Bitchin bestiaries Vol. II

Exceptional, the community and talented writers made it an incredible good setting that is completely fleshed out and still develops each day.

There's a reason it outsold DnD in a lot of european countries and still holds one of the most active playerbases of any P&P in europe.

>There's a reason it outsold DnD in a lot of european countries and still holds one of the most active playerbases of any P&P in europe.

I thought only in germany?

Everywhere that people speak German.

I've been getting into the dark eye and its pretty cool so far. The mechanics are definitely interesting.

4th edition had a bad reputation for being extremely rules heavy. And while even that might be an understatement they've put much effort into making 5th edition lighter and modular.

>only two legs
>incredibly top and front heavy
>should just fall over on it's stupid face

really makes me think

This might sound like a cheap excuse, but in demons in TDE do not weigh anything.

> a lot of european countries
> most active in europe P&P
> everywhere that people speak german
So 3 countries make up for most of Europe? Didn't know germans had this kind of mentality.

3 countries? I can only think of austria

He's probably thinking germany, austria, and switzerland.

For some reason I thought switzerland had its own language

>Didn't know germans had this kind of mentality.

What do you think caused the last two world wars user?

Switzerland speaks a swiss dialect of german (majority, it has like 3 languages)

Think about THIS!

"a lot of" is not the same as "most". That being said, it was probably a poor choice of words, but there's no reason to get your panties in a twist.

It upsets me far more that he seems to think there's a separation between "Germany" and "everywhere people speak German in Europe".

Austria is Germany.

Most educated europeans speak 2-4 of the mayor EU languages.
This is not USA where people refuse to learn anything about anywhere else because "yisus was murrikan" or some shit.

I'm German too and I think was exaggerating. In Germany it's definitely the most popular RPG. (The other German speaking countries should be similar.) TDE/DSA also has a solid player base in France (and I think Italy too), but I think they mostly play 3rd edition.

Anyway, content.

>Most educated europeans speak 2-4 of the mayor EU languages.
This is false, aside from a few smaller countries like Belgium. I don't think you travelled around Europe that much. It's hard to find somebody that doesn't speak english Above A1/A2 outside of UK/Ireland, imagine german or french.

Four languages, mate. Swiss-German, French, Italian and Romansch. The latter could theoretically be called Switzerland's own language.

Actually people speak English very well in Poland.

what with germs and big black creatures fucking white women

piefke raus.

Dead in the water in Italy. No one knows it nor I ever even saw a manual. I know it out of vidya.

It's a strictly German game, so rather unpopular in the rest of non-German speaking Europe (like, the 80% of the effin' place).

Most people learn their mother tongue and terrible english. I got to learn Dogspeak (German) because I had to for work, but trust me we aren't that better than Americans on the language thing. We do it because we must and because our national languages are irrelevant.

No. Even students of new generation rarely go above B2. They fare quite well with reading and listening, but speech is shit. I'm saying this as a Pole.

Hackmaster is an abomination. Its Hacklopedia of Beasts is pretty good though.

Why is it bad tho? Compared let's say, to GURPS or DnD.

It's not just that Hackmaster is too complicated; it's that it's complicated because it likes complications, in and of themselves. All the fiddly, obnoxious details in AD&D that mar the system (percentile strength, different attribute minimums and maximums for each race and gender, different level caps for each class and race pairing which vary according to how high your prime requisite is, etc.) are things that Hackmaster thinks are awesome and seeks to multiply. "Why restrict percentile scores to fighters who rolled an 18 strength? Why not give percentile values for all attributes, no matter how high or low they are? That would be awesome!"

But doesn't such approach give more varied combat and character customisation? I found the typical "4 stats for character, just roll fitting stat when needed and tell a story" lacking in many systems.

Whether a system is rules-heavy or rules-light, it should avoid superfluous rules, and only have those which really enhance the game through their presence. Look at the strength table here and tell me how having percentile values for all levels of all attributes is anything but masturbatory crunch wank. It's so completely unnecessary.

Old school D&D grew organically so that it, like unplanned city streets, is more or less "all over the place". But that's okay as long as things don't get too complicated. So you roll initiative on a d10, surprise on a d6, thief skills on d%, attribute saves on a d20 (roll low), and attack rolls on a d20 (roll high). It may take somebody a little longer to learn how everything works than with a system with a unified mechanic, but it's not that hard. Once you start piling all sorts of shit on top of it though, the system becomes hopelessly clunky and unwieldy. Whatever issues 3.x might have had, the move to the unified d20 mechanic was a good one that was really necessary for a system that had the sort of crunch it did.

Ok, I thought about it. Clearly it can work on a certain scale.

Now show me an elephant doing the same thing.

>different attribute minimums and maximums for each race and gender,
>different level caps for each class and race pairing which vary according to how high your prime requisite is, etc.

Except that's not true. You're thinking of the parody 4th edition. That went away in 5th.

