At what point (or points) do you look at a game and say "This is too complicated"? Is it page count? Number of attributes? Number of steps in a turn? The existence of tables that need to be referenced in combat?

What things make you put the book down and not run it because it's too complex?

Now I know you fellows are apt to do whatever it is you want, but lets lay down some rules.*

1. Your line is your own, I don't care to read arguments over what is complexity or that your favorite game is not really that complex. Those things are lame.
2. You can up vote someone else's complexity line by quoting it.
3. You can ask for clarification if a post is unclear, or you're really interested in what makes that thing complicated in the poster's eyes.
4. Don't worry what someone else thinks is complicated and you love. Just don't. Let go Luke!

*Do I really get to do that? Lay down rules for a thread? I don't know, lets find out.

Now?

• Runequest 3 is at the line.
• D&D 3E and 4E are over the line. Feat stacking and overly fiddly bits annoy me.
• Honor+Intrigue is close to the line. For at least one of my players H+I is over their line.

These days? 5E, basic packet. That's my line.

Amusingly I think 5e is close to right on the GM side, but a little bloated on the player side. Too many special abilities piling up on the character sheet. At least it's better than 3e.

I suppose I could say, "If the players - in their privileged position of having only one character to worry about - routinely forget the special personal abilities they supposedly crave, then there's too much complexity."

Additional red flags for me are:
- Multi-layered, granular skill systems.
- Important rule exceptions scattered all over the text in hard to spot and remember places (one of the key flaws of the otherwise great Stars Without Number).
- Hit location charts and called shots that aren't abstracted.
- Related to the above, average single attacks that involve more than two rolls on anyone's part to resolve.
- Elaborate vehicle creation rules.
- Character creation that clearly takes an entire session to do.
- Any single point in character creation that requires players to choose from more than 7-8 options.
- More than two of any of the following 'special' attributes: honor, glory, renown, sanity, corruption, composure, potency, spirit, etc., etc., etc.

I have a little trouble answering.  I only use my own systems, and have since the early 80s.

I will say that I have advanced and basic rules at many levels, basing much of it on players and how things go.  I tend towards very long games.  So granularity and skill spread vs skill depth is important.  And they are based on a system that splits Class and skil based.

But where is shows up most is chargen.  Once people get the rules, even the complicated ones, much is set up so the players can use the simpler version in game or use the more complex ones if they are more expert players.  But it is in chargen where a total complex homebrew taxes players.  A full session to get a group together is a lot to ask, and while it is mine and I prefer it, that is where it is hard, reflecting slightly on the post above.

Also, most of my games are high lethality.  So taking a long time to build one, your third in ten sessions, can be frustrating...

I prefer simpler, elegant systems.

Different gamers have different views on what this constitutes however. I find Traveller (Roll 8+ on 2D6) to be incredibly simple, but others I've read here have argued it's complicated. A lot of it is to do with familiarity rather than inherent complexity. My eyes glaze over when I read the HERO system for example, but for someone who's been playing it since the 1980s it's probably second nature. FATE is nominally simple, but it also bores the pants off me when I try to read it. The new 7th edition of Call of Cthulhu also introduces rules that supposedly "streamline" the game, but for me it's just a load of mechanics I won't ever use.

D&D5E holds a nice balancing point of simplicity verses complexity. My own complexity tolerance probably stretches as far as RuneQuest. I have lots of games/systems so why learn a new one if it takes an effort?

As GM, probably Mythras/RQ6... though I could see really liking something more complex and giving it a go (I did try to use Phoenix Command once upon a time). I've been reading my way through some Unisystem games (Witchcraft, Armageddon) and... maybe it's just the way they're written, with fluff intermixing with rules, but I'm having difficulties groking it.

As a Player, Pathfinder could get annoyingly nitpicky if I actually had to engage with the rules... which wasn't very often... but GURPS is really lovely in play... so I'm not sure where my line is there, maybe it depends on how much the GM runs interference between me and the game mechanics.

Quote from: Bren;918295

• D&D 3E and 4E are over the line. Feat stacking and overly fiddly bits annoy me.

In general I understand what you mean by "overly fiddly bits" but can you give a more concrete idea of what that means to you?

Runequest 6 and/or Palladium, I think, are the crunchiest games in my RPG "golf bag" right now.

Things that are "too complex":

Anything where I need to reference a rulebook during play, after mastering the basics, is too complex. This means combat tables, combat results tables, what happens when I fall tables, etc.

Systems with thousands (only some hyperbole there) of alternative paths to the same result or with "too many" options for those of us with bad memories. This includes versions of D&D where you have to pick your abilities at level 1 based on the good ones you want at level 10 or 20. I don't mind some rulebook references during character generation, but really, some of the supers systems...

Any constant or required table references during combat. Or having to remember which range of numbers is "good", "bad", "better", or "worse". Traveller combat is actually "too complex" for my liking, because everything slows down trying to remember which armor is working better against which weapon.

Lots of math at the table (which usually means more than one or two numbers added or subtracted from a single roll). I do bioinformatics at work. (Software developer for a cancer genetics statistics department.) I don't want to do lots of math at the table.

Dice pools and rolling more than one dice and picking the better. I know these are popular. I'm not sure if it is a complexity thing or what. I don't want to pick over a bunch of dice or count how many of each number. I just want to know if the roll succeeded.

