10-02-2015, 01:34 PM | #31 | |
formerly known as 'Kenneth Latrans'
Join Date: Aug 2009
Location: Wyoming, Michigan
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Re: Leveled Innocence advantage for DF idea
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For DF, PCs all tend to have really good skills in combat even when it's not part of their concept because players tend to want to go into combat with the expectation of 90% accuracy or so in battle. More combat-oriented world = more combat-oriented people, PC and NPC alike. Monsters tend to get really high stats and skills because they are purpose-designed as opposition for 250-point PCs to fight, PCs whose combat skills range from 14-25 most of the time.
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Ba-weep granah wheep minibon. Wubba lubba dub dub. |
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10-02-2015, 01:42 PM | #32 |
GURPS Line Editor
Join Date: Jul 2004
Location: Montréal, Québec
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Re: Leveled Innocence advantage for DF idea
I wouldn't characterize GURPS Dungeon Fantasy as "silly." You can (and people do) use its rules and stats to play a grim, gritty, life-or-death game in which nobody laughs about anything. Yes, there's some amusing fluff text around and between those rules and stats – that's to keep the series from presenting as a gray slab of boring templates, monster descriptions, and price tags, which is precisely what it would look like without a little zest. But said fluff doesn't detract one iota from the fact that the monsters are deadly . . . that minotaurs are frightening, horned berserkers . . . that millennia of straight-faced and often scary occultists believed that pyramids had supernatural powers in the real world . . . that your PC can die ignominiously in a mudslide or a wildfire . . . or a host of other grimdarkness. As the primary author, I regard the combination of often-lighthearted fluff with serious mechanics to be a way to appeal to the full spectrum of old-school hack 'n' slash gamers, who ranged from goofs playing beer-and-pretzels games to slightly obsessed people who preferred fantasy worlds and characters to reality.
But yes, I do realize that there are "medium is the message" people out there who would judge a game not by its mechanics but by the wrapper, whether that means a bit of cover art, a space-filling quote, or a little joke hidden in a snippet of throwaway text. I guess I'm saying that I assume I'm writing for system hackers who are going to take my work apart and use only the bits they like anyway, and I want to have a little fun while writing for those people, secure in the knowledge that only the mechanical elements are going to matter to them. Were I writing a setting or an adventure rather than a toolkit, I'd obviously care more about tone.
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Sean "Dr. Kromm" Punch <kromm@sjgames.com> GURPS Line Editor, Steve Jackson Games My DreamWidth [Just GURPS News] |
10-02-2015, 02:54 PM | #33 | |
Banned
Join Date: Jul 2006
Location: 100 hurricane swamp
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Re: Leveled Innocence advantage for DF idea
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I've already used DF 14 Psi elsewhere as an idea primer for building powers... indeed I was originally picking up DF for use in my regular non-DF fantasy games... but I'm slowly being sold on the "No, use a Template dang it!" argument (I've rather seen Templates as being of the prime genre concepts for DF... which strangely I did not feel that way about MH or Action!). |
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10-02-2015, 03:07 PM | #34 |
Join Date: Nov 2006
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Re: Leveled Innocence advantage for DF idea
I use psi to be the powers of Lovecraft style Elder Things. Their powers are alien to the DF reality but there are some people who have had their minds attuned to be able to use the powers of Elder Things. The Elder Things were extradimensional beings outside of space time and some have gotten into the reality but have been locked into prisons. But with the help of cults when the stars are right they can be freed to destroy the DF universe including the mundane, the Divine and the Infernal.
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10-02-2015, 03:30 PM | #35 | ||
Join Date: Oct 2004
Location: Yorkshire, UK
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Re: Leveled Innocence advantage for DF idea
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I'm a fan of psi powers in SF, modern and future, McAffreys Talents series, and The Rowan and sequels. PK's Psionic Powers, etc is my gamer psi Bible. |
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10-02-2015, 03:56 PM | #36 | ||||||
Join Date: Dec 2006
Location: Eindhoven, the Netherlands
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Re: Leveled Innocence advantage for DF idea
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And I don't mean to say that DF and Fantasy are mutually exclusive, but don't overlook fantasy as a toolkit option, and if you want to do your own thing, you probably shouldn't be tagging them as "DF," like "My DF Political Fantasy Drama" is a confusing title at best, but that doesn't mean you can't borrow from some of the DF material. Quote:
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So when I say "That doesn't sound like DF," that's precisely what I mean. Everything you said is correct, though you seem to not have put the pieces together on exactly what I meant just yet: I'm saying "That game you're describing doesn't seem well served by the assumptions in DF." Now, of course, if you want to play your gritty GoT game with realistic assumptions with DF... well, I'm not going to gasp and point a trembling, accusing finger at you, but I do think you'd be better served by books outside of the DF line (Thaumatology, Fantasy, the low tech line, etc).
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My Blog: Mailanka's Musing. Currently Playing: Psi-Wars, a step-by-step exploration of building your own Space Opera setting, inspired by Star Wars. Last edited by Mailanka; 10-02-2015 at 04:11 PM. |
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10-02-2015, 03:58 PM | #37 |
Banned
Join Date: Jul 2006
Location: 100 hurricane swamp
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Re: Leveled Innocence advantage for DF idea
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10-02-2015, 04:00 PM | #38 | |
Join Date: Dec 2006
Location: Eindhoven, the Netherlands
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Re: Leveled Innocence advantage for DF idea
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But that doesn't mean that final fantasy games can't hit you right in the feels. It doesn't mean that they can't be grand or epic, or that you're childish for liking them.
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My Blog: Mailanka's Musing. Currently Playing: Psi-Wars, a step-by-step exploration of building your own Space Opera setting, inspired by Star Wars. |
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10-02-2015, 04:04 PM | #39 |
Night Watchman
Join Date: Oct 2010
Location: Cambridge, UK
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Re: Leveled Innocence advantage for DF idea
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10-02-2015, 04:07 PM | #40 | |
Join Date: Dec 2006
Location: Eindhoven, the Netherlands
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Re: Leveled Innocence advantage for DF idea
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The point in saying "That doesn't sound like DF" is saying "It doesn't sound like the game you describe really fits the expectations and assumptions of DF." That is to say, if the game doesn't really sound like D&D or Diablo or Final Fantasy, then maybe you're better off using some different books. DF is specific. That's not bad. That's good. A lot of people want the specific thing that DF is selling... but that doesn't make it the universal or "best" fantasy game. It's one tool, a really good, really useful tool, but it's just one, and it's not necessarily the best one for all possible fantasy genres. And the point is, regularly, the sort of game b-dog seems to describe doesn't sound to me like the sort of game that really use the DF assumptions. It honestly sounds more like he wants a detailed world with some really solid horror elements. Things like bare-bones Fantasy templates, some monsters out of horror, some rules out of horror, some details out of low-tech and fantasy might serve that better than 250+ point wizards and knights and thieves who mow through room after room full of monsters.
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My Blog: Mailanka's Musing. Currently Playing: Psi-Wars, a step-by-step exploration of building your own Space Opera setting, inspired by Star Wars. |
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