#ryuutama: natural fantasy rpg

[ryuutama-zine]

Calling all homebrewers and artists! Sign-ups for contributing to Campfire Collection ~ A Ryuutama Zine are now open!

Campfire Collection is a collaborative non-profit zine focused on creating new material for "Ryuutama: Natural Fantasy RPG" created by Atsuhiro Okada. Campfire Collection aims to promote the creativity of designers and artists in the Ryuutama community, and provide a free resource for fans of Ryuutama to use in their games.

You can read more info about the zine here via our guidebook:

And sign up here via our google form!

Applications will run from 9/12 - 10/11, so make sure to apply if you are interested, and spread this post if you can~!

[tionitro]

RYUUTAMA RPG : Entre Final Fantasy e o Studio Gibli - Um RPG de Fantasia Natural | NITRODUNGEON #resenha

Você já imaginou jogar um RPG de mesa inspirado tanto nos RPGs eletrônicos japoneses como Final Fantasy, Dragon Quest ou Legend of Mana, quanto nas animações de fantasia do Studio Gibli como Nausica, Contos de Terramar, Princesa Mononoke, entre outros? Pois Ryuutama é esse RPG! Ryuutama, criado por Atsuhiro Okada e lançado pela primeira vez no Japão em 2007, nos Estados Unidos em 2015 e agora,…

[mantis-lizbian]

i think another problem to point out with asking for "story-focused" games without much further specificity is that like... allowing for the generally used, but extremely fuzzy and imprecise definition of "story-focused", such games are near universally focused on specific kinds of stories (which is part of why the definition gets so fuzzy when you actually try and pin it down: what makes the DBZ-esque shonen battle anime type stories of 4e D&D any less legitimate a focus than the grimdark intrigue and suspense stories of Blades in the Dark, or the found family/coming-of-death stories of Our Haunt?)

if you say "i want a story-focused game", like... there's no GURPS or Hero System for that that can be used roughly equally well to tell any type of story (or rather... there are, but they're GURPS and Hero System; "not very" still counts as "equally well").

my best submission would be Ryuutama, since it does attempt to actually engage with the fact that different kinds of stories require different tools in the GM's arsenal, and provides those tools as best as it can within its framework, but it does still have a strong preference for stories that involve travel in some way.

Hi, just wanted to ask if you have any advice for someone who grew up with DnD 3.5e and wants to branch out into other game systems. I would really like something that is more storyfocused but also has a space for more rules light combat.

(Sorry if this ask is too demanding, you can gladly delete it. I just have seen you answer other asks about recomendations and wanted to try my luck)

I can give it the ol' college try, but firstly: the ask that something be "story focused" is a bit too vague and broad and can mean any number of things depending on what the person means. Some people use it to mean "rules light instead of crunchy," while others use it to mean "a game focused on genre emulation," and yet others mean "you know, something that's not about dungeon-crawling and combat." I know this is one of those issues where it might be hard to articulate what it is you want exactly unless you already have been exposed to other games, but it's always worth trying to be a bit more specific.

Anyway with all of that out of the way, I'm going to keep these suggestions within the realm of fantasy. Even though you didn't specify that, I'm going to keep at least one angle consistent between these suggestions, because otherwise this'll be all over the place.

Quest is a game I've recommended a bunch of times for people looking for a game that is broadly in the same genre of D&D (fantasy adventure) but does away with some of the mechanics that the genre of "D&D as it's played on podcasts" does away with. It's a simple d20-based fantasy RPG with lots of room for player input and relatively light mechanics. The perfect type of game if you mostly want to chuck some d20s with your friends while playing a pretty straightforward adventure game with minimal logistics. It's also free!

Grimwild is another one I've found quite charming. It's an interesting one: clearly inspired by D&D 5e (like, the character options are straight from 5e), but approaching that genre from a completely different direction. It clearly takes cues from some more modern indie RPGs like Apocalypse World and Blades in the Dark, but still has its own unique twists on many ideas. Worth taking a look if you're into the broad genre of fantasy adventure but want something that approaches that genre via something a bit more generative. Also has a free version available, with the paid version mainly adding some essays about the designer's rationale for some of the choices in the game as well as advice on how to hack the game to different subgenres of fantasy.

