Two new RPG's and my little wishlist for SaS

[EinBein]

Hej guys, it's been a while since last there were some fertile discussions on these forums, so I thought I let you know what I thought when reading through these two new arrivals in my RPG library and what I think are good lessons in RPG rulebook-layout and rules design that can be learned from the two examples:

• Trudvang Chronicles
• Blades in the Dark

Trudvang Chronicles

I backed this game mainly due to the gorgeous artwork. Look at it... It's just... breathtaking... I'd immediately love to go hiking in some nordic woods...



Anyways, I was disappointed when flipping through the rules. The reason for this are lack of focus and campaign aid. Let me explain myself:

First topic: Focus
The rules are so utterly generic, it hurts my feelings to see this bland ruleset in combination with the outstanding art and background. Yes, the rules are not old D20 ruleset at least, but not much better. Written in the project description, the combat rules sounded a bit TROS-y, though I was much mistaken:

• Heroes and monsters have hit points (though they don't improve much for PC's like in D&D, heroes basically never improve on hitpoints).
• Characters have some kind of combat point "pools". They can be split into several sub-totals for multiple actions during one combat round. If you do an action, the sub-total that you reserved for the action (like attacking or parrying) is the max for a simple d20 test (like in DSA - The Dark Eye actually, but more dynamic). It looks like a total mess in all combat examples, as there are several sources of these combat points and many of them are exclusive for certain uses. Like the specialization for weapon fighting provides points only when using weapons or other skills that provide only points for movement actions, etc.

The only things apart from combat that are - a wee bit - different are:

• The addition of rules for fear (characters accumulate fear points when fighting fearsome foes, suffering some penalties with increasing points until they become mad at 51+ points...).
• Rules for wilderness travel ("trapper's life"). These are VERY disappointing: they're basically just counting days until you have to roll some survival tests that just tell you how many more days you have before dying in the vast landscape of Trudvang. In The One Ring, they introduced an innovative travelling system with different roles for the party members and possible outcomes and ideas for complications and so forth. Yes, these may feel a bit boardgame-y, but at least they are tailored for a travel-heavy world and support the fiction! They provide help for the lone game master on how to challenge the players without just rolling on random monster tables day after day...
• The magic and prayers system. These magic/prayers reminded me heavily of the Rolemaster spell lists with the twist that all magic is supposed to cause a mirrored negative/positive effect based on the spell in question (you heal someone, someone/-thing else in the vicinity is hurt; you damage someone, someone/-thing else in the vicinity is healed; you magically submit a message, somewhere in the vicinity, some meassage is misunderstood/not delivered; etc.).

I would have wished for a rules system that supports the fiction. That links into the background world somehow. Something that helps to feel the danger, vastness and loneliness out there in the woods. The mistrust in violent and (wonderfully alien) human cultures and the wickedness and twistedness of the strange creatures of the forest.

Second topic: Campaign aid
The campaign section of the GM book provides a lot of wildlife texts (most fluff texts for the different environs of Trudvang plus the super slim trapper's life rules mentioned above) and a guide on how to distribute adventure points. Nothing else... ... ...

My first guestion was: How are you supposed to manage the balancing act between the endlessness and hostileness of Trudvangs beautiful environment and background world and the fact, that roleplaying is about interaction? What do the "heroes" do in this "empty" or at least very much hostile world?

The answer to my question on the forum was: Just use adventures from other viking roleplaying games and you are good to go... That's NOT what I think is a good answer, because these adventures - available though they may be - do not convey the specialness of Trudvang in particular. They convey a generic viking experience. Where is the world-specific advise?

People coming from a D&D background frequently ask on the forums about "challenge levels" of the monsters... I couldn't care less about building fair encounters, I'd just like to have some support on how to convey the fiction without boring my players to death. After one or two sessions I'd be out of options to describe all those wonderful nature, transport the setting into the next big city and just skip the nature part... Maybe I'm not creative enough for this game.

Anyways, let's have the look at the other spoil of shopping:

Blades in the Dark

I didn't back this game when it was on KS, just didn't notice it or maybe saw it without being aware what gem would become of it. Anyways, I read about it somewhere else and bought it on DriveThrough and...

