ttrpgcafe

[ttrpgcafe]

Could this be the item that you got that email about a few days ago?

I just received a large brass coin with an emblem of a cartoon rat on it in the mail. It was literally the only thing in the envelope – there wasn't even an explanatory card. I presume this is a reward from one of the several dozen crowdfunded tabletop RPGs I've backed over the course of the past decade, but I genuinely have no recollection which – if any – of them it might be, so it's honestly all a bit sinister.

[ttrpgcafe]

Honestly it's weird that roleplaying as we know it evolved from historical wargaming.

Like for example DBA rules contain some suggestions for running campaigns with narrative and "propaganda" so I wouldn't say that it's something incompatible, and 0E looks way more like wargames than say PbtA games do, but storytelling games were a feature of artistic salons for way longer and they appear much closer to roleplaying than rulesets for reenacting ancient battles on tabletop.

Salon games didn't have skill checks but neither did wargames and it's strange that nobody came up with simplistic skill checks to add uncertainty and realism to the game

I think the line is a lot clearer when the role of dice and rules in tabletop roleplaying games is correctly understood.

"Uncertainty" and "realism" are, at best, secondary to what the dice are actually doing. Even most tabletop RPGs get it wrong when they try to explain themselves – they'll talk about the rules as something to fall back on to prevent schoolyard arguments (i.e., "yes I did!/no you didn't!") from derailing the story, when in fact it's the exact opposite.

If we look at freeform roleplaying as an illustrative parallel, we see that, while newly formed groups may in fact fall to bickering when a consensus can't be reached about what ought to happen next, mature and well-established groups tend instead to fall prey to excessive consensus-seeking: the impulse to always find an outcome that isn't necessarily one which everybody at the table can be happy with, but at the very least one which everybody at the table can agree is reasonable – and that's a lot more constraining than one might think.

In this sense, the role of picking up the dice isn't to build consensus, but to break it – to allow for the possibility of outcomes which nobody at the table wanted or expected. It's the "well, this is happening now" factor that prevents the table's dynamic from ossifying into endless consensus-seeking about what reasonably ought to happen next.

Looking to the history of wargames, this is precisely the innovation they bring to the table. Early historical wargames tended to be diceless affairs which decided outcomes by deferring to the judgment of a referee or other subject matter expert, but the use of randomisers increasingly came to be favoured because referees would tend to favour the most reasonable course, precluding upsets and rendering the outcomes of entire battles a foregone conclusion. This goes all the way back to the roots of tabletop wargaming – people were literally having "rules versus rulings" arguments two hundred years ago!

(This isn't the only facet of tabletop roleplaying culture which has its roots in wargaming culure, of course. For example, you can draw a direct line from the preoccupation of early tabletop RPGs with punishing the use of out-of-character knowledge to historical wargaming's gentleperson's agreement to refrain from making decisions based on information that one's side's commanders couldn't possibly have possessed when re-creating historical battles.)

To be clear, I don't necessary disagree that salon games could have yielded something like modern tabletop RPGs. However, first they'd have had to arrive the the paired insights that a. excessive consensus-seeking is poison to building an interesting narrative; and b. randomisers can be used to force the breaking of consensus, and historical wargames had a substantial head start because they'd figured all that out a century earlier.

[ttrpgcafe]

Hi! If you want a very much less Disney owned 3d6 system with VERY similar mechanics, I'd recommend "Fantasy Age" and\or "Modern Age", as both use a similar system. Instead of the "Marvel Die" you instead generate "stunt points" based on two dice hitting the same number, and it lets you do a BUNCH of cool shit! There's general stunts, magic stunts, social stunts, and class specific stunts! I thought it was a similarly elegant, dynamic system, but FAR less crunchy, which is part of what I liked about it. (Admittedly, I still haven't fully grokked the Marvel Multiverse ttrpg, so this might just be me fully misunderstanding how crunchy it is or isn't)

Marvel Multiverse TTRPG

The Marvel Multiverse TTRPG is genuinely well designed and I am confounded.

Previously, I'd read Marvel Universe TTRPG (which is a completely different system written in the 90s) and was caught off guard by how clever *it* was. In it, you assign power gems almost like a worker placement minigame to pass checks, prioritizing effect vs safety.

Marvel Multiverse TTRPG is a totally different system by a totally different team, and now I have to confront the reality that there are at least two very elegantly designed and unfortunately Disney-owned Marvel TTRPGs.

So, what makes Marvel Multiverse work? Well, it starts with a bad idea.

