Briarthorn edition.This thread is dedicated to all kinds of solo games, systems, tools, and campaigns.TQ: Let's keep it simple. What's your go-to system for solo RPGs?> Last Thread: >>98029236Resources:https://rentry.org/srpgghttps://infinityweavers.link/re-up/solo-rp-toolkitMore threads:https://archive.4plebs.org/tg/search/subject/%2Fsrpgg%2F/orhttps://desuarchive.org/tg/search/subject/%2Fsrpgg%2F/type/op/
>>98138737>TQI usually do a variation of Ironsworn, though i don’t think I’ve done vanilla IS. Did one starforged and one sundered isles, havent concluded either campaign. I like how simple it is while keepingvsoke back and forth in combat. Currently cyberpunk red single playering as I got a non solo cyberpunk red game starting. Single player has some great rules and others that I’m less crazy for, but is fun as hell still. I also have the scarlet heroes book but have yet to play it. I think I’ve been taking a break from fantasy stuff.
>TQAs of now it is Clash of Steel 2E.
>>98138737>TQ: Let's keep it simple. What's your go-to system for solo RPGs?B/X or AD&D derivated games most of the time, thought these days the one I am enjoying quite a lot is 4AD. The former are just absurdly easy to solo and the object-oriented design rather than narrative simulation is a huge plus.
Wonder what happened with the anon last thread that was making the module/OSR/Scarlet Heroes variant that included rules for getting bitches and other power fantasy stuff. It seemed like a cool project.
>>98138737>TQ: Let's keep it simple. What's your go-to system for solo RPGs?I like to play Castles and Crusades
>>98138737Newbie here, but what would be a good solo RPG to start with?I've only played 5E
>>981421105e can be a pretty good one to start with, actually. Look up a book called "GM Yourself" (It talks about how to run 5e as a solo game, mostly by adjusting it's action economy.)When I was a kid I would play D&D by myself and it would be fun for a little while, but ultimately get boring. But back in 2017 I looked into playing solo again, and 5e was actually the game that I started with. Ever since, I've played some sort of solo RPG about four or five times a week. It's really opened the door for me to try and experiment with different systems and RPGs. So, start with what you know... Then gradually expand.
>>98142110If you want a more structured,CYOA-style experience there's the Avalon Solo Adventure System. It's essentially a gamebook that supports a party of 4, complete with time and reputation tracking, side quests and plotlines. The main quest, for one, has a sprawling line of books. There are also other books for different faction quests. It's also a lot of bookkeeping but it completely removes the burden of creating new content.
>>98138737>Briarthorn edition. Forgerthorn edition
hey i made a __LEWD__ activities add-on for Ironsworn-like games over here. please let me know what you think and how it plays. https://files.catbox.moe/1n9uab.pdf>>98143850
>>98138883How's Single Player Mode as an oracle? It's one of the ones I'm considering to get started on solo RPGs since cyberpunk is closer to the sort of modern day action I want to play.
On the rentry, https://silaslima.github.io/simplefun-tests/ is dead and I think https://mythic-gme-adventures.idispatch.ovh/ should be added
>>98147040Ok I'll fix that later, when I get home.
>>98138737>TQWFRP 4e with Mythic GME, but someday I'll play some AD&D 2e to fuck around literally
>>98145081Ah hello fellow anon who posts on both threads
you are never solo when you have yourself
>>98138737>What's your go-to system for solo RPGs?I'm trying D6 stuff lately, and today I got the feeling of revisiting FATE for solo, I loved the char customization.
>>98138737>tqDragonBane, it have the things I want. A decent open-ish class that is mostly focused on skills and a few defining feats, currency, the right amount of crunch, not too complicated monster stats, relatively static HP pool, not Vancian spells, "mana" for special ability. I've skimmed through a bunch of systems, and I wanted something that was like Swade, but not Swade, DB fits that pretty well
>>98138737Eh, I tried some solo rpgs a few times and it always felt like masturbating. It's just not the same without your homies you can jerk off.
>>98150758Try Barbarian Prince, it might give you a peek into what solo can be.
>>98150758Masturbating feels pretty good though.
>>98138737I am still trying to pin down my main character's special mechanical ability. I really want them to be good at doing non damaging maneuvers in combat. But also still being able to do normal combat things. I am thinking something along the lines of:>Mind and body: You can make an intel check, if you succeed, your next physical action this turn can have a bonus situationally applicable non damaging effect, if you fail, your next physical action this turn is reduced in effectiveness.It sounds very broad though. Primarily, the down side is that a failure reduces damage that round by half, but If I am doing something non damaging, like climbing rock, I have to roll that at disadvantage. SO this is a character that thrives on clear awareness, but is rather handicapped if his perception is obfuscated, like by darkness or by a good pokerfaced.
>>98152058What ruleset/system are you using?
Imagine playing this SOCIAL activity alone.lol. That's it, not even an lmao
>>98152992I am going between barbarians of lemuria and mini 6.first for fantasy, second for sci fi.
Has anyone seriously tried AI for creating random tables? Worth?
>>98153504not random tables, But I have used it for coming up with special abilities to spice up combat and stuff. I like to use AI more for Auxiliary functions rather than primary.
>>98138737>TQOne Page Solo Engine. I've never found anything I liked better.
>>98153289Ok bump-kun, thanks.
>>98153298I like Mini Six, hadn't touched Barbarians of Lemuria yet, but had seen it mentioned everywhere I should give it a try soon.Last sci-fi character I did in Mini-Six had CQC as Skill, then specializations were melee and unarmed. Mini Six is great and easily hackable.
