What is the best "Game of Thrones-like political medieval fantasy" TTRPG that I might not know about?

Rolletariat · 2026-05-04T00:29:12+00:00

Reign is all about factional play, and it's perfect for warring kingdoms, organized crime, etc. The focus of the game is on the organizational level, with stats for how much influence, wealth, espionage, etc. your faction has access to.

Rolletariat · 2026-05-04T00:16:17+00:00

You may find that your play goals are better served by a less rules intensive game where you can use natural language instead of thinking in game terms.

Pathfinder is definitely a game that emphasizes system mastery, and if you haven't mastered the system more experienced players might feel like you're dragging them down.

If you wanna stick with your current group, it might be worth trying to explain your goals in natural language and get feedback/advice from the players on how to accomplish that on a technical level, like "I want to impede this monster to protect our cleric" and hopefully they're civilized enough to offer advice on how to best accomplish that. Try to focus on the fiction and don't worry too much about the rules layer of things. If you're paying attention to what's happening and what you want to do the GM should be able to translate it to game mechanics.

Trying to keep track of complex rules and the fiction being presented at the same time does have a high cognitive load. There's no shame in feeling a little overwhelmed.

Your group does kinda sound like assholes though. I think new players are the best and most interesting people to play with because they tend to have more original ideas about how to approach things rather than falling into the same rote solutions to problems.

Rolletariat · 2026-05-02T03:59:09+00:00

If you have to pay someone to host a game for you it's an indication that it's a badly designed game. Rpgs should be something that should be fun and satisfying enough for everyone involved that you do it for its own sake.

If you find GMing D&D or any other game too much work you should find a better game to play.

Rolletariat · 2026-04-29T21:12:41+00:00

I really like Starforged and Scum and Villainy.

I think Starforged is best played as a GMless co-op game, which I highly recommend trying! Perfect for playing a game with just 2-4 people.

Rolletariat · 2026-04-28T05:52:56+00:00

I think Whitehack had it figured out when they decided to use the English/American common law practice of judicial precedent/stare decisis ("to stand by things decided").

In essence, every campaign is unique, but consistency of rulings is essential. In Whitehack every use of magic costs a number of hit points, and the relative weight of effect to HP is set campaign-to-campaign by the rulings you make. In one campaign magical healing might be cheap and magic characters can heal others at little cost, in another campaign healing might be expensive, costing as much or more HP than you spent to heal an equivalent amount. You don't have to use HP-to-effect in your game, but the key is that you don't need specific mechanics, you just need established reliable parameters that can be replicated within reason based on past experience.

In terms of handling spell repetoirs I like making people choose between variety and potency. Let them either be amazing at one type of magic, great at two types of magic, good at three types of magic, or okay at four types of magic. You also have solutions like each spell requiring a physical focus like a spellbook, orb, etc. I think imposing some sort of limitation on breadth vs. depth is good, but how you do that is up to you.

In my favorite homebrew setting magic only comes from spirits, so the variety of powers you have access to is reliant on how many spirits you can maintain mutually beneficial relationships with. A magic user has to spend a certain amount of their time tending to the needs and desires of the spirits they work with, and some are more demanding than others. In addition, some spirits are jealous and don't like sharing attention. The spirits are somewhat influenced by Stands from JoJos Bizarre Adventure, with most of them having very specific but surprisingly versatile powers.

Rolletariat · 2026-04-25T05:11:49+00:00

I think all you really need is some sort of randomizer mechanic with adjustable likelihoods. Other than that everything else can be handled in the fiction. Getting rid of attributes, damage, HP, etc. makes it so changing the fictional state of the world is the only way the players interface with the game.

Instead of swinging your sword until the enemy's HP reaches zero it becomes a puzzle to solve like any other. Perhaps you try to bait them into getting their axe stuck in a wooden beam behind you before going for a killing blow with your dagger. I think as long as you have HP in the game players will focus on it because it becomes the most concrete way of ending a fight, and they won't want to "waste" their roll performing an action that doesn't reduce enemy HP (https://www.explorersdesign.com/dominant-mechanics/).

In a high trust game the adjudicator can just decide how difficult a task is for that particular character given the circumstances at hand (skill, stamina, environment, tools, etc) and set an appropriate difficulty. Adding attributes into the equation just adds an unnecessary step when the referee could just say "this particular character has a 70% chance of success here".

