Quote from: Armchair Gamer;819575Fate suffers from the problem that it's a toolkit more than a complete game; Savage Worlds, which surprisingly didn't make the list, suffers the same problem. I think new players might be at a loss for "what do we do?" D&D has never had that problem--"go into dungeons, fight monsters, grab treasure/save the princess."

Fate and Savage Worlds are both games where if they are being pitched for beginners it should include the caveat "and buy a setting book".

Savage Worlds would actually be a really good beginners game, as long as someone buys a setting book with it.

Quote from: The Butcher;819556I don't know what is worse, the ideological bias or the all-too-common "newbs are dumb and will only enjoy rules-lite games."

The condescension might be upsetting if it weren't so amusingly wrong. IME (insert anecdotes are not necessarily data disclaimer here) it's generally the folks who've been around a while who tend to have the most appreciation for simple/rules-lite systems precisely because they're older; with age naturally comes work and/or family obligations making greater demands on their time (for most folks, anyway), so they want games that are easy to set up, simple to run and don't have a lot of cruft and rules getting in the way and slowing things down. It's the newbies, most of whom seem to get their start in grade school or college, when free time is abundant, who are more willing to chew on a load of crunch.

Quote from: woodsmoke;819596The condescension might be upsetting if it weren't so amusingly wrong. IME (insert anecdotes are not necessarily data disclaimer here) it's generally the folks who've been around a while who tend to have the most appreciation for simple/rules-lite systems precisely because they're older; with age naturally comes work and/or family obligations making greater demands on their time (for most folks, anyway), so they want games that are easy to set up, simple to run and don't have a lot of cruft and rules getting in the way and slowing things down. It's the newbies, most of whom seem to get their start in grade school or college, when free time is abundant, who are more willing to chew on a load of crunch.

   This has been documented as going back to the 80s, when D&D was more popular among more experienced fans and AD&D the game of choice for the newer players, after they got started. Given the prevalence of the Red Box, I wonder if this is related at all to the common approach of "we played AD&D like Basic with more options and a few details added in where we wanted them."

Quote from: woodsmoke;819596The condescension might be upsetting if it weren't so amusingly wrong. IME (insert anecdotes are not necessarily data disclaimer here) it's generally the folks who've been around a while who tend to have the most appreciation for simple/rules-lite systems precisely because they're older; with age naturally comes work and/or family obligations making greater demands on their time (for most folks, anyway), so they want games that are easy to set up, simple to run and don't have a lot of cruft and rules getting in the way and slowing things down. It's the newbies, most of whom seem to get their start in grade school or college, when free time is abundant, who are more willing to chew on a load of crunch.

This is true.  The older I get the less bullshit mechanics I want out of the game.  I just want to focus on the role playing since that is the reason why we are playing in the first place.  These young kids can't understand that and I have to explain it to them about the benefits of rules lite system which I strongly feel is far superior than the big bulky systems.

Quote from: Sacrosanct;819554Bwuh?  What does this even mean?



That must be used to mean "unusual" and not "gay" right?  Otherwise that seems like a tightly and narrowly focused preference.  Then again, it might explain the highly niche selection used.

If we're not talking currently in print games, I'd also add Basic D&D to the list, as well as 5e.  I'm partial to Moldvay's Basic since the player section is literally only a dozen pages or so.  And also probably that RPG for kids game too.

I dunno. I have a very close friend who is gay and both he and his boyfriend would scoff at that list (and they have very different tastes themselves). It needs more superheroes, Deadlands or Shadowrun to fit their particular tastes.

Personally, I have used AD&D2e, Savage Worlds, Dragon Age, Marvel SAGA, Star Wars Saga Edition and Buffy the Vampire Slayer all as beginner RPGs with great success.

I started my kids on the Dungeons and Dragons Boardgame. which is more of a Boardgame with RPG elements than an actual boardgame.
but I did put in a bit of RP here and there.

Then after that I ran Dragon Warriors, Pathfinder and Other Dust (by Sine Nomine).
Now I run 5E for both my kids and  Scarlett Heroes 1 on 1 with my daughter sometimes..

Quote from: Sacrosanct;819554Bwuh?  What does this even mean?
That must be used to mean "unusual" and not "gay" right?  Otherwise that seems like a tightly and narrowly focused preference.  Then again, it might explain the highly niche selection used.

He is gay. http://gaygamer.net/author/bryceduzan/

Queer Eye for the RPG Guy?

