Recommend a game for 13 year old

[DarkCloud]

Dis... The amount of planning you need to do depends, I have, for my part, only used prestige classes in about 10% of the characters I make- then again I am almost always ineffectual when playing- but I still generally have fun as long as the others do not munchkin-up their characters... or cheat. I play to role-play, not to optimize a strategic wargame- Battletech is better for that.


Ali- Exalted is a much better system for roleplaying.

[Alinestra Covelia]

Yeah, my group took a look at Exalted, Call of Cthulhu, and a load of other gaming systems. I personally liked Exalted - as you say, it feels better for roleplaying (rather than roll-playing) but the group went with GURPS.

We're in the middle of a homebrew postapocalyptic "hard scifi" game (more redolent of The Road than of Fallout) and my friend Bing keeps promising he's doing a GURPS Ravenloft conversion. We'll see.

[DarkCloud]

I've never understood the attraction of GURPS.

I have played and enjoyed Hero, Cthulu, Exalted, and DnD
Never played GURPS, or Shadowrun, or RIFTS.

GURPS seems to be like Hero... but it is not, correct?
--
What is The Road?

---
Even in groups that are not too amenable to roleplaying, roleplaying always seems to eclipse ROLL-playing with exalted, I have found. It's uncanny. I think it's partially because of the dot system, and partially because of the setting and partially because the characters are so strange and unique.

[DrSpike]

I think Dave's 13 year old would think you two are pretty nuts, to be honest.

[Alinestra Covelia]

This is taken from the GM's blog for our group, concerning why they chose GURPS over various other systems:

HERO System:

* Everything in one .pdf, everything based on d6 rolls. Very modular character design, with a wide variety of powers available.
* But appears to be narrowly focused on superhero type adventures, though. Not easily translatable to DnD type games.

Star Frontiers:

* Everything seems based on d% rolls. Character design and progression are points-based, giving a lot of flexibility.
* Appears to be narrowly focused on science fiction space opera games.

Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay:

* Has the same sort of class-based model that DnD does, which I'd rather break away from.
* Combat is much grittier and realistic.

And now for the strongest contenders.

TriStat dX:

* Character generation is points based.
* XP goes directly to buy new points for advancement and there is much flexibility.
* Opposed rolls.
* No magic system (though it's customizable).
* No mental effects system (though it's customizable).

World of Darkness:

* Chargen points based.
* d10 system.
* XP goes to buy advancement points.
* Magic is possible.
* Narrowly focussed on horror and supernatural play.

Call of Cthulhu:

* d%
* No chargen points.
* Advancement points are special, based on level of skills and which ones you've used.
* Excellent rules for harsh combat.
* Excellent rules for madness and mental effects.

GURPS:

* 3d6 (bell curve)
* Chargen points.
* Advancement points.
* Opposed rolls
* Magic
* Harsh combat.
* Madness and mental effects.
* Versatile - can be used for many other campaign settings.

And just for comparison's sake, DnD:

* d20
* No chargen.
* No advancement points.
* Yes opposed rolls.
* Yes magic (though spell slot reliant, i.e. arbitrary)
* No harsh combat
* Madness and mental effects (Ravenloft only).

GURPS is now my system of choice. I'll always have access to a d6, and I can alter the system to run Gothic horror to post apocalyptic wasteland to space opera. It may not do these as well as the dedicated campaign-specific systems, but it can at least do them competently. And the mathematics behind the rules are much better than many, including DnD's d20 system.

Also, GURPS' marketing focus appears to be much more gamer friendly than Wizards of the Coast ever was. You can buy pdfs and download them. They made their latest edition, 4th, very compatible with 3rd, requiring only a small amount of tweaking. This was consciously done so that people would not have to go out and buy up 4th ed. copies of all their books from 3rd ed. This is another ethical decision that has made me favor GURPS over DnD immensely.

I don't have the financial funding to invest in many different systems. I also think it's lazy consumerism to take whatever the company gives us, especially if they've cynically patterned their marketing strategy to maximize profits. I hope that these notes help other gamers take a critical look at their games and try out (preferably without buying) other gaming systems until they find the one they like the most.

"The Road" is a post apocalyptic novel by Cormac McCarthy. It's so gritty and realistic that it barely qualifies as sci-fi, it's more like a sociological novel.

From what I can remember, GURPS is actually more similar to HERO system than to most others. HERO is more targeted towards playing as supers, though, whereas GURPS is so wide-open that you can tailor it to any setting. You can trim or use rules as you see fit, and the optional books are all thematically arranged.


DrSpike: Your 13 year old would show rare insight

[Zevico]

NWN2 is a lot like Oblivion using the D&D game system plus they just released another expansion pack last December and now you can get one box set for $50 which has the original game, all three expansion packs, and you can freely download lots and lots of user made modules so he should get plenty of game time out of the game.

I disagree on NWN2, mostly because it's combat system is ridiculously easy. I mean really, really easy, so that playing it is outright boring.

Apart from that, the original game has an unimpressive story line. Also, it has unrealistic characters. MotB also suffers from the same combat problems. I didn't even get close to finishing either game because the combat system was boring and unrewarding.

I haven't played Storms of Zehir or the third party expansion. On SoZ, however I will say that whole-party creation games aren't my style, and no NPCs is bad.

NWN2 mods are few and far between because mod-making is a lengthier process in NWN2's engine. For this reason I wouldn't buy it for the mods.

If you want great mods, buy NWN1. It's easy to mod, but the game engine is flawed and limited. Still the end result of easy moddability is great mods, and a lot of them.

[DarkCloud]

Hm. The comments about HERO are interesting- the only HERO games I have played were with discworld and magic- it worked fine with that.

Thank you for the list!

[Dr Strangelove]

How about Bioshock, F.E.A.R., and Far Cry? I know that Bioxhock has an XBox version, I'm not sure about the other two. Does he have a decent PC too?