I just read the player book and most of the gm book. I want to like this game but it seems like a lot of subsystems and information to learn before the first game.

I really want to like Forbidden Lands. I like the art and production of the books, maps,  and core box. It just seems intimidating.

How does it play?

It's billed as low prep but it seems like I need to know a ton of lore and history to run a game in that world. Each adventure site has history, NPCs, random backstories, politics/local issues, and links to other places. Seems like a lot of studying beforehand, especially since it's a sandbox and I don't really know where or what the players will decide during a session. The Raven's Purge campaign book seems like a ton of info to know as well.

It seems like a ton of rules and lore to know before the first game. It's like I need to take a survey course in Forbidden Land lore before starting the Raven's Purge campaign.

I'm also not sure why players need to hurt themselves to gain access to their talents (ie: pushing roll for willpower). Seems strange.

It all seems a bit overwhelming. Would love feedback from anyone that's played it. Am I overreacting? Is it easier in play?

Also, I also own Alien, Walking Dead, The One Ring, and Dragonbane. It seems like Free League really likes to so many subsystems to their games. So far, the only one that really clicks for me (by Free League) is Dragonbane. It doesn't feel bogged down by the rules.

Forbidden Lands is "low prep" in that a lot of adventure time is spent in a hexcrawl where you roll for each hex to determine what is there, and if you find a town or castle or whatever you can put a sticker on the map. The campaign grows organically that way, and for most of the game nobody (even the GM) knows what the full map will look like.

And then there are the premade adventure points, which the GM can place anywhere. Those require a lot more prep as they have full writeups and the GM ought to read ahead to see what is contained at those points.

There's a lot to like about Year Zero and Forbidden Lands.

However, I terminated a campaign after 9 sessions due to some mechanical issues built into the system.

1. It's very easy to create a mechanically broken character that's unstoppable in combat. This either makes combat uninteresting OR I have to devote a lot of extra effort to contriving reasons why combat is still interesting (weird, again this monster targets the OP character's weaknesses).

2. We had a huge issue with the push mechanic. The game is supposed to be gritty, but there's almost never a reason not to push - you recover nearly everything with 1 rest, so my team was running around with lots of extra meta-currency (willpower). Even if you restrict pushing to "only when it matters" this happened all of the time. Again, made it feel much less gritty.

If I run it again I'd use Forbidden Lands Reforged (on DTRPG) - contains excellent fixes for all of this and more.

Quote from: Pen on January 01, 2025, 10:23:03 PMHow does it play?

It's billed as low prep but it seems like I need to know a ton of lore and history to run a game in that world. Each adventure site has history, NPCs, random backstories, politics/local issues, and links to other places. Seems like a lot of studying beforehand, especially since it's a sandbox and I don't really know where or what the players will decide during a session. The Raven's Purge campaign book seems like a ton of info to know as well.

Yeah it's low prep. The lore available on the maps and supplement are very shallow and what you would expect from a brief description. I just don't like the 'game system' with all of them d6s tumbling around. I bought a bunch of them when I wanted to introduce the game to my players. I didn't appreciate all the dice at the table.
The books are a fun light read and I still keep them around for skimming ideas. The tables are great.

I played around 9-10 sessions but haven't ran any as GM so apply salt as needed.

As already stated above, it's low prep in the sense that one of the three pillars (exploration) is entirely random so you don't have to prep it if you're doing that sort of campaign (which I recommend you do instead of something more linear).  I really enjoyed my time with it but there are some issues in balance where stats are much better than skills at creation and absolutely bombing your character with low level talents is incredibly effective at giving you tons more options/abilities than someone who doesn't.   I really enjoyed the core system though and the degrading stats aren't as debilitating as you might think given that simply sleeping for a shift fully heals them (or is it one stat per rest?  don't recall off hand).   

I do like Forbidden Lands.  Yes some of the mechanics are clunky.
I am a big use the rules you want and don't use the ones that get in the way kind of person.  I even use rules from other games and import them in.
In Forbidden lands I almost do it for quick in and out plays with no strings attached.
Create the area, get to the area. I do like the resource and survival stuff, it can change how the players react to an area they come into.  Do what you want in the area and get out.  I also reuse areas if the characters want to travel through them again, sometimes they are repopulated, sometimes to the chagrin of the players.
I have fun with it.

I'm unfamiliar with Forbidden Lands itself, but I have full confidence in Free League to provide a product that's just about escapism without inserting low-effort allegory. Dragonbane might be a little underbaked, but it's my favorite D20 system hands-down, and I cannot find a single thing in its Core Rulebook trying to influence my political leanings.

QuoteI'm also not sure why players need to hurt themselves to gain access to their talents (ie: pushing roll for willpower). Seems strange.

Logic behind it I guess is that adversity hones determination, I guess.

Quote1. It's very easy to create a mechanically broken character that's unstoppable in combat. This either makes combat uninteresting OR I have to devote a lot of extra effort to contriving reasons why combat is still interesting (weird, again this monster targets the OP character's weaknesses).

Really. When I was reading stronger monsters I have feeling even good martials would have a problem. Like griffin just shredded us...

Quote from: Wrath of God on January 04, 2025, 03:08:44 PM

QuoteI'm also not sure why players need to hurt themselves to gain access to their talents (ie: pushing roll for willpower). Seems strange.

Logic behind it I guess is that adversity hones determination, I guess.

That which brain damages us only makes us stronger!    Yeah, I'm not a fan of that particular mechanic exclusively generating metacurrency as well as some talents/abilities only being usable with WP.  I feel like having a baseline amount to start each adventure with and regaining one with rest as well as generating more with failed rolls would have been a better compromise.

Quote

Quote1. It's very easy to create a mechanically broken character that's unstoppable in combat. This either makes combat uninteresting OR I have to devote a lot of extra effort to contriving reasons why combat is still interesting (weird, again this monster targets the OP character's weaknesses).

Really. When I was reading stronger monsters I have feeling even good martials would have a problem. Like griffin just shredded us...

Yeah, if a strong monster hits and you don't make that dodge roll.. it really doesn't matter how many talents you have when the 2d6 hits come in.   When I was playing, I basically made a beeline for the talents that let me dodge and reroll crits after session one had a player beheaded in literally the first round of combat with a monster.

I'm curious, but I haven't played it and don't think I will. On the other hand, I like the idea of places to explore and the sandbox universe.

Quote from: ElifeLau on January 05, 2025, 04:56:37 PMI'm curious, but I haven't played it and don't think I will. On the other hand, I like the idea of places to explore and the sandbox universe.

It's definitely a strong point for me personally and something that was a novel experience.  It's obviously not the first game to have hexcrawl/exploration as a key element but it was the first that I personally played given most of my prior experience was with Palladium's various rehashed games, D&D 3.x, Shadowrun, and others.