Eclipse Phase: The spiking d100 system was quite easy to run but my god was it a complicated hot mess of skills that made 3.x look simplified.

Quote from: GiantToenail on July 13, 2023, 12:19:13 AM
Storygames? Simulationist? High Crunch? Low Crunch? Jenga disguised as an RPG? How have your tastes changed?

5e: It isn't D&D. AD&D was a step away, then 3e-PF was a good walk away and 5e is on the other side of the planet.

The Rules Cyclopedia is D&D in its most complete form 

GURPS: Loved it until I finally gave up on trying to make superheroes work. The system is NOT "Universal".

Shadowrun: The Sixth World is a great setting. Incredible! But the ruleset ...

WoD.

My first ever game that I GM'd was Werewolf the Apocalypse, and I ran WoD through the 90's and in to the early 00's. That's the last time I ran it.

3e D&D/Pathfinder 1e; I still think the 1e Pathfinder Beginner Box as a great game, but 3e is much too complicated and breaks really fast at higher level. IMO 5e D&D is just a better game.

Star Wars D6; I tried the action system when I started running Mini Six, couldn't hack it. I need Mini Six's streamlined approach.

2e AD&D; I ran Council of Wyrms and was shocked how poorly 2e held up. Older editions and OSR games just do trad  D&D better, 5e does neo-D&D better. 2e is an unhappy transitional game with little merit of its own IMO.

Back in the day I used to like running Mega Traveller because of the crunch.  Now, I dislike that level of mechanics and would much rather play something like Cepheus

I find it very telling that the same games keep coming up... and yet we hold those games in such high-esteem.

But when conversations about "updating" those editions/systems come up - or other systems which represent those settings come to pass - people will go gung-ho to defend those older systems. I encountered this a lot when FFG dropped Star Wars, and everyone came out with the d6 pitchforks and torches. I was one of them.

FFG Star Wars works very well. The *only* reason I've put it down is because at the level of detail I run my games in, FFG's system-flaws become real problems for me and my players. Well that, and I think SWADE would do Star Wars better.

This is true of 2e D&D as well. Same sort of phenomenon. I love 2e dearly... but unless my players demanded that I run it, I'd be more likely to create my own fantasy heartbreaker edition of it.

The D6 system, at least for fantasy (which is my favorite genre). And I guess any purely skill-based system while I'm at it (again, for fantasy). Modern and sci-fi games seem to do well with characters who are more diverse and capable at a variety of things, but for fantasy I prefer a class- or archetype-based system where each character has a more rigidly defined niche, a very particular set of skills, if you will. Plus in fantasy it feels like all characters should at least have some focus on combat, while in other genres they can do without more easily.

Or maybe this just reflects on my shortcomings as a GM

Mage the Ascension.

Not because of the mechanics. I rewrote those from the ground up shortly after they ended the line to launch the NWoD (PDFs weren't the thing they are today and I needed a reliably available rulebook for my players).

Rather it was because I got involved in apologetics ("explaining the faith") with my Church and came to understand how utterly toxic the Gnostic underpinnings of the setting were. Essentially I no longer felt like I could run the system in good conscience.

These days when I run World of Darkness I gravitate to the VtM corner of the mythos with an underpinning of "The Catholic Church is right about everything" and werewolves reimagined as suffering the curse of Lycaon and Mages are limited to Blood Magic* (Tremere and mortal Witches), True Faith (specifically Roman Catholic faith), Psychics (inborn powers) and advanced tech (not really magic, but more James Bond tier and allows the MIB to be a scary thing that can turn up).

These days I push to run hunters as PCs rather than vampires (dhampirs and similar "monster-adjacent" types are also allowed... I'm a fan of Changeling the Lost as "survivors of supernatural abuse" as that aligns with the overall cosmology I'm using) and am presently looking at a structural level rebuild of the mechanics to enable the mostly "table-less" tabletop play my groups have gravitated to (i.e. we sit around the family room on sofas and comfy chairs and roll dice on whatever flat surface we can manage... big dice pools aren't conducive for that).

* sidebar: in the cosmology I run with God only gave Cain immortality (so as to have all the time needed to repent) all the vampiric powers and curses came from his pact with Satan enabled by the first witch/demoness Lilith. This resolved the whole "what sort of God creates vampires?" matter (and also makes it more in line with Dracula's mythos where he was a satanic sorcerer and "vampirism" was just a manifestation of his magic).

