Recommend A System! Part II-The Big Damn Heroes Failed

[JNAProductions]

In a previous thread, I asked for help finding a system-I was recommended Risus, which is both a cool system and handling the game it's being used for well.

But, now I come with another game, that I don't think Risus would work as well for. Worlds Without Number might, I have mostly read the free version of that, but I'm wondering if any Playgrounders have any other good ideas.

The pitch for the game is:

You're a group of relatively new heroes. You're doing well for yourselves, just starting to stake claim to fame, but there's rumblings. Something dangerous is going on, in the depths of the world, and it might need strong help.
Only... Those rumblings are true. In fact, the danger that's going on is very much present. As-in, the ritual is being completed now and no one knows how to stop them, with most not even knowing it's happening.

The game would start either briefly before the world is torn asunder, or after the fact. The world itself is being pitched into varying parts of the Elemental Chaos, and the start would be simple survival.

[Sparky McDibben]

In a previous thread, I asked for help finding a system-I was recommended Risus, which is both a cool system and handling the game it's being used for well.

But, now I come with another game, that I don't think Risus would work as well for. Worlds Without Number might, I have mostly read the free version of that, but I'm wondering if any Playgrounders have any other good ideas.

The pitch for the game is:



The game would start either briefly before the world is torn asunder, or after the fact. The world itself is being pitched into varying parts of the Elemental Chaos, and the start would be simple survival.

Shadow of the Demon Lord?

[JNAProductions]

Shadow of the Demon Lord?

This game, yee? It's a little under $20 for the PDF, but it does look reasonably cool...

Mind giving a sales pitch, if you got the time?

[warty goblin]

Shadow of the Demon Lord is structurally interesting and basically thematically perfect. The setting conceit is that the big bad demon lord is consuming the world, and you'd rather he do this more slowly.

The actual game is sort of 5E D&D, but not really. It inherits the attributes and basic resolution mechanic, but does magic and levels and classes very differently.

Classes: you start with a base class, which is something very general like warrior or priest. After a couple levels you then pick up an advanced class, which is something like berserker or ranger or witch. Then you get an expert class, which are very limited but hyper-specific to something like casting water spells or being an absolute tank. You don't just top out your basic class, then your advanced, then your expert though, rather they interweave according to a set progression. Bu design the game tops out, and the campaign ends, at levels 10.

Spells are broken into set traditions, and you only get to learn spells or traditions when your classes say you can. There's a lot of spells, and you ain't getting most of them. IIRC you have to learn the spells in a tradition in order as well, so you gotta pick up the level 2 spell before the level 3.

Instead of the myriad +2 bonuses of 3rd edition, or advantage/disadvantage, the game uses a boon/bane system. Basically if you have X boons, you roll xd6 along with the d20, and add the highest roll to your total. Same with banes, but you subtract. Boons and banes cancel each other put one for one, if a roll has two boons and one bane, you roll with one boon.

It's a fun system, albeit slightly edgelordy. I kinda dig it's schlocky, everything is nasty vibe, but it may well not sit well with you.




Another system worth considering is Against the Darkmaster, which is roughly an updated version of Rollmaster, built around getting into gory fights with a specific big bad trying to eat the world. It's pretty crunchy, has very thorough critical hit rules, and comes with some nifty stuff on designing your very own evil entity. I'd say this is pitched at emulating the vast stack of delightfully sincere Tolkien clones of the 80s and 90s, and seems to do a pretty good job of it. This means that ots a lot more grounded and less, hmm, flashy than something like D&D, where anymore your nose hairs are probably magical in some ways. I mean there definitely is magic, and it's plenty potent (hello spell critical hit tables) bit it isn't as omnipresent.

[JNAProductions]

Thanks for the Shadow rundown. It's tempting me!

Against The Darkmaster doesn't look like what I'm after, but I do appreciate the recommendation! :)

[stoutstien]

I've ran both shadow of the demon lord and WWN and while Shadow is flasher it has a lot of phantom depth. It's still a good system and they have handled expanded content very well but overall it's still gets to feel repetitive. For games that have a planned out X amount of sessions it's fine but it struggles if your party likes to wonder or push the edges of the critical path *too* much.
The theme/setting/rules are all hard-lined. You can refluff and rewrite but as printed it is what it.

WWN is kinda the opposite. Looks deceptively simple at the surface but has great depth if you focus on any single point or aspect. Unlike aot of games there isn't a glaring hole in any major thing you'd expect the party to do while also having the freedom to modify any of those systems quickly to fit your table.

If you use the heroic rules and ALE there is just shy of 1000 hero combos before feats are considered and while it has a lot of OSR roots the players have enough 'stuff' to make them comfortable if they are used to more modern games.
It's sold in a neutral format so it's easy to mold to most settings.

I own both and respect both as valid games in their own right but my WWN/SWN books hardly ever get put away.

[Grod_The_Giant]

The premise sounds fun, but doesn't really suggest any sort of specific system. What kind of feel and gameplay loop are you looking for?

