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

**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.

Hello!

Sorry for the scandalous title and for posting it here. r/dnd did not allow me to post this, so I am at a loss as to where to get the needed attention for it.

I will explain everything in order, but the conclusion would be that WotC is making some horrible choices that are killing off D&D in Japan and all the content creators that revolve around it. I do not want to stirr up drama... but this is the only way I can think of to send a message to WotC.

Feel free to make a video out of this, and feel free to contact me, and I can help you with any links or facts you may need.

----

I am a content creator residing in Japan, and I primarily stream TTRPGs, with D&D accounting for the largest share of my streaming. I also release scenarios with my creator group... all in Japanese. This is not self-promotion, and I am not sharing any of my links.

This is obviously biased, but Japan has one of the most ardent D&D communities.

In case you did not know (since they always leave this out of D&D beyond localization announcements), D&D is localized in Japan. They even have their Japanese YouTube channel, where they sometimes release collaborations with Japanese artists and voice actors like these:

- Kara-tur characters going to Essentials Kit's adventure

- Essentials Kit starter characters in anime style

- Dragons of Stormwreck Isle's starter characters in anime style

The anime-style character sheets can all be downloaded and actually used.

https://dnd-jp.com/tools/

-How it all started-

WotC previously granted licensing rights to various companies worldwide through Gale Force 9. GF9 then sub-licensed to Hobby Japan, a well-established company in Japan with a long history of selling and distributing hobby and western-related goods.

HJ did an amazing job at promoting and also releasing content for D&D in Japan. They even had a backlog of past D&D content from 3.5e and 4e that users could view for free.

This all changed when WotC got in trouble with GF9, revoked licensing rights, and took everything under its wing. Around 2021, HJ announced that no new books would be printed and that Icewind Dale's adventure, which had been completed in translation, would not be released.

The company that helped keep D&D viable in Japan for more than a decade was ousted.

Then we were left in the dak for 1.5 years until...

-WotC assumes control of the D&D brand-

Around 2022, WotC announced that it would bring back D&D and distribute it directly under WotC. They did really well on release day, airing promos on TV (which, btw, was the first time a TTRPG did that in Japan!)

They got famous YouTubers to play and this entire fever lasted for... about a year.

The entire lineup of core rule books was there, and even Xanathar and Tasha were localized.

During this time, adventure-wise, we got Starter Set, Essentials Kit, Dragon Lance, Radiant Citadel, and Witchlight; that is pretty much it. Previous books localized by HJ, such as Phandelver, Tombs of Annihilation, Descent into Avernus, and Dragon Heist, were all halted and never re-released.

WotC attended major conventions alongside MTG, with D&D even getting a boost from the 2023 movie.

During this time, WotC was going through the OGL scandal, and I was pretty much the only one, except for Yahoo News (!), to report on the current state. Don't even get me started on their VTT policy that would have banned my entire YouTube stream backlog.

I noticed that users speaking up about the OGL scandal prompted WotC to change, and the 2024 development was also being driven by user input. I also guided Japanese players through the English-only survey so they could express their opinions.

-Then it happened-

After December 2023, WotC of Japan went completely silent. Their Twitter feed turned into a daily grind of "Hey, did you know today is wrestling day? -> Fighters can use unarmed attacks to wrestle! -> buy our books!" with zero relevance to the topic and mostly Tweets written by someone who knows nothing about D&D (sometimes with blatant misinformation about the books) and a clear hit to their current userbase's interest. Some even speculate it's just a marketing company hired to write random tweets with AI.

A company being horrible at marketing is not a big deal. As I said before, Japan has an ardent D&D community, with people creating events and inviting more and more newcomers to the genre! I obviously chipped in my own time with content creation, but the enthusiasm I have seen here has been massive.

Then it happened.

The core books are running out of print. No matter how many new people the fanbase tries to bring in, and no matter how good they are at spreading the joy of playing D&D, new players are not able to get hold of books.

Amazon has dried out, with other book stores needing weeks to procure them. Not to mention scalpers selling them for exorbitant prices. We do not have digital releases, and we are still at the 2014 edition. (which is fine tbh as long as we can get the books)

During this time, WotC was promoting 2024 and even how it would get multiple-language releases... except that Japan was either not mentioned or removed from the list altogether.

People have been asking for an update on the situation for three years. All the time being met with silence. It is as if Japan is something they no longer want to touch and are just letting it rot.

There have been petitions, but they have fallen on deaf ears.

And that is understandable. Nothing here generates enough heat for any corporate executive to notice.

So here I am.

