Showing posts with label Role-playing. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Role-playing. Show all posts

Friday, May 15, 2015

The REAL Star Wars: Edge of the Empire Review


Wizards of the Coast had a long and very successful run with Star Wars. I owned a number of their books, but never found much of a reason to run the game. I didn't quite know it at the time, but the mechanical similarity to Dungeons and Dragons is what stopped me. Don't get me wrong, I played DnD for a numbers of years, 4th edition in particular, but somehow I couldn't wrap my mind around the idea of using almost identical mechanics  for different stories. It just didn't make sense to me. Again, this is saying nothing was wrong with Saga (or any of the other things Wizards released), I just had a DnD itch already scratched. But what proper nerd doesn't want to run Star Wars in some way, shape, or form?

Enter the new Star Wars, managed by Fantasy Flight games. They came out the gate swinging with X-Wing, a first rate miniatures dogfighting game, and then announced Edge of the Empire, the first in a trilogy of role-playing games set between Episodes 4 and 5. Edge of the Empire is focused on the outer rim of the galaxy, far away from the bulk of the Empire.  That means that things are murky. You have responsibilities, obligations, problems. No one gets out clean.


Edge of the Empire has a unique dice system, as illustrated above.  Your six stats (Brawn, Agility, Cunning, Intelligence, Presence, and Willpower) generate green Ability Dice. Your skills let you swap out those green dice for yellow Skill dice, which have better symbols of success on them. The GM, in turn, has purple Difficulty Dice that can be upgraded to red Challenge Dice. Blue Boost Dice have a smaller amount of success symbols but might work in your favor. Black Setback Dice are the negative version of Boost Dice. You assemble your green dice and upgrade some of them to yellow dice. The GM then adds purple dice and might upgrade some of them to red dice, adding in blue and black dice at the GM's discretion. You then roll all of these dice and read the symbols on them to determine the result.

Using these results the GM and players determine what happens with every check. It's a bit time-consuming, but more than worth it when you consider the results. 

For instance, Jedi master Plo Koon is fighting young Boba Fett. After rolling  and cancelling out the results Plo Koon's left with a success and two threats. Plo Koon barely hits Boba but lost his footing for the next attack, giving Boba a boost die on his next attack.

This is not a dice system for those who simply want the rules to get out of the way. The dice mechanic is the entire reason to play this game and the authors make no attempts to say otherwise. I cannot stress it enough: the dice mechanic is the major hook of this game. Everything else revolves around it to the point where the game plays almost nothing like how it looks. And what it looks like is a traditional RPG.

Character creation is, again, pretty standard. You have your races  (which grant you your base stats and your starting XP), classes (which grant most of your skills) and your sub-classes (which grant you talent trees and a few more skills). You're given some cash to buy stuff and man, it's not enough. Neither's the XP they give you, especially when you realize that you can't raise your attributes/stats past character creation unless you buy super-expensive and hard to get to talents, and even then you can only raise one attribute/stat by one. And stats in character creation take the vast majority of your XP. Which is when the GM offers you the Devil's Deal: more cash and XP for Obligation. 

Obligation is your hook into the game. It's your character's bad past catching up with them now. Each Obligation is given a numerical value (usually 5-10 at the beginning of the game) and a chart is made combining everybody's Obligations. Here's my group's at the moment.
Jer'Ani (Bounty): 1-20
Kaneen (Family Curse): 21-30
Betsy (Betrayed into slavery): 31-40
Melody (Lost brother): 41-50
Zeke (Confirmed Jedi): 51-60
Jabba's Escaped slaves: 61-70
Wanted by the Empire for stealing Death Star plans and seeing the destruction of Alderaan: 71-90

As you can see you can also get Obligations from events you did in the game. At the beginning of the session the GM rolls a d100. If he rolls higher than the chart trouble doesn't come looking for the players. If he rolls any of the numbers on the chart, however, trouble finds the players, from whichever part of the chart that corresponds with the number. This stresses out everyone in the session, the person whose Obligation was triggered in particular. If doubles are rolled something really bad happens and the penalties are doubled.

For instance, at the beginning of the next session I roll a d100 and get a 22.  Kaneen's Obligation of his family curse has been triggered and, thanks to the fact that I rolled doubles, it's a particularly bad session for everyone. 

The GM can offer you more Obligation for more XP and cash. As you can see, Jer'Ani took me up on my kind offer. The Obligation system was a bit tough for me to use at first, but after realizing that that's the primary hook for the session (above and beyond anything else, regardless of what the book tells you), it got a lot easier to work with Obligation. 

Another meta-mechanic is Destiny points. There's Dark (for the GM) and Light (for the players) You can use these points to improve your own dice rolls, hurt another character's dice roll, or make up a small fact about the adventure that wasn't established before. You can only have 1 point spent per side on a single action. After playing it a few times my group and I found that this mechanic was great in theory, not so great in practice. Since you can only spend 1 point at a time it's really easy for both sides to spend a point and for nothing to change. Great idea in theory, not so great in practice.

Combat's pretty standard. You roll for initiative, trying to claim slots in the initiative order that you're allowed to swap with other players. There are two types of damage: wounds and strain. Wounds represent physical harm and strain mental harm. Wounds are harder to recover from than strain, which can just vanish after every encounter. Going down to 0 for either one will take you out of the fight. There's also a critical hit system triggered by Triumphs and enough Advantages, which makes you roll a d100 to determine what type of hit you just dealt/took. Even if the effects of the critical go away the actual status doesn't change until the critical hit is healed, thus adding a modifier to the next critical  hit roll. It adds up pretty fast and, coupled with the dice system, you get some really fun combats that are truly cinematic.

The final important thing is the XP system, which is frustratingly lacking. GMs are expected to hand out between 20-30 XP a session, for...well... whatever you want to reward them for. It's astoundingly loose and informal, which I don't personally count as a strength. You do get rewarded for following your Motivation, but that's all there is to it. It's not that the system's simple: it's simplistic and lazy. 

The bottom line is this: Edge of the Empire is an astoundingly fun system. The dice mechanic, the true core of the system, is a ton of fun and makes up for some well intentioned but flawed story mechanics. Definitely worth buying if you're into Star Wars or just like a narrative dice system.

Friday, April 17, 2015

Creating a Zelda Paper and Pencil Dungeon


Ever since the inception of Zelda there's always been a group of poor, pathetic, souls who want to make a Zelda-themed dungeon.  I am one of those poor, pathetic, nerds, so during my time playing DnD I tried as hard as I could to make Zelda-ish dungeons, always to the harm of my campaign. Part of that is the open nature of a paper-and-pencil RPG, but that's hardly the only thing standing in the way of making a good Zelda paper and pencil dungeon. Most people who have tried (and failed) to make Zelda dungeons just try copying blindly, which is the biggest mistake made.

What makes a Zelda dungeon so much fun to play?


