Non-indie rpgs

[Thomas Tamblyn]

Here's a question, what games that don't get a mention here outside of actiual play are you besotted with?  Tell us why you love it and what your reservations are.

Me - Unknown armies (2nd ed foir what its worth).  Fantastically written, gritty with a system that supports it, best damage system I've seen, truly nasty magic and double-page spread of falvoursome plot hooks at the begining of every chapter.  And some good Gming advice to boot.

It knows what it does and it throws everything into doing it well.

My biggest reservation is that it seems to crib an awful lor from sorcerer without giving credit (relationship maps and almost-kickers as foundation for the adventure) but that might just be coincidence.
Oh yeah - and soemtimes there are too many gimicks, thank god they dumped OACOWAs and BOHICAs for the 2nd ed (basically criticals and fumbles, standing for "Open a can of whoop-ass" and "Bend over here it comes again").

[Ron Edwards]

Good topic!

Me, I go with Champions 3rd edition. OK, granted, a hideously-Drifted Ron brand, with about as much pre-play Genre Expectations briefing as possible, but still Champions.

It's a rare non-fantasy game published since 1982 (Champs 2nd) that isn't a Champions derivative of some kind.

Best,
Ron

[Clinton R. Nixon]

For me, it's:

Buffy the Vampire Slayer: Ok, I'm a huge fan of the show, but damn if C.J. Carella didn't capture it perfectly.

Adventure!: It's Sorcerer and Sword, but fairly Simulationist! Rock.

Unknown Armies (2nd edition only): With the focus 2nd edition gave this game, it became a great almost-Narrativist game about hope in the midst of a nihilist nightmare.

Twilight: 2000 (2nd edition, as well - the 2300AD rules version, basically): There's so many things about this game I like, from the post-apocalyptic setting, to the lifepath system, to the simplicity of almost all the rules. I'm biased - it's the first game I ever GMed, and the first I bought, but damn if it doesn't hold up well.

[jburneko]

7th Sea: One of the best damn blendings of System & Setting I have ever seen.  I love the system and I love the setting.  Oddly enough this is the only "happy" game I really enjoy.  Everything else I flip out over is very dark and disturbing.

SLA Industries: I LOVE this Setting.  It just fills my head with all kinds of ideas.  Sadly the System makes me want to rip the designer's eyes out.  I'm currently infusing it with a lot of concepts from Sorcerer's Soul.  I'm using L.A. Confidential as a basis for a back story and I'm constantly on the lookout for a replacement system.  Right now, Story Engine is the best I've got.

Ravenloft: Again, I think the setting is brilliant!  And, much to my surprise, I even enjoy the novels that were published to go along with this setting.  I rip tons and tons and tons and tons of concepts and ideas out of this setting for almost ALL the games I play.

Jesse

[GreatWolf]

Unknown Armies, for exactly the reason that Clinton cites.  (BTW, I think that the trigger events and relationship map concepts in UA are more Simulationist in nature than Narrativist, especially when you consider that trigger events are how your character became involved in the occult underground, NOT how the character became involved in the current story.)  Oh yes, and I *liked* OACOWA and BOHICA.  :-)  My only reservation is that I'm not sure how to work some of those adepts into a functional group.  But maybe that's the point.

Nobilis:  A heady cosmology, and a rockin' system married with some of the most poetic imagery to come out of an RPG.  My biggest reservation:  a heady cosmology.

Rune:  Viking butt-kicking.  No story, no real characterization, and I really don't care.  ;-)  Hoist the battle axe and bellow!  I only wish that it had gone through one more round of playtest and editing.

Wraith:  the ultimate in angst, even for White Wolf.  What's your initiation event?  You weren't Embraced, you didn't Awaken.  You just died.  And I just realized that Sorcerer techniques apply *directly* to Wraith.  After all, isn't your Shadow just your personal demon?  My reservation:  why do ghosts have a Strength stat?

