View Full Version : Roleplaying Games
Tainted Bushido
03-24-09, 08:57 PM
We here at Althanas are gamers of a sort. Some of us are casual, some of us are dedicated, and some of us are Hardcore. This thread is more for the dedicated and hardcore crowds, but if you have experience in the field, feel free to rush in and toss in your two cents. I'm of course talking of the FIRST role playing games ever, the tabletop RPGs.
However, list threads are looked down upon so here's what this discussion should contain. Tabletop RPGs that you have played, what you thought of them, and ones you'd like to try. Perhaps this will push people over the edge and get them to play games they haven't tried, for fear that they aren't very good.
One last thing, Editions count as most times the changes are night and day different.
I'll of course kick us off right;
Legend of the Five Rings 3rd Edition Revised - I gotta say its an interesting system. Its referred to as the Roll/Keep System where your physical traits and skills combine in an interesting light. Its just lax enough that rolls are done quickly, and just strict enough to keep people from going off on wild tangents.
Dungeons and Dragons Version 3.5 - In my opinion sometimes wizards just skipped play testing, and jumped right into putting things out there. The biggest offense on this was the Tome of Battle: Book of Nine Swords. However the nice part of 3.5 is total customization, you can literally make a character for every situation.
Dungeons and Dragons Version 4.0 - This one is interesting. The focus swings and to many they compare it to MMOs like WoW or WAR, this I feel is only skin deep. The thing about WoW and WAR is the emphasis are on different things. Where as Dungeons and Dragons still keeps the team atmosphere. Things are very different, and I feel this is the same hubris that popped up during the shift from Advanced Dungeons and Dragons (2.0) and 3.0. I have fun playing, and its a different kind of fun.
Shadowrun - This game is very interesting. Its got a couple of quotes I find are hilarious yet entirely appropriate. I'll share them with you to get the idea;
"Shadowrun, the only Role Playing Game where grabbing a soda down the hall involves a rocket launcher."
"Shadowrun, where the excuse 'It seemed like a good idea at the time..." is a valid excuse before, during, and after, the act that triggers the excuse."
THese are the only four I have extensive experience with. I have however read the role playing books for or own;
Vampire: The Masquerade
Hunter: The Reckoning
Demon: The Awakening
Dark Heresy (Warhammer 40k RPG)
World of Warcraft RPG
D20 Modern
So now I open the floor to you guys...
Christoph
03-24-09, 09:15 PM
I picked up the Dark Heresy core book the day it came out, and ran a campaign the following summer. It was fantastic. The atmosphere of the game was fantastic and the style of play was fresh and engaging. As a GM, I loved how your imagination was the limit, and almost no matter what I came up with, it still fit within what the canon setting had to offer. It works off of percentage dice, which I had never used before but am now hopefully in love with. The combat system was nice, but I ended up tweaking it a little bit. My only complaint was that the careers were a little limited, but they are easy enough to tweak to fit what you want. All in all, it was one of the best, most well written game books that I have ever read. In fact, I'd say that it was the second best.
The best, in my opinion, is also on your list at the bottom: Vampire the Masquerade. I’d played that since early in high school and I really can’t think of anything about it that I don’t like. The mechanics of the game are very flexible, yet consistent. It always seemed to work well for anything, from social situations to gunfights and everything in between. I disliked Vampire the Requiem quite a bit, but that’s probably because I got spoiled with VtM first.
I hate D&D 4th Edition, but then again, I never truly cared for 3.0 or 3.5. So… don’t put too much stock in what I say about 4th. Lol.
Visla Eraclaire
03-24-09, 10:31 PM
I started playing DnD with 3.0 rules, but didn't play terribly much during that era. I spent some time playing Vampire: The Masquerade with a mercifully non-serious group in late highschool. I have the sourcebooks for both the old and new Mage games from White Wolf, though the rules are so tedious that it's nearly impossible to find people interested in them.
Most of my experience as both a player and a DM is with 3.5. It's still the best game, in my opinion. Unbalanced additions (like the Book of Nine Swords supra) are easy to simply disallow by house rule or modify. 3.5 was far from perfect, but it had the most stuff for it and the system was just technical enough to still have an elitist tabletop player grit to it.
4.0 is a travesty. I have attempted to play it but immediately fall back into thinking in terms of 3.5 rules. 4.0 is DnD for people who play WoW, and not even old WoW. New, homogonized, mass-market WoW. Magic ceases entirely to feel arcane in any way, everyone is essentially the same, battle now absolutely necessitates the use of minis and grids. Interesting customization and quirkiness is conspicuously absent. I respect the explanation they give that such things are for players to add, not rules to impose, but I liked my RP choices having game-mechanic effects. It is without charm, without flavor. I'm told recent additions have given it a bit more spice, but I think its core philosophy is at odds with mine. I don't want a game for everyone. I'm not playing DnD because I'm a populist... I don't know that anyone is.
