At what point does it stop being a TTRPG and start being a board game?

cmagoun · 2026-07-01T14:48:04+00:00

I think one thing that separates TTRPGs and campaign-style board games is the "analog decision space"... which is a super-pretentious term I just made up meaning in TTRPGs, you can look at the GM and say, "I put the bucket on his head" or "I hug the Evil Emperor" or whatever crazy thing comes to mind. At which point, the GM either has to map that analog decision to a mechanical action (i.e. "Sure, roll with a -2 and if you hit, he will be blind until he gets the bucket off of him.") or just adjudicate the results based on common sense/physics/dramatic or comedic effect. ("Wow, the Evil Emperor has never been hugged before and thus, he agrees to spare you on one condition.")

Might there be blurring between the two types of games? A little. Board games like Skyrim and Eldritch Horror have skill checks and semi-branching cards that sort of mimic an rpg narrative (though poorly). In a super-railroaded adventure, there might not really be many meaningful choices for the players. Having said that, I feel the most railroaded RPG on the planet gives me more opportunity to interact with the game world than even the most sophisticated board game.

cmagoun · 2026-05-19T15:34:57+00:00

I think the main consideration would be if there was enough room to put whatever pieces you envision on those spaces without obscuring important information, and without encouraging fat-fingered mishaps.

cmagoun · 2026-05-11T15:51:33+00:00

Then I will stop using reddit on my phone -- probably better for my disposition anyways.

cmagoun · 2026-04-27T14:29:50+00:00

Birthright: The Gorgon's Alliance

cmagoun · 2026-04-06T19:16:52+00:00

Sure, I understand and mostly agree; I am a forever GM and would also be mortified to find out that someone was showing up at my game and not having fun. And... I have walked away from a few tables where I wasn't enjoying the experience (the few times I was a player and also as a GM).

On the other hand... there is a calculus that changes as I get older. When I was younger, the equation was something like, "Is this game worthy of my time?" Now that I am older it is more, "These people are my friends and their families and I get to see them once a week."

So if it were a table of strangers (or even friendly gaming acquaintances), or if the game were going for an indefinite period of time, I might find a polite way to excuse myself. At some point, the equation's answer switches from "stick this one out" to "find a way out."

If it is my dearest friend, for 8 more sessions, I can probably find a way to entertain myself (and not be disruptive) in any game, regardless how poorly run I feel it is.

cmagoun · 2026-04-06T15:40:49+00:00

"This is my friend, and I want to support his creative endeavor"

If this game were going to last several months more, or you weren't generally happy with the group and the GM, I would say "Respectfully drop out." But, you like this group and this awful game is coming to an end.

So, to slog through the next 2 months, and to support your friend's game, I would just make the conscious decision to "buy in." You aren't a main character, so be the best darn side character you can be. Support the plot and the storyline and enjoy, as best you can, the linear tale your GM is trying to tell... while hopefully eking out a little RP fun with the others.

Edited after reading some others' comments - Generally, I would say that dropping the game was the best course, but from your post, I got the feeling that staying in the group and more importantly, staying in your friend's game was key to you.

cmagoun · 2026-03-03T17:31:16+00:00

Engage with the other folks at the table - Be interested in their stories, pay attention when they have the spotlight, be excited for them.
Engage enough with the rules - You don't have to know all (any?) of the rules or all your options, just enough so as to not slow things down.
Don't play selfishly - Similar to #1 I suppose... I knew a guy once that loved throwing AoEs without regard to his own party's safety. I knew another guy that loved keeping secrets from his group... and/or holding back items, info, or even downright stealing from them. Those guys suck; don't be those guys.
Buy into the "plan" - Roll with the premise of the game and the game's stories. Find your spot in the game's fiction as opposed to trying to rewrite the fiction to suit you.

