Like the title says, what tabletop RPG systems/campaign settings are you playing currently?
Right now I'm playing Rokugan/Oriental Adventures on original D&D 3.0 rules, and may transfer them to Pathfinder 3.75 rules. I love the setting of Legends of the Five Rings, and it feels so different from typical DnD, even though the mechanics are the same. One thing that's odd about this campaign is that going back to 3.0 rules after playing Pathfinder for so long definitely feels powered-down, to say the least. I got both books for only $8 a piece at a local used book store, so it was a definite find!
I'm also about to start a DnD 4E Dark Sun campaign. I haven't had much luck or experience with 4E, so I'm unsure how that will turn out. I do have fond memories of playing Dark Sun when I was a kid, though, so it should have some of that nostalgia at the least. It feels weird playing 4E knowing that WOTC has basically stopped supporting the edition, as they're preparing for DnD Next.
We used to play very regularly but my playgroup doesn't really takes things as seriously as I'd like: they just love to get drunk and make silly characters and do silly things these days
I'm all for having fun but it just doesn't flow as well as it used to
I just picked up this newly translated Japanese rpg, Double Cross, that I'm super excited to try out. I guess the closest system comparison I'd make would be a grim, modern-day version of exalted ~ except with super power-granting viruses, instead of 'exalted sparks.' There are a couple of good rpg.net threads on it, for anybody that's interested. I knew I had to have the game after I read about the 'Balor' syndrome...
I looked up Double Cross... It looks interesting. I might have to give it a look.
In the past I've played Vampire: the Requiem, Star Wars SAGA edition (essentially D20), and Castles and Crusades. One game that would be fun to play would be Game of Thrones, especially with the popularity of the books and the TV show.
There's some great tabletop RPGs that are out of print that I want to check out, like Alternity. It's a shame that it went out of print so quickly.
I'm currently playing Pathfinder Society every week. It's great fun. The first tabletop thing I've played consistently, and I'm enjoying it greatly. The structure and being able to gather with other interested people at my LGS really helps get games together every week. We get about 25-30 people every Wednesday, and our LGS even subsists only off of donations, no walk in price. I really appreciate the opportunity, and am having a blast.
Just finished the D&D Next playtest. Now we're going to do some Dark Sun 4e. I was never huge on 3.5/Pathfinder.
If you like Rokugan, try the 4th Ed books. That combat system is brutal. My Tsuruchi took one hit and died. Great for role playing if you have a good group.
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Just finished the D&D Next playtest. Now we're going to do some Dark Sun 4e. I was never huge on 3.5/Pathfinder.
If you like Rokugan, try the 4th Ed books. That combat system is brutal. My Tsuruchi took one hit and died. Great for role playing if you have a good group.
I have the playtest packet for DnD Next but can't find a group around here who actually wants to play it. We're all kind of waiting to see how it will turn out before getting invested in it, I suppose.
I haven't played the actual Rokugan system that AEG puts out... I'll be sure to check it out.
I'm also about to start a DnD 4E Dark Sun campaign. I haven't had much luck or experience with 4E, so I'm unsure how that will turn out. I do have fond memories of playing Dark Sun when I was a kid, though, so it should have some of that nostalgia at the least.
The setting stuff is pretty good. I think it really just comes down to whether you like the 4E system or not.
I have the playtest packet for DnD Next but can't find a group around here who actually wants to play it. We're all kind of waiting to see how it will turn out before getting invested in it, I suppose.
You and a lot of other people, I think. The whole D&D community seems to be holding its breath about that.
The setting stuff is pretty good. I think it really just comes down to whether you like the 4E system or not.
I'm a big fan of the Dark Sun setting. I'm not exactly pro- or anti- 4E, as I'll play pretty much any system (to be completely honest), but I've noticed I have a much harder time keeping players interested in a 4E campaign versus Pathfinder or 3.0/3.5.
