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It was announced that all systems will just be reskins of 5.5e.

Hi everybody!

So I just found out that the "Heroes of the Borderlands" starting set for DND5 encourages players to share the GM duties. They put the setting in three books: 1) Wilderness, 2) Keep on the Borderlands, and 3) Caves of Chaos. A different person take each book and when the party goes to their book's place, they GM. What a cool idea, guys!

Is there a system, adventure, whatever, that does this besides this box set? I just started to GM this year(Ben Milton's Jim Henson's Labyrinth the Adventure Game first for three sessions so far, and then a break to play Fabien's Atelier in Cairn with smaller groups when the whole Labyrinth group can't make it) and haven't played since a 5e game in 2019. Having a great time, but would love to see both sides on the table and show the players both sides, too.

My interests are in the OSR, and in Story Games like PbtAs, but because I am new to the hobby, I am pliable. Love love loved "Inhuman Conditions", which I believe is a ttrpg; that game got me interested in these other games!

For example, I really like Modern Age from Green Ronin, but one of the rules I always ignore is speed. A character has anywhere from 10-15 Speed, i.e. can move up to 10-15 yards in a single action. Even if I plonk down a map or scribble the combat zone on paper, I'd be hard-pressed and extremely annoyed if I had to guess exact distances.

Most of the time I either ignore it, use it as a +- modifier for chases or just do what 13th Age does and say that everything is either nearby or far away. Now I'm thinking, maybe I'm doing it wrong? There has to be a reason why and how people use exact speed attributes in a TotM game. So I'd like to ask those that use it, like it and wouldn't want to play without it: how do you make it work for you?

Essentially what the title says. I already have way too many games, and I know that Son of Oak holds fairly regular sales anyway, so this is unlikely to be the last chance to get the game at a reduced rate, but what other reasons are there not to buy it or at least to wait, especially if those reasons are specific to this game. Has anyone here played it and either not enjoyed it, spotted weaknesses or identified the kinds of player/GM it definitely would not be for? I'm not asking for it to be trashed, just for excuses to keep my money!

I like to GM for Mothership and have done so a few times with success, but I have never run any other game (though I've played others). I am considering running Vaesen for some friends. I'm currently reading the standard reference document for the Year Zero Engine that Vaesen uses, so I understand that it is different mechanically from Mothership. For anyone who has played both Mothership and Vaesen, is one easier to run than the other?

Where in the universe can I get a copy of these books!? Its feel like borderline lost media!

In Pathfinder's Divine Mysteries, Paizo introduced the world to Atrogine, a god born of the wishes and dreams of a reclusive coven of witches.

In Dragon 293, Wizards of the Coast talk about Small Gods, like:

Lomeriseh, an intricate mosaic. The mosaic, which stretches over thirty yards in each direction, is composed of a seemingly abstract array of magic tiles. It is an artifact whose purpose is now forgotten, and has achieved a level of sentience and power that allows it to influence its environment. The elves worship the mosaic as a god, praying to it for good weather, protection from their enemies, and healing, all of which the artifact can provide. It, in turn, is very protective of its people and will not hesitate to intervene if they are threatened.

Are there any OTHER gods in the TTRPG worlds like these?

I'm referring to:

• High Noon at Midnight
• Neon Rain
• Claim the Sky
• It's Only Magic
• Rust and Redemption
• We are All Mad Here
• The Stars are Fire
• Godforsaken
• Stay Alive!

All of their descriptions are hitting real good. Genres that don't often get general setting guides. At this time I don't have interest in Cypher. Maybe that'll change based on the changes presented in 2e, but for now I'm looking as them as general, non-Cypher, reference books.

Do they offer good value as general genre references, or would most of their content fall flat outside of Cypher games?

Two weeks ago, i asked you for your help, some tips on this.

Bascially it boiled down to: "When players try out to play blind characters (e.g blind fighters like Zatoichi) or antropomorphic characters like "Dog-Humans" that rely on smell a lot...

Can i describe scenes a little more from "their viewpoint" to raise immersion?

https://www.reddit.com/r/rpg/comments/1tsa1om/two_of_my_players_want_to_test_me_made_a_blind/

And you helped. Got a lot of DMs, quite a few very good posts, and i also digged through my esxperience of 30 years of Larp, camping for a long time in the bush and... i just pinged two old Larp buddies who i knew have been for a very, very long time in Special Forces Departments of their countries army. I got some... surprising tips.

One example scene (that i wrote down before the game) where i introduced the character. The players loved it - and yes, it is pretty different to how i described things before. I learned something. Smells seem to also help the other characters. More immersion to a scene and such.

