Another game so obscure even I forgot about it. Neoclassical Geek Revival. Definitely not OSR, but an extension of it. A lot of very interesting rules, a cool action economy, awesome initiative system, and most of its class abilities are about messing with it. I just need to figure out how to teach it to people so I can get it to the table, because it has a lot of weird differences if your used to D&D and the like.

TWERPS.

Kogarashi is a great game that could use more attention.  I mentioned it in my first post.

Why is it good? 

1.  Excellent use of just 1D6.  It's called The True D6 system.  It is a roll equal or under your six attributes to do a skill, and attributes are 1-4 to start with.  The number you roll is also your damage.  Thus, a strength of 3 means you can do 1-3 damage. 

2.  Armor is a saving throw.  1-3 armor points let's you block that much damage.  This is the only time you don't roll under your attributes.  Thus, armor is sort of an unofficial 7th attribute. 

3.  Customizable classes.  Everyone gets two class abilities to start.  As you level up there is a list of 20 abilities, skills, and spells you can pick from.  We're talking parrying arrows bare handed, teleporting thru shadows, summoning jade shuriken, or walk on water.  The magical classes get the more fantastical abilities.

4.  Non-Vancian magic.  As I said, you roll equal or under your attributes.  This includes spell casting.  It's just another skill check.  Some abilities can only be used once a day, while others can be reused until you fail a skill check.  The rest are just unlimited uses.

5.  Solo rules.  Not a lot, but there are rules for solo play.  This includes a simple "oracle" table with lines for about 20 types of questions.  Terrain, direction, NPC reactions, and several for dungeon creation. 

6.  Six classes: martial artist, noble (actually a rogue), ninja assassin, samurai, Onmyoji wizard, and Shinkan cleric

7.  Four races.  Humans, Japanese dwarves, shape-shifting animals (six sub-types), and halfbreed humans (six types, mostly different than the shifter animals).

Quote from: Zenoguy3 on May 24, 2024, 12:15:56 AM

Quote from: Brad on May 23, 2024, 09:14:57 AMWelp, I came in to say this but whatever! EABA is by far one of the best designed RPGs I've ever seen and it plays exceptionally well. Unfortunately, games like GURPS and HERO overshadow it, even with stuff like the CORPS supplement (which is easily the best X-Files style RPG setting ever). Anyway, I kinda feel bad for Greg Porter because he's an exceptional designer but never seemed to get the traction you'd expect. Contrast the BTRC catalog with the numerous trash takeoffs of PBtA...

I know right? One of these days I'm going to force a bunch of locals into a CORPS one shot just so I can make them see how good of a baseline EABA is. I've tried a couple times, but I never understood the rules well enough myself to get my players into it. I will say, I tried once to make a Jojo game using EABA, and it worked better than I expected, and way better than any other Jojo implementation I'd seen before.

OK, so this weekend I ran another of my Savage Worlds Middle Earth games at KublaCon, to a crowd of players who were mostly new to Savage Worlds.

Today after recovering from the con, I looked over my copy of EABALite again, and it's rather unsold me. Even the "lite" version of EABA is pretty confusing. I like the consistency and attention to detail that Porter puts in, and I'm annoyed by some inconsistencies in Savage Worlds - but ultimately, I want something that players can easily pick up and enjoy.

I feel more like wondering about what parts of EABA I can pull in to improve Savage Worlds than vice-versa.

There is a very bizarre Japanese game where you play as zombie girls, Nechronica.

Maybe the idea of this game is a bit (or very) off for most people, and the game mechanics are too complex for my sake, but the backstory is very interesting and can be a good source of inspiration for both dystopian, crapsack-world cyberpunk and for pseudo-scientifically-based zombies (here "zombies" are a kind of AI or even mind upload inside slime mold-based biological computers which can be tied to body parts or mechanical limbs and don't need electricity, since slime molds got their energy by eating living matter)

https://nechronica.miraheze.org/wiki/Main_Page

Quote from: weirdguy564 on May 28, 2024, 08:24:16 PMKogarashi is a great game that could use more attention.  I mentioned it in my first post.

That all looks incredibly interesting, I'll have to check it out.

Warbirds is another game I bet few have heard of. 

It's about playing mercenary fighter pilots on a world of floating Caribbean islands.  There is nothing but gas below them called The Murk, which they suck up and refine into fuel as if it were petroleum.  If there is land under that, the people haven't found it yet.  So, they stick to the open skies, clouds, and floating islands like Cuba, Puero Rico, and Grenada. 

Dice wise it's yet another 1D6 based system.  Attribute + Skill + 1D6, beat a target number.   

It is a classless game.  You're defined by your skills.  It's also not intended to be just a flying dogfight game.  Your pilots are anything you want.  A roving investigative reporter.  A treasure hunter. A military officer.   A merc pilot who's smooth with the ladies. 

It is just that they're all pilots as well.

Technology is the 1930's.  Biplanes are still a thing, but they're metal. 

Interestingly, the people and islands used to be from a traditional Caribbean Sea on an Earth from 1804.  A weird storm whisked the islands of the Caribbean to this new world.  They speak the languages we know, and have our real religions, etc.  they progressed technology along similar lines to what we know, so they're now a 1930's tech.  The only weird science are the flying ships that use float-stone mined from the islands to hover.  It's all normal after that.  Or not, as weird science is an optional rule if you want.

