Dead Letters

Overview

Dead Letters is a podcast about tabletop role playing games. Sam, Misha, and Walid are game designers and academics committed to doing the readings. Rulebooks, adventures, blogposts, articles, and everything in between. Tune in for your weekly dose of RPG discourse every Thursday! If you’re interested in being a part of the conversation, Dead Letters holds a book club every bi-monthly at boshi's place in NYC. Visit boshis.place and join the discord for updates on the next meeting.

Links

spotify.com https://open.spotify.com/show/2u0XMpF4MOWycyvAmtPGqO - Spotify feed

Other entries

Ishanekon World Shapers (2022)
Tabletop Roleplaying Games

Ishanekon World Shapers (2022)

TTRPG
English
Rules-medium
Ishanekon: World Shapers is the (probably) biggest free Indie TTRPG with over 2,500 character options. It has been mainly developed by Jan Luyken, aka Blaze Reason, with the aim of creating a game that can compete (if not surpass) the current biggest games on the market while remaining affordable for anyone. With its easily adaptable rules and wide range of options, from beginner-friendly to highly complex, it is designed to satisfy the needs of almost any story and play style. Description From epic fantasy and sci-fi to mundane humans facing everything from common threats to cosmic horror, Ishanekons: World Shapers’ modular design lets you easily adjust the rules to help you experience your stories. This game is designed with the idea that you bring the flavor, and the mechanics help you bring it to life. The 10 Archetypes with over 200 Sub-Archetypes, 1000+ Abilities, 600+ Talents, 300+ items and upgrades, and more allow you to build anything from a simple cat to a city-destroying kaiju. Role and complexity filters let you find what you need quickly while helping you avoid those features that might be too overwhelming for your liking. System Overview & Key Features Combat d20, Skill d10 The core of combat is built around d20 attack and defense rolls with modifiers that try to beat the enemy's Evasion and DR Power, respectively. Skills, on the other hand, are rolled with d10s, creating somewhat of a dice-based separation between combat and non-combat. Cinematic Actions While IWS has a solid tactical core that will satisfy most war gamers, it also comes with so-called “Cinematic Actions”. These allow narrative-driven actions, independent of what the rules say your character can do, balancing the rule of cool so that role players have a rules-light way to interact with the action, bringing the best of both worlds. Flexible Character Customization This system allows you to mix and match all sorts of Archetypes, features, and Abilities. It encourages such behavior and does not introduce any blocks, such as stat requirements. All sorts of interesting mechanical and flavor combinations open up once you start experimenting. This is also true for items. An extensive upgrade and crafting system exists that can turn any old blade into whatever you want. Carefully Balanced The system's core math has been calculated to ensure that every character option is viable. Breaking the game is not trivial, and you will feel strong, no matter if you are a martial, caster, or something in between. Every weapon and armor type can be wielded to great effect, and each Stat has its uses. “Optimal play” should never get in the way of what fits your character narratively. Regular Patches As a digital product, IWS can be easily expanded. Monthly patches bring new content, buff weak options, and nerf broken combos to help this game evolve and become the best it can be. New digital tools are also added and expanded, such as online character sheets and an encounter calculator. Build Your Own Creatures The website comes with more than 100 creatures, each of which has Level 0 to 15 versions, but creature templates and an online creature builder help you as the GM to create whatever monstrosities you want to throw at your players. All those 2,500 options can also be used for whatever you cook up. Additional links world-shapers.com - Official website world-shapers./resources/adventures - Free adventures Super short rules - Get started with Ishanekon fast

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Call of Cthulhu (2014)
Tabletop Roleplaying Games

Call of Cthulhu (2014)

TTRPG
Beginner-friendly
English
Released in 2014 by Chaosium, Call of Cthulhu 7th Edition is the latest version of the cult-classic cosmic eldritch horror role-playing system originally launched in 1981. The story is based off of the  literary works of H.P. Lovecraft and lovecraftian works. Instead of setting the players up as heroes, the characters are regular investigators who are exploring cults, forbidden knowledge and various eldritch-cosmic entitites and threats. Description Occupations in the game for the characters include academics, reporters, and private investigators. The gameplay loop revolves around uncovering information, analyzing clues, and evading dangers. As the supernatural elements in the game are considered more powerful than the investigators, they have are not expected to actually confront most of the threats head on. Instead they usually have to resort to avoiding or escaping any situation that may arise. Combat is lethal and usually leads to characters getting permanently killed or pushed to insanity (which eventually is the same).  System Overview & Key Features Percentile Framework (d100) Every action is resolved by rolling two ten-sided (d10) dice to get a result from 1 to 100. If you roll is equal to or under your skill rating, the action is deemed a success. This approach simplifies the mechanical process of the game, as there are no complex tables to keep track of and compare to decypher whether it is a success or failure. Pushed Rolls If a character fails a skill check, they may attempt to "push" the roll, allowing for a second attempt. This requires the player to come up with a new, more desperate approach to performing the task. If this subsequent pushed roll also fails, the Keeper describes a severe and immediate negative consequence. Sanity and Madness A core mechanic of the system is the tracking of mental stability. Investigators lose points from their Sanity gauge when exposed to anomalous creatures or disturbing truths. Drops in Sanity result in the character experiencing temporary or permanent forms of madness, which can manifest as new phobias, delusions, or a temporary loss of player agency over the character. Bonus and Penalty Dice To account for situational advantages or disadvantages, the game employs a system of bonus and penalty dice. If a character possesses a distinct advantage when performing a task, an extra d10 is rolled and taking the higher result. A disadvantage means rolling an extra d10 and taking the lower result. Combat Lethality Physical altercations are inherently dangerous by design. Investigators possess limited hit points, and the damage output of both conventional firearms and anomalous entities is high. Recovery mechanics are slow, simulating realistic healing times. This structural lethality serves to discourage combat and incentivize stealth and investigation. Expendable Luck Players can spend points from their character's Luck pool to retroactively lower a dice roll. The points are subtracted on a one-to-one basis until the dice result qualifies as a success. This ensures that the Luck pool is a limited resource which should be used and utilized in the most critical situations. Additional links chaosium.com - Official publisher website and digital storefront drivethrurpg.com - Digital repository for official scenarios and sourcebooks

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Dungeons & Dragons | Sweden
Communities

Dungeons & Dragons | Sweden

Swedish
Dungeons & Dragons
Discord server
Dungeons & Dragons Sweden is a community for Dungeon & Dragons fans and players who live in Sweden or speak Swedish, we try to be as inclusive and welcoming as possible to have a nice place to meet others to talk about or play Dungeons & Dragons with. Come, talk about the game, find players for your group, groups to play with, try to find one of the elusive, almost mythical Available Dungeon Masters. Links Discord server invite

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