Відео

I've honestly been struggling with TTRPGs lately. I started with such a love for them, and now I feel like I can't even properly run one. I also struggle finding good players. So I figured I'd give it a go at solo TTRPGs. I've been playing Ironsworn Starforged and I'm greatly enjoying it. I do think I'll try something like mythic GM emulator with a more traditional system though and see how that works for me. Great video, even if you said I shouldn't have pizzas every day 😅

Solo games help fill in those times when your between groups or your group meets once a month or less.

I have played many systems solo over the decades, this led me to create my would-be game, Interstellar Frontiers, which is based on solo play from the ground up. The hardest part with solo play in my opinion, is being engaged; to have the NPCs act 'independently' from what 'we' might want them to do. To achieve this I created a pile of charts to help with this. Try creating a chart using a d100. Assign variables like, "Advance, retreat, evade, hesitate, flee, etc." and using this to determine how an NPC will react in combat. We can create another chart for negotiations, intimidations, and searches. These charts allows us to assign both some chaos factor and some NPC independence. So, in combat, for example: I can roll to determine the foe, be it a single person, beast, or squad-sized unit, their attitude coming into the event; assign modifiers based up on the situation/circumstances (Is the OpFor (opposing force) supported; vested in the event; hired/mercenary, and so on).

I like playing OSE advanced. I have played some pre-made adventures and also some completely random table based games. Now i own a copy of The Halls of Arden Vul, a 1100 pages Multidungeon adventure and i want to start a new solo campaign based on OSE advanced and with making use of Mythic 2e as an oracle, the book of random tables and On Downtime and Demesnes for in between dungeon fun. I think i will use 4 characters but i am wondering if i should keep a log for all characters seperate or one log for the who group, since it is such a large campaign, even if broken down in smaller parts.

The problem is, this product was really designed to be for "Players of Star Trek Adventures who want to play the game on their own", but they failed to mention that as a requirement for picking this up. It is more of a "toolkit" to do solo play, and a "tweaking" of the normal rules of Star Trek Adventures. They mention within this book that you can play using more of the Star Trek Adventures rules if you want more crunchy mechanics. That way you can get all the special racial adjustments and extra things that make it feel more Star Trek. Their neglecting to inform people of the requirements to understand this book is going to lead a lot of people to dislike this product. Is it a great product? No, it is laid out very poorly. Does it have a robust solitaire game system? No, it offers a way to do what I call a "roll and write" roleplaying game. Roll the dice and do a lot of writing. I pick and choose aspects from Star Trek Adventures to use when I am playing Captain's Log, and I have written 40+ pages of Captain's Logs using this book. It helps fire the imagination, and gives a Star Trek Adventures feel without bogging down in mechanics. It streamlined the mechanics out of necessity to reduce the need for automating the GM. I had such an entertaining adventure the first time I played this that, when I told my buddy about it (who also loves Star Trek and had played Star Trek Adventures with me before) and he was so interested he wanted to play and purchased the book. We are currently doing a cooperative Captain's Log game, which the book "opened the door" to the concept, but failed to provide any insight in how to do it. So we are working our way through an episode cooperatively. In fact, we are meeting tonight to continue our game! It is certainly not for everyone, and not even for experienced roleplayers, but if you know and have played/ran Star Trek Adventures, and you always wanted to play more but couldn't, this product could be for you IF you don't mind playing a "roll and write" style game, as their is a LOT of writing in this game. But it is great at giving you ideas to run with.

How do you deal with npcs and asking for information?

Exactly! Right after a lot of mind work trying to simplify my solo setup and finally making progress by copying my favourite oracle tables at the beginning of my notebook, I find this video and your take on "character sheets". Amazing my friend. That "I can carry everything with me" take is exactly my style of play. Reducing the material resources to the minimum and letting the mind and imagination do the magic. Let me ask you: How exactly do you manage to make your gaming more straightforward systemwise? What kind of combat or resolution mechanics do you mostly use?

Great video, John -- luckily I've been able to use all my TTRPG time with you and the rest of the gang 😁

Off topic but…watch Babylon 5. Seasons 2-4 are some of the best sci-fi TV ever.

Great suggestions! Thanks, John!

I have never played solo. Well, with dice and pens. My brain is constantly in process of making up stores and playing through them in my head.

If you think about it Disney+ runs up against these issues too. They could have wrote a good story & never mentioned Jedi or lightsabres or the force & had that story happen on a world that one day is dominated by the Empire which destroys their culture & history.

Thanks, John!

Cool vid bud

Your point about modifying a rule set you are familiar with to see if you enjoy the setting it a great idea. Even base d&d rules can always be treated as a framework to build your dream setting.

I too am learning Star Trek Captain’s log. One thing I am doing is developing my own Quadrent and then have all my adventures that quadrant. I then keep my logs organized on my computer. I then read previous logs for fun but then look for which ones could have a follow up. I don’t use every character on every episode. I have an epic feel because characters have a history.

Very good suggestions! I play Traveller solo and have streamlined a lot of the repetitive tasks. I really struggled with this concept in the beginning and assumed I needed to follow the rulebook for everything to the letter. I hadn't considered using abilities for skill checks. That might be a bit farther than I want, but I think I will take a look at what skills I can condense down into a smaller pool (such as all Engineering into 1 skill.) Every time I play, I find something where I decide "I can do this better" and I'll adjust my house rules accordingly. I'm currently at 12 pages which covers my own personal touches and makes the game so much faster. I rarely need the core rulebook, which is made easier with Traveller's standard 8+ on 2D6 system for most rolls. I also don't factor in a lot of combat modifiers, which speeds up encounters. I streamline most NPC's to have standard stats without modifiers unless it's a boss which might get a +1 or +2 depending on how hard I want the fight to be. I have a sheet for my Travel Log and oracle, which is a condensed version of several solo GM systems. I couldn't find one that really worked well for me, and I'm still refining it as I go. I'm currently working on supplementing it with the Droyne Coyn system instead of word tables. Same concept, but a bit more "fun" to draw a set of coins. I also have a couple of pages for generating missions, map-as-you-go exploration, locations, ships and NPCs. It all fits in a 1 inch binder with dividers for easy reference, and has plenty of room for more adjustments as needed (hopefully smaller, not larger.)