Things that are "acceptable":

Traveller character generation. Lots of tables, but it is a fun sort of lookup, since you aren't worried about getting to the next person.

DwD Studios BareBones Fantasy is an example of good. Everything you need is on your character sheet. There is some lookup during character generation, but it is limited.

I eventually hit on my own preferred level of complexity. (It still needs beta testing.) Characters have attributes for: Offense, Defense, Magic, Skill, and Hit Points. (Magic counts as psionics, super powers, and/or special technology gadgets.) Characters get two careers which provide bonuses to skill attempts in those areas. Each attribute is a die size. All rolls are opposed rolls. Active/initiating roller aims to meet or beat opponent's roll. Players go before monsters and a turn is movement, offense, magic, and then skills. Attacks do 1 point of damage. (Monsters can have 1 or several HP.) Two spell systems: one that's super simple and an optional/alternative one that is more flexible but more complex. That's it except for details about advancement and monsters.

Quote from: Shipyard Locked;918306Amusingly I think 5e is close to right on the GM side, but a little bloated on the player side. Too many special abilities piling up on the character sheet. At least it's better than 3e.

I suppose I could say, "If the players - in their privileged position of having only one character to worry about - routinely forget the special personal abilities they supposedly crave, then there's too much complexity."

Additional red flags for me are:
- Multi-layered, granular skill systems.
- Important rule exceptions scattered all over the text in hard to spot and remember places (one of the key flaws of the otherwise great Stars Without Number).
- Hit location charts and called shots that aren't abstracted.
- Related to the above, average single attacks that involve more than two rolls on anyone's part to resolve.
- Elaborate vehicle creation rules.
- Character creation that clearly takes an entire session to do.
- Any single point in character creation that requires players to choose from more than 7-8 options.
- More than two of any of the following 'special' attributes: honor, glory, renown, sanity, corruption, composure, potency, spirit, etc., etc., etc.

I can't comment on 5E since I've never read or played it. And I'll give an exception to Traveller's character creation because it is so entertaining, but this is right on.

Anything more complex than Barbarians of Lemuria and Basic D&D(and related OSR games) has been off the table when I've been GM'ing last 4 years (and most of the time before that).

My "upper limit" today would probably be vanilla BRP (big yellow book, but with none of the more fiddly options switched on like strike ranks, hit locations, super powers etc) and maybe Savage Worlds or D&D5e.

Something like D&D 3,5/Pathfinder, GURPS, MERP/Rolemaster, Mutants&Masterminds, AD&D raw by the books, HERO System is completely off scale for me. The most fiddly game I have enjoyed would probably be 4e D&D, but not much as a DM. I am a very rules light GM at heart and I feel very set in my ways. I just feel bored by too complex games and the effort of learning them.

Quote from: Onix;918364In general I understand what you mean by "overly fiddly bits" but can you give a more concrete idea of what that means to you?

In general the number of rules, exceptions to rules, exceptions to the exceptions to the rules and the number of classes, types of classes, versions of classes, specialty or prestige classes, multi-classed characters and multi-multi-classed characters about which one could say "my PC has 3 levels in rogue, 2 in bard, 1 in barbarian" ...etc.

My "line" is very high complexity, but that's because I've played for many years and gradually add complexity, and have stuck with one core system (TFT/GURPS/house rules) and have also gotten into wargames, games programming, etc. However I still find new systems and even the presentation of GURPS 4e a bit of a pain. It depends highly on how much I like what I get for the complexity. I like detailed simulationist rules for mundane situations. I usually don't like gamey abstract complexity. So when GURPS 4e dumped all of the Compendium material and more into one all-settings slushy of an 800-page (?) Basic Set, I balked a lot for two reasons: 1) Most of the settings and styles included are stuff I don't want to play (e.g. supers and psionics) and 2) many of the changes are attempts to streamline or simplify things in ways that I find needless or degrading compared to 3e.

Similarly, Phoenix Command is a bit much for me, but it wouldn't be if I it matched my interests and opinions more closely. I think it gets some important things wrong as is delves into sub-second time tracking and rules for exactly how long it takes to saw through someone's arm with a chainsaw, and focuses on some wrong things, and does it in a clunky (not just complex) style, with too many opaque table lookups rather than explained  (and easily-mod-able) mechanics (i.e. instead of a formula where you can see how the factors involved contribute to the numbers to roll against, there are many pre-baked tables).

More often, games hit my "lower line", which is about where The Fantasy Trip Melee is. If a game does not have a tactical map that takes into account things like facing, cover, body position, weapon reach, and it lacks things like effects of injury, defensive tactics, lethality of weapons, unpredictability, or if it just seems fake, arbitrary-imagination-based, gamey or wrong in some ways, I'm likely to be uninterested.

On the GM side, I've never run into a complexity barrier; stuff from old FGU games to World of Synnibar has proven no problem.

On the player side, I don't want a complex character design process. So stuff like Gurps, Hero, and M&M is out. I don't actually mind complex characters, as long as the process is largely rolling dice with a few key player choices, or has a very straight forward design process like BRP.

I also don't like games with complex interactions on the player facing side. If a player can't simply tell me in plain language what he wants his character to do, it is probably not a game I want to run.