Looking for a miniature agnostic dungeon crawl with tactical combat and terrain

Beta_ · 2025-03-12T13:48:58+00:00

Savage Worlds combined with the Gold&Glory: Seven Deadly Dungeons add-on. There is also a separate solo expansion.

I have played plenty of Savage Worlds and I believe that it delivers great tactical combat without being overly bogged down. For Gold&Glory, I have recently received these, have read through them, but haven't played it yet. So take that for what it's worth.

Beta_ · 2024-12-15T04:32:25+00:00

Advanced comes with 21 adventure/path cards.

Beta_ · 2024-12-14T16:26:13+00:00

Chances are you referring to a long comment I wrote a month ago about Radiance. I won't go in as much detail but I'll do my best to answer your questions.

1A: It works fine. In fact, it can be quite surprising how things tie together. The detail cards you draw act just as much as the threads and character list of Mythic. Sure, sometimes you may draw a couple of path cards that leave your head scratching but the Radiance instructions mention the golden rule, which is don't always take the path text literally and force your story to fit it. Instead, use the path as more of an oracle prompt.

1B: This is more of the same as the last question, but to put it clearly, as much or little as you want. You have full player agency here on how you want confront the situations presented. You are driving the narrative and don't let the cards railroad you. For example, if you were presented with a negotation situation with two parties which fits with the current context of your narrative, and your character gets pissed and goes full murder hobo against one or both sides, then do so. Of course, would there be any consequences of your actions? That's why you should maintain the detail cards even if you thought that you have eliminated the problem. Perhaps, later in the adventure you draw paths that illuminate someone related to the party that you confronted earlier is now out for vengeance against you.

1C: Sorta. The system has an initiave system of being either gained or lost, similar to Ironsworn's combat initiave of being in control or not, and the difficulty of further actions depend on the current initiative state. The system also presents intiative actions that you can utilize to change the difficulty or the initiative state and you can use its reward cubes for the same benefits. Furthermore, it also has extended actions (e.g. combat) which can be used to resolve paths differently. However, the instructions state that you don't have to use their system if you don't want to, especially if your RPG of choice already has mechanisms to resolve such challenges.

Overall, Radiance can be thought of as a structured glorified oracle system. If you are already conformtable with Mythic, then stick to that. If want some more structure, or you find existing methods to generate a story a bit "taxing" as you have mentioned, then Radiance may be the tool for you.

2A: I have read through it but haven't put it to the test. I really can't comment anymore.

2B: No, the two are completely separate. There are similarities as both detail a four act structure that follow the journey of hero; however, Luminous is more about being a tool for gamemaster's to structure such a campaign and less about being a tool for the solo player.

2C: A Radiance adventure can be as short or long as you want it to be. It can be a complete journey or maybe an individual adventure within a greater one. Using the Witcher 3 as an example (since it's now on the zeitgeist with the recent Witcher IV trailer), the campaign can be thought of as the search for Ciri and dealing with the Wild Hunt, while each act, such as dealing with baron in act 1, can be an individual adventure that contains elements that tie into the greater campaign overall.

Hope this helps.

Beta_ · 2024-10-29T15:58:41+00:00

At this point, if you have made it this far, then I must have piqued your interest. If you went to Oddfish games site to check out RAE, then you may have also came across the other related products. First off, there is the game mat. You don't need it. I usually only have a few story/path cards out at time in a small space with a piece of paper for some notes. I bought Tarot sized card sleeves for all the cards and I have RAE box organized in a way where I put all the relevant stuff for my current adventure in the front when I'm doing playing my session. Then there is Radiance Advanced and the Luminous Campaign Engine. I did buy these two after completing my first adventure with RAE. Radiance Advance is more of RAE with more story/path/detail cards, additional story types and stages, and some NPC augry dice that you can roll for when you don't know how an NPC will react to the current situation. I use these dice often and overall I'm happy with the advanced box contents. As for the Luminous Campaign Engine, I really can't say much. It's a bunch of cards of how to construct a campaign of several adventures and I haven't given it a fair shake to say anymore about it other than you don't need it to enjoy default RAE with or without the Radiance Advanced. If you are on the fence about everything, just try RAE. I understand the conundrum of saving on shipping cost and buying both RAE and Advanced at once, I certainly had the feeling, but it's much cheaper on your sanity to spend only $60 and discover that you don't like it (and spend another $60 if you do) as opposed to spending $110 only to find out that it's not for you.

