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GURPS vs. HERO System
▲ 8 r/tabletop+3 crossposts

GURPS vs. HERO System

I'm looking for a good system to run a modern-day superpowers campaign (Worm inspired, the original series accessible through the link and discussion available at r/Parahumans) and I need a good system to accommodate the setting. Gritty, granular combat with realistically high stakes and the ability to solve problems creatively is important.

I've largely settled on GURPS or HERO System, but I'm suffering from some indecision between them. Any feedback for either system, or alternative suggestions of your own?

It's worth noting that the setting already has Weaverdice as a canon TTRPG by the author, but it's not very thoroughly developed (at least compared to the systems I'm leaning towards).

Thanks in advance!

parahumans.wordpress.com
u/PMurmomsmaidenname — 3 hours ago
▲ 108 r/tabletop

Kid and parent friendly game looks rad, I just stumbled on this and can't contain my zeal for war of the shaaaapes!

Me, dad of two boys randomly searching on myminifactory.com for stuff. Blockwar miniatures game... I looked, scrolled past. Scrolled back up. Zoomed in. Wait. What!? Little robot sphere people and cube people (and other shaped nation states of robots) blowing each other up on an alternative activation tactical army building game. Huh... guess I'm still a child despite being 41. Anyways here are these adorable dudes

u/Most-Damage-4540 — 14 hours ago
▲ 1 r/tabletop

Looking for a table top RPG

A couple of years ago I saw a video of a WW1 kind of themed tabletop rpg with these non-human creatures called like Snoods or Snoids or something. It looked really fun but I can’t remember the name does anyone have an idea of what I’m talking about? Thank you.

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u/finndahuman — 1 day ago
▲ 1 r/tabletop

Designing a cooperative memory/rescue party game: "THE OFFICER DOWN"

I've been working on a concept for a cooperative, high-tension board game called "THE OFFICER DOWN." It’s designed for 4-8 players (best with 5-6) and blends a "UNO-style" declaration system with memory-based puzzles and cinematic police drama.
The Premise:
Players act as a police tactical unit attempting to rescue a hostage. The challenge? The team is constantly getting wounded, and unless someone yells "OFFICER DOWN!!" to call for EMS, the wounded officer is lost for good.
Core Mechanics:
Roles: 1 Hostage (memorizes the "case file"), 1 Criminal (manages time/pressure), and the rest are Police Officers (provide hints/guide the hostage).
The Clock: You have 10 minutes to memorize the files, then only 5 minutes to solve the rescue scenarios.
"OFFICER DOWN" System: Every 2 turns, an officer is wounded and becomes incapacitated. If no one declares "OFFICER DOWN!!" before the next turn, they are killed in action and permanently out of the game.
Goal: It’s not just about winning—it’s about bringing everyone home with zero casualties.
Advanced Rules:
Backstab: A hidden traitor among the police.
Stockholm Syndrome: The hostage might start sympathizing with the criminal if things go south!
The goal of the game is simple: complete the mission while keeping the casualty rate at zero.
I’m currently refining the starter kit (attached is the current concept art). Would love to get some feedback on this core loop. Is the "declaration" mechanic something you'd find stressful or fun in a party game setting?

The officer down :HOT LOADED

Expansion: "HOT LOADED" Variant (The Action Movie Mode)
If the base game is a tactical investigation, the "HOT LOADED" variant turns it into a high-octane 80s action flick.
The "Hot Loaded" Mechanic:
Every time a Police Officer gives a hint, they have the option to use a "Hot Loaded" bullet.
Precision vs. Risk: A "Hot Loaded" bullet makes your hint much more specific and accurate, but it carries a risk of jamming your weapon.
The Jam: If the Criminal rolls a failure during a "Hot Loaded" hint, your weapon jams. You are incapacitated, and—worst of all—the "OFFICER DOWN!!" call is blocked until your next turn.
New Tactical Options:
The Ammo Dump: Each officer starts with 3 "Ammo Cards" (Normal vs. Hot Loaded). Manage your resources wisely: do you play it safe, or do you burn your ammo to secure the rescue?
Akimbo Readiness: When you declare "OFFICER DOWN!!" to recover, if you still have Ammo Cards, you can trigger "Akimbo." This gives you a massive boost in hint precision for the next turn, but with a 50% success rate. It's a high-risk, high-reward gambit!
New Victory Tier:
S-Rank (HOT LOADED): Rescue the hostage with zero casualties, and have every officer finish the mission using a "Hot Loaded" bullet.

