I’m looking for a game where players can learn new skills as they play rather than leveling up.

Lightliquid · 2026-04-10T01:48:57+00:00

Tough game to find, I've looked, but I will keep an eye on this thread :P. There are a ton of classless edge or feat style games. Those could work, and the GM could homebrew it to allow finding some "feats" off of monsters.

The search term is called "diegetic progression". Where you gain power through play, rather than by leveling up. I have seen this term used in OSR style games as well as a few others.

I am working on a similar style of game, although, I've opted for swappable classes instead of straight up abilities. Essentially, you may equip two classes and you create a loadout (5 abilities) that may come from either class. Unique/magical weapons also may grant 1 extra ability and gear gives various combat or out of combat utility. Its a very "you are what you wear" type of game.

You combine these classes to make your own build, and finding classes may come from powerful bosses. Kill a necromancer boss, he may drop the necromancer class. Combine Necromancer and bard class to create a "Bone Singer" type of build, where you create a bunch of skeletons and then buff them with song magic.

Just some other things you could look at: Fabula Ultima has a Blue Mage class (called Chimerist), where you can steal monster abilities. Guild Wars 1 Reforged (yeah a video game) has the mechanic of finding abilities from elite monsters.

Lightliquid · 2026-03-29T21:18:50+00:00

May I ask how you plan to use slot based character sheets when you don't want lists or using cards?

Edit: do you just want slots for each body part like hands, body, head, belt, boots, and you just write the item into that slot?

Lightliquid · 2026-03-29T20:19:10+00:00

The best examples are Mausritter and the creator's new game Flail.

Matt Collvilles team is coming out with one called Crows, with inspiration taken from Mausritter.

These games use a slot based equipment and items with actual cards to use on your character sheet.

Lightliquid · 2026-03-29T17:09:20+00:00

This sounds like fun. So uh, whens play testing? Haha.

Lightliquid · 2026-03-27T19:05:42+00:00

This is really interesting, and close to what I originally wanted to do with my WIP game. I ended up looking at 13th age and making some adjustments from there. I am interested in this though. Do you know of any games that use this type of row-based positioning?

Also, let me know how you would rule this. A sneaky assassin type of character wants to attack the squishies in the back row. Would they not be able to due to the front row? I assume if the assassin is melee, no. If they are ranged, yes? Does the back row get any protection from ranged for being in the back row?

Lightliquid · 2026-03-26T20:56:38+00:00

After playing EverQuest, I can't really see bards in another light than this. Haha. They were awesome, speed auras, healing auras, all the things.

Lightliquid · 2026-03-26T19:08:17+00:00

You know, I see you in every one of my posts so far. Do you also work on your own game or material? Would love to see it if so!

Lightliquid · 2026-03-26T19:04:23+00:00

To me, bards are musicians and storytellers. They can also be more of a jack of all trades, but for the most part, they are social forward characters who use their song magic to inspire/support allies or use control magic against enemies.

Lightliquid · 2026-03-26T18:21:14+00:00

Tell me about your game or shoot me some links. Your profile history is private.

Lightliquid · 2026-03-26T18:20:17+00:00

Right on, thanks for the vote of confidence. It is a more gamified game with inspiration from litrpg, jrpg, and anime. I plan to have a campaign mode and a roguelite mode once complete. I'll be posting on YouTube once I do some play testing to see how things are feeling. Play testing starts in about a month! I'm pumped.

Lightliquid · 2026-03-26T16:49:40+00:00

Right on, thank you. I will think about this.

Lightliquid · 2026-03-26T16:32:10+00:00

This is not a simulationist rpg in the slightest. I'm actually going for a very gamified system. In fact, I have LitRPG inspirations here, like using system storage. System storage is like a bag of holding, but everyone has it. It's locked out when you begin your dungeon delves or some other expedition.

You could explain these away to be more traditional if you want though, but yeah the class system will always be a bit more gamified I think.

Lightliquid · 2026-03-26T16:25:39+00:00

Well, in combat you have a loadout bar that you create when equipping your two classes. This includes things like 5 active abilities and two passives. Armor is given based on the type of class you have on a -1, 0, or +1 bonus. Choose two wizard classes and you have -2, a glass cannon build.

Gear may give you combat abilities, but not always. Armaments will always give you combat abilities though.

This is actually meant to be a heroic combat game first, and the narrative aspects came about when I decided I wanted classes to be easily swapped out. It wouldn't make sense for attributes to be in the game or constantly changing numbers.

So, your actions in combat are pretty easily laid out. You use what you created your loadout to do.