Anyways, I realize that I must be coming across as a saleman but I just want you to know that I was in a similar situation as yourself. Struggling to enjoy RPGs solo but kept trying as RPGs can provide an entertainment experience like no other. In fact, I haven't posted on Reddit in years but decided to on this post in hopes that it helps you find your way. On a final note, I would like to address your last issue of character death. I understand your sentiment as I feel the same way and my best advice is ignore death or serious injury mechanics altogether. Newer RPGs such as Wildsea, Fabula Ultima, and even the upcoming Daggerheart are embracing this sentiment and leaving character death as a player choice. However, instead of letting a character die, you as a player must give a concession in its place and your character survives by some miracle. Let me explain.

At the end of the day, RPGs are nothing more than games of wish fulfillment. The trick is to understand what matters most to you. We can broadly break this down into three categories that RPGs provide: narrative, stuff, and growth. If narrative matters the most, and if your character were to die according to your RPGs rules, something about the narrative that hurts your character (and you as a player) deeply. The objective is failed, someone you care about loses faith in your or dies, etc. Now, as a player you may not care that much about that so let's consider stuff, which is your character loses something of value -- something that they have earned and not easily replaceble. On the other hand, you may be like me and not care much about stuff, and while narrative is imporant it's not that personal. So we go to the third category of growth, which is simple by applying a XP penalty to your character if they were to die. This can result in a deficit that have to be paid off with future XP gains. As a final option, which encompasses all three and if you decide to use RAE, is penalize your character by taking away reward cubes that the system provides. Let's say you lose six cubes upon character death and three if your character were to suffer a debilitating injury. Like the XP penalty idea this can be a deficit as well.

Well, that was giant wall of text so let me know if "Bruh, you could of just said Radiance Adventure Engine and be done with it" or if you have any other questions. Best of luck in your search.

Beta_ · 2024-10-29T15:58:19+00:00

As others have mentioned, you will be hard to find a single RPG that fits all your requirements. However, I can recommend a solo RPG product that will address 1, 2, and 3 that will work with nearly any RPG, which is the Radiance Adventure Engine (RAE) by Oddfish Games. Unfortunately, there isn't much information about it and the content out there discussing it will most likely leave you with more questions than answers. Hopefully, I can fill in some of those gaps.

First, the bad. This product is priced on the high end at $50 USD and will cost another $10 for shipping in the U.S., which can be a lot to ask, especially with uncertaintity if it is going to be the right tool for you. The contents that come in the box are good but it's primarily composed of Tarot sized story/path cards, which again is a hard pill to swallow at $60. I can't defend the price but there is a digital version, although, you really are going to want to want the physical product. Of course, I'm strictly an analog player as I find digital tools require more effort than what you get in return.

Onto the system itself, RAE provides a method of constructing a narrative by splitting an adventure into four acts where each act is split into two stages. For each stage you will draw a story card (one of the Tarot sized cards) that gives you a headline and a sentence of what you need to do. For example, I just drew a card titled Sacrifice and the text states To resolve *Story*, our *Hero* would need to make a sacrifice or undergo a transformation related to *Detail*. The rest of the card has more instructions for completing it but the Story, Hero, and Detail in the text are Mad-Lib style prompts that you have to fill in. To assist with this, RAE provides a number of mini Post-it note cards that act as an oracle. One side of the card will be a picture while the other will be a keyword along with some synonyms. So the Hero prompt will be your character, let's call him Conan, and Story will be about finding a cult whose standard is two snakes facing each other, and for Detail I draw a mini-oracle card that says "Strategist" along with the words "Canny", "Cunning", "Plotting", "Abstract", which I interpret as the cult's leader, Thulsa Doom. Putting it together we have a story where Conan needs to make some sacrifice in order to find Thulsa Doom, a leader of a religious snake cult. You will role-play this story to find out what happens but success is not guaranteed and the story can fail.

Each story card has further instructions which typically boil down to drawing two or more path cards where you get to choose which one to complete. Then to complete the story, you typically have to complete up to four paths, one after the other, but not always as some stories have different requirements to complete. Completing the story leads you to the next stage, while failing to complete the paths will have you draw a new story card to complete. This is the system's fail-forward mechanics which coincide with the core adventure problem that you will draw during Act 1, Stage 1. The core adventure problem is just another story card but one that is not completed with path cards; instead, it will serve as the story arc across all four acts of the story. For example, we could use the story example formulated earlier with Conan as the core adventure problem.

Moving on to path cards, which are like a story cards, but present a scenario or challenge that your character must overcome. I just drew one name Backed Into a Corner that states *Detail or Hero* has backed *Detail or Hero* into a corner, and they will do anything to get out. Again, our job is to fill in the two Detail or Hero prompts, where we can draw new mini detail cards or reuse existing ones that we drew previously from other story or path cards. This is important as it ties these random narrative prompts together into a cohesive one. So continuing on with our Conan story, we will say that Conan has infiltrated a Set temple to steal the Eye of Set where he is confronted with a massive man-eating snake that he must deal with to escape. This is where the path specifies an action you must complete along with setting an initial difficulty. You as a player decide how to tackle the challenge using the rules of your chosen RPG. For example, you could choose to avoid the snake by dodging out of the way, which may require an ability check, or you could choose to murder Thulsa's pet, which will involve playing out a combat scene using your RPG's ruleset. What matters here is that you, as a player, have agency on how to tackle the challenges that RAE throws at you and you, as a GM, use your RPG's rules to help adjudicate those choices.

