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I love D&D/Pathfinder.. i really do. But, there are certain aspects of the game that i grow increasingly tired of. Like levels and alignment. So, if i were to look for a fantasy game like DnD/PF, with a point based character advancement like nWoD, Witchcraft, or GURPS instead of levels, and no alignment or anything based on that concept.. what game would I be looking for?
It still depends a lot on what you are looking for. Rules light / rules heavy. Do you want a system that contains a fully described world, or are you happy to create your own.
Just the first ones that jump to my mind.
AFMBE's Dungeons and Zombies
G.U.R.P.S. (as you already pointed out)
Hero System (like you did not see that one coming)
Jaws of the Six Serpents
Mutants & Masterminds' Warriors & Warlocks
Questers of the Middle Realms
Savage Worlds
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It still depends a lot on what you are looking for. Rules light / rules heavy. Do you want a system that contains a fully described world, or are you happy to create your own.
I personally like creating my own world. And rules light too.. A complete system in one book..
PS: and I've never played Hero System.. tho i'm not opposed to the idea
If you want rules light, Hero is not the way to go.
Considering you are already largely familiar with d20, I would suggest Warriors & Warlocks. It tries to model Sword & Sorcery comic books, so it glosses over a lot of granularity. Since you say you want rules light, that may be right up your alley. Some people find it a flaw rather than a feature.
Also, Mutants & Masterminds (W&W's daddy) still has levels. However, I have found them much less restrictive than in other d20 systems. Just something to watch out for.
If you really want to go rules light, I say Questers or Jaws. PDQ and PDQ# are free on Atomic Sock Monkey Press's website. Questers and Jaws use that system, so you can take it out for a test drive.
AFMBE would be a middle ground between PDQ and G.U.R.P.S./Hero. Probably about the same level as M&M. I played in one game where someone used AFMBE Dungeons and Zombies. It seemed passable to me.
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Thanks for the info! I'm looking at AFMBE Dungeons and Zombies, and it looks to be about what i was looking for. Though, not sure how i feel about the abundance of undead, as opposed to the more traditional fantasy. I remember when i played Witchcraft, i enjoyed it a lot, and wished there was a fantasy equivalent. I'll also take a look at Warriors and Warlocks if i can find a copy.
The game I was in simply ignored zombies altogether. You may have to pieces-parts some other monsters together. It may add some work, but it would also add mystery as the players will not know what a monster's exact abilities are.
Actually I really like GURPS, but it is definitely not rules light. I like D&D for it's simplicity and the available source material. If Steve Jackson Games had a decent character generator I liked, and more available creatures to borrow from, I would definately go back to GURPS.
Also GURPS tends to favor magic users, so based on experience, you may have to control certain spells (movement college comes to mind).
There are huge problems with some parts of it, but the "Kernel" of Shadowrun 3rd edition is timeless for my group.
We've had great success using just the melee/ranged combat resolution system, skill roll resolution, base time, street index/availability, contacts, karma (advancement and pool) etc. Not just for Shadowrun, it also makes a good fantasy/epic scifi system in a pinch.
Of course, this is leaving out the horrendously cumbersome computer, vehicle, and magic subsystems. The magic subsystem has good parts, but on the whole it's a little out of whack with the rest of the game.
It looks like the subsystems in SR4 are cleaner, but they messed with the core mechanics! That pretty much kills any chance of me using any part of it. Sigh.
Mutants and Masterminds did an awesome job of breaking down the traditional d20 system and turning it into a totally classless point buy game. It plays fast and easy and still has plenty of options. I've really enjoyed running the odd super hero game with it. I've been planning a MARS game using the rules, but I haven't had a chance to run it yet. I've heard good things about the Savage Worlds system (for rules light), but I don't really know much about the mechanics of it. I also hear good things about the Warhammer rpg, but again I'm not too familiar with the mechanics of the system.
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You could always just not use alignment or experience. Your always welcome to change any game you run to suit your needs.
Savage World is rules light, kind of point driven and a decent system with a lot of options for how to run and build a campaign world in any type of setting.
Plus the explorer edition book is pretty darn inexpensive!
If you want to go ultra-light on the rules, check out Risus. A short read, it's free, and the rules are very flexible indeed.
Savage Worlds all the way for me. 10 bucks gets you the core rules and they just put out a fantasy companion as well to handle D&D type games.
Rules light, fast, solid mechanics, easy to pickup, and damn fun to play.
Their motto is FFF. Fast Furious Fun.
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Since you know and liked Witchcraft, I'd second AFmbE Dungeons and Zombies, it has the same, easy rules and it is easy to add rules from other supplements (spells, powers and creatures from various witchcraft supplements, oriental adventures stuff from AfmbE Enter the Zombie etc.) and it IS fairly easy to ignore the whole Zombie outbreak background and create other critters and backgrounds.
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Savage Worlds all the way for me. 10 bucks gets you the core rules and they just put out a fantasy companion as well to handle D&D type games.
Rules light, fast, solid mechanics, easy to pickup, and damn fun to play.
Their motto is FFF. Fast Furious Fun.
I have to agree, I finally picked up the SW Explorer's edition and I have to say it's very simplistic and rules light, with plenty of free stuff out there to scavenge for your own game.
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Since you know and liked Witchcraft, I'd second AFmbE Dungeons and Zombies, it has the same, easy rules and it is easy to add rules from other supplements (spells, powers and creatures from various witchcraft supplements, oriental adventures stuff from AfmbE Enter the Zombie etc.) and it IS fairly easy to ignore the whole Zombie outbreak background and create other critters and backgrounds.
