How would you go about running a game inspired by Dark Souls?
Before anyone jumps to talk about how I should totally use GURPS, I want to be clear: I'm NOT asking for a system. What I do want to discuss is how to make a *setting* that feels inspired by the Souls and Bloodborne games. Something that captures the feel of a dying world, kept on the brink. Where I do want to talk about mechanics, I want to hear what you'd do to make going Hollow feel like a threat, or how to handle unkillable player characters. Mechanics that reinforce the themes, not just creative combat.
I've actually made this thread a few times, but I'm currently reading a Dungeon World hack (a hack of a hack) inspired by Dark Souls, call Cold Ruins of Last Life. Has anyone else heard about/read/played it? It has a pretty neat system for their version of Hollowing.
Are there any other games inspired by Dark Souls out there? I know there was the Embers of the Forgotten Kingdom Kickstarter, but that seemed to just be in a Dark Souls style setting in Pathfinder/5e/Demon King, not so much drawing from the themes in any real sense.
Since my original OP was too long: >It has a pretty neat system for their version of Hollowing. You start the game with a bunch of Bonds and every time you die you either take a debility or lose one of your bonds. There's a big focus on memories and the amnesia, versus pushing forward and creating a new life. It's got a neat system for XP, alongside that usual PbtA style, where you have two separate tracks: Radiance and Memories, and each time you "level up" in one track, you get to choose a special event from that track but cross off an event from the other track. Once you've gotten four of either, you can basically signal the beginning of the end of the game by either discovering and renewing or creating a new bastion to defend. Of course, each time you die instead of taking a debility or losing a bond, you can also permanently lose one of your Radiance or Memory rewards.
It seems interesting so far, though I haven't actually read Dungeon World yet. They handle the whole obfuscated lore thing by having players create some of the lore. There are sample areas, but they come with questions to ask the players. Players can also do a Move to remember information and if they get what I think is the Dungeon World equivalent of a critical, they get to make up a fact about the world (if they get a normal success, they remember most of it, but the GM fleshes the rest out).
Jordan Reyes
Hollowing would work about the same as it did in the lore: the final death you don't come back from. Either as flavor for when the player simply stops playing, or as an enforced mechanic for a limited death counter.
As for actually running the campaign, Dark Souls may be light on the story, but what story it does have is defined by plots within plots and schemers scheming against schemers. The player character is a puppet being sent to kill things, and there are no less than two or three sets of hands trying to force their way into that tight butthole at any time. The backstory takes this over the top, with schemers running their plots for upwards of several hundred years, with projected arcs that could, and in one case does, outlast written history a few times in a row. To feel like Souls, the players would need to have major characters actively keeping them oblivious and using them to complete their own objectives and remove obstacles, while other characters give them very convincing arguments to flip them over to their side, all while enough information is sitting around to make everybody look suspect but the players know for a fact that in the end they'll be advancing somebody's agenda no matter what they do. Really reinforces that hopeless feeling and the theme of everybody fighting over the last few scraps and trying to make the best of a world rapidly approaching heat death, where the heat death is a living, malevolent force with an agenda of its own.
Jayden Jones
just keep killing them all and making them start over, it'll feel just like the game
David Sullivan
I think you mean Kaathe, not Frampt. Frampt is the one who was working with Gwyndolin.
If you kill Gwyndolin before getting the Lordvessel, nothing happens. Gwynevere is still there and apparently fully operational, your character either doesn't tell Frampt or he just couldn't care less, and the Link the Fire ending is the same. For all intents and purposes, Gwyndolin's continued existence isn't necessary for the plot. Raises a few questions about who's really running the show.
Also, the prophecy itself leans toward the self-fulfilling type and could easily be a fake made up by Gwyndolin and crew to get undeads moving in the right general direction.
Josiah Garcia
>Someone who hasn't gotten gud. But for real, Dark Souls is not about difficulty. Miyazaki has even said this himself. This is where Dark Souls 2 went wrong. They saw all the "Prepare to Die" advertisements and without Miyazaki they thought that meant making a quarter munching bullshit game and filled long boring linear areas with enemies that would aggro in large groups, barely stagger, and have homing missile arrows.
