Quote from: Doctor Jest;586944When doing conversions, converting the concept is always much, much easier than converting the mechanics.
I've converted RIFTS into three other game systems successfully by sticking to the maxim of "convert the concept not the mechanics".
We already know the mechanics are broken, after all. Strip those out entirely, separate the system from the setting and then read just the (copious) amount of fluff on each thing in the game you're converting and say "how would I make that in this system" and then do that.
Spinning off from this, what conversions have you done, and what did you feel were the challenges associated with your particular conversion, not specifically from a mechanical standpoint?
Also, how successful or unsuccessful were they and why?
My most recent experience was working with Living Steel (from Leading Edge) and working it into a semblance of the d20 system. I'm mildly satisfied with where I'm at, but I'm waiting to run/playtest when I get back.
The challenge is rarely in the skills and mechanics, but in arbitrary stuff like magic and "feel". Magic is flat out the hardest, because you need to consider how each spell will work within your game framework, will a certain spell make characters combat gods if used as written, how does it balance, and you need to do that for every single spell. Take for example magic missile. Its a basic, simple spell that creates an arrow or arrows that can't be avoided or dodged. Works great in a game where hit points nearly run into phone numbers, but in my system an arrow in the guts can really mess you up. So, significant changes are needed.
Feel is a bit less laborious but can be just as tricky. If the game you are converting has special rules for say madness, you have a choice between reflecting that in your conversion or setting up an independent system that works better with your rules. Not quite as ephemeral, if its pulp, buff up the stats, if its primarily social tone down the combat skills.
And then in some games like Vampire I don't care that the writers want to emphasise the social skills of pasty faced blood drinkers sporting the last word in popped collars so I harden that edge regardless. Makes for a great game too.
Other than that, a jeep is a jeep, an awareness skill is an awareness skill.
Every time I have ported Rifts to another system, I have had fun, but there was definitely something missing. I definitely feel that for most conversions, you do lose something when you gain something and the big issue for you and your group is whether the gain is substantial enough.
In general, I have been happy with my Savage Worlds conversions, but for those groups who are more casual and happy to avoid the specifics of a setting and just play around in the generalities with a fast, easy system.
I've never really converted systems; I've modified systems sometimes, and I've converted settings to other systems than the ones they came with.
RPGPundit
Ive pondered converting Rifts for example. (System wise or porting the setting to another system) But just looking at the breath of what just the main book has. It seems like a LOT of work. To the point I dont want to bother with it.
Quote from: Spinachcat;586992Every time I have ported Rifts to another system, I have had fun, but there was definitely something missing. I definitely feel that for most conversions, you do lose something when you gain something and the big issue for you and your group is whether the gain is substantial enough.
In general, I have been happy with my Savage Worlds conversions, but for those groups who are more casual and happy to avoid the specifics of a setting and just play around in the generalities with a fast, easy system.
That same issue of feeling like something's missing is what keeps me from doing Robotech in any system other than Palladium. Rifts I've never felt as bad about; I did one using d6 that went fairly well, although the scaling system made things work out MUCH differently (instead of having MD stuff I just used scale and gave SN things some extra dice) especially from the perspective of the 'normal' characters.
Probably the biggest coherent conversion I did was (d20) Iron Kingdoms for RMFRP. Sadly I didn't get to run it for as long as I wanted to.
Funnily enough, the thing that I didn't actually like about the d20 implementation carried over very naturally. For whatever reason, the authors decided to give warjacks a metric fuckton of hit dice (like, on the order of 18) and thus insane BAB where in the wargame it's lucky to hit a broad side of the barn without a warcaster babysitting it. In Rolemaster a high offensive bonus is going to give high chances to hit as well as increased damage so it all works well enough.
Warcaster abilities were tricky. IIRC I made a Training Package spell list for that though no player ended up using it anyway. Sadface.
I didn't even bother with detailed mechanika rules as I still have no idea what the hell is going on in most of Liber Mechanika. Way to write completely incomprehensible rules.
I'm currently in the middle of a good-size conversion project involving my own setting. Terracide was originally written for the Hero System, and now I'm working on the Savage Worlds version. I have to agree 100% with Doctor Jest's comment: stripping out the mechanics and starting over with just the setting material is pretty much the only way to do this without going insane.
As far as "feel" is concerned, I realized early on that the SW version would necessarily have a very different feel compared to the Hero edition, but I decided not to struggle with it. Savage Worlds fans expect a SW setting to have a certain feel to it, and trying too hard to change that, to make it something other than Savage Worlds, would drive them away. So I'm focusing on being true to the mood and outlook of the original Terracide setting, and at the same time, if it feels and plays like SW, that's a good thing.
Someone (I've forgotten who) on another forum said "setting provides flavor, rules provide texture." Does that make any sense?
