GM Advice:
Gaming Systems

By Shamus Posted Wednesday Oct 15, 2008

Filed under: Tabletop Games 166 comments

Talking about gaming systems is a lot like talking about operating systems. There is a certain fervor in the discussion that always seems incongruous to me.

I want to turn the GM advice thing around this time and see what everyone else is playing, and why. I talked about what I look for in a roleplaying game and solicited advice in a post way back at the beginning of this year. That made for fascinating reading, and I kind of wanted to return to the well for another drought of that.

It seems like a majority of gamers begin with one of the major systems (probably a version or variant of D&D) and then graduate to one of the more specialized systems once they learn about the game and discover what parts they enjoy most. Some people latch onto a system and play it until the rulebooks are a part of their DNA. Other people skip from one system to the next with reckless abandon. A lot of this depends on your group, your preferred setting or genre, and (unfortunately) your budget.

So, a few questions I’m curious about. Just answer the ones that are most interesting to you:

  1. What gaming system did you start with when you were learning the game?
  2. What’s your preferred gaming system when you’re running a game?
  3. What system do you prefer as a player? (For some people this is different from #2.)
  4. And because we live in an imperfect world: What system do you actually end up using?

This answer might get kind of long. I know trackbacks are about as reliable as the Holodeck, so if you answer on your own site please send me an email (shamus at shamusyoung dot com) and I’ll add a link at the bottom of this post.

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166 thoughts on “GM Advice:
Gaming Systems

  1. Penn says:

    I started with AD&D 1st edition.
    I’ve skipped through many preferred systems over the years (mostly whatever the most recent version of D&D was, with a foray into Rolemaster at one point).
    As a player, I prefer whatever system suits the game being run. I’ve quite enjoyed many, many systems over the years, although currently I’m really having fun in a Changeling the Lost game, using Mind’s Eye Theatre (the new version) rules.
    Currently, I’m about to start up a second game of D&D 4e, to go with my first one (different players).

  2. MintSkittle says:

    1: AD&D. I never actually played a game with it, but reading the one rule book I had made me want to play.

    2: Shadowrun. Because that’s the one game everyone in our group knows.

    3: Since Shadowrun is the ONLY tabletop RPG I’ve played, I guess that will also do. I would like to run a heroes game, but the Hero System book is a behemoth.

    4: Shadowrun. See previous answers.

  3. Strangeite says:

    1. AD&D 1st Edition. For me, it is the system by which all other systems are judged. For a 4th grade nerd living in Hazard, Kentucky, it was like being given a magical portal to another dimension.

    2. GURPS. The flexibility of the system to cater to my erratic plot lines which incorporate way too many genres.

    3. White Wolf’s Storytelling System. I am ashamed to admit this and it has been many years since I have played the system, but I have very fond memories of its ease. I really enjoyed those games.

    4. D&D 3.5. I have the books. My 10 year old son knows the rules and since I only find time to play very sporadically, it seems the most logical to jump right into.

  4. Eric says:

    To answer all the questions at once: D&D. I keep coming back to it after trying something new. WOD, werewolf, 7th sea, their all good, but in the end I don’t like the d10 system, after a while your rolling enough die that you can’t fail(even at the beginning of the game depending on how you role your character).
    I don’t feel that complete randomness like the d20 system has, anything could go wrong at anytime just like in reality. The roleplaying aspect just depends on the group your with.

  5. Gabriel Mobius says:

    1. D&D 3.5. I was a latecomer to tabletop RPGs, mostly because next to no one in Barbados plays them. But I eventually found an IRC room with a couple of guys to play with, and it went from there.

    2. Tough call. I like a whole bunch of systems for different reasons, but I’d have to go with Mutants and Masterminds. That system allows for so much, and requires very little book-keeping on the part of the DM. Not to mention how easy it is to fudge a villain’s abilities on the fly or even come up with a whole new villain on the spot because the players did something unexpected. It’s great fun.

    3. D&D 3.5. I enjoy messing with the system and seeing what I can create within its confines. That, and it’s the system most likely to be run here with any regularity.

    4. I wind up using whatever I can muster up interest in. It’s usually D&D 3.5, but sometimes it’s M&M or something else.

  6. krellen says:

    1. D&D Basic. The red box.

    2. I don’t have one. I tend to run what’s most appropriate for the setting. All my games have been forum-based for the past three years, so I’ve mostly used light, stat-centric systems that make conflict resolution simple.

    If I had to pick an existing rule-set to run with right now, I’d probably go with 4th edition D&D.

    3. I’m having a blast playing 4th edition D&D right now. They took out all the parts of 3rd that sucked.

    4. See comments about forum games. Basically it’s a six-stat system with balanced assignment between mental and physical abilities.

