The Gaming Den

With a few exceptions, d20 based games.

Enterprise Season 4 was what the show should have been out the gate. Trekkie fan-service wrapped in an interesting story wrapped in Trekkie fan-service. But it was too late in the game. Still, "In a Mirror, Darkly" remains one of my favorite Trek episodes.

Prior to play, GMs and players need a two-box pre-flight checklist when selecting a system and setting. 1. Does the game's basic engine match the setting and the focus of the game? If not, the character intentions will eventually settle into matching the system. 2. Do the rule sets for character ach...

MGuy wrote:So the question is, does the game function decently with only moderate optimization? Could I run the game off of 3 or four books (thinking core rule book, starships, villains and clone wars)?

No, not really. I found the sourcebooks only amplified the core book's issues.

Disbelieve the notion that immersion is a passive reward that GMs provide to players. Proper alignment of player and character goals is 80% responsible for immersion. By the same token GMs should reveal how player characters are perceived by NPCs, provide challenges that reflect the focus of the gam...

Traveller and most of its associated settings (OTU, 2300AD, Judge Dredd, etc.) use a catalog approach for equipment. Roughly 1/3rd of priced equipment provides no stat modifiers. Rather its listed as being a prerequisite to complete a certain tasks. For example, a DNA scanner is a requirement to ide...

Over my total time sitting at game tables I've heard less pedantic whining over D&D alignment than I have over d20 Star Wars' Light Side/Dark Side points system. I'm on the fence regarding bennie pools but I prefer EotE's Light-Side-Benefits-Player/Dark-Side-Benefits-GM system over whatever d6/d...

SW Saga provides little in the way of a mechanical challenge to an adventuring party that includes a half-competently built Jedi. Area effects are the only hindrance I've encountered and any GM who turns his stormtroopers or battle droids into squads of anti-Jedi grenadiers should be rightly called ...

I'm curious as to which TTRPGs don't treat vehicle rules as an afterthought.

Edge of the Empire tries to give everyone at the table something to do during starship/vehicle combat.

I wasn't aware there was a new card game until I saw a demo at Gen Con.

I know nothing other than the game had six designers, four of whom are no-names and one is tied to D&D 4E. That's a red flag.

hogarth wrote:I much prefer an adventure with a pre-chosen plot because the average GM is much worse than the average adventure writer at coming up with his own plots (in my experience).

I agree. Adventure modules tend to be bland but at least I know how much enjoyment I'm going to get out of a session.

Here's a cynical question. If Disney/Marvel comics decided to go full-on affinity fraud with the troglodytes and have public firings of certain artists and Fox News segments decrying feminazis literally emasculating gods or whatever, how much money would that gain them if anything? It would be negl...

Before RedBrick folded its operations into FASA, it produced a Pathfinder/OGL Earthdawn port.

It might be easiest to snag a copy, see what's already been done, then tweak for Tome.

As I see it - and I may be too cynical - a vote for Burning Wheel is a vote for 2indie4u. As shitty as VTM was mechanically, we know that people actually played it. Hell, there are still people on the Onyx Path forums talking about the campaigns they're still playing and are planning for imminent p...

1. Marvel/DC superhero comics are about the illusion of change, not actual change. Thor was a frog in the 1980s fer fucksake and the 1990s had electric Superman. Default Thor will return so long as Chris Hemsworth is a moneymaker. Which leads to... 2. Marvel/DC comics are dictated by the films. Medi...

In a world of magical airships, I'm not going to get bent out of shape about porters. Trying to reconcile Earthdawn, Shadowrun, and the historical record is a recipe for depression.

FASA recently wrapped up their Kickstarter for 4th edition. They were shooting for IIRC a September release date. You might wait for that if you want to jump on to the latest version. I'm partial to 3rd but only because that was the first version where I was actually able to rope people into playing...

Smirnoffico wrote:What else can be done?

Completely unrelated to mechanics: take a chainsaw to the setting.

Well technically and officially Starfleet does have enough resources to fix all problems of want and need because they live in a post-scarcity society. I mean, they don't actually have a post-scarcity society, and the writers have often said that saying the Federation doesn't have money was one of ...

The Prime Directive is a pretty good baseline because it admits that even the Federation isn't perfect. They still have prisons, for example, and fucking up a society is pretty easy to do when you're a few centuries or even a millennium ahead on the technology curve. On the flip side, I think I pref...

Finished The Well of Ascension last night. It was an acceptable fantasy romance novel with chaste love and PG-13 violence. Woo, non-radical Mormons.

I pulled Charles Stross' Neptune's Brood off my shelf last night so that's next.

This hardly qualifies as an objective review of the system but I found the following statement amusing/interesting: Unlike many other roleplaying games, Torchbearer is very much a "we all hang together or we all hang separately" experience. The restrictive nature of light sources, the gri...

Kaelik wrote:How much is just about done?

Less than 100 pages left to read.

I own a set of pre-Gold Edition Burning Wheel books and I've read them all cover to cover. I haven't had a chance to crack my Torchbearer book but I'll share an overview when I do. Soon.

Just about done with The Well of Ascension by Brandon Sanderson. It's fine. I'd recommend it to non-fans of the fantasy sub-genre. I do like that the magic system is alloy consumption-powered wire-fu rather than runes, rituals, fireballs, and old men with beards. I joined a book club at work and I n...