[animorte]

Classes: you start with a base class, which is something very general like warrior or priest. After a couple levels you then pick up an advanced class, which is something like berserker or ranger or witch. Then you get an expert class, which are very limited but hyper-specific to something like casting water spells or being an absolute tank.

I've ran both shadow of the demon lord and WWN and while Shadow is flasher it has a lot of phantom depth. It's still a good system and they have handled expanded content very well but overall it's still gets to feel repetitive.

I'm getting quite interested in Shadow myself, never heard of it before now.

I own both and respect both as valid games in their own right but my WWN/SWN books hardly ever get put away.

I need this in my life.

[Anonymouswizard]

The premise sounds fun, but doesn't really suggest any sort of specific system. What kind of feel and gameplay loop are you looking for?

Yeah, I could see this working with almost any generic or fantasy system on my shelf. But it's going to feel very different if run with Cortex Prime than with Fate or Anima: Beyond Fantasy. You could even do something like this with Legends of the Wulin, although I'm not 100% sure who'd be your big bad.

Huh, SotDL is finally back in stock on Amazon, might pick it up in a couple of weeks.

[Lord Raziere]

I agree with Anonymous, JNA you'd have to define power level, available abilities and such and so on, this pitch right now is very open-ended and could work with basically anything, the question is how do you want actual play to go, how do you want things to resolve, whats the system loop you want to go with, what abilities are available, things like that. I have some experience with playing in your games so I probably have a better idea than most people in the thread how you do things, but some specificity about how you want to do things would help.

[JNAProductions]

I'd want the characters to, at least in the beginning, struggle. They might be more prepared for cataclysm than most others, but they were not fully ready in the slightest.
I would also want some amount of power scaling-probably not D&D fast, but ideally as time goes on, the characters become more suited to the new environments and more capable.

[Anonymouswizard]

I'd want the characters to, at least in the beginning, struggle. They might be more prepared for cataclysm than most others, but they were not fully ready in the slightest.
I would also want some amount of power scaling-probably not D&D fast, but ideally as time goes on, the characters become more suited to the new environments and more capable.

So not GURPS, Legends of the Wulin, or anything else on the extremes. But at the same time not a system where characters are mostly or completely static. Alright.

I think the next real question I have is what do you want the gameplay to focus on? As I said you could easily do this with Fate* or Cortex Prime, but if you don't like narrative gameplay or want a focus on crunchy combat encounters neither will work.

* The default build is quite static, but there's loads of knobs we can twist.

[JNAProductions]

Definitely on the crunchier side. Combat and survival should be a good part of it.

[Grod_The_Giant]

Savage Worlds, maybe? It has pretty straightforward character creation, good fast-paced combat, and has a solid-but-not-overwhelming level of crunch. Characters improve with experience, but nowhere near D&D-levels. I ran Savage Worlds Deadlands for a while and it was a good (if chaotic) time.

[Anonymouswizard]

Savage Worlds, maybe? It has pretty straightforward character creation, good fast-paced combat, and has a solid-but-not-overwhelming level of crunch. Characters improve with experience, but nowhere near D&D-levels. I ran Savage Worlds Deadlands for a while and it was a good (if chaotic) time.

The only issue I see with Savage Worlds is the desire for crunchy exploration challenges, and even the latest edition is a combat engine with some bits glued on.out of the Standard Trio of Generics (GURPS, Savage Worlds, Fate) it's definitely the best fit, but you'd need to steal a few systems from elsewhere.

It is, however, a great pick if the PCs are going to be leading a group of NPCs, the game handles a dozen or so a side relatively elegantly.


Advanced Fighting Fantasy might also work, but I think it's a bit crunch light. It's basically a translation of the old gamebooks to being a group based RPG, with all the results of things such has having a stat that covers 'do stuff' (don't worry, Special Skills allow for differentiation). It has one of my favourite supplements ever (The Titan Herbal, mostly just a list of plants and their gameplay properties), but it's pretty dang light on the actual systems.

[Grod_The_Giant]

The only issue I see with Savage Worlds is the desire for crunchy exploration challenges, and even the latest edition is a combat engine with some bits glued on.

True. Though to be fair, I haven't seen many systems that have good exploration-based crunch at all. Maybe Fate, since you can assign arbitrary amounts of narrative significance to anything you feel like.

I'd also argue that the "environmental conflict" rules in STaRS do a good job, but, then, I would, wouldn't I?

[Anonymouswizard]

True. Though to be fair, I haven't seen many systems that have good exploration-based crunch at all. Maybe Fate, since you can assign arbitrary amounts of narrative significance to anything you feel like.

I'd also argue that the "environmental conflict" rules in STaRS do a good job, but, then, I would, wouldn't I?

I mean, what does crunchy exploration even mean? I believe there's some games with good hexcrawling or similar systems, which technically counts.

On the more nitty gritty side, as you say there's basically nothing. Fate and Cortex Prime can both provide meaningful challenges, but they're pulling the exact same 'narrative weight' trick. There's also several games with investigation systems, but those probably aren't appropriate here.