  7. Kizer says:

    I started with DnD 2nd Edition, but that wasn’t very formal. I really started with DnD 3rd, with the starter box. I still like Mialee to this day . . .
    As for now, I don’t game as much as I used to, so I like systems that are easy to pick up and play. Which means . . . Feng Shui!!
    However, nothing beats the fun of GMing for DnD in my opinion.

  8. Matt K says:

    Started with AD&D which worked nicely because we were all 14 and so mostly kick in the door players. Since then I had a taste of Vampire and Mage and found that system was interesting enough that I wouldn’t mind playing more. However, besides those two occasions, I exclusively played AD&D and then D&D 3/3.5. Unfortunately I haven’t had a chance to play table top since College (and even then it was on very rare occasions). I probably should try and get back into it at some point since I’m itching to play some table top again.

  9. Daemian Lucifer says:

    All of the systems that exist cannot compare with a home made one.Add the best bits from what makes sense in other systems,change and quirk it a bit,and youll end up with the perfect one for you.Both as a GM and a player I prefer home brewn one over a bought system.The later usually boils down to metagaming and exploiting the rules.Personal system,especially if the rules aren revealed to the players,forces them to think of things that make sense,instead of those that will go best with the rules.

    I myself didnt try that many systems though.Started with AD&D2,went to shadowrun,then mingled among a lot of home tweaked systems.Then I patched one myself and use it ever since,except when I am the player.

  10. Hal says:

    Well Shamus, you might remember that you’re the one who started me into RPGs, so I guess it’s obvious that I started on 3.5 D&D. Which is also what I run when I DM, since I started by DMing.

    As for preference . . . well, I tend to take things that I like from everything I’ve done. I like 3.5 D&D, but partly because I know it so well. I’ve played a few Savage World games, and I liked that because of the ability to get some use out of those more obscure dice (yay for d12!).

    Currently, I’m playing both a 3.5 and a 4.0 game of D&D. I’m really enjoying the 4.0, since a lot of the mechanics are new and interesting for D&D. I wrote a bit about it on my blog not too long ago.

  11. Target says:

    1. AD&D 2nd edition. Mostly Forgotten Realms (though I ignored the major NPCs) or Dark Sun.

    2. I’ve only recently returned to DMing. And I’m not sure I’m wild about the system I’m currently running (Starship Troopers d20. Essentially 3.X combat system).

    3. Playing in a RuneQuest game w/ a homebrew adaptation of D&D3.5 magic. Really liked the high level (for lack of a better term) campaign, having more frustrations w/ a low level campaign. I’m sure some of that is culture shock (95% chance of success to 20%) and some of that is probably the GM requiring skill checks for routine things (what do you mean I failed my worship roll? I’m a priest, you’d think I could give these foes a proper burial)

    4. Running my SST game is a bit hard for me at the moment. Feeling a bit overwhelmed by all the crunch (especially since I haven’t played in the system before, I’m just not as familiar w/ the rules as I’d like to be). Some of that will change w/ time. But generating encounters still seems to be an awful lot of work. I’ll need to try to steal some 3.x resources and adapt them or come up w/ a better/quicker method on my own. Or I’ll just convert over when Mongoose releases SST on a d100 system.

    Right now I prefer the d100 system of RQ. I think a lot of that is familiarity. 4e looks interesting, but I’m not willing to make that purchase yet. Especially since I would end up doing a lot of conversion work to make SST run.

  12. 1: AD&D, started when I was a kid when my dad ran a game for me and a couple of friends. It was years before I could play again, but I played all the old gold-box computer games that came out.

    2: Probably Mutants and Masterminds or 3.5 D&D depending on what I’m running.

    3. Whatever suits the game, I like a fair amount of variety in my games and I’ve played just about every major system out there at one time or another. I do not like any White Wolf game or variant thereof, though, I find the system obnoxious in the extreme.

    4. Whichever system is the game we’re playing–there aren’t many truly generic systems out there.

  13. Bowmore says:

    What I started with: Like many players, I started with 1st edition AD&D when my second-oldest brother introduced me to it. I quickly graduated to 2nd edition AD&D, and when 3rd edition came out, I never looked back. THAC0 is dead to me, and I’m looking forward to getting 4e books.

    What I prefer when running: Any system that allows me to quickly whip up NPC enemies or even eyeball the stats of the PCs and make up something on the spot they can fight without having to flip through pages. I like to be able to get right into combat with as few pauses as possible to arrange things — it really grabs the attention of the players if you can jump right into a combat scenario with them. So far, Star Wars RPG Saga Edition has been fantastic for this.

    What I prefer when playing: Any system where concept determines class, not the other way around. I enjoyed 3.5e D&D, but the inflexibility of many of the classes and the false versatility provided by feats got tiresome after a while. Again, SW RPG Saga has been very good to me.

    What did I end up using: For most of my gaming life, 3.5e D&D. It’s far from a perfect system (curse you, save or die!) and the game’s balance breaks down past level 12 or so, but my old group had a blast with it.