Quote from: Armchair Gamer;819575But isn't one of the core ideas of certain segments of the hobby (that appear to be in the driver seat for 5E) that the overly complex modern versions of D&D alienated new players, and that we should go back to the simplicity of the Red Box or the 'simplicity' of AD&D?

Sort of. See, I wouldn't hand a copy of Rolemaster or Pathfinder or even Savage Worlds to an 11-year-old and tell him to figure it out.

But very often, when the subject of "good introductory games" comes up online, people tend to assume that rules-light = newbie-friendly, despite having been introduced to gaming with BECMI or B/X D&D, or WEG D6 Star Wars or any one of several old games that nowadays no one really thinks of as "rules-light."

Unless one is conflating "rules-light" with "rules-medium stuff I played/play a lot and know by heart and it's a breeze to run" but that's another can of worms entirely.

Anyway, I think the importance of choosing the "right" game pales before the importance of the attitude of thd GM and the rest of the group. It is my experience that voluminous books do intimidate newbs, who might imagine elaborate and obfuscating rulesets. But I put them at ease by clarifying that it doesn't matter because you don't have to know the rules to play a roleplaying game. That is a preconceived notion they carry over from boardgames. All you have to do is to play your role, i.e. your character, and the burden of handling the mechanical bits for the beginner should fall upon the GM, possibly with the help if other players.

If there's interest, I trust that the new player will become familiarized with the rules at his or her own pace, in due time.

Quote from: The Butcher;819621Unless one is conflating "rules-light" with "rules-medium stuff I played/play a lot and know by heart and it's a breeze to run" but that's another can of worms entirely.

Yeah, no kidding.  I rather doubt that there'd be so very much support for D&D on the list here if it wasn't (a) the game the advocates grew up with; (b) the industry leader throughout the history of RPGs; (c) the game with overwhelming name recognition; (d) the game the advocates are familiar with; and (e) the one for which newbies are most likely to find games.

For Chrissake, the two PDFs comprising 5th edition's freebie basic rules total a whopping 178 pages.  GURPS Lite is a third the size, and GURPS wouldn't be my first choice for a newbie, even if I've been teaching it successfully to newbies for 29 years.

D&D is a great pick (almost every edition) not because of nostalgia, but because it has the most GM support. Ready made monsters, ready made well... everything.

Plus its level based, so relative power level is a lot easier to judge and its not as complex as a point build for characters. There are options, but its mostly "choose this or this" when you level.

Even 3.x, which I personally think is too fiddly for new gamers, has such a WEALTH of material to pull from for the average GM that I would still suggest 3.x/PF to a new group before I would suggest most games.

Its not nostalgia, its practicality. Its just one of the easiest games to run, because you aren't thrown out in the deep end of "make every single thing up because there is no support for you" which is where a lot of games sit.

And rules complexity and rules length are HARDLY the same thing. Those 178 pages of the Basic PDF are mostly just character options like class/race/background, things you have pick in creation once and have great guidelines for picking them and they are done. The actual play of 5e is super simple. (and then you have the pages of spells, something else that doesn't add complexity, ready made stuff = easier).

Quote from: The Butcher;819621See, I wouldn't hand a copy of Rolemaster or Pathfinder or even Savage Worlds to an 11-year-old and tell him to figure it out.

I'd give the kid a copy of RIFTS. Here's why:

A) It fun to fuck with kid's heads. Little bastards deserve it.

B) Rifts is a tween's fevered dream of awesomeness. None of that watered down corporate bullshit or aren't we PC hipster indie crap. Rifts is just page after page of GUNS! ROBOTS! BLIND BOOBIE NINJAS! SKULL NAZIS!

C) The kid wouldn't give a shit about the system and their version of the system would probably be really fun to play.

Yeah, I was a fan of the Robotech RPG, so I was probably going to like Rifts, but thumbing through it and seeing all those awesome Kevin Long illustrations...

I'm glad Kevin got into video games where he can obviously make more money, but I wish he had been drawing for Rifts all this time.

Quote from: Spinachcat;819645B) Rifts is a tween's fevered dream of awesomeness. None of that watered down corporate bullshit or aren't we PC hipster indie crap. Rifts is just page after page of GUNS! ROBOTS! BLIND BOOBIE NINJAS! SKULL NAZIS!

That may be the greatest description of RIFTS I think I've ever seen.

Gotta say it - LBB Traveller. With or without the "official" setting, the actual rules are damn simple. The UPP might not be intuitive since it's just a string of numbers, but list them vertically and label them like D&D did and I think that it would be an awesome into RPG. You can (and we did) put an entire character on one side of an index card and then you're off - Ad Astra!