What RPGs are the best in terms of your ability to actually roleplay a character?

What RPGs are the best in terms of your ability to actually roleplay a character?

...Any of them, depending on the group and the players?

Let me be more specific, what games have the best rules that compliment roleplay?

Again, any of them? It depends on the playstyle of your group. Some people love narrative metamechanics for supporting roleplay, others despise them and find them restrictive. Personally I think a good set of combat rules enhances roleplay, because having tangible consequences for my characters actions in a crisis makes them feel more meaningful and significant.

It's such a broad question it's hard to give a specific answer which has any actual value.

Alright thanks, what RPGs do you recommend?(not pertaining to the question but rather just in general)

It depends on the group, not system. Some system do try to encourage it, but still it's 99% the matter of players and 1% of the system at most.
If I had to answer, something rules light I guess though.

It depends on the players more than the game. However, any system that uses narrative dice is a bit more fun to roleplay with, in my opinion. I enjoy Edge of the Empire for that, but there are other systems if you prefer.

Dogs in the Vineyard. 1001 Nights. In certain groups Microscope, but usually not. MonsterHearts taken seriously. Bizarrely enough, The Flux.

Tenra Bansho Zero.
Your only way to gain experience and metacurrency is by receiving them from other players for convincingly and/or entertainingly playing your character according to their central aspects, which are defined and changed following the system's rules.

Mechanics in a game absolutely do make a difference in terms of how players engage in roleplaying.

Take chess. I could roleplay that my bishop is instigating a religious coup against your king when I check him but the game doesn't really allow for this.

A game like D&D 5E does allow more scope for roleplay due to the nature of character creation , picking backgrounds and engaging within a campaign world. However with the vast majority of the rules mired in tactical combat the main thing you're encouraged is to kill monsters and take their stuff to improve your characters. There might be decisions you have to make within a game but most gameplay will boil down to combat by the system.

You could 'roleplay' a far more intrigue based game where your cleric is trying to instigate a coup against the local lord but since the mechanics don't really do anything interesting for that beyond binary pass/fail d20' rolls it's really not much different from 'roleplaying' that same interaction in chess.

A game like Apocalypse World on the other hand makes this more interesting by hard baking it into the rules. Instead of a binary choice you have multiple conflicting choices you and the gm can make when you pass or fail a roll that snowball. Likewise character creation is designed to create conflict between the players which is at the heart of roleplay and drama. Whereas since the mechanics in D&D point towards combat character conflict ends up being resolved in combat and therefore it tends to be avoided as GM's don't want to derail the game with pvp. Likewise the resolution isn't that interesting by the mechanics.

I've attempted to include character conflict within my D&D games as a GM and have had players annoyed with me that is cause rifts in the group that could have players killed etc. This is because there's little mechanical ways of resolving conflict beyond combat. A game like Burning Wheel however has social combat mechanics to resolve conflict satisfactorily.

whichever one you're currently playing

Roleplaying doesn't stop when combat starts.

Original 2nd edition Vampire the Masquerade. The rules are weak enough that you focus on drama over gameplay. It's a relatable setting with relatable PCs. Very freeform so plenty of room to innovate.

>vampire
>relatable PCs

Was earlier Vampire less edgy than later editions or are you some form of hyper-nihilist?

Pretty much any that has as few rules detailing character interactions as possible.
Systems giving you allies, enemies, contacts, favors, rolling for social interactions results and so on are rather poor since they limit how much you can make out of those features when they get rules for that.

I agree and when you're playing chess , or warhammer , or mage knight , or heroclix you can roleplay out what's happening in the 'combat' to your hearts content but it's not particularly interesting. Likewise you can 'roleplay' out a combat in D&D to your hearts content but without further mechanics to support it then it's not particularly narratively interesting in a roleplay sense either.

For your playstyle. Personally, I find roleplaying D&D combat extremely fun (well, not in 3.PF), because how they act in conflict is a compelling way to express your character. The choices you make and how you interact with both allies and enemies can convey your characters personality just as much as dialogue, and when a system presents you with a hard choice, both fluffwise and mechanically, the existence of those strong mechanics to support it makes it more meaningful.

For my playstyle. That's the key thing. It's all pretty ludicrously subjective.

Heck, has a playstyle that is pretty much diametrically opposed to yours. That doesn't make either of you wrong, it just means you have different preferences and priorities and that there are different systems to cater to each of your groups.

Again you can do that while playing warhammer 40k, or mage knight, or chess, or heroclix does that make any of those games roleplaying games ?

