Skip to main content

#RPGaDay 2017 -- Day 19

Which RPG features the best writing?

This is the third or fourth time I've been tempted to scream "define your terms" at this list; "best" is such a subjective term anyway, but then we get into the "what do you mean, do you mean 'conveys the system' or 'sticks to the tone' or 'reflects the game's priorities' or what?" part, and everything gets really wobbly.

So I'll give you a few, and my take on them.

For sheer readability and enjoyability, CJ Carella's Buffy the Vampire Slayer comes out ahead; it was the first (and one of the few) RPG core rulebooks that I sat down and read from end to end, like a novel. The prose takes the tone of the show perfectly, and the layout and setup of the game parts are very well done. Other RPG rulebooks that are enjoyable to read: The Quiet Year, FVLMINATA, and Flatpack: Fix the Future.

For evocative tone and setting relatability, you can't miss with Maschine Zeit, Dogs in the Vineyard, or There Is No Spoon. Runners up include Psi*Run, Motobushido, and Monsterhearts.

And for possibly the best definition of "what is roleplaying", then you can't go wrong with Apotheosis Drive X. Runners up in this section include Fate Accelerated Edition and Breakfast Cult.

So depending on how you define "best", there are at least 14 answers to this question.

What are (some of) yours?

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Organizing And You: Lessons from Labor History

    I made a joke on Twitter a while ago: Do I need to post the Thomas M Comeau Organizing Principles again? https://t.co/QQIrJ9Sd3i — Jerome Comeau says Defund The Police (@Heronymus) July 15, 2021 and it recently came back up because a member of my family got their first union job and was like "every job should be offering these sorts of benefits" and so I went ahead and wrote down what I remember of what my dad told me. My father had many jobs, but his profession was basically a labor union organizer, and he talked a lot about the bedrock foundation items needed to be serious about organizing collective action. Here's what I remember.    The Thomas M. Comeau Principles of Organizing -- a fundamental list for finding and building worker solidarity from 50 years of Union Involvement. This list is not ranked; all of the principles stated herein are coequal in their importance. Numbering is a rhetorical choice, not a valuation. 1) Be good at your job. Even in...

#RPGaDay 2017 -- Day 18

Which RPG have you played the most in your life? If you count all the editions of D&D as one RPG, then the answer is D&D. I never was serious about 1st or 2nd Ed., but I was part of a 3E playtest group, and I started a 4E campaign basically as soon as I could. If you don't count all of the D&D editions as one, then the answer is HERO system, specifically Champions 4th Ed, the Big Blue Book. I was part of a group that played with the BBB for quite a while, through two multi-year campaigns. I have to admit, there is something rather satisfying about chucking great fistfuls of d6s across the battlemat and being able to figure out the body damage basically instantly. After that, I think it's GURPS, and then after that would be Pathfinder, and then 4E. I've dabbled so much with so many systems that the long-term campaigns basically swamp everything else.

#RPGaDay2018 Day 12: Your Wildest Character Concept?

I've always liked to play characters that are more than a little off-of-plumb, so this isn't actually very easy to figure out. I mean, aside from the geth detective-inspector, or the kobold necromancer, or the Paladin of Kuan-Yin who was forbidden from killing anything? I think the one that stands out the most to me at this point, looking back, is my halfling bard / gunslinger, Otto. He was designed to have the fastest mouth in all of Ptolus; all (and I mean ALL) of his resources were dumped into bluff and intimidate, and his perform skill was "monologuing". He was entirely about establishing a baseline of being a badass, and making sure no one noticed that he had absolutely nothing to back it up. Otto did eventually end up with a decent shooting skill, but other than that, he was mostly about talking himself into (and not nearly as often out of) trouble. Otto was fun.