Marvel Multiverse runs on a d616. This sounds *awful* but it's the best bit of tech I've ever seen in a game with this high a budget.

First, that 616 is actually 3d6. You roll and add up, and mathematically this gives you more average outputs. Also the "1" crits on a 1, and its 1s count as 6s. So it's basically an extra strong d6 that hands you crits 1/6th of the time.

If you crit but miss the target number you botch instead, but Multiverse's advantage/disadvantage system gives you the option of rerolling individual d6s. So you can try to hit the TN, or you can crit fish.

Also, that "1" tells you your attack damage. It's used as part of a formula that also factors in your stats and optionally weapon. No need for a second damage roll. You get a really high density of information out of a single pass through the 3d6.

Now, Marvel Multiverse is still a very traditional style TTRPG. You can hop from DnD to this and barely notice the change in scenery---it's just the dice are cleaner, faster, and more predictable. You're still moving around in 5 foot squares, using your suite of character-specific powers, swinging at and sometimes missing a rat.

But those rat-misses happen a fair bit less, and your special abilities all come from one big mana bar called Focus, and you can intentionally spam your powers until it puts you in a stupor.

Basically, I'd recommend this system to three people:

-It's Marvel Give Me Marvel

-I Want To Play Modern AU Superhero DnD

-Fellow Sleek Core Mechanics Enthusiast, This Core Mechanic Is Sleek AF

If those people are you, you may want to give it a look.

[ttrpgcafe]

a stud in black leather on a black motorcycle just revved their engine at me and thank god I tore my demonic uterus out ages ago because I think that would have finally knocked me up

[ttrpgcafe]

how?? just how?

[ttrpgcafe]

Little cat wakes up and stretches after a beautiful nap

(Source)

[ttrpgcafe]

[ttrpgcafe]

people misunderstand what ‘gifted kid’ actually means but it’s ok it’s fine it’s cool it’s good

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[ttrpgcafe]

Anyway.

[ttrpgcafe]

The only retail job I miss is being the cashier at a local Hardware Store in a small town surrounded by other small towns, because I was essentially a high fantasy GuildMaster.

I worked there three summers in a row, and every laborer from every nearby town would come there for whatever supplies they needed, and man could they gossip like there was an Olympic medal for it.

At 8 AM, every morning, every plumber, roofer, electrician, and landscaper in the county was at the door waiting for me to unlock it, and they’d come back throughout the day.

I knew every tradesman in a 30 miles radius, and I knew too much about everyone in town because of, like I said, the tradesman gossip. It’s shocking that people basically tune out an entire person in their living room and say whatever they want, because they don’t see the guy fixing their light fixture as real somehow.

Then your average citizens, the townsfolk, would come in to ask for labor recommendations. The cashier at the local hardware store is a god among yelp reviews.

A woman needs her roof repaired. A man wants central air installed in his 100 year old house. Someone needs to break into a safe they inherited without the combination.

And I would make recommendations. I’d take down names and information so when a plumber I liked walked in an hour later, I could say, “come here, I have a job for you” like I needed them to clear a village of Redcaps.

There is no difference between your local mom-and-pop hardware employee and Greed Karga sending the Mandalorian on bounty hunting jobs.

If Geralt of Rivia walked in, I could have found him something to do.

I believe all plumbers dual-wield drain snakes and arcane magic, because you’d be surprised how often Liches come up in septic tank repairs.

You can belong to a monster hunters’ guild and a welders’ union, if you have the time. Always good to diversify your portfolio.

[ttrpgcafe]

[ttrpgcafe]

A call to action: review games you love!

If you enjoyed an independent TTRPG you played recently, go give a review! It takes less than a couple of minutes and can really help the creators of the games you love! I've just reviewed a few of my recent favourites (Exquisite Biome, RUNE and I'm Sorry Did You Say Street Magic) and wanted to encourage others to do the same!

I'd love if people reblogged with their favourite games, I'm always looking for more to check out!

[ttrpgcafe]

When people get a little too gung-ho about-

wait. cancel post. gung-ho cannot be English. where did that phrase come from? China?

ok, yes. gōnghé, which is…an abbreviation for “industrial cooperative”? Like it was just a term for a worker-run organization? A specific U.S. marine stationed in China interpreted it as a motivational slogan about teamwork, and as a commander he got his whole battalion using it, and other U.S. marines found those guys so exhausting that it migrated into English slang with the meaning “overly enthusiastic”.

That’s…wild. What was I talking about?

[ttrpgcafe]

This animation without the filter because it fucked with the framerate for some reason (this isn't the intended look otherwise, but bleh)

[ttrpgcafe]