>>98153504I've done this, it is good if you know how to wrangle the tard with the right prompt-fu. In my experience, Claude is the best at this for now, it is not as retarded as others, too bad it is not as cheap as Gemini.
>>98146336I like it a fair bit. The oracles are all really good and it has a few systems I like a lot such as a countdown clock by rolling a pool of dice and taking out any 1s, or doing cyberpunks beat charts with dice rolls. You have cyberpunks usual list of beats (scenes) and you can just roll em and keep it going with them till it makes sense to complete the gig. I had one where I snuck into a warehouse to save an important person, rolled an oracle for whats next and got FIST FIGHT so one of the kidnappers confronted my dude and they got into a fist fight with a countdown to how quick everyone else could respond. Felt great. I’m not sure how sold I am on its “quick and dirty combat mode” for when you don’t want to play out fights as i think its just a “lmao roll to win” vs a lot of other solo systems that have back and forth, but I don’t know how else they could have. That’s my only real complaint though.
>>98153902>specializations were melee and unarmedhmm, thats one way to take the specialization rule. I kind of assumed you couldnt do that for any offensive skill, but now that I think about it, I think it just said weapons. though that might be taking the letter of the law instead of the spirit as far as combat balancing goes.but then again, you dont get the bonus die to damage for using weapons if you go unarmed, so it might balance out.
>>98154600Yes, you are right, better keep things clean.
>>98140850underrated game>TQWell right now all I do is play Choir of Flesh, but previously when I had more time to screw around I used a lot of cepheus engine
https://starforged-asset-workbench.vercel.app/ this is kinda fun
>>98154829>https://starforged-asset-workbench.vercel.app/neat!
>>98153504Yeah, some simple ones for coming up with physical features for characters, and some of their personality traits
>>98152058>>98153902Ok, refined the ability a bit>Offhand specialist: When you have a free hand you can take a penalty to an action to preform a secondary action with that free hand.For the fantasy campaign at least, I think my character will specialize with one handed weapons and having the other hand free to do grappling and hand signaling. Kind of what you see in a lot of smallsword treatises.
>>98157037Eventually I might try to get an offhand gauntlet, kind of acting like a offhand dagger in that it increases defence against melee, but not against ranged.
>>98157037>Offhand specialist: When you have a free hand you can take a penalty to an action to preform a secondary action with that free hand.That's quite good.>>98157044yeah, make it a sort of +Parry bonus
Anyone play Sword world 2.0 or 2.5 solo?
>>98154829Can this be fed into the nboughton journal thingy?
>>98160349Oh, wait. Pocketforge is better. Neat.
Why isn't Pocketforge in the rentry? This is way superior than nboughton's.
>>98160397Got a url for that?
>>98160943pocketforge(dot)rockpaperstory(dot)com
How do people work with such small random tables? Mythic, the gold standard, has only 100 words per table even on the generic tables. That feels like a laughable amount
>>98161740If you need more than 100 words per table you just want to be spoonfed the answer. Even then, having more kinds of tables is better than making each one a dictionary
>>98161740I can often get by with just the VERB ADJECTIVE NOUN tables a lot of rpgs have. Roll a couple words and extrapolate an answer with your ImAgInAtioN! I sometimes like my tables more vague as it gives me more room to make shit up. A table with too many words would tell me the whole story where ad a table that just gives me a couple WEIRD WORDS can do wonders. “Avoid Wealthy Stranger”Shit, maybe theres some rich merchant looking for you and you gotta avoid him.
>>98153504>>98153933Free version of Gemini is actually pretty decent. You just need to prep it similar to when you're running it as a GM. ChatGPT is better and less prone to small inconsistencies. Claude is overkill and the reason it's not cheap is because of the insanely detailed prompt injector they have. Grok is only good for short advisories because of the ridiculous limit it has now.These chatbots are pretty powerful. Any time you guys are having trouble with them, just ask another chatbot for advice, tell them the other one is talking shit too so we can get this robot war started sooner.
alright this is srpg-adjacent I guess, but it fits better here than bgg. Does anyone know of a 4X style solo(able) game that I really can play with sheets and a book(and or dice and or cards etc)? basically, I know of several 4X board games, but I don't want a board. i want a glorified spreadsheet. I found one guys basic project from reddit but thats about it
FUCK useless goddesses
>>98138737>What's your go-to system for solo RPGs?D&D 5e :^)
>>98163328I've found a good workflow for the pro version of Gemini, where you divide all the mechanics and lore dumps into their notebook, since it's better at sourcing and data retrieval, and keep the regular narrative end of things in Gemini's gem feature plugged in with your GM settings, character files, and plot developments. So far, it keeps things far more coherent; it takes some time to set up, but afterward, it's almost plug-and-play.
>>98164257Seems like she's no longer useless to you.
>>98161740I can get by with just a table of 4 (earth, fire, water, air), and just applying liberal amounts of context and implication.
>>98163766I'm interested in something like that too. Got a link to the r*ddit one?
>>98164543I have AI make token efficient versions of the documents. I only have 2 files, the prompt instructions and a campaign bible. I use Ironsworn so I don't let the AI handle the mechanics as I prefer doing that myself. It's just the storyteller and event generator to me. AI is still prone to hallucinations even with higher context window so every 30 or 40 replies I have it dump everything that happened in a text file, have another AI convert it to token efficient version and put it in my campaign bible, then create a fresh chat. It's been great so far. What's funny is if I hit the daily rate limit but still want to play I can just pack up my shit and move to another AI.
