Simple, but important question:

there are two important elements, strings and conditions

strings are gained by characters on other characters as a measure of how much leverage you have over them
>strings can be spent to give PCs bonuses or penalties, to offer the player xp if they do what you want, or to force a roll in order to do something the holder doesn't want you to
>they can also be spent to command NPCs

Conditions represent weaknesses or negative reputations, when an action against someone takes advantage of one of their conditions you get a bonus to doing it.

It makes it very hard to directly oppose someone when the social hierarchy puts them above you, since your working with a bunch of penalties, a very appropriate mechanic for a game about high school drama.

Aaaaaaand here is the character sheet that took me a million years in MS Paint to do.

As to why I like the system:
>easy to use resolution mechanic
>not class-based
>system is not so specific that its tied to its setting
>combat is fast and deadly

>MS Paint
Why? You are aware there are programs like Illustrator, Corel, InDesign or Photoshop?

...that was a joke

Good

Dude spent a million years making this file.

This dude was alive a million years ago and invented ms paint just to start working on this document. Dude, I'm not trying to discredit you but, the dude is over a million years old, he deserves a lot more credit then what you're giving him.

BRP, I started with it, it's simple, and you can adapt it for any low level heroics setting with ease (that's what I love to play, the very fews time I played at least).

Was talking about the D6 System the other day and rekindled my interest, though I admit I haven't played since the early '90s, I recall it being pretty quick and fun.

GURPS.
I like most of its mechanics and how it can do loads of things well.

GURPS.

Get a good tablet and get all the books, System can do just about everything once you escape the learning curve

How and where do I start learning it? It really seems daunting.

Tie between Iron Kingdoms and Warhammer 40k RPG.

Mostly due to the basic die rolling mechanics. I like IK because having separate defense, armor, and health makes more sense to me than AC. Having health as spirals that affect you as your health goes down is also pretty cool, though I wouldn't say it's my favorite. I also like that you only need three or four D6 rather than a whole mess of dice.

WH40k is similar. All you need is two D10, which I copied when I wrote up my own version of Fallout PnP.

Using only a few dice means you don't need to buy as many dice to play a game and I think it helps speed the game up.

GURPS Lite. It's free but it gives you the important bits you need to get started. Just understand that GURPS doesn't really do settings. It's more "here's mechanics for you to use in your setting".

How do d6 systems work? I've never played any of them.
Also, I really like the Storyteller, it's quick, the story can flow without rules getting in the way.

the basic set seems really daunting but it's mostly just because there's a ton of lists of things you can have or do. so if the basic set seems like too much, read GURPS Lite and that'll give you GURPS without all the extra bits that confuse people, then once you get that, check out the massive compendium of books of optional rules and setting advice!

I'm kinda new to rpgs, so ive only played: dnd 2e,tephra, and numenera. So far I like numenera the most. I actually like how your stat pools get smaller as you do stuff, as I find it to be a good representation of a PC getting run down as the day goes on.

Tunnels and Trolls.

There's a Dungeon Fantasy line that aims to streamline everything to make fast and easy to run/play dungeon dwelling games.
And they made a box with everything important from DF and Lite, it should come out soon.

Underrated comment.

27 pages including ambientation? Pretty short, nice.

Also thanks for sharing.

Risus. Yeah, characters feel like pic related, but it's very easy to set up and even easier for newer players to grasp. Pumps, lucky shots, and teaming up all make the death spiral a little less predictable and add a small tactical veneer to combat. It's also very easy to change the resolution system to a success-based one with dice exploding on 6, lowering the difference between cliches even further and giving your single die cliche that much more of a chance to shine. All in all it's a very flexible little game that works really damn well for small, short campaigns.

FATE core

I love how I can make it as rule-heavy or rule-light as needed while the whole system kinda "rolls" in how consistent the design principles are.

Also, while I have heard of some rounds not having success with them, aspects have resonated very well with my groups, to the point where I got over my DM-fatigue by switching to this system.

Used to play a lot of Unknown Armies like On that topic- What did you take from Unknown Armies and what did you leave? Also, why?

Well, Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay 1 ed. for the setting, but Call of Cthulhu for it's quick, charming elegance and flexibility.

GURPS checking in as well. It's a great system. It can be as heavy or light as you want it to be, can be tuned to suit a wide range of gaming and setting styles, and obviously also is incredibly flexible within genres.

It's not perfect but it's by far the best.

I don't know enough about either setting to know if this is bait

It's not. I admitt to using CoC version of Basic Roleplaying system for 90% of my one shots that are not fantasy or Star Wars.

The Riddle of Steel.

Pros:
+Melee combat somehow manages to be very realistic AND very fast.
+The genuine risk of character death makes combat more meaningful. (Duels are fucking intense.)
+Doesn't require mapping for combat. (Helps immersion and saves more time.)

Cons:
-Magic rules suck.
-Ranged combat rules suck.
-Out of combat rules are ok but they barely exist.
-No longer supported, so its problems will never be fixed.

>What is your favourite RPG system, and why?
um...
well I have a top 3.

1: FFG Star Wars RP, (EotE/AoR/F&D)
The game mechanics are simple and straight-forward, It takes very little time to get used to the system, and as a GM I can spend less time on drawing-up character stats and distrabution of XP during prep, and more time on plot, characters, and setting. It's also nice that the game is hard to munchkin, and the rewards for doing so are limited, so PCs feel more like characters than a pile-O-numbers to fulfill a player's power fantasy.

