Gary Gygax fails save versus death

[Encryptshun]

http://www.theage.com.au/news/....html

Good night, fair prince. May flights of angels guide thee to thy rest.

[JimmyMethod]

Saw that. Table top gaming lost one of it's pioneers. Oh well... DnD was never a great system, WotC has made it even more ****ty.

WEG ftw.

[Encryptshun]

I never pegged you for a table top gamer, JM.

WEG = West-End Games? Like the old Star Wars system (pre d20)?

I've always preferred the indy titles. Unknown Armies is my favorite system and game world ever, followed closely by Call of Cthuhlu/Delta Green and then maybe Shadowrun. I was a White Wolf fanboi for years, I'm ashamed to say. VtM and WWtA only, though.

I'm jonesing for a good SuperHero system (heard good things about Aberrant, but never played it).

I don't suppose any NICO members ever go to GenCon Indy? If so, give a shout out here and we can do a beer-meet this year. Rockbottom is just a couple blocks away from the convention center and we always pick up a few growlers as a grown-up alternative to game beverages...

[Hijacker]

If you want a horribly complex and bad table top system, go play Roll Master. You'll appreciate the ease of calculating THAC0 a lot more.

All in all, 3E wasn't too bad. I enjoyed it, and the games I played in it (even in 3.5E) were some of my most memorable.

Chad, I'm with you on the superhero system. Years ago, we played a GURPS based heroes system. It was fun, except way overpowered. We actually built up a rules system that was pre-3E. The weird thing is that when 3E came out, a lot of WotC's rules systems were very similar to ours. We ended up switching to running nothing but 3E once it was leaked on Eric Noah's website. It was a blast making a game around snippets of rules you found on the internet. Also, it was before WotC nerfed the hell out of our favorite things.

[Encryptshun]

I played Marvel a few times, but both the system and the chargen suck.

I picked up the "Serenity" game at GenCon last year, as well as a really interesting fantasy system called "Reign".

Actually I haven't done any tabletop RPGing for way too long. If my group gets together we usually play the Arkham Horror board game by FFE. That game is the Sh1t.

[Hijacker]

I haven't played in probably 2 or 3 years now. With as busy as I am between car stuff, work, and airsoft, I don't know where I'd plug in getting into table top gaming again. I gave up WoW because of time constraints (which was a damned good decision I might add). The thing I really miss about table top gaming, though, is that it did serve as a great source of inspiration for my artwork. I've been fairly stalled in drawing new pieces for a while now.

[Encryptshun]

What kind of art?

[Hijacker]

I do character sketches primarily. I'll link a few things when I get home. I stored a bunch on my facebook account, but I can't access it from work.

[Encryptshun]

S'cool, ese. I look forward to seeing them.

[Hijacker]

Here ya go:













I also used to paint the figurines that the group liked to use:

[Encryptshun]

Those drawings are teh ish, mang. Very nice stuff.

ROTFL at the band of maurauding Viking Dutch Reformist Nuns, though!

[Hijacker]

The Battle Nuns™ rock!

[MinisterofDOOM]

I never liked D&D much. The system was too...cold.

Still, sad to see a gaming pioneer go.

[xekushnr]

Never played DnD, just found this on another forum and thought of this thread.

[JimmyMethod]

I never pegged you for a table top gamer, JM.

WEG = West-End Games? Like the old Star Wars system (pre d20)?

Psh, I bet I out nerd almost everyone here. Just because I know anime is ghey, doesn't mean I don't roll with the best of them.

Yes, WEG is West End Games. The old system (d6) was a fanastic system. It made sense. d20 makes zero sense and sucks major donkey balls (this coming from the guy who can tell you just about every rule's page number in the DMG, PHB, and every monster's page number in the MMI, and who has 21 3/3.5 edition books sitting behind him). I could go indepth as to why, but having FORCED my old gaming group to play it after 5 years of d20, they immediately apologized, and kept asking me why we never played it sooner.

Masquerade was pretty cool too, but I never played it much. I liked the setting. My older bro used to LARP V:tM in college... I'm not THAT nerdy...

[MinisterofDOOM]

Masquerade was pretty cool too, but I never played it much. I liked the setting. My older bro used to LARP V:tM in college... I'm not THAT nerdy...

The World of Darkness rules are excellent. Masquerade used the old ruleset, though, and the new one is even better. It's very natural feeling and caters well to actual roleplaying (as opposed to constantly fighting monsters in dark corridors). That's not to say that the combat system is lacking, though.I've also always disliked the idea of levels in tabletop games and WoD's effective alternatives (which are different depending on the type of character...vampires have blood potency, for example) are, again, a much more natural way of doing things.There are a lot more games that use the WoD ruleset than just Vampire, though. There's also werewolf (though I'm not a big fan of it) and Mage (which is INSANELY complex but a lot of fun), Promethean (frankenstein's monster was a promethean), and changeling. Under the old ruleset there were even more, like Demon: the Fallen (very fun, but can get stale as you play very very powerful immortals), Mummy, and others.All the WoD sub-sets exist in the same universe so it makes for an excellent storytelling platform.

