We're Back, Redux, Again

I like my d100 games, and in the latest round of garage reorganizations, I pulled them out and I am working on space to shelve them. I enjoy these games too much to store them away, and I want them back.

The big losers this round are 5E (except for Tales of the Valiant), Shadowrun, Mechwarrior, Pathfinder 2, and a bunch of other games I don't have time for. I may come back to them, or I may not.

The big winners this round are my OSR games, Traveller, Call of Cthulhu, Runequest, my 2d6 games, my d100 games, and a few others. GURPS and Dungeon Crawl Classics are solid and staying on my new display-style shelving.

Specifically, Runequest brought me back, again. This game is not that large, and I was only missing one book to have a complete set. I ordered that and I will be back in these lands and exploring. Runequest has this established lore, and it has not been invaded by the stereotypical nu-fantasy tropes, planar beings, or all these 5E variant lineages. Runequest has a wonderful set of its own, established within lore, each with a wonderful lore and history, and the game isn't constantly porting in new things.

Runequest is diversity, history, homeland, plus culture, and that is the perfect mix.

5E is "bland options galore, all the same" like fruity pastel marshmallows in a breakfast cereal. It is lazy diversity with no world, talent, place, sense of home, culture, history, or effort put into it.

It is good to have Elemental Lords as a race, right? What do I do with them? I dunno. Where is their home? Greyhawk? The Forgotten Realms? I dunno. Did they come here from the planes and are looking for a home? I dunno. Corporate wants them in here. They are in the setting.

Sure, "use your imagination" is how they are intended to be used, but I can buy games that do that work for me and give me a higher-quality experience. I can read about them, learn about them, live in their culture, and think about how it would be to play one of them in the campaign. Runequest did the work. D&D doesn't, and to be fair, many games don't. Even some of my OSR games.

ACKS II is an exception, that game is an amazing OSR game that does put in the work, and it covers a similar bronze-age world like Runequest. There is something about these myth and legend games that is a step above the generic pseudo-Renaissance fantasy slop we get these days.

With all these generic fantasy games coming out, Daggerheart, Draw Steel, Cosmere, D&D 2024, Nimble 5e, and so many others - they all feel like they are treading the same ground. Everyone is doing this cosplay fantasy genre, and one game can't be told apart from the other. The only difference is the type, number, and size of dice you roll. Many of them are Powered by the Apocalypse clones with different dicing and narrative mechanics.

Runequest?

That is its own thing.

That is what makes it special. 

Why We Are Back

It has been a while since I've posted, but I always loved the excellent Barebones Fantasy game, the original game this blog covered. So, this blog sat quiet, and I only had a little to say. I enjoyed the game, played occasionally, and did not update this site.

So, I put 5E to the side for a while. What replaced it was Runequest. I wanted something more of the same old fantasy world, that generic pastel-bubblegum-planar sort of every fantasy that gets boring after the 20th time. Runequest made me put Pathfinder's Golarion into my storage boxes, and the world is just that good. The world feels honest; it has a history so deep they published a pair of coffee-table books on it, and the borders and kingdoms are in flux. There are cultures here to lose yourself in. This is the sort of campaign world D&D dreams it could have.

Then, I started to move other games on the shelf that shared the same d100 mechanics. Basic Roleplaying and Call of Cthulhu were easy to put alongside since they are all Chaosium games and equally as good.

Then I wondered what would happen if I put all my d100 games on the same shelf. Barebones Fantasy, its sister games of Covert Ops, and the outstanding Frontier Space were easy choices.

Runequest's "sister games" of Mythras, Open Quest, and Simple Quest were also easy to put alongside these greats.

Rolemaster is very d100, one of the OG games of the 1980s. Its MERP-like sister game, HARP, was also an easy choice. Another MERP sister game is Against the Darkmaster.

I found a dozen amazing d100 games on that shelf and decided to make a space where I could talk about them. All of them are sort of "d100 dungeon games." Even Frontier Space and Covert Ops, if you remember the original inspiration games of Star Frontiers and Top Secret, were also very "dungeon-like" in their modules, so in a way, they fit in well.

There are really three different lineages of the d100 system here, the TSR one, the Rolemaster one, and the Runequest one. In a way, the games are all different, but in another, they are very similar. The Rolemaster branch is the only roll-high d100 system here, while the others are roll-under. Some are d10-only, while others mix in the standard polyhedral dice.

And I know I am missing M-Space, HARP-SF, and Space Master. Those could be here as well.

So my Barebones Fantasy blog now has some incredible neighbors and games to share this space with, all of which are d100 games. BBF will still get love, but rekindling all my great d100 games will help make this place more random and exciting but with one common theme.

Hello!

 Welcome!