I've found that 3.5 DnD is the hardest to keep people iinterested around here. 4th edition gave them interactivity not found in 3rd or Next. Going around the table rolling dice bores them. In a role playing game, I need solid combat rules. Any DM worth his salt can run the role playing part no problem.
That said, Next has everything based off ability modifiers. It's nice for the ever rotating 5th sand 6th player slots to not be completely confused about adding 6 different numbers to make a check. It slows the game way down.
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I've been playing a game I designed for about 6 months now... actually, that reminds me, we're prepping to shoot the kickstarter video for it today, shooting tomorrow
Right now I'm running a Pathfinder Campaign (Rise of the Runelords). Unfortunately, all my friends who were playing have brought their girlfriends/wives into it, so we have a party of 7-8 now, so I've got to modify the campaign a bit to make it less of a curbstomp. I mostly picked Pathfinder over 4E because I love the art direction (also, D&D next scared me off of adopting 4E right now, we only started Pathfinder earlier this year). Seriously, the Goblin designs really sold me, as did the stand-up tokens (although that one is irrelevant now that I use Roll20). I also use HeroLab to manage the characters, because while my friends love to play and always pester me, they won't read very much (or at all) and so they need everything laid out for them. Of course, I've made all of them pay for Herolab
I can't recommend Roll20 enough. If you have away of connect a TV to the internet or a computer, use this app to manage your games. It has cut my prep time down by more than half, and I won't lose or forget anything I need.
In the past we've played Star Wars: Saga Edition (just D&D 3 with Star Wars Characters) and the Fallout PnP RPG.
Running a 3.5 campaign here on MTGS's Pen and Paper Inn. It's the only one running there, sadly. We wouldn't mind a few more people running games to kick some life back into the old girl. Not many of the regulars are into 4e. Pathfinder and 3.5 will probably accumulate some players though. I know I'd likely join.
I'd also like to try out the Dresden Files RPG but nobody else I know both reads the Dresden Files and plays tabletop games.
Everything scares me... kitties scare me... squirrels scare me... corpses....corpses bring forth a pletora of confusing feeling which i prefer not to dwell on...:p
It looks awesome, to say the least. Rich Baker, Dave Noonan and Stephen Schubert, all WOTC expatriates, are working on a swords-and-sorcery style campaign setting in the vein of Conan and Cthulu. I was a big fan of all stuff Rich Baker put out during his tenure with TSR and WOTC.
The interesting part is that they're doing a simultaneous release across 3 different systems (13th Age, DnD 4E, and Pathfinder).
Reading this also made me a little sad to realize that WOTC hasn't released a new DnD campaign setting since Eberron came out and that was ten years ago. It kind of makes me miss the 90s, when there was no shortage of awesome campaign settings like Al-Qadim, Planescape, Dark Sun, Birthright, etc.
Running a 3.5 campaign here on MTGS's Pen and Paper Inn. It's the only one running there, sadly. We wouldn't mind a few more people running games to kick some life back into the old girl. Not many of the regulars are into 4e. Pathfinder and 3.5 will probably accumulate some players though. I know I'd likely join.
I'll have to give that a look this weekend. The last time I was looking at a campaign here on MTGS was last summer and it seemed as if there was zero interest.
My group just wrapped up a Deadlands (classic) campaign and a Call of Cthulhu campaign. Our next RPG is going to be an amalgamation of 5 different systems (there are five of us), where our characters are randomly/semi randomly transported to a new setting with the goal of collecting 5 macguffins one from each setting.
I am running the paranoia setting
My wife is running DnD 4.0
Brother is running Call of Cthulhu
1 friend is running Deadlands
and other friend is running DnD 3.5 / Pathfinder.
Each of us is building our character in pathfinder and then converting everyones characters for our given settings.
Simultaneous with that, on different nights, I will be running a savage worlds 50 fathoms campaign.