While I think the bound book looks really classy, I purchased the PDF. I am happy that I did. I thought the organization while logical isn’t efficient for game play. So, I printed out the pages and put them in a more logical order. Doing this helped me understand it better.

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Great suggestions with the ability checks, scaling down adventures, and simplifying however you please (it's solo after all!). I would also suggest using a yes/no oracle and open question oracle.

All true

Why pay for 5e when you can B/X for free with "Basic Fantasy role playing game" !

Looking at this for World of darkness games. Changeling the dreaming mostly.

I play solo. Love the game ! I started a party of 4 at 1st level with 18hp no matter what class. I didnt want to spend most of my time creating new PCs. However when they get to 3rd level the only increase in HP will be if they have a Con bonus. Then it will be the correct hit dice etc starting 4th level. I still had 2 main PCs die at 2nd level.The rest of the party barely survived. The 2 dead will be seeing a cleric to get resurrected.😊😊. Even then Ive decided if they survive resurrection any PC will only come back with 85% of the HP they died at, as I fugure it must still be quite a strain on a physical body to come back from the dead. Then if the PC makes it to the next level they will be restored to full HP. All characters die at 0hp. Great video.Moving Onto your review of the Field Guide which I also bought, And your right for the price of hard copies its not even a contest with the DnD books.😅

I will throw out a recommendation for Scarlett Heroes built to streamline & solo D&D. I used it to run one of my most memorable solo games.

If you like D&D 5th Edition and own the Dungeon Master's Guide, that book has optional rules for playing using only ability scores without skills, or for simplifying the skills. It also has rules for different ways to handle "hero points" and "plot points" which can give more control to the players. I've always read those and thought, "Yeah, I can see how some groups might want to use them." After seeing this video, though, I now think they're extremely useful for a solo player.

I found F.O.R.G.R. to be very inspirational for playing osr's solo.

Interesting video- after buying many “solo games” I am finding solo games to be pages of lists - lists of names, items, monsters, terrain features- is a list now considered a game?

Really interesting, thanks for the idea on this video.

I think if you are wanting to use d&d as system I’d use White Box, Basic Fantasy or B/X. You can fit characters stats on 3x5 notecard. White Box is good because it has a single saving throw value to work with. Plus the pdf is free and physical copy is cheap. The same for Basic Fantasy as well. A simple d6 oracle for yes/no questions is all you really need too.

Love this! Thank you!

Never considered scaling down my adventures. Always assumed I had to run everything at full bore and would get overwhelmed in the process. Also like your suggestion to just use the settings and tweaking to my own preferences. Liberating. Very helpful and informative. A lot of great ideas and advice! Really appreciate these vids.

Definetly inspired by this demo, thank you very much! I was wondering which system are you playing?

Star Frontiers is my 11th ranked TTRPG! I had bought many of the items when they were released, but got all the updated stuff when it was free on the Internet, till asked to take it down after years on being up and known! There is still a magazine with homebrewed stuff out there! The basic book was good for an introduction to the system, while the advanced book was just a good and fun game!

Very helpful, thank you!

Great review, thank you.

The good ole days! Ha, ha! Epic!

Dice goblins! Yes!!! Bravo 👏 This is one of the best solo actual play videos I have seen! I was in a rut for the last few months and this really helps me seeing what I can implement to move me in a better direction for my table. Simple, fast yet exciting play through. Keeps things moving forward with the potential of the unknown at any given moment. This is how it should be! Light and flexible! Really like the advantage and disadvantage aspect also! Well done!

My difficulty in planning sessions always seems to be the plethora of ideas I have running in the back of mind all at once and narrowing them down to just a few. Staying focused and savoring the moments while not jumping too quickly from one thing to the next is a real struggle. Not sure if anyone else wrestles with that? Thoughts? Helpful ideas?

Great job! Thank you for providing such great insight and ideas. This was so refreshing! Linear play that allows for ebb and flow. Unpredictably is what makes playing so much fun within basic guidelines. Keep providing great content. It’s a breath of fresh air!

This is a great and helpful video. I really wish more would put out videos like this! Too often I think content creators assume their audiences just know how and what they are talking about. You’ve provided us all a succinct and visual aide. Thank you very much.

This is pretty much my go-to system to use as a baseline, but I have been working on some hacks and homebrews to make characters more powerful like newer editions for the sake of longer story-driven campaigns. But that's the beauty of TTRPGs -- you can do whatever's best for any given campaign, you don't have to use every rule every time. They're more like guidelines, anyway.

Lots of valuable advice in there! Always fun to have a peek in other soloists' treasure box. Thanks!

How "rail-roaded" the adventure needs to be? I mean do you improvise as player and GM as well?

Really good!

I used Emperor Cartagia from B5 once, that was a BLAST.

well my twisted brain seems to do ok, but i have no problem "borrowing" from other modules or game books :) i then insert them as encounters, not really over all game story. thanks for the vid another great info session, cheers, keep em rollin

Great ideas, John! Thanks for the suggestions.

Good episode with solid advice :)

Solid way to farm for ideas