  1. Physicality. Zelda dungeons are always solved by doing something physical that isn't related to combat. Push the blocks, blow up the wall, push the button!
  2. Analytical Thinking. Instead of having the completion of the dungeon hinge upon combat Zelda dungeons force you to use your head.
  3. Flair for the Dramatic. Hard or easy, you're gonna remember the Ancient Cistern, where you had to climb up a rope to escape an endless horde of zombies while your stamina gauge was running out. Memorable does not mean hard (although the Water Temple is a reminder that it can)
DON'T
  • Use any of the puzzle elements from Zelda. Zelda's a videogame, and most of the best video games (in this humble blogger's opinion) are very aware of it and make no effort to hide it. As a GM you have a much lower suspension of disbelief threshhold than Zelda. So no buttons! No torch-lighting! Or killing all the enemies to open the door! Or crystals! Any of it! NO! BAD GM!
  • Make puzzles with one solution. Zelda can afford to do this because it's a video game and, by the very nature of a video game, it's much more acceptable to railroad. You're not playing a video game, however: you are playing something that allows your players to do whatever the heck they like. Do not squash that, otherwise you ruin the whole point of doing a table-top game in the first place.
  • Use Dungeons and Dragons. It's my blog and I'll opine like I want to. Dungeons and Dragons of almost any edition is a terrible fit for Zelda dungeons because of the overemphasis on combat. If you want the focus to be on the dungeon you'll want a rules system that focuses on other aspects of an adventure besides HP.
DO
  • Make tests physical. Zelda dungeons are physical affairs, so you need to know the physical world pretty well. How do load-bearing walls work? How much oxygen do you really have in a cave? Questions like these aren't boring, they're pieces of the puzzle you're about to throw at your players.  For instance, if you want to do a magma dungeon (like I always find myself wanting to do) then the first problem is oxygen: how are players going to breathe? Or you're in a temple to a forest goddess and the vegetation works like poison ivy but worse. All of it.
  • Make puzzles that suggest gear but don't bloody railroad it. Zelda's a gear-based game, and rightfully so: your stats don't ever improve beyond the supernatural (yet another reason why DnD, particularly 3rd and 4th editions, don't fit). You have to make puzzles that, by their nature, require gear to get around them but don't force them down one path. Always, always, always allow the players to come up with a solution themselves, even if it means they have to make their own tools. 
  • Use a game that's focused only on dungeon crawl. Torchbearer's your best bet because of the emphasis on the mundanity of your characters and the grind that's present, but I'm sure there are other games available. I just wouldn't use any other DnD than Moldvay (or possibly 5th, if you really limited magic item use). You  could even use Burning Wheel if you wanted a more character-driven dungeon crawl than Torchbearer, but then the emphasis stops being on the dungeon itself, and where's the fun of that? Ultimately it's to your taste, just make sure that if you're going to do a Zelda crawl you keep the magic items down so the ingenuity of the players can run rampant. 
  • Go with a theme. Yes, do your Forest Temple. It wouldn't be Zelda if you didn't. Just remember to go with the Zelda theme using table-top strengths: imagination, creativity, and surprise. Throw out your monster manual if you have to, do whatever it takes to just focus on your theme. Research animals, flaura and fauna, and fantasy them up! Whatever it is, stick with the theme and go for it. 
  • Research, research, research. This is now shooting the dead horse, but it bears repeating: the more you know about how the physical world the more people will be engrossed, because they already know the rules well enough.
  • Read this and all the links on that page. They're awesome and you should read them regardless of whether you're going to make a Zelda styled dungeon or not. They're just good for basic dungeon-building tips. 
  • Make most puzzles gear based, link gear to boss battles. Nuff said.
Making a dungeon is a whole lot of fun. Making a Zelda dungeon should be fun and challenging. Go out and make awesome stuff for your players!

Wednesday, November 14, 2012

Fiasco RPG Review


So, after a number of months, I've finally started to "get" how to play Burning Wheel. Standing back and only challenging the players when they fail a roll is a bit challenging, but so incredibly worthwhile... except for one thing. Burning Wheel is a long term game, and I am not known as the most patient person on the face of the planet. Sometimes I just want something NOW!

Heh hehheHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! FIASCO!

I apologize for that outburst of evil laughter, but Fiasco is so damn evil that it makes me giggle. But then again, I like Oh Brother, Where art Thou?, Raising Arizona, and The Ladykillers.


That's right, this a game that's made to emulate Coen brother movies. Be afraid, people! Similar to another favorite game of mine, 3 Dragon Ante, this game seems to take the worst of all humanity and makes sure that you have to indulge in it as much as possible to get ahead. The game is GM-less and, while it doesn't look it at first, this can be a ridiculously competitive game. Why? Because in the first half of the game you can help determine how crappy of an ending your "friends" have. In the playtest game I completely screwed over a friend of mine, and we both enjoyed it immensely, if only because I managed to get the upper hand through good play. 

I'm not gonna lie, this game probably doesn't have to be so damn competitive. But, but... why would you play it any other way?

Thursday, September 27, 2012

The REAL Burning Wheel Gold Review


OK, so I posted a review of Burning Wheel Gold at the beginning of the year, but it was based off of a few read-throughs and playtest reports from forums, so no personal experience to really relate to anybody. It's been 10 months and I've had quite a bit of time to run not just Burning Wheel but Mouse Guard and Burning Empires. So, here's my review, after 10 months of being soaked up in Luke Crane's work, and what do I think?

This is a truly remarkable game. There are some parts of the game that I'm not a particular fan of (character creation, you giant pain in the ass you), but the things that Burning Wheel sets out to do it does so well that I'm in awe of it. What does it set out to do? An RPG that will make stories similar to Lord of the Rings, the Earthsea Cycle, the Count of Monte Cristo. What does this mean? The RPG is designed to give you a story that will be long, character-driven, and fun, while keeping the sanctity of the character not being you, but someone who you watch develop and become attached to. This last point is probably the most important difference between this and other RPGs. We'll get back to that in a little bit. 

Burning Wheel is a D6 dice pool-based system. You roll a number of six-sided dice equal to your number in the skill, and try to roll a number of successes equal to the obstacle number, or Ob. If you succeed you get intent that you originally stated, carte blanch If you fail, however, the GM instead gets to muck with your original intent while making sure the plot still moves forward. Failed your Power check to knock that door down? Oh, you get the door down, but you attract the attention of your hated rival, who has been following you the whole damn time. Or the guards. Or your father, who owns the facility. Y'know, something awful and unforeseen but that doesn't get in the way of the narrative. These results stand for the entirety of the session, thanks to the Let It Ride rule, which states that all die rolls, unless changed, stand. So if you failed that Power check, all applicable Power checks fail until the situation changes or the end of the session. If the GM can't think of an interesting failure for your task, you automatically succeed.  Notice that interesting should mean something linked to your Beliefs, Instincts, and Traits, also known as BITs.

Oh, right, BITs. I should probably explain those. 

Beliefs, Instincts, and Traits are the things that make the wheel turn! These determine not only characterization, but where the plot will go, and what hooks the players and GM will be able to pull on to make the story move. Beliefs are an ethical statement with a specific plan of action attached to said Belief. This is where you get to state what your character is about and what he is going to do about it. Instincts are those little things your character has learned to do in the course of his life that aren't necessarily the best things to do, but he does them anyway (like "Never accept an insult"). Traits are personality traits that you are the embodiment of, for good and for ill. 

You then get rewarded for playing out your BITs with something called Artha. Artha are points that you get for role-playing in such a way that the story moves forward. There are three types of Artha: fate (for playing out your BITs, especially to the point of trouble!), persona (for fulfilling personal goals and breaking free of your BITs), and deeds (going beyond your own problems and helping everyone in a heroic fashion). Artha may then be spent to improve your dice rolls so you can get what you want. If you're playing the game correctly you find that you've got a good story-game, filled with drama and tension as you earn Artha for playing out your flaws and spend said Artha so you can get your goals accomplished. 

That's essentially the game in a nutshell, folks, but there's a bit more to it. Burning Wheel has a lot more to offer, and this is where a lot of people have issue with the game, because Burning Wheel refuses to do anything like any other RPG I've ever seen. This is good, because the mechanics are exactly suited for the game, but bad, because the mechanics are just enough out of the norm to get some rather significant balking from people, particularly RPG vets. If you've never played an RPG before this won't be as much trouble, but the next section is a bit more for the people who have issue with the following mechanics. 

Burning Wheel has a series of extended conflict resolution mechanics that are based off of the same basic idea. You construct a series of actions from 3-9 moves ahead of time, and play them out against your opponent, who has done the same. These moves are then resolved in a rock-paper-scissors format. This is done for two very good reasons: it puts a very strong tension into the conflict and it keeps the sanctity of player-character separation completely intact. I have never had so much tension as I've had in a single Fight! or Duel of Wits, because you genuinely have no idea what is going to happen next. I've seen conflicts turn around so quickly it makes my head spin. And again, this reinforces the fact that you are not your character, something that is critical to making this game run. Why is this critical?

Burning Wheel is designed to be resolved in 30+ sessions, and some games last years. You are watching a character evolve for a very long time, and, quite frankly, that can be a little dangerous without the proper distance.People get all wrapped up in their characters all the time and that's a bit unhealthy. Burning Wheel recognizes this and makes sure that you will always be a spectator of your character's actions, not a perpetrator.

