Roleplaying Games Design

Just joined this. It's underway now, and finishes up on August 25th.

I've been writing a game based around super humans, and I need some people to help out with play testing my character creation. Here is a link to all the files in a Google Drive. Please read the README file and get the feedback form when you are done. Thank you all

Not even sure if I'm ready for playtesters yet or if I'll even keep working on this, but I had fun making it so far. If you've got any thoughts on what would make this more or less playable, it'd probably help me if/when I do get back to working on this.

For those who aren't familiar, Four Against Darkness is a solo pen-and-paper dungeon crawler. You control four characters of various classes at a time. You roll dice, a table shows you which dungeon room or corridor to draw, then you roll again for its contents, etc. In the base game, all combat and all actions are resolved with a simple d6.

Normally, I would balk at this. A d6 simply doesn't permit sufficient resolution. It leaves little room for depth of mechanics. And to be fair, the base game isn't really all that interesting (to me) because of its lack of depth.

But - and here's the thing - there's so much extra content you can get for this game. Adventures, new classes, new mechanics (some of which involves other dice than the d6 although the base mechanic of the game is always based on the d6 as far as I'm aware), etc. For example, the excellent Treacheries of the Troublesome Towns supplement (which comes in two books) adds the ability to enter towns where you will meet all sorts of characters. There are even options for romance, having children, buying a house, and becoming the mayor of the town - there's so much that can happen. And that's just one of the (around 50, I think?) supplements that are out there.

So, in summary, I find myself fascinated by this game despite its lack of complex mechanics, simply because there is so much content for it. If you want, you could think of it as not very deep (read: simple mechanics), but very wide (read: lots of available content).

What are your thoughts on games like this?

I'm making a fantasy-based TTRPG, and I'm pondering whether or not I could make foraging interesting.

I have a hexcrawl system with rules for what happens when the players traverses a hexmap using random tables. One of the things that can happen (besides random encounters, finding locations, etc) is that they can come across "resources", which for now is only different types of food (mushrooms, edible roots, etc). But I wonder if I could extend this system in a meaningful way, to make foraging fun? As in, can I make a system where players think going out to forage for herbs or spell components in the wild is more attractive than simply buying them in a local magic shop?

The most simple and obvious solution is to extend what I already have in the same way that it already works. That is, one of the things that can happen as players traverse hexes on the map is that they can come across resources in the form of "herbs" or "spell components", etc. When that happens, there could simply be a random table (different for each type of hex terrain) that you roll on, to see what and how much you found. This system would work, but I'm not sure it would be very interesting.

I mean, sure, as you're walking around in the wilderness, the other things that can happen (possibly hostile random encounters, and finding random locations, etc) will probably help keep the process of wandering in the wilderness as a whole interesting, but I wonder if the "you found resources/herbs" event itself could somehow be turned into a mini-game or something, to make it more interesting.

Anyone have any suggestions about this?

In order to reduce the amount of times you have to update your number of torches (etc), and also to introduce some random uncertainty, some people suggested an alternative method. Instead of putting "10" in the number of torches you have left on your character sheet, you could put "1d8". This means that every time you need a new torch, you roll 1d8.

If the result is anything other than a 1, then you don't have to update your character sheet at all. But if you do roll a 1, you change it from 1d8 to 1d6. And if you roll a 1 on the d6 in the future, it goes to 1d4. And once you roll a 1 on the 1d4, you're out of torches.

Again, the point of this is to reduce the amount of times you have to change the number of torches you have on your character sheet. Also, it introduces tension - you're several levels into the dungeon, and you only have 1d4 torches left; will it be enough?

This is all fine. I like this system. But it does have a small problem, I think.

Let's say you have 1d4 torches left, and you buy 2 "units" of torches to go from 1d4 through 1d6 up to 1d8. Each "unit" (read: die) you buy costs the same. But, and here's the (slight) problem: going from 1d10 to 1d12 is more valuable than going from 1d4 to 1d6, because the 1d12 only has a 1 in 12 chance of depleting (which is good), but the 1d6 has a 1 in 6 chance of depleting (which is worse).

