RPG Pet Peeves

If a halfling oneshots a dragon with a kick, it obviously wasn't to the shins.

It adds extra tension to die rolls and helps facilitate big moments without the stupidity of lolrandumb nat 20's. The halfling one-shotting the dragon with exploding dice is fine, because it's likely a 0.001% chance they manage to do that. It doesn't make it any less suicidal, and it's not something where you could just chuck a handful of halflings at the dragon and expect them to win.

>>taking roleplay-only flaws for extra character points
This, especially if those flaws are things that encourage That Guy behavior.

>roleplay only flaws
Are... are these a thing? The only examples I can think of are stuff like that in Burning Wheel, but those systems only give you rewards for them when you roleplay them out.

>Flaw (Loner)
>Flaw (Nightmares)
>Flaw (Enemy)

>randomness in chargen
>long skill lists
>vancian magic
>splitting weapon skills up (separating unarmed, blunt, blades, etc)
>splitting up climb, jump, run, swim
>itemized and pedantic encumbrance system
>subsystems

>Lesbian PCs

OUT OUT OUT OUT OUT!

>Lesbian PCs
That's nothing, you haven't seen true horror until you've seen Lesbian DMPCs

Yes. Example is Sterile from SLA Industries. 10 extra points for something with no mechanical effect. Got nerfed in 1.1 to only give you 1 point for that very reason.

SenZar's Karmas/Codes are similar. No mechanical effect until you go past 10 (out of 20), give you some extra chargen points. Some things might interact with them mechanically, but they themselves don't do anything until you get up to them actually manifesting something. Although the system does encourage you to take them at 10, because that's average human, and going below that is trending towards Buddhist letting go of the material world shit.

oh my

Nothing wrong with that.

Flaw (Lazy)
Flaw (Talentless)
Flaw (Delusions of Grandeur)

>Flaw (Talentless
This one is legitimate.

>taking roleplay-only flaws for extra character points
Nothing wrong with that. It's a game about roleplaying after all.

Nothing wrong with the concept but the execution is almost always ass. It's mostly a way for neckbeards to play out their sexual fantasies while disguising it as a character trait.

Maybe, but I'm willing to tolerate it. One of my players is playing a barbarian, who tries to bed every attractive woman the party saves or helps, Conan-style. At first I've said "No way", but then I've thought - hey, why not? It's not like sexuality isn't a natural part of many fantasy stories, like Conan I've already mentioned. So as long as it's done with a tasteful fade to black, and fine with the other players...

Can't see how the situation would change if the barbarian was a woman, and not a man.

>chuck haflings at a dragon and expect them to win...
How about giving them heavy armour with dragonbane poisoned spikes and using a trebuchet?

>"This book requires several of our other products, listed here..."
>No index in the back
>Core book references specific subraces, cultures, factions, or Gods from specific settings, yet is otherwise written to be a universal fantasy ruleset
>"Magic items are supposed to be unique, special, and legendary" - proceeds to list their exact use, nature, and cost
>Class-free systems that basically require you to shoehorn your character into a RPG class trope anyway
>Groups that don't use the wealth of materials in the D20 SRD to readjust and rebalance their campaign
>Classes that come with pets or familiars. (One on the party isn't bad, but it's retarded if everyone in the party is followed b their own entourage of magical woodland beasts.)

(me)
*halflings

I mean, I personally don't care too much. On my list of character tropes I'd veto out of hand, "lesbian" doesn't even make the cut.

The reason making the character a woman rather than a man is creepier is because it goes from understandable male power fantasy to weird voyeuristic mental porn. The neckbeard doesn't want to BE his lesbian fighterfu, he wants to watch her make out with the sexy cleric lady.

This is wrong and you know it.

>Many moons ago
>A young, naive version of myself was running 3.5
>May players were running rampant with the Unearthed Arcana rules
>Following the (alternate) rules presented in the book, one player was basically an unstoppable spiked chain brandishing machine
>The cost? Fear of penguins, couldn't hold back in combat, and swore an oath to only use bladed weapons...

>skill lists that are too short and leave big gaps about what a character knows or can do
>every PC runs at the same speed
>system doesn't support a PC being below average at a thing
>physically weak character can barely lift an empty backpack while the physically strong character is a flatbed truck on legs
>magic is really easy to do according to the rules, but for some reason it's really rare in the world

Is a spiked chain really a bladed weapon?