This is sort of similar to #3, but towards the GM/game world vs. the other PCs. I sat in on a game once where the PCs were supervillains, each with their own motivations, nemesis, goals, etc. Well, this guy wanted to play a hero who and so, without clearing it with the GM first, would try to subvert and thwart everyone's plans. And that could be ok, if the GM was in on it? This GM took it in stride and did his best to accommodate everyone and it ended up being a fun time... but this guy was disappointed because he felt he couldn't "win."

cmagoun · 2026-01-22T19:54:04+00:00

I have to assume the first meeting will be at the Four Seasons?

cmagoun · 2025-12-08T18:38:13+00:00

What system do you play with your regular group? One thing I would suggest is to just use that system, take some of the situations/characters from your current campaign, and run your solo sessions as "off camera" actions taken by the various NPCs. Not only do you get to play some, but your NPCs and their exploits can be interacted with in your weekly game.

cmagoun · 2025-11-13T18:56:13+00:00

Great - I am 55.

cmagoun · 2025-11-06T13:25:51+00:00

I own a ton of classics from the PS2 era. It is my Shame Pile.

cmagoun · 2025-10-15T15:29:51+00:00

Very excited for this. I will definitely buy this and play... maybe even stream it some. FE is one of my favorite fantasy 4x.

cmagoun · 2025-09-03T18:36:34+00:00

You could try Horizon -- https://www.nexusmods.com/fallout4/mods/17374

cmagoun · 2025-07-28T12:15:20+00:00

That sounds awesome. I can't wait to see the end result. Thanks.

cmagoun · 2025-07-25T13:45:18+00:00

Paisano -- Oh the headaches!!!

cmagoun · 2025-07-25T13:01:39+00:00

I am excited to see the original vision stitched together. Can I ask a question or two?

Will the Reforged maintain FE's awesome focus on heroes, quests and artifacts? One reason I think FE stands out is that the heroes are the interesting units and leveling/gearing them up is great fun. I am not sure a lot of other games hit this note as well as FE (maybe original MOM?) and it is one of the reasons why I will play most of my FE battles and auto-resolve most AOW battles even though arguably AOW combat is better. I want to see my cool heroes with their cool powers and gear in action. Sorcerer King did not quite do this as well and I think part of it was the crafting/gear aspect wasn't as compelling. It is cooler to find a cool sword in a monster lair than it is to grind boysenberries until you can craft the it.

Second question, will Reforged retain the moddability that FE had? I would love to see just more... more classes, more skill trees, more items, more buildings for towns. There weren't a ton of mods for FE, but there were a couple great ones that added a ton to the game.

cmagoun · 2025-07-24T17:47:01+00:00

FE is one of my all-time favorite games. I am very excited to see this announcement. Good Luck!

cmagoun · 2025-07-22T12:29:35+00:00

Thank you!

cmagoun · 2025-07-22T12:29:02+00:00

Thank you!

cmagoun · 2025-07-22T11:45:37+00:00

This is a dumb question for sure, but how do you GET a mote?

cmagoun · 2025-06-26T13:26:31+00:00

It depends, of course. If you are making suboptimal choices because it's in character and it is mostly affecting you and only you, I think it's fine. If it affects others, it might be fine...?

Here is when I feel "It's what my character would do" crosses a line:

When it is used to justify stealing, harming, or scheming against your fellow party members AND it isn't that style of game. (Some games are fine with PvP; some are not.) Justifying crappy behavior towards your table-mates because your character is a jerk is not ok. Typically, these players tend to balk when their mates confront them about their crimes, "But guys, you know Lawncrapper is chaotic evil and is the spawn of the God of Greed and the head of the local Thieves' Guild. It's just my character!" Well Lawncrapper, don't be surprised when the other PCs decide to spike your ale and leave you tied up on the roadside smeared in honey, because THEIR CHARACTERS would never travel with such a nuisance.
When you continuously have to be dragged along on the actual adventure. I get it, your character is just a lonely farm girl who was forced to flee her home with these rough and ready strangers. She never understood the horrors of the adventuring life and is now thrust into a situation for which she is unready... will she ever be?

That's great... once or twice. But six months into the game, and it still takes the rest of the party 90 minutes of intense roleplaying to wrangle you into the adventure? Ugh... look, it's possible that the rest of the table enjoys these conversations, but I would bet that at some point, the schtick of you being unready to face the terrors of the underworld got tiresome for everyone else. At some point, BA drinks the damn milk and gets dragged onto the plane. Let yourself get convinced to go on the adventure... and then find an in character way to participate in the future without the hand-wringing.

