Advantage #6 and #7 (for my table): * PCs can have several npc hirelings and it won’t really slow down play - D&D and most other systems just turn hirelings into a game-stopping slog. * Player characters can be of vastly different “levels” and everyone still has something to contribute
Well. Being a huge fanatics of SWADE since the time it was called Deadlands... XD A couple of things : - I like the fighting system because it is an RPG one, and at the same time as Savage World was at a time a tabletop game, you can really pull out your figurines and have fun. The rules are great on that regard. (old version of D&D like AD&D are quite good here as well) - D&D fights become more and more and more horrible as you level up. Just because of the hit point pool. It is the "combat attrition". - bennies > Advantages/disadvantages. Advantages are great. But it is good as a player to be awarded with stuff and spend the stuff when YOU chose. (bennies is the best system you can imagine, they were in old deadlands as poker chips, 3 types you could spend on this or that. Bennies is just a simplified version, streamlining and simpliyfing was the right choice) - feats vs edges/hindrances. If you take 2 fighters in D&D and run them Battlemaster... very very very few differences. In savage world because the Edge/hindrance, you can have bloody radically different fighters.even with the exact same stats and skills. Feats are rare and not that game breaking. And I agree with the tactile system. I adore cards. My fav tool. BUT cards are bad at random generation. So having various dices, in small pool, a "yoyo" dice, cards, bennies, figurines. So great.
Pralinor, you again have a comment that is spot on. I think you and must have a lot of the same design preferences in our games sir! Thanks for the comment.
I agree. The main reasons why I prefer SW over D&D and its derivatives are that I greatly dislike "Vancian" (Gygaxian) magic with its spell slots and that the hit point bloat in D&D is simply ridiculous.
You know the HP thing is something that I didn’t even realize I disliked UNTIL I saw SWADE’s solution. I just took for granted HP is just the way you had to do it for tactical combat play. I was way wrong.
Well one as to try to figure out what all that meant for its creators. HP and magic were resource-based. In the same principle as length of rope, arrows, and such. D&D and the later Advanced versions were wargames far more than what we call RPG. (I should also add the fact the magic system is based on Arneson's ideas very very very poorly rendered by Gygax who is not the best at explaining rules). Doesn't mean that the ideas of D&D cocreators are relevant in modern RPG and for D&D5 (ironically). I totally agree on the fact both of those are... meeehhh. but i also point that for Gygax (who wrote the rules on paper) this made some sense if you see what he was trying to achieve.
I was always infatuated with the Mutant Chronicles universe and tried to convert it to many systems, (the earliest was AD&D 2nd Edition, and the latest being GURPS). While GURPS had an entire toolkit to recreate my vision to the smallest detail, I found the actual conversion was mind numbing. THEN, I tried it in Savage Worlds and all major antagonists and settings with all the weapons and gear took me a total of about 6-8 hours and we were playing a fully fleshed-out Mutant Chronicles campaign the following day! I just can't recommend Savage Worlds enough for even Home-Brewed gameds.
@@booksbricksandboards783 Some may find it too simplistic, but all I can say is the action flows like Avengers Infinity War movie. The first major battle with the Dark Legion, (Demnogonis to be exact) was incredible! Hoards of Necrophages were storming the player's position, throwing dark arts at our heroes who were fighting for dear life, when they saw it, a Nepharite of Demnogonis grabbing The Copper Tablet, the key to all the Dark Apostles and the means to open a gateway from their dimension to ours! Our heroes blasted their way to the altar, but buefore they could stop the Nepharite, it opened a portal using the Dark Symmetry and escaped with The Tablet! Never have I seen a group of players so adamant about bringing an NPC to justice before. They were totally livid and we loved every second of it! It truly played like a MCU or LotR movie!
Fell in love with Savage Worlds after backing the current edition of Deadlands. Now its my go-to for most settings, as it fits my GM style perfectly. It's fast and easy, like a proper modern system, yet still has the old school feel of danger from any combat. And there's no thoughts towards "balance" or "challenge rating," I just grab a couple bad guys that sound cool for the situation and see what happens when they meet the players.