I converted Castle Falkenstien over to the CODA system (used for decipher Lord of the Rings and Star Trek). This was mainly because I had players who did not like using cards. The conversion was very well received, and I think the reason for that is I was very careful to pick a system that suited the setting, as the CODA system has a very duel-like quality to its fights and very broad classes that could easily be adopted to Victorian-feeling professions.
Quote from: Panzerkraken;586951Spinning off from this, what conversions have you done, and what did you feel were the challenges associated with your particular conversion, not specifically from a mechanical standpoint?
Also, how successful or unsuccessful were they and why?
I am converting the Pathfinder adventure path Serpent's Skull to Fantasy Craft on the fly.
The major task is converting NPCs, because despite both being d20 games, they have slightly different philosophies where:
1) scope of NPCs, and
2) magic items
are concerned.
Overall, though, once I learned a few things (and came up with a spreadsheet I could plug numbers into), it was pretty successful.
There were some odd corner cases that turned out pretty interesting. Fantasy Craft doesn't have wands as expendable items like D&D 3e & PF do, and makes magic much rarer. But FC has much more detailed non-magic modifications, with stuff like superior materials, bleed (for things like barbed weapons), armor piercing, etc. So most magic weapons became non-magic with one special non-magic "quality" per plus.
As for wands as expendable items, I often convert them to potions. One example had a group of ambushers equipped with a wand of "glyph of warding". I essentially made this into a weird elixir, oily with metallic bits in it. When you poured it on the ground, it formed a rune-like lattice that became the "trap" that triggered when stepped on.
The same group of NPCs also had potions of invisibility. I replaced this with natural abilities that just made them damned stealthy, and cut the magic even more.
Quote from: RPGPundit;587350I've never really converted systems; I've modified systems sometimes, and I've converted settings to other systems than the ones they came with.
I agree.
Systems are just a means of simulating a situation or providing a framework for a narrative.
It's the
setting that matters.
And, oh yes, I've converted a setting or two dozen. :)
I've done tons of conversions, primarily to D6. I like the idea of putting your XP directly into what you want to get better, along with the concept that attrbutes directly power skills. Oh, and I also like the skills defaulting to the relevant attribute thing.
I usually get stuck when trying to map back abilities (and particularly what they cost) in some kind of a fair way.
We had a hoot back in the nineties with a D6-powered fantasy campaign. I ran modules for it, exclusively, converting on the fly. We even attempted Dragon Mountain.
I've also recently attempted running Paizo's Beginner Box scenario against Warrior Rogue Mage, via Roll20.net. Worked pretty well, but still wound up being a lot of prep work.
Quote from: Ben Rogers;587785Systems are just a means of simulating a situation or providing a framework for a narrative.
I also like to rely on systems to provide decision support. Like in the 'multiple core rules' discussion, I cited the Star Wars RPG as being incomplete because it relied on the GM too much to make judgement calls about things depicted in the films.
I like to see the corner-cases touched, at least a little, so I can point to the book and move the game forward.
One of my favorite 'systems' that I played for several years was a mishmash of whatever we happened to have handy. It was 2nd edition D&D combined with Rifts and other Palladium games, plus Shadowrun and any random thing we saw that we wanted to add. Once the general idea was done, we could convert stuff from nearly any source pretty much on the fly.
I also made a point based D20 system that my players seemed to enjoy. There were no classes or class levels and no hit dice, you simply bought what you wanted to get better at.
Being a fan of Universal Systems (Hero, GURPs, Uni-system, and of course Continuum), I never had an issue with an adapted setting. The only settings I did adapt were ones that were good settings and interested all parties involved. Were they 100% perfect matches, of course not. If they were... we would be playing them in their native systems. However, if they work better than the existing system... then we were all happy.
I've mostly converted adventures, even from differnet genres. Using a simple system as your base helps immensely. My best ones were an AFMBE adventure for D6 Adventure, and a Star*Drive one for D6 Space.
I second the idea of converting concepts instead of mechanics. I've tried converting mechanics before, and that way lies madness, let me tell ya. My most disastrous example was trying to convert the Dragonlance modules to 3e, with an almost OCD-like level of detail. This was long before the official adaptations were available.
There is however, a caveat where you just can't seem to get the same, intangible "feel" of a game. RIFTS is a common example. I feel D&D is another. You can do "dungeon fantasy" with another system all you want, but nothing feels like D&D.
Otherwise, I think you have to content yourself with just ripping off the spirit of a game, rather than the exact concept. For example, I don't think I could do Mage faithfully with D6 Adventure, but I could do modern-day magicians in a secret war against Illuminati-like technocrats and other supernatural threats ;)
Quote from: Spinachcat;586992Every time I have ported Rifts to another system, I have had fun, but there was definitely something missing. I definitely feel that for most conversions, you do lose something when you gain something and the big issue for you and your group is whether the gain is substantial enough.
