I've tried Barbarians of Lemuria, tried Savage Worlds, tried The Riddle of Steel, tried Astonishing Swordsmen & Sorcerers of Hyperborea. Nothing really clicked for me. Either it feels too lite, or too cumbersome, or whatever. Couldn't get the proper feeling out of it.
Any good pulp fantasy RPGs out there?
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100% not trolling but isn't "pulp" more of a setting than a system thing?
Isn't it more about the universe and the feeling of the game than about its mechanical aspects?
Maybe I'm wrong about what "pulp" is.
Rule systems very much affects the kind of feel a setting has.
That said, OP should be more specific in what (s)he expects of a "pulp"-system mechanics wise.
What I meant is, you can even use D&D5 for that. Allow only barbarians, fighters, rogues and spell-less rangers, give your players different class features from other classes as they progress, and mechanically you are set.
You can amp up or rework a bit the system, especially the encumbrance rules, and give damage reduction to armors or something.
Everything else, everything that really matters, seems to me like being 100% setting/feeling/DM dependent.
Iduno, maybe for example some people think the damage-spongy combat of DnD doesn't really fit any other genre than "Loot and XP Simulator 2013"? Bit of a big bit of the system to rework.
> damage-spongy combat
I don't think you've played D&D5 if you felt that PCs at lv1 were "damage sponges".
Also, it's only a matter if you think hit points are the amount of blood your character can lose without passing out. Which would be retarded, wouldn't it?
>Bit of a big bit of the system to rework.
Not even, really. If that's really a huge issue, why not half hitpoints from statblocks ?
> OP should be more specific in what (s)he expects of a "pulp"-system mechanics wise.
That'd be nice, yes.
no one has used xp in dnd since 2014, user
I admit that I mostly just played Neverwinter nights and only a single session of actual tabeltop 3.5. I have also heard the claims that HP should be seen as something else than Meatpoints, which makes about as little sense as viewing them as meatpoints. HOWEVER. I do not want to shit up OP's thread with a long rant about why I don't like a specific system. My point was that just because YOU think one system fits everything perfectly doesn't mean it matches everyone else expectations.
They got rid of it in later editions? How does leveling work now?
>My point was that just because YOU think one system fits everything perfectly doesn't mean it matches everyone else expectations.
I understood your point, and it was to be an agressive little bitch using your absolute ignorance to argue against me saying: "hell, even d&d5 can be used for this thing you seem to want, OP, so can you be more precise?"
And I basically explained how you're wrong. So now you can piss off and let this thread die.
The only thing you explained was your own opinion.
Except for, you know, the game. All the books and the supplements and everyone playing by the rules. And, objectively speaking, most players on the internet and one should assume in real life. So yeah, maybe your group does the "GM grants levels when he feels like it" but just because you've houseruled something doesn't mean everyone did.
>They got rid of it in later editions? How does leveling work now?
it's still included in the core rules but basically every DM just levels up on party milestones now
>why not half hitpoints from statblocks ?
>confirmed for not having the slightest fucking idea about game design
lol I assure you user your DM is the weird one
If "everyone" would've switched to that rule you can bet your ignorant autist ass that'd be presented as the default rule in the books. WotC is not, in fact, being ran by retards, no matter how much you may dislike them. It's basic business.
He's trolling. Xp is still there, but the dmg incorporates an alternate leveling system where players gain levels when they complete tasks the dm had decreed, called milestones.
>WotC is not, in fact, being ran by retards
Did I seriously fucking derail a thread just for suggesting DnD doesn't perfectly represent every genre?
Pretty sure Curse of Strahd especially, but also most other adventures, is written with milestones level ups, so you don't actually know what the fuck you're talking about. Which is unsurprising since - congratulation! you're the first "autist"-spewer in this thread.
XP is useful for encounter creation, and that's why it's still omnipresent in the game, but that's about it. If you were actually running a game, you could understand that.
Good shit everyone, we've actually derailed the thread into D&D vs the world.