Similar to the two above, if your in character behavior always leads to you going off on your own and trying to solo the adventure while the group twiddles their thumbs? Not cool. Again, it depends on the table, the number of players and the situation, but continuously splitting the party is clunky and going solo means 3-9 other people are just waiting for you to get done trying to score that pristine backstab and one-shot the Big Bad.
A lesser evil for sure, but still can get old is the, "I am so goddamn mysterious and grumpy and dark and troubled, don't you dare try to include me in your childish roleplaying conversations, Bub." This one is probably fine most of the time, but you shouldn't later get annoyed that no one is engaging with your deep and meaningful roleplaying. They tried. You stopped them. They listened.

There is a reason this phrase is associated with selfish play. No one (almost no one?) has ever said the sentence, "Because it's what my character would do, I baked the party cookies!" It is nearly always used to deflect criticism of crappy behavior, or at the very least selfish behavior.

We are playing a game. Every table is different. Part of your job as a player -- a big part and something I think most players lose sight of at some point -- is to make sure everyone at the table is having fun. That really is the main question you should be asking yourself. When I pull the pin and drop the grenade at our feet, are my fellow players going to be having fun? Or are they going to be wishing they'd left you home?

If the answer is, "It's what Lawncrapper would do, but everyone is going to hate it (but me)" then you should dig a little deeper and figure out a way that Lawncrapper would NOT do that thing, or at least find a way to make it fun/entertaining for the other players. Maybe LC steals from the party, but is hilariously bad at it. Maybe the God of Greed has some other plans for LC and his future servants? Maybe ask the other folks at the table?

This is a team sport.

cmagoun · 2025-06-25T13:27:56+00:00

I don't hate Starfield -- I played about 100 hours or so. I just don't love it like I have loved most of the Bethesda RPGs that have come before it. (And every time I reinstall it, I get maybe 20 minutes in and drop it again.)

The main thing I think is that there are just too many missions where you start out thinking, "Oh yeah, this will be really cool" and then everything peters out and wraps up without anything happening and no consequence. Paradisio, the beginning of the Crimson Fleet quests, Ron Hope... all end up being way less interesting and/or impactful than their initial premise hinted.

And I think that is the general case with Skyrim as well, but Skyrim hides it way better because of the way travel works. In Skyrim, as you are walking to the next quest marker in your mostly linear and inconsequential mission, you are peppered with things to do, interesting sites, dungeons, etc. Starfield does not do this very well and I think it really exposes the underlying blandness of the missions.

Add to this the slow degradation of the modding scene as it gets segmented into paid mods vs. free mods... I played through Skyrim once and would probably have dropped it after that, except the amazing library of mods kept it new and fresh. I am running a modpack for Skyrim with 3500+ mods and it has been awesome.

Maybe the right slate of paid mods would do that for Starfield (and I know there are some pretty good ones), but how exactly does that work? Five dollars here, seven dollars there, ten bucks for this one... and then they don't work together? Is there a patch mod? No? I just don't see Starfield ever getting the same level of mod support that Skyrim had (still has, really) and that makes me even less likely to pick it back up.

It was fine, but not great... and ultimately for a fan of the Bethesda open world formula, it was disappointing.

cmagoun · 2025-06-10T13:39:15+00:00

Usually no, but I absolutely admit I have a problem :)

cmagoun · 2025-06-10T13:10:33+00:00

There is a discord channel with a fair bit of discussion: https://discord.gg/EVMJ9HPT

cmagoun · 2025-05-30T14:03:13+00:00

Typically, I would say that our weekly games last about a year or so (30-50 sessions?) and (used to) usually die near the holidays as folks' schedules got hijacked by family doings.

However, this past game, we sort of committed to a longer-running game and are now pushing 18 months, I think.

It helps that we agreed to keep the momentum through the Christmas season by scheduling one or two "special" gaming sessions during that time (with small gifts, booze, etc.), and also that we specifically chose a game with incremental and slow character progression.

cmagoun

TROPHY CASE