What's a good beer-and-pretzels fantasy game/adventure/system that I could use for an evening of quick fun? Something that could be explained, run and concluded with newbies in about 6 hours.
Dungeon World
Kobolds Ate My Baby
Fiasco
maybe Microscope, though it's rather more abstract than a standard RPG
Dungeon World for sure.
Also seconding Fiasco, though it's probably not what you want.
>>46652973
>>46653012
Fiasco's more for modern heist games, isn't it?
Can DW be explained to new RPG players in about 20 minutes? That's probably the attention span I'm going to get before people get bored and leave.
>>46653052
>Fiasco's more for modern heist games, isn't it?
There are different playbooks but yeah, it's aimed toward that sort of thing.
>Can DW be explained to new RPG players in about 20 minutes?
Definitely. All moves in the game follow the same basic principle (roll 2d6, add a modifier) and the rest is standard RPG stuff (like hit points and XP). All the character generation and class-specific moves are baked into the character sheet.
It's the kind of game where, as a player, you don't even need to know the rules. You can just say what your character does and then the GM tells you what to do.
Plus it has fantastic GM advice and a great chapter on running your first game session (which also applies to one-shots). I guess the downside is that it requires a bit more effort and skill on the GM's part.
Anyone tried Open D6 or Fantasy d6 or whatever it was called?
>>46652865
Beyond the wall and other adventures.
wushu open.
probably many more board games.
>>46653167
Does it come with a fantasy setting?
>>46652865
Can you be a little more specific about what you want to do with said system? Like what is fun for you in RPGs?
>>46652865
Old School Hack is my favorite beer-and-pretzels game
>>46654079
Which one?
Fiasco has free playsets on the website, you use these to generate a scenario:
http://bullypulpitgames.com/download-category/fiasco/
There are a couple of fantasy ones, but the game is aimed at more freeform storytelling where something goes wrong, imitating films like Fargo and Burn After Reading. It's GM-less and aimed at one evening of play, which is why I seconded the suggestion.
Dungeon World assumes your typical D&D medieval fantasy setting, but it doesn't describe one. Instead it encourages you to "draw maps, leave blanks". You might have a dungeon mapped out, but the players also have a say in the game world. e.g. you might ask a player what kind of area the dungeon is in, whether people live nearby, how the king feels about it, etc.
>>46652865
>What's a good beer-and-pretzels fantasy game/adventure/system that I could use for an evening of quick fun? Something that could be explained, run and concluded with newbies in about 6 hours.+ 0 post omitted.
Ryuutama.It's sort of like Dragon Quest meets a Ghibli movie.
Not OP, but still curious: what exactly qualifies as a "rules-lite" RPG? How lite do you have to be to be for real lite?
>>46654260
Isnt part of the theme of that system long journeys? Aka not a one-shot?
>>46654293
To me its character gen + rules explaination <30 mins
>>46654376
><30 mins
This is kind of what I'm aiming for with the system I'm building, but I worried it will lack depth or longevity. My guiding tenets are "the quickstart rules ARE the rules" and "the edge cases aren't worth it."
My biggest problem is character creation: I added some features similar to Burning Wheel's beliefs, goals and instincts to flesh out characters and encourage role-playing (with XP rewards) but that can be a lot for people to take in, I think. Even if it amounts to "belief represents your character's moral code; make one up or roll 1d6", there are multiple layers.
>>46652865
You could try Beer and Pretzels.
>>46654480
Take a note out of AW's book and give A few options for each at char gen. You could also have players introduce a new piece of what drives each character every session.
>>46653052
DW is stupid easy for players. They largely just have to explain what they do and they'll learn the moves as they play.
(especially if you print some of those reference sheets that came with the character sheet document.)
It's insanely hard to to learn to GM it right, though. There's a bunch of stuff that looks like it's missing or doesn't work in the game if you don't completely understand "how to think Dungeon World" - and unfortunately neither the rulebook, nor the guidebook do a very good job of strongly and concisely conveying that to you, exactly.
That said, you can still run a pretty good game of DW even if you only half-understand the rules.
Just don't come to /tg/ and whine about how there are no explicit rules for things like traps or stealth, because those things will actually work themselves out if you're running the game as intended.
>>46654991
I like Dungeon World and I don't understand a lot of /tg/'s bitterness towards it, but I will say that a LOT of things make more sense if you also read Apocalypse World.
And that one fan guidebook does help, I just wish the original book had been clearer about some of that stuff.
But overall I'd say don't worry about it too much.
>>46654991
>there are no explicit rules for things like traps or stealth, because those things will actually work themselves out if you're running the game as intended.
It's not skill-based? Can you give an example of how stealth works then?
>>46655267
I'm not really sure what you mean by skill-based, as there's no mechanic named a "skill" in DW.
But in short, you basically keep "playing to find out what happens" and employ the rules of the game, even after you would perhaps have decided to "roll stealth" in a different game. Long version follows:
So the player describes hiding, ducking behind pillars, etc. and the GM keeps describing what's happening.
If what's happening is getting dicey, the GM will narrate a Soft Move: basically dilemmas/problems/warnings that don't have any immediate irrevocable consequences, but will result in real trouble (a Hard Move) if ignored.
For example, someone smashed an earthenware pot on the marble floor and there are tons of little pieces that may be noisy if stepped on.
'Ignored' in this sense means the PC doesn't (or can't) manage to somehow do something that deals with it appropriately; that includes stuff like saying "Okay then i move extra slowly, taking great care to step around it", but they could just as well do something that happens to trigger a move that nullifies the problem.
Eventually the PC might have to [act despite an imminent threat or suffer a calamity] of being discovered, perhaps by being forced to dive quickly toward a hiding spot, as a guard is turning his head to look their way.
In this kind of scenario, you would use a Defy Danger roll using DEX (or maybe even INT.)
But the takeaway is NOT that Stealth is Defy Danger; in fact, the scenario could easily play out without such a roll ever being necessary.
It's that stealth is not special; it's represented by the same broad mechanics that represent everything else. The same mechanics that will represent traps, or getting into the good graces of a countess at a royal banquet.
(There's also another option for the GM that can be used in place of the core gameplay; he could also come up with a custom move instead. But that's more of an optional curiosity, best used sparingly.)
>>46655170
Personally I think it is the worse aspects of the games it is trying to stitch together (AW and dnd). If you like the mechanics and GMing style of DW you should really just play AW.
>>46656419
Thanks for the attempt, dude, but I'm sorry, you're not very good at explaining this game.
