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

Due to unforeseen circumstances (a US Customs delay, unrelated to FRPG Day itself) the kits bound for the UK are on hold. Sadly, the event will be rescheduled within that region. We will update when we know more.

• https://freerpgday.com

A free bundle is currently live, through June 30th on RPG Trader in honor of Free RPG Day (June 27th), with 250 digital titles free, including some mouseritter, Mork Borg, Shadowdark (**disclaimer: including my own contribution**), liminal horror, and Mothership content, and I'm sure others that I will find once I dig through.

https://rpg-trader.com/products/1025/free-rpg-day-2026-bundle

Just thought I'd mention it since RPG Trader was a topic of discussion the other day. I like it so far, and seems like they plan to give Drivethru a run for their money. They had some technical issues earlier in the day, but seem to be on track now.

Hello.

I am a Japanese TTRPG player who usually plays online.

I have played various rules systems, and recently I noticed something that I found interesting while thinking about action resolution in TTRPGs.

In my view, an action check should not be something that is rolled, or called for, casually and without much thought.

Rather, I think an action check exists because of dangerous contact, dynamic risk, or a change in the situation. In other words, an action check is meaningful because, if the action fails, some kind of change in the situation follows from that failure.

If that is not the case, then the GM can simply judge the situation in light of the PC’s context: the PC succeeds, the action is impossible, or the PC succeeds but with some cost or consequence.

However, I began to wonder whether roll-over resolution systems, especially systems with critical successes, give ordinary players the wrong incentives and implications.

I have two concerns.

The first concern is that players may come to see the random element as an amplifier of the final result.

In this mindset, a check is not something that is demanded by the situation. Rather, it becomes an opportunity to see how much the result derived from one’s skill can be increased. Because of this, players may become eager to roll action checks.

As a result, players may come to feel that checks should be rolled often, and they may feel mild dissatisfaction toward a GM who prevents them from rolling.

The second concern, although I think this is a smaller issue, is that in a roll-over system with critical successes, not allowing a roll can easily look like the GM is preventing the PC from displaying their competence.

For example, when the GM says, “No, this is clearly impossible,” or “You can succeed, but a cost is required,” the player may still feel, “But if you had let me roll, I might have scored a critical success.”

I feel that this possibility works against the mindset I currently have about action checks.

These are my current thoughts about roll-over resolution systems.

What do you think?

I would welcome any kind of response: points I may be overlooking, ideas that connect to this, methods for preventing these problems, or broader mindsets that might expand the premise of the discussion.

English is not my first language. I wrote the original in Japanese and used AI assistance to translate and polish the English version. I have tried to keep the translation close to the original, and I include the Japanese text below for transparency.

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こんにちは。

私は普段TRPGをオンラインでプレイしている日本人プレイヤーです。
さまざまなルールシステムで遊んでいるのですが、最近、CP-REDのマスタリングを模索している際に、興味深い事実に気付きました。

本来、行為判定とは「とりあえず考えもなしに振る、振らせる」というものではなく、
「危険な接触、動的リスク、状況の変転」――つまり、その行為に失敗した際、なんらかの状況の変転が付随するからこそ、行為判定は成立するものだと考えています。
そうでなければ判定を試みているPCの文脈を踏まえて、成功させるか、不可能だと言うか、成功するがコストや代償が発生するか、いずれかで処理すればいいのです。

しかし上方判定（ロールオーバー）――特に決定的成功があるルールだと、
これは一般的なプレイヤーに対して間違ったインセンティブと示唆を与えているのではないか、と疑問に思いました。

疑問点は二点あります。

まず一点目は「プレイヤーが乱数を達成値の増幅器だと捉えてしまう」点です。
判定は「迫られるもの」ではなく、むしろ自分の技能から導出された達成値が如何に上昇するかの機会であり、その為、積極的に行為判定を振りたがるようになってしまうのです。
その結果、判定は沢山振られるべきであり、それを阻止するGMに対して、マイルドな不満を抱くようになってしまいます。

二点目――これはあまり大きな問題ではありませんが――「決定的成功がある上方判定ルールでは、振らせない事がPCの有能さを妨げている」ように見えやすいという点です。
つまりGMが判定させずに「いや、これはどう考えても無理だよ」あるいは「成功するが、代償が必要だ」とPLに告げる場合、しかし「判定をさせてくれれば決定的成功があるのに……」とプレイヤーが思う余地を生んでしまっており、それが私が認識する行為判定のマインドセットに対して逆効果をもたらしてしまっている。

以上の二点が、上方判定に関する私の「気付き」ですが、皆さんはどう思われますか？
私の考えが見落としている点や、あるいはここに接続できるアイデア、これらを阻止できる方法、そもそも前提を拡張するマインドセットなど、どのような返事でも歓迎します。

※私は非英語ネイティブなのでAI翻訳を利用しています。原文はこちらに併記しておきます。

Or one you thought didn't exist, until you found it.