I generally agree with you about roleplay-only flaws not being harsh enough, but if not holding back in combat means he's unable to retreat then he could pretty easily get screwed over by that.

Yeah, I remember arguing with him at the time. Apparently in the 3.5 or 3rd edition rules, the spiked chains are described as being "spiked or bladed". He used the fact that a rapier is a piercing weapon, yet it has a blade. (Or something like that.)

And the "No holding back" rule had a specific name and it specifically said that all of your attacks are lethal, and you can't perform a non-lethal attack.

I honestly think whoever wrote the entries on the flaw system knew that they were just coming up with stupid, "That Guy" shit.

What kind of people are you playing with? If a flaw is obviously not influencing the roleplay in the current setting you don't grant points for it. Hell, if you have min maxing players that pick obvious useless flaws you kick them for not roleplaying properly and being powergaming cunts.

I am currently not playing with them. I specifically said that this happened a long time ago.

That being said, I've never had a good group to play with. I've played with over a dozen different groups over the years, and they were all min-maxers and "That Guys" that we're more obsessed with power gaming and cheating than having a good group experience.

Seems more like that's a problem with you and the people you play with. Not a general problem with roleplaying flaws.

Why is that weirder than pretending you're the one bedding imaginary people?

I agree with this to avoid powergaming, but it makes sense if you think about it in setting.
>Character has shaky flaw, penalty to ranged attacks.
>Said character trains to become a primarily melee-focused combatant.
If you were cross-eyed and couldn't hit a castle wall with an arrow, what reason would you have to want to do so?

Conversely, and this is the part I agree with, stacking irrelevant flaws to get power-ups is stupid, unless they can be related to each other. I.E., flaw says you can't attack women, so you do more damage to men or something to that effect.

The only real pet peeve i have is people arguing with the GM over the interpretation of a rule

It's hard for me to articulate but basically it goes from a base sex fantasy to something kind of fetishistic.

I should point out my issue is less with the concept itself and more with the fact most of the people who play it are just annoying and repugnant in general.

>cybernetics systems that require you to spend experience, character points, whatever to acquire or improve implants

The sole exception being those very rare games that unify the character points and wealth systems.

You just do not give up. Did Savage Worlds slap you in the face and steal your girl or something?

You really shouldn't want to be your character anyway.

>a concept is inherently bad because a system implemented it poorly and someone abused it

Play with well-adjusted adults and exercise common sense.

>I should point out my issue is less with the concept itself and more with the fact most of the people who play it are just annoying and repugnant in general.
No arguments there.

I mean, ARGUABLY it takes some training to get used to implants, and unlike normal wealth, they're not something you can just lose access to if you're imprisoned(except maybe cyberlimbs), so I'd say a minor XP cost would be reasonable, but yeah, bulk of the cost should come from wealth, not experience.

Why do you keep shitposting forced memes on Veeky Forums like this?

Probably on Veeky Forums.
Which is why frogposting is frowned upon, since we're not on reddit or /pol/.

>cybernetics systems that require you to spend experience, character points, whatever to acquire or improve implants

>Cybernetics are strictly worse than normal limbs
FUCK YOU, STAR WARS SAGA

>reading teh rules
>first 20 pages is fluff
>next 80 pages is fluff
>10 pages of mechanics
>mechanics are convoluted and cause problems in game
>200 more pages of fluff

Why dont they just brainstorm more than 1 week to make up good mechanics that make the game playable

An explanation for those of you curious why things are like this.

Well, it obviously doesn't, but that's why it shouldn't be called that way. If someone tells me "if you pick this, you're a tank", i'm expecting mmo style tanking. If i'm just going to be "beefy guy with a shield", don't fucking call it tanking, because that's not what it is.

MMO definition of tank is flawed, anyway. Tanks work best for fast attacks and exploiting weaknesses in enemy line, they're not for drawing enemy fire.

>taking roleplay-only flaws for extra character points

Is that really that bad? I remember the Shadowrun rulebook telling me that i can give my character some minor ailment in exchange for an additional skill point. So i gave him an allergy, and got an extra skill point. Said allergy was used by the GM a couple of times to create tension and interesting situations.
I liked it.

>>There's no wrong way to roleplay, just have fun

Just for that I'd have them face cultists of the CE arctic god penguinis.

