**Come here and talk about anything!**

This post will stay stickied for (at least) the week-end. Please enjoy this space where you can talk about anything: your last game, your current project, your patreon, etc. You can even talk about video games, ask for a group, or post a survey or share a new meme you've just found. This is the place for small talk on r/rpg.

The off-topic rules may not apply here, but the other rules still do. This is less the Wild West and more the Mild West. Don't be a jerk.

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I was hyped to see Girl Frame, an rpg of trauma and queerness about being forced to pilot half-living mech suits in order to fight eldritch abominations, which I've been eyeing for a while, get recognition. This hits some really hard topics.

As a lover of weird setting and GMless card games, I was also very interested in A Land Once Magic, a setting that describes itself as post-fantasy, a world of molten metal where society exists only on magical powered airships fueled by elemental blood, to mostly quote the devs, because I couldn't have put it better.

Sickest Witch is something I did not know of until yesterday, when some of my friends were going through the nominee list and suddenly got smitten. It's a dark low fantasy game about, obviously, witches that grow stronger by hacking enemy body parts. It's gruesome and claims that people with old school DnD sensibilities will find themselves at home playing it, even though it makes no attempts to appeal to nostalgia. This kind of brutality reminds me of Mork Borg.

Mappa Mundi is a game that I was supposed to try twice, but the GM had to cancel last minute. It's an rpg where you play a Chronicler exploring and documenting the natural world after a calamity that happened a 100 years ago. There is no combat in this game. It uses cards, which a big fan of The Quiet Year, Dialect and For the Queen, I adore.

I am happy to see Midnight Muscadines get some love because while many might find the system somewhat clunky (using both dice and cards), the worldbuilding is top notch. It features a world where people once foolishly broke the sun and the land is kept alive by five of its shards, being otherwise left in eternal twilight. Magic is found in jams and the whole vibe is as darkly cozy as bundling up in a stormy night.

Deadline: A Clockwork Press is also pretty neat for a GMless game, mixing map drawing with worldbuilding in the vein of similar titles. Its pitch is that the story is woven through newspaper headlines and that as press you can both tell the truth or be unreliable narrators. Our group was yellow press.

Painted Wastelands got a Player's Handbook, it seems. This is psychedelic metal science fantasy/post-apocalyptic, just as Ultraviolet Grasslands, Grok and Vaults of Vaarn, with a good dose of inspo from the likes of Moebius. It is weird, surreal, dreamlike, at times horrifying and I really need to get this to a table. I haven't checked but I willing to bet it is NSR, as the previous setting book was for OSE and interestingly enough in comparison with similar titles it is a hexcrawl rather than a point crawl.

Rapscallion, which is kind of a mess of a book got somehow nominated for Best Writing. It's a PBtA Pirate rpg in the tone of Pirates of the Caribbean. I've written a review on it some time ago. Plays well at the table if only the GM can parse the rulebook.

From a cursory glance, there's also an rpg about performing a ballet routine in front of a eldritch abomination, a cooking show and goblin magical girls, which i would think would at least interest someone.

(Of course, there also bigger titles everyone knows about like Daggerheart and Legend of the Mist).

I've never understood the point/appeal of the open world sandbox style. However, I recently had a bit of an epiphany, so here's my attempt at a take:

Sandbox campaigns are about living an alternative life in a fantastical world.

You grow up, find work, develop relationships, go on adventures, travel, craft things, build alliances, etc. However, there's no guarantee this will ever lead anywhere "big" the way a more narrative campaign might. Then again, that's how real life works, too.

Sorry if this seems obvious to anyone else, but it's taken me a long time to realize exactly what the "point" of sandbox / West Marches games are.

I'm one of those people who doesn't understand something until I can put it into my own words.

I realize this topic has been done to death. I got excited and wanted to share.

I’m quite fond of the idea of magic being dangerous business, and would love to get recommendations of systems or settings where that’s a key component.

I’m looking for things more akin to Dungeon Crawl Classics imprevisibility instead of “magic has a cost” vibe of Kult, Delta Green or even Stonetop. The tone I’m looking for is more like “if you cast a spell you’ll likely get what you’re looking for but it comes with unpredictable twists”.

What do you know is like this?

Hi all,

I've been playing ttrpgs both as a game master and player for the better part of 7 years. The system I play the most (probably not super surprising) is D&D 5e 2014, but after so many years I feel like I've seen all the game can offer and it's left me wanting something a little meatier, but there are so many options out there, I'm hesitant to invest time learning without first knowing that they're going to be worth it in the long run. I have experience with a few other systems: I've played a fair bit of Powered by the Apocalypse, Kids on Bikes, Vampire the Masquerade, Daggerheart, and Star Wars 5e. I like elements of all these games, but none have quite scratched that itch enough for me to switch over from D&D 5e.

My biggest complaint is that everything in D&D 5e feels very streamlined and same-y to me.

Character builds can only mechanically vary so much before you've seen all the different flavors of wizard, fighter, etc. While subclasses are a nice, thematically cohesive way to give the player some variety, they also limit the number of mechanically creative choices you can make when building a PC.

I would love a system where character build customization can be open and complex. I've heard a little about GURPS, and it seems like players can spend points to create moves/abilities and modify their properies (damage, number of uses, range, etc.). This type of thing seems really appealing to me. I also like the idea of more modular number increases, like with D&D 3e/3.5e's skill increases being based on character class and intelligence rather than a flat proficiency bonus that's exaclty the same on everything.