How easy is it to play a standard fantasy game (complete with demons, devils, and most importantly, dragons lol) using these rules?
I'm surprised no-one has mentioned the WEG editions of Star Wars. Lots of people have heard of that system, but lesser well known was the d6 System booklet. It used the same mechanics (rules-light and no levels), but explained the d6 system in pretty good detail in ~100 pages.
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Thanks everyone.. I'll be on the lookout for these books at the nearest half-price books store, as well as half.com, for discounted/used game books during the next week :)
Hopefully, if i don't find them all, i can find more at the nearest book store near me where i'm moving
At $10 Savage Worlds does rate up there, however, it does really require a battle mat.
S.
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What about Steve Jackson & Ian Livingstone's Fighting Fantasy books? The first one "Dungeoneer" covers most things you would want. With the exception of Alansia the books go for a song. If fact I have a spare copy of Dungeoneer I'll send you for free it you want it.
These books are about as rules light as you can get, 2d6 and you are set.
S.
Overall, I am not a fan of additive dice pools.
Good point! I generally don't mind additive dice pools, because most of the games I've played with those systems have balanced out all that rolling and adding with a lot of role-play and interaction. Though I have to admit, I did get jelaous when a friend in 1st ed. Shadowrun managed to pull off a 46-dice spellcasting episode (we later found out he should have only been rolling ~30 dice, but still!).
So yeah, the d6 system could potentially involve a lot of dice, but it is rules-light and probably available somewhere for $1 and open to house-ruling to prevent the need for several dozen six-siders...
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I'm personally a fan of the Cortex System RPG.
It's pretty rules light, and effective for many genres.
On a different note, the more I look at Mutants and Masterminds the more I see it less as a straight superhero system and more as possibly the best multi-genre system. Especially after looking through "Mecha and Manga" and "Warriors and Warlocks".
I would add Agents of Freedom to that list. I agree, it works well as a rules light, cinematic system. I am currently running a Cold War Espionage PbP game with it. No powers.
I may be adding a Traveler PbP game. Maybe psionics. I am undecided.
You don't get much lighter on rules than Minimus
Complete RPG in 4 pages. (Available at the link there for download, and the game is donation-ware. If you find it useful, send me some money via PayPal, following the instructions in the footer.)
1 page character creation, 1 page how to play the game, 2 pages on how to run the game. The character creation rules will enrich character generation for any RPG system.
Fair warning - it is going to be much more relationship and character dynamic driven than "Kick in the door, kill the monster, loot its spleen for the Gobstopper of Near-Omnipotence.". If you enjoy the 'tactical puzzle' play of D&D, this isn't the right system for you. If you're one of those people who uses the die rolling and combat to frame the cool heroic fantasy movie in your head, then it'll be a breath of fresh air.
It may NOT be something you can sell your players on.
I can recommend the Dungeon Fantasy series for GURPS as a way to trim out the excess stuff in GURPS and make a D&D-esque game, but without D&D's "Chinese Menu" systems.
As to the gripes about additive pools for dice - that's also a reason to avoid Hero. (I personally don't find it to be such a problem, but I also generally don't run campaigns past about 12-13 dice per throw.)
Task resolution in Hero is not handled with a dice pool, it is always 3d6. Damage can get up to 12-13 dice if you are running a Supers game. In a Heroic game, it should be around 4d6.
I love D&D/Pathfinder.. i really do. But, there are certain aspects of the game that i grow increasingly tired of. Like levels and alignment. So, if i were to look for a fantasy game like DnD/PF, with a point based character advancement like nWoD, Witchcraft, or GURPS instead of levels, and no alignment or anything based on that concept.. what game would I be looking for?
d6 Star Wars was as rules light, no classes, no levels, no alignmnets system I know. It should be cake to adapt it to fantasy as needed.
Task resolution in Hero is not handled with a dice pool, it is always 3d6. Damage can get up to 12-13 dice if you are running a Supers game. In a Heroic game, it should be around 4d6.
And when rolling damage, you're not just adding Nd6 together (which easily gets to 18 dice), you're also counting how many dice came up 1s and 6s, which slows the game down. Or you're adding dice together, rolling a die of a different color, subtracting 1, and multiplying it by the sum of the prior set.
You're also using a phased movement system for combat that has too many phases to be useful. When your speedster is moving 7 out of 12 phases, 8 tops, there's wayyy too much overhead for keeping track of who gets to do what to whom when. We quickly replaced Champions' phased combat system with the "tick-tock" time keeping from Feng Shui.
Don't get me wrong - I like the flexibility of the Hero character design system. I will put up with many other aspects of it...but if someone hates rolling and adding buckets of dice as a reason not to use WEG D6, then Hero is probably NOT a good fit for them.
I would go with either Savage Worlds or BRP (Choasium's Basic Roleplaying Game system) for a rule-light, easy to grasp generic systems. I tend to prefer SW for cinematic action, and BRP for investigation/political scenarios. They both can do fantasy really good.
Burning Wheel is a really nice game, but the rules are crunchy. The learning curve is pretty steep (less than Hero) but once you know what you are doing, it plays really well and fast. For a gritty, savage, dangerous fantasy system, it's an impressive engine. It also can be adapted to other genres (there is a Dune-like setting somewhere on the web.)
Gurps and Hero are good engines, but you will be spending a lot of time creating characters (a little less in Gurps, but still).
You can also take a look at FUDGE and FUSION.
Also, you can download D6 Fantasy along with a bestiary and a "locations book" for free on DriveThruRPG. (Adventure/Space D6 are also there for free.)