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u/Moby_Dickvessel — 3 days ago
▲ 2.0k r/tabletop

I've been making 'My First Tabletop' sets for kids and their parents

I've started with one of my nostalgia points from childhood in Sesame Street. The idea is that we can create familiar characters for children in Dungeons and Dragons style, and then make them a part of a short 2 hour one shot campaign for families.

This one is the Cookie Monster Barbarian.

https://www.instagram.com/mattmakesstuff.co

u/matt-makes-stuff — 8 days ago
▲ 19 r/tabletop+4 crossposts

How could I use painting as a game mechanic? (My worldbuilding project)

I've been toying with the idea of turning my worldbuilding project, Pigment, into a video game someday.

Pigment is a colorful world where art isn't just a way to express yourself. It's a force used to fight back an ever-creeping darkness. Players would explore the world, meet whimsical creatures, and slowly restore life and color.

The biggest question for me is the gameplay.

What mechanics do you think would fit a world where art is the core theme? Would you imagine creature collecting, painting as a gameplay mechanic, puzzle solving, turn-based combat, real-time action, or something completely different?

I'd love to hear your ideas, I always find these discussions incredibly inspiring.

If you're looking for an illustrator and world builder for your game, feel free to reach out. I’d love to help! 🌱

u/artofpigment — 5 days ago
▲ 7 r/tabletop+1 crossposts

Gallerie TTRPG: Queer Stories of Beauty, Horror, and Hope

Hello all, happy Wednesday!

I'm one of the artists on the team thats working on a new TTRPG that's being fully written, illustrated and produced by a small team of queer artists and writers.

we don't have any corporate backing since we're just a small team, but book is coming along amazingly, and I hope you'll all take a look at it and help spread the word! There a link below, as well as a preview of the content inside, please help support out work!

The launch page:

https://www.backerkit.com/c/projects/weapons-grade-funk/gallerie-ttrpg-queer-stories-of-beauty-horror-and-hope

and the preview!

https://www.weaponsgradefunk.com/_files/ugd/5bb3e8_ae7f5b97cab9409090b0010338efd9b9.pdf

u/Halley_Valentine — 5 days ago
▲ 1 r/tabletop

Eat, Play, Love: Or how we escaped to India only to find ourselves designing a board game

I'm Livi, an environmentalist and together with my husband Robert - musician and graphic designer - we'd like to share the story behind our first soon-to-be-published board game: Bharat: Kings of Legend.

Since I was a little girl, I have loved folk tales and mythology. Some stories I heard somehow became alive inside me and stayed with me ever since. About ten years ago, I came across a story of this kind: the Mahabharat.

At the time, Robert and I were living in Cambridge, UK, and were becoming increasingly interested in yoga. Through that journey we found a teacher whose words resonated deeply with us, and we started listening to more and more of his talks.

That was when we discovered his series of lectures on the great Indian epic, Mahabharat. Fantastic tales of kings, yogis and warriors and their struggles woven through lifetimes across millenia. It has the kind of drama which makes Game of Thrones feel like a saturday morning cartoon. It completely blew our minds.

We became so fascinated by the culture and by yoga that we decided to make a bold move: leave our jobs, leave the UK, move back to Hungary, and travel to India for as long as our visas and savings would allow.