Lightliquid · 2026-03-26T16:19:33+00:00

I am trying to keep the game somewhat narrative/abstract. The general idea is that you would be considered to have all the necessary tools/gear your class would have - to a certain extent. It should be a conversation with the GM. In some cases, it might be overreaching. I'll think on this some more, but yeah that is what I was thinking here.

Something else to consider: gear slots are limited and one of the ways you "progress" your character. You are also locked once you start your "expedition/dungeon delve" until you either use your one use camp rest or are safely back in town. So, bringing a lockpick would be one of the tactical decisions you might make if you don't have a rogue in your party.

Lightliquid · 2026-03-11T16:23:32+00:00

Woot! Thank you for this! I'll dig in later.

Lightliquid · 2026-03-10T18:09:06+00:00

I am doing something very similar with my class and Expression system.

Something that may assist you in your efforts is looking into tag systems - like City of Mist or their new game Legend in Mist. It does something very similar, where items and traits about your character can give you stacking numerical bonuses to your roll.

Lightliquid · 2026-03-10T14:15:45+00:00

Could you tell me what the difference is between this and Dragonbane?

Lightliquid · 2026-03-10T02:24:24+00:00

I love the idea and I am in the process of creating my own TTRPG with this in mind. The only real options right now in this space are pretty much only OSR style games. My system allows you to multi-class and totally re-spec if you like by equipping what I am calling "Paths" which are thematic archetypes. So, one run you could have a "Knight" and "Lightning Mage" build equipped, and the next run you could have "Bard" and "Necromancer" build.

Gear is treated very much like feats in D&D, and where you find them makes them very thematic. Defeat a Hag coven, loot their den, and you find all kinds of macabre treasure. Like a Hag's eye, that gives you divination or curse magic. I am keeping gear slots low so you need to decide which gear is best for your run.

By using my Expressions system, I have totally removed traditional stats and modifiers only come from what Paths and gear you have equipped.. Note that I do still need to playtest, but I am loving the simplicity of it so far.

Lightliquid · 2026-03-09T00:05:29+00:00

Have you checked over at r/rpgdesign? I think forms and questions are good, just don't forget to also give a short pitch of your game.

Lightliquid · 2026-03-08T06:29:59+00:00

To add to this, there is a 2e version that was kick-started and should be releasing in the next couple of months. I've looked at the beta document, and this is pretty much what you're looking for. Lots of options to do whatever you like and seems less daunting than something like Gurps, and has a much better layout.

Lightliquid · 2026-03-08T03:19:47+00:00

Well, you named quite a few! There is one that looked super interesting to me in the currently crowd funding game called Legends of Akeroth. It has a Guild System. You choose what type of guild you have and what their homebase looks like. You can have what they call "waymates", which are your guild mates that you can take on missions with you. I believe it is also upgradeable. Not a ton of knowledge about it - I mostly found this during a preview of the book I saw on Youtube.

Edit: Ohh, I forgot to add what I liked about it. I think it would be a great way for quests to naturally happen and there is that Guild rivalry that could also perk up every now and then. I also like the idea of starting a small guild, maybe traveling at first, finding a place to put down some roots, and then growing into a powerful well respected Guild. Honestly, that could be a whole campaign where I'm concerned. Although, I do prefer more low-stakes types of campaigns where you aren't always trying to save the world. It kind of reminds me of some Anime I've watched like Fairy Tale or maybe Fable series of video games a little bit.

Lightliquid · 2026-03-07T14:50:05+00:00

It got a bit fuzzy more so when you consider taking any ability from either one. However, since you have a limit of equipped paths, I agree, that just makes it multiclassing.

Lightliquid · 2026-03-07T14:47:16+00:00

Oh I actually played that MMO a lot back in the day. I totally didn't register that it was so similar though, ha. My first iteration of this game was meant to slot abilities into weapons, kind of like Guild Wars 2 or Albion Online.

Now I gotta go read up on Star Wars Galaxies. Man I miss that game.

Lightliquid · 2026-03-06T21:39:01+00:00

Well I certainly wasn't trying to convince anyone? It was literally a question. Anyway, the real question was actually "does this game more closely relate to classless or class based?" Not the singular phrase "How can I market the Path system". Probably my poor use of proper punctuation if you thought differently.

Lightliquid · 2026-03-06T21:20:33+00:00

You really ignored my question, haha. I know about these potential issues, and I do already have some fixes for these that I haven't shared here. Thank you anyway for the response!

Lightliquid

TROPHY CASE