A thread dedicated to discussion and feedback of games and homebrews made by Veeky Forums regarding anything from minor elements to entire systems, as well as inviting people to playtest your games online. While the thread's main focus is mechanics, you're always welcome to share tidbits about your setting.
Try to keep discussion as civilized as possible, avoid non-constructive criticism, and try not to drop your entire PDF unless you're asking for specifics, it's near completion or you're asked to.
>Do you prefer comprehensive gear lists, or do-it-yourself guidelines
>What mechanic from another system do you wish you came up with yourself?
>When do you work on your game?
Kevin Hill
Bumping
>What mechanic from another system do you wish you came up with yourself? When I read through the new Unknown Armies gammas from the kickstarter, I was floored by how simple and smart the Identities system was. It compresses the whole idea of do it yourself skills into something that takes two seconds to figure out but helps you explore your character better and is both open ended yet just restrictive enough.
F'ing Stolze.
Brody Green
>Do you prefer comprehensive gear lists, or do-it-yourself guidelines
That depends. As a designer, I like do it yourself guidelines. In my head canon, it allows players to create whatever they want, and thus put control back in their hand. Also it's less work in the creation process, even if it does have to be tested more rigorously. Like that game where Mortal Kombat decided to let players create their own fatalities.
But as a player, I can't be assed, and apparently neither can anyone else, considering the "Kreate a Fatality" was widely panned as lazy, uninspired, and completely out of sync with the rest of the game. When I need gear, I just want to look something up, pay the price and be done with it. If I need something slightly different, me and the DM can hash it out.
Moral of the story: Don't try to push design work off on the players. It just makes people confused and indifferent.
Jason Brown
Do you think there's a middle ground where freeform design and pre-written item lists converge that works for most games?
There are games that do player-made content really well. I'm thinking of Wild Talents, and frankly most superhero games, which in particular has a very robust superpower creation system.
Hudson Sanchez
>Middle ground Oh absolutely. But it's a matter of asking yourself "Is this easier for the player if I do it? Or more fun if they do it?" Like, making your own sundae as opposed to making your own ice cream.
For example, I wanted to make a build your own armor system since I had this chart of armor pieces. It worked pretty well, but created a logistical nightmare for the player. That's not fun, but it sure was easy for me.
The magic system is a build-your-own spell kind of thing. It was a little more work in the balance, but ultimately it's fun for the player. It also lets them theme their characters a bit better, which is aces in my opinion. What's good for the player is good for the designer in the long run.
Hudson Watson
Realized that I forgot to put my handle on stuff
I've put together the first draft of the brief Armor, Weapon and Shields section for my ORE space adventure supplement. My goal here is to lay the groundwork for how a GM might tweak the rules one way or another based on the kind of setting he's building, as well as well to put together a reasonably composed list of possible armor and weapons that one might be interested in.
Matthew Murphy
So there's been renewed interest in my "Necromunda with big robots" game idea. I'll have to work out a functional version and post it.
>Do you prefer comprehensive gear lists, or do-it-yourself guidelines I prefer middle-ground. Have a strong core list of gear, but let there be some customization. I'm big on modifier and enchanting systems.
>What mechanic from another system do you wish you came up with yourself? There's definitely been a few that I'm thinking of adopting, like the system Wrath of Kings does, where you pool hits to inflict wounds (i.e. when a model is hit, compare the number of hits to an armor stat, for each full amount of hits that equals the armor, you lose a hit point).
>When do you work on your game? Annoyingly, most of my big ideas come right as I'm going to sleep, at that point when you are trying to turn your brain off, so it starts to wander.
Michael Carter
I've been toying with a project off and on for awhile now and I'd like to get some advice. Keep in mind this is still really early in the design project.
I'm currently working on the magic system, the magic-user classes and what spells they can and cannot use. I like to keep the fluff and crunch closely linked. In this case, humans aren't naturally supposed to be able to use magic and in addition to making some sort of deal with a magical entity to gain spellcasting abilities, have to choose a focus or affinity. They gain insight into one aspect of magic to the exclusion of all other aspects. It would be like going to college to study cellular biology, but afterwards being physically unable to learn robotics or astrophysics. Or like being a master with a sword but never learning to use a spear, and having taken a binding oath never to try. Also you think spears are dumb.
I'm looking for help designing the classes based on these restrictions. Fighters and the like will have a similar system, but for now I'm working on muh mages.
Specifically, I need help with the types of action magic can have, and the types of targets. Also, names for spellcaster types would be helpful.
Will probably be using a d100 system. Also, when I get to working on the spell list I'm going to try and make it much, much larger than, say, D&D, as I want to include a large number of utility spells. I understand the reason why, but I've always been disappointed that most RPGs focus on combat spells to the near exclusion of more civilian pursuits. I also like the idea of players figuring out combat uses for spells not specifically designed for that.
Please excuse the mess. As I said earlier, I'm still in the early stages of design.
Ian Morales
>Do you prefer comprehensive gear lists, or do-it-yourself guidelines Comprehensive, largely because I enjoy coming up with lists like that.
>What mechanic from another system do you wish you came up with yourself? The magic from Ars Magica. It's almost exactly what I want to use and more clearly defined than I could have come up with on my own. It's just great. I'm btw. I'm mostly talking about how it defines what a spell does, rather than the actual in-game casting mechanics.
>When do you work on your game? I shift between writing and designing, but try to set aside at least an hour a day for one or the other. Classes and work get in the way.