There is always the possibility, but it is generally slim. They have to roll enough to do the wounds to incapacitate you, then to die, you would have to critically fail your Vigor roll (1’s on the wild die and the Vigor die). Assuming that you have a D6 in Vigor (average and I would encourage no character with lower Vigor), that is only a 2.7% chance of a critical failure AFTER the huge roll from the opponent. So there is a chance, but it is slim. Then again, played co op with my two boys and first session had it happen… so there is that chance! Lol. Thanks for watching.
Playing Savage Worlds for the first time tomorrow, excited because I've always wanted to try a generic system, and reading through the book it feels like it would fit a sword-and-sorcery setting way better than D&D would. Think like Conan, Lankhmar (I know there's a supplement for this which is also cool) or even Dying Earth.
You are in for a good time I think. The Lankhmar setting has several supplements. Very good representation of the source material. The SWADE system is amazing at replicating Swords & Sorcery, if you add the Fantasy Companion, it can give a very close recreation of pretty much any fantasy setting you would want.
Justin, my gaming brother from another mother: You nailed the elegant, unique, and tactile intricacies of SW. It's system simply feels fresh (re: versus the hoard of RPGs with rote D20 mechanics). And while I am still enjoying Judging DCC, MCC, and its derivatives a metric ton, I have missed the pure lethality of SW -- as incredibly customizable as SW characters are, they are as equally fragile, haha! And I loooove the benny economy and SW's initiative system.
Not Tim, great to hear from you again! We do indeed have similar gaming genetics. I think I have room for lots of games in my life, but if I had to keep just one RPG, it would have to be Savage Worlds. So much to like there!
Yep, I am EAGERLY awaiting 20 Strong… I bought it to take on vacation with me. My vacation was back in August lol. It’s been delayed a couple times. It looks like a great fast option for me to take on the road.
❤ Well done Thank you How about some of the new rule systems coming out.... Does Savage World still better than some of them❓ I heard that initiative and even strike rolls are gone from some of them in order to speed up the game action....
Thanks for the kind words. I can’t speak to those issues specifically without knowing some of the games you are referring to. I know the PBTA games largely ignore initiative, making it a narrative decision by the GM. Similarly, there are many systems that forgo GM rolls altogether, opting for a player facing roll, ie you roll as a player to defend, not as a GM to strike. Those aren’t newer systems that I am talking about though. I will say, I think that Savage Worlds hits a sweet spot in flexibility, crunch, speed, and ease of teach, that makes it really hard to beat for an innovative GM that has a willing group. Thanks for watching!
Last Dnd game a bugbear chieftain mook from a meaningless random encounter just wouldn't die. It took the entire session grinding his Hps down to 0. Endless!! I remember thinking to myself: Lord this would of been over in 5 minutes with Savage Worlds.
RIGHT! I think a lot of us have been doing piles of HP so long, we just don’t think about there being another way, a better way to do it. Combat should be “fast, furious and fun”!
Awesome, SWADE in my opinion is a fantastic way to try something different for a while. You can do a lot with very little time invested… as an example, only using the core SWADE book, I created a TMNT game for my kids, with all of their favorites accurately depicted for them to interact with. Most systems, I would have had to either spent a lot of time homebrewing rules, bought a few supplements, or not ended up with a good representation. Because they included the setting rules options and the race creation options right in the core book, it was a very effective and slick process! Thanks for watching. I myself have always wanted to try Traveller, but not done it yet.
Going to have to disagree with you here. It is quite literally, 3 wounds and on the fourth wound you are incapacitated. If the attack fails to create a wound there is the shaken rule, and if you are already shaken and get shaken again, then that too becomes a wound… but as I stated in the video, you get 3 wounds, then on the fourth you are incapacitated. This was not a how to play video, so to cross reference other related rules and rulings of each topic was never the goal.
@@booksbricksandboards783 but it's not simply 3 wounds, you can get hit, become shaken, can't do anything, roll to be unshaken, spend bennie or wait, if you get hit again THEN you take the wound or if you get hit with enough raises you become shaken AND take wounds.Not saying it was supposed to be a how to video but as some feedback, shaken is most definetly a big part of the combat part and what makes Savage Worlds better. Not death by a thousand cuts (HP) but a lot of back and forth, shaken or take wounds and of course the consequences of taking the wounds is another aspect that makes the game great.
