Good video. I have always thought that classes did not mix well with a big overarching skill system. I like the concept of niche protection and the sense that classes should have unique abilities that members of other classes can't just pick up a la carte. I don't care for some modern systems that make every class good at combat in different ways, yet still feature a class called fighter or warrior. I think that those design choices are part of what makes people view fighters as a lackluster class. If everyone fights well, then the fighter doesn't really have a place. I am pleased to hear that Baptism of Fire recognizes this, and makes the fighter class actually the best overall class pertaining to combat.

Quote from: GhostNinja on Today at 01:42:06 PM

Quote from: Nakana on Today at 01:26:08 PMIf OSR keeps growing the way it is, WoTC will make 6E OSR.

*6e proper, not 5e 2024

Not that would be a bad thing.  Make D&D great again. 

Ignoring my disdain for WoTC for a moment, but a mix of B/X and 1e with some of the skills from 4e/5e and a unified d20 mechanic... and it being officially D&D would be pretty cool.

Sadly, it's highly unlikely that I  would buy it though. I can already get that game from multiple publishers with the benefit of not supporting WoTC. But it would be cool to see official D&D come full circle.

I would suggest that the biggest need the RPG industry has is to branch out into the Collaborative Strategy department. The big failing of most of the bigger RPGs is that players are practically always doing their own things when it comes to their character arcs and character advancement decisions, which means the GM's job can become an exercise in herding cats.

It's generally my conclusion that RPGs simply aren't difficult enough on the player-end for players to bother talking to each other that much. If you have classic monsters vulnerable to a certain thing you learn about from reading the Bestiary (or making a knowledge check) then either a player knows it, a player character knows it, or it's irrelevant. In all circumstances, the conversation takes two seconds. By extension, the usual way RPGs increase difficulty is to make monsters roll with bigger modifiers and roll bigger damage dice. There is literally nothing to discuss here; you aren't actually increasing the difficulty so much as increasing the peril.

However, if you actually give the players a puzzle to solve together, they actually have to sit down and talk for a moment. Once you do that, players are more likely to talk to each other about other things, like their character arcs and their character advancement decisions.

Quote from: swzl on Today at 07:24:37 AMI am adapting Witchery by Levi Kornelson to my home brew game. It is a noun, verb, casting method style of magic system. It features magic that can cause side effects even if successfully cast. These include:

• Affliction: Things like being tangled, sickened, cursed, blinded or even physically transformed.
• Delay: Actions taking up more time than one might expect, or even 'hanging' indefinitely until something else is done to fix the delay.
• Displacement: Things ending up where they shouldn't, including effects going astray.
• Expense: Resources (usually items) being used up.
• Helplessness: The spellcaster being rendered heavily entangled, paralyzed, unconscious, or comatose.
• Injury: General damage, sometimes of a broad type (burning, etc) being done to the spellcaster or their allies.
• Peril: Entirely new threats being generated or attracted (like lighting striking the building you're in and setting it on fire).
• Strangeness: Odd effects, often unsettling or confusing to onlookers, which can complicate the situation at hand.
• Weariness: Imposes exhaustion levels.

I implemented a increased duration/impact mechanic based on the severity of risk the caster takes. The choices also allow for mitigation of large risks by spreading out results, so a bit of injury, some strangeness, and a helping of peril.

I'm in the process of creating NPC's in the system. The players were given the 1.0 version last night. I'm hoping the inclusion of free form casting with memorized spells will ween them off Vancian magic.

I was playing with the concept of an Noun + Verb magic system in the vein of Ars Magica, but again I'm not going for a wizard like arcane magic system, but more discrete powers where the effects scale based on risk of investment into them.

Quote from: Nakana on Today at 01:26:08 PMIf OSR keeps growing the way it is, WoTC will make 6E OSR.

*6e proper, not 5e 2024

Not that would be a bad thing.  Make D&D great again. 

If OSR keeps growing the way it is, WoTC will make 6E OSR.

*6e proper, not 5e 2024

Quote from: Brad on June 13, 2024, 02:28:12 PM

Quote from: the crypt keeper on June 13, 2024, 11:40:13 AMMy vote goes to Mayfair's MEGS system used for DC Heroes 1e-3e. Besides the best system for supers I have used, it is certainly capable of serving as a generic game engine. Maybe not as polished as some of the newer games mentioned, but I am surprised it does not have a heartbreaker available by now.

MEGS doesn't really qualify as it is extremely well-known; I mean, it was used for the DC RPG for around 15 years. That notwithstanding, I guess if you hate life you could get Blood of Heroes and just pull the system from there for whatever you want to do.

Fair point. I do have tBoHSE and it is worn thin from my ongoing game. I take the lore section out and the horrible art and print up a spiral bound version for the table. Re-organized with shit where I want it.

2. MEGS Retro-Clone.

Quote from: weirdguy564 on June 15, 2024, 09:56:14 PMYeah, this topic came as a surprise to me as well.  I don't recall ever hearing this claim that the OSR is dying.

If anything, more OSR games are coming out almost weekly it seems.

I agree.   If anything the OSR is getting bigger as wotc keeps screwing up and pissing people off

My local library actually has a D&D policy.  They're quite welcoming, if you want to be a freaking therapist/babysitter.