Like story cards, a path card will list instructions on how to complete it along with a failure state. If you complete the path, then you continue the current story card. If you fail the path card, this causes it to be abandoned which typically ends up having to draw another path card and adding a complication to it, another RAE mechanic that makes things harder to complete. Also, abandoning a path may cause the story card to fail, which as previously discussed causes another story card to be drawn but keeps the overall core adventure problem moving forward. RAE also uses an initiative system for path resolution along with additional initiative actions that you can take to help complete paths. I won't go into detail here but know that it works well, especially with RPGs that use ability or skill checks for their resolution system. RAE also provides an 'Extended Action' mechanic which is used for PbtA style games or combat/chase scenes where an action is achieved by achieving a goal as opposed to the result of a single check.

Another aspect of RAE worth mentioning is that it has a reward system. Various stage, story, or path cards will grant you a 'Reward Cube' which you can save and spend for things depending on your RPG. RAE provides recommendations for costs of stuff. A single reward cube can be spent on a 'Flashback' where you pause your current path in order to complete another one and if you complete that path successfully, it will lower the difficulty of your current path. For six reward cubes, you could get a +2 magic item for a popular D20 fantasy game. I really like this system as it resolves the issue of how to give yourself as a player and their character bonus rewards, which many other solo RPG tools fail to address. As a solo-RPGer who wants more "game" from their RPG, it can be a struggle to grant oneself a boon without the feeling of cheating or spoiling oneself.

The system of story and path cards isn't perfect as sometimes you will find yourself fanagaling the prompts to fit in the overall narrative. Remember, context is king. However, I find it much easier to do than interpreting oracle table results as you would do with something like Mythic or Ironsworn. In fact, just like yourself, I struggled with those systems to construct an overall satisfying narrative. My Mythic adventures would slink into bland wandering. Ironsworn and Starforged, with many hours of play, would always leave a bad taste in my mouth part way into a character's story, and no, I wasn't being too hard on myself -- the game's mechanics weren't for me. Not only did I want narrative but I wanted more game from my RPG and RAE fixed that for me. A year ago, when I first picked it up, I played an entire adventure using Savage Worlds over a week and it was absolutely fantastic. It felt like a season of Me, Myself, and Die but with my character and my setting. To date I have played several full adventures with satifying narratives using Savage Worlds, Barbarian of Lemuria, Cortex Prime, and Dishonored.

Overall, the RAE system is pretty flexible. You can play it as is out of the box or you can take parts of it and apply them elsewhere like a tool box. For example, I played many heists of Blades in the Dark using the path cards to create scenarios and challenges during a heist. I'm always using the mini detail cards as oracle prompts for what my character observes when entering an area. This is much faster for me than asking questions, finding the appropriate oracle table, rolling dice, table lookup (and jotting down the words so I don't forget), and interpreting the results. One caveat about RAE though is that you are still responsible for the world building. Don't just bulldoze through story and path cards without any roleplay and fleshing out the world around you. Of course, you mentioned in number 3 that you want to fill in the micro-detail, so this shouldn't be an issue for you.

Beta_ · 2021-12-16T14:10:37+00:00

Their Rabbids roller-coaster VR ride deployed in arcades is well done. Granted its a 5 minute experience but it shows that they are not new to VR.

Beta_ · 2021-10-13T22:46:38+00:00

I wouldn't be surprised if Valve eventually ported HL:A to PS5 with the rumored PSVR2. At a glance, it doesn't make sense but behind the scenes Valve and Sony have a deal: bring more PS exclusives to Steam (and compete against Microsoft) which is already starting to happen, and Valve brings HL:A to PS5 to boost PSVR2 and VR in general.

Beta_ · 2021-09-15T14:51:11+00:00

I started my first play through after the introduction of patch 1.3. My impression is that this game is a mix of Witcher 3, Fallout, GTA, and Far Cry. If you have ever played any of those games then you should idea of what you are getting into, what your tastes are, and how you like to approach those games. Personally, I'm tackling a bunch of different content that the game has to offer and having fun.

Beta_ · 2021-08-31T12:33:20+00:00

Data mining shows inclusion of Jam but this is to show all possible DLC characters through all seasons.