You die, you get back up again.
In terms of story, DaS1 actually seems really similar to a lot of generic D&D games. Especially when you get to SEN'S FUCKING FORTRESS. DaS1 needed a 10' pole.
When you first play the game, you don't really even know about the scheming of Frampte and Gwyndolin. You just have a very straightforward plot: >Here's a prophecy, fulfill it as Oscar's last wish, because after only six lines or so you already love him >Turns out the "fate of the undead thou shalt know" is that you're meant to succeed Lord Gwyn, so go kill some folks and do that >Open the way and kill Gwyn, then kindle the First Flame with your own body I mean, you only find out Gwyndolin manipulated you if you kill a *very hidden* Covenant leader (or shoot the giant titty lady) and realize Anor Londo was a lie. You only find Kaathe if you get the Lordvessel and then, instead of placing it, defeat one of the bosses out of sequence.
Wait, what happens if you get the Darkmoon Seance Ring and kill Gwyndolin before getting the Lordvessel?
>I think you mean Kaathe, not Frampt. I don't know what you're talking about. How is Gwynevere there, though? Gwynevere isn't even real!
Angel Rivera
This line:
>You only find Frampte if you get the Lordvessel and then, instead of placing it, defeat one of the bosses out of sequence
Sorry, I should've specified.
As to how Gwynevere sticks around despite being an illusion, I haven't the slightest clue. Note that you can also form a covenant with her, and that doing so nets you a ring that specifically says the real Gwynevere left a long time ago. And the covenant itself has restricted spells, so it's not just symbolic.
I mean, I guess maybe Gwyndolin just makes really, really good illusions? The game doesn't try to explain that part. It also doesn't explain the part where all the enemies except the silver knights disappear when Anor Londo goes dark, implying they might've been illusions too but you could still kill them for souls and get equipment off them. I don't think illusion means the same thing in Souls.
Landon Evans
I know what you were talking about, I deleted my comment and fixed my mistake. It was a jest, you see
Actually, are you sure? I went and looked it up and if you shoot Gwynevere in her titties, you'll get the Lordvessel the same way you'd get other souls or a tail weapon, but if you kill Gwyndolin first, the Lordvessel will be in the chest at the end of the Lord's Tomb. And apparently if you shoot Gwynevere before stepping into the room, you won't trigger Dark Londo.
Xavier Kelly
I'm quite sure, yes. Killing Gwyndolin doesn't kill Gwynevere. In fact, if you kill 'lin first and 'vere second, it results in what's probably a bug and the area becomes permanently invadeable by darkmoon ring invaders, reds, and gravelord hosting even without a boss. The Lordvessel may or may not be in that chest, I actually never bothered to look because you can still get it from Gwynevere.
Yes, killing Gwynevere before talking to her will still give you the Lordvessel, and killing her from outside her room doesn't make Anor Londo go dark (which is probably another bug). Although, if you kill Gwyndolin first and Gwynevere second, you get the day to night cutscene but Gwyndolin's voice doesn't come up, which is a neat touch. Come to think of it, I can't imagine any scenario where the Lordvessel would be impossible to get outside of a glitch, which makes it surprising that they added in two different backup ways to get it if the normal way failed.
Austin Lewis
Okay here we go. Dark Souls for tabletop.
>Long-term injuries. E.g. apply a debuff when recovering from unconscious state that lasts until a rest.
>Learn through experience. Never describe a monster or item by in-game terms.
>Outmatch the players. Make every encounter lethal, then refine it back to give the PCs a chance.
>Environments. Make the players DRAW a map as they go, even!
>Tactics over stats. Give your encounters high power, but also a weakness that can be exploited by observant players.
For example, throw your players against an encounter that's 10 levels too high, in a dungeon full of ways to stall or avoid the boss.