Over the years we ended up spending nine months living in the ashram in Tamil Nadu, India - learning yoga, volunteering, and just immersing ourselves in one of the only remaining ancient living cultures. These times were the most magical and rich experiences in my life, it had everything from tending for cows to unspeakable spiritual experiences, from hanging out with monkeys, peacocks and cobras to picking jasmines with the locals, or not even recognising my husband one morning, because he offered his long hair for some ritual and turned completely bald - not to mention tasting the best mangoes on the planet…oh, those mangoes. Whenever I think about it I’m like, what am I doing in Europe anyway?

These times felt like we were living the epic.

The stories of Mahabharata became richer the more context we learned. One idea especially stayed with us. Our teacher often encouraged us not to judge the characters as historical figures, but to experience them as reflections of ourselves. "It is not just history," he would say. "It is your story." That idea completely changed the way I experienced the epic. Instead of asking: "Was this character right?"

I started asking:"What would I have done?" "What would it feel like to be one of those kings?"

With this new insight, the stories of Mahabharata became deeply personal. This, along with the crystal clarity with which our teacher revealed the multi-layered dynamics of being a leader in that age, felt like we’ve got hold of something really valuable, something universal that is so inspiring it yearns for finding expression. The more we looked at what we received, the more it started to resemble something truly unexpected: a game. A bundle of interwoven mechanics, together expressing something much deeper than the sum of its parts.

This eventually became the seed of our game; Bharat. 

As I was always toying with the idea of designing a board game, it felt like everything fell into place: This is what we will do! A Mahabharat board game…How hard could it be, right?

Well, looking back after 8 years of designing the game: pretty goddamn hard. 

(But also kinda beautiful…)

u/Flashy-Actuator6677 — 5 days ago
▲ 3 r/tabletop+4 crossposts

I built a Coin Flip app with a hidden "Magic Mode" that lets you control the result

Hey everyone,

A - Answer
OneToss solves a simple problem: quick coin flips when you don't have a coin nearby. It also includes a hidden Magic Mode for pranks and party tricks.

B - Better
Unlike most coin flip apps that only generate random results, OneToss includes both a realistic random mode and a hidden mode that lets you secretly force Heads or Tails while still showing the full flip animation.

C - Cost
Free usage with ads and an optional subscription or lifetime unlock.

  • Monthly: $1.49
  • Yearly: $12.99
  • Lifetime: $20

App Store: https://apps.apple.com/us/app/flip-a-coin-onetoss/id6743804010

I'd love feedback app users:

  • Does the hidden control mechanic feel clever or gimmicky?
  • If you discovered this feature in an app, would you actually use it for pranks or party tricks?
  • Any ideas for making the "magic" aspect more fun without making it obvious?

Also happy to answer any questions about the implementation.

u/vigneshvp — 9 days ago
▲ 74 r/tabletop+26 crossposts

¿Siempre quisiste probar D&D pero no sabías cómo? ¡Creamos un RPG en solitario como D&D y, después de un año de pruebas, desde hoy ya está disponible!

¡Hola a todos!

Somos dos hermanos detrás de Master of Dungeon, y nos alegra mucho volver por aquí después de un tiempo desde que empezamos a compartir el proyecto.

Para quienes todavía no lo conozcan, aquí va un resumen rápido. Nos encantaba jugar a D&D, pero como a muchos de vosotros, cada vez nos costaba más mantener sesiones regulares. El trabajo, la vida, cuadrar horarios… cada vez era más difícil volver a sentarnos alrededor de la mesa. Así que, en lugar de dejar que esa sensación desapareciera, decidimos intentar recrearla de otra forma.

Así nació Master of Dungeon: un RPG de texto para un solo jugador, inspirado en la libertad y la narrativa de D&D.

Llevamos más de un año trabajando en él, pasando por varias fases de prueba, iteraciones y muchísimos comentarios de los primeros jugadores. Y por fin sentimos que estamos listos para dar el siguiente paso.