Reading this also made me a little sad to realize that WOTC hasn't released a new DnD campaign setting since Eberron came out and that was ten years ago. It kind of makes me miss the 90s, when there was no shortage of awesome campaign settings like Al-Qadim, Planescape, Dark Sun, Birthright, etc.
Conventional wisdom is that setting glut is a large part of what killed TSR. WotC's strategy has consistently been "make core books that everybody buys, let them worry about their own settings".
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Conventional wisdom is that setting glut is a large part of what killed TSR. WotC's strategy has consistently been "make core books that everybody buys, let them worry about their own settings".
has that been working for them?
It doesn't with my group, since we all just kind of view DnD as "generic" -- but thats personal opinion, I have no idea if its shared by many people.
I'll be playing the DnDnext dungeon delve at GenCon this year at least once... I'll see if my opinion of the system changes, but I doubt it will do much to change the "generic" feeling.
It doesn't with my group, since we all just kind of view DnD as "generic" -- but thats personal opinion, I have no idea if its shared by many people.
I'll be playing the DnDnext dungeon delve at GenCon this year at least once... I'll see if my opinion of the system changes, but I doubt it will do much to change the "generic" feeling.
D&D is a victim of it's own success. It's the baseline for High Fantasy, as iconic as Tolkien at this point.
I think part of their problem was the Pathfinder split. They'd be doing exceptionally well if they didn't have such major competition for the RPG market - based on their own system, no less.
Side Note - What is Deadlands? An how is Call of Cthulu? I've seen the board games but I know little about the RPG system.
D&D is a victim of it's own success. It's the baseline for High Fantasy, as iconic as Tolkien at this point.
In a sense this is true, but in another sense -- the original DnD was pretty much a setting rip off of the races Tolkien came up with, and set in a "generic" world. I'll grant this is on purpose, and may work for others, it just doesn't work for me very well.
I think part of their problem was the Pathfinder split. They'd be doing exceptionally well if they didn't have such major competition for the RPG market - based on their own system, no less.
Talk about self inflicted wounds. The open gaming license was one of the best things to happen to RPGs and one of the worst things to happen to DnD. Their business model relies on new editions, and the ability for another company to just continue making the old edition in a slightly different setting hurt them big time.
Side Note - What is Deadlands? An how is Call of Cthulu? I've seen the board games but I know little about the RPG system.
Call of Cthulhu is good. Very brutal and you'll probably go insane if you live long enough. In the recent campaign we jsut ended I touched something I shouldn't have and got transformed into an old god, or rather possesed by and transofrmed by it (dead-ish), one player had his sanity reduced to zero because he looked at me and I promptly ate him, third player couldn't run fast enough.. ate him too.
Fourth player made it out alive, ready to be picked up and die in the next campaign we do.
The game is a lot more about mystery and puzle solving than it is about combat. If you like lovecraft and the cthulhu mythos you'll like the game. Rules are pretty easy to pick up too.
Deadlands is set in the "weird west". Follows our history up unitl the battle of Gettysburg (more or less) when things get... weird. All the dead get up and start indiscriminately killing each other and other people. Wiki is probably better summary tan I can give. But, it's basically cowboys and monsters. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deadlands)
I recomend either system, although CoC is way easier to learn than deadlands. Also, the savage worlds system is more or less deadlands light (super light).
Talk about self inflicted wounds. The open gaming license was one of the best things to happen to RPGs and one of the worst things to happen to DnD. Their business model relies on new editions, and the ability for another company to just continue making the old edition in a slightly different setting hurt them big time.
I did a lot of research on the history before I settled on Pathfinder. The fact that Wizards didn't share anything about 4E is what drove Paizo to keep publishing Pathfinder as their own variant, since they couldn't prepare any materials for the new system in advance. Apparently the switch to 4E was brutal.
Call of Cthulhu is good. Very brutal and you'll probably go insane if you live long enough. In the recent campaign we jsut ended I touched something I shouldn't have and got transformed into an old god, or rather possesed by and transofrmed by it (dead-ish), one player had his sanity reduced to zero because he looked at me and I promptly ate him, third player couldn't run fast enough.. ate him too.