Pendragon:  I'm playing this now and I'm liking it.  Consistent Sim play, with a simple yet deadly combat system, and multi-generational play.  Still on my first character, but I'm looking forward to building a lineage.  My reservation:  Oy!  So many details!

Ars Magica:  This one isn't quite fair, because I haven't played it.  However, it looks like Pendragon for mages (in a sense), which is good by me.  I'd like to try this out quite soon.

Ninja Burger:  I had more fun playing this than Paranoia (and I do enjoy Paranoia quite a bit).  Bumbling ninja making fast food deliveries.  Need I say more?  My only problem is that I think that my sense of humor might not mesh with scenario preparation, and I don't draw good maps.

Seth Ben-Ezra
Great Wolf

[szilard]

I'd have to second Wraith. Core game statistics/mechanics include the Passions that drive characters and the Fetters that tie them to the world. Add the Shadow, a metaphysics built on memory and self-perception, and a unique setting. Then realize that the characters are just normal people who died. I need to run this with the Adventure!version of the Storyteller mechanics and figure out some way to allow using Pathos like Inspiration.

Stuart

[Simon W]

Well, I am an Amber fan, so I have to go with that.

Gideon

[Brian Leybourne]

I'm still a fan of Deadlands, I have to say.

I probably wouldn't play it again, we've done it to death and the system is not the best, but the setting is damn cool and relatively unique.

Plus they just published me for the second time (just an article in each case) so with that and OBAM I'm finally starting to get out there, have to love them for that! :-)

Brian.

[Rich Forest]

As the official raving Street Fighter fanboy, I'm contractually obligated to mention it here: Street Fighter: The Storytelling Game.  

1) I think it was the first real non-WoD White Wolf game, providing lighthearted action-adventure before Feng Shui made action cool again.  

2) Streamlined Storyteller system combat:  Greatly reduced handling time, but increased strategy in combat.  

3) Interesting martial arts—fun to choose a style and build a character's beginning abilities.  Fun to spend experience points to continue to build up the character over time.

4) Good range of abilities for campaign play: Beginning characters could easily take out mooks without the need for an extra "mook rule."  But World Warrior characters could easily take beginning characters.  And in an extended campaign, the characters could become as powerful as the world warriors, join their ranks, and go toe to toe with them.

5) Interesting interplay between Honor and Chi—Because the game limited available resources of Chi, and Chi was essential to energy waves and mystical-type martial arts maneuvers, an honorable fighter was better off in an extended tournament than a dishonorable fighter.  However, the dishonorable fighter also had the advantage in individual battles because he could hit dizzied opponents.  I've seen many a player making the agonizing choice in the middle of the fight whether to do the honorable thing and improve Honor in the long run or do the dishonorable thing and be more certain to win the current fight.

6) A  licensed, full color, glossy, and inexpensive book ($14.95 for 185 pages)—I can't imagine that White Wolf even intended to make a profit on it, and I seem to remember a "White Wolf Magazine" article explaining that the game was an attempt to draw new players into the hobby.

Reservations?  Well, if you insist.  

1) The cover art on the core rulebook.  Not at all like the standard Street Fighter/Capcom art, I sometimes want to blame the game's market failure on it alone :)  

2) The martial arts styles sometimes clashed with the real world versions in glaring ways, which could be a problem for those of us who pay too much attention to these kinds of things.  

3) Break from Capcom "canon."  Again, a problem only for people who spend way too much time collecting info from the original Japanese Capcom materials, and probably just a bit picky on my part.

4) Very inconsistent support books, with problematic editing/proofreading issues, that introduced a number of untested rules that didn't work well in the context of the original game.  

And this is my short list of both good and bad.  I'll just add a couple other non-Indie faves of mine, without much explanation—Castle Falkenstein and Heavy Gear both blew me away when they first showed up, for very different reasons.