I like it.  It's an interesting setting more than anything else. 

Quote from: weirdguy564 on June 12, 2024, 08:02:59 PMWarbirds is another game I bet few have heard of. 
...

That's incredibly interesting. Thanks for the reading material

Quote from: weirdguy564 on May 28, 2024, 08:24:16 PMKogarashi is a great game that could use more attention.  I mentioned it in my first post.

Why is it good? 

1.  Excellent use of just 1D6.  It's called The True D6 system.  It is a roll equal or under your six attributes to do a skill, and attributes are 1-4 to start with.  The number you roll is also your damage.  Thus, a strength of 3 means you can do 1-3 damage. 

2.  Armor is a saving throw.  1-3 armor points let's you block that much damage.  This is the only time you don't roll under your attributes.  Thus, armor is sort of an unofficial 7th attribute. 

3.  Customizable classes.  Everyone gets two class abilities to start.  As you level up there is a list of 20 abilities, skills, and spells you can pick from.  We're talking parrying arrows bare handed, teleporting thru shadows, summoning jade shuriken, or walk on water.  The magical classes get the more fantastical abilities.

4.  Non-Vancian magic.  As I said, you roll equal or under your attributes.  This includes spell casting.  It's just another skill check.  Some abilities can only be used once a day, while others can be reused until you fail a skill check.  The rest are just unlimited uses.

5.  Solo rules.  Not a lot, but there are rules for solo play.  This includes a simple "oracle" table with lines for about 20 types of questions.  Terrain, direction, NPC reactions, and several for dungeon creation. 

6.  Six classes: martial artist, noble (actually a rogue), ninja assassin, samurai, Onmyoji wizard, and Shinkan cleric

7.  Four races.  Humans, Japanese dwarves, shape-shifting animals (six sub-types), and halfbreed humans (six types, mostly different than the shifter animals).

Based on your recommendation I checked out True-d6 ($1 on drivethru). Wanted to say thanks for turning me onto it. I really dig the text file only philosophy. Reminds me of something that could have been floating around back in the AOL days.

It's a solid system, very hackable, and super easy to print out sections for handouts or even add your own house rules and subsystems to it.

Any of Clash Bowlery's games but in particular the In Harms Way military rpgs (I really liked the Wild Blue modern air combat game but the others are all cool too) and Cold Space (the cold war in space with orion nuclear pulse drives).  Lowell Was Right (19th century applied physics, not steam, not punk) and Tools of Ignorance (the baseball league rpg) are also really cool.

My vote goes to Mayfair's MEGS system used for DC Heroes 1e-3e. Besides the best system for supers I have used, it is certainly capable of serving as a generic game engine. Maybe not as polished as some of the newer games mentioned, but I am surprised it does not have a heartbreaker available by now.

Quote from: the crypt keeper on June 13, 2024, 11:40:13 AMMy vote goes to Mayfair's MEGS system used for DC Heroes 1e-3e. Besides the best system for supers I have used, it is certainly capable of serving as a generic game engine. Maybe not as polished as some of the newer games mentioned, but I am surprised it does not have a heartbreaker available by now.

MEGS doesn't really qualify as it is extremely well-known; I mean, it was used for the DC RPG for around 15 years. That notwithstanding, I guess if you hate life you could get Blood of Heroes and just pull the system from there for whatever you want to do.

Quote from: Rox on June 09, 2024, 08:09:52 AMThere is a very bizarre Japanese game where you play as zombie girls, Nechronica.

I want to run this game.  It's going to be a tough sell though. 

Quote from: Zenoguy3 on June 12, 2024, 11:41:30 PM

Quote from: weirdguy564 on June 12, 2024, 08:02:59 PMWarbirds is another game I bet few have heard of. 
...

That's incredibly interesting. Thanks for the reading material

I am glad I could put that one on your reading list.

Also, just so everyone knows, Warbirds also has a few expansion books.  One is for Cold War jets.  It has nothing in it for a weird setting.  It just presents the rules for missiles, and stats for many well known jet fighters like the F-15, Mig-15, F-14, Su-27, F-86, FRS-1 Sea Harrier, Mirage-III, ect.

There is also a WW-2 sourcebook with stats for planes like the Spitfire, Zero, Hellcat, Focke-Wulf 190, Lavochkin LA-5FN, ect.  Again, it isn't presented as a new time era of the floaty island setting.  It could be used to run a military campaign in the 1940's on Earth.  Or you could use them as the planes of choice on Azure, which is the name of the gas planet with floaty islands.  That is up to you.

Last, there is a space game as well, and this one does have a setting attached to it.  It advances the timeline forward, and the people of Azure have gone into space using VERY primitive spacecraft.  Then they encounter VERY high tech aliens.  Long story short: The side effects of the unique, but low tech Azure spacecraft interferes with the high tech gadgets of the aliens, rendering them both on an even playing field.  Dieselpunk spacecraft can hold their own against the sci-fi super alien technology of the future.

Quote from: weirdguy564 on June 12, 2024, 08:02:59 PMWarbirds is another game I bet few have heard of...

I'm on the short list.  I should probably give it a re-read.