Please share this around so it may reach WotC, and they can finally step up and say what the hell they plan to do with Japan.

Are they backing off? Are they staying?

Perhaps they are trying to reboot again using 2024...I have no idea, but the way they treated Japan, first shafting their best partner and then leaving the entire userbase in the dark, is no way to communicate with a fanbase. It's fine if they don't want to deal with marketing, but at least the books should not be taken away. They have everything in their power to solve this, but we got zero communication.

Thanks for reading thus far!

Ever since WotC took over, stuff has been going downhill, so any buzz about this would be really appreciated. There's a fanbase over here that is silenced by the language barrier. I don't want to let that happen!

-Bonus read-

Why are you playing D&D? There's other TTRPGs out there!

Yes, I do play other TTRPGs! But I also like playing D&D on top of it!
Japan got a fresh start in the TTRPG genre when Call of Cthulhu was kick-started again in the 2010s via videos. The way D&D plays is actually a novelty in the Japanese scene right now, and many new players are discovering this playstyle.

Call of Cthulhu you say?

Yes, Call of Cthulhu (7e exists, but 6e still dominates!) stomps D&D and any other competition here in Japan by a massive margin. Or that's how it is generally portrayed. The truth is a bit different.

Ever since 2012, people have started releasing scenarios for Call of Cthulhu that involve a heavy emphasis on story and inter-character development rather than the usual cosmic horror. In essence, people released some cool concepts and ran them with CoC's engine, and it spun off into its own genre.

So people are playing CoC because it happens to have cool scenarios and not because of the system per se. (btw, sales in Japan make up for most of the sales globally)

Anyway, that is it for now!

Feel free to AMA, I'll lurk here when I have the time!

With a preference for something that's light on lore, so no Warhammer systems.

I'm thinking a system that's less "space ships fighting" and more "guy with gun and a cool tech-device"

Hi all,

I was wondering if anyone had the fan made errata originally posted in this thread:
https://www.reddit.com/r/rpg/comments/258017/geist_the_sineaters_fanerrata_lets_expand_on_this/

I am aware of 2.0, I have purchased it already but I lost this a while ago and would like it back for nostalgia reasons.

Monte Cook Games did one of the silliest things I've ever seem a game publisher do.

For anyone unaware, Rascal News is a site where professional journalists cover the TTRPG industry. It also has a neat feature where you can announce your own projects as a community member.

It seems that Monte Cook made a post on Rascal announcing their crowdfunding campaign for their latest Numenera products. Then, they quoted that very announcement in a post on bluesky. They attributed the quote as being "--Rascal" which implies that the literal journalists wrote copy praising their game.

I'm not trying to rake the muck here. I genuinely think it's funny and interesting. Rascal's Announcement section is a useful tool for the community. It was made with good intentions! But, someone found a way to abuse it.

What do you think about this?

There are a lot of highly emergent TTRPGs where everyone plays to find out what happens. That is: Nobody at the table, not even the GM, knows what's going to happen next. The rules of the game and the advice provided to the GM cause a lot of unexpected, exciting twists and turns.

Are there any TTRPGs out there that support following a predetermined plot or sequence of events? That emphasize playing to find out how it happens instead of what happens? That is: Everyone at the table already agreed upon and knows all the major plot beats that'll happen; they're playing to flavour it with a bunch of little decisions, character moments, tropes, bits of symbolism, and other fun storytelling conventions along the way. There are fewer rules for action resolution (That is: "Can they actually physically accomplish?") and more rules or incentives for playing to the character, the story, the genre, etc.

I realize this is a bit of an unusual ask since even in most linear games the GM is expected to withold the plot from the players. I think this "play to find out how it happens" playstyle gives everyone more power to metagame the story, like being able to dramatically foreshadow a future event. It does require players who are perfectly fine with, and can even enjoy a piece of fiction in spite of knowing what's going to happen.

Yazeba's Bed and Breakfast is a decentish example of this I think. Every chapter comes with a list of what are basically stage instructions. You have to follow the instructions, but they're broad enough that they can be played out in several different ways. You don't have to plan out an overarching story ahead of time, but even if you don't the players can readily choose what chapter comes next.

Ten Candles might count as well. By the end of the one and only session of the game, all the player characters will die. The game is basically about how they decide to spend their final moments.

Chuubo's Marvelous Wish-Granting Engine might be like this from what I've heard, but I haven't gotten the opportunity to read it fully yet. It does have explicit rules for stuff like structuring character arcs and genres though. Like: "Quest 1 of this arc is about [x]. At the end of it, [y] happens. Quest 2 of this arc is about [a]. At the end of it, [b] happens. etc."

