The Future of the Dungeon Fantasy Roleplaying Game?

[b-dog]

I feel that demons in DF don’t really seem like demons just a sort of monster. Demons should have dark powers in addition to their brute strength. They are the Infernals which are the chief adversaries of the Divine and Creation. They are not just bullies like the orcs and trolls they are the soldiers of the force of evil. AD&D gave demons an assortment of powers to use and often high intelligence too. They peshkali in the adventure should at least be able to have the ability to make darkness and most likely have other powers too. He should be able to gate other demons too even though he is bound magically to guard the temple. I feel an encounter with a demon must be extremely challenging. The only bad guys that can compete with them are Elder Things and some high powered undead.

[finn]

I am very very sad to hear that DFRPG will not continue as a line.

I have run 2 adventures of DFRPG so far. "I smell a rat" (2 sessions) and "you meet in a Inn" (1 session). Both me and the players are having a blast. We are planning to run all the published adventures, including the ones for GURPS Dungeon Fantasy.

I may have sound critical on some aspects of "I smell a rat" in [spoiler!] the thread I started, but I want to emphasize that is was great fun to play.

One reason I love DFRPG is the streamlining of the rules and templates, and the abundance of sample characters. It made it much easier for me to translate only the necessary bit for the players that own a weird mixture of 3rd and 4th edition books in various languages.

I would not have run the above games if I had to go through Basic, Magic, and GURPS Dungeon Fantasy PDFs to figure out what the PCs needed.

I voted for "Just make more." to show support, but I understand that it is not realistic. So, I have 2 requests.

First, to have future GURPS Dungeon Fantasy PDFs to be compatible to use in a DFRPG game. Without it, I will not be likely to buy new GURPS Dungeon Fantasy PDFs (with maybe the exception of adventures).

Second, to issue a "how to use GURPS Dungeon Fantasy in DFRPG" PDF with guidelines for each GURPS Dungeon Fantasy PDF published so far. It doesn't have to be complete, but enough so GMs will feel confirtable in introducing new elements to DFRPG. This should give incentive to DFRPG owners with no GURPS experience to purchase GURPS Dungeon Fantasy PDF, and maybe buy into GURPS in the future.

[ArchonShiva]

I have zero doubt that DFRPG will be played a decade from now, even if SJG terminates the line tomorrow. Now, is there a way to increase that play and make SJG money?

To me and those I can see using it, the upsides to DFRPG are:
1. Self-contained: It requires a limited number of books to have “complete” rules and options.
2. Curated: Every rule, template, and item has been looked over by a single intelligence, in light of lots of feedback.
This is like the second coming of the GURPS Compendiums, which I still think of as the single best GURPS release in history.

What should happen now, if SJG is to make money from DFRPG:
Buying Adventurers, Exploits and Spells must be an option for players. If this is somehow more viable, a single book containing Adventurers and those bits of Exploits that players need (aka Player’s Handbook without spells) would be great, but I wouldn’t count on it.
GMs must additionally be able to buy Monsters (and the rest of Exploits, if that is a thing).
Without essential books available, there are no new games, and few new players. Either SJG makes that gamble or they don’t, but it’s a baseline requirement for anything else to happen.
PDF-only *is* a option, but it basically means tabletop is out: DFRPG mostly becomes an online-only game, except for the lucky few who have the books, or the resources to have them made.
Magic Items and Traps are nice, but home-printed PDFs will do just fine.

If the above happens, then I think there are three additional paths worth exploring:
1. Third-party adventures: Open up publishing adventures to anyone who cares to. Don’t go full OGL, but encourage people to make money from whatever adventure in whatever format. They will have an interest in you selling your books, and become your ambassador; they will create the support that the game needs. Either say no to new templates, spells and non-unique items, or assign quotas (5% of word count for new spells and stuff, to make sure they strictly remain adventures.)
2. Favor VTT integration: DFRPG being separate from GURPS is a boon here, as it allows taking some risks with licensing without selling out the main game.
3. If and when the thresholds are met, publish new full-sized books, obviously PDF at first, which grow the game at a slow and steady pace, stay true to the game’s style, and keep everyone on the same page. Adventurers II, for example, with some of the more reasonable new professions, and a few more races, multi-classing lenses, and maybe new equipment options. No all-out crazy “what did I just buy?” stuff like DF. New books should basically be must-buys or not happen at all, and the total number should be few. If this step is never reached, so be it; there’s always DF, and the DFRPG stands solidly anyway.