In general, I have been happy with my Savage Worlds conversions, but for those groups who are more casual and happy to avoid the specifics of a setting and just play around in the generalities with a fast, easy system.
In my experience, conversions usually are not worth it. I prefer to tweak a system built around a setting, as opposed to converting, or having to do a total rebuild of a ruleset for a setting.
One problem I have is what I call 'Baggage'
If you try to use Pathfinder for a setting like Game of Thrones, players will be asking things like...so I can play a Tiefling Sorceror Oracle right?
Tons of the stuff in DND just don't fit that setting.
As for 'Feel'; that matters a lot to me.
I would use Rolemaster for a Conan setting, but I would not use 4E dnd for a Conan setting.
Quote from: RPGPundit;587350I've never really converted systems; I've modified systems sometimes, and I've converted settings to other systems than the ones they came with.
RPGPundit
What's the difference between converting systems and converting a setting to another system?
Quote from: Ronin;587362Ive pondered converting Rifts for example. (System wise or porting the setting to another system) But just looking at the breath of what just the main book has. It seems like a LOT of work. To the point I dont want to bother with it.
I've done this before, converting Rifts to Silhouette (Heavy Gear, Jovian Chronicles, Tribe 8). It was a tremendous amount of work, mainly because the actual
stuff (robots, armour, weapons, magic, TW, races, monsters, etc.) are what make Rifts great. And I'm talking about just the main rulebook.
Converting that takes time, no matter how you do it. My personal preference for doing so was along the lines of what was recently mentioned in another thread: describe the item from Rifts in plain english, then build that description in Silhouette (or other desired system). Again, it's not terribly difficult, it's just the sheer volume that sucks up time.
Others have mentioned the difficulty in maintaining "feel" between different systems, but I think that's a bit of a red herring; many systems produce a particular "feel" due to their fundamental nature, and if you feel the need to significantly alter the new system to achieved that desired "feel," it's probably not the right system for the job.
Quote from: Bobloblah;591062What's the difference between converting systems and converting a setting to another system?
I will answer your question with you own post
Quote from: Bobloblah;591062Converting that takes time, no matter how you do it. My personal preference for doing so was along the lines of what was recently mentioned in another thread: describe the item from Rifts in plain english, then build that description in Silhouette (or other desired system). Again, it's not terribly difficult, it's just the sheer volume that sucks up time.
This is converting the setting. Converting the system involves trying to figure out how to convert the rules over to the new system. Ex: How does MDC convert over to D20?
Converting the setting is taking the elements of story, culture, etc from the game and simply rebuilding them with the new mechanics instead of trying to port them over directly.
Most conversion projects do a mixture of both.
Quote from: Stephen (Alto);591074I will answer you question with you own post
This is converting the setting. Converting the system involves trying to figure out how to convert the rules over to the new system. Ex: How does MDC convert over to D20?
Converting the setting is taking the elements of story, culture, etc from the game and simply rebuilding them with the new mechanics instead of trying to port them over directly.
Most conversion projects do a mixture of both.
That's the thing...they are virtually never seperate. Anything in the
setting that needs to be converted has rules in both
systems. Hence you are converting the rules for such from one system to another.
I'm trying to think of an example of truly converting only system, and I can't. What would that even look like? How is it any different from taking a few mechanics in one system and using them in another?
Put another way, when one talks about "converting an RPG," how is there any difference between the two? Most RPGs have a "setting" that is, at some level, tied to the rules, even if it's only implied.
No doubt this is simply my own lack of imagination; can someone throw out an example?
Quote from: Bill;591006In my experience, conversions usually are not worth it. I prefer to tweak a system built around a setting, as opposed to converting, or having to do a total rebuild of a ruleset for a setting.
One problem I have is what I call 'Baggage'
If you try to use Pathfinder for a setting like Game of Thrones, players will be asking things like...so I can play a Tiefling Sorceror Oracle right?
Tons of the stuff in DND just don't fit that setting.
I think when you're trying to do an adaptation of an existing setting, the GM has a bit more work communicating with the players because he can't just throw them the book and be done with it. It is more prominent with D&D because of the "everything goes" mentality of 3.0+ vs say the "everything optional" culture of Rolemaster or GURPS but not really unique to it.
To a lesser degree you're already forced to do this in systems that support multiple settings anyway (what do you mean I can't play a Noldor Elemental Warrior?) so I think it is normal and no big deal.
As to the feel of the system, no doubt it's going to influence the game and there is often a best fit, but it can also be interesting to see how the different approaches will provide distinct experiences and if you would actually enjoy it for a change of pace. D&D 4e might not be a great fit for R.E.Howard's Conan (as if any D&D was) but it can give you Blizzard's Conan, so to speak, which may be an entertaining romp in its own right.