Free light-weight RPGs with little or no combat; also, GMing tips for same

[TuggyNE]

Background: my sister tried playing DDO with me for a while, but she's rather soft-hearted, and doesn't like the killing things part. And killing things is mostly what MMOs are about. (Sometimes you can sneak past things instead of killing them, sometimes you can get them to kill each other, but generally you're gonna have to kill at least some things to get anywhere.)

So, I'm looking for a fairly lightweight game that works well without any real fighting at all, and is free to start playing. Probably fantasy mostly; definitely not horror or anime, and probably not pulp fiction. I've found a whole ton of possibilities (Risus, Mouse Guard, Spirit of the Century, FUDGE, Perps, Castles and Crusades, Legend, Diaspora, Hackmaster), but I'm not sure which is likely to work best.

Also, and probably more importantly, I need some tips/advice on getting the story framework going, since I'm pretty lousy at free-form creativity.

[valadil]

I don't think you have to go light weight to achieve low combat. You just need a game that lets you play a pacifist. I love 4e for instance, but every character is combat ready, so it's a poor choice here. I actually think it'd be pretty fun to play a 3.5 game as a rogue who sneaks, a bard who charms, or a wizard or casts his way past encounters.

[Grinner]

I think the trick to a freeform RPG is just knowing the setting really well, making yourself able to behave as the character should.

In games like D&D, a player can just play for the combat gameplay and ignore the setting altogether. Freeform/rules-light games don't have that distraction.

[Djinn_in_Tonic]

FATE (Spirit of the Century's system, but I'd recommend the new FATE Core over SotC) is perfect for this and, since combat and non-combat situations use the same resolution mechanic, you can even allow her to approach fights, if any, in a non-violent manner.

As for story: intrigue, exploration, adventure, mystery...there are TONS of genres for an RPG that can be extremely nonviolent. What would you like to run? We can help from there.

[Grod_The_Giant]

I'll second Fate, although Core isn't out yet and will probably cost money when it is. It's pretty simple, fun to play, and is fantastic for roleplaying. I've been running one Fate-based game, and played in a few sessions of another-- during which we didn't get in a single fight-- and it works quite well.

[Grinner]

I'll second Fate, although Core isn't out yet and will probably cost money when it is. It's pretty simple, fun to play, and is fantastic for roleplaying. I've been running one Fate-based game, and played in a few sessions of another-- during which we didn't get in a single fight-- and it works quite well.

I think they said that FATE Core and Fate Accelerated would be available as a pay-what-you-want-including-nothing deal.

[Rhynn]

fairly lightweight game that works well without any real fighting at all

...

Hackmaster

I think you've been badly mislead.

(Also, Mouse Guard without fighting? What comic did I read...)

Anyway, it's mostly about how you run the game. Lightweight is a system thing, no killing is a genre/style thing. You can run D&D perfectly well without killing things. I'd recommend an oooold version (OD&D, B/X, BECMI) or a retroclone (Labyrinth Lord, Swords & Wizardry, Basic Fantasy, etc.). Use XP for gold rules if you want regular dungeon crawling (avoiding, circumventing, fooling, outwitting, etc. monsters to get their treasure), or do story-based adventures where there's always a non-violent (or at least a non-lethal) option. Animated films are great for examples on how such encounters would be run.

D&D retro-clones are mostly free, and particularly the OD&D ones are exceedingly rules-light. (And, unlike OD&D, they're easy to comprehend, too.)

[erikun]

Also, Mouse Guard without fighting? What comic did I read...

Mouse Guard could work just fine without fighting, especially if you wanted to make it about exploring wilds and surviving hazards. The biggest problem, though, is that a lot of the setting is tied to fighting, and so it would likely feel unusual or unrealistic to play a game in the setting without any chance of violence.

I would recommend Faery's Tale Deluxe as a good one where fighting is minor or avoidable, although it is not free.

[Grod_The_Giant]

I think they said that FATE Core and Fate Accelerated would be available as a pay-what-you-want-including-nothing deal.

Oh? In which case, I'd recommend looking for Fate Accelerated, when it comes out. It's got some really neat stuff-- instead of specific skills ("Presence +4") you're rated in approaches ("Forceful +4"). It looks like it'll lead to much more jack-of-all-trades characters than many other approaches, which could be good for a more solo game.