[Encryptshun]

Okay, you guys are now my favorite peeps on NICO. I wrote an entire treatise on gaming for a class I took in Grad school. I'll try to dust it off and post it one of these days. Basically, though, you guys hit on it: Roleplaying is stigmatized, but not everyone who is in to roleplaying is a social retard. Like Strong Bad said, "Everyone is different. No two people are not on fire."

I love my gaming group because we will call off a session due to one of us being too drunk or due to a football game or automotive sports event being on or so someone can go off and get laid. We are good-looking, successful guys and gals who will go out to bars and hook up with hotties for the night, yet we still get a kick out of rolling dice and calculating damage.

It's pretty damned difficult to find new blood for the gaming group due to the aforementioned criteria, but I have "turned" quite a few straights to gamers by just providing a safe environment. It's like Fight Club and we absolutely honor the first rule. lol

[Hijacker]

I've also always disliked the idea of levels in tabletop games and WoD's effective alternatives (which are different depending on the type of character...vampires have blood potency, for example) are, again, a much more natural way of doing things.

That's actually pretty cool! A few years ago, a friend of mine was trying to create a similar rules system that would do away with level advancement and would instead give you character points that you could distribute between abilities/powers to increase as sessions were played. I liked the setup as it was flexible for use between different campaign settings, whether it be fantasy or modern. super hero or class based. But since our group likes the simplicity and flexibility of the d20 combat system, we were going to retain the core concepts and adapt them to the new ability-up system.

I'll have to mention the WoD system to him, though. I think he'll like it.

Also, WotC is supposed to be introducing a White Board setup with the launch of 4e that will allow table top playing across the internet. I think it's going to be subscription based, but once it's out, it should be a matter of time before free versions pop up. We used to try to run internet games using photoshop to lay out combat zones, and AIM voice chat features back in the day when our old group was split up amongst different colleges (this was like '99-'00 so you can imagine how sh1tty that was to coordinate). So the whiteboard idea sounds like a fun tool, and with it, I might actually start playing again.

[MinisterofDOOM]

That's actually pretty cool! A few years ago, a friend of mine was trying to create a similar rules system that would do away with level advancement and would instead give you character points that you could distribute between abilities/powers to increase as sessions were played. I liked the setup as it was flexible for use between different campaign settings, whether it be fantasy or modern. super hero or class based. But since our group likes the simplicity and flexibility of the d20 combat system, we were going to retain the core concepts and adapt them to the new ability-up system.

I'll have to mention the WoD system to him, though. I think he'll like it.

That's exactly how World of Darkness works. Check out http://www.white-wolf.com You can see their character sheets to get an idea for it. If you're buying books, make sure you look for the NEW World of Darkness. The old one was good but the new one is much more streamlined.WoD uses a D10 system...ONLY D10s.

[Encryptshun]

Very few gaming systems use "Levels". Most are actually based on skill advancement.

Blood potency and level increase aren't a direct correlary in WoD, though. Blood potency sets your maximum trait levels but it's not something that can be changed except by direct player character action (i.e. committing diablerie)

[Hijacker]

WoD uses a D10 system...ONLY D10s.

Still no love for the d12.

[Encryptshun]

Still no love for the d12.

You can always roll up a Barbarian, Bart. d12 HP/level FTW! no armor FTL.

[MinisterofDOOM]

Very few gaming systems use "Levels". Most are actually based on skill advancement.

Blood potency and level increase aren't a direct correlary in WoD, though. Blood potency sets your maximum trait levels but it's not something that can be changed except by direct player character action (i.e. committing diablerie)

Right. But Blood Potency is the unit of measure for "power" and the means by which any two vampires might be compared. That's where I draw the parallel to character level. It's definitely not exactly the same, but that's why I used the word "effective."

[Encryptshun]

Right. But Blood Potency is the unit of measure for "power" and the means by which any two vampires might be compared. That's where I draw the parallel to character level. It's definitely not exactly the same, but that's why I used the word "effective."

I know you know, but that's not to say someone who hasn't played V:tM would know, though.

Besides, are you even supposed to HAVE RPG games in Utah? I thought Jesus would come down with his 10,000 Iroquois warriors and smite you if you had dice in that state?

[MinisterofDOOM]

LOL!

Jesus would probably like playing Vampire. All the symbolism of blood and flesh and redemption. He could play a Ventrue serving the Lancea Sanctum.

[HashiriyaS14]

Hijacker: Your art sort of resembles that of "Misfile". Do you ever read that?

[Hijacker]

Nope. Never even heard of it.

[_dk]

i love that this convo almost exclusively involves mods.

ex-palladium (rifts) gamer and mod at e30tech.com here-

interesting data point, that...