Magpie Games have a Kickstarter upcoming for an RPG based on Avatar: The Last Airbender which looks more interesting than I'd initially expected – you can get the quickstart by signing up here.
It seems to be PbtA, with at least one use of a Blades in the Dark-style progress clock; part of me feared another Dragon Prince-type dice pool nightmare. This playbooks approach to character options seems more in line with the pitch for this kind of licensed game, but it's a solid system for narrative-driven stuff.
The one thing that's really caught my eye is combat, which uses three different "Approaches" that players choose for each combat "exchange" – whether they're being defensive, attacking, or evading. Each one uses a different stat, and they're resolved in a set order; on successful rolls you get to choose a Technique from your Approach's list. I'm a little worried it would be unnecessary bookkeeping, but I do like the tactical sense it gives, and the fact that in order to inflict damage on an opponent you've got to pay a cost. It's unclear how long an Exchange is; it sounds like it could comprise an entire encounter, or just a single round.
I'm a little surprised you never got your head around the Cortex system in Dragon Prince. Cortex has been around for ages now and is generally well liked. I'll admit I've never played it myself but I've never heard of anyone bouncing off it quite so much.
Cortex made slightly more sense once I saw it played, but it still seems clumsy; every roll you make has to be litigated afresh in terms of what features, skills, and equipment applies, so it seemed to take longer than it should to get anything done.
I remember finding that in Edge of the Empire too. Rolls took that bit longer to process and all sorts of consequences would spin out of each one so it would sometimes leave us making another roll to resolve the side effects of the previous roll. My solution was to give each roll more impact and ask for rolls less frequently. It worked really well from then on, far more RP and bullshitting through situations and then when the dice came out everyone knew that anything could happen.
I guess Cortex could benefit from similar adjustment?
Another game down. My group of teen-agers have finished the Whitehack dungeon adventure and decided it is time to move on. Next week we are starting a Traveller game. Possibly a Very Long Traveller game.
The Avatar RPG Kickstarter has launched; it's set a new record for first-day funding for an RPG (doubling the previous $600k), and it just overtook the previous highest total for an RPG product ($2.1m). It has 28 days left.
The quick start has been updated as well, with a few refinements to the combat system that make it much clearer (including a very helpful gameplay example). I'm about 80% sure I'll be running a one shot next week in place of The Expanse, though I haven't told the players yet… 😅
Dunno - maybe, once Strahd is done, I can get the Tuesday group to play something else, but I really want to play one of these things, not run it, and I don't know if anyone else wants to DM, never mind run something else entirely.
I'm starting up another game on Thursdays soon™, though, and we're all current and former DMs, so I'm hoping we can do some one-shots in other systems here and there.
I'm currently running two weekly games for the same group, I'm thinking of giving them the boot later in the year so that I can start running for different people. I might have space if you are interested.
We'll see; I think my Sunday game is going to end soon - or my part in it, at any rate. In the Before Times, we played in a pub on Tuesdays, but changes in management and my DM game being on Tuesdays means I'm unlikely to be able to carry on with it if there's a return to meatspace.
I've finally cracked and started writing a system for Foundry VTT. We played our first Avatar session last night, and it's been floating around the back of my brain for a while as a decent candidate for a relatively rules-light thing to convert (and there isn't a system for it yet), so I've kicked that off. Twice, in fact, because the first time I tried it I hit a really weird bug that I couldn't solve even with help from the Discord channel. (I've since worked out where it's coming from, but not why it's happening.)
Avatar itself seems pretty good, although I'm not sure my player characters are the kind of adventurous teens the system is really set up for – they're very laid back and I had to all but force them into combat, but thankfully it was pretty easy to have them stumble into the specific scenes I wanted them to see. I might have to encourage them to be more outgoing, but now that they've met the primary MacGuffin NPC who's going to ask them to help her, that should light a fire under them – I hope.
It's tough to get fully into the PbtA mindset with regards to the Moves; there were times when none of them applied, but a simple "you do/don't recognise this person" GM decision didn't seem entirely fair. Calling for an arbitrary roll is somewhat counter to the spirit, but it seemed the most interesting way to resolve it.
Combat worked out okay, but I don't feel like I did a great job explaining the Approach system. I think I need to do more to force the players back to a perspective of "describe what your character is doing, don't worry about the mechanics"; they're both coming from a lot more D&D-type systems, so there was a lot of looking at Moves and Techniques to decide on their action, rather than letting it flow the other way.
I should also encourage RP based on their Balance alignments; one of the characters, an Icon, is all the way at the Freedom end of her scale, but I feel like she's still playing it as quite conservative and focused on the Role end.