Aquí tenéis el enlace de Google Play:
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.bitforge.mastersofdungeon&hl

Si jugáis en iOS, podéis hacerlo aquí:
https://testflight.apple.com/join/mg6UrBH9

La verdad es que tenemos mucha curiosidad - y también un poco de nervios - por saber qué os parecerá cuando más gente pueda probarlo.

Si queréis seguir el desarrollo más de cerca o entrar un poco antes, podéis uniros ya a nuestro Discord. Estamos preparando una recompensa especial para quienes nos acompañaron antes del lanzamiento oficial y ayudaron a dar forma al juego durante el camino.

Gracias por leer, y como siempre, nos encantaría saber qué pensáis ^.^

u/Tigeline — 11 days ago
▲ 6 r/tabletop+5 crossposts

One of my favorite moments from our Thirst of Strahd campaign | Session 1

One of the creepiest moments from our first session happened before the party had even properly met.

A young Vistani girl walked up to each of the three characters and handed them a handmade doll. Each doll resembled the person receiving it.

The unsettling part? She only had two dolls when she started.

Our campaign is called Thirst of Strahd, our sapphic take on Curse of Strahd where Strahd is reimagined as a woman. We recently started recording our sessions as a way to preserve the story, help with note-taking, and have something to look back on after the campaign is over.

If you'd like to see the scene, here's the timestamp from Session 1:

🎥https://youtu.be/DJ45BSwVTQQ?si=8hZ4k4YPGBmCrfe7&t=3135

u/Str1ker751 — 8 days ago
▲ 3 r/tabletop

Looking for a tabletop game that could be combined with bowling pins?

Hi everyone!

For a small birthday party, we'll have access to a private bowling alley. Since we're all big tabletop game fans, I thought it might be fun to somehow combine the two.

My idea was to use the number of pins knocked down as a bonus to certain rolls or mechanics. None of us are particularly good bowlers, so knocking down lots of pins feels almost as random as rolling dice anyway.
Also, it's not regular bowling but nine-pin bowling.

I've only played a handful of systems so far, including D&D and a few smaller or homebrew games, so I was wondering if anyone knows of a tabletop game that would lend itself well to this kind of gimmick. It would just be for a fun one-shot where the main goal is to have a good time together. We're also much more into roleplay, exploration, and mystery than combat-heavy games. Even though, maybe combat-heavy would suit the bowling pins more? There will be around six people.

Does anyone have any recommendations or ideas for how you would integrate the bowling pins into the game?

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u/CrocoFairy — 7 days ago
▲ 9 r/tabletop

Looking for more ideas

Hello everyone, I was wanting to see what you guys might suggested for tabletop games. We have the usual D&D and Pathfinder but i wanted to see if you guys have any ither suggestions like heroes, horror, grimdark, and other genres you might recommend. Thank you for your time reading and responding.

reddit.com
u/NoConsideration3839 — 13 days ago
▲ 0 r/tabletop

Which if these titles is more evocative

Hey folks! Need help deciding the name. If I had to explain the setting very briefly it would be:

"A Dark fantasy exploration RPG where adventurers explore anciente ruin left by a forgotten civilization in a new continent. Powerful relic are born from magical corruption, creating new creatures, cursed artifacts, and scars upon reality"

Which title best matches the description?

Which title would make you click?

And vote which seems the most interesting to you!

Ask any questions to help you decide.

View Poll

reddit.com
u/Guilher_Wolfang — 12 days ago
▲ 2 r/tabletop

Try my warm-up party game for TTRPGers

I made a card game you play in character, while you wait for that last player to show up to the RPG session. It's a quick game that gets people talking about everyone else's characters. As a side effect it reminds people what has happened in the campaign so far, so it's great for a warm up.

It's available to try for free here:

https://deckanddicegames.com/questionable-characters/

reddit.com
u/mpascall — 13 days ago