It is absolutely 3 wounds, and then the fourth you are incapacitated… yes there IS a separate rule for shaken, and yes shaken has its own effects on the game. But as far as wounds go (which is what that portion of the video is discussing) it is undeniable that you can take 3, then on the fourth you are incapacitated. With a single raise, you receive a wound (I think you probably know this, but your response said “with enough raises you receive wounds”, not enough, with a single raise… making sure that this discussion doesn’t confuse a new player). So as I said before, I’m going to have to disagree with you here, because I said what I meant to say and it was accurate. There is another rule which has different effect, but it is not part of the discussion in the video. Thanks for commenting.
In practice I have found it far less impactful than you have… firstly, Spirit is a pretty key trait, so most heroes have a d6 or better there, making it a 75% or better chance to make the Shaken roll(due to the Wild Die), which they get for free each round they are shaken. Toss in the fact that on the failed Spirit roll they can potentially use a Bennie to remove it that reduces the risk further. Finally, you aren’t prohibited from doing everything if you remain shaken, you can still take free actions, including movement, even running… so that is a much longer conversation than I wanted to include in a top 5 list that was talking about the deadliness of Savage Worlds combat, which at its core is a result of the limited number of wounds a character can take before being incapacitated.
Video games are just so impersonal. There really is no connection with the other characters and situations. If you die or things don't work out in a video game, just reload a save, which takes away some of the excitement because you really just cannot die. Plus, even MMOs are a single-player experience because you're 99% alone in your own room in a solitary environment. Video games are actually the most antisocial form of entertainment I've experienced, unless you're playing the card game, Solitaire. TTRPGs are 100% the exact opposite to everything I mentioned above. This is why I prefer TTRPGs over Video games.
Agreed. I would generally rather play a solo RPG or board game than a solo video game. As a group experience, I would ALWAYS rather play an RPG or board game than a video game. Discussion and fellowship is half of the fun.
I tried to give Savage Worlds a fair shake, but at the end of the day, the combat just felt too much like a war game* for my liking. *Savage Worlds is actually a 2nd gen rpg derived from Dead Lands: the Great Rail Wars, a skirmish board game set in the Deadlands universe.
Tasty, that is fair. Like you said it did indeed start as a war game. Perhaps I don’t see that as a downside since I played a lot of war games (Battletech, Warmachine, 40k, Batman, etc)… of course D&D started as a war game as well (Chainmail). If you gave it a try and it isn’t for you, that is a good enough reason to play something else. Thanks for Watching and sharing your thoughts.
@@booksbricksandboards783don’t get me wrong, I like both as well (though I’m relatively new to war games at only about 2-3 years of experience vs a decade of ttrpgs), but there was just some kind of weird disconnect for me with “combat movement in inches” and a lot of saves that just didn’t set right with (but my favorite combat system is Runequest, so crunch isn’t a problem)
I think that a thing that I might see as a barrier for a lot of people, maybe you and possibly not, is that while most RPG’s support miniature use, Savage Worlds almost demands it. While true it has rules to play in “theater of the mind”, much of its premise is predicated upon the miniatures, measurements and angles of attack. I like the trade off there, but I can certainly see where a lot of people would not. The non-5e Iron Kingdoms RPG was very similar, sticking quite close to its Warmachine roots. Not coincidentally, I’m one of the few that enjoyed that system as well! 😊
Tobi, I am terrible about remembering to share this, but my email for the channel is BooksBricksAndBoards@gmail.com . I don’t check it every day, but usually every couple days. Looking forward to talking with you!
Advantage #6 and #7 (for my table):
* PCs can have several npc hirelings and it won’t really slow down play - D&D and most other systems just turn hirelings into a game-stopping slog.
* Player characters can be of vastly different “levels” and everyone still has something to contribute
Great additions!
Well. Being a huge fanatics of SWADE since the time it was called Deadlands... XD
A couple of things :
- I like the fighting system because it is an RPG one, and at the same time as Savage World was at a time a tabletop game, you can really pull out your figurines and have fun. The rules are great on that regard. (old version of D&D like AD&D are quite good here as well)
- D&D fights become more and more and more horrible as you level up. Just because of the hit point pool. It is the "combat attrition".
