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Two big bundles went live recently with a huge variety of games, comics, fiction, even some maps.

https://www.drivethrurpg.com/en/featured_promotions?promotion_id=RPG_26_TGOI

Looks like stuff from Chaosium, Evil Hat, Onyx Path, Green Ronin, Arc Dream, R Talsorian, Goodman Games, Pelgrane Press, Catalyst and some indie folks too.

Someone asked for recommendations for the best game-night ttrpg one-shot systems. We had a good list going but OP deleted it. Here’s some of what we came up with.

What is missing? What are your favorites? What do you keep in our bag for a last minute game-night one-shot?

• Lasers & Feelings
• Brindlewood Bay
• 2400
• Trophy Dark
• Honey Heist
• Elf With A 10 Page Backstory
• Perils & Princesses
• Tunnel Goons
• Lady Blackbird
• Everyone is John
• Hireling
• Weird North
• Bees in Mechs
• Our God is Dead
• Crash Pandas
• Exiles
• Mustang
• Dread
• Cracker Barrel has Fallen
• Jason Statham's Big Vacation
• X.F.R.S (Xtreme Forest Reclamation Squad)
• Waycastle
• We Saved This Vessel Once
• Someone Dies in this Elevator
• Traveller’s Tale
• Crime Idiots
• Collaborative Taskforces

I'm looking for a lost blog post and all my efforts so far have been in vain so I'm hoping someone remembers it and can help.

The blog post (maybe it was two blog posts actually, but on the same website) was about precursors of RPGs. It described games played during the end of the middle ages and renaissance that could be seen as early role playing games.

The first, and older IIRC, was named "the game of life". People would draw scrolls attached to ribbons from a basket. Each scroll would have some person's situation and aspiration ("You're a baker that wants to find a wife") and once everyone had a role, they'd roleplay the interactions of their characters trying to reach their goal through the story.

The second one was based on Orlando Furioso by Ariosto, an epic fantasy poem from the 16th century that was extremely popular at the time, think Lord of the Ring kind of influence at the time. The game revolved around a board divided in squares. Each square depicted a scene of Orlando Furioso. Players would roll dice to move through the scenes randomly and act the scenes out, linking them with the previous scene they were in, therefore creating an entirely new story by drawing inspiration from randomly selected scenes of the poem and what the other players created in the same time.

The blog was quite obscure (as evidenced by the fact that I can't find it anymore), from an historian IIRC, and I read it in 2021 or 2022. It's possible that it is actually a video essay as I watch a lot of those as well, but I'm 90% sure it was a blog post.

While the memory is vivid, the fact that I can't find anything related to that blog or these games annoys me, so if you know about it and can share information I'd be very grateful.

EDIT: found!

• https://aidungeon.medium.com/role-playing-games-in-the-renaissance-court-ab0bd680409a
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XwFU9Xjzork
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f20rpBU_QYo

I'm looking for TTRPGs that allow for character to possess inner worlds, or otherwise center entirely around a group of player characters with inner worlds. What I mean by "inner world" is some kinda personal, metaphysical pocket dimension hosted within their own mind or soul or whatever. It usually represents who they are, what their history is, what they believe in, and the ties they have to others. Sometimes in a kinda abstract way. Sometimes they can draw power from it, or manifest parts of it in the real world. Other times, fixing a problem in the inner world helps to solve a problem in the real world.

I'm not looking for any specific themes or implementations beyond that. I just think it's a cool idea and wanna see what people have done with it. Here's some examples:

-Player characters in Chuubo's Marvelous Wish-Granting Engine can possess the "Called Away" Arc. It grants a fundamental tie to some kind of distant Realm. Generically, the Realm represents some kind of broad concept like Love, Ambition, Sorrow, Time, Truth, etc. It doesn't have to be an inner world per se, but it'll almost certainly end up having strong thematic ties to the player character in some way. Anyways, characters who are "Called Away" can open portals to and from their Realm, manifest parts of their Realm in the "real world", and bring forth various things from it.

-Player characters in Beast: The Primordial are ~basically~ people whose souls have been replaced by the embodiment of some kinda fear. These range from more primeval ones like "fear of dying" and "fear of what lurks in the dark" to more contemporary ones like "fear of my secrets being exposed." The easier-to-comprehend explanation I like to use is that they're the antagonists of fairy tales. You know Death from Puss in Boots: The Last Wish? That's basically what a Beast is. Beasts have a personal, metaphysical, nightmarish Lair they can draw people into that's designed to induce said fear, and they can even project parts of it outwardly into the physical world if there's at least a vague resemblance to it.