>>98165583This but unironically. Overreliance on tables is a crutch
>>98165583I go one step further and dont really use tables, just rolls to determine if my first broached answer is right or its something else more unlikely.But If I was to reintegrate them, I might do one table for qualities, like the classical elements you said, then one for quantities like no, little, medium, high, very high.In statistics basicly nominal variables and ordinal variables. answering the category question of “what type” and the measurement question of “how much”
>>98166772actually strike that “no” in the quantity table, because thats actually too absolute os a statement it should really be little to no, little, medium, high, very high to complete.
Mechanically speaking, is Ironsworn: Starforged just a de facto replacement/superset of Ironsworn/Delve? Obviously there's the sci-fi theme but few of the actual mechanics seem especially coupled to the sci-fi fiction, so I'm wondering if most people just play Starforged and file off the theming when they play Ironsworn.
>>98165775That's a good idea, I'll have to try that. I've been playing with some crunchier systems like the Warhammer games, along with the Mythic gme so having the AI process all my rolls speeds things up immensely
>>98165775>>98164543how do you do battles? do you tell the AI where on a map you move and how you attack? and then it decides what attacks to use? does it stick to an attack list and statblock, or make stuff up?
>>98169483I either keep it abstract or just have it create an an ascii battle map. You have to kind of handhold the AI a lot with custom instructions, such as either making a custom statblock or using a preestablished one from the core rules/supplements. Left to its own devices, it will lean towards letting you win, so you need to include that in your instructions. At least with Gemini, the gem system works as a base template for how it should act across all chats, so it's better suited to running the narrative end of things. At the same time, the notebook is better at actually citing its sources across multiple books and shows you where it's pulling stuff from, and is better geared towards the math side of things, which is where you would want to actually run combat. You could ask the regular chat for a narrative breakdown of events if you wanted to.
>>98150758This is a very homosexual post.
>>98169503awesome thanks.Also, to you, or anyone else:If you solo play, do you just use one character, or do you make an entire party? do you let the ai control your party members?I imagine even a pay to use AI would have trouble keeping track of all of the characters, but doing a dnd campaign solo would also be difficult
>>98172258I use the paid version of Gemini, and I've tried ChatGPT. From my experience, you can have it track other characters and even keep stat blocks for use, but I wouldn't try it with more than one at a time, since it will eat up a lot of context very quickly. The best solution I think would be to have a party and keep your combat scenarios with your character as 1v1 with your allies in the background giving you some sort of support or are fighting their own battles which you can then help reslove. Alternatively, you can come up with on your own or collaborate with the AI for house rules on how to run the party more abstractly and keep them around for boss encounters.
>>98172512thanks that's helpful. I am considering running an AI for the narrative parts, then using a separate AI for the actual battle. I would need AI 1 to have me to ability checks and present stat blocks for the enemy, but I would have the second simpler AI run the battles Lastly, is the AI good at coming up with enemies and stat blocks? do they make you roll ability checks and perception checks?
>>98172713nta but generating stat blocks is pretty much the only thing its good at. i used copilot and claude to build a setting but i already had all the ideas to start with, i just needed some help organizing and contextualizing things. AI requires a lot of tard-wrangling to prevent it from going completely off the rails and inserting things that don't belong. i don't think i would rely on it too heavily for narrative or even combat scenarios beyond stats, tactics and something vague like "why are these guys attacking me?" after providing it with a context prompt of significant detail. plus just from a practicality standpoint, jumping between 2 AIs, system rules and whatever else you might want to introduce sounds really cumbersome and draining.
>>98154600You're not supposed to specialise Dodge, Brawl or weapon skills RAW.
>>98172713You could make AI do anything provided your prompt-fu is good. Prepping the AI is often where you'll take your time the most. Give it context to what you're doing, how you want it to be played. Give it a sample input and output. Then tell the AI to make you a prompt and refine it some more from there until you're happy. Feed that to your AI GM.That said, the "simpler" AI isn't gonna be the one doing the battles for you. If your giving it math, you're gonna need a model with a built-in calculator. You'll likely run Claude although it's a tad bit overkill. The tard AI is your narrative GM.>>98173050 Anon is kinda right. Your AI GM spitting out statblocks and scenario context, plugging it into CombatAI seems might be a bit cumbersome going back and forth like that. How's your planned play flow anyways? Do you want CombatAI to keep asking you every turn what you want to do? Sounds awfully slow. If you're not a paypig, you might want a less crunchier system.
Tell me about the game you guys are playing. What are you doing and where are you adventuring?
>>98173050>>98173141thank you both for the adviceMy main reason for using two AIs was to save on tokens/memory. I'm worried as soon as I have a long battle with a few different enemies, that will take up a significant amount of the narrative AI's memory. Also, it's an entire extra mechanicthat I don't need to teach to the NarrativeAI, that can focus on the story while the CombatAI (a good idea you have to name them) just does the combat. Plus, it's no problem to reset the combat AI for every combat, it doesn't need to remember past fights, just stat blocks for the current one, and I want to keep the memory/story without having to restart and summarize for the NarrativeAI as long as possible.But I haven't done it before, perhaps I am misguided and it would be more work than help
>>98173658I'm running a custom Scarlet Heroes campaign in a Philippines-style archipelago, and I added dark elves in because I wanted choco elf pirates
>>98173658Urban fantasy urbex in a city with a rapidly dwindling population. Currently going through a giant abandoned mall complex
>>98173658Split four ways between:>the nexus of a tear in reality that scattered the party across the realms>a dragon lair>a citadel populated by literal wandering souls. I presume it was built to capture and study them. >the interior of the device that caused the rift, scaled up to be a megastructureWe're all trying to meet back up and fix the rift before it unleashes untold horrors.