But I'm looking forward to seeing where things go from here – the players seemed to click with the system (and familiarity with the setting definitely helped), and we ended on pretty much the exact cliffhanger/reveal that I was hoping for.
My Curse of Strahd group laid eyes on the Man Himself at the end of last night's session. I'm wondering if they're going to try to fight him next week; it wouldn't be out of character for some players, but I think they know he's a Big Deal, and I'm not going to have him attack first, and even if it does come to blows, he'll just be toying with them.
I’m listening to the Incomparables podcast, they’ve been doing Strahd for a while, but I binged a whole six months of shows in a week. Sounds like a fun setting.
I’m planning a final session in AIME (Adventures in Middle-earth) before restarting in TOR at the end of the year.
I think something big, like a Nazgul may be ‘fun’ and leave them all on a cliff top half dead as a literal cliff hanger.
Picked up the Fallout 2d20 book the other day – having most recently run PbtA games like Monster of the Week and the Avatar Legends preview, the depth of character creation (and NPC creation) options is frankly overwhelming.
I am, however, already trying to figure out a short story to run – another one to add to the list…
I haven't tried playing anything 2d20. I tried reading the Star Trek Adventures book but it's laid out like a TNG console and I just couldn't process it at all.
It's not a problem with the system mechanics as it is the pages and pages and pages of weapons and loot and ammo and armour and magazines and and and and and and
Free League have announced a Blade Runner RPG using the same system as their Alien RPG.
Tomas Härenstam, Free League co-founder and lead game designer of the ALIEN RPG, will fill the same role for Blade Runner, with setting writing by Joe LeFavi and original artwork by the lead ALIEN RPG artist Martin Grip.
I finished my Cthulhu campaign on Monday night, it was utterly miserable and I loved it. I'm fairly sure my players enjoyed it too but whatever.
Rather than using Call of Cthulhu or Trail of Cthulhu I used the ultra-lite Cthulhu Dark for the system and we played through four of the five scenarios in the Trail of Cthulhu campaign The Final Revelation.
The system gives you just enough to work with Characters are a name, an occupation and an ever increasing Insight score representing their comprehension of the true nature of reality. If Insight ever reaches 6, that PC can no longer function in normal society and you have to find an exit for them, one way or another. I also liked that if PCs ever try to fight a monster, they die.
The scenarios are "purist" mythos adventures. They are creepy and sad and instead of having a climax, they have a turning point at which the protagonists realise the immensity of the horror and they either die, give in or return home and try to live a normal life. They are loosely connected and I took the opportunity to have characters, often surviving PCs, from one show up in others. The titular scenario ties them all together in a way that I found immensely satisfying.
So yeah, consider this a strong recommendation for both Cthulhu Dark and The Final Revelation. I certainly found it a very welcome change of pace after running 5e and OSR for most of the last two ro three years.
Cthulhu was the first TTRPG I ever played, though I can't remember which version/edition it was. I'd like to have smidge go at it, but mystery stuff generally isn't the kind of thing I'm very good at running.
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I hadn't prepped at all for my Strahd game last night, but it went well regardless - it was an RP-heavy session, with the players feeling out the political situation in Vallaki, meeting some creepy characters, and ending with an "oh, shit, what the fuck" from one character as he discovered a note in his bag that just says "help" in handwriting he doesn't recognise.
The stage is set for a showdown next week with one of the two factions in town, though they haven't decided which one to approach (attack?) first. I've done a lot of rewriting for this module, and Vallaki has a big chunk of it; looking forward to seeing how well it all shakes out.
Cthulhu was the first TTRPG I ever played, though I can't remember which version/edition it was. I'd like to have smidge go at it, but mystery stuff generally isn't the kind of thing I'm very good at running.
Between Coriolis and Cthulhu I’ve run a few over the last year, the trick seems to be to make situations complicated but don’t hide the clues. When you break it down an investigation scenario isn’t structured very different to any other. Instead of travelling from scene to scene collecting stuff or fighting bad guys, you are travelling around collecting information. The Gumshoe adventures handle it well because they highlight the core clues in each location which the players must find to progress which makes it really easy to avoid blocks.
I've been listening the an actual play of the Alien RPG and it sounds really great. It's Fria Ligan so it's the same system as Tales From The Loop and Coriolis but they have added in some excellent mechanics for adrenaline and panicking. The adventure they are running, The Destroyer of Worlds, seems to really get what makes a good Aliens story; it reminds me of the better Aliens comics I used to read.