Hey OP, we obviously need more direction here. What do you mean by `pulp'? You want Conan, Fafhrd, Lovecraft, what? And are you looking for a rules system or a setting?
Personally, Barbarians of Lemuria is my goto rules system for this (or ORE), and I just throw together bullshit based on Fritz Leiber and Dark Sun for the setting details.
Oh, and what was wrong with the ones you tried? Cause that would definitely help us out.
No, the company that still rules the tabletop market is not being ran by retards. If they were, they wouldn't have been ruling the market. That's the beauty of the system. Once a company stops being good at what it does it stops making money. You may not AGREE with what it does, but that's your deal, not theirs. They're giving people what they want, and the people pay for that. The day people stop paying is the day they stop doing what they do, or they will die.That's clever businessmaking. Simple as that.
Either too lite or too cumbersome, so I'm guessing he's looking for some kind of "medium-crunchy" system?
>Good shit everyone, we've actually derailed the thread into D&D vs the world.
It's ok because it was a shit thread to begin with
Basically "free market, bitches". It's not terribly friendly to sophisticated art or actual innovation, but it sure ain't friendly to idiots, either. Say what you may about Micheal Bay, the fact is people are still throwing money at him to produce movies at very little expanse for himself. There are a lot of retards in that equation but he isn't one.
>Typical american thinking one cannot be succesful and moronic at the same time.
I think the RuneQuest mechanics work wells for pulp, combat is nice and deadly and magic is suitably culty. Just put it in a good setting
You can, if your customers are more moronic than you. In which case, you can still claim to some cleverness since evidently, you're the one exploiting their stupidity, rather than the other way around.
If people have a bad enough taste you can shit out a script in two hours and make a hundred million dollars off of it, why shouldn't you? You're not forcing them to buy it.
I'd say one roll engine, then. Deadly combat, magic is relatively simple, things move fast and its good at actions scenes. More complicated than BoL, but less than RoS.
>You can, if your customers are more moronic than you. In which case, you can still claim to some cleverness since evidently, you're the one exploiting their stupidity, rather than the other way around.
>Inb4 Trump literally rode that car all the way to leader of the free world
OP, the reason you're running into a wall here is because you're trying to squeeze fiction from rulebooks.
>Rule systems very much affects the kind of feel a setting has.
This guy knows what's up. For the sessions, you're gonna want a system that emphasizes dramatic structure, or an episodic format. And it's gotta give players more leeway in what they're doing than "I do one of X rigidly tailored moves." Would Conan wrangle with hundreds of pages of cross-referenced tables? No, he'd punch that camel in the face.
>autistic libertarian screeching
Dungeon Crawl Classics. Fantastic system and lends itself well to sword and sorcery pulp settings. A few years back the Free RPG day adventure for it was even set in Lankhmar.
OP, just look up OSR.
>so I'm guessing he's looking for some kind of "medium-crunchy" system?
So not rules-medium like Savage Worlds, but rules-medium-heavy? I'm not really sure what fits that bill, because once you go past rules-medium, I quit paying attention.
I dunno, give Mythras (formerly Runequest 6) a shot. It's crunchier than BoL and Savage Worlds, while being less crunchy than Riddle of Steel.
What's the difference between Runequest and BRP?
dungeon-world.com
PRINCIPLES
• Draw Maps, leave blanks
• Address the characters, not the players
• Embrace the fantastic
• Make a move that follows
• Never speak the name of your move
• Give every monster life
• Name every person
• Ask questions and use the answers
• Be a fan of the characters
• Think dangerous
• Begin and end with the fiction
• Think offscreen, too
Free playsheets download that may be playable.
Have you ever considered that maybe you're just shit at running pulp fantasy?
I'm not him, but BRP is a genericized, somewhat simplified version of RQ, from what I recall. Of course, I'm not familiar with all the RQ editions, so take that for what you will. But RQ has a specific setting (or at least a *type* of fantasy setting), while BRP could just as easily do guns and shit.