Everyone who has actually played a game of HM has had nothing but praise for it.

There's also Belgium, or at least part of it.

show me what it actually looks like, because now I'm curious

They should have seriously made a new name for it instead naming it Hackmaster 5th edition. Most people won't even play it just becouse they remember most of previous shitty editions.

My 2cents on the crazy strength table. Char gen crunch is the least offensive crunch.

Well, the basic rules are offered free on their website.
kenzerco.com/free_files/hackmaster_basic_free_.pdf

If it interests you, you can find the full books with a 100% discount if you know where to look.

Agreed. It was a strange decision.

Anyway, content.

It's like 3.5 border villages.

->First impression.

I like low fantasy type of writing. My type of game.

thanks

Really alls the creature would need is an effective muscular system on its legs and back to support the weight of itself.

it was a scam though. they released the extremely high quality monster manual first but then the main game turned out to kind of suck

at least the expensive leatherbound hardcovers make good stage props

of course the hacklopedia is pretty useful for running games in their decent official setting, and has a lot of great fluff that you could transfer to other games. even the stats could probably be converted without too much effort.

I played it, it's not that good. gb2/kenzerco/

>Most people won't even play it just becouse they remember most of previous shitty editions.

I thought there was only one other, and the previous "editions" were just fictional aspects of a webcomic.

Is this the same book as the OP, and if so where can I nab an english version to read through?

The picrel of OP is from Das shwarze Auge. The one you point at is Hackmaster 5e.

>Das shwarze Auge
So this is going to end up like Engel (German) and Nephilim (French) where there is never a real English translation?

ulisses-us.com/
ulisses-us.com/thedarkeye/
kikebook.com/thedarkeyegame

There's already multiple high quality english translations of the newest publications. There will be new stuff as long as it's financial sucesful enough in the anglo-american market.

The pic from the OP as well as the other German stuff in this thread are from the German pdf of the "Aventurian Bestiary".
and are from a preview thread on the ulisses-us forum.
The Bestiary as well as several other books from 5e are already fully translated and available as pdf from drivethrurpg and as hardcover books. Some books (like the core rules) are also available as softcover variants.

>Das shwarze Auge
Btw it's called "Das schwarze Auge" oder "The dark eye".

>"Das schwarze Auge" oder "The dark eye".
Whoops I'm mixing languages.
it's called "Das schwarze Auge" or "The dark eye".

>correcting the German spelling of people who don't even speak German

Ah, awesome to know, thanks!

Bestiaries, you say?

What game is that?

the original version was, but that was part of the agreement made when they were essentially doing a total conversion of first edition d&d.

when they made their own system it was rules heavy stuff, but played straight and, aside from a couple of in jokes, is a decent system albeit a complex one.
the setting has shifted to kalamar and the bestiaries in question are very detailed regarding the creatures.
four pages per, if i remember rightly.

example of the hobgoblin is in the pdf thread, here's a cross link
i.4cdn.org/tg/1488081119639.jpg

it's pretty standard, with the exception that bestial creatures have a section describing yield of components or other items of special quality from the corpse.

I feel it's a bit of a missed opportunity that they created such a neatly detailed description for the hobgoblin, but didn't really do anything interesting with the concept.

Some Japanese thing, not sure if it's translated.

That's a bestiary by ShindoL. Not sure it's a real game. Filled with lots of bad ends and especially lewds

True.

Some of the creatures they do something with, but others are still an in depth view of pretty standard fantasy representation.

I really like the format though and the physical copy is a lovely fake leather covered thing.

there's another hacklopedia due out this year and it could have more unique creatures within it.

The release is both a good thing and a bad thing for me at least.
the exchange rate combined with the fact they've got a particularly expensive option for shipping to the UK means I'll either have to miss out or get kicked in the balls for over eighty pounds to get it over here.

I like his art style, lewd or not lewd. Wish he would do more stuff like that.

So what is that supposed to be?

A Laraan. Basically a Demon that transforms into a beautiful man, woman or sometimes animals. Most of the time it's summoned for sexual services or assassination. It seduces the desired targets and then reveals its disgusting form to permanently drive the victim insane.

Cool.

Woher kann ich lese Das Schwarze Auge kostenlos?

Can you read german?
mega.nz/#F!KcYnFRwB!svAhjnY3pBgihPFs2CUoUg

Otherwise you may want to look at the quickstart guide which contains a limited ruleset for a small preview.
ulisses-us.com/thedarkeye/TDE-Quickstart Revised 20160505_tm.pdf

Thanks! As you can probably tell, my German is pretty terrible, word order is a bitch. Thanks though, I wanted the German version in particular, I think it would be fun to read through something like this in a different language.

So I heard some good things about the dark eye, except for how there are skills and spells that are kind of newbie traps.

I've come to realize that D&D 4e's Monster Manuals are brilliantly designed.

