Is this a good game for people who have been getting sick and tired of D&D?
I love King of Dragon Pass and Glorantha as a world seems amazing, but I've never actually played RuneQuest before.
What am I in for?
Is this a good game for people who have been getting sick and tired of D&D?
Depends why you're sick of D&D, and what it is you like in RPGs in general.
Now, I could start pointing out all the things I dislike about 5E but I don't want to start a fight here. Someone will always come out to defend it.
We just want to find a game that lets us to create characters instead of classes and where skills actually mean something.
Ignore the people that would defend it. They're not the ones having the problem. You are and as such your opinion is the only one that matters, and as such it's your opinion that will help narrow down suggestions.
My main issue with 5E is that pretty much everything in it is combat oriented. Sure, you can create a character that excels in other areas but that gets boring fast, because the system doesn't support that. There are only few skills that are worth using because of that.
Looks like you are looking for a pure Skill-based game
This video may get you some suggestions and a good look at the pros and cons of it
Okay, and what is it you want from a campaign then? High magic, low magic, no magic? Are PCs impressive heroes far above the common man, or just the common man, maybe something in between? Any genres, tone, or themes that are particularly exciting? Any mechanics you love or hate, or think you would love or hate? Any additional detail would be appreciated as well.
D&D is at its best in B/X because of the simplistic nature of doing quests to get gold to level up, establish your own kingdom essentially, maintaining the funds for keeping it going by doing more quests, repelling attacks, hiring mercenaries or guards to patrol shit, collect taxes, and such while exploration is throughly well defined and structured turning it into an ever evolving quest for gold to keep YOUR people and YOUR home that YOUR party built safe and prosperous in a shit world.
Going from that to just kicking down doors and being murderhobos (which has been a problem since AD&D) really is where the game STARTED falling apart.
>I want skills to matter
Arguably the toughest nut to Crack. You either need a massive list of skills that people simply cannot do unless ranked in them or catch all broad skills for certain categories.
I had the same issues with 5e, went to GURPS, and have been loving it. Lots of material to dig through, and I can make and run anytime I want.
If you're interested, word to the wise: literally every rule is optional. Don't use mechanics that don't interest you or would overcomplicate things.
For inspiration, yes, for playing, nope.
RQG is a jank ass outdated and poorly formatted peice of garbage masquerading as a polished game with the nice art in it’s rulebooks
If you want to play any other setting instead or you want to play a glorantha campaign and know what you are doing but hate RQG,s ass
Play mythras instead, it’s a far better designed version of runequest
Oh yeah, Mythras seems interesting.
A good video. Thanks.
I'm cool with all kinds of magic and settings and genres. It's the system that's the most important to me, since that's how you play the actual game.
I'd love to see a system where being a warlord or a noble actually meant something. Managing a stronghold or other base of operation always felt like a fun idea. Also I'd probably like a game that has actual rules for massa combat.
Magic, setting, genre, etc. all effect the system. A superhero game plays differently to an noir detective game because the setting and genre demand different abstractions
Either way I'll suggest Conan 2d20 to you then, as that hits everything you've mentioned in this thread so far. First things first, have this thread of explanations about various parts of the game
https://archive.4plebs.org/tg/thread/81696580/#q81696782
That will give you an idea if it'll be your sort of thing
The game is classless and skill based, so check for that. The game makes all the Skills it provides varied and useful, often allowing them to be useful for PCs you might not expect. Such as the Sorcery Skill being great for sorcerers and witch hunters alike. So another check there. The character generation is pretty much entirely designed to give you a fairly well realised character with some backstory with things like homeland, caste (and an event from said caste), a significant event, an education, and some personality traits all off the bat and all being mechanically reflected in your stats. So big check there. There are social standing mechanics so stuff like being a noble matters, and being a noble also dictates a lot of what you'd be good at, but further still there are entire sourcebooks dedicated to that sort of thing which both expand on what it means to be those things and given extra mechanics for what you'd expect
Conan the King has stuff dealing with all the aspects of courtly life you'd expect, intrigue, war, disaster, and so on. So you can manage a kingdom and go to war with other kingdoms. Conan the Mercenary is where you would find the warlord stuff, this has rules for mercenary bands and large battles. So Conan the Mercenary has rules for the company-scale battles a warlord would take part in, Conan the King has rules for proper wars where its two kingdoms fielding armies. There are a good chunk of books like that too. You can find them all in the share thread
Whelp botched my post slightly
Who the hell gives a damm with the state of the board these days
The Runequest/Mythras combat system absolutely mogs D&D's.
You want to stop a charging monster by impaling it on your spear? Kill an armoured enemy by jamming a dagger in his visor? Throw sand at an opponent then disarm it by cutting his arms off? Block his attack and immediately counterattack? You can do all of that with zero GM fiat and not in a narrativist way.
All of that while still managing to be less complicated than D&D.
I'm about to start a Mythras campaign after running several 5e campaigns.
Can't fricking wait. Everything about it looks much better than 5e.
From just reading the books and doing some gladiator fights by myself, is completely right.
I’ve personally had a massive amount of fun working on my weird post apoc setting that I convinced for mythras
Gotten quite far with the homebrew too
I’ve now got a large list of gear weapons armour trade goods starting gifts and psionic talents
When the time comes to run a campaign it will be a miniature game in its own right
Extreme dissonance. RQ tells you it's a game about hero wars but the most heroic thing you'll do is stealing cows and tribal shit.
That's extremely heroic by bronze age standards
If you can't make a simple cattle raid parallel the time Maran Gor clapped her cheeks so hard that food rained down for her starving followers, I don't know what to tell you. I know that YGMV but you have to at least try, anon.
Yeah, but what about the Hero Wars the game promises? I know Heroquest has some adventure to this regard, but otherwise? Locked with playing hill barbarians instead of squaring off with the likes of Argrath or Harrek.
I think Runequest is more fun when you drop the whole mythopoetic bullshit; but then what's left? Pavis, Big Rubble?
>Start watching Spice and Wolf for wolfgirl bawdtiness
>God damn economics classes instead.