people keep on asking about the aasimar tief cross so. Theyre only ever born out of love between their parents, no tiefling/aasimar birth can be viable without it (and even then they are exceedingly uncommon). They’re fully sapient and are swayed toward neither good nor evil, however their inherent wrongness in the eyes of mortals and gods alike can often drive them into isolation regardless of their individual personalities.
the physical sensation of seeing one is a lot like the dizziness experienced when you step onto land again after a long boat ride- tolerable but weird. The unusual characteristics don’t stop there- aasimar/tiefling hybrids will live exactly twice as long as their longest -lived parent, down to the day, and will be twice as tall. strange creatures!!!
that’s super cool, I could write all sorts of stories about this. by why don’t they have faces?
Make sure the system you use matches the kind of players you have, for an optimal experience
Admin Note: This is part of the ongoing series called “D&D isn’t the only TTRPG if you don’t want fantasy play another goddamn game!”
I already reblogged this once but this is important:
Like I run a D&D blog. I understand that D&D is the most well-known and popular RPG in the world. But a lot of the time I see people going like “Hey I want to run a D&D campaign and throw out all the D&Disms and here’s all the notes I have for running a campaign about courtly romance and chivalry in a historical setting” and I’m just like STOP YOU DON’T NEED TO RUN THIS USING D&D
There’s a sort of a mistaken assumption that because D&D is the biggest game on the market and that it’s fantasy that it should be the go-to fantasy game but look it’s not D&D isn’t a generic fantasy game it’s a very specific kind of fantasy all of its own, one that steals liberally from swords & sorcery and high fantasy and adds fucking extradimensional cube robots for good measure
So next time you’re thinking about a fantasy campaign in a decidedly non-D&Dish setting consider instead of jamming the square peg that is D&D into a round hole trying to find a system that actually supports what you’re trying to do
And this is not to say that you shouldn’t play D&D: D&D is hella fun. But there’s a lot of genres and styles that D&D does a piss-poor job of doing, and because of that it’s so good we’ve got other games
*cracks knuckles*
All right then. I’ve been meaning to dust off my own D&D sideblog for a while, so here we go with providing some examples. I’m limiting this specifically to other types of fantasy outside of the standard high fantasy and sword & sorcery millieu.
Courtly Romance and Chivalry
There are a number of options for this, and they range from standard secondary world fantasy to more historical and mythological settings. My list here shouldn’t be treated as fully extensive.
Blue Rose - based on the romantic fantasy subgenre, specifically as seen in the works of Tamora Pierce and Mercedes Lackey. A lot of courtly drama and intrigue and swashbuckling, based in a fictional world.
Pendragon - naturally based off of Arthurian mythology, and having a lot of stuff given over to the court of Camelot and the chivalric adventures of the various knights. The same company also has a kickstarter for a spin-off called Paladin: Warriors of Charlemagne that might be worth checking out.
Historical Fantasy
This one’s a bit more prominent as historical settings serve as an inspiration for a variety of fantasy worlds and games, and this of course invariably extends to settings that actually use historical settings with a degree of fantasy elements thrown in. Note that I’m going to emphasise Europe here simply due to greater familiarity with games in that millieu, and as a European myself I’m ill-equipped to judge how accurate or respectful games using other settings actually are.
Because of this, feel free to add other examples in reblogs
Chivalry & Sorcery - one of the early tabletop games inspired by D&D, taking a more pseudo-historical approach.
It’s based on 12th century France and strives for a degree of historical accuracy and medieval politics.
World of Darkness, Dark Ages (including Vampire and Mage) - while the World of Darkness has earned some negative attention lately (and for good reason), the dark ages RPGs are still an old favourite of mine. Also worth checking out is Mage: The Sorcerer’s Crusade, set during the Renaissance. The Mage stuff has a really cool open-ended magic system worth checking out.
Ars Magica - this exists along very similar lines to the dark age material above, based around mages and magic-users in a ‘Mythic Europe’ setting. It also has a really cool open-ended magic system, and one of my personal favourites.
Awwww shit heck yes I might want to add to this list but this is a really good starting point
SHADOWRUN PLS MORE PEOPLE NEED TO PLAY IT I LOVE IT SO
Shadowrun is so cool but also the system is quite heavy
I’d recommend Shadowrun: Anarchy as a good jumping off point. The cue system in it feels like an unnecessary quirk (I know it’s based on an established system but it feels weirdly bolted on in Anarchy) but with a trad GM/Player dynamic it basically runs as a really good Shadowun Lite
And this from a GM who absolutely loves games that give players narrative agency. It’s not a bad idea, but in Shadowrun: Anarchy it almost feels like an afterthought that doesn’t really add much to the game, but ymmv
Hackmaster is great! It’s a lot tougher than modern D&D and has a lot of its own tropes. Pathfinder is a lot like D&D 3.5, but that edition was super fun, so it’s totally worth checking out. I haven’t done much with FATE core but I find it fascinating and who doesn’t want to buy more dice?
Seriously guys, there are so many great TTRPGs. I know that a lot of us have sunk a lot of money into D&D since the books breed like rabbits, but if you have an idea that just won’t fit that world there are so many others to choose from!
I have a lot of love for Hackmaster for reasons similar to why I love Champions so much: both have insanely detailed physics engine like systems that produce interesting situations purely through how the rules interact with the fiction. It’s a shame I haven’t been able to find anyone to play Hackmaster with.
The single best ttrpg game I’ve ever played was Apocalyose World. It felt like making a graphic novel in real time, so there was suspense, action, and we didn’t all have to work together. It was like we all had character arcs that would meet together for scenes but even when it wasn’t your scene, your attention was still on the game. 10/10, would recommend
I’ve also heard good things about dogs in the garden but I’ve personally never played it
Apocalypse World is a truly amazing game. It’s also a breeze to run because all the mechanics are player-facing and the MC gets to focus on the main thing: setting up interesting conflicts and following up with the consequences of each action.
It’s definitely one of those games that shines when players understand to think of it outside of the traditional “adventuring party” setup and the MC knows how to push the players against each other.
how… what is… did you just have this art lying around?? was it in a box labeled In Case Of Goblin Seduction 6-Pack Joke Break Glass? apparently this is a Magic card and I have a lot of questions for Magic: The Gathering right now
I can never remember this card’s real name because everyone just calls it “Abs of Treason”
The card name is “Enthralling Victor”. It has a ‘spiritual sequel’ card in terms of artwork called “Captivating Crew”, drawn by the same artist:
Abs of treason
no no you gotta understand there is also a Magic card called Act of Treason and Enthralling Victor has a similar effect hence “Abs of Treason” and that goblin is a Twitch emote for the official MtG channel and all of these are actual facts
my favourite thing to do is to tell my friends about the wild things victor hugo did and see the look of shock and horror in their faces bc they only know him as the great author who wrote les mis and hunchback and not as the man who gave his fiancee a live bat in an envelope
*meeting a guard npc*
Rogue: I give her the lesbian once over
DM: *rolls die* she just kinda shrugs, doesn’t seem interested
Like three players at once: oh she’s straight :(
Rogue: what did you roll for?
Warlock: that was the kinsey roll
DM: yeah that was the kinsey roll
Don't give up. Unless you have to for a little while. Then don't panic. CONTAINS: Star Trek, Dungeons and Dragons, Critical Role, History, Current Affairs, Space, Cats, and Etc. Adult.