>>98173658I recently found the log book for a sci-fi space adventure I was running. The party had just finished fighting a fungal parasite puppeteeting some bones on an ancient artificial hollow world that has been overrun by fungi
>>98173658My own campaign has been on hiatus, but it left off in the fire plane because we opened a portal in a last-ditch effort to escape a problem we semi-caused
>>98173842If your system's combat is crunchy, that'd be the way to go.
>tfw my AI DM keeps insisting the noble's daughter has a mustache
>>98179622it would be impolite to reject her advances
>>98165588https://www.reddit.com/r/Solo_Roleplaying/comments/1dqrrdr/dominion_ascendancy_a_4x_pen_and_paper_solo_game/I haven't played it yet but it looks to have some interesting ideas at least. just not sure if it'll scratch that 4x itch
AI anons, how do you get the AI DM to understand the map that you are using? coordinates? how is your experience with this?
>>98173658Cyberpunk red, my guy just ran a hard job but forfeited the money he would have made so that he could instead keep and fence the sick car that was stolen. Now he needs another job before the month ends. I rolled up a gig and it looks like someone from NoPR (Nomad Powered Radio) needs protection. Maybe theres a shortage of manpower and the host was told maybe just keep it off this weekend until we are sure you’re protected from those recent threats, but hes too dedicated so he hired me out. I have enough funds to bring in two more dudes to help. I got my borderline schizo solo and my naive friendly lawman. Gonna play it out by having them sit on the station each day and have a threat clock maybe counting down to a LARGE attack that may or may not happen. Still figuring out the details.
>>98180031I haven't, honestly. I don't think it's really geared toward that kind of visual analysis. If you have a rule book that clearly outlines where things are geographically with written descriptions, it can handle that, like the WFRP 4e depictions of Reikland
>>98180122That sounds fun.One of the campaigns I'm juggling at the moment is at NC 2045, it's gorgeous, the level of detail to work with is so good, and the single player mode tools are quite decent too. I strip the pdfs from images and upload them to notebooklm and use it as my RTG CPR pokedex / A.I. wiki.
>>98180031I'd say the most advanced at multimodal right now is Gemini (to understand visuals and give feedback based on them), and even at that you have to hold its hand and wrangle the retard to make your biding. Not worth the squeeze yet.A.I. is good as support and assistant, not yet to act as a full-fledged DM, it fails even at simple tasks like understanding a simple hex or battle map.
>>98180031>AI anons, how do you get the AI DM to understand the map that you are using? coordinates? how is your experience with this?Personally, I've always left the AI handle distances and so on...
>>98179667Thanks, that seems pretty cool. Not sure if I'm a fan of exploring each turn, as that could make the map blow up in proportion over the course of ages, but maybe it's intended for shorter games.
>>98173658Made a Starforged inspired sci-fi horror mecha game. Been playing Freelancer for a week so I thought hey why not like this but with mechas. Went to find a friend, got waylaid to a planet, blew up a mech printing network and now my dude has 2 AIs vying for control in his head. Gonna roll later where this goes.
thoughts on solo map building games? what the best one to start?
I'm feeling overwhelmed by all the options, tables, oracles, systems and combinations available, so I don't know what to do.
>>98184763get clash of steel, enjoy>>98180809the more I study it the less enthused I am about it. I'm taking some notes to start figuring out my own system.
>>98173658I might play one based on Bleach
>>98184763A) try a lighter game built for soloB) try a game youre super familiar with and use a single die as a yes/no oracle. If you need tables, work those in over time. Personally, I opted to use a game that came with lots of tables already to help guide things a bit.
>>98184763Start with Ironsworn. It's simple. Then try something else. Just keep trying things until you figure out your personal taste. Learning what you like is part of the process.
Play a game you know well, and play as both the player and the GM. When you feel like things are uncertain, us a coinflip to decide a yes/no question. Start adding more oracles and tables if you want to leave more up to chance rather than deciding directly.
>>98184763Try something that you know extremely well and ideally, something not super crunchy. If you don't know anything super well, look for a system that is simple enough for your own taste and give it a go. As for oracles, I'd highly recommend something simple like One Page Solo Engine but desu, its gonna take time to find the system, gm oracle, and style of solo play that works best for you. If something doesnt turn out to be as fun as you'd like, thats fine. Give something else a go. Best of luck friend.
>>98138737Are there any ressources for randomly generating maps for encounters? Whether it's scrambling tiles, a roll table system or something involving tossing die on the table.Similar tools for the amount and placement of foes would also be useful. I figure that wargames might be the place to look at for modern games.
>>98185646Depends on what map you want. There's Donjon and Watabou for small, local stuff. Then there's Hexroll for big hex maps.
>>98185766I'm looking to generate encounter maps for outdoor spaces, rather than dungeon crawls or large scale travel maps which I is what Donjon offers.Watabou has some pretty nifty generators, the house and village ones will be particularly useful for me.
>>98185940>https://ajuc.github.io/outdoorsBattlemapGenerator/This technically fits your specifications but it's the only one I can find. At this point I would either steal an existing battlemap or slop one from Gemini.
What do solo rpgs sound like? Train of thought or is it a back and forth of description and response or what?
>>98190494To me it’s roll dice, write story, roll dice anytime some shit is about to occur (combat or skill) or a question is asked (oracle or table), continue to write story. Theres also chunks of “Okay, whats the quest/gig here and whos involved?”, roll dice tables to generate a bunch of themes, places, and characters and kind of fit them together.