I played an Alien game, the Chariot of the Gods cinematic adventure. It was amazing how every single cunning, manipulative plan my Company exec character made fell completely apart as soon as anything started to go wrong. I thought I'd been so smart!
I watched a bit of that! I forgot all about it and never finished because YouTubelol.
I like the idea of running a loooong SF campaign with Alien or Traveller where you see the setting change over time. In Alien (Or These Dark Places, which is similar) you could manage the passage of time through hypersleep. In Traveller I like the idea of running a bunch of different games over hundreds of years, except it's all different crews of the same ship.
I only know of the prequels by reputation, but the first mini-campaign LoadingReadyRun did in Alien brought in a bunch of stuff about the black goo, and made it work (for me). I don't know how much of what he did with it was canon, though, or his own version of it.
Has anybody here run a hexcrawl or similar before? I'm considering giving it a shot for a short Fallout 2d20 game I'm going to be running in a couple months (based on our current scheduling nightmares with the MotW and Avatar games I'm doing), but I'm constantly second-guessing the size of my map and the scale of the grid and the number and size of tables to roll on, and how many landmarks I should have pre-populating the place versus pure rolling…
Basically, if anyone can tell me how and where to limit things, it would be extremely helpful.
I have run hexcrawls, they are fun but they are hard to predict. Seems like a good match for Fallout to me. There isn’t really a right or wrong answer to how big it should be or how dense the encounters are; more hexes just means the game takes longer, and more encounters makes it more dangerous and will focus the game more on resources (food, ammo, medpack, etc).
Personally I prefer my hexes slightly more zoomed in than they are usually presented. If your group are travelling 4 hexes a day then they have more options each day and if they push you can give them an extra hex to clear or they can split their day into a morning or scavenging and an afternoon of travel. It also gives the option of having certain types of terrain slow the group a little.
The biggest piece of advice I have though: do not give the players a blank map. The map should at least have landmarks and reasons to visit them. If the group are told to explore a blank map, even if they are looking for something specific, it doesn’t matter which way they go, which saps any fun from the process. To ensure that “Which way now?” is a meaningful question, I would usually allow them to see what was in the neighbouring hexes and also give them at least two locations to try and reach.
Finally, it is worth knowing that at ground level you can see rough terrain up to 6 miles away or mountains 18 miles away. Standing on a mountain you can see 18 miles or other mountains 36 miles away.
Free League have a Halloween sale on and their games all (or mostly) have a FoundryVTT implementation, so I have just bought the whole run of the Alien RPG. Worth a look if you've had your eye on any of their games.
Grrr. Missed that. I’d like to give Alien a go, but one of our group has drawn the line at horror games - but not sure if it’s really not more sci fi than horror.
Our regular DM is taking a break for NANOWRIMO so I’ve got a two episode run of Lord of the Rings - last time they crossed the Misty mountains they got trapped in a dream, this time they found a stone circle with blood dripping from the stones. I may have thrown a 9th lvl baddie at the three 6th lvl characters. First hit knocked half their hit points.
I’ve already shown them that using a prayer can stop the blood, I want them to use one as they strike the baddies to double damage them.
Grrr. Missed that. I’d like to give Alien a go, but one of our group has drawn the line at horror games - but not sure if it’s really not more sci fi than horror.
If you wanted to run an actual campaign, I don't know how you'd sustain it as full-time Alien-style horror; most of it would be corporate intrigue stuff, I imagine?
I have a few ideas for ways to extend an Alien campaign. I think the one with the most potential would be to run a series of 4 session games telling different stories each decades apart so that the campaign can explore the long term effects of Aliens on human society.
Ten minutes before the end of tonight's Avatar Legends session, I had no idea how I was going to get to a satisfying cliffhanger. They'd accomplished plenty, so it wouldn't have been a disaster, but I was 90% sure we'd have to end with the old "well, that's us out of time" damp squib.
And then the players escorted a Fire Nation general into the headquarters of the Earth Kingdom resistance, publicly revealed the identity of a VIP in hiding for her life, betrayed one of their NPC allies (who one player has spent multiple sessions building rapport and trust with), appear to have double-crossed the resistance, and led a Fire Nation army assassination squad to the lot of them.
FoundryVTT is on sale at 25% off (which works out as $45 with UK VAT), for anyone who's on the fence about it. I've found it much better than Roll20 in a lot of ways (not least being able to build my own system for Avatar Legends), though it does require a bit more in-depth setup in others.
I'm still loving Foundry, it makes so much more sense than Roll20 and everything just works the way I want it to. I've even managed to install a few modules for fog of war maps and 3d dice without any hassle.