2: Pathfinder
Admittedly on almost the complete opposite end of the spectrum from FFG, the appeal of pathfinder is it's 'moddability'. You can tell whatever story you want in whatever setting you can think up, so long as you are willing to do the work, and when you have an overactive imagination, like I do, that extra work is hardly a problem.

3: Dark Heresy (1st edition)
This game is here, I will admit, for largely sentimental purposes. It was the first RPG I ever played and what got me interested in playing RPGs to begin with.

Yea, not quite done but I honestly dont see the need for a book thats 100+ pages

My nigga.
It's great for almost everything, and in WT you can make anything.

Right now its exalted third edition, head and shoulders. I love the fact that super bureaucracy powers or super sail powers are just as viable of a build as super sword powers. I love all the different character concepts I can make and actually do well, like I'm trying to cook up whats essentially the bastard child of Plato and king Solomon right now. Also the setting is super amazing on top of that. Best social mechanics I've seen in any ttrpg.

It's d6 dice pools. You have a Stat of say 3d6 and a skill based off that stat of +2d6, so you roll 5d6 and add to try to beat a target number. Pretty simple stuff.

I love GURPS and it may be my favorite but it is rather involved. Which is fine for me but not everyone I play with. I'm always on a quest to find a simpler generic system.

Can't tell if you have great taste, or utter shit taste.

Legend d20.

Because from my perspective it did literally nothing wrong except for being unfinished. It hit on the exact mechanics I like in RPGs, it's highly customizable yet easy to expand upon due to the way almost everything in the game works, the track system is the single best way to handle multiclassing I've ever seen, and skills actually matter and can let you do a ton of actually useful shit.

>They fell for the meme

If I had to find a complaint, it's that tracks kinda make classes redundant. It should be "pick an offensive track, pick a defensive track, pick a utility track, and call the result whatever you want," with a larger selection of tracks to cover more concepts. Fantastic, underrated choice otherwise.

Classes provide a structure for the tradeoff system to work in the first place and give players workable defaults. Plus I've seen characters who've done some weird shit that don't fit into the offense/defense/utility track mold without springing for the 4th track.

I am a big fan of l5e/7th Sea. I am also really enjoying my first Edge of the Empire game. Warhammer Fantasy Role Play is good too.

You. Have excellent taste my friend.

Alternity. Still the best sci-fi ruleset I've ever played. Had one of the most interesting dice mechanics I've ever used, THE best wound tracking in any game I've played thus far, and was extremely flexible about what you could do within the system. Have seen my DM do a complete system hack on it twice to do non-sci-fi things with it, and it still runs great. Can be made to run everything from Star Wars to Mass Effect to Firefly to X-files, to 18th century wet-navy Pirate adventures with minimal fuss.

It's a great system, and I backed the second edition even though they made sacrifices I really didn't like in the name of smoothing play.

How come no one posted VtM/Storyteller?

I know when I was learning programming, there was a saying - "Learning a programming language is easy, it's learning to program that's hard".

Do you think the same is also true with RPG systems vs. getting down RPGs in general?

Of course. This applies to anything; For example, You are an aspiring writer, and you know how to write, you know the syntax, but if you don't read, or can't comprehend text you are reading, you will never be a good writer.
It's basically theory vs. practice, and comprehension of the subject is the key element in learning it to the fullest degree.

and once you escape the black hole caused by collecting all the GURPS books in one location.

D&D 4E. All the RP fun of D&D but with better, streamlined rules and fun tactical combat.

Either iteration of WoD. Finding a group that isn't shit is a feat in itself, but if you find that group it's easily my top RPG.

I absolutely ADORE 4E. It's what I run most of the time. I love it for what it is. I even love it for openly shitting on 3.5. It isn't perefect, and it isn't generalized enough to run every type of game, but when it comes to the sort of game it's specialized to run, you couldn't do any better.

apocalypse world, but its hard to get a game started due to interest, but when i am able to get a game started its fucking fun.

I've tried to parse through Riddle of Steel's melee combat myself and keep finding myself getting confused. Would you mind running through the basic framework of it for me?

>Riddle
This, right now it's pretty much my favourite system.
Haven't had much chance to play it though.

>-Magic rules suck.
How so? They are pretty free form and not focused around combat. In theory I like them.
>-Ranged combat rules suck.
Kinda true. The supplement "The Flower of Battle" helps a bit though.
>-No longer supported, so its problems will never be fixed.
You know that there are three successor-systems? True, none of them official because of copyright fuckery I think, but nonetheless there are systems that try to build and improve upon TRoS.

ask in the Song of Swords (one of the spiritual successors of Riddle) general they have a Roll20 room. Maybe you can catch someone to help you in the thread or the roll20 (which is currently rather empty). I am not very "fluent" in the game, so I'd rather not try teaching it yet.

At the moment it's a tie between FFG Star Wars and Shadowrun 3rd edition. Star Wars because I really dig the system and the way it handles success and failure, and Shadowrun because it is the system I've played the most of, not to mention that specific edition was the first game I played that was more tha kick down door loot room roleplaying.

Dungeon World. Because it's simply the best option out there for fantasy. Period.