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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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Was looking at doing a rotation of different RPGs and I always like seeing how the mechanics bind into gameplay

Sanity in Call of Cthulhu is the typical example people bring up of mechanics impacting feel but I’m looking for the less noticed but still impactful examples

Not looking for anything in particular I just love learning about other RPGs (:

I have a player that keeps track of all their dice rolls. They love getting crunchy. It made me think, what would that look like as a GM and would it even be worth it?

I'm looking to spend some of my money on some new games, and I'm in the mood for a few reads that are more "new technology in game design to think about" than anything else.

So, what are some of your favorite games with interesting mechanical twists on the PbtA, FitD, and CfB frameworks/philosophy?

One of my favorites of late was keys and deadlocks in Blades '68. In play, they do such a wonderful job of making you play into your character, while also having the looming moments where they change irrevocably - it really makes me want to drive the character like a stolen car. So simple, but really effective.

So me and my friends are almost done with a multiyear dnd campaign and we will be looking for something new. I want to DM but I am looking for something very specific so bear with me.

I finished black myth wukong recently and I loved it so much I got into journey to the west and chinese mythology in general.

I'm looking for a ttrpg that embodies chaotic battles like that. I want my players to face armies and fight gods. Think a system like the dynasty warrior games or something. I believe the chinese genre is called xianxia although I am not very familiar with it.

I would like to write my own world and story but I want to use the resources and stories of the ttrpg as inspiration and ofcourse I want to use the classes and mechanics from there as well.

Are there any good ttrpgs out there that offer this level of mythic battles? I was recommended Exalted by a friend but I have not looked into it yet

I'm adding hexcrawl mechanics to my game and so I'm looking for examples to draw inspiration from. I'm more interested in what kinds of things I need to include in my game rather than how, specifically to do them. So I don't care if the rules work well or not. But I do care if they attempted to do the important things. Price is a concern; I don't want to shell out $40 for a game I'm never going to play.

Also, any advice anyone has on what makes a good hexcrawl would be appreciated.

Just to be clear, with "Narrative meta-currencies" I mean stuff like Heroic Inspiration or Hero Points, basically bonuses that the GM can give players for doing ceirtain stuff, such as doing something heroic or having a really original idea. Now for some context.

So I was preparing to run a new system (Outgunned: superheroes) and came across a section covering the game's meta-currency, Power. Now, Power in this game is used for a ton of things, from special abilities to adding bonuses to rolls, and though charachters can gain it by using ceirtain abilities, this seems to be quite rare, and is usually gained through the GM. Moreover, the book includes this line.

Power is an important resource you should use very often. If you get to the end of a Session without giving a handful of Power, it means you’re being too stingy!

I will now go over my problems with it.

• Mechanics like these feel so subjective. Even though the game does give some suggestions, they are extremely arbitrary and don't offer much structure. Which I guess is the point with these kind of mechanics, but without some semblance of consistency, they will break the game.
• Unlike Advantage and Disadvantage, which take place when the logistics of an action would vary its difficulty, meta-currencies are much more abstract and "up to the GM". This is specially a problem for newer GMs, who might have problems assesing table situations.
• I don't fell that they achieve their objective, even when managed correctly. These meta-currecies are supposed to incentivise players to roleplay creatively and do cool stuff, but I feel it instead gamifies roleplay in a way that takes away from it. By "rewarding" players for good roleplay, what you're doing is putting a value on their perfomances, which will eventually lead to them trying to optimise and asking "Do I get an Inspiration for that?" which is the exact contrary to the goal. You want players to do cool stuff because it's cool! Not do it because they know if they are "Cool enough" you will reward their efforts
• And finally, they are really harmful to new players. If a new player sees that they are getting less bonuses than their friends, they will feel like they are not "good enough" and will be less motivated to play. Also, gamifying roleplay so much will make it feel like instead of telling a colaborative story, you are maxing out speech in a crpg.

I know many will disagree with my takes. Hell, narrative meta-currencies are in almost every big ttrpg and people don't seem to have a problem with it. But I hope my points at least make sense to some of you, and maybe you will have something to share yourselves.

I can’t seem to include an image which feels weird but on the Kickstarter for Space 1889, it says the following:

“Space 1889: After is available for the fifth edition of the most popular game system in the world. To perfectly capture the hard-boiled, retro-futuristic Victorian setting, the core rules have been expertly reengineered to the 5e system. When you open the book, you will find:

“A World Without Magic: A grounded, science- driven setting with no items, spells, classes, or class features that rely on the supernatural.”

I like 5e, I play it every week, but how are you going to say a system is perfect for what you’re doing and then have to gut half of it to get what you want? It seems like so many people are just making 5e versions of things because that’s what sells or what they feel like will sell, and I wish more producers would just be honest about that instead of giving us empty statements like this.