- bennies > Advantages/disadvantages. Advantages are great. But it is good as a player to be awarded with stuff and spend the stuff when YOU chose. (bennies is the best system you can imagine, they were in old deadlands as poker chips, 3 types you could spend on this or that. Bennies is just a simplified version, streamlining and simpliyfing was the right choice)
- feats vs edges/hindrances. If you take 2 fighters in D&D and run them Battlemaster... very very very few differences. In savage world because the Edge/hindrance, you can have bloody radically different fighters.even with the exact same stats and skills. Feats are rare and not that game breaking.
And I agree with the tactile system. I adore cards. My fav tool. BUT cards are bad at random generation. So having various dices, in small pool, a "yoyo" dice, cards, bennies, figurines. So great.
Pralinor, you again have a comment that is spot on. I think you and must have a lot of the same design preferences in our games sir! Thanks for the comment.
I agree. The main reasons why I prefer SW over D&D and its derivatives are that I greatly dislike "Vancian" (Gygaxian) magic with its spell slots and that the hit point bloat in D&D is simply ridiculous.
You know the HP thing is something that I didn’t even realize I disliked UNTIL I saw SWADE’s solution. I just took for granted HP is just the way you had to do it for tactical combat play. I was way wrong.
Well one as to try to figure out what all that meant for its creators. HP and magic were resource-based. In the same principle as length of rope, arrows, and such. D&D and the later Advanced versions were wargames far more than what we call RPG. (I should also add the fact the magic system is based on Arneson's ideas very very very poorly rendered by Gygax who is not the best at explaining rules).
Doesn't mean that the ideas of D&D cocreators are relevant in modern RPG and for D&D5 (ironically).
I totally agree on the fact both of those are... meeehhh. but i also point that for Gygax (who wrote the rules on paper) this made some sense if you see what he was trying to achieve.
I think you would enjoy EZD6 and Forbidden Lands, both have really cool magic systems that can be easily reworked into anything.
@@booksbricksandboards783Same! It wasn’t until I did some trial combat that I realized why I hated HP.
I was always infatuated with the Mutant Chronicles universe and tried to convert it to many systems, (the earliest was AD&D 2nd Edition, and the latest being GURPS). While GURPS had an entire toolkit to recreate my vision to the smallest detail, I found the actual conversion was mind numbing. THEN, I tried it in Savage Worlds and all major antagonists and settings with all the weapons and gear took me a total of about 6-8 hours and we were playing a fully fleshed-out Mutant Chronicles campaign the following day!
I just can't recommend Savage Worlds enough for even Home-Brewed gameds.
You definitely get my love for this system. Absolutely a game changer for the creative GM!
@@booksbricksandboards783
Some may find it too simplistic, but all I can say is the action flows like Avengers Infinity War movie. The first major battle with the Dark Legion, (Demnogonis to be exact) was incredible! Hoards of Necrophages were storming the player's position, throwing dark arts at our heroes who were fighting for dear life, when they saw it, a Nepharite of Demnogonis grabbing The Copper Tablet, the key to all the Dark Apostles and the means to open a gateway from their dimension to ours! Our heroes blasted their way to the altar, but buefore they could stop the Nepharite, it opened a portal using the Dark Symmetry and escaped with The Tablet!
Never have I seen a group of players so adamant about bringing an NPC to justice before. They were totally livid and we loved every second of it! It truly played like a MCU or LotR movie!
Fell in love with Savage Worlds after backing the current edition of Deadlands. Now its my go-to for most settings, as it fits my GM style perfectly. It's fast and easy, like a proper modern system, yet still has the old school feel of danger from any combat. And there's no thoughts towards "balance" or "challenge rating," I just grab a couple bad guys that sound cool for the situation and see what happens when they meet the players.
That is exactly why my group is switching to Savage Worlds once our PF2 campaign ends. Can’t wait to be playing it full time!
Ngl, after rolling 39 damage (enough for 8 wounds to my character), I'm a little afraid of getting one-shot myself...
There is always the possibility, but it is generally slim. They have to roll enough to do the wounds to incapacitate you, then to die, you would have to critically fail your Vigor roll (1’s on the wild die and the Vigor die). Assuming that you have a D6 in Vigor (average and I would encourage no character with lower Vigor), that is only a 2.7% chance of a critical failure AFTER the huge roll from the opponent. So there is a chance, but it is slim. Then again, played co op with my two boys and first session had it happen… so there is that chance! Lol. Thanks for watching.
