Hey guys,
I've wanted to get started in tabletop roleplaying for a while now. Me and my friends have been talking about how cool it would be. But I don't really know where to get started. What guide do I need to read first? I plan on being a GM with my friends. Could you guys explain to me the basics and post a couple of links?
>>46858960
1. Figure out what you want to play.
2. Read the rulebook.
3. Have everyone else read the rulebook.
4. Play.
5. Tweak whatever wasn't fun
6. Play again.
Repeat staps 5 and 6 until everyone is happy/dead.
>>46859344
Alrighty, could you link me the rulebook that you think is the most fun/best?
>>46859431
There is no such thing. It is all up to personal preference.
Decide what how much roleplaying you want, how much wargame you want, how dark and gritty you want it and what kind of world you want.
Once you know that, people should be very happy to suggest systems.
>>46859431
For beginners, I would say D&D 5e is the way to go pal.
Get the starter box, it's not expensive and you'll see if you like roleplaying or not. If you do, time to spend money on the real books.
>>46858960
>>46859493
The thing is that role-playing is so big and varied that just asking for the best one doesn't really work.
It's like asking a random person what the best movie is, it's going to be completely useless advice unless they know something about what you enjoy.
Do you want a very stereotypical role-playing game where you level up, fight monsters in dungeon and generally runs like a videogame without graphics?
D&D is easy to pick up.
But if you want something that looks or plays even remotely like fantasy you are used to from books, D&D will disappoint you.
So the first question is, are you approaching it as a gamer or just general fantasy/story nerd?
>>46859431
Sci-fi, Medieval Fantasy or Modern Fantasy?
Dark and gritty, horror or lighthearted?
Rules heavy or rules light?
Combat oriented or Roleplay oriented?
2-players? 3-players? 4-players? 5-players?
Go to: http://www.basicfantasy.org/
You can get a free game there which is an old school, simple fantasy game like D&D. It's all you need. Download the PDF and print it out. There are also many additional PDF's you can download for new races, classes, campaigns etc.
Try playing that game with your friends and see if you like it.
>>46859431
Firstly, don't get in over your head with systems just yet. Think firstly about being the GM yourself. Find a setting that you and your players would enjoy and try a homebrew system to start with. As far as actually GMing goes;
>Don't overplan things. Think up a general plot for your party to follow, as well as both plot-hooks (versitile ways to start a quest/mission with your party) as well as side-quests irrelevant to the main plot that can be used at any time.
>Have a list of place names, people names and items to use as you require. One of the worst things is when a GM pauses when asked an NPC name
>Don't force the players too hard to play your plot. If they want to do their own thing, let them. Nothing is worse than a GM that can't adapt and is forced to railroad the players.
Also, some tips for your new players
>Give them the idea that flawed characters are good. Many new players come into RPG's with a video-game like idea of what their character should be. Make it known, and even reward them if their characters aren't perfect, aren't good at combat, display visible flaws etc.
>How serious the game should be is up to you, but one way to keep the players engaged is act like everything they say while talking to an NPC is what their character says. If they pretend to tell an NPC to fuck off, have the NPC act accordingly.
Seconding the D&D 5E Starter Set. Buy extra dice though.
>>46859602
As a gamer
>>46859663
Either of the 3.
Dark and gritty
Rules light
Roleplay
2-players
>>46861296
I am currently playing World of Darkness (Chronicles of Darkness) Mortal with me as a Storyteller and two of my friends as players. It's working out great.
World of darkness is relatively rules-light and created for dark horror in a modern world where the things that go bump in the night exist.
WoD is also heavily geared towards roleplay, especially if you decide to play some of the other books.
If you want to play mortals dealing with ghosts or horrible monsters or Vampires dealing with vampire politics or Werewolves trying to survive in an evolving world then i suggest you check out the WoD general, it should have links where you can pick up the rulebooks for some perusing.
>>46861969
Did they change it too much with the God-Machine Chronicles? Because before that, it struck me as more complex than Pathfinder.