Fourth player made it out alive, ready to be picked up and die in the next campaign we do.
The game is a lot more about mystery and puzle solving than it is about combat. If you like lovecraft and the cthulhu mythos you'll like the game. Rules are pretty easy to pick up too.
First of all, that Campaign SOUNDS AMAZING! That's just the kind of thing my buddies would like.
So I've seen board games based on this (The fantasy flight ones), is that the same thing as this or is there a 'Core Rulebook' out there. This sounds genuinely interesting.
Deadlands is set in the "weird west". Follows our history up unitl the battle of Gettysburg (more or less) when things get... weird. All the dead get up and start indiscriminately killing each other and other people. Wiki is probably better summary tan I can give. But, it's basically cowboys and monsters. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deadlands)
I recomend either system, although CoC is way easier to learn than deadlands. Also, the savage worlds system is more or less deadlands light (super light).
Also sounds interesting, although if Savage Worlds is easier, it'd be better for my players. They tend to run headlong into battles and traps equally.
It's the quick start rules for the call of Cthulhu RPG, which is made by Chaosium. They jsut came out with a new edition of the game recently, but unlike DnD there aren't major overhauls in the new editions, just tweaks.
The adventure sends the investigators into a haunted house. The whole setting takes place int he 1920's (although there are alternate rules for the dark ages and present times too).
Quick start rules are GREAT for running a qiuck one or two shot adventure to decide if you want to buy into a system. Most RPG's have them in some form r another.
So I've seen board games based on this (The fantasy flight ones), is that the same thing as this or is there a 'Core Rulebook' out there. This sounds genuinely interesting.
Lovecrafts works are in the public domain, so there is no copyright on the general world/concepts. In this case it is a different company making the RPG than it is the board games (which are Fantasy Flight).
Also sounds interesting, although if Savage Worlds is easier, it'd be better for my players. They tend to run headlong into battles and traps equally.
Savage worlds is simpler on the rules, not necessarily easier on the players if they do stupid stuff.
With deadlands some character types can be really good depending on the player. Take the mad scientists for example, my friend (who is an engineer) and me (who was an engineer before going to law school) both play mad scientists. Our background in designing and making things has really let us run with that character type. Someone without that background in real life will have alot harder time coming up with original ideas.
And the game definitely rewards you for coming up with original ideas and how they "should" work.
While I would enjoy Call of Cthulu, I don't think my party would. They like to kill things, whether or not all reason and logic points to running away.
Deadlands may be interesting as well. My group IS creative, they've concocted elaborate reasons and plots for creating their own zombie servant and how to pay back the shopkeeper that ratted them out. It's the more common things they can't handle, for some reason, like remembering what their own damn abilities do.
While I would enjoy Call of Cthulu, I don't think my party would. They like to kill things, whether or not all reason and logic points to running away.
If this is the case, CoC may not be for them. My group is much more on the playing their characters, and less on the killing and combat. Although, my friend and I do roll racist gnomes (Gnome Supremacists) whenver we play DnD.
Fighting most things other than people in CoC will get you dead or severely hurt. Fighting anything in CoC without a plan will get you dead fast.
Deadlands may be interesting as well. My group IS creative, they've concocted elaborate reasons and plots for creating their own zombie servant and how to pay back the shopkeeper that ratted them out. It's the more common things they can't handle, for some reason, like remembering what their own damn abilities do.
LoL
For the most part deadlands character don't *have* abilities. Other than one or two edges (think DnD feats), and if you are a caster you have a few spells (I think you get 3-6 spells, I've always played a mad scientist though). Other than that its your gear that does stuff.
Sadly, there is no deadlands quickstart rules as its just a setting for savage worlds now. Deadlands can be run how the storyteller wants to run it. It can be combat oriented or puzzle oriented or both (or neither I guess).