-For a non-TTRPG example: Psychonauts! You play as a psychic that delves into other people's mindscapes, each of which is basically a personal reflection of who that person is. Though, the game primarily centers around exploring other people's minds and helping them rather than trying to control or manage your own (There's some elements of that! It's just not a big focus).

What I mean is, a game where the party must manage a kingdom or other large organisation but are not expected to handle each and every issue said organisation has, having resources at their disposal to send, and the challenge being in knowing when to act themselves and when to send their minions/servants.

I do realize that, as presented, the premise doesn't seem too well suited for a TTRPG, but I just got curious. I remember the existence of Birthright for AD&D, though I never played it.

Thanks a lot for sharing your knowledge :)

Today, especially in the U.S., I feel D&D is ubiquitous. I'm curious about role-play markets during the 80's and 90's outside of the English-speaking world. Did other tabletop rpgs, like Basic Roleplaying, get much more traction than D&D? And why?

I understand that Drakar och Demoner has some Basic Roleplaying DNA, and so I wondered if other countries had their own rpgs that gained more popularity than D&D even if they were heavily inspired by other English-sourced non-D&D products.

Would part of it have been TSR's marketing and translation strategy not hitting a wider fanbase around the world?

So I'm having an itch for a dark urban fantasy game about polical intrigue and being a monster that uses superpowers to kill other monsters.

​

I love the Underworld and Blade movies, and I'm looking for something that fits that vibe. Which of those games would be a better fit?

​

The Vampire splats for WoD/CofD, Curseborne or Urban Shadows?

​

And are there other games besisdes those that could fit?

Okay so I have recently been in a bit of a Greek Mythology kick, and I wanted an RPG to be able to play a god character, I generally prefer systems that are on the medium to heavy amount of rules, but I am okay with a lighter system if it is really good for the concept.

I have heard of godbound and scion 2e but godbound is osr, which doesn't feel like it would fit very well, and when I looked up discussions about Scion I saw lots of complaints, not helped when I noticed that I would need to buy four books to be able to play on the god level, so i am a bit wary of possibly wasting money, so what do any of you​ recommend?

What can you say for or against any given system? It doesn't have to be godbound or scion if there is another system you heard of that you think is better for this then I am all ears.

Thought experiment: The year is 2037 (100 years after the death of Lovecraft) and it's time for the 13^th edition of Call of Cthulhu to be published.

Due to a series of unforeseen as much as unlikely circumstances you're the sole person in charge of this edition.

What do you do? What choices do you make? Do you choose to follow the BRP system or do you change the game altogether?

I'm thinking about running an Open Table/West Marches this summer for a large friend group of mine and was wondering what system/setting would be a good fit.

I discovered over the years I have an extremely hard time coming up with adventures/campaigns when I am by myself, but when I have something to riff off (either with a system/setting that leaves a lot of blanks and/or my players that roleplay and talk amongst each other) running and prepping come very naturally and I can run a fairly decent session.

The most successful campaign I've ran to date was with Lady Blackbird, because it had a very clear goal and established characters while leaving more than enough blanks for me to go ham with my own ideas.

I'm specifically looking for a system/setting that also require much prep and doesn't knock me over the head with 300+ pages of lore or campaign modules since I find those very hard to digest and they don't spark my imagination.

Does anybody know of any other systems/settings that fit this bill?

I'm personally thinking about Mythic Bastionland but I'm not sure if it can work as a West Marches.

Thanks! :)

Hey everyone,

I am running a campaign with the german "Splittermond" system and i realised i find it frustrating. It is a rather crunchy system with a lot of numbers and calculations. It makes improvisation and especially combat so much harder than, say, my dearly-loved Shadowdark. My players do not want to lose the great class-less system (it comes with rather easy modular character creation) of Splittermond and the "balance" that 2d10 instead of 1d20 bring. They also like having specialisations (survival, performance...) instead of just having 6 stats.

Do you have recommendations for a rules-light, rules-medium game that we could transfer our campaign too?

I'd love to switch to Shadowdark, but the players want to keep the mortality in the hero-tale cosmos. Is there any OSR game that is not as deadly but flexible and easy to prep?

Thanks in advance : - )