Edit 1: If you’re going to comment in an effort to communicate with me directly, don’t, I’m not going to be looking at any more comments on this post.

To the guy who said I should grow up for expecting companies to be more honest, just an FYI that saying respectfully before being disrespectful doesn’t change anything, and I don’t think it’s unreasonable to be tired of companies and designers being full of crap reasoning for stuff like this.

To combat the summer heatwave (please, I beg you, do not visit Florence in August unless you want me to scrape you off the sidewalk with a spoon), my cohorts at Oddplan and I have decided to release a game we’ve invested years of our lives into for no apparent reason. Masochism, probably.

Anyway, Goblindom is a tabletop RPG where you play as... well, a goblin. So far, so good.

The goblins in Goblindom aren’t special at all; in fact, they’re right at the bottom of the food chain in the Dungeon they call home, as it should be. The fact that they are mechanically weaker than a pothole doesn’t make them humble or risk-averse; quite the opposite, actually.

Despite having the life expectancy of a cat on a highway, the goblins in Goblindom are constantly embarking on petty adventures to get rich or carve out a bit more clout in their community, usually with disastrous results. There isn’t a single drop of heroism in their lives, and that’s precisely how they should be played: cowardly, incompetent, and utterly hilarious dregs of a Dungeon that ignores them (on a good day).

The style is a mix of Saturday-morning cartoon and Itchy & Scratchy: the violence is extreme yet cartoonish, and never mean-spirited. You play to see what happens and to collectively tell the misadventures of goblins who really should have picked a hobby better suited to dungeon crawling.

Gameplay-wise, the game blends streamlined, fiction-first mechanics with challenges resolved using opposed ranks, with rules that nod to OSR design, complete with classes, levels, and equipment to slightly improve your (meager) chances of avoiding a grim fate.

All you need is a pool of d8s and a coin per player, which essentially acts as Goblin Luck to manipulate roll results and, if you fancy, throw a teammate under the bus, forcing them to help you with a test and suffer the consequences of the roll. “Pass the Buck” was actually one of the most praised mechanics during playtesting: nothing beats accidentally drawing the attention of a dragoblin and forcing your friend to get flambéed in your place.

Naturally, every coin has two sides: once you’ve spent your luck, it’s time for the GM to pull a few tricks on you.

I won’t bore you any further. You can find the game on itch.io, DriveThruRPG, and RPG Trader at 50% off for the first week, mostly because we apparently hate money.

We also have a free Quickstart with all the rules and a starter adventure that’s been up for a few weeks if you want to try before buying: link.

Had a fun Shadowdark session last night where we were running through “The citadel of the Scarlet Minotaur“ and we got to the Bath Room where there’s a Medusa like statue in front of a basin. We were sure there was some kind of trap or secret and we scoured the room (in fact we ended up having a random encounter from taking so long)…and then we found out it was just a bath and the statue was a highly decorative faucet (yes the water was scalding but it cooled off and yes, we found out later that if we kept pulling drains out we could have released a swarm of insects that had been living in the pipes but that’s not a trap). We all had a good laugh about it.

I love hearing stories about times people overthought a room or were sure there was a puzzle when there wasn’t one. So what are some of your favorites from your sessions?

I run a few online games so people will sign up and sometimes the groups don't quite mesh. Expectation are always laid out but occasionally, there someone who either misunderstood the tone or ignored it. I'm always able to pivot in game to throw them a bone or two and make sure they have fun while giving gentle but firm reminders of the tone and it usually turns out OK. My online games are all one-shot so I haven't had to deal with this over a campaign. What's your approach?

A few weeks ago I excitedly backed Justice League Unlimited. One night my imagination really got going and I created a character from the free quick start rules. 🖤

The customizability was a little overwhelming at first, but as I kept going I came to really enjoy how the mechanics clicked with my character concept.

Inspired by some of the existing DC trans superheroines, Galaxy and Dreamer, I created one of my own called Emerald Eagle (aka Lisa Giuliano). She grew up in Gotham City but now attends Metropolis University as a journalism student. She becomes Emerald Eagle to take her reporting investigations further than she could as herself.

The majority of Emerald Eagle's powers come from the Martial Training power kit. Lisa's father, a GCPD detective, is accepting of her trans identity but insisted she learned Tae Kwan Do to be able to defend herself. She also has Grade 1 in Marksmanship because of her one superpowered feature: her Nth Metal throwing knives. Emerald Eagle calls these blades her "Eagle Feathers", and they grant her Grade 1 in Flight.

I had so much fun just making up my own superhero with these quick start rules! 😊 Has anyone else had the chance to give this a try?

https://imgur.com/a/sUFYFCe