Third I'm going to suggest QuestWorlds. QuestWorlds is technically setting neutral, but specifically meant for pulp adventures where the heroes are larger than life. It's a game with a history going as far back as the early 2000s and has gone through a few names, with QuestWorlds being the latest, and at the time of release it was one of the first examples of a roleplaying game that did not try to simulate its fictional reality via specific procedures but very specifically applied its rules towards emulating story convention. The main issue with QuestWorlds with regards to this ask is that it's very much a toolkit and also it doesn't really have a combat system. It has systems for resolving conflict, and those systems can in fact be used for resolving combat, but it's probably not what you're looking for if you want an actual combat system. Regardless, a very interesting game, but sadly no free version of this one.

Hopefully at least one of those will scratch and itch. If not, do let me know if there's something more specific you're looking for! :)

[ttrpgart]

full-colour art for the hunter, artisan, merchant, and farmer classes.

source: ryuutama - natural fantasy rpg artist: ayako nagamori

[prokopetz]

Do you have any recommendations for TTRPGs that emulate JRPGs well, or have a very JRPG-like setting? I find the unself-conscious mixing of fantasy, sci-fi, and steampunk elements that's commonplace in JRPGs very appealing, as well as the inventive combat and advancement mechanics (for reference I am playing the first Trails in the Sky game right now and I am enjoying it very much).

You've got several distinct questions there, though you may not realise it, and I'm going to tackle them in order.

First, with respect to emulating JRPGs and JRPG-like settings at the tabletop, it's hard to go wrong with, well, actual tabletop JRPGs. While English localisations of Japanese tabletop roleplaying games are admittedly thin on the ground, there are a few of them out there, including official translations of Double Cross, Golden Sky Stories, Ryuutama – Natural Fantasy Roleplay, Shinobigami, and Tenra Bansho Zero, as well as the odd partial fan-translation, of which Meikyuu Kingdom and Nechronica are probably the most notable. (No direct links to the latter two because fan-translation is technically piracy, though I'm sure you can chase them down on your own if sufficiently inclined!) There are a lot of cultural assumptions about what an RPG is and how it ought to work that aren't going to come across in an Anglophone author's attempt at genre emulation, so you'd be well served to go straight to the source.

(I vaguely recall that there are also a couple of Japanese indie RPG authors self-publishing their works in English via itch.io, though it’s late and names escape me at the moment – if anyone reading this can point us in the right direction, please do!)

Second, with respect to emulating the steampunk science-fantasy settings that Western fandoms often associate with JRPGs (though they're far from universal within the genre – their apparent prevalence is more a reflection of what gets localised than of the genre as a whole), the above-cited Tenra Bansho Zero will give you that in spades, though it's also one of the most rules-heavy entries on that list. If you have a specific desire to play in a game where the party consists of a cursed samurai, a child mecha pilot, a Shinto MiB, an oni Jedi knight, and Robocop, that it'll do.

If you'd prefer something less crunch-heavy, or more American-style in its game design approach, you might alternatively have a look at Anima Prime. It's not a localised title, but its lighter and more familiar approach may be an easier sell for your group than dropping Tenra Bansho Zero's seven hundred page rulebook on them. Aesthetically, it sits somewhere near the RWBY-meets-Final Fantasy XIII intersection.

Finally, with respect to emulating the combat of The Legend of Heroes: Trails in the Sky specifically, that’s a tough one – I don’t think any Japanese tabletop RPGs with proper grid-based tactical combat have workable English localisations at the moment, even taking fan-translations into account. In terms of non-localised games, I’d probably go with something like Valor; it’s basically an anime-themed Dungeons & Dragons 4th Edition clone, but then, most games that focus tightly on grid-based tactical combat are to varying degrees these days – D&D4E is extremely good at what it does, the protestations of certain vocal grognards who don’t approve of what it does notwithstanding.

[madqueenmomo]

Ok. So like. Let me tell y’all a story cause I know tumblr would appreciate this chaos.

I’ve been playing this Japanese Table top game called Ryuutama: natural fantasy rpg.

It’s fun. And it’s basically you go on a journey and stuff happen and you can be a merchant and farmer ect and it’s fighting is more story telling focused with using items for bonuses. It’s nice.

It starts with a game zero we’re your party and dm create a world you adventure in.

We noticed the logo has an egg. And create a world that is egg shaped and every house is a baba yaga house that can just up and leave you on a short notice. We call it “moving day”

And this is our party.

So in this game we each have jobs. One of us draws a map. One takes in inventory. One has to handle our fighting info.

But more importantly, one of us has to write a journal of our adventures.

Luckily, being the dislexic who not word good I am, I’m the one who handles inventory.

But….

One day……

Our journal keeper, the only human in the group, was not present…

And so. I give you…

The point of this post.

Adventures taken down by a giant chiken that sound like was written by a crazy person but I swear it’s what happened that game.