...it is just ingenious. It's an easy to learn, creative sandbox with rules specifically and carefully tailored for one narrowly focused kind of fiction. The PC's are a crew of scoundrels in a post-apocalyptic gloom-/steampunk city named Doskvol or Duskwall, starting from a small "garage operation" and being able to follow their agendas up along the ladder of the criminal underground.



There is a non-exhaustive list of ingenious mechanics like:

• The "crew" (group of PC's) is a character of its own. The group can be choose a crew type like Assassins, Bravos, Hawkers, Thieves, a Cult, etc. - which provides the type of adventures they are getting crew-xp's for. This is basically like the "group-drive" (speaking in S&S terms). They can level up the crew, claim turf and special locations like brothels or temples, etc. (would be an idea anyways to have Group Drives, wouldn't it?)
• Characters are chosen from "playbooks", which - like crews - are also kind of reminding of S&S, because those playbooks specify which methods of problem-solving provide xp for the character (violence for a Cutter, technical skills for a Leech, stealth for a Lurk, etc.). It doesn't matter which playbooks form the crew. You could play a crew of Smuggler with two Cutters for example. Those Smugglers would just use a lot of violence and coercion in order to bring their wares from A to B...
• All the things going on and which are related to the crew's experience are tracked in "clocks" and proceed as a result to the crew's actions or just because the gamemaster tells a story with them. They provide numerous anchors for adventure and tell the players that they are not alone in the city. And the PC's can chose to interfere with these happenings or follow their own devices, just as they see fit (though clocks are also used to track short-term actions, like combat, lockpicking, sneaking past guards, etc.)
• In order to get extra dice, player's can accept a Devil's Bargain, presented by the GM or other playaers. These are disadvantages in relation to the action in question that they can impose unto themselves in this way.
• My favorite is Flashbacks. Especially in games, where the group is planning and conducting heists a lot, this planning can take hours and hours, just to break down completely with the first encounter on their way to the goal and dissolving into chaos and mayhem. Instead, in BitD, the players set a certain tectic (assault, deception, stealth, etc.). Together with the plan comes one detail: Where do we assault? What is the angle of the deception? And then starts the score... An initial engagement roll determines the starting situation. How is the entry going? Any immediate complications? Then, its a flow of action, complication and reaction going on and on until fulfillment. Any time the group faces unforeseen obstacles though, the PC's can introduce flashbacks. These are basically the same as narrative effects you could buy for Drives in SaS, but instead being attributed to sheer luck, the player explains how he prepared for the provision to be there. Instead of "I jump out of the window on the hay cart, driving by miraculously in this very moment" the player describes a short scene where he prepared for the cart to be there in time. It feels professional. Like the Ocean's movies.

In relation to the Trdvang example above, BitD delivers everything what I missed and more:

First topic: Focus
BitD is the definition of focus: the scope of the fiction is clearly defined as per above and the rules are tailored to it. Many "hacks" are now being generated by fans labelled "Forged in the Dark"-hacks under the umbrella of the publisher to cater for different tastes, but every single successor system is still focused.

This means for sure that there is not so much freedom as in S&S. While S&S lets the player choose Drives from an infinite number of open ideas and lets you play campaigns from stone age into the renaissance and from military backgrounds to the intrigues at court out of the book, BitD lets you choose the general vibe of the campaign: Want to kill people? Play an Assassin crew. Want to deal with illegal goods and their transportation? Play a crew of Smugglers. etc. But in the end, all crew types are made up of scoundrels in the gutters of this one city.

Second topic: Campaign aid
John Harper (the author of BitD) included an extensive chapter on how to play BitD. Which is very much appreciated, as the system is much different than any other RPG I played before (though with some similarities to the premises of S&S). He has a chapter of best practises and advise for players and one for the GM.

All in all, the mechanical side of BitD can look a bit ... well, mechanically. But in fact, at least watching John Harper GMing on Twitch or Youtiube, you can see the gears working together to inspire the fiction and deliver action at all times.

---

Anyways, this is not to say that BitD and SaS are in any way redundant, but they are similar enough in player-driven-fiction-focus to learn from each other. And also from the faults of Trudvang. I'd just wish SaS to include a chapter where the GM and the players get some advise on how this particular system works best in the form of best practises.

What do you think?

[Benedict]

Hej guys, it's been a while

Indeed.