In other words, it always makes sense to buy as many torches as you can (if you ignore encumbrance, I guess), because the last "unit" you buy will be more valuable than the first (read: have a smaller chance of being depleted).

So, one way of changing this would be to flip it around: Having 1d4 torches is the MOST amount of torches, and when you roll a 1, you switch "upwards" to 1d6 instead. Then, when you finally get to 1d12 roll a 1 on that, then you're out of torches.

This doesn't solve the problem of each "unit" of torches you buy is valued differently, but at least then the least valuable ones you buy are the ones you buy last, instead of the ones you buy first. This introduces diminishing returns on buying loads and loads of torches, which has some positive effects. But the problem with this approach is that it's less intuitive ("What? Having 1d12 torches means I have LESS than 1d4? That makes no sense!").

So, what do you think? Personally, I feel like I'm overthinking this and that I should just go with 1d4 being the lowest amount which is more intuitive, and the problem with that which I'm describing above is so small as to be insignificant.

Additionally, I want to abstract this further and say that instead of "torches" in your inventory, it should just say "supplies" which includes torches, arrows, and other similar resources. The point of this would be to reduce clutter on your character sheet.

I really dislike the modern look of RPG sprites. They all have a blended look of cartoon and cutsie. A double-sized head with gigantic pie-sliced eyes and crazy stupid weird colored hair. I really can’t stand it. I could go on for hours about how I dislike them. Suffice to say I’m seeking alternatives.

Anyone know of any artists that make and sell a different look? I don’t mind dropping a few bucks for art if it’s worthwhile. Its very frustrating that everything I find has gigantic heads with more @$#%^ eyes. It doesn’t need to be lifelike but I would want it to be better proportioned.

Anyone know of any good software for making the animated spreadsheets yourself via posing a 3D model? I tried Easy Pose last month with low success, though it was my first attempt and arguably there’s a learning curve here. There is a disconnect between the style of the clothed sprite and the style of my other tiles (world, furniture, etc) so I must redo them. I’m considering using them as a base underlay to create my own from scratch. It’s going to be a butt-load of work and am unsure how it will turn out. Would hate to do all that with low success only to find out later there is a better way.

Also monsters/enemies would be something additional, though I don’t mind the RPGMaker enemies anywhere near as much as the horridly awful actor/character sprites. I would not like to see a huge difference in style between monsters and characters.

As for my specifics, I’m kind of looking to end up with a 96x192 top down rpg sprite with idle and animated walking. Side view battle would be nice but not necessary. Other animations are a bonus but can live without. I intend to strive towards a a base model character that I can swap out layers on to create numerous permutations of featured characters.

I’m using the RPG Maker Unite engine which is similar to other RPGMaker products in their design style for the sprites. I can do a fair amount of pixel art myself so even like a base model body that I can expound upon would be something to consider. My base tile size is 96x96.

As a note, I am also a 3D cadd designer by trade. Working in Blender or other cadd software isn’t too much of a problem for me, though I run AutoCAD and Inventor mostly and am still largely new to Blender. I often know what I want to do, but have to research how I get the software to comply. As such, I am usually just exporting out of AutoCAD to an intermediary format and importing that into Blender. I do all my own touch ups in paint dotnet, and am pretty proficient with it as well.

Just looking for recommendations from someone who may have been there before. I’m no worse off if I get no replies. It’s also notable to mention that I’m just a hobbyist doing this for fun. I certainly lack a lot of knowledge that a true video game designer would have. I can use tips if you’ve been there and got em.

Going to start play testing some parts of my game, and I am going to need to gather feedback. Anybody for a good feedback system I can look at? Documents offer forms? Thanks.

Wrote a new blog today about how much setting should go in a rulebook. It's different for every game, but I feel a lot of games put too much lore in with the rules.