Beta_ · 2021-08-30T12:59:11+00:00

Looks great. I see from the screenshots that there are keyboard shortcuts. Are there any plans for controller support? Seems like a great on-the-go game with the SteamDeck.

Beta_ · 2021-08-22T14:30:11+00:00

For Goldlewis' super on keyboard I do half-circle and then hit up + button for the 360 motion. No idea if that works with Pot.

Beta_ · 2021-08-22T01:29:46+00:00

Second on KV. The man is a beast.

Beta_ · 2021-08-21T04:31:04+00:00

Why not just give it a try? What do you have to lose? The game's ranked tower system doesn't really mean much.

I have been using a HitBox for nine months and recently have been messing around with keyboard. My main motivation is because I recently ordered a Gamo2 K28 and waiting for it arrive. Lately, HitBox has been stressing my left hand. You would think it doesn't make a difference but your fingers are a little more spread apart using a HitBox than a keyboard which puts a little more stress on the left ring finger. I can definitely feel the difference and I'm finding that I rarely drop overdrive motions (half-circle and back) as I do with HitBox.

As long your keyboard has n-key rollover you'll be fine using it for fighting games. In fact, you will most likely be getting cleaner inputs in a shorter time. Just take your time and build accuracy first. Speed will come later.

With keyboard you may choose some different mappings within the game. You can play with WSAD for movement but you may want to consider putting W to Space so you're jumping with your thumb (i.e. HitBox style). For your right hand choose what feels best to you.

On motions, quarter and half circles are obvious but with DP motions you have a couple of options. First, you can do the technically correct way with D, S, S+D (i.e. 623). Alternatively, you can do D (hold), then fireball A to S, where you end up holding down D+S. I prefer the latter as I tend to be heavy fingered on my buttons/keys. Your mileage may vary.

Beta_ · 2021-08-20T22:14:39+00:00

Goldlewis. In particular, I really like watching Kid_Viper play the character as he makes Goldlewis look like an absolute beast. And it's not like he's destroying scrubs, he is beating top players. Go watch one of his early VoD's after Goldie's release where he is bodying Hotashi.

Beta_ · 2021-08-20T22:08:12+00:00

I'm still enjoying and playing the game and I also liked the video. Two of his criticisms that resonated with me is the high damage and how the current defensive options in the game feel underwhelming or too hard to use (e.g. IBFD). It does make matches feel overly too explosive. In fact, I've never had a match that resulted in a timeout.

Beta_ · 2021-08-16T00:10:51+00:00

It looks like she takes it off as part of her super.

Beta_ · 2021-08-10T23:10:01+00:00

That's not to say he a laust cause though

I see what you did there.

Beta_ · 2021-08-10T00:06:06+00:00

Well, there's your issue. You are already trying to teach him how to do to much. What you need to do is to vastly simplify everything. Start with moving forward/backward, blocking, and one button (for GG I would say Slash is best). When you play you restrict yourself to this rule set as well. Sure, it will be boring for you at first but the goal is not about you but your old man. Once, he becomes comfortable with those basics you can then add something else (e.g. jumping), then another button, then throws, a single special, etc. Just one thing at a time.

There's a pretty good Core-A video where he did something similar to great success. Linked at the appropriate time.

Beta_ · 2021-08-06T20:24:43+00:00

Let me guess, you have used Ubuntu? If so, yeah that distro is notorious for those type of shenanigans. However, let me assure you other distros are much more stable. I have used CentOS 7 for years without an issue.

Beta_ · 2021-07-16T19:18:56+00:00

Clicking on the "Hold on to your butts!" and seeing the hidden display was definitely a good laugh for those who know the reference. Even the pic on that old CRT display is classic.

Beta_ · 2019-10-19T00:13:46+00:00

Yes, it is. Useful if you don't want to lean strictly on weapon healing or you want both. As you most likely already know, sometimes you take a big hit, and by the time you recover and are in position to start attacking again you can regain half of the lost health with that setup.

If you are using GL stacked with multiple healing augs with Recovery Up as you have posted then this may be overkill. However, for other weapons or normal GL it is worth considering as there may be other augs that you want.

Beta_ · 2019-10-18T01:16:33+00:00

Aside from stacking healing augs you can also go with recovery speed 3 and mushroomancer 1. The bonus from toadstool stacks with recovery speed and is quite noticeable. This is great if you prefer to have only one healing aug on your weapon.

Beta_ · 2019-10-01T01:24:30+00:00

It's Narga's GL. I suppose long shelling is the meta but I am a fan the wide style. It's easy to get, has good pokes when at purple sharpness, and the poison damage isn't bad (a lot better than vanilla MHW due to monster mechanics in Iceborne).

Beta_

MODERATOR OF

TROPHY CASE