Symbaroum: A GM's Perspective
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- Опубліковано 11 вер 2024
- I have been playing the Symbaroum RPG for about a year, and my players have finished the first two adventures of the official Throne of Thorns campaign, so I thought I let everyone know my impressions of the game.
You can pick up the PDF on drive through RPG. If you use my affiliate link down below, I get a few cents from your purchase, which I will put forward to buy and review more RPG stuff.
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I love the setting, the artwork, and the books, can’t wait to see what they come up with next! I just ran my group through a warhammer style campaign, though, so we won’t be playing this next. But soon....
It's on my to-play-list as well. Certainly when the end of the Thron of Thorns campaign has been published, it's time to delve back into Davokar.
I just want to say your voice and presenting style is so calming and soothing yet still highly informative. Would love to see you breakdown more settings and games in this way. Really enjoyed it
Plenty of nice soothing videos about settings and other stuff on my channel. ;)
Many thanks for ur thoughts about the Game and is a wonderful one indeed!
Good vid! Thank you for the detailed overview and explanation. It seems like a gorgeous gothic setting.
GREAT INTRO! I just discovered Symbaroum and this is perfect! BTW - I recommend purchasing "Into the Wyrd and Wild" by Charles Ferguson-Avery as a great resource to make PCs fear the woods in future campaigns you run.
Way ahead of you mate.
Got a video about it on my channel.
Great book!
I like this video, it's a beautiful explanation of a fantastic world. This video made me acquire Symbaroum and I don't regret it at all. Many thanks for that.
and Wow ! the musical background is fabulous.
Thx. I wish you have lots of fun with game!
Great review - I'm hoping to start running the main campaign soon.
Great video. Can you expand on what rules you find to be problematic, and what house rules you'd institute to correct them? I have the core rule book and would like to run a game, and if I know beforehand what to watch out for it would be really helpful in order to keep the gameplay balanced and fun.
I fear, I have not played the original Symbaroum rules in a long time, so I can't give you too much advice there. (I'm happy with the 5E conversion so far.)
Just a few things from what I remember:
Don't let a PC take dark blood, where he regenerates HP each round.
Expect all PCs to make precision their dump stat. The game is designed that way.
Be open for creative applications of spells, way beyond the spell descriptions. The few spells the game have are too restrictive otherwise.
I would change how corruption is recovered. The base is, that it is wiped after each scene. But that does not fit the tone of the world, or how it is described in the lore. Make it regenerate like HP. Maybe 1 per rest, maybe 1D6 per rest if you want to speed it up. But complete after each scene is silly.
Sebaa did you find the adventurers to be on rails or did players have decisions to make and choices that determined outcomes? What are your gold standard systems when you say it's not perfect but good enough would help to have some reference of comparison. Loved the music and well edited video! Really captured the art and vibe !
The adventures were not completely railroaded, apart from Mark of the Beast, there were choices for the players to make. And they have non linear sections that play like little sandboxes. But I think it is in the nature of a long, pre written campaign, that the outcome of an adventure is mostly set in stone. How else would they write the next adventure in the campaign?
Still, there is so much material in the individual episodes of the Throne of Thorns campaign, that you can easily make your own campaign with it.
No RPG System is perfect, but there are a few that I would play unmodified. Like 5E, Forbidden Lands or Mörk Borg.
Symbaroum can be played unmodified, but you have to keep the broken mechanics in mind, so the players will not break the game.
@@Sebbaasdungeon thanks for the follow up and answers to my questions! I hope to check back after trying one of these. If you do compile your house rules and protections against (possibly unanticipated by the designers) broken mechanics in Symbaroum I hope you'll share them too.
Thank you for this. Loved the explanation and have ordered the core rules as I’d rather play it the way it was intended (I already dm 5e).
this was great!
Could you narrate more stories in Symbaroum ?
What do you mean?
@@Sebbaasdungeon Stories from Symbaroum adventures ? Talking about the lore, world and adventures.
@@troisot1107 I got a Symbaroum playlist, where I present most of the official adventures.
ua-cam.com/video/7zlNUCP5blo/v-deo.html
@@Sebbaasdungeon Thanks, I was thinking more about lore, world and story.
@@troisot1107 Possibly. I've never done lore videos before, but Symbaroum would be a good candidate to do a few of those.
Art shouldn’t draw you to a TTRPG. Art is nice but ttrpgs are theater of the mind games.
Bullsh1t
1. Where is the problem? Whatever draws you somewhere, has achieved something beautiful. Drawing, pulling touching is the genuin identity and purpose of art (if it needs that)
2. I count theatre of mind games as art, too. Why shouldnt other art like music, visuals, films, photography, etc draw you towards another art?
3. My first contact ever with a roleplaying game was when discovering the cover-picture of a box in a friends room. It showed a Viking, an Elf and a Dwarf. "What is this?" "A game" "But these are only books" "should i show you how it works?" "ok, cool." The magic happened and I never lost interest. It was the picture of DSA3.0 BasicBox drawing me towards my greatest hobby.
4. Are only words allowed to catch the style and mood of a setting?
5. TTPRGs dont have to be theatre of mind games for everybody. D&D evoled from miniature war gaming and keeps parts of that legacy until today. Peopl only need to enjoy them in any way they lkike
@@bAtACt1X okay, let me address your points. Some great games don’t have great art. If art is the primary matrix you judge the game on, then you’re only going to be drawn to publishers that can afford to pay for top notch artists. To me this is superficial. Conversely, you might have game books that have great art but the game actually sucks to play.
And what I meant by “theater of mind” in this context was all TTRPGS are theater of the mind in the sense that ALL ttrpgs are collaborative storytelling games of imagination, I wasn’t specifically talking about theater of the mind as in “not using minis and grid”. No matter how you play (minis or not), the game is still narratively played at the table (board or not), not read or illustrated from a book.
Great art is awesome in a book, just don’t judge a game book by its cover or art content - rather judge a game book by how the game plays at the table.
That’s all I’m saying.
@@mattm4557 you are right I have games that look wonderful and sucked to play.
1. I dont know a single game showing art as its only selling point. It`s always been the art + some intriguing idea. A mechanic or twist to the setting ( In fact my most sucking games have a lot of those XD). I assume youre talking about this kind? I call them fancy games. The problem I have with fancy games is that I cant immerse in the world. I cant relate. Everything is to strange and to far beyond. Degenisis is such a game and Numenera for sure. But well...I like these "gameworlds" , their weirdness and beauty. I cant enjoy them by playing, but I know others that do. Both have a huge Fanbase. So they do not suck.
2. There are games with rules and mechanics that suck. True. When I was young this was Earthdawn to me. Played it a lot. Realy sucked. Love it until today for its Setting, Style and ideas. Today this isn`t a problem at all with games as there are so many fine working and easy to use Rule Systems out there( or now I just know and use them) and. Earthdawn inspires me until today.
3. "Unknown Armies" is the third case. The game just didnt achieve what it had promised (at least to me!), except being unic somehow. But art was not its selling point.
So why does Symbaroum suck? And which other games with good art do in your opinion?
Every rpg you've ever played triggers immediate art and symbol memories, which inspire imagination..
@@Crack_the_Skye what does that have to do with what I commented? Like I said, Art is nice but it’s not the substance of a TTRPG book. Don’t buy a game because of the art. Buy a game because you like the game. The art is a bonus.