Trudvang Chronicles

I backed this game mainly due to the gorgeous artwork. Look at it... It's just... breathtaking... I'd immediately love to go hiking in some nordic woods...

And have some Amon Amarth playing.

youtu.be/ARnBgW5XgSo

Yes, this is good artwork. Breaks away from the stereotypical my-PC-is-badass poses we usually get nowadays. Apart from the artist's skill which is evident, there is narrative conveyed, which imho should be the #1 goal in RPGs artwork-wise.

For the rules I can't say much, apart that it sounds segmented for no reason.

Some points:

• Is there a solid core mechanic? By the looks of it not really. More like circumstantial rules exceptions.
• Hitpoints are not bad by themselves. The notion that throughout 10-1 hp you function perfectly and at 0 you die is bad. And slabs of hit points. After all, if you think about it, S+S also has hit points. 5 to be exact. What if they are called Wound Levels? It's the way the whole functions that makes it great.
• Always liked Fear concepts. Still tracking shite to the 50s sounds horrible.
• Survival and Travelling. That's a thing that sounds a bit rushed. I've always had my players roll up shite like this up front at the start of a trip. The better the roll, the smoother the trip. Bad roll? More encounters, lost time due to bad weather, provisions packed improperly resulting to moldy food, etc. Especially 'Bastards with Margin of Success/Failure works like a charm with this. Oh, and I always have custom "encounter" tables that include anything from fights to heavy rain and earthquakes. A little planning can go a long way.

How are you supposed to manage the balancing act between the endlessness and hostileness of Trudvangs beautiful environment and background world and the fact, that roleplaying is about interaction? What do the "heroes" do in this "empty" or at least very much hostile world?

The answer to my question on the forum was: Just use adventures from other viking roleplaying games and you are good to go... That's NOT what I think is a good answer, because these adventures - available though they may be - do not convey the specialness of Trudvang in particular. They convey a generic viking experience. Where is the world-specific advise?

Seriously now, did they have the Devil running at their backs shouting "DEADLINE - DEADLINE" or something? When designing a world specific game it's better to detail the world and say something like "use OpenD6 or whatever..." than this: " Just use adventures from other viking roleplaying games and you are good to go..."

Blades in the Dark

Now this sounds better. Sanbox me likey. But. I personally get bored of post-apocalyptic steampunk stuff. Sorry, just not my thing.

I might "borrow" a rule or three tho if it is as good as you say and I get my hands on it.

The "crew" (group of PC's) is a character of its own. The group can be choose a crew type like Assassins, Bravos, Hawkers, Thieves, a Cult, etc. - which provides the type of adventures they are getting crew-xp's for. This is basically like the "group-drive" (speaking in S&S terms). They can level up the crew, claim turf and special locations like brothels or temples, etc. (would be an idea anyways to have Group Drives, wouldn't it?)

Don't forget that we have a Faction chapter pending hopefully. Which is the first thought that came to mind when I read the above.

Anyways, this is not to say that BitD and SaS are in any way redundant, but they are similar enough in player-driven-fiction-focus to learn from each other. And also from the faults of Trudvang. I'd just wish SaS to include a chapter where the GM and the players get some advise on how this particular system works best in the form of best practises.

I'm sure there will be a handy GM section on that. Dunno what the guys are planning. But my personal approach is this:

Imho the heart of 'Scoundrels - as 'Bastards before it - is Drives. You can't go wrong with them. It needs some planning on your GMing to get it rolling, but when it does, it hits you and the players like a truck filled with bricks. Just don't forget. In order to do that you have to act like a mischievous genie that twists wishes around. Make em love the setting and the characters through narrative, then make it tumble upon them for everything they chose. Like what thirtythr33 did in Floating City.

[taelor]

Blades is pretty cool. I ran a short campaign of it a year or so ago. As GM, you really need to stay on the ball with keeping the players engaged. (This is true of all systems, but in general, I've found that it's especially true of Apocalypse World derived games, which BitD ultimately is, much more so than, for example, the Burning Wheel derived games that I normally play)

[EinBein]

Yes, this is good artwork. Breaks away from the stereotypical my-PC-is-badass poses we usually get nowadays. Apart from the artist's skill which is evident, there is narrative conveyed, which imho should be the #1 goal in RPGs artwork-wise.

