Hey all, I'm watt, creator of the Ennie-award-winning, Nausicaa-inspired Mothership setting Cloud Empress. I'll be launching a Castle in the Sky/Arcane-inspired TTRPG called Rust Wings for Mausritter next week.

I'll be checking and responding to this post synchronously until about 6 PM CST US.

Happy to answer any questions about indie tabletop roleplaying game publishing, crowdfunding, my designs/design process, worldbuilding, writing literary adventures, Ghibli, etc.

Update: Closing the AMA down. Thanks for all the awesome questions and appreciation for my work!

**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.

​

----------

​

This submission is generated automatically each Saturday at 00:00 UTC.

Has anyone played Outcast Silver Raiders? It looks gorgeous, and I may want to get it for the art alone, but does it play well at the table? I love OSE and other deadly, grim type games. Is it just a reskin of OSE? Did you enjoy it?

Hey everyone! I’m looking for a TTRPG with a combat system that uses Zones (built for zones instead of just altering the rule to make zoned combat) instead of a battle grid.

I’m specifically thinking of how The Electrum Archive handles it: the GM divides the battlefield into a few zones (often 3: party zone / enemy zone / in-between), you can interact with anyone in your zone, and you generally move one adjacent zone per turn. The GM can also add zone conditions like choke points or hazardous areas, and zones can change during a fight (like a flying zone). And the system itself is designed around that.

I just don’t actually like Electrum’s overall system, so I’m not looking to “just play Electrum.” I only want something that captures the feel and clarity of that zone-based positioning.

I want it to still tactical enough to be interesting (movement choices, terrain/conditions matter), but doesn’t require me to find/make maps.

Any help would be appreciated!

I love crunchy tactical combat RPGs. Lancer and Pathfinder are some of my favorites.

However what I don't like about them is that you can wait a while for your turn then accomplish nothing because you miss or they make their save or whatever. That just feels bad. I'd prefer if the random element was how much you accomplish on your turn, not whether you accomplish anything at all.

Are there any games like this you'd recommend?

I'm looking to run Public Access as kind of a one off or very short campaign for some friends. I see there are a bunch of Mysteries available on DriveThru, and didn't know if y'all could recommend your top 3 favorite mysteries,

Me and my friends have done a campaign that's lasted for a few weeks now. we play like twice a week, and as of now in our campaign; they've beat the BBEG and now I'm starting a new chapter for them featuring a warforged that's trying to take over the world by replacing every living being with warforges. They already killed one of my PC's father, and have tossed around the party to show them they mean business and one of my friends said that it's getting dull to me in private and even suggested that he should DM instead because he has a better idea. I feel offended, but idk if I should. They had loads of fun before and I don't know what to do.

I recently stumbled onto Joseph R Lewis' Writing RPG Adventures series and his read aloud format and strategy completely changed my opinion on the usefulness of read aloud text in adventures. In short: He condenses the read aloud text to <50 words and anything that has more detail gets bolded and underlined so the GM knows to reference the bulleted points below the text for more information.

I plan to check out his adventures for more details on that thoughtful design to see how I like it for my own games. I try to practice being concise with descriptions, but can sometimes ramble past being useful.

What adventures or modules have you run that felt did an amazing job formatting or condensing information nicely to allow GMs to spend less time prepping and more time running?

I've been looking lately for a game that would handle Doom and Diablo style sessions, with dice pool combat - I'm thinking of something like Warhammer without the minis.

Just missing throwing all those D6s and clearing out minions by the handful.

It doesn't have to be a balanced or fully fleshed-out system, and I'm happy to re-flavor it during play if a specific setting is attached.

Any recommendations?

If the best answer is "play WHFB without the minis", I'll roll with that. I've still got my 90s rulebooks around. :D

It's kind of funny to me to see how much the pdf version are pushed by publisher as a "cheap" alternative from printed book. They are indeed good, since you can add internal link to jump from one reference to the other. Crazy usefull, for a TTRPG corebook, or even for an adventure but...
I never falled in love with them. The only way to read them for me is with my phone (that I hate to use. Big finger and small screen don't love each other) or on the computer. The only use I have is to share it with my table (playing on discord but via a phone since I have table both physical and virsual at the same time).
I was thinking the problem came from my reading device, but I was "lucky": I broke my old ebook reader broke last year so I have a brand new one. Well, still 30 seconds to turn a page, it's useless to even try.

So my question is: does anyone manage, somehow, to make this pdf readable on an ebook reader or should I just stay forever that not-quite-old guy who hate the new trend? Joke aside, please, help. I have so much book I can't even use

I am a roleplayer not someone who likes crunch. Through and through. the funny thing about this? In roleplay heavy systems like Masks or Avatar the last Airbender I prefer the sidelined combat since I have more freedom in it to do as I please while in more crunchy systems like Pathfinder? I prefer roleplaying because I am not as restricted because there's little to no rules when it comes to roleplaying.

Am I doing something wrong?

I’m interested to hear how the community builds one-shots. Do you have an idea and then find a system? Or do you come across a system and use a pre written module? Find a system and make your own storyline? How much of pre written stuff do you use vs. creating your own plot?

I’m also interested in how long you tend to run them, if you fully read the rulebook or just skim, or anything else you might want to share!