>>46861296
From my experience, only having 2 players would make D&D somewhat awkward as it is built around party balance.
World of Darkness is set in the modern world and can be roleplayed how you want it, horror or just dark.
GURPS is a generic system that can be applied to anything but requires more rules.
Eclipse Phase is a sci-fi horror and conspiracy system.
Savage Worlds is also a generic system with lighter rules. It has books for any setting you desire and can be played dark if you want it.
Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay and Dark Heresy (and its kin) are set in the grimdark worlds of Warhammer Fantasy and 40k respectively. They are a bit more combat-focused and with it follows some more rules, but they are good systems.
Shadowrun is our world in the future with fantasy races and magic. You can play it how you want, ranging from lighthearted heists into dark noir or cyberpunk conspiracies.The system can be a bit tedious at times, due to how there are rules for both machines, internet and magic.
>>46861296
The Dragon Age RPG from Green Ronin stuck me as a good option - it is relatively light on rules (especially if you start at low levels), the setting can be reasonably dark, and if you are a fan of the games you can think of quite a few good roleplay situations. You might want to give it a try.
World of darkness is one of the big names for dark urban fantasy RPGs, but if you are just starting it may be somewhat hard. I've played Witchcraft and it is reasonably good at the same niche.
For a "weird west" mix of western and occult settings, Deadlands struck me as a very interesting game, but I haven't played it yet.
>>46862302
Chronicles of Darkness (NWoD 2E) is GMC added to the normal rules. The rules themselves stay pretty much the same. I must admit I find it strange how you would consider any wargame less complex than the Storyteller system.
>>46858960
First of all, ignore every single person that will try to shove you D&D and Pathfinder as "way to go for new people".
Just ignore them.
Then you should definitely think what type of game you want to play. I mean what setting or world it should be. Something realistic? Fantasy? Maybe sci-fi? Or a historical game?
This is very important, because in most cases game mechanics are suited for the setting, so game designed for space opera will be more suited for space opera than game originally evisioned as cowboys and Indians.
For first few runs I think you shouldn't even use any system at all. Just create some basic story and let your players roll a dice - any dice you want - when you feel like it. The better the score, the better performance, just bare basics, no real mechanics behind them.
This way you all will get hang of the things and realise if that' what you actually want to do with your free time.
Because there is nothing worse than people forcing themselves into a hobby they don't really want to do.
If you've got preferred setting and are sure you and your players really want to play this, then simply search for RPGs related with the setting you want to play.
>>46858960
D&D is not a good representative of the RPGaming hobby, it's a good representative of the D&D-gaming hobby (which includes the like of Pathfinder).
Do you just want to enjoy the D&D experience or do you want a RPGaming hobby experience?
>>46861296
I would say "The Witcher", but there only exists fan-translation of sub-par quality (rules are understandable, but the grammar is simply off). But you can always check it out, it's a game super-easy for new players, since most of the mechanics are very intuitive in their design.
>>46858960
Find a group
Play what they play
Make a group
Pick a game
Be the GM
Good games to fill an evening:
Dread
Lasers & Feelings
Everyone is John
Good places to start getting serious:
Mouse Guard
Monsters and Other Childish Things
Fate Accelerated Edition
Good games to progress to when you're sure everyone wants to invest the time:
Torchbearer
Reign
Unknown Armies
Delta Green
Diaspora
Better Angels
Games to avoid unless you find a group and no other:
DnD / D20 / OGL, but NOT OSR!
Gurps
Savage Worlds (not as bad but still)
Games you would be lucky to find a round / players for:
Dogs in the Vineyard
Don't Rest Your Head
Kult
Mountain Witch
>>46858960
Here, grab this.
While it's written with D&D (specifically - 0D&D, the oldest one) in mind, it applies to pretty much ALL games.
And I'm the guy that keeps bashing D&D for the sole fact of existing, so go figure how useful this short text is.