Anyone else use the Juice oracle? I have a little printout of it on nice paper that I keep in my solo RPG book to roleplay at work in my free time
>>98190647How come you have free time at work, are you like a security guard?
>>98190759Yup
>>98190767Oh cool. Yeah I try to do everything in my head, no paper. Inevitably I end up using my phone when I need rules.
>>98190494you can do what you like:- dialogue- omniscient narrator- 1st person narrator- any of the above with audio recordings- drawing a sketch- "investigator" taking brief impersonal notes account of the scenelast option can be useful if it's hard to come up with things to write, whatever works for you
>>98191385Is it common to find solo RPGs boring?
>>98193907No, it's not for everyone. It's also one of those activities where it isn't fun until something clicks and you just start riding a groove.
What's the best solo game for the full Sword & Sorcery open world experience? Explore wild lands, ancient ruins, defeat evil sorcerors and monsters, and collect hot bitches. Scarlet Heroes? People always praise Ironsworn but it seems too narrative-oriented.
>>98194357Kal-Arath
>>98193907a lot of people find table top games boring, solo RPGs is an step even further, depends how much you can amuse yourself with a few prompts using mostly your imagination
>>98190647I made a quick function in my notes app to roll on the action table from Usurper. if I'm bored at work I pull up the app and can play around mostly just using that. Usurper is great for this
I need a way to roll dice on my Windows 11 PC. I prefer seeing the dice roll around with physics. Recommendations?
>>98196493if you google "die roll" it shows a die you can roll
>>98145081what the fuckI mean, don't get me wrong, good job and thank you for your service. But also what the fuck?>>98150758There's always machine-assisted. A free, offline-locally-ran chat AI (fuck data centers and fuck tech bro CEOs) is still masturbation, but has that The Stranger effect in the same way that a fleshlight isn't your hand despite being a fancy sockpuppet.>>98196493>I need a way to roll dice on my Windows 11 PC.Easy. google sheets, it will even do your math. I have the entirety of Tom Bloom's Goblin With a Fat Ass in a google sheet, just a roleplay.>I prefer seeing the dice roll around with physics.Nevermind
>>98196493the dice at hexroll are ok, but I don't know if there is a stand alone version of it, hexroll runs on any browser.
>>98145081>>98196758CLOCKS!
>>98196758>offline-locally-ran chat AII don't have a rig that can run that shit unless I want it to type one letter per 3 hours.
>>98197343Shouldn't need much, just a decent CPU and graphics card. My computer is a few years old and it can run AI pretty well, especially with better software.
>>98194996Interesting. Do you have a pdf?
>>98197343perchance is pretty good and pretty simple, also versatile and everything is stored in your browser, not a data center allegedly. My laptop is old af and I run it with no problem.
I'm so used to reacting to content as the way to play. Never been a GM either. This solo thing makes my brain hurt.
>>98199239Yeah, being a GM before trying solo really helps a lot with getting the right mind to it.You could try being the GM and emulating players instead, that could show you the ropes.
>>98198428Check the pdf share thread >>98193120
>>98199269I'll try that, what I've been doing isn't working.I feel like I don't have a creative bone in my body. I don't know. I probably just need to practice and get good.
>>98199307Try starting with stricter, more board game-like rules and spend more time imagining the places, people, and actions. The game can continue if you draw a blank, but you still get some creative exercise. Then you just need the confidence to feed your imagined details back into affecting the rules.
>>98199444To add to this, very procedure-heavy games like 5 Parsects and OSRIC is a good place to start since you can strip away the fluff and the game still functions on its own.
>>98199444It helps when I have a good mental picture of the scene so I can decide what I do/say on my turn. That helps, thanks.
>>98197208What games use clocks (other than that sex one posted earlier in the thread)?
>>98194357Clash of Steel 2EIt comes with solo rules.
>>98203525Anything PtbA or derivative, including BitD (which is why the sex addon uses them, because base Ironsworn does since it's a PbtA derivative).Index Card RPG.Goblin with a Fat Ass
>>98203525Cyberpunk singleplayer had a neat clock idea that was “Grab a pool of dice, roll them each turn/action/5 minutes, get rid of any 1s and repeat”. I kind of like it as it also allows the chance of INSTANT failure and you can supplement it with bonus rules like “subtract a dice to restore luck, add a dice if you succeed a difficult preparation check”Clocks are probably my favourite thing for solo games, great for adding tension
>>98206675Cyberpunk RED singleplayer is quite good, I liked it lots.
>>98169438The OG Ironsworn's 2.0 version is actually in development and the current draft is available in the game's shitcord server. But yes people do use Starforged to play in a fantasy setting. There are even conversion pdfs floating around to facilitate it.
>>98209612Oh cool I didn't know there was going to be a second edition.
