Quote from: JeremyR;663013West End Games had to come up with a simpler version of the D6 system because people (at cons) apparently struggled with adding up d6s.

I believe that was their legend system. I was shocked when I heard about it, but I've only had one, maybe two, players who got confused adding dice together.

I was going to run a Lands of Adventure game set in Classical Greece. We rolled up characters and it just kind of fell apart. We played two sessions and then personal problems got in the way of the game. It's a shame because the party looked like it might be pretty interesting. I don't have my copy anymore. I remember the game being complex, but not more complex than Chivalry and Sorcery 1st or 2nd ed.

I've run C&S many times and it use to be my preferred fantasy game for most of the 80s. Still have my copies of 1st and 2nd edition.

The most complex game I've run that I didn't enjoy would be Space Opera. I had already been playing/running Traveller for a couple of years so Space Opera felt like lots more complication without any real payoff. I didn't think Rolemaster was overly complex, but I wasn't fond of the endless charts.

Bleah, sorry, I realize I'm rambling so let's shut this down.

Quote from: David Johansen;663075Or you can just write down the result the first time you work it out.  But IRRC the per rank multipier did change to reflect the difficulty sometimes.  Don't take my word for it, it's been years.

I just looked at the combat rules for Universe.  Painful.  Anyway, lots of squaring of numbers going on.  And charts to get new modifiers from.  And each skill has rules of its own to look up.

I never could get anyone to play this game when it first came out.  I liked the world generation bit from it though.

As for complex games no one ever playeed surely Eoris is in with a shout - http://www.rpg.net/reviews/archive/15/15093.phtml

Powers & Perils. We didn't even make it beyond character creation.
Followed up by Aftermath and then Chivalry & Sorcery. Still, at least we actually played (and enjoyed) both of those.

Quote from: David Johansen;663077Yeah, great system except that a first level fighter who puts 25 points into Strength and weilds a maul can kill trolls in a single blow.  I like so much about C&S 3e but there are some holes that are hard to plug.

Earlier editions were worst. 1st edition far, far worse, and even more worse when you used the Vikings books. We had a 1st level priest of Odin who could kick a Nazgul to death in half a turn with his bare foot (with over 100% chance to hit), and couldn't die during the fight (but would afterwards if a fatal wounds were inflicted).

Quote from: David Johansen;663077Still, why fight when you can bring a case of liquor at the bottom of the supply cart and use it to bribe the orcs?

You know the reason the orcs only charge a toll of one copper piece? Because if it's higher, they can't count that high, and they can't tell coppy from silver or gold. Or cow dung, half the time.

Quote from: Jason Coplen;663084I believe that was their legend system. I was shocked when I heard about it, but I've only had one, maybe two, players who got confused adding dice together.

I've known people (one in particular) who have no problem with it, but insist on adding them up out loud, one at a time.

GURPS 3E Revised. As a player I enjoyed it, as a GM I had to simplify some stuff to find it enjoyable. I'm fine with its char gen.

MERPS

Quote from: Libertad;6629773rd Edition Dungeons & Dragons.

+1

Well, 3.x/Pathfinder. A horrible mess of assumptions and other stuff that I just couldn't grok.

Quote from: KenHR;663008I'm with you.  But not many others are.  I used to tutor algebra for college undergrads; they could barely do multiplication without begging for their calculators.  That was about 10 years ago...don't want to think what the situation is like now.

Hell 10 years ago people whined to high heaven about subtraction on RPGnet and the like.

It still goes on apparently...

As for "Maths is hard, call the waaambulance!" I teach in a Junior High School (12 -15 in age). Classes there where Deriving Quadratic Formula: x2 + 6x + 10 = 0

Seeing that on the board made my brain hurt! Though I could do it once, I seem to have forgotten.

undoubtedly burning wheel. i fucking hated every minute of it. it was the most un-fun rpg experience i have ever had.

Rolemaster certainly. I enjoyed the campaign as a player but I would never run such a monstrosity. Charts upon charts for everything.

Also, tedious chargen combined with a randomly lethal combat system is not a good mix. I don't mind frequent character death but combined with that much  pain in creating a new one its a waste of time.

Space Opera. Character generation took an entire day, and mostly involved plotting out half our character's lives, doing shit-loads of math, and deciding what university courses they took. Played one session and it was more work than fun. Space Opera was like taking a university course on a really boring subject when you're 12.

Comparatively, character generation in Chivalry and Sorcery wasn't so bad. However, we never did more than make characters for C&S.

Just to echo some of the previous ones.

Space Opera - OMG complicated but I learned a lot about astrophysics from its space and planetary generation system.

Tri-Tac systems - Fringeworthy, Bureau 13, Incursion etc. All great games with great backgrounds / settings but hell of a difficult combat system. I loved it before I knew better very realistic in some ways in others didn't work so well.

Aftermath - Another overly complex combat system but realistic (As much as I could ever want) and deadly.

Warp World - had a magic system that was overly complex but had very definitive rules about it but it was something I could barely "Get" even though I love systems and rules.

Quote from: David Johansen;662993I honestly don't get that.  Fourth grade math is very basic skills for daily living math.  How people can even live in the modern world without using it is mystifying to me.

Quote from: Rincewind1;662994It's not about difficulty, it's about tediousness of it all.

The math underlying doing your taxes isn't hard either. And yet a lot people pay someone else to do it because it's a drag.

My buddies and I were unusual among RPGers in the 80s in that we weren't geeks in the math and science sense. We were into comics and reading and drawing, but had a strong aversion to anything in a game that looked mathy. Could I work out a formula in grade 8 math test? Yep. Did I want to work our formulas as part of fun-time playing games? Nope.