Now, on to the thing I don't like about Burning Wheel: length of character creation. What you do is you put together a basic history of what your character has been doing all the way up to the beginning of the story in what's called Life Paths. It's a fine system, and is frankly quite awesome, I just don't like how long the ****ing thing takes, especially with beginners (myself included). It's taxing and exhausting, and sometimes is just infuriating how detailed it is. But, the thing is that all these parts are necessary to make the game work in this particular way. 

And that's the last thing you need to know about this game: it is NOT for everyone, and was never intended to be. Burning Wheel is heavy, crunchy, finicky, intense, and very particular. If you read this review and find that some of the things in this game really don't jive with you, that's fine! Burning Wheel is not the only story-based game out there, but it's a really awesome one. Do NOT buy this game looking for a catch-all RPG, because this isn't it and, let's be honest here, such an RPG doesn't really exist (no, not even DnD). But if you're looking for a game that will give you a story like the Lord of the Rings, the Earthsea Cycle, and the Count of Monte Cristo, this is that game. It's only 25 bucks for an awesome hardcover, and I cannot begin to tell you how excited this game makes me on a weekly basis.

Tuesday, September 18, 2012

Revenge of the Countess of Fire, Chapter 1

So here's the opening session of the campaign. We were all tired so it was a bit flat, but ultimately it worked out pretty well. Nothing beyond the basic rules were used, so there were no extended conflicts. This session happened two weeks ago, so my notes aren't that complete, but I wrote up what I could remember.

Here's the players and characters:

Elenor Grinslow: Played by Maria. Here's her Beliefs and Instincts. Elenor was a noblewoman who ran away from home to escape an arranged marriage. She became a criminal fence, and only recently came back to head up her family, due to the death of her parents.

Belief 1: My purpose is to further my business ruthlessly.

Belief 2: I will protect any secrets of my family.

Belief 3: I will deny my criminal past.

Instinct 1: Always have my weapons ready.

Instinct 2: Never depend or trust people without proof of their credibility.

Instinct 3: If people approach me, I pay strict attention to their non-verbals.


The Hungry One: Played by Eric. Wolf, who was at first caged. He escaped by eating his feeder. He's been part of the criminal element ever since.

Belief 1: I want to steal the item to hurt a human and bring me profit. And it's fun!

Belief 2: Talwyn is the only person I am afraid of. I will put up with the girl for the moment.

Belief 3: I will find my old captors and I will kill them.

Instinct 1: If I see a human I don't know I will deal with them aggressively.

Lena Mekish: The daughter of the Vermin Lord. She's aware of her ancestry, but no one else is. Is currently in a romantic relationship with Aldwynn, the leader of the criminal element in their town. Played by Martha

Belief 1: erased from the character sheet, but it had something to do with retrieving the item in question.

Belief 2: I will do anything for Talwynd as best as I can because I want him to stay in love with me.

Belief 3: I will talk to Kincaid in order to see if he knows anything about my father's demise.

Instinct 1: I always make sure I am safe before I think of anyone else.

Instinct 2: I draw at least two kunai at the slightest sign of something looking out of place.


Kincaid: played by Julio. Stock: spider. The husband of Honey, who's the leader of the revolutionary spider movement, whose aims are to liberate the spiders from their slavery. Kincaid's a bit of a nut.

Belief 1: Honey's beliefs are always my beliefs, her goals are always my goals.

Belief 2: Talwynd suggested I couldn't pull off this job, so I will do it anyway!

Belief 3: The only way to gain power is to gain a reputation.

Instinct 1: A challenge is something that will always be accepted.

Instinct 2: If there's any chance of danger stay in the shadows, and watch.

-Aldwyn gathered Lena and The Hungry together, and told them that there was an item in Elenor's basement that he needed. The characters were not to know what the item was (and hell, even the GM didn't know!), but Aldwyn was told it was an item of enormous value. Camren decided she was going to infiltrate the house as a new maid.

-Elenor was visited by Honey, the leader of the spider resistance movement, and was asked (aka forced) to buy a shipment of especially absorbent wood. Elenor attempted to find out what the shipment was for, but was unsuccessful in getting any addition information. She accepted the job, and Honey left, promising to keep in touch.

-Kincaid broke into Elenor's attic and bumped into another thief, a woman!

-Camren then snuck into Elenor's house as a maid and stole downstairs, taking The Hungry One with her when she was sure no one else was watching. She broke into "the room", and discovered that the package was a man who was able to control electricity! He cowed Camren and the Hungry One into stepping aside and letting him go.

-Meanwhile, Kincaid made a ruckus up in the attic, causing everyone to run upstairs, facilitating the mysterious stranger's escape from the house. The woman thief escaped as well.

-The Hungry One attempted to follow the stranger, but was caught and forced to run for his life in fear from the obviously superior being.

-At about the same time, Elenor realized that someone was trying to break into her recently-closed shop, and she fled out the back door. It was the mysterious stranger, of course. Kincaid saw her leave, and watched as the stranger burned the following words of the store: "Adrick Grinslow, I will kill your daughter for what you did to me".

-Kincaid followed from a far distance the stranger, who got on board an airship, which took off a few minutes later.

-Elenor arrived at her house, and found out about the chaos that had preceded her coming. Her head servant revealed that the stranger was being held by Adrick, Elenor's father, and he had no idea as to why.

-After a convo with Aldwynd Camren and the Hungry One headed back to Elenor's and checked in on her. Kincaid revealed that it was Camren and the Hungry One who had let out the stranger in the first place, and then offered Honey's protection to Elenor. Elenor declined.

-Everyone parted ways to try and figure out what the hell they were going to do next.

Monday, August 27, 2012

Why Turn Structure's Important

So, Saturday night all my friends and I get together, and my roommate (known to y'all as Sparky) declares he wants to run a short one-shot for all of us. Eager to play for once in the last few months and help my roommate out with getting started at one of the most difficult but rewarding hobbies there is (GMing), I jump up to the challenge. We were told to make any character we wanted in a modern setting, so I decided to make "Dexter Morgan", the infamous serial-killer-vigilante.  Now, as you can tell, I'm a rather chatty guy. I'm so extroverted it's actually a bit of a disadvantage sometimes.... like when you're playing an RPG with a bunch of introverted people.

Oops.

Fortunately, Dexter took a head-shot about half-way through  the game session and died on the spot, allowing the quieter people to step up and actually get in a word edge-wise. Now, it wasn't just because I was a hog, mind you. I did try to step down. The problem, however, was that once someone steps up to lead a certain part of the session everyone sort of assumes that they'll continue to do so. And in a narrative-based game that means that one person leads the narrative.

This is not OK.

One person should NOT dominate game sessions, and I say that as someone who accidentally did! So what should be done? Each player should have a set of priorities that, when it's his turn (and there should be actual turns, a person, once done with a certain amount of actions should step down and the next person should be allowed to go), allow him to start sorting out the problem of the session in his own way, or to strike out on his own and figure out his own thing, and alter the story in... it's... own... direction...

DAMNIT BURNING WHEEL, WHY DID YOU GET THERE FIRST????????

Monday, July 30, 2012

5 Common Sense Things Burning Wheel Taught Me

I just finished my first campaign of Burning Wheel yesterday, and I'm more than impressed with the game, because it is EXACTLY what I hoped it would be. This is a brilliant game, the best that I've played so far, and I've learned much from it about gaming in general. But the best five things I've learned are the following:

5. Accept a Game for What It Is
There just isn't any other way to state it: experiencing one game does not mean you've experienced them all, and the experiences you've had might not transfer over. This is pretty difficult to accept in our RPG culture because of the prevalence of Dungeons and Dragons, Pathfinder, and World of Darkness. Once you get outside of the mainstream games, however, the play experience becomes wildly different.  I don't know how often I've had to take basic assumptions about GM'ing and throw it right out the window so that way I could run this game properly. Seriously, secretiveness was the hardest thing for me to change in my GM'ing style for this game, but I'll get better at it...

4. Collaboration is Key
Oof, this one's not too easy either, especially with our biggest RPGs putting all the world-building and story duties on the DM. I've found that having everyone else help make the world makes it so much easier on me that I think I'll just make it mandatory from now on in whatever game I'm running. Collaboration in everything makes GM'ing more pleasurable and easier, and really makes the playing as cooperative as I've always wanted.