Nah, there are enough hero poses from Paul Bonner as well, though also some desperate ones, as you can see here: Paul Bonner Artworks

Some points:

• Is there a solid core mechanic? By the looks of it not really. More like circumstantial rules exceptions.

There is a solid core mechanic, yes. Quite simple actually: It's a d20 roll under system where the TN is the total of the applicable skill (0 to 10) plus an applicable discipline (0 to 5) plus an applicable speciality (0 to 10) plus or minus an applicable trait/attribute (-4 to +4). Disciplines and specialties are basically two layers of specialization. See the skill tree for Fighting for a better understanding:

[*]Hitpoints are not bad by themselves. The notion that throughout 10-1 hp you function perfectly and at 0 you die is bad. And slabs of hit points. After all, if you think about it, S+S also has hit points. 5 to be exact. What if they are called Wound Levels? It's the way the whole functions that makes it great.

I believe this is a matter of taste. The damage system in Trudvang is also easy: Every weapon deals 1d10 damage when connecting. Depending on the heaviness of the weapon, it gains a larger "open roll" range (exploding faces). One handed light weapons have OR10 (reroll 10's), one handed heavy weapons have OR 9-10 and two-handed weapons have OR8-10. If you have a lot of exploding dice, it's basically a critical. Nothing to do with skill value here. The problem with active attack and parry (same as in our German "Dark Eye" with binary results for both rolls is, that there will be a lot of rolls where nothing signifcant happens. Either because of an attacker's miss or a successful parry.

Additionally, there are no rules for fighting multiple opponents. You just count down initiative and everyone acts so long as they have combat points to spend. "Chaos" comes from the fact that initiative is rolled and then (privately) modified by chosen action type. The GM counts down from max. value and players call their turns when their privately calculated modified initiative is called for. It's a nightmare for the GM, who has to calculate multiple initiatives for his NPC's and keep track of it during all the rolling, calculating of remaining Combat Points and rules referencing...

In order to see what I mean with Combat Point calculation, look at this experienced NPC stat sheet for Combat Points:

This is basically the Combat Pool, but you can only use the mentioned fractions for actions with related equipment or maneuvers... I'd need a computer for every player to be able to keep track of that in parallel of the chaotic initiative and fear systems!

[*]Always liked Fear concepts. Still tracking shite to the 50s sounds horrible.

In this case, it's just another figure to track. The hitpoints are bad already: You get penalties when they drop below fractions of the max. value and need always to campare max. and actual values and be reminded of the applicable penalties... Fear is just adding on top of that with other steps and penalties.

[*]Survival and Travelling. That's a thing that sounds a bit rushed. I've always had my players roll up shite like this up front at the start of a trip. The better the roll, the smoother the trip. Bad roll? More encounters, lost time due to bad weather, provisions packed improperly resulting to moldy food, etc. Especially 'Bastards with Margin of Success/Failure works like a charm with this. Oh, and I always have custom "encounter" tables that include anything from fights to heavy rain and earthquakes. A little planning can go a long way. [/list]

Especially for a game world and system that is so much reliant on nature experience, it was quite disappointing.

How are you supposed to manage the balancing act between the endlessness and hostileness of Trudvangs beautiful environment and background world and the fact, that roleplaying is about interaction? What do the "heroes" do in this "empty" or at least very much hostile world?

The answer to my question on the forum was: Just use adventures from other viking roleplaying games and you are good to go... That's NOT what I think is a good answer, because these adventures - available though they may be - do not convey the specialness of Trudvang in particular. They convey a generic viking experience. Where is the world-specific advise?

Seriously now, did they have the Devil running at their backs shouting "DEADLINE - DEADLINE" or something? When designing a world specific game it's better to detail the world and say something like "use OpenD6 or whatever..." than this: " Just use adventures from other viking roleplaying games and you are good to go..."

Maybe I have to add that this KS was about translating an established award-winning Swedish system into English language. As part of the KS, two adventures were translated as well, but both are high-level adventures. There is no "introductory course" and - as I said - no soft advise either.

Blades in the Dark

Now this sounds better. Sanbox me likey. But. I personally get bored of post-apocalyptic steampunk stuff. Sorry, just not my thing.