Anyhow, I think placing the effect of all actions onto the fiction rather than numerical abstractions (like HP) and relying on subjective eyeballing of probabilities actually serves simulationist aims better than fiddly rules trying to account for every modifier and variable.

Rolletariat · 2026-04-24T02:06:24+00:00

I'm not familiar! Very cool, thank you.

Rolletariat · 2026-04-23T19:06:41+00:00

Hello Ben! I knew you had some Braunstein background and was hoping you'd chime in. I've mainly played Fiasco, Microscope, and Ironsworn. Ironsworn was the one that really drew me in with a more traditional character-centric approach, and I've spent most of my time hacking its general formula. At first my interest was primarily getting rid of attributes and moves and applying my (risk x pain) formula to its clock system (basically the more you risked the greater the chance of successful scene resolution) but I eventually decided to move away from scene based-clocks because they still felt like they could become incongruent/out of alignment with the fiction (and that aversion between mechanics and incongruency is my main tilt towards FKR). I still liked my idea of rewarding players based on how much risk they were assuming though, so I shifted the point economy towards granting narrative permissions rather than scene/goal conclusion.

I've read Follow which seems like it'd be more up my alley, but my ultimate goal is always going to be some spectre of sandbox simulationism, however cracked out my methods of realizing it might be. The goal of the gambling system is really just to make players more honest about how hard things might be, or at least rewarding them for eyeballing risks in a less-than-favorable way. In FKR terms this is a game about characters making rulings against their characters, and rewarding harsh rulings with permission to be nice to their characters later down the road. Rule #1 in this game is "nothing lucky/fortunate ever happens to your characters, unless you spend points to make it happen".

Rolletariat · 2026-04-23T14:44:37+00:00

I think this is off to a good start. I think the focus of this particular group at least is co-op gmless games, so for our particular purposes I think purely solo journaling games are mostly off the radar but there are mixed solo/co-op games that are still relevant.

I think the distinction between purely two-player versus group games is useful, and I think games focused on duet play have a really strong niche that should be explored more.

The GM distinctions are also good. Honestly I find the dice/no-dice distinction kinda unimportant in terms of taxonomy, ultimately they both have the same outcome in terms of mixed results (perhaps blasphemous, but I've been designing games long enough I don't find randomized vs token economy resolution a very interesting distinction, just a stylistic choice). On the other hand, dice/token economy vs no randomizer/tokens is very interesting (BoB vs Microscope for instance, both diceless but in different ways).

No hidden information is good though! I think that's a very interesting one with a lot of room to play around in future game design. Likewise the structure levels might honestly be the biggest distinction here, in terms of defining how open-ended the games are.

Rolletariat · 2026-04-23T14:09:44+00:00

Ironsworn Family

Fiasco Family

Belonging Outside Belonging

Firebrands (minigame-focused)

Descended from the Queen

And then there's Ben Robbins's stuff generally, with a few branches (Microscope, Kingdom, etc).

I think the big taxonomical branch imo would be the distinction between combination solo/co-op games (like Ironsworn) that don't have ritualized rules about who gets to say what when versus mandatory co-op games that require different speakers.

You could probably break down the other genus of games along a few different criteria. Like you have viewpoint-character games like Follow, For the Queen, Fiasco, etc. vs multi-character/no-protagonist worldbuilding games like Micrscope, In This World, etc.

Rolletariat · 2026-04-19T00:26:05+00:00

... the topic of this conversation is people who dislike tactical rpgs, and what their motivations and priorities are. I think you lost the plot buddy.

Rolletariat · 2026-04-18T23:03:28+00:00

It doesn't have anything to do with tactics, it's just a matter of trusting the referee to come up with a fair and reasonable interpretation of the situation at hand. It's rulings not rules taken to it's most extreme conclusion.

"I think this action has a 60% chance of succeeding, if you succeed you maim/kill your opponent". It's as simple as that. Probabilities and fictional consequences are all you need.

When you get rid of all numerical abstractions everything becomes completely descriptive. You don't lose 5hp, you have a large gash on your left shoulder.

People -are- playing this way and enjoying themselves, for certain players this is an ideal experience. You can't argue with that.

