I recently picked up Fireborn from ebay after assuming it was just another D&D clone. It seems to support both fantasy and modern play with powers, but feels like yet another Exalted rather than D&D.

Does anyone have experience in playing it? How would you categorize it?

It is hard to categorize. I think it was part of its failure to succeed.

In feel, it is a lot like those Immortal Series that happened; Forever Knight and HighLander.   You have a regular life in the present, which has a lot of drama because of what makes you different and the secret society you live in.  You then have "flashbacks" to your life past. These flashbacks are illuminating in to either your current plot or some past relationship.  

So Dragonborn is about Dragons.  In days of old, you were one of the several kinds of dragons and interacted in Dragon Society, occasionally messing with humans.  They learned to transform into people and would do that upon occassion.  

Something happened...  Dragons were forced to become people to survive and stayed that way.  They mostly have forgotten their dragon lives and immortal bit.

Now some are remembering.  They can access little "dragon edges" now.  Someday the will get big transforms and things but not for a while.

Play... nobody would play it.    I have never met anyone online who has. Lots of people who have the rules. I have met a few that want to run it. Nobody who has played it.

It is hard to GM correctly and a bitch even to do a half assed job.  The rules have a strong learning curve, but not an insurmountable one.

The system is very crunchy in parts, for a game that has an emphasis on this story aspect.   Some of the crunchy parts are very, very crunchy and seem bolted on to the game system.  Martial Arts/ Combat systems come to mind.  Still, it is a cool game if all the right factors could get together.

Quote from: brettmb;291382I recently picked up Fireborn from ebay after assuming it was just another D&D clone. It seems to support both fantasy and modern play with powers, but feels like yet another Exalted rather than D&D.

Does anyone have experience in playing it? How would you categorize it?

I think it's more like a mix between Exalted and Highlander....but that still does not really explain it well.

It's the RPG for people who really dig fighting videogames like Tekken or Dead or Alive.  The combat mechanics are supposed to emulate the feel of those games.

I dig the idea, but thought the execution was suboptimal and was ultimately put off by the obnoxiousness of the games' cheerleaders (well, cheerleader) on RPGnet.

KoOS

It was a neat concept. Pretty much marred by being stuck in "same old same old", they stretched mythical spirits to be Dragons while ignoring dragons of myth and legends for the background (Cernunnos a dragon? Really?)

They tied it to Atlantis (most overused trope ever.)

The system was heavily marred by its vibrant combat system that didn't have similar vibrancy for other skill checks or magical use. I like the concept, but it wasn't implemented well.

You play two variants of your PC--the modern human incarnation, and the ancient dragon incarnation of memory--but sadly this didn't actually get much detail on how to make it cool and useful to the modern incarnation. (That I recall.)


I think the game could have been rectified with a tiny bit of work more in the playtesting stage. Making the big dice pools work well for everything, including magic and skills.

It seems to me that it could be fashioned into a better World of Darkness.