Likewise D&D doesn't present you with particularly 'hard' choices via its mechanics. Usually it's just kill the thing or run away. Yes obviously a GM can add flavour to that but again nothing stops you adding such flavour to your next game of chess, does it make chess a good roleplaying game?

>Likewise D&D doesn't present you with particularly 'hard' choices via its mechanics

So you don't actually understand D&D, got it.

It makes you seem kind of dumb to condemn games just for not aligning with your playstyle when you don't actually know how they work.

Please provide an example of a 'hard' choice' related to roleplaying that the mechanics of D&D create that couldn't be emulated in any tactical miniatures wargame and without resorting to GM fiat.

In an encounter with a recurring enemy, one of his minions is threatening an ally but the key foe himself, injured but alive, is currently unengaged, leaving him free to cast a spell that might harm the group or allow him to escape.

It is, simultaneously, a mechanical and narrative choice. If I pursue the greater foe, I am leaving an ally to their fate, in the pursuit of a greater good or out of a desire for revenge, not letting the recurring enemy get away again. On the other hand, if I go and assist the ally, I can help avoid them being injured, but at the cost of allowing the recurring villain unrestrained action.

This is an incredibly simple, basic example not involving any of the mechanical depth that (good) D&D combat systems enjoy. Nuanced crunch and tactical depth can directly mesh with the scenario and ongoing narrative in similar ways, creating interesting decision points with tangible mechanical and narrative consequences. This applies to all systems with good crunchy combat, not just D&D.

In battle where I am running my Space Marines and Allied Imperial Guard against my opponents Chaos space marine force led by his Chaos Sorcerer villain who he recurringly uses. One of his Chaos Marine units is threatening my allied Imperial Guard commander but the key foe himself my opponents Chaos Sorcerer is injured but alive and is currently unengaged, leaving him free to cast a spell or run away.

It is, simultaneously, a mechanical and narrative choice. If I pursue the chaos sorcerer with my space marine units I am leaving an ally to their fate, in the pursuit of a greater good or out of a desire for revenge, not letting the recurring enemy get away again. On the other hand, if I go and assist the ally, I can help avoid them being injured, but at the cost of allowing the recurring villain unrestrained action.

Except there is no ongoing narrative context to justify that. You're coming up with an arbitrary example that doesn't actually make sense.

Different user here.

>Except there is no ongoing narrative context to justify that.
Says who?

>needing mechanics to roleplay

wew lad

Says the nature of the game. Different styles of game come with their own assumptions. Wargames tend to be played as competitive scenarios, without any real continuity between them or an objective other than achieving victory (aside from having fun along the way). Wargame campaigns, even narrative ones, do exist, but they are very much the exception to the rule.

Roleplaying games, meanwhile, are implicitly based on the idea of a continuous, connected set of events with what happened before mattering and having an impact on what happens after. One shot and scenario based RPGs do exist, but the default assumption is that of a long term consistent narrative which completely changes the context in which combat occurs.

Sure there is. Me and my opponent play regularly, my opponent always uses a chaos Sorcerer who I never manage to kill and we've crafted a narrative out of it and used the combat mechanics to inform that.

As I've said there's nothing wrong with this but it's possible with nearly any game with a tactical combat system. The question is what separates D&D that creates satisfactory roleplaying? While it certainly has more scope it's mechanics don't really lend itself to roleplay that much more than a game of warhammer would.

That is a social context, not a narrative context. It might appear similar in some ways, but it comes from a different place and lends to playing the game in different ways.

It is also not the norm or default assumption for how you play the game, while it is when it comes to D&D and other RPGs.

But the question was for a roleplaying-related "hard choice" created by mechanics of D&D.

Your argument is completely unrelated to the mechanics (and consequently the question), being based instead solely on the way a game is "supposed" to be played.

So you agree chess/warhammer / hero clix / mage knight and straight up freeform improv acting are all satisfactory roleplaying games since you don't need any mechanics to roleplay?

How is a mechanical choice between attacking a dangerous enemy or protecting a vulnerable ally not a hard one?

Even in a board or wargame, you can arrive at a similar decision. However, in an RPG, along with that mechanical difficulty, you also have the narrative side which makes it more complex and more compelling.

The intention with which the system was made and the principles of its design are of key importance you fucking mong.

>How is a mechanical choice between attacking a dangerous enemy or protecting a vulnerable ally not a hard one?
It is a hard one, but not because of roleplaying concerns.
The roleplaying side is unrelated to the mechanics, which means that the "hard choice" in terms of roleplaying (!) does not arise from the mechanics, which also means that the roleplaying aspect of the hard choice can be equally applied to games that are not "supposed" to have that roleplaying side.

...How in the fuck does that make any sense? They're intimately linked by the context they mutually occupy.