Allergy presumably has mechanical consequences, such as penalties when the allergen is encountered, or expenses in the form of medication. Roleplay-only flaws - that is, flaws that don't have mechanical effects - are kind of bad design. Compare night terrors that appear regularly and render the sufferer fatigued or negate the benefits of rest either partially or completely with nightmares that merely result in the player stating "yeah, my character slept badly last night". The latter should probably not give the player extra resources at character creation(though if well played, it might result in roleplaying bonuses later, whatever form those might take).

Your example is flawed. The character could suffer halved regenerations in case of nightmares, require additional water in the wild because of nightsweat or knock over and destroy stuff regulary in his sleep. E.t.c. Just sleeping bad is not what is defined as a negative trait.

Your GM was just bad at enforcing roleplay flaws properly.

But a character sheet is supposed to describe the character, not the player

I think that's a great idea though, OP. Justify yourself!

Like, I don't mind flaws like having a dependant in SR or an archenemy. Say you're in the middle of a run and your dependant needs you. Creates some tension.

The expression started because during WW2, specially in early stages, tanks proved to be awesome mobile cover for advancing infantry. When the enemy lacked anti tank weapons, your tank could pretty much slowly rull down the narrow streets of european villages and even heavy MG placements wouldn't do much agaisnt it's armor, so the infantry behind it could get in position...Like reaching an alley from which they could move and flank the MG position.

During field battles, or battles with other tanks involved, your armored forces would likely be engaging the enemies and your infantry would be doing something else, because they'd be terminated quickly in open field where there are tanks. In those cases, tanks where meant to move fast to an advantageous position and attack enemy tanks from the side or rear. Or see an opening they could rush through the enemy line, forcing them to change formation and open the line for more vulnerable troops.

While the second only vaguely ressemble MMO mechanics, the first can function as a neat analogy of drawing fire (though it's still flawed since the tank wasn't 'drawing' fire, it was merely standing in the way)

>though it's still flawed since the tank wasn't 'drawing' fire, it was merely standing in the way

That's the difference with an MMO Tank vs. a 4e Fighter.

Avatarfagging is against the global rules you know.

He's talking about flaws that specifically only have a roleplaying element to them. Flaw (Delusional) or Flaw (Kleptomaniac) or Flaw (Arrogant), things like that.

Stupid frogposter

How's that only roleplay? A good gm will always apply this into the rpg. Arrogant? You get negative modifiers when talking to higher ups. Kleptomanic? Better roll that willpower when you see that gold necklace. Delusional? Hope you don't get an outbreak in a stressful situation like combat.

Remove thyself, frogposter.

>A good GM
Any argument that includes that phrase is pretty bad when talking about systems. "A good GM can houserule it" is not an excuse for lazy or bad design.

What is this picture from? It looks cute.

>Only getting to play a few times a year
>Expensive books pristine and dust covered.

Dumb frogposter

It's better than the Veeky Forums party line where every gm is incompetent shit.

The majority of GMs range from bad to decent. Good GMs are an exception rather than the rule.

>hard caps on skills, or no cap at all

What did he mean by this?

Yes, luck IS a great mechanic. I'm glad you agree.

>hard caps on skills, or no cap at all
>What did he mean by this?

In a hypothetical system where you roll a d20 and add a number equal to your skill rank (skill rank starts at 0), your skill rank cannot be raised above N, where N is the hard cap for every skill category regardless of the PC's other attributes. As in, "In this game, no character may have a Fuckoff skill higher than 10, regardless of what their base Fuckitall score is".

No caps = no caps.

>Class-free systems that basically require you to shoehorn your character into a RPG class trope anyway

This one I kind of get but only because class free systems can tend to be heavily directionless compared to something with templates, unless you're going to go fucking crazy with it, you'll just make something you're familiar with which is usually a class. At the very least they need templates.

I more meant it as how do you have fucking both and use it as a form of bitching at a single system.

But now that you've explained hard caps that IS pretty fucking stupid, although I still don't understand the problem with no-caps as the alternative. Maybe because I don't have a real example within my knowledge of something with "Soft Caps".

>Maybe because I don't have a real example within my knowledge of something with "Soft Caps".

Say you have a system where skills are divided into the groups "PUNCH SKILLS" and "NON-FIGHT SKILLS".

A character's maximum PUNCH SKILL rating could be equal to their Strength score +10, so someone with a 5 STR would have a PUNCH cap of 15, while someone with a 15 STR would have a PUNCH cap of 25.