3. Everyone Needs to Read the Damn Rules
This is so basic I wonder why people don't just do this as a courtesy, but most of the people I've met who play D&D never really bother to learn the rules, because the DM does everything already, so why not leave everything to him? Not quite in Burning Wheel. Players are expected to know the rules, and the reasons for that start to get painfully obvious once you realize that you have to stop the game and read the rules out loud for the third time because no one else bothered to look the up...


2. Gamers Play What They're Rewarded For
A simple act of human nature: people are more likely to do actions they're rewarded for. That's why you get psychopaths who believe that humans aren't intrinsically good, because we reward good behavior (If we aren't good intrinsically why do we reward good behavior?). This carries into all our interactions, games especially. It's also something that's very frustrating to not understand (particularly when you try to get a real story going and your players just wanna kill the monsters and take their treasure) and to try to counter. Don't counter that instinct, run with it!

1. One Size Does Not Fit All
By the time the campaign finished, it became obvious which out of the seven people actually liked Burning Wheel for what it was and wished to play the game itself. I'll give you a quick hint, it's less than half, and that's OK. Different games scratch different itches, and that may be the most important thing to walk away from. A game cannot be everything for everyone, because it'll wind up being a crappy game for no one.

Wednesday, April 25, 2012

Tuesday, April 3, 2012

My List of RPGs

Here's the RPG's I own, with a short review of each one if I have any play experience of them. My actual experiences aren't all the impressive, but oh well.

Dungeons and Dragons 4th Edition


Books Owned
Players Handbooks 1, 2, and 3
All the power source books
Eberron, Forgotten Realms, and Dark Sun
Manual of the Planes
The Shadowfell boxed set
Madness at Gardmore Abbey boxed set
Both DM's Guides
Monster Manuals 1 and 2
Time Played: 5 years. No, not 4 and a half. I was playing this game off of bits of leaked info 6 months before the game was released.
4th edition was the first RPG I ever loved. Totally disgusted by 3rd edition, I found in 4th what I was looking for: a tactical game that allowed for some awesome action scenes. It's the RPG I've spent the most time with, by far. After a span of time trying to make 4th edition be a true narrative game I've found enough games that actually do narrative play to allow 4th edition to be what it always was: an awesome tactical RPG.

Star Wars SAGA
Books Owned
Core Rulebook
Threats to the Galaxy
The Unknown Regions
Knights of the Old Republic era
Rebellion era
Legacy era
Time Played: One campaign and approximately four sessions.
Star Wars SAGA is one of those games that, when I sit down to actually play it, I find I enjoy immensely. The action is incredibly fast and cinematic and, in some ways, plays better than 4th edition. The only reason I haven't played so much SAGA? I've always been playing long-term games with 4th. Thankfully that won't be a problem after this year.

Mutants and Masterminds 2e
Books Owned
Mutants and Masterminds
Masterminds Manual
Paragons Campaign Setting
Time Played: 4 sessions
Talk about a missed opportunity. I loved playing this game, and yet I've played... a measly 4 sessions. Huh. Darn. Well, it's going to come up. I bought the Paragons Campaign Setting, and I'll definitely be using it sometime sooner than later.

Burning Wheel
Books Owned
Burning Wheel Gold
Monster Burner
Magic Burner
Adventure Burner
Time Played: 5 sessions

As the second newest addition to my RPG collection, Burning Wheel has completely reshaped how I view RPGs in five...short... sessions... This will become my main RPG after Situational Blindness is done. Period.



Mouse Guard


Books Owned
The box set
Sessions Played: 1
I list it as a separate game from Burning Wheel because, while it uses the same basis as Burning Wheel, it really is its own distinctive game. After one play session I've decided that I'll be running this and Burning Wheel this summer. Yes, they're both that good.

World of Darkness
Books Owned
World of Darkness (new)
Time Played: One year
I've run and played in a game in the last year, and I have to say that the greatest thing about this system is the lore they've set up. Don't get me wrong, the game rules are pretty stellar. But, overall, I say the system is easy to play in and to run. Willpower isn't actually used all  that much, but Carpe and I found a way to hack the system to where it runs better.

Gamma World
Books
Gamma World boxed set
Time Played: 12 sessions
Oh gosh, this game is... this game is... words fail me. Sunohara probably has more to do with my impressions of this game than anything, but it doesn't matter. This game is awesome. But you have to have the right group of people to play it. I still play it from time to time whenever I need a laugh.


Changeling the Lost
Hunter the Vigil
Vampire the Requiem
Serenity


The above are games that, while I haven't played them yet, I really look forward to doing so! I like their lore and their feel, and will play them whenever I can. I do have a Vampire-Hunter game in mind, some day...

EDIT: Since it was so close to the actual posting date, I decided to add Mouse Guard in.

Thursday, March 29, 2012

4eMOD: The oAssassin

I can't remember exactly what my initial reaction was when I originally saw the Assassin come out on DnD Insider. I know it involved a lot of staring, shouting, and eventually screaming in joy. I do remember the lasting peace that spread through everywhere and warmed the cockles of my overjoyed heart, though. That was pretty distinctive.

So was my letdown upon seeing the boards. Apparently the Assassin sucks.

Now, this was news to me. My friend Sunohara had played an assassin awhile back in one of my games, and he had a blast. He played the class as it should have been: someone who hides in the shadows, destroys one target with a well-placed blow, and moves on. Granted, in that game I had cut the HP in half and doubled the damage of the monsters, but that's moot, right? Wrong. Turns out when you mess with the math like that it pretty severely skews things in the assassin's favor. I looked at charts and graphs and arguments, and concluded the naysayers were right. Had I not modified the math as I did, Sunohara's assassin (named Blackstar after an anime character who I just now had the... pleasure... of meeting... *twitches*) wouldn't have been nearly as effective. "Well, I thought, we'll just have to fix that." So I did.

The assassin is, in my opinion, one of the most interesting and well-designed classes in the game, even if its not one of the most effective. It sets up a style of play extremely effectively, to the point to where I try to push that in all my 4eMOD classes. But, it does need a few tweaks for effectiveness. Here are a few things I would add:

Weapon Finesse: This lets the assassin use Dexterity for his melee basic attack and damage rolls. That little change alone lets the assassin play so much more offensively it's almost ridiculous. Seriously, an assassin can charge now! Laugh if you will, but sometimes that extra movement can make all the difference, especially because of...

Death Attack: If any attack of yours would reduce a target to 10 HP or less you may kill the target as a free action. At level 21 you may kill  a target when you reduce it to 15 HP instead. So what if I stole this from the Essentials assassin, and then made it better? It's a pretty flavorable (and powerful) ability. And really, who wants Essentials to be better?

Poison Adept: An assassin has sold his soul to the Shadowfell, and has gained power from it. His soul itself is death, and your body now oozes a black fluid that's deadly to whomever touches it. As a minor action you may make your next attack gain the poison keyword. If the attack used has the poison keyword already you get a +2 power bonus to the damage roll of the next attack. At level 11 increase this damage to +4, and at level 21 increase this damage to +6. Why have this? It makes the Venom Hand feat tree actually worthwhile now! The assassin should be a poisoner, it's built right into the idea of an assassin. So let's push that as far as possible. This makes the DPS the assassin deals without shrouds more potent, and allows us to get to the Death Attack that much quicker!

Assassin's Shroud: Finally, the ability that got the most tweaks. The Shroud is an awesome idea in theory, but in practice it could have done much much better. So I changed the flavor. Instead of putting "invisible shrouds" on your foe, you make your own shadow a creature of death.

Basically, Noob Saibot from MK9

So all the time spent "building up shrouds"? You're making your own shadow solid, so it can leap out and deal a huge attack when least expected! This is the essence of the Shroud ability, to catch someone so completely unawares you destroy them.

Change the range on Assassin's Shroud to Personal, and the target yourself. And then, change the first line of the second paragraph to this instead:

Before you make an attack roll against any target, you may choose to invoke either all of your shrouds or none of them. 

Add the following special:

Special:  When you invoke your shrouds and have all four of them your shroud dice become d10's instead of d6's and deals normal damage even on a miss. This includes minions.

All powers talking about the target of your shrouds must now be changed to any target. The assassin's only reason for not attacking from round to round is only that he has so few hit points that getting hit once will almost certainly bloody him (especially if he's been an annoyance before).