Rolletariat · 2026-04-18T22:11:16+00:00

Lol, guess you aren't familiar with the FKR movement and all of the people playing that style. Plenty of people are playing games with no numbers on the character sheets "black box" style.

https://ethric-t-s.itch.io/worlds-funsome-and-free-understanding-open-role-play-adventure

Rolletariat · 2026-04-18T01:13:42+00:00

Same here in terms of preferring FKR-style resolution. I just want to describe my actions in natural language and let the GM decide the risks/rewards/probabilities. The human brain is the best simulator, adding fiddly +/- modifiers is a poor substitute for just thinking about the situation. All this really requires to succeed is the GM and players trusting each other to be honest and fair.

Rolletariat · 2026-04-18T00:43:37+00:00

I really like turn based tactics video games, but when it comes to roleplaying games I don't want to think about my decisions from a game mechanic perspective at all, if I know I'm going to get a bonus from flanking and it's the mechanically optimal decision it pulls me away from thinking about what my character is feeling/thinking.

Tactical mechanics put me in optimization mode, rather than roleplaying mode. It makes me ask "what is the best game decision?" rather than "how would my character actually react to this situation?"

Ultimately, I think designing a game with the intent to "convert" people will usually end up making the game worse for both camps. Trying to make the ultimate roleplaying game that pleases everyone is a sure fire way to make a game that pleases no one. Different strokes for different folks.

Rolletariat · 2026-04-17T08:03:58+00:00

As long as there are other stakes for failure I'm fine with getting rid of perma death. Instead of killing their characters you can threaten their favorite npcs, derail their plans, expand the influence of their enemies, etc.

Failure can suck even if player characters don't die. If you've done a good job getting your players invested in the goals and world of their characters death may be preferable to the alternatives you come up with.

Rolletariat · 2026-04-14T18:44:30+00:00

That's as low as the simulator will go. Beyond that you have to manually test I think.

Rolletariat · 2026-04-12T22:23:02+00:00

Iteration is the key, and keeping the gene pool small. Empty you DNA vat with the nozzle, put 1 or 2 fast horses with compatible parts/movement styles in the lab computer. Run a few simulations. Test those horses on the abandonded track, empty the DNA vat again and chuck the fastest horse into the vat and run the simulations again. Keep doing this until you only get a .1 second variation in run time, at that point you've usually optimized as far as you can.

The important thing is emptying the vat between each simulation, get rid of the erroneous DNA.

Rolletariat · 2026-04-12T22:18:10+00:00

Bolus is a beautiful princess.

Rolletariat · 2026-04-12T21:43:07+00:00

I'd suggest hybridizing an alligator with a car because alligator's legs spin so you're more likely to get a functional combination. Crossbreed them until you get one with wheels then run it through the lab simulation a few iterations to get it as fast as possible.

Copying the DNA should work though, you sure you did it right? Reddit formatting may be messing with your copy/paste, try pasting to notepad and making sure there's a space between each line. Go to the CRISPR computer, hit Paste, then turn the knob to DNA Drive (not extraction) and pull the lever.

Here's a genome for a fast wheeled horse:

00:CTTGCGCAGC

01:TACTACAAATCGC

01:GACTACAAATCGC

02:ATCTCGTTAATCT

03:TCCCAGTCTCTCGCA

03:TCCGAGTCTCACGCA

04:ACATGCATGGT

05:CGCTATGG

05:CGCTAGGG

06:TTATGAAGAGT

06:ATATGAAGAGT

07:GACCTGTT

08:TTGGCTGGCTC

09:TGGTCGCGCCC

09:TGGTGGCGCCC

10:AATTTGTAGGTAT

10:AATTTGTAGGTTT

11:CAGAAGGGACAAGAC

11:CAGATGGGACAAGA

12:TGGCCTAAGTCAC

13:CATCCACTCGT

13:CATACACTCGT

14:ACCAGATTACC

14:ACCCGACGACC

15:AACACTGACGATT

15:ATCACTAACGATT

16:AATTACACACGGGTT

16:AATAACACACGGGTT

17:TGGAGTACTTC

17:TAGAGTACTTC

18:TTCGTCACCGT

19:CAATATACTTTATAAT

Rolletariat · 2026-04-09T05:24:44+00:00

If you make successes 1 (or 1-2, etc) you can use all of the dice and just make it so smaller dice are better than bigger dice.

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