Rich Forest

[Valamir]

Hey Brian, in case you don't already know, I believe there are plans to release Deadlands for Savage Worlds.

Savage Worlds being basically a roleplayized version of Deadlands Great Rail Wars minis rules, I expect it to be all the cool without the kludge.

If The players book, Book O'the Dead, and Quick and the Dead had been the only books released...I would hold the game in much higher regard.

[Brian Leybourne]

Hey Brian, in case you don't already know, I believe there are plans to release Deadlands for Savage Worlds.

Savage Worlds being basically a roleplayized version of Deadlands Great Rail Wars minis rules, I expect it to be all the cool without the kludge.

If The players book, Book O'the Dead, and Quick and the Dead had been the only books released...I would hold the game in much higher regard.

Yeah, I had heard that, and I may pick it up again at that point - the GRW system wasn't too bad really.

I have, like, an entire shelf of Deadlands books (basically everything they ever released up until about a year ago), but we've played it so much that I think it's pretty much dead for us now, there's not much more to explore :-)

Brian.

[Adam]

As the official raving Street Fighter fanboy, I'm contractually obligated to mention it here: Street Fighter: The Storytelling Game.

For those of you who are into Kayfabe and other forms of pro wrestling RPGs, I'd like to mention that I've heard Street Fighter mentioned as "the mainstream RPG that should be a wrestling RPG" by more than a few people.

[wyrdlyng]

1. SLA Industries.
Why? Because the characters know they're damned, know that they're doing it to themselves, and that the best they can do is find the least painful way to get there.
Reservations? That the game isn't written well enough to allow most people to "get it."

2. DC Heroes from Mayfair Games.
Why? It's to me the most elegant game for superhumans that I have encountered. It can run quick and painlessly scales to handle most power levels easily. It was one of the first games to really stress the usefulness of Subplots in a Supers game. And, it distinguishes between Mental and Mystical (a MAJOR pet peeve of mine regarding Supers games).
Reservations? Quite honestly, I'm very biased towards the game but perhaps unnecessary reliance upon the Acting and Effect charts. They could be easily distilled into formulas. Other than that is the fact that it's currently attached to an unattractive setting (Blood of Heroes) which scares people away from it.

[joshua neff]

Castle Falkenstein--I love love LOVE this game. Admittedly, I've never played it, & I've heard some people complain about the card-based resolution mechanics. But...it has this weird hold on me. Everytime I even glance at the rulebook's cover, I get giddy. Ideas start flitting through my head of what I could do with the game. Yes, I have a schoolgirl crush on Castle Falkenstein.

Adventure--I I have a major thing for the pulps. And this game fixes a lot of things I haven't liked about White Wolf mechanics. I ran it recently & it went very well indeed. (Sadly, I've also found some things about the system, mostly left over from past WW games, that I still don't like.)

Nobilis--Another one I haven't played yet. I love the wacked-out cosmology & the various factions. Hits a lot of my gee-whiz buttons. My one real complaint? I hate the way the 2nd edition book was done. I mean, it's laid out well, it has nice art, it's well written--but the damn thing is way too big for easy reference. I really think they sacrified use for style, & not in a good way.

I also agree with Clinton regarding Buffy.

EDIT: I also quite like Mutants & Masterminds, & hope to give it a little test run soon.

[Mike Holmes]

Traveller. Yes, for sentimental reasons, but I also like the determination of the designers and fans to bring such a vast setting to life. It's...majestic.

In Nomine. For the situation/setting, not the rules (which I jettison in play for other systems). Yes, the American version. It's not as sarcastic, from what I understand, as the French version, but that makes it potantially a whole 'nother game. One which, for me, is full of all sorts of possibilities for philosophical introspection.

Call of Cthulhu. Because it's Lovecraft, and I really dig it.

Paranoia. Too much fun, every time out. You know how you can have a bad session with some systems? Never seen that with Paranioa.

Just a couple off the top.

Mike