Also that chicken is just trying really hard to jot this shit down.

Anyway bless our GM and remember to create spas for fairies to assert your non dominance.

[j-richmond]

A list of awesome games you can play instead of Dungeons & Dragons. These are all games I like (theres a ton of other games I like too). The people who make them are cool. Supporting these games is supporting actual game designers and not just people who took someone elses game put their name on it. Try these. You'll like them! Post your own recommendations (or your own games). - Lancer. Crunchy and flavorful sci-fi mecha action. Lots of options. Great art. https://massifpress.com/lancer - Death in Space: Scary gritty space exploration. Simple and easy to play! https://deathinspace.com/ - Contenders: GMless Boxing drama. Emotions! One of my favorite gaming experiences ever! https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/20233/Contenders - The Quiet Year: Mapping and community building after the collapse of society. https://buriedwithoutceremony.com/the-quiet-year - Motobushido: Post-apoc motorcycle samurai. Fantastic storytelling and a fun easy to learn system. https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/117797/Motobushido-The-MotorcycleSamurai-RPG - Ryuutama: Gentle and easy to learn fantasy role play that feels like a Ghibli film. For people who prefer travel and farming to Goblin murder. https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/151366/Ryuutama--Natural-Fantasy-Roleplay - Godsend Agenda: Mythical superhero action. I loved the original version and a new edition coming this summer! https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/khp/godsend-agenda - Romance Trilogy: Three excellent small games about romance. All three are worth your time! Breaking the Ice was an eye opening experience for me. https://www.indiepressrevolution.com/xcart/Romance-Trilogy-PDF.html - A Dungeon Game: Simple but clever dungeon crawling. So easy to get into! https://loottheroom.itch.io/a-dungeon- How about my own game? - The Magical Land of Yeld is a fantasy adventure about children form our world who discover a secret land through a magical door. https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/256555/The-Magical-Land-of-Yeld - Panty Explosion Perfect (also known as Tokyo Brain Pop) is a psychic school girl adventure game. https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/124334/Tokyo-Brain-pop - Sea Dracula is the iconic single page lawyer dance battle game. https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/55263/Sea-Dracula - Ocean is a single session underwater survival mystery game with a shared GM role. https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/63429/Ocean - GxB and BxB are simple one hour dating sim games that use a deck of cards and pre-made characters. Idea for new gamers! https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/108158/G-x-B-Girl-x-Boy

[adventuresandshopping]

Sample character from Ryuutama : Natural Fantasy RPG. (Resources)

[wesschneider]

Indie RPGs & PAX West Panels

Over the past weekend I spent a lot of time talking about tabletop RPGs at PAX West!

In Knights & Nightmares: Horror in Tabletop Gaming Tyler Carpenter, Amanda Hamon Kunz, and I talked about how to run terrifying games while making sure all your players still have a great time.

In That is Not Dead: Cthulhu in Gaming Marion Anderson, Penelope Love, Mark Morrison, and I talked about the basics of cosmic horror, crafting secret histories, and how to keep the unfathomable unfathomable in a world where Cthulhu’s become a household name.

In Ask the Game Masters, Crystal Frasier, Amanda Hamon Kunz, Rodney Thompson, and I took on challenges from dozens of gaming groups, suggesting how to do navigate the most fraught narrative and social gaming scenarios.

A fantastic fact came up durning all three panels: We are living in a golden age of indie tabletop roleplaying games. Many attendees shared scenarios that boiled down to them tying themselves in knots trying to make high fantasy RPGs provide strong experiences for horror, mystery, romance, or any of a thousand other genre possibilities. And clever GMs absolutely can run D&D as a horror game or Pathfinder as a high school dating sim.

But you don’t have to.

Using the right “console” for the story you want to play came up again and again. Want to play dragons? Use the game about playing dragons. Want horror without the distraction of dice and miniatures? Use the game that clears the table for suspense. Numerous indie RPGs came up during these discussions, many of which attendees hadn’t heard of.

To that end, here’s just a short list of a few indie and small press RPGs that came up during my recent discussions at PAX West.

Dread - What I play for horror.

Bluebeard's Bride  - Gorgeous, feminine horror inside the mind of Bluebeard Bride.

Monster Hearts - Monsters and hormones, where getting “turned on” is a status effect.

Hot Guys Making Out - My favorite game about the Spanish Civil War.

Eclipse Phase - A terrifying and beautiful future where everything can be hacked.

Apocalypse World  & Dungeon World - More story, fewer rules. 