Combat also feels very boring run rules-as-written in 5e without serious overhaul from the GM. There's little reason for a player to deviate from the optimal set of actions in a turn. A melee fighter will get within 5 ft of an enemy and attack over and over again with their strongest weapon, standing unmoving in that spot, until the creature is dead, then do the same with the next enemy. Sure every once in a while a creature might resist a damage type and a sorcerer might have to switch their go-to firebolt for frostbite, or cast a bigger leveled spell on a harder encounter, but more often than not, characters tend toward a single, optimized set of actions an only incentivised to deviate when their bread-and-butter is ineffective.

I really want a system that encourages adaptive combat. Where the objective and the players' means to obtain it vary from encounter-to-encounter. I would love to have player characters and enemies constantly reacting and adapting to each other, players rewarded for working in tandem with one another, and better rules for things like elements of the terrain that interact with the players to either give them advantages or drawbacks and make combat feel varied.

Aside from character creation and combat, I'm looking for something that still emphasizes the roleplaying element and gives mechanical and aesthetic incentive to create rich characters and settings. I'm a fan of more hard-rules games, favor fantasy or setting-neutral systems, and want a game that rewards high player and GM investment.

Please let me know if you have any recommendations that fit the bill for what I've described.

So I received an email from Magpie with the announcement of the Ennies Emporium 2026

We all know that some companies kinda use backerkit as a pre-order store, but if I'm not misunderstanding this, they are now just selling games but as crowdfunding.

I'm a bit shocked because even the FAQ says:

What is Pledging? Pledging in crowdfunding is a commitment to support the creation of a new product or project. Unlike a traditional purchase, you're not buying an item that already exists. Instead, your contribution helps bring a creative idea to life, and in return, you typically receive rewards (such as the product itself) as a thank you for your early support. 

so.. does Backerkit now offer the consumer the same protection as a store or is this still a just crowdfund? If people don't get their products will they be legally entitled to buyer protection?

Is there something I'm missing? Because from my perspective it just seems like a store without legally being a store.

I want to try Pendragon. I couldn’t find it at the local game shop, although that’s no surprise as it’s tiny.

Where am I best likely to get a copy here in the UK and should I be buying a starter set or is there a better combo of books to buy?

I was a huge fan of Arthurian legend growing up and would love to immerse myself in that world.

So, I'm looking for this puff I found online. It was about how to properly GM horror.

This one talked about 5 different conflicts (against self, against nature etc) and used five different Alien movies to illustrate how they look like in movies.

I've found some gives googling it but not this one

Anyway, hope this rings a bell for someone because it really was a good guide

Two weeks ago, I was a player in a D&D game. We were playing a one-shot, and our friend playing a bard had to sing a song. He made up a really beautiful song and entertained all of us, but even our DM was laughing, he told him to roll with advantage. The rolls came up bad, and the song failed,which made me feel like something was really wrong. Am I just too Fate minded or narrative minded as a player? I know it would have been cool to explain it by saying,the song was nice, but the crowd didn’t like it (or because something unrelated to the song went wrong) so it wasn’t a good performance, but I still felt it was not ok for me.

(English is not my native)

Anyone know of good city map making tools for cyberpunk games like Shadowrun?

Hello everyone! Putting it open to start: as English isn't my main language, I did passed this text through an AI to make it more coherent.

I am finally discovering the Ultimate Answer to the Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe, and Everything this year, and I want to celebrate by bringing together the friends I’ve been playing TTRPGs with for years. I have 3 different gaming groups, which adds up to about 15 guests (plus partners). Total number can fluctuate between 10 to 20 friends.

The plan is to convert my garden into a Fantasy Themed Tavern, invite everyone to cosplay, and spend an afternoon/evening having fun. I have about 2 months to set this up and would love your suggestions, personal experiences, or resources!

The Plan So Far:

• The Icebreaker (RPG Quiz): Start with a 1-hour quiz to mix up the members of the different groups so they get to know each other. Rounds will include classic RPG knowledge, fantasy pop culture, and inside jokes/facts from our actual campaigns.
• The Main Event (LARP Lite): A 3-hour casual live-action adventure. The premise is defending the tavern from a monster raid, mixed with secret individual goals and puzzles to overcome the threat.
• The Nostalgia Phase: Wrapping up the structured events with some storytelling about each group's campaigns—I really love that nostalgic feeling with good friends.
• The Magic Shop: Throughout the quiz and LARP, players will earn 3D-printed coins and gems. At the end of the night, they can spend them at a "Magic Shop" run by my daughter, stocked with 3D-printed minis and RPG accessories as party favors.

What I Have to Work With:

• A 3D Printer: Already queuing up coins, gems, and props.
• An above-ground pool: No one is swimming, but I want to transform it into something cool and integrate it into the LARP (like a "Forbidden Lake" or monster lair).
• An old projector and screen: Can project onto the garden wall.

Where I Need Your Help:

1. LARP Mechanics for Beginners: This is my biggest blind spot. I want to be the only NPC/GM. Since my guests are all experienced players and good friends, roleplaying won't be an issue, but I need a very simple, lightweight rule system or guidelines to write the scenario. Any recommendations for running a "Tavern Defense" LARP?
2. Pacing: Does 1 hour for the quiz, 3 hours for the LARP, and 2 hours for eating/socializing sound balanced, or is 3 hours too long for a casual LARP?
3. Prop & Projector Ideas: Any clever ideas on how to use the projector or the pool to elevate the tavern atmosphere?

I'm completely open to any ideas, links, or modules you've tried in the past. My deepest thanks for all your contributions!

I have a friend who is returning to GM for the first time in years. I see articles on different specific games but what are the best overall GM primers you’ve read in the last few years?