I still say you should run the CoC quickstart for them some day. maybe a day when one player can't make it so you can't run the normal campaign. If they don't like it, hey, at least you got to have fun runnning it once.
Conventional wisdom is that setting glut is a large part of what killed TSR. WotC's strategy has consistently been "make core books that everybody buys, let them worry about their own settings".
That might be the case; however, I think a new setting every 5-6 years or so wouldn't kill them.
I wonder if WotC's strategy of not worrying about new settings and just updating/revising existing licenses is working better for them as opposed to coming up with something new every now and then. There's no way to prove it but it is interesting to consider.
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Right now I'm playing Rokugan/Oriental Adventures on original D&D 3.0 rules, and may transfer them to Pathfinder 3.75 rules. I love the setting of Legends of the Five Rings, and it feels so different from typical DnD, even though the mechanics are the same. One thing that's odd about this campaign is that going back to 3.0 rules after playing Pathfinder for so long definitely feels powered-down, to say the least. I got both books for only $8 a piece at a local used book store, so it was a definite find!
I'm also about to start a DnD 4E Dark Sun campaign. I haven't had much luck or experience with 4E, so I'm unsure how that will turn out. I do have fond memories of playing Dark Sun when I was a kid, though, so it should have some of that nostalgia at the least. It feels weird playing 4E knowing that WOTC has basically stopped supporting the edition, as they're preparing for DnD Next.
We used to play very regularly but my playgroup doesn't really takes things as seriously as I'd like: they just love to get drunk and make silly characters and do silly things these days
I'm all for having fun but it just doesn't flow as well as it used to
"Personally I love high-riak, low-reqars gambles. Life's best with a decent amount of riak. And f*** reqars."
In the past I've played Vampire: the Requiem, Star Wars SAGA edition (essentially D20), and Castles and Crusades. One game that would be fun to play would be Game of Thrones, especially with the popularity of the books and the TV show.
There's some great tabletop RPGs that are out of print that I want to check out, like Alternity. It's a shame that it went out of print so quickly.
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If you like Rokugan, try the 4th Ed books. That combat system is brutal. My Tsuruchi took one hit and died. Great for role playing if you have a good group.
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I have the playtest packet for DnD Next but can't find a group around here who actually wants to play it. We're all kind of waiting to see how it will turn out before getting invested in it, I suppose.
I haven't played the actual Rokugan system that AEG puts out... I'll be sure to check it out.
The setting stuff is pretty good. I think it really just comes down to whether you like the 4E system or not.
You mean L5R 4E, right? Because D&D 4E is definitely not.
You and a lot of other people, I think. The whole D&D community seems to be holding its breath about that.
candidus inperti; si nil, his utere mecum.
I'm a big fan of the Dark Sun setting. I'm not exactly pro- or anti- 4E, as I'll play pretty much any system (to be completely honest), but I've noticed I have a much harder time keeping players interested in a 4E campaign versus Pathfinder or 3.0/3.5.
I've found that 3.5 DnD is the hardest to keep people iinterested around here. 4th edition gave them interactivity not found in 3rd or Next. Going around the table rolling dice bores them. In a role playing game, I need solid combat rules. Any DM worth his salt can run the role playing part no problem.
That said, Next has everything based off ability modifiers. It's nice for the ever rotating 5th sand 6th player slots to not be completely confused about adding 6 different numbers to make a check. It slows the game way down.
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BWRAlesha, Who Smiles at DeathBWR
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I can't recommend Roll20 enough. If you have away of connect a TV to the internet or a computer, use this app to manage your games. It has cut my prep time down by more than half, and I won't lose or forget anything I need.
In the past we've played Star Wars: Saga Edition (just D&D 3 with Star Wars Characters) and the Fallout PnP RPG.
TerribleBad at Magic since 1998.A Vorthos Guide to Magic Story | Twitter | Tumblr
[Primer] Krenko | Azor | Kess | Zacama | Kumena | Sram | The Ur-Dragon | Edgar Markov | Daretti | Marath
I'd also like to try out the Dresden Files RPG but nobody else I know both reads the Dresden Files and plays tabletop games.