>embark on a mission about a haunted well or something>reach the village>I ask some rope to the villagers and I descend the well >as I descend, I feel wonky>I cast detect magic then identify>wtf there are several layers of alteration and conjuration magic imbuing the well>it's a magical processor...in a well>on the bottom I hear a voice>it says it seeks a keeper>wut>I return above>after investigating around I find out that around 50 years ago the well collapsed after an earthquake and they rebuilt it, however the workers they hired ran away after reporting seeing weird things like water that moves in the opposite sense of gravity and weird masonry that gave them an headache just by looking at it>the next day I descend again to speak to whatever it's in the well>I notice it's not aggressive, it speaks in a automaton-like fashion>I can't make heads or tails of whatever it is>after asking the village's oldest elders, I find a very important clue: since the old well collapsed, life has been easier here: better crops, less illnesses, longer lived, but at the same time it became weirder: people having memory issues, perceiving the same event in different ways (kinda like the dragon breaks made by the numidium, but localized there)>that's it! it appears to be an ancient local reality warping machine, currently programmed to bring prosperity, however its functioning seems to "scramble" reality causing those weird effects>after chatting with the elders and thinking about what to do, I call for a meeting of all villagers to decide what to do>they vote in a slight majority to keep the machine>I return in the well, and find out that the keeper was like an adminstrator component that got borked time ago, and it can be reprogrammed>I reprogram the keeper to be the villagers themselves, allowing them to control the machine by majority voting>now the village is essentially a magically enforced democracyI expected to find a troll or something, that was wild
well I finally got my first choir of flesh character to his conclusion. I think I last dropped in here when he found a legit saint and her settlement. She asked him to stay there and since he's very distrustful of people, said no. he left, ran into some people, did some things, and finally woke up in a huge thunderstorm. there was a massive landslide and he got caught up in it. he prayed to the choir for salvation and they liked him so much they took him and now he's ascended to the choirI love that this game has mechanics for doing things like that, its very thematic. anyway time to roll up a new character
I'm thinking of doing a horror anthology campaign. One setting, episodic sessions covering random stories. Horror, so if my characters fail then it's appropriate to the genre.
>>98212258That's a good adventure, and seems like you had plenty of fun with it.
>>98212996Sweet meaningful ending there.
>>98180122Finally got round to this>rolled up the quest, NoPR Nomad Radio host hires us to fill in for his security, who are nomads who needed to answer the call for a big thing or some shit and just told him to keep the radio off the weekend while theyre out. Bly, the host dont wanna stop but the toecutters were threatening him, so we get hired. >my dude is a simple fixer, hired his two best buds a schizo scottish solo sniper and a naive escaped clone soldier. >use fixer contacts to get a good deal on 5 mini missles (from a girl who likes fixer from an older job who works more urbantech armaments)>set up a combo countdown clock and yesnomaybeandbut oracle. Roll a pool of d6s in a clock and a d20 fate mill oracle, if a 1 comes up in the 6 pool remove the die, if a yes comes up do a skill check for a bonus, if a no do a cliff or dev, and if a positive and or but negate the 1 that turn, if a negative and or but remove a die. This should make it lean negative. Roll 4 times each day for the weekend. >variety of stuff happens, toecutters try to scare us with a bag of toes, some drunk challenges main guy to a fist fight, the group has a small party, etc.>final night on the second last check possible it finally runs out. >ask the oracle “Is it an attack from the toecutters?” [NO AND] No it isn’t and they are infact worse. >Roll a table of encounters, an AV flies in?>roll random adjective noun verb and settle on sleek cyber cult trying to steal the whole NoPR radio setup for their cult>Roll perception to see if my guys see then coming, my two dudes with good perception failed but main guy suceeded>Since he saw the AV in the night early enough each character gets a free turn before it enters the field>Clone shoots missle. Misses but theres an ability to flip a coin for a second hit, misses WAY harder >Sniper does absurd damage to it>main fixer shoots missle, crit fails and partially damages self, a second missle, and ruins his cover.
>>98218142Continued…>clone shoots and misses with the 4th missle>Sniper hits perfectly again doing absurd damage>fixer shoots last missle and somehow takes the AV down>survivors are mopped up easilyOveral job went well but I feel like the Urbantech girl needs a talking to about her equipment. I liked the dumb tension system i made though
>>98218142>>98218146damn kind of kino sounds fun
Thinking about making my own solo RPG. How hard could it be?
>>98221409What is probably hard is finding a non-already taken niche. What are you thinking as for themes/genres?
>>98221409it's easy, write about a historical time or culture that nobody has done before, then you can steal the names, that's the hardest part of doing an rpg, and call it research
>>98221424Either surrealism or speculative history, either satire or comedy.>>98221491You know how doctor seuss just pulls names out of his ass? I like that.
One thing that's been bugging me is that I don't know how to ask Fate Questions. I'm a curious person, so I want to ask about everything. That's a lot of rolls. What are important things to ask about in a scene or what should I prioritize?
>>98223432Yes, the thing is, if you ask too many questions, some of the answers will end being conflicting between each others because of the random nature of oracles. The main thing is always "Follow your expectations" (Had you seen PICREL?). Solo playing is more like daydreaming but with extra tools, but the extra tools should not surpass the daydreaming. You just got to find your own style/flow, I guess.
>>98179667Interesting. I have been working on something similar for a while now. Much simpler, and multiplayer, but making it singleplayer is achievable. Pen and paper exclusively also.