You can use the common rule of Four-wound-cap, which will almost kill you in one shot but not quite
Playing Savage Worlds for the first time tomorrow, excited because I've always wanted to try a generic system, and reading through the book it feels like it would fit a sword-and-sorcery setting way better than D&D would. Think like Conan, Lankhmar (I know there's a supplement for this which is also cool) or even Dying Earth.
You are in for a good time I think. The Lankhmar setting has several supplements. Very good representation of the source material. The SWADE system is amazing at replicating Swords & Sorcery, if you add the Fantasy Companion, it can give a very close recreation of pretty much any fantasy setting you would want.
How did it go?
Justin, my gaming brother from another mother: You nailed the elegant, unique, and tactile intricacies of SW. It's system simply feels fresh (re: versus the hoard of RPGs with rote D20 mechanics). And while I am still enjoying Judging DCC, MCC, and its derivatives a metric ton, I have missed the pure lethality of SW -- as incredibly customizable as SW characters are, they are as equally fragile, haha! And I loooove the benny economy and SW's initiative system.
Not Tim, great to hear from you again! We do indeed have similar gaming genetics. I think I have room for lots of games in my life, but if I had to keep just one RPG, it would have to be Savage Worlds. So much to like there!
When you talked at the end about Chip Theory Games, you remind me of their latest fulfilment for burncycle... and Unbreakable. You do have those yes?
Yes I have both. I have all the Chip Theory Games.
@@booksbricksandboards783 20 strong comming soon it seems also! 🤩
Yep, I am EAGERLY awaiting 20 Strong… I bought it to take on vacation with me. My vacation was back in August lol. It’s been delayed a couple times. It looks like a great fast option for me to take on the road.
❤
Well done
Thank you
How about some of the new rule systems coming out....
Does Savage World still better than some of them❓
I heard that initiative and even strike rolls are gone from some of them in order to speed up the game action....
Thanks for the kind words. I can’t speak to those issues specifically without knowing some of the games you are referring to. I know the PBTA games largely ignore initiative, making it a narrative decision by the GM. Similarly, there are many systems that forgo GM rolls altogether, opting for a player facing roll, ie you roll as a player to defend, not as a GM to strike. Those aren’t newer systems that I am talking about though. I will say, I think that Savage Worlds hits a sweet spot in flexibility, crunch, speed, and ease of teach, that makes it really hard to beat for an innovative GM that has a willing group. Thanks for watching!
Last Dnd game a bugbear chieftain mook from a meaningless random encounter just wouldn't die. It took the entire session grinding his Hps down to 0.
Endless!! I remember thinking to myself: Lord this would of been over in 5 minutes with Savage Worlds.
RIGHT! I think a lot of us have been doing piles of HP so long, we just don’t think about there being another way, a better way to do it. Combat should be “fast, furious and fun”!
Thank you. I am long time Traveller player thinking of running swade instead for a while
Awesome, SWADE in my opinion is a fantastic way to try something different for a while. You can do a lot with very little time invested… as an example, only using the core SWADE book, I created a TMNT game for my kids, with all of their favorites accurately depicted for them to interact with. Most systems, I would have had to either spent a lot of time homebrewing rules, bought a few supplements, or not ended up with a good representation. Because they included the setting rules options and the race creation options right in the core book, it was a very effective and slick process! Thanks for watching. I myself have always wanted to try Traveller, but not done it yet.
Literally would have given thumbs up like PURELY off of you using Wayne's World clips lol
The drop ins add some fun to the edit process. Glad you liked them!
Great video!
Thanks Nick, I have a few Savage Worlds I have been wanting to do, but unfortunately my preorders at Pinnacle have been held up… hopefully soon!
Great review =)
Thanks sir!
One thing you didn't mention in the combat section was the shaken rule. It's not just 3 wounds.
Going to have to disagree with you here. It is quite literally, 3 wounds and on the fourth wound you are incapacitated. If the attack fails to create a wound there is the shaken rule, and if you are already shaken and get shaken again, then that too becomes a wound… but as I stated in the video, you get 3 wounds, then on the fourth you are incapacitated. This was not a how to play video, so to cross reference other related rules and rulings of each topic was never the goal.
