Wrapping up that last few days of August...
29) Most Memorable ENCOUNTER
Ehhhh... not really thinking of any...
There was one Cthulhu game where the players were trying to be so gentlemanly and logical and talk sense to a VERY drunk bright young thing who just wanted to have fun and party some more and had zero idea how much danger she was in and completely frustrated the players attempts to save her at every turn... the players actually clapped at the end of the encounter!?? I think it was more the clapping because they'd enjoyed it SO MUCH is what made it memorable, than the actual encounter itself, which seemed to me just like any other ..?
30) OBSCURE RPG You've Played
I've owned a few obscure-ish RPGs... I'm not sure I ever played any of them...?
What even IS "obscure, anyway!? To a lot of people, I imagine, anything that ISN'T Dungeons & Dragons is "obscure".
At one point I would have thought The Morrow Project was pretty obscure... then I learned there was a FOURTH EDITION!?!? It can't be THAT obscure if there was enough people playing to warrant a second, third, or FOURTH(!?) edition.
Maybe Teenagers From Outer Space, again...?
31) FAVOURITE RPG OF ALL TIME
You know what.... I HATE "what is you favourite .... ?" questions... I have NO IDEA. There are games that I'd like to play now, that I like the idea of... There are games that I played in the past, some of them a LOT, but am no longer playing, and probably for REASONS!? NONE of stand out above all others as "THE BEST" or "FAVOURITE" of all ..
Do any of you, dear readers, have any memorable encounters, obscure games you've played, of favouritest games of ALL TIME!? LET ME KNOW!
Long time since I indulged in any Roleplaying; I recall one Bushido session - the group I was with took the roleplay seriously and we were in either game mode (where discussion was free form) or in character.
ReplyDeleteI was playing a peasant; I spent my time saying "Hai lord" bowing and scraping and trying to improve my atrocious cooking skills. The other group members were all university classics students, one of whom has become a professor (he's an expert on certain military aspects of the Roman army). He played a samurai who it happened had some medical expertise.
We entered a village in a province subject to famine. There were no elderly or children about. At the inn we were offered "meat". Everyone in turn declined, stating the were Buddhists, until they all looked at me - I said "I'm a peasant" which naturally excused me! We hatched a plan the J ( the professor above) would offer his medical skills to any elderly or children to determine if any were left in the village or if they were indeed cannibals. We switched to formal RP mode. J approached the innkeeper. He intended to say "Innkeeper I'm a doctor. Do you have any sick elderly or children in the village?"
What he actually said was "Innkeeper, I'm an innkeeper...." at which point we all fell about in hysterics .
After resuming formal RP mode (which was very SERIOUS), J attempted again to ask the Innkeeper about the vulnerable inhabitants. "Innkeeper, I'm an innkeeper......no I'm not a bloody innkeeper I'm a doctor!"
At which point, further hilarity. The gamesmaster turned to J and said " loose 1 point of honour".
J had form. We had some non-player characters, 2 brothers named the Kurimi brothers or similar, it being the Japanese for "wheel", hence they were referred to as the "wheel brothers" . J routinely called them the "wheelbarrows"...
I don't remember any more of the adventure, but that episode has stayed with me.
Neil
Ha-ha! That's fantastic! Thanks, Neil!
DeleteI never did play Bushido. I was always aware of it and thought it looked interesting... Alas, as a teen with limited resources in the 80s I couldn't play EVERYTHING!? Closest I got was first edition AD&D Oriental Adventures - which was fun - it has ninjas and Samurai.so...
DeleteI seem to remember the combat system being very clunky - as we were mostly wargamers it didn't seem to matter.
ReplyDeleteMuch preferred Runequest and Call of Cthulu.
Runequest -unfortunately I lacked the Cult books so couldn't run it properly. I ended up with lots of novices. I do recall two incidents. In one a novice fighter with about 25% chance to hit was fighting a trollkin with about the same to hit odds; fumbled, with headgear falling over face reducing to hit by 25%....only able to hit on 1% critical hit. Trollkin eagerly attacked, fumbled, helmet falls over eyes reduce to hit by 25%.....
They spent a few rounds of blindly flailing at each other until someone else put the trolkin out of it's misery!
Neither dared risking stopping to remove visual obstruction.....
In another, a new player suspiciously rolled 18 for every characteristic (or very close to 18); ended up with a character that was a killing machine; opponents had a huge reduction to hit, he had a superior to hit chance. The party ended up putting "killer" at the front and he chewed his way through the low level monsters. There wasn't much of a challenge and I wondered about introducing a tougher opponent. They reached a part of the caves where it was possible to get swept down a tunnel into a shallow pool. "Killer" promptly ended up in the shallow pool. First turn had a high % chance of standing up; failure meant taking damage from drowning. Each subsequent failure reduced the chance of being able to stand and risked further drowning damage.
"Killer" failed, started drowning . Next move, failed again. Ended up with a 40-50% chance to stand. Each damage roll was variable and had been at the maximum. All waited with baited breath, roll....a fumble! Superman "Killer" promptly drowns in 6" of water!
I told them it was because he was so perfect the gods wanted him for themselves.....
Neil
Ha-ha! Those are great! Never played Runequest. Did play a bit of Cthulhu. Your stories reminded me of the first time I played Rippers: the Horror Wars- not technically a role-playing game, but powered by Savage Worlds, which I did use as my go-to rpg system for nearly a decade? But I think I'll have to wait until I have access to a keyboard before typing that out... I don't love typing on this phone...
DeleteAlmost forgot about this...
DeleteSo, the first time I played Rippers: The Horror Wars... I can't even remember who was playing what, but it was hunters against a mishmash of monsters, including some vampires and werewolves...? Halfway through the game one of the hunters stabs the lead vampire and hits him... and then rolls for damage.
Now, in Savage Worlds, for anyone not familiar, there are "exploding dice" - i.e. if you roll the highest number on the die, you roll again and add it to the number you rolled. The damage roll is compared to the targets toughness(?) and if it ties or beats it the target is stunned or shaken. If it beats it by four the target takes a wound. Most lesser characters take one wound and they are OUT. But a "Wild Card" (an important Charcter) will not only have a high Toughness (or was it Vigour....? It's been a while... I may be off on the terms) they also have three wounds...
So rolls for damage and gets a six (or an eight? If it was a D8)... and then does it again... and again... and AGAIN... and keeps on going until they roll 48 which ends up being, like, eight wounds or something... the Vampire is SUPER dead... Unless it soaks the roll.
The Monster player says; "fuck it, why not" spends one of their three bennies they have for the entire game and attempts to soak the roll (making a vigour roll - which for a vampire had to have been at least a d8 - if not d10) for each full multiple of four rolled, one wound is "soaked" and they rolled the highest number on the die... and then again... and AGAIN... and in the end rolled at least 36 - because they ended up soaking ALL the wounds - plus one...
I don't remember anything else about that game - other than we all had a really good laugh about the ludicrous statistical improbability of it all...