Cairn v1.  Derived from 'into the odd', it's simple free and has a fair amount of support on itch.io.

I don't follow you how pocket fantasy is great , but Basic Fantasy is meh?  The whole of the Basic Fantasy ecosystem, rules, add-ons, modules, etc are all free pdfs.  Thousands of pages worth.

And if you want a printed copy they are super cheap on Amazon.

And if $5 is cheap enough I would add "White Box" by Charlie Mason, also on Amazon. It's swords and wizardry white box, reorganized.

Quote from: orbitalair on October 01, 2024, 10:34:17 AMCairn v1.  Derived from 'into the odd', it's simple free and has a fair amount of support on itch.io.

I don't follow you how pocket fantasy is great , but Basic Fantasy is meh?  The whole of the Basic Fantasy ecosystem, rules, add-ons, modules, etc are all free pdfs.  Thousands of pages worth.

And if you want a printed copy they are super cheap on Amazon.

And if $5 is cheap enough I would add "White Box" by Charlie Mason, also on Amazon. It's swords and wizardry white box, reorganized.

I like Pocket Fantasy over Basic Fantasy for a couple different reasons.

1.  Pocket Fantasy is an opposed roll system, while Basic Fantasy is a roll vs a static Armor Class number.  I grew up on Palladium's RPG's which use an opposed roll (Strike vs Parry, or Strike vs Dodge).  It "feels" better to us to have opposed rolls.  It also keeps players engaged when it's not their turn. 

2.  Pocket Fantasy is super rules lite, but still is a full featured game.  That impressed me, so it ranks high for that.

3.  Non-Vancian magic.  I am always going to prefer games with non-Vancian magic.  Quite a lot, actually.  Pocket Fantasy also never neuters the magicians.  They get 1-2 spells per fight, every fight.  More if they turn in re-roll tokens for extra spells.  In Vancian magic, when you're out of spells, you're better off putting on a chain mail shirt and a short sword you keep in your backpack. 

4.  Classes.  Both games only come with the typical four classes.  BF adds more, but they're scattered across different PDFs. PF has more as well, 14 in fact, but has them all concentrated on one PDF

Basic Fantasy: is more or less what got me into the OSR, I'm always going to give it a mention as it's a great introduction and a very good B/X system. in my imagined dream world, I'd have a book structured like OSE, but with the rules of Basic Fantasy.

Anyway for running Open-table stuff, Basic Fantasy is amazing since everything is free.

Maze Rats: Easily one of the most solid condensing and abstraction of the OSR D&D style, it's not quite compatible, but that's more an issue of translating stats more than anything.
The great thing about Maze Rats is the amount of tables, really useful tables, for loot, books, just random details or things you'd need.

Anything by Kevin Crawford: He has an extremely generous free version of almost all his major products, such as Worlds Without Number, and Stars without Number, and I do mean generous, the free versions are 85% of the paid version, and these books are huge coming in at 400 pages, so everything you need and would want is most likely in the free version.

Footnote: Now that I think about it, Basic Fantasy is Creative Commons work (another plus) someone could totally reformat it like OSE and publish that for free. not a bad idea.

I'd probably go with anything by Crawford if I can.

Is Better than Any Man still free?
Amazing scenario in sXVII Holy Roman Empire.

Quote from: fbnaulin on December 10, 2024, 05:16:21 PMIs Better than Any Man still free?
Amazing scenario in sXVII Holy Roman Empire.

It is.  Well, technically it's pay-what-you-want. 

Drive-Thru Link

Quote from: Socratic-DM on October 03, 2024, 11:47:44 AMAnything by Kevin Crawford: He has an extremely generous free version of almost all his major products, such as Worlds Without Number, and Stars without Number, and I do mean generous, the free versions are 85% of the paid version, and these books are huge coming in at 400 pages, so everything you need and would want is most likely in the free version.

He's been releasing free versions of all his stuff, basically top tier without the bling.

I do like Basic Fantasy.
I think it is still great Old School introduction.
It being free is super cool.