[TuggyNE]

Update: my sister is pondering whether she might like to GM instead. But since she's wholly new to RPGs, that means I could use some advice for her too if we go with that.

I don't think you have to go light weight to achieve low combat. You just need a game that lets you play a pacifist. I love 4e for instance, but every character is combat ready, so it's a poor choice here. I actually think it'd be pretty fun to play a 3.5 game as a rogue who sneaks, a bard who charms, or a wizard or casts his way past encounters.

Oh, sure. It's just, I'm not sure I want to have to teach her all the complexities of how to mechanically make an effective non-combat character in 3.x.

On the other hand, having to learn a new system myself, if we don't use 3.x, isn't exactly super-attractive either. (Even the 6-page Risus. )

I think the trick to a freeform RPG is just knowing the setting really well, making yourself able to behave as the character should.

In games like D&D, a player can just play for the combat gameplay and ignore the setting altogether. Freeform/rules-light games don't have that distraction.

Yes… and since I'm more mechanically minded, I tend to throw in RPing on top, as almost an afterthought.

FATE (Spirit of the Century's system, but I'd recommend the new FATE Core over SotC) is perfect for this and, since combat and non-combat situations use the same resolution mechanic, you can even allow her to approach fights, if any, in a non-violent manner.

OK, but FATE Core doesn't seem to be out yet.

As for story: intrigue, exploration, adventure, mystery...there are TONS of genres for an RPG that can be extremely nonviolent. What would you like to run? We can help from there.

Probably fantasy exploration, or similar. Mystery and intrigue seem, frankly, too complicated for right now.

I think you've been badly mislead.

(Also, Mouse Guard without fighting? What comic did I read...)

Meh. I was mostly listing the lightweight/free systems I had heard of/found, without regard to whether they could actually manage this. Since, y'know, I'm not familiar with any of them and didn't want to spend several hours on each one figuring out if it was any good!

Anyway, it's mostly about how you run the game. Lightweight is a system thing, no killing is a genre/style thing. You can run D&D perfectly well without killing things. I'd recommend an oooold version (OD&D, B/X, BECMI) or a retroclone (Labyrinth Lord, Swords & Wizardry, Basic Fantasy, etc.). Use XP for gold rules if you want regular dungeon crawling (avoiding, circumventing, fooling, outwitting, etc. monsters to get their treasure), or do story-based adventures where there's always a non-violent (or at least a non-lethal) option. Animated films are great for examples on how such encounters would be run.

D&D retro-clones are mostly free, and particularly the OD&D ones are exceedingly rules-light. (And, unlike OD&D, they're easy to comprehend, too.)

True enough, and really, the combat-light and rules-light aspects are quite separate (though I didn't phrase this too well); however, both are pretty important for this to work well. I.e., I need a system that I can make work without too much prep work and without any real fighting needed.

Mouse Guard could work just fine without fighting, especially if you wanted to make it about exploring wilds and surviving hazards. The biggest problem, though, is that a lot of the setting is tied to fighting, and so it would likely feel unusual or unrealistic to play a game in the setting without any chance of violence.

Yeah, we're completely new to the Mouse Guard setting, so that may or may not work well. (As in, I didn't even know there was a comic until today.)

[Grod_The_Giant]

Of the ones you've listed, then, I'd go with Spirit of the Century. Evil Hat books tend to have great GMing advice, too-- I'd been running games for years, and I found some useful tips reading through my Dresden Files books.

[Matticussama]

If it is the killing and not necessarily the fighting that is the problem, you could go with Mutants and Masterminds 3rd Edition ( http://www.d20herosrd.com/ ) and run a Silver Age/Golden Age comic book style game. Classic comic book heroes almost never kill their enemies, and the system can emulate pretty much any kind of superpower/superhero that you might be inspired to create.

Even without fighting, M&M provides a solid chassis for intrigue and solid roleplaying. You can use your various powers for social influence just as easily as you could for combat, and it provides numerous Advantages to represent well-connected characters to provide ties to organizations and groups within the world.

[lady_arrogance]

Anyway, it's mostly about how you run the game. Lightweight is a system thing, no killing is a genre/style thing.

Just quoting my opinion from earlier poster. Basicly one can run non-combat based adventures in any system, but some systems are better suited for it.