In a system with hard caps, it would just say "no character can have a PUNCH higher than 15".

Sort of close, in Shadowrun being mildly allergic to bees gives you a bunch of points.

>Maybe because I don't have a real example within my knowledge of something with "Soft Caps".
Soft caps are when a system has hard caps except you can go past them, usually in a way that provides severely diminishing returns or is so rare and specific to a set of circumstances that it almost never comes up. Like how in 5e, you can't increase an ability score higher than 20. Except for if you're a 20th level Barbarian, then it's 24 for STR and CON. Also a few magic items let you increase past 20, but those either are only used once a century (Tomes of X) or just flat out set your stat to something high that can't be changed (Giants' Belts). So technically there is no "hard cap" for where your ability scores can end, but it's so uncommon for anyone to have the capability of going past 20 that it's effectively a cap. So it's a soft cap.
At least that's what I understand soft caps to be.

D&D 3.PF caps skill ranks based on level, but doesn't cap bonuses from other sources.
Most classless dicepool games have diminishing returns for anything you invest in.

Both of these are examples of soft caps. A game that's totally uncapped lets you pour all your skill points/XP/whatever into one or two things. Such systems do exist, and they are terrible.

What system? I'm not talking about DnD specific but every system with negative traits. That's how you do it.

If your pnp doesn't come with acceptable rules and ideas you're playing a shit system anyway.

>That's how you do it.
You mean that's how YOU houserule it. It's still shit design.

No, my system comes with alternative rules, ideas and examples how to apply roleplay focused negative traits.

No-one cares about your system.

Show me on the doll where Savage Worlds hurt you

When the first thing I see in the core book is basically a little bedtime story about one specific person in one specific situation to "set the mood", instead of an overview of the setting as a whole.
I know fluff is important but please, start from the top. Give me the hard facts that every player in this setting most likely needs to know. This amount of personal focus is not worldbuilding, it's plot, and it's not the plot of my campaign.
The time to "set the mood" is when you're about to start actually playing, in which case I should hope you've read at least part of the core book already.

>"Arrow!" said the bowman. "Black arrow! I have saved you to the last. You have never failed me and always I have recovered you. I had you from my father and he from of old. If ever you came from the forges of the true king under the Mountain, go now and speed well!"

There's your exploding dice one-shotting a dragon.

SLA Industries. What a game, I miss my Wraithraider. But seriously, Sterile was a ridiculous flaw.

not on /r9k/

Your pic reminded me that my biggest pet peeve in RPGs is things like your pic related, where the game designers don't realize that they're not very good at designing things like stationary, corporate logos, etc. because they're amateurs, so they don't know how bad and fake this stuff looks like to people who actually know about the subject.

Sci-fi games like Shadowrun are the biggest violators, because they invariably have a single designer creating all the in-universe logos, which means that every company logo looks like it was designed by the same person.

As an aside, I enjoyed the Dawn of the Dead remake from 2004, but was extremely irritated that the superimposed graphics (i.e. "supers", like the bars along the bottom of the screen with the name of the anchor or reporter) their supposed "local Madison, Wisconsin TV station" was obviously created by a Hollywood studio and didn't look anything like what an actual local news station in Madison would be able to produce. The rest of the movie was kind of a blur after that point because I kept thinking, "man, if they had only bothered to have an actual news station produce that part instead of trying to fake it".

>table of contents for an RPG book
>chapter 1: thing
>chapter 2: other thing
>chapter 3: stuff
>chapter 4: options
>chapter 5: fluff
>chapter 6: useless shit
>nothing else

Is it really so hard to make tables of contents that look like pic related? It makes finding shit in a book so much quicker and easier. Fucking lazy assholes.

It is a great mechanic. Combat should always be dangerous and dramatic, and never a foregone conclusion.

That dice will rarely allow the occasional and rare events is the whole reason to use dice in the first place.

That's why you describe your attack after you roll damage.

Sounds like your players shouldn't have taken the flaw (unimaginative)

Roleplay flaws can be really fun if they're not the usual "I love money so much i'd kill a baby" stuff

Are you retarded or just illiterate?

>classes
>levels
>a twenty-sided die with modifiers as the main resolution mechanic

Read the savage worlds core rulebook. Yes, they are a thing.

Then roleplay. You don't deserve a reward for doing what you are already supposed to be doing.