Ryuutama - Travel and adventure in a Dragon-Quest-like world of wonder and natural beauty.

Epyllion - Baby dragon simulator!

The Shab-al-Hiri Roach - What would make you swallow a super-sentient roach?

Carolina Death Crawl - Swamp ghosts see your Civil War sins.

There are, of course, thousands of other amazing indie games out there, but there were just a few that came up. Find more at Indie Press Revolution and Drive Thru RPG.

Many of these games are short, accessible, and fantastic for one-shot sessions. Pick up a few, find the ones you like, and play the experience you want to have. No one’s asking you to retire your 90 years of D&D splatbooks, but for the price of one more tome of monsters you and your players could have an experience unlike any they’ve ever had.

Look around, there’s more to eat in the forest than just berries—no matter how much you like berries as a tot. (#analogies) 

Many, many thanks to everyone who hosted, spoke on, and attended the tabletop gaming panels at PAX West, along with everyone who asked such fantastic questions and those who stopped by to say “hi!” 

PAX West remains a great time for tabletop RPG gaming of all stripes. You can bet I’ll be submitting more tabletop panels and will be back at the show again next year!

[ryuutama-zine]

Last Call To Sign Up For "Campfire Collection ~ A Ryuutama Zine"!

Campfire Collection is a collaborative non-profit zine focused on creating new material for "Ryuutama: Natural Fantasy RPG" created by Atsuhiro Okada. Campfire Collection aims to promote the creativity of designers and artists in the Ryuutama community, and provide a free resource for fans of Ryuutama to use in their games.

You can read more info about the zine here via our guidebook:

And sign up here via our google form!

Applications run from 9/12 - 10/11, so make sure to apply if you are interested, and spread this post if you can~!

[dragon-moms]

Taking A Week Off

Hi, everyone, it’s your author friend who would love dragons a little too much, except it’s impossible to love dragons too much! It’s me, poet! This week is the first week of my classes (I’m a teacher, which means I had a lot of prep to do in order to start the semester) as well as me being out of town for most of the week for GenCon. As such, I’m giving myself the week off while all that happens. Dragon Moms will return next week. Thanks for understanding!

In the meantime, though, in honor of GenCon, I wanted to share a couple suggestions of Tabletop Roleplaying Games with Dragons I quite like, because why not?

I am a huge fan of Epyllion: A Dragon Epic. It’s a game of growing up as a dragon in a strange, ancient world filled with dangers weird, magical, and unfortunately too close to home. I love the way the game plays with gender (there is only one gender among dragons, and it has unique pronouns), age (Elder Dragons are gigantic, and the world is built for them, so the little dragonet Player Characters are initially in a world where they are tiny and sort of insignificant, which they slowly grow into), romance (the way dragon eggs are made in setting, a dragon can have essentially any number of parents, as long as they’re all in a romantic relationship with each other), and storytelling (the game is very Saturday Morning Cartoon and kid-friendly, but has plenty of hooks to slowly grow it into something more serious and mature). It’s a game I’m so excited about I’m positive I’ve scared my game group off multiple times by going on and on about it, but when we have played it, it’s been fantastic. My husband and I have booked a game of it at GenCon as well, and I am very thankful he’s put up with my excitement about it. I really don’t think the game has gotten near the eyes on it that it deserves, and that’s a dang shame, so please, consider it!

Ryuutama: Natural Fantasy RPG is such a good game. It takes place in a world where, at some point in their life, every person is filled with the need to go on a quest for a while. So adventurers in this world are rarely badasses, but instead are completely normal people just trying to see the world and make it a better place. The game has combat rules, but most character classes are super bad at combat, which constantly encourages players to seek alternate, pacifistic solutions. The biggest risks normally faced are travel, and preparing for travel, and dealing with problems like “the road has been washed out.” It’s just fantastic. But the best part is that the Player Character party is guided by a Ryuu-jin, an elemental dragon that the GM embodies. The Ryuu-jin is a character and can directly affect the story, but the more the GM affects the story with their Dragon-Ex-Machina, the closer the Ryuu-jin gets to death. What kind of dragon the GM makes strongly changes the tone of the game, as well, making them feel like real characters. There’s also just pages of completely adorable little non-Ryuu-jin dragon art in the book, which is also a plus. Often games are either all in or all out with violence, and I feel like Ryuutama does a fantastic job of making violence seem like an extremely bad idea, but still fun if it becomes necessary.