And about the Fantasy explaration as a plot, I think it will go pretty well. Lots of non-violent encounters (natives who like to trade, need some help (outsider negotiating peace between two warring tribes/cities, general exploration of the land, identifying of flora/fauna, etc.) and some violent encounters she can dodge in some way.

It will go fine!

[Stubbazubba]

I don't know of any fantasy games that don't focus on combat (WAIT! Just thought of one, the Mistborn Adventure Game, which only focuses on combat as much as it focuses on politicking and other things, but it has a very specific proprietary setting and magic system that take some getting used to, though the books its based on are fantastic, absolutely worth reading and learning), but there's a game based on the Smallville TV show that focuses as much on person-to-person drama as combat. If she's into that kind of dramatic stuff, it might be worth looking into. Unfortunately, it just went out of print, so you'll have to buy it secondhand or something.

[Totally Guy]

I read this free, light, GMless game and I thought it'd be cool to play. It's called A Grail Epoch. It uses miniatures but to establish who is in which scene rather than for fighting.

If your sister is considering GMing this game splits the traditional GMing responsibilities between the players so there's a bit of experience in that area too.

[Doorhandle]

I don't think you have to go light weight to achieve low combat. You just need a game that lets you play a pacifist. I love 4e for instance, but every character is combat ready, so it's a poor choice here. I actually think it'd be pretty fun to play a 3.5 game as a rogue who sneaks, a bard who charms, or a wizard or casts his way past encounters.

Also, an insanely strong, pacifist barbarian who simply knocks things down until their is a wall/path between the party and their goal.

[Rhynn]

Meh. I was mostly listing the lightweight/free systems I had heard of/found, without regard to whether they could actually manage this. Since, y'know, I'm not familiar with any of them and didn't want to spend several hours on each one figuring out if it was any good!

Well, that's the point. Hackmaster is a perfectly good system, but rules-light? Never in a million years. It's an affectionate parody (and a playable game) of AD&D 1E, which includes the whole "tables tables tables" aspect, but also of GURPS etc., which includes the "point-buy with a million things to buy for points and get points from."

Also, not free.


Anyway, still recommend D&D retroclones. They're basically mostly free downloads, just Google Labyrinth Lord, Basic Fantasy, Swords & Wizardry, OSRIC, etc. The focus of old D&D was on exploration and stealing treasure over fighting, and it'd be easy to run non-violent games on it - you just have to get creative with encounters.

pacifies barbican

[Grinner]

Also, not free.

I believe he was talking about this.

[TuggyNE]

Of the ones you've listed, then, I'd go with Spirit of the Century. Evil Hat books tend to have great GMing advice, too-- I'd been running games for years, and I found some useful tips reading through my Dresden Files books.

Hmm, OK. That was the one I looked into the most so far; I'll obviously need to do a bit of fiddling to adjust from the default pulp setting, which seems a bit tedious, but oh well.

If it is the killing and not necessarily the fighting that is the problem, you could go with Mutants and Masterminds 3rd Edition ( http://www.d20herosrd.com/ ) and run a Silver Age/Golden Age comic book style game. Classic comic book heroes almost never kill their enemies, and the system can emulate pretty much any kind of superpower/superhero that you might be inspired to create.

Even without fighting, M&M provides a solid chassis for intrigue and solid roleplaying. You can use your various powers for social influence just as easily as you could for combat, and it provides numerous Advantages to represent well-connected characters to provide ties to organizations and groups within the world.

I have heard some good things about M&M, too. Probably check into that more.

And about the Fantasy explaration as a plot, I think it will go pretty well. Lots of non-violent encounters (natives who like to trade, need some help (outsider negotiating peace between two warring tribes/cities, general exploration of the land, identifying of flora/fauna, etc.) and some violent encounters she can dodge in some way.

Yeah, basically.

I don't know of any fantasy games that don't focus on combat (WAIT! Just thought of one, the Mistborn Adventure Game, which only focuses on combat as much as it focuses on politicking and other things, but it has a very specific proprietary setting and magic system that take some getting used to, though the books its based on are fantastic, absolutely worth reading and learning), but there's a game based on the Smallville TV show that focuses as much on person-to-person drama as combat. If she's into that kind of dramatic stuff, it might be worth looking into. Unfortunately, it just went out of print, so you'll have to buy it secondhand or something.