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The sun seems finally to set and the shadows here in this street catch up with you. You feel the temperatures change, from a hot summers day, towards the night. You pick up the sparrows now getting more active, making a ruckus in a bush somewhere near you. Overall, the air seems to get clearer somehow, the sounds getting more crisp.

You tap your way down the street, following the description of that boy you asked the way to that tavern.

And yeah, at the end of the street, you seem to hear some sounds you deem to be a tavern. On your way further down the narrow street, to the left upwards, an open window. You hear a young couple in a heated discussion. Some ceramic breaking. To the right of you, a baby.... crying. A mother singing, some giggled "Oh oh oh" hummed inbetween. Guess somebody really shat himself.

The street is filled with evening scents. Cooking. Burned fat, sizzling meat, cabbage soup, cooked grains. Hints of geosmin, the dust reacting with the air getting more damp. Dry fir resin, lime, chalky smells. Cooling tar. Also, these cracking sounds. Half timbered houses settling in with the temperature change.

You enter the tavern. A real FIST in your FACE of smells and sounds storming your ears and nose. Old beer, spilled moonshine, perpetual stew, dry and dusty, earthy notes of rotting drying up straw, loamy notes from the kicked up floor. Piss and somebody probably puked a day or so ago. A mixture of discussions, cards slammed on tables, burps and laughts.

Sweat tells you a lot about the people here. No hints of this rusty, nose cringing smell of Sweat in a Gambeson with a Chainmail. More like, sweat in linnen. Sundried. This is definitely a workers, a farmers place. Yeah. you get hints of cheap blacksmith coal. Cow and Pig shit. Rotten fruit. Very cheap ale. Onion Farts and rotten teeth and bad breath.

As you arrive at the bar, following the steady squeaking sound of a damp cloth rubbing on ceramic and hearing three times the dark, grunted "Ok" from there when somebody yelled for more beer...

... you smell that bartender. Dried beer. Liquor. Sweat. Lots of it. Pipe smoke. Real shitty cheap tobacco. Garlic. Stew. And this extremely sweet, caramell notes in the sweat smell tells you something - he will not getting to be very old. You assume his bad mood based sound to be connected with a lot of back pain. Guess that this person already has problems with his Intestines.

After you showed him that wooden badge you got for that job, you hear only that gruntled, slightly drunk "Through the curtain. Down the hallway. When the shitters left, open the door on the right, up the stairs, then left, through the door. "

You walk through that stinky curtain. Mildew. Old potato. Ash. Rancid Fat. And yeah, you can tell where the shitter is. OH BOY. No way to miss that one.

Slowly opening the door. First steps up the stairs. Your nose is catching something. An open window. Somewhere above you, probably next floor. And - that creak. Thats not the settling wood. Thats someone shifting his weight very slightly. Behind the corner upwards of you. The cool night wind brings you scents, from somebody upstairs. Around the corner.

Camelia seed oil on steel. Somebody loves his knifes. Like a chef. You could pick up that peanutty sweaty metal coin smell everywhere.

Damp fur and this very light smell of forest and grass and algae. That weight shifting. Thats not shoes. Hooves. There must be a satyr up there. Somebody who washed himself in a river before coming here.

What are you going to do?

Hey all!

I was having a discussion with some buddies of mine, and it got me to thinking...what is your favourite action style in a TTRPG? Just to clarify, I mean actions taken in and out of combat, like attacking in DnD or Pathfinder.

I'm personally lacking experience with much outside of those two and Cyberpunk RED, so I was curious what y'all think.

EDIT: Turns out I didn't do a great job explaining myself. Probably blame the lack of sleep.

I should have asked what game system you think handles action economy the best. Think DnD where you have an action, bonus action, and a reaction, or Pathfinder where you have three actions to use how you please.

Sometimes, the party has to leave the dungeon before they’ve completely explored it, satisfied their objective therein, etc. Alternatively, the party has “finished” the dungeon and either they (or the GM) does not want to backtrack through all the rooms they’ve just cleared, instead “evacuating” (whether to the dungeon entrance or even back to town) instantaneously.

In either case, TTRPG groups/systems may have some designated mechanic or procedure (sometimes called an escape roll, sometimes not) for allowing the party to leave the dungeon without actually having to backtrack. Some megadungeons are even designed with the idea that parties will end each session back in town, no matter where/when their dungeoneering for the day has concluded.

My question to you is, how do you (or your group) or your preferred system go about handling the “leave the dungeon” bits of play? Why is this the mechanic/procedure you prefer and/or have come to rely on?