>>98163766you can plausibly rig Starforged to play like a 4X game Reskin meters or keep the correlation in your head: >Momentum -> Political Capital (should be obvious) >Health -> Borrowing Capacity (BC, a one-in-all debt, credit score, outstanding debt, etc meter. if you can't borrow anymore, i.e. 0, you ded. increase max BC to 10 and start the game at 5 BC if you want to simulate an economically growing empire) >Supply -> Liquidity (immediately available assets, bank deposits, and such. this is where your money goes when you put your cash into gubmunt money market) >Spirit -> Stability (polarization, domestic political issues, regime's credibility)>(optional) for any of the 5-limit meters, you can set the max to 10 and start the game at 5 to simulate potential growth and smoother gradients Reimagine stats: >Edge = institutional adaptability, flexibility, legislative efficiency >Heart = soft power, political credibility, cultural and linguistic dominance>Iron = hard power, military might >Shadow = espionage, diplomatic ability to extract concessions >Wits = scientific and economic prowess, human capital (don't get brain-drained!) Moves: >reskin existing moves or just roll the appropriate +stat for the situation and interpret the result as yes-and (+1 PC) or yes-but (narrative complication) or no (pay the price) >in addition to the Momentum (PC) mechanic, you can suffer -1 Liquidity or -1 BC to upgrade a miss to a weak hit or a weak hit to a strong hit (you're paying raw cash or issuing bonds to pay your way through) >if it's a matching miss, you HAVE to pay the price, no upgrading allowed >generally, try to envision moves as notable policy decisions or government-backed initiatives, each spanning a month or two (ignore timespan if undesirable) >instead of Sojourning, you have to roll +Spirit to recover +2 (strong hit) or +1 (weak hit) of a non-PC meter
Am I supposed to discover threads or set my own? I'm used to being told what to do by characters but realize that it's unnecessary.
What're the best AI models to enlist as a GM for solo play?
>>98228688You can always roll an oracle to decide this stuff, or just pick something that makes sense. Theres’s tables out there for character motivations or tables for mission types and events and then you just go from there. Hell, you can just try “ADJECTIVE NOUN VERB” oracles too. If you still need help here’s a set of stuff from cyberpunk red singleplayer i like.
>>98229490claude does great for a while, then since it has a smaller context window it fails.Gemini with a gem loading notebooklms is good, but you'll eventually will run into retard shepherding. The others aren't as good, or will want you to pay a lot for very little gain.And those who say AI models are as good as a human at GM, they are high on dangerous doses of copium and their own farts.
>>98229572Doesn't work if I have no ideas.
>>98231894pursue conflict. that will open up additional random events and lead to new threads.
>>98231894Maybe make characters and a setting and throw your dude in the middle is my advice. I usually can’t get into solo rpgs until I generate a setting and factions. Roll em up and find a reason for them to be in conflict. Maybe give your character something they want, or make one faction try to subvert the other and need characters help.
>>98232307>>98231894It's not that hard. Go with the classics.You get into town at dusk. You enter a tavern. You pay for a room and take a meal before going to bed.You hear X number of rumors while you eat.There's a dungeon in the forest. It was discovered not long ago, but only one guy came back. They others fell prey to traps while trying to explore it. People in the village aren't adventurers, o they decided to leave it alone. Are you a bad enough dude to try your luck?The city up north is in armed conflict with it's north-east neighbouring city. With the beginning of a plague coming from the south, things are becoming more intense and people more violent day by day. Can you use this to steal valuables? Or are you a good negociator that could help save lives by uniting the two cities in their hour of need? Or maybe you're a Druid and are just suspicious about the nature of the plague. Maybe it's not natural.Use any random table/oracle/idea generator/AI/movie or book plot you want.Setting isn't difficult. Go generic and detail it as you play. Like when you read a book or watch a movie. They give you info about the world one bit at a time.A great thing about olo i that you can really lean into your PC's goals and motivations. In a group, it's mostly about the plot. In solo, your PC makes his own destiny. You don't have to seek a quest from someone else.
>>98153933Claude? Claude Hooper Bukowski? He finds that it's groovy to hide in a movie?. Pretends he's Fellini and Antonioni and also his countryman Roman Polanski all rolled into one?One Claude Hooper Bukowski?That Claude?
Are there any places on the intarwebs to post huge ass adventure logs ?
>>98235779Start your own blog, there are many free hosts
I have a problem that maybe you guys can help me with.I'm running a solo game and a mission has come up where I need to find a specific temple that has been lost to time. No one knows where it is exactly, they just know that it's not within the immediate vicinity.What's a good way to simulate such a place being hidden on a map that isn't just "Roll on a d20, on a 1 you found it"?
>>98236386Maybe make a progress bar that fills up as you investigate, making your “Roll under this number to find it” easier each time. Maybe searching a place it isn’t in adds one to the number to roll under, finding a map adds a few more, enlisting the help of a historian adds more too. This way, it won’t take forever as you’ll be continuously building to it, but it won’t be quite as simple as “lmao just roll”
>>98236386Roll up notes about the temple in the form of keywords. When you investigate things tied to a keyword, extreme results tell you a clue as to whether its nearby.For instance, the temple has "pillar" "water" and "mountain". Investigating a mountain, you make a roll to see if theres a sign in the region. On a success/crit you get a minor or major clue that its nearby. If you critically fail you get a clue to the ACTUAL mountain its on. Similar sets of rolls eventually lead you to finding the temple inside a semi-submerged cave in the mountain
>>98236386Deck of cards where you want to get the Ace of Diamonds. If you draw a black card, you make no progress towards finding it. If you draw a heart card, you draw another card as you've gathered a clue about where it is. If you draw a diamond card, you draw 2.So long as you keep the cards you drew out of the deck, longest you can go without pulling the Ace is 27 draws, which only happens if the top 26 cards are all blacks. Anything else will likely cause a cascade through the deck, which is fun.
>>98236386You can't just find hidden temples. A lost temple you can find but that takes a lot of time to search yourself. Any kind of clue or information will be necessary to begin a search.All you really need to calculate is how much time it takes to find the temple. You will find it eventually, given that you don't give up the search. This could be weeks, months, or years.This reminds me of a video I saw. It's about game design, but specifically the part that matters is where he talks about representing a search with a deck of cards. https://youtu.be/zyVTxGpEO30?t=676
>>98236386Unrelated but where could her genitalia be?