@@booksbricksandboards783 but it's not simply 3 wounds, you can get hit, become shaken, can't do anything, roll to be unshaken, spend bennie or wait, if you get hit again THEN you take the wound or if you get hit with enough raises you become shaken AND take wounds.Not saying it was supposed to be a how to video but as some feedback, shaken is most definetly a big part of the combat part and what makes Savage Worlds better. Not death by a thousand cuts (HP) but a lot of back and forth, shaken or take wounds and of course the consequences of taking the wounds is another aspect that makes the game great.
It is absolutely 3 wounds, and then the fourth you are incapacitated… yes there IS a separate rule for shaken, and yes shaken has its own effects on the game. But as far as wounds go (which is what that portion of the video is discussing) it is undeniable that you can take 3, then on the fourth you are incapacitated. With a single raise, you receive a wound (I think you probably know this, but your response said “with enough raises you receive wounds”, not enough, with a single raise… making sure that this discussion doesn’t confuse a new player). So as I said before, I’m going to have to disagree with you here, because I said what I meant to say and it was accurate. There is another rule which has different effect, but it is not part of the discussion in the video. Thanks for commenting.
@@booksbricksandboards783 all i was getting at is the section was titled "Combat" and shaken is heavily part of combat.
In practice I have found it far less impactful than you have… firstly, Spirit is a pretty key trait, so most heroes have a d6 or better there, making it a 75% or better chance to make the Shaken roll(due to the Wild Die), which they get for free each round they are shaken. Toss in the fact that on the failed Spirit roll they can potentially use a Bennie to remove it that reduces the risk further. Finally, you aren’t prohibited from doing everything if you remain shaken, you can still take free actions, including movement, even running… so that is a much longer conversation than I wanted to include in a top 5 list that was talking about the deadliness of Savage Worlds combat, which at its core is a result of the limited number of wounds a character can take before being incapacitated.
Video games are just so impersonal. There really is no connection with the other characters and situations. If you die or things don't work out in a video game, just reload a save, which takes away some of the excitement because you really just cannot die. Plus, even MMOs are a single-player experience because you're 99% alone in your own room in a solitary environment. Video games are actually the most antisocial form of entertainment I've experienced, unless you're playing the card game, Solitaire.
TTRPGs are 100% the exact opposite to everything I mentioned above.
This is why I prefer TTRPGs over Video games.
Agreed. I would generally rather play a solo RPG or board game than a solo video game. As a group experience, I would ALWAYS rather play an RPG or board game than a video game. Discussion and fellowship is half of the fun.
I tried to give Savage Worlds a fair shake, but at the end of the day, the combat just felt too much like a war game* for my liking.
*Savage Worlds is actually a 2nd gen rpg derived from Dead Lands: the Great Rail Wars, a skirmish board game set in the Deadlands universe.
Tasty, that is fair. Like you said it did indeed start as a war game. Perhaps I don’t see that as a downside since I played a lot of war games (Battletech, Warmachine, 40k, Batman, etc)… of course D&D started as a war game as well (Chainmail). If you gave it a try and it isn’t for you, that is a good enough reason to play something else. Thanks for
Watching and sharing your thoughts.
@@booksbricksandboards783don’t get me wrong, I like both as well (though I’m relatively new to war games at only about 2-3 years of experience vs a decade of ttrpgs), but there was just some kind of weird disconnect for me with “combat movement in inches” and a lot of saves that just didn’t set right with (but my favorite combat system is Runequest, so crunch isn’t a problem)
I think that a thing that I might see as a barrier for a lot of people, maybe you and possibly not, is that while most RPG’s support miniature use, Savage Worlds almost demands it. While true it has rules to play in “theater of the mind”, much of its premise is predicated upon the miniatures, measurements and angles of attack. I like the trade off there, but I can certainly see where a lot of people would not. The non-5e Iron Kingdoms RPG was very similar, sticking quite close to its Warmachine roots. Not coincidentally, I’m one of the few that enjoyed that system as well! 😊
@@booksbricksandboards783dude, you’re spot on.
@@tasty_wind4294 Thanks Tasty!
Hi Justin,
This is Tobi from Bossbecher & Ladymug Games. I would Like to contact you somehow 😊
Best regards
Tobi, I am terrible about remembering to share this, but my email for the channel is BooksBricksAndBoards@gmail.com . I don’t check it every day, but usually every couple days. Looking forward to talking with you!
@@booksbricksandboards783 thanks for your reply. I will send you an Email :)