If the system doesn't back up that intent with mechanics it's failed in its goal.

D&D originally had a very clear goal of kill monsters in dungeons and get treasure and its mechanics supported that so it worked really well. Within that you could craft a narrative , but that's possible in say warhammer too which equally has guidelines for narrative play in its rules.

As it's grown it's goal has been forgotten , indeed that goal of loot and XP is seen as almost dirty by a lot of 'roleplay' but it's mechanics have virtually stayed the same so don't actually help support other forms of gameplay that well.

Except in one system you create a character, and play a role. In the other you don't. That's the fucking difference.

That's correlation, not causation.
The question was for causation.

it's a system independent skill

The mechanics created the context within which the choice exists, and directly resulted in the narrative consequences that must be considered. It is direct causation.

>How is a mechanical choice between attacking a dangerous enemy or protecting a vulnerable ally not a hard one?
Because RAW, it's always better to kill something before it can do damage than to try to prevent/recover from damage.
It's why despite there being a "defend" option in combat, no one ever takes that if they can just full attack.

Play games with better combat systems where that isn't true.

No, that is correlation.

The mechanical choice is
>prevent loss of allied unit
>attack important target

The narrative choice is
>protect my friend
>attack my nemesis

They just so happen to arise in the same context, and sound similar because they refer to the same objects, but the considerations going into each are completely separate. The former is based on mechanics, while mechanics do not factor into the latter.

Why? You're making an arbitrary assertion that makes no sense.

A Roleplaying Game is a unison of those two elements, the roleplaying and the game, becoming more than the sum of their parts. Why are you so obsessed with trying to prove that they're completely disconnected outside of explicit narrative mechanics despite that being obviously untrue?

There aren't two separate choices. It's the same choice, involving both mechanical and narrative elements. You can't make one and not make the other.

Going strictly by D&D any of them that aren't 4e. That game does not let you roleplay. At all. Anyone telling you otherwise is lying and still assblasted their shitty game died to Pathfinder.

D&D 4e does no less to support roleplay than any other edition of D&D, and arguably does more. Stop repeating shitty memes.

Wow, even by 4e bait that is low quality.

>D&D 4e.....does more.
And here comes the 4rries starting edition fights in threads that have nothing to do with it. There goes another good thread.

holy shit please show me the page where it says roleplay is not allowed

Even if I think people in the thread nailed the main ideas, I think that there are settings where it is easier to role play/to start role playing :

D&D is a good introduction for "easy and stereotypical" roleplay, mostly with a humorous tone.
All almost actual settings where you play "normal" people are awesome to start more "engaging and realistic" roleplay, like Call of Cthulhu, or any XXth/XXIth century settings : players have more reference on how to act, and can really focus on their character instead of the lore of the setting.

Hardest would be strange settings where you don't have any social references (w40k, dark and serious fantasy, stuff like shadowrun...)

At least that's how I feel from my own experience. Also, I think the best way to help the players to roleplay is conflict and personal stories. The best way to almost force people to roleplay is pre-gen characters with interlacing backstories and opposite goals

Please provide evidence to support your claims, which isn't just 'Waaah I can't use spells to effortlessly solve problems'.

And here comes the army of 4rries to start shitposting in response to someone not saying something positive about 4e.

Typical.

>And here comes the 4rries starting edition fights in threads that have nothing to do with it.

I think the fight started with since that's the first to mention 4e.

Yep, they mentioned 4e, didn't praise it as the most perfect system ever designed that can do no wrong, so the angry 4rry defense force got triggered and started edition warring, again in a thread that had nothing to do with them.

Provide evidence to support your unsubstantiated claim, or stop posting and shitting up the thread.

>posting a blatant lie is the same as claiming a system isn't perfect

4e is an extremely imperfect system. That it 'doesn't let you roleplay' is not one of its flaws.

I'm pretty sure insulting an edition makes that the first shot of an edition war.

Well, just imagine that your mage is almost sure to die from a lich next turn, but if he made he will cast a spell that should kill the lich outright. You can protect him, or try to slay the lich, knowing that your chances to success are quite low, you must choose between a sure kill next turn, or the possibility of killing the lich and having the mage kills another enemy (and if you don't succeed, he dies). Most of the time, it's not mechanical, it's risk vs reward, and it's way more difficult to judge.

That doesn't work because the lich can also simply do something else and wait until you're not protecting the mage any more.
Thanks, spells having a uniform casting time of 1 turn.

Don't take the very low grade bait.

Weirdly, of all given editions the example actually makes the most sense in 4e, where protecting your allies is an actually useful thing you can do.

You don't know what roleplaying is do you?