This is one of the major setbacks: You have to like the setting, or the basic rule system isn't for you. There is light at the end of the tunnel though, as during the successful KS, a lot of official "hacks" were unlocked, which are still worked upon. The first is about to hit the shelves and can already be acquired on DriveThru: It's called Scum & Villainy and is about crews of criminals with a Star Wars / Serenity / Outlaw Star / Firefly vibe. The crew is basically replaced by the ship and the ability to interact with the ghost-world from original BitD is replaced with "The Way" (like The Force... you know?). Scum & Villainy is a complete ruleset though. You wouldn't need BitD as a basis.

I might "borrow" a rule or three tho if it is as good as you say and I get my hands on it.

My thoughts exactly!

The "crew" (group of PC's) is a character of its own. The group can be choose a crew type like Assassins, Bravos, Hawkers, Thieves, a Cult, etc. - which provides the type of adventures they are getting crew-xp's for. This is basically like the "group-drive" (speaking in S&S terms). They can level up the crew, claim turf and special locations like brothels or temples, etc. (would be an idea anyways to have Group Drives, wouldn't it?)

Don't forget that we have a Faction chapter pending hopefully. Which is the first thought that came to mind when I read the above.

Nah, this is quite different. BitD has also a faction system, but crews are about linking together the group of PC's with a common goal and bringing expectations of the players in line and providing a metagame asset that can evolve. On some basic level, the crew acts as a faction as well - especially when it becomes larger (more followers) - but at first, it's just a bracket that holds together the party.

Anyways, this is not to say that BitD and SaS are in any way redundant, but they are similar enough in player-driven-fiction-focus to learn from each other. And also from the faults of Trudvang. I'd just wish SaS to include a chapter where the GM and the players get some advise on how this particular system works best in the form of best practises.

I'm sure there will be a handy GM section on that. Dunno what the guys are planning. But my personal approach is this:

Imho the heart of 'Scoundrels - as 'Bastards before it - is Drives. You can't go wrong with them. It needs some planning on your GMing to get it rolling, but when it does, it hits you and the players like a truck filled with bricks. Just don't forget. In order to do that you have to act like a mischievous genie that twists wishes around. Make em love the setting and the characters through narrative, then make it tumble upon them for everything they chose. Like what thirtythr33 did in Floating City.

Yeah, this is a start, but BitD has some 16 pages of GM advise alone. Starting with some general introduction ("GM goals"), then specifying how the GM is supposed to interact with the world and players ("GM actions" - like "ask questions", "provide opportunities", "cut to the action", etc.), then a list of solid "GM principles" (like "be a fan of the PCs", "always follow the fiction", etc.) and then giving another section of solid "GM best practices" and "GM bad habits". A few of the information is redundant, but most of it really helps to collect players that are used to a more traditional approach. And that's just the GM. Players get another 4-and-a-half pages with best practices. (all in small page format though, nothing with 6-point font and letter pages)

Blades is pretty cool. I ran a short campaign of it a year or so ago. As GM, you really need to stay on the ball with keeping the players engaged. (This is true of all systems, but in general, I've found that it's especially true of Apocalypse World derived games, which BitD ultimately is, much more so than, for example, the Burning Wheel derived games that I normally play)

True. But you get clocks as an easy tool to track the multitude of things that the players can challenge themselves with. Actually though, as I haven't played it myself (just followed the youtube Rollplay: Blades series a bit) I need to see in reality how this helps or does not help.

[dysjunct]

Blades is indeed awesome for all the reasons listed, although I haven't played it yet. The layout and writing is a model of clarity and vision. It does have the usual element, common to a lot of slightly-weird RPGs, of being easy to assume it's your run-of-the-mill game when read by old hands at the hobby. Then important rules are missed, or the reader assumes that it should have rules for XYZ and when they aren't there, then the game's broken.

I GMed two games last year that were both fantastic. Short campaigns (six sessions) of each:



Ryuutama is a Japanese RPG, translated into English a few years ago. It is designed around a "heartwarming" aesthetic which is apparently a trend in Japanese RPGs. It has a very pastoral feel, maybe "anime bildungsroman"? -- it's tempting to call it "cutesy" but that doesn't quite capture it. You can still die, but the feeling is more of wonder and discovery than grimdark murderhobos or fantasy Vietnam. The theme of the game is traveling and friendship. In the setting, everyone is assumed to take a journey at some point, and travelers join up together because the wild can be dangerous.