And we're still not done. More insult must be given to injury. Two of the At-Wills have to be modified, because they're essentially worthless. Make sure Inescapable Blade adds the assassin's dexterity modifier to the damage roll, and leaping shade does 2 extra damage for each shroud you've invoked, not 1 (and 4 extra damage per shroud at 21st level), and the assassin is mostly fixed. And by mostly fixed I mean some of the other powers aren't as great as they could be, but with those baseline fixes to the class the assassin is now a huge threat. I mean, huge. This is a guy who will be pinballing between all available targets to kill them with a deadly mix of poison, well-placed attacks, and his own shadow! The fact that he has such low HP is more of a thrill now, if you ask me! One good hit and you're dead. But the same is true of your target.

Wednesday, March 21, 2012

Thoughts on Creating a High-Fantasy "Story-Based" Game


Everyone who plays DnD has played high fantasy. Y'know, the swashbuckling, heart and fist pumping,constant magic, awesomeness, etc., typa fiction. I was thinking about how to take the feel of high fantasy and make it more story and narrative-based. The first thing to do is to realize that the game will quickly fall into line for whatever you reward the most. What should a high fantasy game reward? Here's a few ideas.

High Risk-Reward Actions
Swinging off a chandelier to kick someone in the face, breaking the floor beneath a foe to temporarily knock him over, jumping down a monster's throat to shred his insides, etc. These are the types of things that people who are in a high fantasy story do often. Players should be rewarded for these types of decision that, while they're bone-headed in a low fantasy system, are the bread and butter of high fantasy.

Intertwined Plot and Action
I've always seen low fantasy as more character driven, because you're dealing with the failings of the world and how people deal with that. In low fantasy the plot must deal with characters being aware of the possibility of failure at every possible second, only to succeed anyway. High fantasy is much more akin to Gurrenn Lagann's "Who the hell do you think we are???" type of fiction: attempting the impossible and somehow getting away with it. The emphasis is in the amount of thought afforded to the odds.

Low fantasy? Dude, you'll spend forever making sure everyone doesn't die. Because they will.

High fantasy? LET'S KICK IN THE DOOR, BITCHES, WE'RE GONNA KICK SOME ASS!

It's like the difference between Halo and Mass Effect. In Halo you just go and kill the aliens. Mass Effect you have to slug through all the grunt work, getting people to overcome their inner foibles and such, otherwise you won't have the best type of ending. In Halo you just walk in and do it yourself. Character work must serve the action, not the other way around.

Gurren Lagann-Style Thought
... or lack thereof. A high fantasy RPG should reward those actions that you feel from your gut. Wanna just shoot the politician who's holding things up, give an awesome speech that'll convince all the people who were formerly against you, and lead them all to fight the big bad? In a high fantasy game you should be rewarded for those types of actions. That doesn't mean complications won't happen because of your boldness, quite the contrary! That'll screw up a LOT. The difference is that you'll make it awesome.

A Clear-Cut Resolution Mechanic
You cannot have a dice pool for a high fantasy game. Either the thing worked or it didn't. I'm not saying d20, but there can't be shades of gray in the feel of the mechanics either, which is something a dice pool models rather well.  

To sum up: high fantasy is all about the gut and the intuition. Obstacles are things to be overcome, setbacks are to be smashed through, and enemies are to either get out of the way or be defeated.

There, Carpe, there's my thoughts on a high-fantasy story game. Make an RPG inspired by Gurren Lagann!

Tuesday, March 13, 2012

Burning Wheel Review Part 5 (Final Part): Romeo, Juliet, and the Raksha


 So far I've run three playtests, two of which were written about on this blog. Over spring break I decided I wanted to run another playtest, this time with characters made by the players (no pregens). I told them the setting was "Romeo and Juliet gone worse", and to build 4 life-path human characters. I got some grumbles about being a racist bastard, but they relented when I told them I was the GM and they had to deal with it. Go authoritarian GMing!

Anyway, at the last second two more people joined in (literally for Mrs. Schmitty, she walked in the door!), so we had to use pre-gens for those two. We all sat down together, tossed a few ideas around, and generated a setting and backstory.

Backstory: 10 years ago Ellen Guelph disappeared. All rumors pointed to Marcus Redgate, but no conclusive evidence could be found, and so the case remained a mystery. Apollo Guelph, the head of the Guelph household, was more than convinced, however, and declared war on the Redgates. Over the ten years leading up to this session the one-sided conflict became a full-scale cold war, and the city of Venicea suffered as a result.


Player Characters


Saravon Redgate (Schmitty)- The third son of Marcus and Francesca Redgate. Since he's not the heir (or even the second-in-line), Marcus is relatively free to do what he likes, so he's taken up sorcery and a beautiful young fiance by the name of Catherine.

Ezio Guelph (Raphael)-  The brother of Apollo, head of a vineyard. Ezio has given up on getting revenge on the Redgates, and has taken his nephew, Antonio, in and has started to tutor him to take over the vineyard someday.

Livia Guelph (Mrs. Schmitty)- A young sorceress who is related to the Redgates by marriage to Saravon's older brother, Donald. She believes the Redgates are evil to the core and would like nothing more than to embarrass him.

Aragon (Naomi): Aragon is the bastard child of Francesca Redgate. He's on good terms with Saravon. Aragon hunts in the woods out of Venicea. Hunts in the nearby woods, and is good with a bow.

Ezio woke up in the middle of the night to the sound of a crash. He ran outside to find two people running in his vineyard. As he watched, one of them tried to vault the wall and failed. The pursuer slashed her (judging from the scream) across the back, and both of them vaulted the wall and vanished. Ezio's nephew Antonio came running out of the house in a bathrobe, sword in hand, asking what was going on. After a few seconds of exchange Antonio runs out the vineyard, following the two mysterious figures. Ezio, correctly concluding that Antonio wouldn't be able to catch the two acrobatic trespassers in a bathrobe, shrugged and went back to bed.

Saravon Redgate woke up the next morning, to find his fiance Catherine in bed with him... suffering from a debilitating slash to her back. He woke her up, and she said they needed to talk. For the past month, she had been having an affair with Antonio Guelph. They were about to have another meeting last night at Antonio's room, when Saravon's father, Marcus, climbed in and started attacking them! The deep slash on Catherine's back was Marcus's work. She started crying, apologizing for her awful behavior, trying to explain that the affair meant nothing to her and that Saravon was the only one she could trust. Saravon simply told her that they would discuss it over breakfast, and got some bandages and alchemical agents to help her wound. He only found some sedatives, which would work in the short term, but she would need real healing sooner than later.

At about this point, Aragon snuck in  through the back door to see his mother, Francesca (since the rumor was that Marcus wasn't home). He spent a few minutes of chit-chat with Francesca, who asked him to kindly check the door leading to the roof. When he did, he found a trail of blood, and the door unlocked. He looked around the house, and poked his head into Saravon's room. The two of them had a short discussion about the whole "fiance in the bed" thing, and they agreed to discuss it more later.

Now my memory's fuzzy, because we danced around for a little while, but here's the gist of what happened in the middle.

  • Antonio admitted his affair to Ezio, who immediately began preparations to get his nephew out of town and into the country, with the possibility of Catherine joining him. 
  • Saravon used Mage Sense to see if Catherine was being magically controlled, and found a massively powerful enchantment on her. It was so powerful that he couldn't properly scan it, and realized he needed to test the enchantment later. He knew of no mage able to make this powerful of an enchantment.
  • Livia Guelph did a lot of the legwork in this part, gathering information on the Redgates for Ezio. She discovered that the Redgate house was up to something fishy in the criminal element, and that a lot of her former mage students had vanished after taking jobs from them. The ones who backed out had clammed up, and only after a few days of prying did she discover that there was a secret entrance to the Redgate residence in the sewers of the city.
  • Livia established contact with Saravon and Aragon, and convinced them to come with Catherine to Ezio's vineyard at night to see if Antonio had also been enchanted. 
  • When they got there, it became abundantly clear that Antonio was not enchanted. He was just young, dumb, and horny. They also learned that the enchantment placed on Catherine made her seek out Antonio to have sex with him whenever he was within a certain radius. 
That's when it began to rain like a monsoon, and Saravon was forced to shut his Mage Sense off. The rain was magical in nature, and so overpowering that Saravon couldn't afford to scan anymore. Someone knocked on Ezio's door, and he went to answer it.