Neither of us has read Mistborn (though I intend to one of these times, since I do like Sanderson), and neither of us knows anything about Smallville.

I read this free, light, GMless game and I thought it'd be cool to play. It's called A Grail Epoch. It uses miniatures but to establish who is in which scene rather than for fighting.

If your sister is considering GMing this game splits the traditional GMing responsibilities between the players so there's a bit of experience in that area too.

Eeeeeh, something about that just doesn't really seem to jive with me, I'm not sure why. Maybe it's the odd specificity of working with exactly 3 PCs and exactly 7 NPCs?

Also, an insanely strong, pacifies barbican who simply knocks things down until their is a wall/path between the party and their goal.

This? From what I know, those don't usually, y'know, move much.

Well, that's the point. Hackmaster is a perfectly good system, but rules-light? Never in a million years. It's an affectionate parody (and a playable game) of AD&D 1E, which includes the whole "tables tables tables" aspect, but also of GURPS etc., which includes the "point-buy with a million things to buy for points and get points from."

Fair enough. I did say I hadn't finished researching these, didn't I? (IIRC I got HackMaster off a previous thread of this general sort from a year or two back.)

Anyway, still recommend D&D retroclones. They're basically mostly free downloads, just Google Labyrinth Lord, Basic Fantasy, Swords & Wizardry, OSRIC, etc. The focus of old D&D was on exploration and stealing treasure over fighting, and it'd be easy to run non-violent games on it - you just have to get creative with encounters.

Heh. Come to think of it, I have no idea what she'd think of the rampant kleptomania that typifies most D&D characters of any era. Something to think about.

---

1So, it looks like my options right now are basically M&M, some variant of FATE, Risus, or an old D&D clone.

M&M I don't know, but I guess it's d20-ish? So probably doable. Setting is maybe not so well-suited, but not out of consideration.
FATE is very flexible, but I don't know it at all, and getting the feel of it will take a bit. Also, maybe not quite enough structure for my creativity to get going. We'll see.
Risus: same as FATE, except more so and with feeling.
OSR variants I have a bit of direct experience with (enough to tweak some houserules in off the bat, probably, as a matter of fact) and a lot of general knowledge about from various sources. Generally rather gritty, but I suppose a lot of that only shows up in combat, of which there won't be any!

(Incidentally, I found it amusing that an old thread recommended GURPS Lite for rules-light beginner-friendly gaming, which I found inherently rather hilarious, however suitable it might actually turn out to be.)

[Grinner]

Hmm, OK. That was the one I looked into the most so far; I'll obviously need to do a bit of fiddling to adjust from the default pulp setting, which seems a bit tedious, but oh well.

If you decide to go with FATE, I believe you can spare the trouble, as somebody's already done that.

[puctheplayfull]

I would recommend FATE or Risus both as easy to pick up games that don't have focus on combat. Both use the same systems for resolving social conflicts and skill attempts as they use for resolving combat, so there isn't a lot to learn. Character creation in both is fairly easy and strait forward, though FATE can require a little more thought and background for your character. If you pick up the various recommended house rules for Risus the character development becomes a little more in dept and fulfilling like that of FATE. And with either system, they just provide the core rules, so you or your sister can use them to create the settings, tone and feel you want for the game you run.

M&M provides a great way to do the same. You can create nearly any kind of character you can conceptualize, and the GM can reward players for great roleplay and adding to the story over successful combat. You can set the game anywhere and anywhen you like, and the tone and feel are based on how you run the story. I'm more familiar with 2nd Ed, but 3rd didn't change much in this regard. In addition, if you go with 2nd Ed, they released several different splat books that help with specific settings and styles of play, including sword & sorcery, manga/anime, pulp fiction, and I'm sure there are many others by now. The largest problem you may have is, while the system is rather simple, character creation can be a little overwhelming to a new player because it is completely point buy, and you build the character from the ground up.

[TuggyNE]

Update: my sister has decided to run a game in a world she's been working on for a story (which has undergone continued revisions since her preteen years, and is nowhere near done)*. We're gonna use Free Fate once we finish working out the background and stuff.

Any further suggestions specifically for this?


* I have no idea whether she'll fall into the common trap of trying to make things "just like the story", but under the circumstances it seems less likely.