Reward cycle: PCs get XP for the most dangerous terrain they've traveled through this session, XP for the most dangerous monster they've fought, and XP if the GM used a special power.

Despite the game's look, it has a really crunchy journey system that is similar to The One Ring's. You make checks to find your way, to avoid incident, and to make camp. The difficulty of the check is based on the terrain (plains are easy, mountains are hard) plus the weather (clear skies are easy, blizzards are hard). You have to track encumbrance, rations, water, etc. It all serves to underscore the feeling that journeys are hard and dangerous and you have to plan.

The combat system is semi-abstract and reminiscent of Final Fantasy or some other JRPG. You are either at the front of the skirmish or the back. If you're in the back, you can only hit or be hit with ranged weapons or spells. If everyone in the front goes down, everyone in the back is automatically moved to the front. The bestiary is wacky and cute -- a recurring enemy are cat-goblins, and another are anthropomorphic eggs that have arms and legs.

Spells are nature-based and thematic. They are in schools named after the seasons and work about as you'd expect. One of the spells creates a cubic meter of dry leaves. That's it. No damage or anything. I love spells like this -- it really requires the players to be creative about how they use them.

The GM plays a character, a godlike celestial dragon called a Ryuujin. The conceit of the game is that the Ryuujin is watching the PCs from the spirit world and writing down their adventures. Why write stories? Because that's what baby dragons eat! You don't want your babies to starve, do you? The ryuujin has a variety of powers they can use, that broadly correspond to traditional ways that GMs fudge. Some of the powers help the PCs and some hurt them. If the ryuujin uses the ones that help (e.g. a PC you thought was KOed wakes up with half HP), it loses HP and could die, ending the campaign. If it uses the ones that hurt (e.g. a monster that misses gets to swing again) the PCs get XP. So this lets you, as GM, do the traditional bad-habit things, but it puts a cap on them so you can't go too crazy. It's a neat system and really kept me involved -- do I want to save the PCs here, or hope they get lucky and keep my power for a more dangerous encounter?

In our campaign, the PCs cleared a marketplace of cat-goblins, failed to reunite a single mother and her madman-of-the-woods former husband, and then investigated a crop failure. In between all those scenarios were harrowing journeys across the wild, with twisted ankles, lingering coughs, and going hungry. The last scenario ended with a Dogs In The Vineyard-type climax -- the crop failure was due to a local witch, who cursed the wineberry crop because her brother drunk himself to death. The town elders wanted to execute her for destroying the town's livelihood. The PCs ended up restraining themselves and not interfering with the execution, in a moment of high drama and pathos.



Fria Ligan, the publishers of MYZ, is killing it right now. I wrote a review over on RPGgeek here:

https://rpggeek.com/thread/1740376/radi ... stone-soup

... so I won't go into much detail other than to expand on the reward cycle. You get XP like so:

- 1 XP for showing up to the session.
- 1 XP for working on a project on the Ark.
- 1 XP for exploring a new sector out in the Zone.
- 1 XP for sacrificing or risking something for the PC you've chosen as your "buddy."
- 1 XP for sacrificing or risking something for the NPC you've chosen to keep safe.
- 1 XP for sacrificing or risking something to mess with the NPC you've chosen as the one you hate.
- 1 XP for sacrificing or risking something to work towards your (player-created) Big Dream.

We created the setting together (basically set it near the town where my group lives). I showed them the XP table -- "Here's how you get XP. What do you want to do?" The rest of the game flowed like magic. As GM, the only thing I need to contribute are interesting threats to the PCs' favorite NPCs. And I provide plausible reactions to the PCs' actions. The rest is totally player-driven. The exploring part is procedurally-generated using random tables, so I have no idea what they are going to find. An enclave of mutated horrors? An artifact of the Ancient Days? Both? Easy to run, easy to play, zero prep.

[EinBein]

Ryuutama Would never have thought that there is a market for pen and paper JRPG's ... I don't like them much electronically, so maybe not my thing if the pen and paper emulates that kind of gameplay

Anways, MY0 looks like a gem. Though I'm not a huge post-apocalypse fan. We tried Degenesis once. Wasn't for most of the group. The only post-apo scenario I ever liked was Gorkamorka tabletop Because Orks. I've bought the PDF anyways in order to learn from the rules!