[robertsconley]

Originally Posted by David Johansen

D&D has an implied setting that's basically Greyhawk. GURPS Dungeon Fantasy has town and the dungeon. Again, it's a question of adventures for readers verses adventures for people who actually play them. But it's the readers who buy the successful adventure lines like Pathfinder's Adventure paths.

There are people willing to put in the time and effort to write adventures. The more open that process is the more adventures that will be available. If there only a single source then there will be always "reasons" to be found to do something else other than writing more adventures.

[David Johansen]

Perhaps a fan curated adventure index like the GURPS content index would help.

[Purple Snit]

The way I see it, the DFRPG suffered from an identity crisis. If you already played GURPS DF, you didn't need a streamlined version of the rules. And if you weren't already inclined to be a GURPS player, it didn't have anything new to pull you in. I've played GURPS since the 90's, and I backed the kickstarter, and I thought it was a well-packaged set that looked great - but for the DF campaign that I'm about to start, I just used the older DF rules and expansions. And that's probably where my money would go in future, truth be told; I don't need "rules lite" GURPS. It's a shame it didn't succeed, but I would hope that SJG will continue to give us Dungeon Fantasy expansions in the future, and not give up on the genre.

[Apollonian]

At present, the Dungeon Fantasy RPG is not on SJ Games wishlist. (The GURPS Dungeon Fantasy line is, though.)

(Also, the wishlist link from the Getting Started page {http://www.sjgames.com/general/guidelines/authors/guideupdate.html} is broken.)

If I were picking up DF from raw, no-GURPS experience, I think I'd want to see at least a couple adventures on the same scale as a classic D&D module sitting next to the DF basic set... and on DrivethruRPG or at my FLGS, because if I'm not playing GURPS to begin with, I have practically zero reason to ever visit Warehouse 23.

Now? Here's my wishlist for the DFRPG (emphasis on wishing):

Monster cards (like these) and associated Cardboard Heroes. Thematic monster supplements would be pretty cool, too. (Court of the Dark Elves, Creatures from the Pit, The Sylvan War Host, stuff like that.)

How to do a megadungeon, and a worked example. Mostly I just want something like Peter's Felltower stuff.

How to do a hexcrawl, and a worked example.

Adventure paths or equivalent, with adventures that can be played out in a few sessions of 3-4 hours each.

[ULFGARD]

This just sucks. I had such high hopes for the DFRPG line. I started a campaign within a month of getting the boxed set. I ran them through I Smell a Rat, which took 4 sessions, but included more sewer exploration (and therefore improv on my part), the beginning of some conflict with the local mafia (think Gnomish mafia from a Pyramid article way back), and preparations to rob the town's mayor. I think this might be some of the difference between the Pathfinder, etc., adventures I've played - they seem to be much more railroad-y, though that could be a matter of play style between groups. Either way, I wonder if OGL licensed adventures could include GURPS stats, if for no other reason than to let players and DMs know that this other system can run the same adventures.

I have to say that I have included non-DFRPG material from the very beginning. Two of my players have played GURPS in the past. I imported one slightly experienced DF Druid character (which required importing animal companions and a couple of spells from Magic). The other player wanted something different. She ended up settling on a Dungeon Alchemist. Regardless of how much DF material I import, I'm still considering the DFRPG game itself to be the "core" of the campaign.

Is it possible to make the existing books available for POD? I think that, coupled with a free conversion guide, this could be a gateway into the broader DF line (and GURPS as a whole). In any event, it's a sad day.

[robertsconley]

Originally Posted by ULFGARD

Either way, I wonder if OGL licensed adventures could include GURPS stats, if for no other reason than to let players and DMs know that this other system can run the same adventures.

As a side note a 3PP program doesn't have to use the OGL. For example SJ Games with Warehouse23 selling other company's products. They have the infrastructure to offer a space to sell products that use their IP and manage royalties.

Or since they are now on the OBS site, they can work with OBS create a GURPS Community Content program.

Personally I prefer something based on the Open Game License, but it would be a fallacy for me to argue that the OGL is only way to open up GURPS 3PP.

[ArchonShiva]

Originally Posted by Purple Snit

If you already played GURPS DF, you didn't need a streamlined version of the rules.

I strongly suspect you are wrong about this for a significant chunk of the market. DFRPG fills a role that GURPS DF, which I love and am three years deep in a huge campaign on, simply can’t.