There is so much free stuff,  which I do appreciate.
Unfortunately the deluge makes it difficult to separate wheat from chaff

Quote from: jeff37923 on September 24, 2024, 05:58:52 AMClassic Traveller Facsimile Edition is a free PDF on DriveThru.

https://www.drivethrurpg.com/en/product/355200/classic-traveller-facsimile-edition

Don't know if Classic Traveller is still free there, but the Mongoose Traveller Starter Pack is free at the link below.

https://www.mongoosepublishing.com/products/starterpack?srsltid=AfmBOorePQNmo-JCzPVAa7T0s0ZPJEXD5EXTS2JOZyupxotfbXpSTHcx

And I will add another vote for Basic Fantasy. It is pretty good in my estimation.

Quote from: weirdguy564 on September 23, 2024, 08:22:51 PMI get daily emails of new or interesting products from Drive Thru RPG every day.  Tonight, another free RPG.

Fatebenders RPG.  I know nothing about it, and that's not really the point of this post. 

It seems to me that there are way too many RPG's available that are free as PDF's.

Don't get me wrong, I still buy commercial books.  Hell, I'm getting the original Rifts RPG 30th Anniversary in hardcover this week as a birthday gift, and my twin is getting Castles & Crusades PHB, MM, and DM Guide in exchange.  I also think he got off easy when it comes to cost of one $50 book, but C&C trio of books is about $160. 

So, let's forget that wallet drain and go back to free RPGs. 

Which ones do you like?

I'm a big fan of these:

1.  Pocket Fantasy, especially with the optional classes to bring it up to 14 classes.

2.  Basic Fantasy.   It's not the game so much.  In fact, what I like are all of the additional bits like more classes.  BF using just the main book seems a bit too little for me.

3.  Olde Swords Reign.  Almost nobody talks about this one, but I love the simple design.  Its best feature is the customization of the four stock classes.  With the customization, you don't need anything else. 

4.  Mini-six:Bare Bones.  This is the best set of D6 Star Wars style rules out there.   Almost.  The magic system needs some TLC, but that isn't hard to house rule.  Just let the GM set difficulty numbers vs effect size rather than use the fixed numbers from the book.

5.  True-D6.  Ok, I'm cheating.  The game is technically a dollar for the text only version.  It's not free, but a dollar isn't a large barrier to overcome.  I like it because it cleverly squeezes a lot of gameplay out of just 1D6.  There even is a fancier version with art called True -D6 Printable Edition, but is $6.  I also love it because the rules are reworked to be my favorite Samurai and Ninja game called Kogarashi. 

What free games should I look for next?

had some great experiences with grant howitt's one page rpgs, just one shots mind you, but fun ones nontheless. also Cat and Schauermärchen by jon wich are pretty nice

For free B/X style play, if you don't want WWN, I really like Heroes of Adventure

It adds and mixes stuff from several systems, well laid out, AI art is okay, 3 books and some adventures. Not one and done, the creator updates it and the GM tools are good.

Technically, the no art version of LotFP Rules And Magic is free, so it takes the cake any day of the week.

I was actively on DrivethruRPG ages ago and being flooded by free games became so overwhelming. Everybody is putting out games like there's no tomorrow and most of the stuff is just useless imho, while even the interesting stuff is still overwhelming that even if I wanted to use it there's no time. So I just decided to stick with some system favorites and unsubscribe from all the DTRPG nonsense and make life easier.

I only play free RPGs, basically...

BFRPG is the one I use most often.

There are free versions of LotFP, OSE, LL, OSRIC, WWN, LFG, Dungeon World, even D&D 2024 (and clones or SRDs of almost every version of D&D, excluding maybe 4e).

I hope I can make an updated and free version of my own in 2025.

There's also the Microlite D20 games. Stripped down versions of B/X, AD&D, 3E, 5E, PF, etc. All free:

https://www.drivethrurpg.com/en/publisher/9500/retroroleplaying?affiliate_id=196921