He got the briefest glimpse before a vampiric Ellen Guelph punched clear acrost the room. Behind her came up Marcus Redgate, grinning broadly. He announced that the ten-year wait was over, and that the town would be "theirs" tonight. My players didn't want to use the extended Fight! rules, and elected for a Bloodied Versus against the vampyr. Aragon led the fight with his bow, and with a bit of aid from his friends chased the vampyr off. Marcus jeered at them, telling them that it was no use. The town was doomed. The rain that was falling would send everyone into a killing frenzy, and there was nothing they could do. Marcus openly proclaimed his part in the affair of Antonio and Catherine, proclaiming that it was just a bit more fun for him to inflict on the two families before they all died in a frenzy of angry townsfolk. Saravon (correctly) pointed out that Marcus had no spellcasting ability, so how did he get away with all of this?

Francesca Redgate walked into the room and announced her part in the tragedy.

She had been the one to turn Ellen Guelph into a vampyr, and had done the nuts-and-bolts work required to get the rain working.

Aragon stared, in shock, as his beloved mother began to tell him that all of them were being messed with for sheer amusement. This was a side project. Ezio's respones was to run up to Marcus and hit him in the face with a warhammer. I handed them the Fight! sheets and told them they weren't getting out of this one. They groaned, but decided to try it. Saravon pulled off the luckiest of lucky moves, and "critted" with the Shards spell, maiming Marcus right out the gate. Ezio very swiftly did the same to Francesca with his warhammer, and she surrendered. They begged that their lives be spared, that they didn't want to go back to hell. Ezio knocked off Marcus's head as his response. Everyone froze in horror.

Marcus's head had transformed into a tiger's head.So had Marcus's body.

Ezio stared at this a moment, and then killed Francesca. Her body also turned into a tiger's. Saravon recognized what they were now: Raksha, demon spirits from hell who played on the misfortune and inner turmoil of other sentient beings. They were the best at sewing discord. And, as they looked out the window at the rain, he realized they'd done their job admirably.

Everyone went under the Redgate residence (thanks to a few water-sealed barrels of Ezio's), and found miles upon miles of interconnected catacombs, filled with rotting corpses of tortured victims. At the very bottom of this heinous complex they found a statue to a god they did not recognize, nor did they want to. They destroyed the statue, and the rain stopped. But by then, Venicea was in shambles.


And with that, my last playtest is complete. My mind, assuming that it wasn't made up already (it was), is made up. Burning Wheel is exactly what I want in a game, down the scripting of actions ahead of time. The use of relationships was the finishing touch for me. All the NPC's listed in this blog post were made up by the players, along with what influence they would have on the story. If anything, I didn't use them all!

In short, Burning Wheel is an amazing game. I heartily recommend it to any and all people who want a good story in their RPGs.

Wednesday, March 7, 2012

Another Addition to Burning Star Wars: XP to Leveling

Whoever's idea it was to make XP, it wasn't mine!

I hate experience points. They're just numbers that do nothing until you get a certain number of them, which you get just for showing up! But if the gameplay is good enough, you should want to show up anyway!

Which is why Artha is an AWESOME system, because it rewards people for fulfilling their Beliefs and making a story! So why not link up the Force Points from my previous blog post to character advancement? Those, along with the Destiny points already present in Saga Edition, should be all the rewards anyone will ever need. Add in Action Points from 4e, and you have a very robust system. 

You level up when you spend 5 Force Points, 3 Action Points, and one Destiny Point. They need not be all spent in the same session.

A FURTHER CLARIFICATION AND ADDITION: You get your initial Force Points (divided up between Light and Dark) from your class, as stated in the SAGA edition rulebook. You get one Action Point at the beginning of the game, and are given more based upon the fulfillment of your Beliefs, at GM and the table's discretion, as per Burning Wheel rules. Since you get rewarded Force Points for fulfilling Beliefs as well, you'll find that this makes for a very adrenaline-pumping game.

GMs should make sure that villains get Force and Action Points in the same way the players do, to keep the original balance of the game intact. After all, why should the heroes get all the fun? Regular monsters and NPC's shouldn't have Action Points, however. Each Stormtrooper being able to pull off an Action Point? Gosh, that would be awful for the characters!

While not yet playtested, that looks like an amazing system. I can't wait to try it at some point! Comment if you do try it, and let me know how it goes!

Wednesday, February 29, 2012

Burning Wheel Review, Part 4: Trouble in Hochen

S'yeah, the series that focuses on Burning Wheel continues. I found out in the last review that Burning Wheel is designed for a very specific experience, one that really cannot (and should not) be tweaked. So this time I tried to play to the playstyle presented. I grabbed five people for Trouble in Hochen (another adventure from the Adventure Burner), and sat down to play. We had a knight, a sorcerer, a priest, an elf archer, and human trapper playing in this scenario.

The set-up is this: the town of Hochen is in the middle of a bad famine, they've abandoned the god Tolmud, and now there's a demon causing havoc! Everyone but the trapper was sent an official town letter asking for aid. They all traveled to the town, only to find that Marten, the mayor, was standing at the bridge telling them that nothing was wrong. Unfazed, they started to argue with Marten.

I stopped the game. "You all know you have a social combat mechanic for this, right? It's called the Duel of Wits". Everyone looked at me, rather excited. They chose the priest to be their primary talker, and I handed him a Duel of Wits sheet, and gave one to myself. The argument lasted for 6 volleys, ending with a splendid 8 damage Dismiss from the priest against Marten! Unfortunately Marten managed to knock off a few dice off the Duel of Wits pool on the players, and so a compromise was struck. The players were allowed to stay in the town and look around, but Marten wasn't going to admit to writing the letter that summoned them there. Not only that, but he wouldn't aid them in their search beyond giving them a place to stay for the night. The town showed signs of horrible mangling; claw marks were everywhere. The trapper noticed that these were bear claw marks, and no demon. After a meager meal and a lot more question-dodging, everyone went to sleep. They decided to take shifts because the townspeople looked a bit... unkind.

The trapper decided to go stay with his mother (both were natives of the town, although the trapper hadn't really been in the town for a few months), whom he hadn't seen in awhile. He found out that people had thought Tudom, the god of righteousness, had deserted the town. There were whispers that the people had fallen away in turn. Concerned, the trapper asked his mother to go stay with a friend until they could sort out whatever was going on.

The elf was up and keeping watch when he heard someone trip and curse outside. He looked outside to see most of the town heading for the central longhouse (this town's in the way up north, so hanging out in an open air market is beyond dumb). He alerted his companions, who snuck up on the house. The trapper joined them shortly thereafter because of the fore-mentioned tripping and cursing. The townspeople brought out an idol to the goddess of fertility, Tawaret, and started to pray to her and ask for her intercession. After a long while of chanting they started to talk about how the town was going to hell in a handbasket because of Marten's inability to lead. One man, the village blacksmith, said that they needed to sacrifice Marten, the "interlopers", and that bloody trapper to Tawaret to appease her and make her favor the town. The townspeople, in true cultish fashion, agreed.

That's when a giant grizzly bear busted through the side of the long house and began eating villagers. The knight immediately threw himself into combat, and the rest of the group moved to aid him.

This is where, once again, I screwed up. I thought: Fighting villagers is always boring. I'll let them fight the bear!

Fortunately, my players got the idea faster than I did. Fighting the bear was total insanity. They barely bruised the darn thing, the sorcerer got knocked around, and everyone in general was feeling pretty scared of the bear by the second volley of Fight! They ran. Amazingly, so did the bear.Which had black oil dripping from its orifices, BTW's (figured that might be an important detail) Almost like it was called off or something...

As they exited the building, the blacksmith confronted them and blamed them for causing even more trouble. He pulled out a blacksmith hammer and charged. The knight stepped in and knocked the blacksmith clear out. The sorcerer sensed that something really funky was going on magically around them, and she started to look around and see where the source was: Marten's lodge!