Quote from: S'mon on July 18, 2023, 02:50:04 AM

Star Wars D6; I tried the action system when I started running Mini Six, couldn't hack it. I need Mini Six's streamlined approach.

Hey, good.  It's not just me that thinks D6 Star Wars combat sequence is not good.

I also prefer Mini-Six static defense rule better.

Quote from: weirdguy564 on July 21, 2023, 01:58:36 PM

Quote from: S'mon on July 18, 2023, 02:50:04 AM

Star Wars D6; I tried the action system when I started running Mini Six, couldn't hack it. I need Mini Six's streamlined approach.

Hey, good.  It's not just me that thinks D6 Star Wars combat sequence is not good.

I also prefer Mini-Six static defense rule better.

Yes, that's where I am now. Iterative initiative based on AGL rolls, attacks vs static defence. Hero Points giving +6 to one roll, not Force Points doubling all rolls. Looking back on running SW D6 in the late '80s I'm not sure now how I ever enjoyed it as written. Even at the time I remember Force Points being overpowered, no one ever ran away from Stormtroopers as in ep IV, when you could spend a FP and just blow them all away as in Rogue One.

Quote from: S'mon on July 22, 2023, 02:49:27 AM

Quote from: weirdguy564 on July 21, 2023, 01:58:36 PM

Quote from: S'mon on July 18, 2023, 02:50:04 AM

Star Wars D6; I tried the action system when I started running Mini Six, couldn't hack it. I need Mini Six's streamlined approach.

Hey, good.  It's not just me that thinks D6 Star Wars combat sequence is not good.

I also prefer Mini-Six static defense rule better.

Yes, that's where I am now. Iterative initiative based on AGL rolls, attacks vs static defence. Hero Points giving +6 to one roll, not Force Points doubling all rolls. Looking back on running SW D6 in the late '80s I'm not sure now how I ever enjoyed it as written. Even at the time I remember Force Points being overpowered, no one ever ran away from Stormtroopers as in ep IV, when you could spend a FP and just blow them all away as in Rogue One.

Yup.  I prefer Mini-6.

However, it dawned on me that static Defense is just a re-invented Armor Class system.  Yet, it's not totally true.  In Mini-6 armor can interfere with dexterity and that makes scoring hits easier to achieve.  Armor's real value in D6 rules is to make it not hurt that bad, if at all, when you are hit and wearing armor. 

I'm not nostalgic for either WEG SW 1st or 2nd edition.  Mini-6 is better for my table.

The whole crunchy D&D/fantasy genre has left me cold for a long time.  If I were to ever come back, it would be Tunnels and Trolls or one of the Arduin Grimoire variants.

5th Edition Dungeons and Dragons.

I really loved it when it first came out... Ran more than a few campaigns with it. Bound Accuracy was really awesome in the sense it felt like you could throw Higher CR rating creatures at your Party and not worry... And lower level CR creatures were still a threat.

Overtime though, the game began to show it's warts. Most of the Monsters in it are just... Big bags of Hit Points that don't really do anything interesting combat wise... and the Legendary Saves and Lair actions are just a band aid to handle all the "Save or Suck" spells that are still in the game.

The final nail in the coffin for me was reading Pathfinder 2e, which is just mathmatically a much better experience with more interesting options for Players and DMs in characters and Monsters.

Quote from: Orphan81 on July 26, 2023, 09:43:09 PM
5th Edition Dungeons and Dragons.

I really loved it when it first came out... Ran more than a few campaigns with it. Bound Accuracy was really awesome in the sense it felt like you could throw Higher CR rating creatures at your Party and not worry... And lower level CR creatures were still a threat.

Overtime though, the game began to show it's warts. Most of the Monsters in it are just... Big bags of Hit Points that don't really do anything interesting combat wise... and the Legendary Saves and Lair actions are just a band aid to handle all the "Save or Suck" spells that are still in the game.

The final nail in the coffin for me was reading Pathfinder 2e, which is just mathmatically a much better experience with more interesting options for Players and DMs in characters and Monsters.

You should do a thread that explains what's great about PF2E.  I played it a few times, and nothing really grabbed me. I recall there was a three-action economy (?) that didn't feel right.

I was enjoying 5E until I joined a 2E campaign and was reminded how much more exciting and engaging the older systems are.

Now I'm in that conundrum that I've almost completely lost interest in 5E, but it's the edition pretty much everyone else is playing. I'd really like to get a Castles and Crusades campaign (Greyhawk) going where I live, but my work schedule keeps me out of town about a third of the time so it's problematic.