Does anyone know of any others?

Hi everyone,

I started a new homebrew campaign (dnd 5e 2024) a few weeks ago and I spent a few time asking myself what my strengths and weeknesses as a gm are. I know I'm good at giving life to stuff, but I know I'm not that good at creating it from the start. For exemple if I have map I can create a good combat, but I cannot create a good map. If I have a monster I can create a nice adventure to hunt it, but I can't create a new monster. The list can go on, but I come to my request.

Do you guys have any books or any suggestions that have references with good art and maybe a bit of an explanation on the topic while being system agnostic? I need references so I can spark my creativity. A good example of what I mean is "no place like homebrew" that is giving me lots of ideas, but I want to have a few other things too if possible.

Thanks to everyone who can help me

Howdy, I want to take my immersion making to the next level by improving on the sounds and music that happen during sessions. At the moment we play typical GM lead TTRPGs (D&D mostly), and I use youtube to find "[theme] ambience" sounds, loop that and hit play. I'll have three or four music tabs open at the beginning of a session, but I want to explore playing with more unique sound effects, like being able to maybe loop the intro of a song, or play "gloomy" music but have the sound of rain over it, then finish the rain. This sorta stuff.

I have a very limited budget, but could probably float a small sub fee if the program is really good. Any suggestions welcome :)

Thanks

Edit: I am working with a standard PC laptop.. Lenovo workhorse sorta deal.

I am a fan of Armored Core games, and part of the fun to me is fully customizing your own mech from scratch, and i've never found something that scratces a similar itch.

Of course i played many, many hours of Lancer, and while in that game customization of mechs is satisfying and crunchy, it never really scratched that AC itch: that im making my own big robot - I think what takes away from it (to me) are the Frames that act like 'classes', and how a lot of its mechanics are so deeply entwined with its own setting.

So here i am, looking for suggestions and help - perhaps something closer to what i am looking for.

And mean no disrespect at all, since I really like it and I've already run it. But it seems like, even with some promos and youtubers giving it a try (or more like reading/skimming through it I suppose), I'm not seeing people in other spaces bringing it up ever (maybe one or two times last month?).

Maybe it's just my algorithm, but it's such a shame, since this game can do lots of stuff free-form but also with a solid structure to not be too "hand-wavey".

Like for example, you can and are expected to do stuff that you probably already do in other more combat oriented games roleplay-wise, like heavy roleplaying with almost no interaction with the rules, or trying to come up with creative ways to use cantrips/spells; "rule of cool" and all of that.

Is it that the system needs some reading and understanding first in order to "get it"? Maybe it seems like just another narrative game, so people give it a read expecting light rules only to be surprised by a thick tome full of examples, art, and templates (which I love). Or maybe, I don't know, people expect a bit more frontloaded "oomph" like in PbtA/FitD or even more OSR games?

It also doesn't help that most youtubers I saw convering the game didn't seem to really "get" the system more than what the solo tutorial adventure tells you, tbh. Like, they treat it and/or compare it to 5e type games in some cases. I even saw one who made a one episode let's play, who literally ran it like the players were in a comic book, using language like "are you ready to move to the next scene?", but I digress.

What do you guys think?

I've seen Spencer Campbell's works mentioned enough times to be curious, with Lumen being cited as a counterexample to "Rules-lite games can't be tactical." Our booth was even across from Gila's at Gen Con last year and I got to admire all the physical books as well. I'm curious to sample the Lumen system or its derivatives, probably as a 1- or 2-shot, but I really have no idea where to dive in. There aren't quite enough reviews for me to assess the relative strengths of the games. Here's the store for reference.

If you've played one (or preferably more) of these, can you help me understand the differences so I can decide which one to play?

• Light (Beacon Edition): Destiny as a TTRPG. Pioneered the Lumen system. Not a setting I'm super into. Dusk appears to be similar; what's the difference?
• Nova: Same idea but Gundam instead of Destiny? Also not my go-to setting.
• Hunt: One-shot (yay) about knights on a hunt. Promising.
• Loot: Diablo-ish, loot- and combat-focused. Interesting but maybe more combat crunch than I'm interested in?
• Thorn: Mythic Bastionland by way of Lumen, I think? Promising.
• Rune: Solo Souls-like TTRPG. Sounds cool, and Reap sounds even cooler, but I want to try a multiplayer game.
• Slayers: I see this on the store but have very little context on what it is, how it plays, or if it's the same "family" as the other Lumen stuff.

Omen and Corvid Court seem to be a different breed of game (unless someone corrects me).