white Monopoly board minus the hotels, houses, colourful money, twee metal tokens, and property names. So, roll 2d6, land on space E, pay 1200 to obtain article E, etc..

I've known two players who basically try to play this way (and, as a result, are heavily into optimizing at the expense of everything else) because they feel that all fluff is fully interchangeable and therefore irrelevant. They tended to be rather impopular in game groups.

Velaryon
2016-11-13, 07:16 PM
Closest I've ever come was a series of back-to-back combats that lasted three full sessions (never again!), but even those had description and flavor, so I guess they don't apply.

I've had nude characters though. It's pretty much canon in my game that wild elves abhor clothing and will only wear it under coercion, and even then only until they can get away with taking it off.

Bohandas
2016-11-13, 11:48 PM
I mean playing D&D or any other TRPG by stripping off the colour of description, leaving only numbers. Kind of like playing on a black-and-white Monopoly board minus the hotels, houses, colourful money, twee metal tokens, and property names. So, roll 2d6, land on space E, pay 1200 to obtain article E, etc..

Or in the dungeon, you advance 35 units, meet entity A which has 14 hit points and is worth 90 xp. 300 units later you meet entities B, C, and D which have 3 hit points each and are worth 15 xp. You win, and later, in an enclosure you roll 1d6 to locate an access to a new area, which contains a trap which costs you 1d6 hit points. Etc.

I played the old Gold Box D&D computer games, which were extremely minimalist

Atarax
2016-11-14, 01:11 AM
Where do I sign up?! Oh. You meant math :(

Psyren
2016-11-14, 03:57 PM
No only strip dnd. When you lost a character you removed an article of clothing. Rolling 1 or 20 then you drank a shot.

Wasnt much fun, six sweaty, drunk and half naked guys in my moms basement.


Sounds like a good time to me.

Thirded. Also, lol.



Or in the dungeon, you advance 35 units, meet entity A which has 14 hit points and is worth 90 xp. 300 units later you meet entities B, C, and D which have 3 hit points each and are worth 15 xp. You win, and later, in an enclosure you roll 1d6 to locate an access to a new area, which contains a trap which costs you 1d6 hit points. Etc.

Not only would this require even more work (to "deskin" everything, especially in a module) but the end result would actually be more confusing despite having ostensibly less content. Consider for instance that without spell names like "Fireball" or "Bless" that you'll basically need to read aloud the spell description, including range, radius and descriptor information, every single time just so that people understand what the hell is going on.