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It looks awesome, to say the least. Rich Baker, Dave Noonan and Stephen Schubert, all WOTC expatriates, are working on a swords-and-sorcery style campaign setting in the vein of Conan and Cthulu. I was a big fan of all stuff Rich Baker put out during his tenure with TSR and WOTC.
The interesting part is that they're doing a simultaneous release across 3 different systems (13th Age, DnD 4E, and Pathfinder).
Reading this also made me a little sad to realize that WOTC hasn't released a new DnD campaign setting since Eberron came out and that was ten years ago. It kind of makes me miss the 90s, when there was no shortage of awesome campaign settings like Al-Qadim, Planescape, Dark Sun, Birthright, etc.
I'll have to give that a look this weekend. The last time I was looking at a campaign here on MTGS was last summer and it seemed as if there was zero interest.
My group just wrapped up a Deadlands (classic) campaign and a Call of Cthulhu campaign. Our next RPG is going to be an amalgamation of 5 different systems (there are five of us), where our characters are randomly/semi randomly transported to a new setting with the goal of collecting 5 macguffins one from each setting.
I am running the paranoia setting
My wife is running DnD 4.0
Brother is running Call of Cthulhu
1 friend is running Deadlands
and other friend is running DnD 3.5 / Pathfinder.
Each of us is building our character in pathfinder and then converting everyones characters for our given settings.
Simultaneous with that, on different nights, I will be running a savage worlds 50 fathoms campaign.
Conventional wisdom is that setting glut is a large part of what killed TSR. WotC's strategy has consistently been "make core books that everybody buys, let them worry about their own settings".
candidus inperti; si nil, his utere mecum.
has that been working for them?
It doesn't with my group, since we all just kind of view DnD as "generic" -- but thats personal opinion, I have no idea if its shared by many people.
I'll be playing the DnDnext dungeon delve at GenCon this year at least once... I'll see if my opinion of the system changes, but I doubt it will do much to change the "generic" feeling.
D&D is a victim of it's own success. It's the baseline for High Fantasy, as iconic as Tolkien at this point.
I think part of their problem was the Pathfinder split. They'd be doing exceptionally well if they didn't have such major competition for the RPG market - based on their own system, no less.
Side Note - What is Deadlands? An how is Call of Cthulu? I've seen the board games but I know little about the RPG system.
TerribleBad at Magic since 1998.A Vorthos Guide to Magic Story | Twitter | Tumblr
[Primer] Krenko | Azor | Kess | Zacama | Kumena | Sram | The Ur-Dragon | Edgar Markov | Daretti | Marath
In a sense this is true, but in another sense -- the original DnD was pretty much a setting rip off of the races Tolkien came up with, and set in a "generic" world. I'll grant this is on purpose, and may work for others, it just doesn't work for me very well.
Talk about self inflicted wounds. The open gaming license was one of the best things to happen to RPGs and one of the worst things to happen to DnD. Their business model relies on new editions, and the ability for another company to just continue making the old edition in a slightly different setting hurt them big time.
Call of Cthulhu is good. Very brutal and you'll probably go insane if you live long enough. In the recent campaign we jsut ended I touched something I shouldn't have and got transformed into an old god, or rather possesed by and transofrmed by it (dead-ish), one player had his sanity reduced to zero because he looked at me and I promptly ate him, third player couldn't run fast enough.. ate him too.
Fourth player made it out alive, ready to be picked up and die in the next campaign we do.
The game is a lot more about mystery and puzle solving than it is about combat. If you like lovecraft and the cthulhu mythos you'll like the game. Rules are pretty easy to pick up too.