I really like Fellowship’s take on collaborative storytelling and building a stable of interesting NPCs to follow the player characters around and locations they’re actually going to care about when they get attacked. And as you might expect, I get very extra excited about The Dragon playbook expansion for the game. The way Fellowship lets you define what a Dragon (or any playbook, really!) is is a lot of fun. (Maybe it’s a real dragon, maybe it’s a title, maybe it’s just what a bunch of people who love fire call themselves, it’s all up to the player!) In fact, the entire mechanic of “you represent your race, so you fill in information on literally anything that has to do with your race” is just really fun, and lets the Overlord (the GM role) get to sort of discover and explore things along with the players. I haven’t gotten to get Fellowship to the table yet (I’ve been so close several times!!) so I suppose take this recommendation with a grain of salt. But I like it enough through reading, thinking, and listening to actual plays that I’m ready to jump on the chance to play, if I’m given it, trust me.

Finally, if you’re more of a LARPing and/or not paying money type, I highly recommend an entry from the 2017 200 Word RPG Challenge, a contest where the idea is to create a full set of RPG rules in 200 words. The game is So You’re Becoming A Dragon: A How-To Guide for Young Tenderwings on Their Transition from Weak Flesh-Sacks into Powerful and Sexy Masters of the Sky by Wendy Gorman, and it’s so cute and fun! I’m honestly in awe at how well it uses every single word to spark ideas for roleplay. I would be hard pressed to point to a wasted bit in the rules here. If we ever have dinner together sometime, let’s play this, okay?

Anyway, I hope you have a fantastic week while I’m distributing syllabi and rolling dice! Again, Dragon Moms will be back next week! I’ll see you then!

[pretendtobeanelf-blog]

Originally posted to Facebook March 03 2018

Quite a lot of tabletop RPGs are about conflict in one way or another, whether it's direct physical combat, the tension of high-stakes courtly drama, backstage politicking at a wrestling federation or whatever. The goal is to usually create dynamic, interesting stories and the best games exploit the strengths of the RPG medium to produce experiences that cannot be replicated by other media. Ryuutama takes a look at this and goes "naw, the goal of this game is to come away from a session feeling good about yourself." It's a game about going on a journey, going to new towns and eating delicious pastries. It's a game where you take time to pet dogs, smell flowers and enjoy the world you immerse yourself in. It's a game where when it was translated into English from Japanese, the translators errataed the rules to prevent an umbrella stacking strategy that was legitimately game breakingly overpowered. It's a beautiful little game that's just very cozy and nice to sink into for a few hours and enjoy some simple, innocent little fantasy stories. http://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/151366/Ryuutama--Natural-Fantasy-Roleplay

[ryuutama-zine]

Three Days Remain To Sign Up For "Campfire Collection ~ A Ryuutama Zine"!

Campfire Collection is a collaborative non-profit zine focused on creating new material for "Ryuutama: Natural Fantasy RPG" created by Atsuhiro Okada. Campfire Collection aims to promote the creativity of designers and artists in the Ryuutama community, and provide a free resource for fans of Ryuutama to use in their games.

You can read more info about the zine here via our guidebook:

And sign up here via our google form!

Applications will run from 9/12 - 10/11, so make sure to apply if you are interested, and spread this post if you can~!

[ryuutama-zine]

Ten Days Remain To Sign Up For "Campfire Collection ~ A Ryuutama Zine"!

Campfire Collection is a collaborative non-profit zine focused on creating new material for "Ryuutama: Natural Fantasy RPG" created by Atsuhiro Okada. Campfire Collection aims to promote the creativity of designers and artists in the Ryuutama community, and provide a free resource for fans of Ryuutama to use in their games.

You can read more info about the zine here via our guidebook:

And sign up here via our google form!

Applications will run from 9/12 - 10/11, so make sure to apply if you are interested, and spread this post if you can~!

[prokopetz]

Could you recommend a RPG system that emphasizes travel? I’m looking for something where travel as a concept is given substantial mechanical development, although only relative to the rest of the system—I don’t care how crunchy the game is overall.

Depends on the tone you’re shooting for.

If it’s more Studio Ghibli, you might have a look at the localised Japanese title Ryuutama: Natural Fantasy Roleplay.

If the Prose Edda is more your speed, perhaps Ironsworn.

If you prefer your fantasy less pastoral and more epic, Fellowship might be the ticket.

On the flip side, if you’re in the market for just a brutal fucking slog where everything is bigger than you and wants you dead, try Mouse Guard.

If what you’re after isn’t any of those things, you’ll have to be more specific!

[ttrpgart]

artwork for the artisan and merchant character classes.

source: ryuutama: natural fantasy rpg artist: ayako nagamori