I know it's really hip to have your setting lean on your mechanics and vice versa, so neither works great without another, but I am more of a fan of rules that support tone and play patterns that reinforce genre more than specific settings. Probably mostly because I am not big on learning a lot about a setting before I feel good about running a game.

I also like to have lots of room to improv and make a setting my own. I know you can do that with any setting, but I just feel more confident doing that with less definition in the setting.

I could probably drop a little something more into my rulebook as a stinger to get people excited about what kind of fiction the game presents. I guess that could be interpreted as setting, or at least adjacent.

Curious about what other think about this topic.

https://infantofatocha.itch.io/chronomutants/devlog/572397/whats-a-paradox-war-anyway

sprites

Today's blogpost is all about my flailing to refine and streamline my design docs into a coherent rulebook. I read enough of the d**** things you'd think I would know how to compile and order one. I understand the basics and where I went wrong, and have roadmap, but compared to design development is long and grindy.

Would really love if other folks have input on what makes a rulebook good? what have people done to make their projects easy to get? Which books are your favorite examples? What are your biggest hurdles?

For me I intellectually understand what needs to be there, but actually getting the writing clean and succinct to read is a challenge. I see a lot of DiY books for of background art and such trying to emulate a AAA book but they don't have the text and order of content hammered out 1st, I didn't want to move to layouts until my text was set, but maybe that's a mistake? Curious to see what people think.

how would you guys feel about a magic system where humans can only gain magical powers by consuming monster body parts? like to be able to shapeshift the character would need to eat a pound of werewolf or changeling flesh? or to cast fire magic they'd have to eat a fire elemental's core?

Mechanically this works off of synthetic dream machine. You pay hp for spells and each level up gains you 4hp. Spells would have a fixed minimum cost thus enforcing certain level requirements. You would gain access to certain groups of spells if you eat a corresponding monster core, like you have access to all fire spells if you eat a fire elemental core but they still have hp costs so you can't just cast fireball at level one.

A lot goes into making a game, and each game and designer has a different mix of focus and needs for their games. Off the top of my head we have: world building, rules creation, technical and prose writing, art, layout and visual design, feedback and iteration, promotion and marketing, and community support skills.

Collaboration and contracting are good ways to make up for weaknesses, but so is practice and patience.

So what are you best at? What are you working on improving?

I thought I'd share this since it's running for the next month. Both one page RPGs and game jams are a great way to get something creative done quickly. They're especially nice as a breather from larger progress projects.

Looking for folks to trade a little proofreading. I will read your book and give the best feedback I can on your document. I am not an editor, consider this more like a playtest for an enthusiast seeing your book. I do read/love a lot of rulebooks and game. I can tell you what does/doesn't make sense to me. I can tell you what spelling/grammar mistakes I notice. I can tell you if I see any rules contradictions. If you want I can also give design feedback/impressions, but I was thinking more of a editing pass, at least for what I would like in return.

Specifically, I'm looking for feedback on clarity of my rulebook. Awkward sentences, poor grammar, unclear rules. My rulebook is 20,847 words. So if you have something for me to proofread it would cool to exchange. I feel like this is the only part of my book I cannot do without a 2nd person. You can DM me for specifics, and if you would like to see the gamepage to decide if you are interested first: https://infantofatocha.itch.io/chronomutants

I'd definitely suggest reading the articles and playing around with the tool a bit. Knowing the likelihood of different dice outcomes has been super helpful for me to do things like tailoring loot tables to include item rarity. I thought it might be useful to others as well.

This channel is shaping up to become a really interesting resource in the #TTRPG space. They've already got some good videos from which I've learned a thing or two. I encourage you to check them out.

This is an interesting blog post by @malin@dice.camp about how to weave multiple stories/plots together in an interesting way, which makes it possible to organically "catch" the players even if they wander off in an unexpected (read: unprepped) direction.

This can be used in any #TTRPG, but it can also be turned into a mechanic, built into an #TTRPG. It reminds me of Fronts (I think they're called) in #DungeonWorld.