Deadlands is set in the "weird west". Follows our history up unitl the battle of Gettysburg (more or less) when things get... weird. All the dead get up and start indiscriminately killing each other and other people. Wiki is probably better summary tan I can give. But, it's basically cowboys and monsters. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deadlands)
I recomend either system, although CoC is way easier to learn than deadlands. Also, the savage worlds system is more or less deadlands light (super light).
I did a lot of research on the history before I settled on Pathfinder. The fact that Wizards didn't share anything about 4E is what drove Paizo to keep publishing Pathfinder as their own variant, since they couldn't prepare any materials for the new system in advance. Apparently the switch to 4E was brutal.
First of all, that Campaign SOUNDS AMAZING! That's just the kind of thing my buddies would like.
So I've seen board games based on this (The fantasy flight ones), is that the same thing as this or is there a 'Core Rulebook' out there. This sounds genuinely interesting.
Also sounds interesting, although if Savage Worlds is easier, it'd be better for my players. They tend to run headlong into battles and traps equally.
TerribleBad at Magic since 1998.A Vorthos Guide to Magic Story | Twitter | Tumblr
[Primer] Krenko | Azor | Kess | Zacama | Kumena | Sram | The Ur-Dragon | Edgar Markov | Daretti | Marath
Give this a try: http://www.chaosium.com/forms/coc_quick_start_bw.pdf
It's the quick start rules for the call of Cthulhu RPG, which is made by Chaosium. They jsut came out with a new edition of the game recently, but unlike DnD there aren't major overhauls in the new editions, just tweaks.
The adventure sends the investigators into a haunted house. The whole setting takes place int he 1920's (although there are alternate rules for the dark ages and present times too).
Quick start rules are GREAT for running a qiuck one or two shot adventure to decide if you want to buy into a system. Most RPG's have them in some form r another.
Lovecrafts works are in the public domain, so there is no copyright on the general world/concepts. In this case it is a different company making the RPG than it is the board games (which are Fantasy Flight).
Savage worlds is simpler on the rules, not necessarily easier on the players if they do stupid stuff.
With deadlands some character types can be really good depending on the player. Take the mad scientists for example, my friend (who is an engineer) and me (who was an engineer before going to law school) both play mad scientists. Our background in designing and making things has really let us run with that character type. Someone without that background in real life will have alot harder time coming up with original ideas.
And the game definitely rewards you for coming up with original ideas and how they "should" work.
Deadlands may be interesting as well. My group IS creative, they've concocted elaborate reasons and plots for creating their own zombie servant and how to pay back the shopkeeper that ratted them out. It's the more common things they can't handle, for some reason, like remembering what their own damn abilities do.
TerribleBad at Magic since 1998.A Vorthos Guide to Magic Story | Twitter | Tumblr
[Primer] Krenko | Azor | Kess | Zacama | Kumena | Sram | The Ur-Dragon | Edgar Markov | Daretti | Marath
If this is the case, CoC may not be for them. My group is much more on the playing their characters, and less on the killing and combat. Although, my friend and I do roll racist gnomes (Gnome Supremacists) whenver we play DnD.
Fighting most things other than people in CoC will get you dead or severely hurt. Fighting anything in CoC without a plan will get you dead fast.
LoL
For the most part deadlands character don't *have* abilities. Other than one or two edges (think DnD feats), and if you are a caster you have a few spells (I think you get 3-6 spells, I've always played a mad scientist though). Other than that its your gear that does stuff.
Sadly, there is no deadlands quickstart rules as its just a setting for savage worlds now. Deadlands can be run how the storyteller wants to run it. It can be combat oriented or puzzle oriented or both (or neither I guess).
I still say you should run the CoC quickstart for them some day. maybe a day when one player can't make it so you can't run the normal campaign. If they don't like it, hey, at least you got to have fun runnning it once.
That might be the case; however, I think a new setting every 5-6 years or so wouldn't kill them.
I wonder if WotC's strategy of not worrying about new settings and just updating/revising existing licenses is working better for them as opposed to coming up with something new every now and then. There's no way to prove it but it is interesting to consider.