>>98237888Between her legs
Looking for oracles or anything which adds texture and allows you to progress whatever you are doing RIGHT NOW - be that the story or worldbuilding.>pic exactly the kind of table I'M NOT LOOKING FOR
>>98138737Started a little scenario with a character. A swashbukcling navel officer with a knack for reading people.Based on Horatio Hornblower. His name henceforth will be Hawkwood the Blue!
>>98240215His specific ability is that he can make an intel check on someone before acting on them (whether that be an attack or help action). If he succusseds on that roll he correctly reads them and can add a secondary effect to that action (like attacking for damage AND Batting away their sword since he saw that they were holding it loosely). If he fails however, he reads incorrectly and his action is only half as effective (He mistoook his enemy's grip and it was actually strong, so he spends his time ineffectively beating at it and even if his attack is successful it is only a fleshwound, so half damage)>SO far, he came across 5 ruffians in a Industrial forge looking to steal cartloads of cole. He warned them off, but when they begain comming after him he drew his matchlock pistol and downed one, seeing his disadvantge in numbers, he climbs up a nearby ladder to be in a more advantageous position.>Two ruffians climb up his ladder, the first one sweeps at his ankle but Hawkwood pulled it back, the second one is still climbing the ladder. THe other two went further off to clim up another ladder to get to the second floor>Hawkwood makes an intel check, and sees that the ruffian in front of him is percariously close to the edge, he bats the ruffian's cutlass to the side and delivers a kick to his chest, forcing him back over the edge and also knocking over the ruffians buddy climbing up behind him>Hawkwood needs to be ready as the other two ruffians have finished clmibing up the further ladder and are comeing at him fast!tbc...
Is there any mecha pilot solo out there?
>>98241547https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/198541/paper-mech/files
>>98241831Thanks, but I hate the american "wargame" take on mechas. This genre is (post-Gundam, at least) adolescent Bildungsroman, not war simulation.
>>98240306>>98240215What ruleset are you using?
>>98242015Barbarians of Lemuria. It has been my go to over the last few months.I Find it hits the perfect middle ground of basic enough to not be a pain to play, but complex enough for there to be some depth.
>>98241845I'm trying out beam saber right now. Maybe take a look at that if you want to run a Gundam campaign
>>98242089Could do, but there are certainly good mecha RPGs - hell, I could try to conoct a solo one for shit n' giggles myself, I guess, but I wanted something ready to use
>>98242107So far, looking at it, it's pretty rules light, so you can just import/homebrew anything you want into it, and there's room for customizing your mech.
>>98241547>>98242107There's a mech add-on for Starforged but it was kinda ass so I made some tweaks myself. Midway through the campaign, I realized it's still ass lol.
>>98240215Based hornblower enjoyer.
>>98239575It is nothing too special, but I did find the random encounter tables of Tales of Argosa pretty decent as in they are more descriptive than average.
Alright thread is at page 9 so lemme throw a shot in the dark. I have a system I'm making a solo variant of (if youre in another thread you might recognize it)Normally, you roll 5 d6s and match the numbers into poker dice (think yahtzee) patterns to score a hand between 0 and 5 points, and compared against a target number of 1 to 5. This isn't feasible as a mechanic to use as an oracle since the numbers arent even and players can try to roll towards a higher or lower hand with rerolls.As such, the current idea for an oracle roll for this system is to roll 5d6 against a target number of 18. Things that would make a roll more or less likely have you reroll reroll certain results (for instance, maybe a likely has you reroll any 1s and 2s once, while very likely is twice). If generating the target number of an action from the oracle roll, divide the result by 6.I could make it so every 6 points above or below the TN changes the degree of yes/no, but part of me wants to have the poker dice hands tie in to severity and whether there are random events. Every roll will correspond to a hand no matter what, so every roll should theoretically generate a different effect. Im just unsure what to do and what becomes unnecessary bloat.
>>98250038For an oracle I'd suggest just rolling extra dice and picking the strongest "hand" of five rather than more specific rules about rerolls.
>>98250861I have a personal rule that i can use less than all 5 of the d6s, but never more.
>>98240306cont.>As the two try to box him in he rolls an intel check and notices a hanging chain, he jumps to it and swings to an adjacent gangway. One of the two ruffians he kicked down the ladder gets up and moves towards hum and so does one of the two that got on the gangway he was previously on. the other one chucks a shovel at him and misses.>Hawkwood takes them for a ride as he swings back to the first gangway and manages to batter the ruffian who stayed there and threw the shovel, however, his feet were steady enough that he wasnt pushed off. He attacked back, but hawkwood parried. The two that were chancing him grown and return to the first gangway to help thier buddy>Hawkwood attempts another intel check but fails, hes distracted and can only deal half damage with no bonus action, luckily it was a good hit regardless and he takes out the third ruffian. However by that time the two other ruffians get up and start attacking him. Bafflingly, neither seem to be able to get a good hit in.>Being outnumbered, hawkwood does another intel check and notices the gangway all three of them are on is unstable. He disengaged, hops down and kicks out the supports, sending the two ruffians crashing down with the gangway. One is out cold, Hawkwood askes the other to surrender, but He is stupidly angry and doesnt comply, unfortunately for the ruffian, he rolled snake eyes on his attack, tripped on a supporting beam, and ko'd himself. To hawkwoods drole amusement.I liked this more dynamic, environmental playstyle! I changed it up slightly. Basicly intel check to do 1 extra enviornmental action, but on fail, my normal action is rolled at disadvantage.
Is using lonelog worth it?