At present the only game I'm playing in is a heavily modified 3.5 game (Iron Heroes base ruleset but with significant further additions). It's enjoyable, if quirky.
I think, sad as it may be, time for serious tabletop roleplaying may be a thing of the past for me. I'm not sure I can see myself giving up a day of cherished weekends for it, once I'm at a firm... presuming I can even find a group then.
BlackAndBlueEyes
03-24-09, 10:49 PM
The closest I ever got to playing D 'n' D was filling out a character sheet. Never actually sat down and played.
Now, I don't know if this game'll qualify, but I used to be really big into Magic: The Gathering. I'm talking about the times when Gerrard and Urza were mucking about Rath and Dominaria. I got out right after the Phyrexian War story arc happened. Ice Age was hands down my favorite set. Despite some really bone-headed trades I made (who else would nearly give away a friggin' Coat of Arms?), I had some nigh-unstoppable decks. My favorites were a deck that revolved around birds and a 40-card burn/counterspell deck.
Phil and Kaja Foglio were hands down my favorite card artists back in the day. I had a deck that consisted of nothing but cards whose pictures were drawn by them (and yeah, it sucked). DiTerlizzi was also a great artist who had a style that stands out in my mind.
Christoph
03-26-09, 07:51 AM
The closest I ever got to playing D 'n' D was filling out a character sheet. Never actually sat down and played.
That's sort of like getting a D&D handjob. =p
BlackAndBlueEyes
03-26-09, 07:57 AM
And I felt just as dirty as if I were to go "all the way", so to speak...
:P
Now, I don't know if this game'll qualify, but I used to be really big into Magic: The Gathering. I'm talking about the times when Gerrard and Urza were mucking about Rath and Dominaria. I got out right after the Phyrexian War story arc happened. Ice Age was hands down my favorite set. Despite some really bone-headed trades I made (who else would nearly give away a friggin' Coat of Arms?), I had some nigh-unstoppable decks. My favorites were a deck that revolved around birds and a 40-card burn/counterspell deck.
Phil and Kaja Foglio were hands down my favorite card artists back in the day. I had a deck that consisted of nothing but cards whose pictures were drawn by them (and yeah, it sucked). DiTerlizzi was also a great artist who had a style that stands out in my mind.
M:TG does have some beautiful cards. My favorite deck was my deck containing every sliver known to man, but that was before even the story arc containing the giant city I forgot the name of that was an entire universe.
I also had plans using the Mirroden block cards, and cards from several other previous editions spanning all the way back to Alpha to make the Indestructible deck, using all Artifacts. That is, a Microsynth lattice to force Artifact status, and a Dark Steel forge to make everything indestructible, then use The Worldslayer equipped on something to destroy every permanente. Since all mine are artifacts, my deck is uneffected, but my opponets gets destroyed on the spot.
The other theoretical deck was codenamed Timelord, and it's concept was to screw with time itself, giving myself extra turns, ending opponets turns early, and all sorts of fun time based spells, plus the monster cards needed to attack.
My favorite blocks however in all this, were Unhinged and Unglued. Mox Lotus and Gleemax FTW!
sweet_oblivion
03-26-09, 02:41 PM
World of Darkness; freakin owns.
Only got a chance for one sit down as it took months for us to finally get the books and weeks for cody to creatue his character (used both the Werewolf: Forsaken and Vampire: Requiem books as well as the core).
It was was pretty interesting, though i probably missed out on the full effect there being only three of us and me being the only werewolf, but I enjoyed it more than DnD 3.5 in general.
DnD 3.5 was good to me though, and I played a few times though the many different books made it a challange with such a large group (8+) at times, but overall it was pretty fantastic.
Max Dirks
03-26-09, 02:44 PM
Nerds...
I played M:TG when I was in 6th grade.
It was pretty baller, I've still got my deck hidden away somewhere.
Lightfoot
04-08-09, 04:10 AM
I have no experience with Tabletop RPGs whatsoever. I've been dying for a chance to try out the new DnD 4.0 since I've heard it's actually easier to learn than before.
I was in love with Hunter: The Reckoning video games though. They were pretty awesome to me.
Last of the Saratu
04-08-09, 08:09 AM
7th Sea all the way baby... great game.
The Forgotten
04-09-09, 01:16 AM
Played some Star Wars RPG... took out an Imperial Star Destroyer in one pass with a "lightly modded cargo ship". Seeing how it was just the GM and me, we had lots of hoots and hollers customizing characters, altering storylines, surviving an orbital bombardment, building a smuggling empire, triggering the events that led to the entirety of episode four...
Fun times.
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