The rest of the party found a townsman lying on the ground, leg broken. Black oil was seeping into his leg and, despite the party's best efforts, the townsman died after a few moments. The priest stood up and gave a frankly beyond-epic speech, commanding the town to return to Tudom, that he had not abandoned them, that they had abandoned their god instead! More faith was required to make it through these hard times, and what could a fertility goddess do to help them, when their problem was wavering of heart? The townspeople looked on, shamed, but no one stepped forward.

Until they started hearing Marten screaming obsenities at them. He told them all to go away, that what they said couldn't possibly be true, he knew the truth. All of it! They noticed black oil was coming out of his eyes and nose as well, and the priest decided enough was enough. He exorcised Marten.

Now, here's where things get tense. I asked the priest to roll for a minor miracle (Obstacle 5), and he had 5 dice to roll. Now, granted, he could reroll 6's, since you can do that with Faith. He spent a Fate point, which allowed him to reroll 1 of the failures. He rolled 3 successes. He failed the check. I told him to receive a -3D wound penalty.

As the priest prayed over Marten, both of them began to scream in pain. The priest was sweating blood. The mayor? He was dissolving. With a final cry that left everyone's ears ringing Marten dissolved into a puddle of black goo. A crash was heard in Marten's house. Everyone ran in, to find a 3 foot-long black rod sitting on the floor. The sorceress reached to touch it (against the severely wounded priest's advice), to find that a part of the rod because black oil and ran under her fingernails. Immediately she found herself grappling with the will of rod. And while she did become infected, she finally found out what happened, as the rod revealed its properties to her.

The black rod was a necromantic item, that only a true death artist would be able to wield. This rod required a true master to make it, and (after a few questions of the townspeople), no one had ever known Marten to be a sorcerer of any kind. The black oil turned people into revenants within 3 days, assuming they were tough. The liquid needed to be drained out of everyone's body, and fast. The town doctor (the trapper's mother, ironically enough) was brought was in, and everyone was saved. The priest stayed to help the town get back on its feet, and within a few weeks things were much better.

So what're my impressions? First, Duel of Wits is AWESOME. Awesome awesome awesome. So awesome, in fact, that I'm probably going to keep modding up Star Wars to accommodate some of this stuff. Everyone was jazzed by the fact that talking was an actual part of the game now, and role-playing was required. Fight! rules were terrifying. Genuinely "holy crap everyone could have died" terrifying. People much preferred to talk because bloodshed was crippling, like in real life. Basically I found that Burning Wheel has a grittiness to it that makes actual role-playing more than a nice thing, but required for survival's sake! That far more suits the style of game I like running, as the damage tables that I drew up for 4th edition (which I'll eventually release), should attest.

Basically: this is the game I've always wanted to run. Period. Go Burning Wheel!

EDIT: Luke Crane, the creator of Burning Wheel, linked to this post via his Twitter! YEAH!!!!

FURTHER EDIT: I suppose I should try to act a little more dignified. I am a 23 year old man, after all. I mean, I guess the previous wasn't too bad, all things considered. I didn't squee. Anyway, I would like to thank Luke Crane for taking notice. Tis rather flattering. OK, I'm probably making too much of this. I'll shut up now.

Monday, February 27, 2012

RPGs and Group Dynamics

Disclaimer: For the people of both groups that I am talking about (Situational Blindness and Marks of Eberron), please don't misunderstand the post. Yes, I'm writing about y'all. But I'm doing my best to be as fair and balanced as I can. Whatever that means.
 
So there I am, playing my pally (Sir Varis Phlan) in my weekly 4e Eberron game, The Marks of Eberron. I've been playing in this game for a semester and a half now, and we've accomplished quite a bit. We've stopped a massive uprising of undead, burned brothels (a staple of any sane RPG group, I believe), and wandered over to Xen'drik to gather artifacts for the mysterious Chamber. This is my second PC (the first dying in a tragic potion drinking accident), and I like him as a character. He's a gruff and foul-mouthed Paladin of the Silver Flame who's looking to get revenge on a cardinal for murdering his mother, but still takes time to help build a church in between his adventures.I also like him mechanically. Like all pallies, he's remarkably tough. So tough, in fact, that he can take crits and walk out with only ten damage dealt to him. Pretty special, really. Well, the DM decided to see how far he could push my guy and... he just died. At the teeth of a Dracolich.

Granted, I had it coming. I marked like no one else's business and made sure to be as annoying as a pally can be (particularly when he's doing radiant damage to a zombie-like creature). Here's the weird thing, though.

I didn't care one wit. In fact, I was pretty bored. So bored, in fact, that my overly-neurotic self wanted to sell all my 4th edition books and jump straight into Burning Wheel.

What the hell is wrong with me? I wondered. I like 4th's system of combat, that's for sure. The At-Will, Encounter, and Daily system that 4th uses is extremely intuitive to me, as well as the skill use. I hemmed and hawed, and thought, and decided to hold off on dropping out quite yet.

The next night was my 4th edition game, Situational Blindness. And I had a blast! Combat was awesome, plot was generated by the players just as much as by me, and we ended early because a certain SOMEONE rolled yet ANOTHER nat 20 on a Bluff roll! Everyone was done, so we just sat around, and watched 3 seasons of The Guild.

Not sure what the hell is wrong with me, but oh well. I guess some of the difference is in the groups themselves: the people from my group, Situational Blindness, are all very intensive on storytelling. They want to build a narrative, and what a narrative we've built! It's messed up just how... convoluted that story gets. But there's 7 plot intensive people sitting in a room, what do you expect? Marks of Eberron is different. Not everyone is wanting the same thing. Some of us want plot. Some of us want to relax and kill shit. Some of us are new to the game, and are just excited to be there. The focus doesn't seem to be quite... there. Dunno, maybe I'm just nuts. Group composition seems to be pretty important, however.

So yeah, I think I learned something very important: people need to be grouped very carefully. They can't be shoe-horned into someone else's plot and dreams, they need their own room. That requires pre-game work, but, as I'm realizing, that stuff is extremely important. Without it people can't really connect in and play a role, because the game's not theirs.

What does that mean for me and Marks of Eberron? No idea. Obviously, I have some more thinking to do.

Sunday, February 19, 2012

Burning Wheel Part 3: My Playtesting of Burning Wheel

Soo.... I decided to run Burning Wheel.

For twelve people.

For those of you who have run Burning Wheel, start laughing. For those of you who haven't, I'll provide an example of why this is funny. Most of you who read this blog are at least familiar with Dungeons and Dragons. One of DnD's hallmarks is its flexibility.  You can do pretty much anything with the system. It's part of the reason why DnD is the flagship RPG of our hobby. They say to only have six people max, but, to be honest, DnD can be run with as many people as you'd like. At some point it gets impractical with one DM, but that doesn't stop the system from operating.

Not so with Burning Wheel. It is fickle, and requires very exact specifications.

As with everything in my life, I found this out the hard way. I adapted "The Sword" to 16 people with the help of the Adventure Burner's premade PC's, and tried to run it. Gah, that didn't work.  People got bored when only two of them could enter the Duel of Wits (which I didn't even understand properly, it turns out), so I did what normally would work in DnD.

I sicced a dragon on them, without reading the text block. As a DM of many years I figured it would be fine. Terrifying, but fine. So when the dragon incinerated half the party with one good blast,  I realized I'd made a mistake. The rest of the time the surviving party was trying to get away from the dragon with the sword. Ultimately they failed, and left the sword to the dragon.  I'd gotten the Fight! and the Duel of Wits rules wrong, and had pretty much flubbed up everything.

And yet, from what I could understand of the system as I ran it, this is exactly the type of system I want to run. I like the systems we ran. The brutality of the system just  makes... sense. Fighting a dragon was what I'd always imagined it to be: a terrifying experience that required running and the shitting of pants. Maybe it was the Mortal Kombat in me, but I liked the finality of it all. I'm not sure if Burning Wheel is for everyone.

In short, I loved it. I'll be running another playtest in two weeks. But this time it'll be with just FOUR people. I'll be running the Demon scenario from the Adventure Burner, for those of you who are curious.

