What's a Good Gamist Game?
Ghostwheel:
Sorry if this is in the wrong forum, but had a question for the people who frequent this board... I'm a first-time poster, so please be gentle :-)
I've been looking around, and haven't found a good gamist RPG. I'm looking for something with tactical combat, where you can make on-the-fly decisions that change the outcome of the combat/specific rounds in meaningful ways, while still being challenging. I've tried various incarnations of D&D (3.5, PF, 4e), and the closest that's come is if you had D&D 3.5 focused on Tome of Battle. A primarily encounter-centered resource management system is a big part of what I'm looking for, as well as a strong and balanced encounter system that allows you to quickly and easily create encounters for the players with a good idea of how challenging that encounter will be all the while staying on the RNG. I far prefered ToB over D&D 4e due to the ability to regain encounter powers (maneuver) without having to spam one's at-wills, and having to decide if one should use a power, regain the use of powers, or save powers for later, all the while staying within the action economy. That cerebral type of gameplay is very attractive to myself and the friends I play with, but unfortunately the encounters 3.5 brings to bear are atrocious, both in the way they challenge a party and how difficult the system asserts they should be.
So is there an RPG system like that? Where players can feel awesome and as though their tactics matter, and where they have multiple options that they can use, and perhaps reuse depending on the situation?
faux:
Not sure if it's good, but it is sure as gamist as can be: Rune RPG ( http://www.atlas-games.com/rune/ )
Based on the Rune hack-n-slash PC-game. Also, it has vikings.
David Artman:
HeroClix and Mage Knight. ;)
Ron Edwards:
To those who've replied: Please don't reply to initial posts that do not include actual play content.
Hi Ghostweel (it's OK, I'm being gentle with you),
You're being very clear about what you're looking for, which I appreciate. It would help immensely if you were to describe one of your experiences with one of the atrocious encounters characteristic of D&D 3.5. What that will tell us is what you find atrocious, which is to say, we will be able to provide suggestions that match your preferences.
Best, Ron
Ghostwheel:
Thanks for the responses!
So some the problems that I have with D&D 3.5 include... (I'm sure a few more will come to mind if I spend some more time thinking on this.)
Monsters that are rated at a certain CR and fail to actually be at that CR. (Dragons, for example. Another is a beholder--what's a warblade going to do against all those rays?)
Monsters that have abilities that far outpace the kinds of abilities PCs have, and can thus easily dominate them. (Beholder, mind flayer, etc. Remember, the kind of party I'm envisioning is one made mostly out of ToB-type characters.)
The encounter system being based around a single monster of the characters' level. (In order to have the same number of creatures as PCs, one has to have pitifully weak monsters if you base encounters around the "building encounters" table in the DMG).
I much prefer the 4e encounter paradigm, and think that they had a lot of good ideas and design philosophies... but failed in the implementation, especially as far as the PCs go (still having lots of one's resources tied to a per-day mechanic, not having ways to recharge encounter powers, being reduced to spamming at-wills after blowing through encounter powers, etc).
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