>>46858960
theres an old system called tft which is the precursor to GURPs, and a company called dark city has streamlined the rules into a few pages that make it very easy to teach newbies and is quite fun in general as you can homebrew anything in, you could try dnd or anything listed here really, i only object to dnd as i ,personally, find it stifles creativity as people tend to rely on the source manuals and numbers to define themselves.
they offer the rules for fantasy, wild west, and sci fi for free, their a few pages of concise rules and you only need 6 sided dice to play
http://www.darkcitygames.com/
>>46862899
>Suggesting Fate as starter
>Proposing Delta Green as game for newbies
>Avoiding Savage and GURPS
Other than those few bits, pretty much THIS
>>46862961
These are the FAE rules.
There are no more.
It's okay to not like it, especially as a gurpsfag, but it isn't hard.
>>46863027
>If you diss Fate, you must be a gurpsfag
And you appeared to be a pretty nice fella, anon
>>46863065
I am. You defended it.
Gurpsfag isn't an insult. Not from an oldfag.
>>46858960
Suggestions:
Unknown Armies. It's roleplaying the roleplaying game of roleplaying with loads of great pointers and smart suggestions and brilliant little elements that just oozes roleplaying and character.
FATEcore, for much of the elements that are also in Unkown Armies. It has a mechanical element that ruins it for me but you might not be bothered by it, and really I shouldn't either, and that's the haggling over the meta points. Everything else are just amazing at introducing people to the RPGaming hobby.
Savage Worlds, one small step closer to D&D we go, and it's not a big one, but it has a bit of a level mechanism. I personaly prefer the original Deadlands but Deadlands Reloaded, run with the Savage Worlds system, is great as well and it's Deadlands, it's Western made awesome by the way of ghostrocks.
The Dragon Age RPG is a surprisingly good starting point if all you want is an introduction. Your players might even get familiar with the setting by alternative means and it has some great "stunt" mechanics. It don't scale well though, the character development is very lackluster.
If you wanta Basic RPG fantasy then I'd suggest Symbaroum, from sweden, now in English as well. It's a great simple system with some interesting mechanical choises. Dark and some what gritty fantasy.
If you want some postapocalypse then I would recommend Mutant Year Zero, a Swedish RPG translated into English. A big meta-sandbox that it is up to the group to let their creativity run free with. The games has a great and simple dice pool system that brings forth the importance of not just Physical trauma but also Emotional and so on. I really like it and it's easy to pick up and start playing.
But R'lyeh, you're not a RPGamer unless you've played you some Call of Cthulhu. R'lyeh, get you some of that Call of Cthulhu, now or down that line.
>>46863118
It's not about this. It's the assumption as such, making a massive jump I must be a GURPS player, because I'm against avoiding it. Nothing personal, I simply find it strange to assume such thing
>>46863223
That's fine.
>>46858960
Some of the most important things to know -
Don't obsess over the mechanics or what the material tells you, do what you and your friends feel, what you as a group find is entertaining. The groups entertainment is what counts, everything else are nothing but inspiration and suggestion, the books, even the dice results, all just inspiration and suggestions for you to manipulate each other to have a fun, a hell of a entertaining time full of whatever it might be that you wnat to experience.. Character success is just an easy tool to grasp in all that, but even failure and missery can be made to be entertaining and for interesting storie sto be told, but you, you all, have to be aware of each others reactions, personalities, wishes - unspoken or not, and play on thouse. It's all about being entertaining.
Focus on making everyone enterained, no matter if you're a Game Master or a player, everyone needs to be entertained by each other.
Nothing destroyes a good time like everyone just focusing on their own enjoyment. We're all in there together, putting our trust in our fellow players to all make this an entertaining experience.
I hope you'll have an amazing time with some awesome people.
>>46863306
That's alright. but it isn't the only wisdom.
Some groups need the structure of a ruleset to not decay into complete ambivalence. The challenge of the dice can be more rewarding than the story. It's a different way of playing, but I know many veterans who swear by it.
>>46862791
Hipsterfag detected.
>>46863120
Could you post a pdf or link where I can download, I want to look into it.
>>46863306
>>46862722
I was planning on running some Homebrew as well, could you guys give me some tips on that?