It tells you the minimum amount of information needed to run that monster, and gives you the exact information players can find out completely with different information depending on the DC.

As interesting as reading monster fluff is, it's better when you can convey what the monster is as mechanically as possible.

But does it tell you where you can find them? When their activity cycle is? What do they eat? What do their tracks look like? What sort of medicinal or alchemical or magical items can be made from their corpses?

The people want to know.

That kind of information can literally be made up at the table in no time at all.

It should be the GM's job to come up with the fluff when it's just D&D with no particular setting involved.

While that might suffice for a lot of parties, there are those who value a consistent world background and fluff over well balanced fights.

>, there are those who value a consistent world background and fluff

Then take notes?

This shit isn't complicated.

How the hell am I supposed to know what sort of tracks a fantastic creature is supposed to make? Do I Iook like some sort of magical taxonomist to you?

What do you think it's feet look like?

What do you think what pattern those feet would make?

Are you seriously that creatively bankrupt or are you just being facetious?

You make it sound so easy. So if I asked you to draw cat tracks, and deer tracks, and bear tracks. All of them real animals you should be somewhat familiar with, you could do it and get it right with just a pencil and paper, without cheating and looking it up on google?

Go buy a campaign setting then.

The whole point of core D&D, Pathfinder, etc. is allowing freedom for the GMs to design their own settings. Mindflayer for instance can have completely different roles in one game than another.

I won't need to draw them. Unless my players have been living under a rock all their lives, they know what a cat's pawprint looks like, and a bears, and a deer's hoofprint. I don't actually need to draw it out, I can just say it and let their mind to the work for me.

Because if the player is looking at tracks, I can describe it in similarities to animals, but if it's not an animal, emphasize the differences. If they succeed on a roll to identify the tracks, then they know the creature it comes from, so just say the fucking creature because the character knows it. If they fail, they don't, so don't.

It's really fucking simple.

And that is exactly my point. They know what a cat track might look like, because you know cats, and they know cats. But neither of us knows what random fantasy creature looks like exactly. And if the players have never encountered one, or even if they have but never saw any tracks, then how are they supposed to recognize it? Well, you show them a picture, a picture provided by the book.

Because showing them a cool picture is cool. Saying, these are manticore tracks if only your characters rolled correctly enough on their knowledge to figure this out, is boring as fuck.

Ok, then I guess we can agree.

The point of those "fluffy" Bestiaries is to offer creatures tailored to a specific setting. I don't know about Hackmaster et al. but the TDE book (called "Aventurian Bestiary") is specifically made for use with the "Aventuria" setting.

>Unless my players have been living under a rock

Actually you're wrong. Most people aren't hunters and have had no interactions with deer except seeing at the side of a road or maybe hitting one with a car. And most have absolutely no clue how to properly draw bear tracks.

Even if they did, they'd have no way of telling one type of hoofed creature from another, or a brown bear from a grizzly.

>If they fail, they don't, so don't.

But even if they don't recognize it, they still see the tracks. You should be able to describe them in detail, is the front foot different from the back foot? do they have the same number of toes? do they have claws or are they retractable? but neither of us are magical taxonomists, so we don't really know what these tracks look like, so how the fuck are we supposed to describe them?

>then how are they supposed to recognize it?

By comparing and contrasting similarities.

>Saying, these are manticore tracks if only your characters rolled correctly enough on their knowledge to figure this out, is boring as fuck.

No, it's not beating around the bush and wasting time, treating your players as idiots. A drawing of a monster paw is a novelty at best, and a great deal of effort for something totally inconsequential.

For example, when i'm playing a far future post-apocalyptic campaign, I don't describe magic boxes with pictures in them. You're treating your players as idiots then. It's a fucking television, just say so. They clearer you can describe something the more effective you convey it to your players.

>You should be able to describe them in detail

So use similiarities to existing animals, or if the character doesn't know animals at all, describe it in the vaguest sense.

They don't fucking know, so they don't get that information, and so that information isn't important now.

If they say they draw the tracks to later be identified, then they do. You don't need to describe every fucking detail.

I don't know about you, but I have a very easy time coming up with stat blocks, attacks, and abilities for monsters, and a much harder time coming up with fluff.

Even if I didn't have to make up the stats from scratch, I often have to adjust them anyway due to the context of the session.

>While that might suffice for a lot of parties, there are those who value a consistent world background and fluff over well balanced fights.

Maybe hackmaster 5e and DSA has both of them?

Keep it civil gentleman, this topic is for fluffy bestiaries as well as statblocky ones, or both in one, as long as requirment of having lots of entries is met.

Of course, but I wouldn't consider combat a core priority of dsa/tde 4th or 5th edition. Combat in those is more narrative than tactical.

Did you really think this user was being uncivil?

Chargen crunch is pretty bad tho
You don't want to bore the shit out of people and put them off before you've even started