This week's RPG is Dungeons and Dragons 4th Edition!

Have you played it? Have you run/GM'd it? How did it go?

What's your favourite memory from the game?

What's the best thing about the game?

What's the worst? How would you improve it?

How does it compare to other editions of D&D?

Edit: So many comments! Thanks all; I'm in the forest this weekend so will get to them eventually =]

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Last week was Mage the Ascension. Join us again next week for Numenara!

I’ve talked to my players recently and realized that DnD has some shortcomings. Namely, I don’t think it offers the “generic” archetypes presented in fantasy. Where’s the witch class? Where’s the summoner? Where’s the spirit-possessed oracle? Where’s the shapeshifter that’s not a Druid?
A lot of classes and features in DnD and other games are focused on the mechanics of dungeon delving. I want a game that feels like reading a typical fantasy book. This might be a vague request but if anyone can suggest an interesting fantasy rpg, please let me know. I’m open to games with urban or medieval setting, if that helps.

So I joined this roleplay group over a year ago. They're friends and the campaign had been running for 7 years at that point.
Note that the setting is alternative 1730's France.
Overal, I was excited to join and make my character.
Decided that he was going to be spanish-mix from the caribean.
Pirate, gets captured and enslaved before getting hauled off to France to be sold as a slave.
I've always described him as Spanish-looking. (His mother was a prostitute, no idea who his father was, left that up to the DM's discretion.) Maybe a bit extra tan because of being out at sea a lot under the caribbean sun.
1730's France has racism. Our party is progressive and want to break this world view, but it is a thing. I was 'ok' with my character being called 'negro' because we're talking about French Nobles. Anyone who isn't pale is a negro.
But now our DM has it stuck in his head that my character is ACTUALLY black.
I mean. Technically his father could have been black, but I have consistantly described him as spanish-looking.
I've talked to him about it multiple times about this, that in my head, my character is not black. I don't want him to be black. Yet he just won't budge. Says it's better for story. I mean, sure.
ButThatsNotHowIEnvisionedHim.
I finally caved and changed him to be mixed black-spanish. (Based him on the actor Ricky Whittle) But I'm not happy with it. Yet, any time I try to correct our DM, it makes me sound so racist when he asks me 'why is it so important to you that he's spanish?'
BECAUSE THATS THE IMAGE THATS STUCK IN MY HEAD.
I just wanted to make my own character.
(Originally thought of making him half-Aztec, or Aztec-descendant, but that wasn't possible in the setting.) Mexicans weren't a thing yet, so, Spanish.

I'm sorry.
I just want to vent because it makes me so mad that I can't choose the simple thing of what my character looks like.

Inspired by the other thread saying DnD is not generic enough. I want to go in the opposite direction. Classic, but not generic

A good example of what I mean, maybe the best, is The One Ring 2e which I will be playing the starter set of soon.

While I haven't read them, some good examples are, at least to my knowledge (correct me if I'm wrong):

The Sword, The Crown and the Unspeakable Power for an ASOIAF feel

Stonetop, for being classic Iron Age while having its own identity

Pendragon, for being about the Arthurian Myth

Potentially Mouse Guard, because the comics tell classic stories through a mouse-y perspective

What I am NOT looking for:

Games that are classic by being pop culture derivatives: e.g. DnD 5e and anything derived from it

Games which are very unique and gonzo (don't get me wrong. They're my fav type of games): The Wildsea, Ultraviolet Grasslands, Mythic Bastionland

I am from one of EU's poorer countries and I often save up quite a bit by buying pdfs (especially because the cost of shipping kinda' annoys me), but lately I have been having a lot of regrets about not having purchased the physical books. I'm big on tactile feel and reading a book is just somehow more fun and I find it easier to focus.

But I'm also kinda' addicted to reading and playing ttrpgs and I cannot afford all of that stuff. Still, it does make me wonder if I should slow down and more mindfully shop than buy way too many bundles and too many books and fund too many kickstarters (with the pdf tier only).

A few years ago I ran across a Dawn of Worlds update that had an expanded number of ages - Age of Myths and Mists, Age of the First Children, Age of Magic and Faith, Age of the First Civilizations, Age of Heroes, and the Age of the Second Civilizations. I can't find the document that had the update any longer though, and I'm looking for help finding it.

Hey guys! I was wondering, do you think it’s possible to run a NINAH (No i'm not a human) role-playing campaign? I mean, it would be really cool, but I don't think there’s a suitable RPG rulebook out there. Plus, there's the question of how to handle what ACTUALLY happens in the campaign. What do you think?