Monday, February 13, 2012

Burning Star Wars SAGA: A Few Houserules


So here's a random idea. Light Side Points and Dark Side Points, tied into Beliefs. This is just a quick and dirty thought experiment, so it's not been tweaked or playtested. But I think it works really nicely for Star Wars SAGA, and would do tons for that game system.

I'll cover what the Points do first. The Light and Dark Side Points replace Force Points. When you make a character you divide up the amount of points you get from your classes between Dark and Light. You do not regain Force Points every level.

Light Side Points are a manifestation of the Light Side of the Force, and are extremely powerful. Whenever you use one you may either re-roll a d20 roll, amplify a Force Power (as Force Points normally did), negate a Dark Side Point (and nothing else), or regain your Second Wind. You regain Light Side Points by doing good deeds that threaten to complicate (and possibly end) your character's life.

For instance, let's say Han Solo hates the thought of Wookies being enslaved, so he helps save one's life. He gets kicked out of the Imperial Academy, but he gains a Light Side Point! Don't forget that the Wookie stuck with him til the end, too.


Dark Side Points are a manifestation of the Dark Side of the Force, and are highly corrupting. You may spend a Dark Side Point to add a bonus equal to 1d6+half-level to a damage roll, amplify a Force Power (as Force Points normally did), or regain your Second Wind. Whenever you spend a Dark Side Point you not only generate another Dark Side Point but you lose a Light Side Point. You get Dark Side Points by using Dark Side Powers and committing evil and selfish deeds, even if it's not to your benefit.

Now then, there's Beliefs. These are similar to Burning Wheel. You must have three. These Beliefs must be specific and have a plan of action written into them.  

Darth Vader is evil and must be vanquished.

Beliefs must have a Light or Dark descriptor on them as well. This helps describe the general intent of your belief, of whether or not your character means well in his belief. Whenever you fulfill one of these Beliefs you get the descriptor's Force Point, regardless of whether it's a good or evil action.

So, for instance, I said in my belief that Darth Vader must be vanquished. I attach a Light Side descriptor to this Belief. Whenever I take a step in the direction of fulfilling this Belief, regardless of what type of action it is, I get a Light Side Point. This represents the relative purity of intention. Of course, if I keep doing Dark Side things with a Light Side belief, that might piss the GM off.


If you keep abusing your Beliefs to get a plethora of both Points the GM may start a vote to change the descriptor of your Belief. If there is a universal vote, your Belief's descriptor is changed. This is to prevent power gaming and those bastard munchkins who think that the best way to play the game is to exploit it. ROLE PLAYING GAMES ARE NOT MADE WITH MUNCHKINS IN MIND, AND THE RULES SHOULD REFLECT THAT.  The GM may not invoke this vote unless it is obvious to all involved that the offender in question is only in it for exploiting the rules.

All feats that apply to Force Points apply to Light and Dark Side Points.

That's it for now. If you guys have any helpful additions and thoughts, please comment! I'll incorporate the suggestions into the main post and attribute whoever suggested it.

Tuesday, January 24, 2012

Burning Wheel, Part 2: The Monster Burner



So, as usual, this isn't much more than a review after what's a cursory glance. The question I had when looking at this book was: will it help me make monsters in Burning Wheel?

The answer is a resounding YES. This'll help me make amazing monsters for Burning Wheel.

Wait, what's all this other stuff in here? Interesting...

OK, so there's a lot more to the Monster Burner than it looks at first glance. There's a section detailing the stats and why they are the way they are, the 100 questions for making a monster, and quite a number of monstrous races, complete with lifepaths for players, several appendices detailing the math behind shades and using the monsters. And of course, the wonderful information on how to build your own lifepaths and traits. There's more, but this is the stuff I thought was important, so I'm gonna review it!

Really, this thing is a catch-all. The sections on stats and shades I found extremely illuminating, and I'm tempted to show my future players these sections for their own education. It just seemed more informative than the Gold explanation, and a lot more in depth! The monster races I like to a certain extent. Basically it seemed like it was just loving on Orcs as far as player races were concerned, which was a bit annoying. That being said, I wouldn't mind using these lifepaths to make really detailed monsters the players would have to face. As a resource for a GM this part is fantastic, but I really wouldn't want to see these as player races.

Of course, I could be (and probably am) wrong. Dunno. Has anyone tried any of these races? If so, please comment and let me know how it went!

The custom lifepaths and traits section is just flat-out amazing. I loved looking through and realizing that creating these things would be relatively easy, especially with the guidelines in the book! I can't wait to give this particular section a whirl and draw up a few lifepaths for, say, a sci-fi game. Or a Japanese game. Or whatever. That's the beauty. These sections are so bloody simple that you could pretty much hack the game however you wanted, and the game would still have a pretty similar level of quality!

This is exactly the sort of book I've always wanted for an RPG: something that breaks down the math and shows me how to make anything I want. Rather than go and make tons of cash off of us by requiring that we buy everything that comes up into his head before releasing the math, Mr. Crane lets us under the hood immediately, and helps us do exactly what RPGs are supposed to do: make up whatever we want and have a good time doing it.

Ha, Carpe! Got here first!

Tuesday, January 17, 2012

Review of Burning Wheel Gold, Part 1: The Main Book

... sorta. Carpe beat me to it, cause I locked myself out of my house for the weekend, away from my book and computer. So maybe there was some interference. I don't think Carpe's above that sorta thing, personally. I demand an investigation!

What's that? Carpe doesn't live in Kansas anymore? Bah. His family doesn't live that far away from me...

I'm not saying anything. Just... stating facts.

Anyway.

There are a lot of RPGs out there that sport "new and edgy" mechanics. These books are filled with self-important prose, proclaiming how different these games are from, well, Dungeons and Dragons really. There are so many of these bloody games it makes my head spin, so I usually avoid the majority of them, and stick with a few "trustworthy" RPGs: Dungeons and Dragons, World of Darkness, Mutants and Masterminds, Star Wars Saga, and Serenity. Each of these games gives something new and different to my gaming experience. Dungeons and Dragons is Dungeons and Dragons, World of Darkness gives me my horror kick, Mutants and Masterminds my superheroes shot, Star Wars is Star Wars, and Serenity for a more story-based game, and well, DUH, it's Serenity!

Burning Wheel has joined the rotation. Officially.

Good God this book is sexy


What does it do? It's the character RPG of the group. No, really. This is the only RPG I've ever seen to go this far in making sure that character comes first. "XP", also known as Artha, is given for playing the character according to the Beliefs and Instincts outlined by the player. Your skills increase, sure, but without the Artha it would be a very gritty dungeon crawl. Unfortunately I haven't played the game yet, so this is just a read-through review (and probably a rather shoddy one at that), but Artha really is what makes the game so different. It's given for holding to Beliefs, for making everyone stop dead with laughter. The group is also much more important to gameplay than in any other RPG, since the group can give traits to players and penalize munchkins as a collective, as well as award Artha for roleplaying (unanimous vote, people!). I'm always one for increased player participation, so this stuff's AWESOME in my eyes. It also scratches the fantasy itch that was implanted right along with that pesty little Alien egg when I was kid.

I should probably have a doctor look at it.

To compare this game to Dungeons and Dragons is a bit of an insult to both games, honestly. They're both so different from each other that I hesitate to say they're even related, beyond sharing the fantasy genre (and even then they're on opposite sides). This is a game that competes well with D&D by creating a completely different experience: one driven by player and character just as much as by GM. Honestly, this game is sooo frickin' long (600 pages for the basic book!) that reviewing the whole thing is far beyond the scope of a casual gamer like myself.

I will say this, though: if you want a game system that is focused on character, with a sense of darkness and light that you only get in fantasy, a game that asks questions that no other RPG will even think to ask, if you want a story,  get this book. It's only 25 bucks for 600 pages, people! That's a wonderful steal in today's economy, especially considering that this is really all a player will ever need. Seriously, it's all in here. Are there more options? Probably, but the way this game's set up the options that are here will last a players for decades, in a way that makes other RPGs almost shallow in comparison. I know that, once I'm done with my current Dungeons and Dragons game, Burning Wheel will become my main RPG.

I will be getting the Monster Burner (basically the GM's book) today. I'll get you a basic review sometime this weekend, provided I don't lock myself out of the frickin' house again. Carpe, I will get revenge for your foul play!