    BONUS! What I’d like to play: I’d like to try out more non-D&D games. I’ve dabbled in a few White Wolf games, a couple Marvel superhero systems, and even a diceless game, but I feel like I’ve been eating peanut butter sandwiches for my entire life. I’m getting restless to try something else, and there are several systems I’m very curious about. It’s just a matter of staying in one place long enough to find a group that plays more than D&D.

  14. Dave says:

    1. AD&D 2nd Edition
    2. Star Wars Saga Edition (also, the only system that I’ve ever used to run a tabletop game, but that’s beside the point)
    3. Star Wars Saga Edition or D&D 4e (I think; I like the mechanics, but haven’t actually played 4e yet)
    4. D&D 3.5; we may move to 4e at some point, but 4e launched a few months after the most recent campaign started, and we’ve got an old near-epic game that’s going to be revisited for a few weeks.

  15. Lukasa says:

    1) I started with AD&D, but almost immediately graduated to D&D 3E, so I tend to consider that my ‘real’ first system. I didn’t play AD&D long enough to think that THAC0 made sense.

    2) D&D 4E. Call me crazy, but I think the lack of roleplaying rules is a good thing. That means I can freeform roleplay with my players, before we step into a very streamlined and fun combat system. I enjoy watching my players work together in combat, and they do it much better in 4E than they ever did in 3.5.

    3) A dead-heat between D&D 4E and New World of Darkness (along with its various expansions). As I said above, 4E is a very streamlined and simple system, that encourages teamwork, and so I prefer it for group games: if nothing else, the game moves at a better pace to keep people interested. However, my friends and I also do a lot of internet-based solo roleplay, and we prefer nWoD for that, as it has more character depth built into it.

    4) 4E when I’m with my gaming group in meatspace: nWoD otherwise.

  16. Ludo says:

    1. a quite old and now fortunately obsolete game named “L’Oeil Noir” (the Dark/Black Eye in french) when I was 12 years old (that was 21 years ago). I remember I played a game when I was 8, but the name of the system eludes me. It was not D&D.

    2. definitely ORE. It’s flexible, powerful and tweakable to my tastes. In my 20 or so years of gaming, I tried a lot of systems (or at least read them).

    3. difficult question, I haven’t played as a player for more than 4 years. I have really fond memories of D&D 2nd and Agone, and the diceless Ambre was a thing of beauty.

    4. me and my players are actually playing Godlike (ORE then) while waiting for Wild Talents 2nd Ed.

  17. Ericc says:

    What gaming system did you start with when you were learning the game?
    I started playing D&D (Keep on the Borderlands). It made an impression on me because my first character received a ballista bolt to the head (not a backstab, though). I fiddled around with with Twighlight 2000 and Traveler in middle school/junior high, but it wasn’t until I graduated from High School (1990) and started running a game for a fantastic group of players that we started playing around with other systems. I was introduced to Cyberpunk 2.0.2.0., Torg, picked up Vampire, & tried Mage & Werewolf.

    What's your preferred gaming system when you're running a game?

    This is a tricky question. I typically prefer D&D, however, with my current group Vampire or Mage brings out the roleplayers in all of them and we really have a lot of fun. Drawback is the lack of adventure/campaign support from White Wolf. I burned out on writing while getting my MBA, so I don’t have the motivation to write my own stuff. Plus, one of my strengths is mutilating prepared adventures to match the players’ preferred playing styles.

    What system do you prefer as a player? (For some people this is different from #2.)
    Difficult to say…probably Torg or Cyberpunk 2020. I like the Drama Deck in Torg and the Interlock System for 2020. The d20 system follows the same ideas as the Interlock System (roll a dice, add skill level & modifiers, compare to target number).

    And because we live in an imperfect world: What system do you actually end up using?
    D&D. It’s pretty universally known.

  18. cardboard says:

    1. ADND 2nd
    2. Hero, because it’s easy to use for pretty much anything. I’m running a modern day mercenaries campaign right now, and I have a high fantasy campaign on indefinite hold and a low power old school fantasy campaign floating in my brain. No it’s not just for supers, No you don’t need calculus to play it, No the combats aren’t really any slower than other fairly heavy systems (depending on rules used and the players).
    3. Hero
    4. Hero, because I’m running the games. I’ll soon be hooking up with another group that seems to prefer DnD 3.5 and BESM.

  19. Retlor says:

    1. D&D 3.5 was my first system, and it took me a while to get used to it. That thing is more complicated than a lot of people realise.

    2. I’ve only ever GMed nWoD so I’ll have to go with that. Hopefully that will soon change with the upcoming Exalted game I’m going to run.

    3. My favourite system to play is Exalted 2nd Ed. Something about the rules does it for me. Whether it be the way that the rules work with the fluff to create an engaging and actually fairly intuitive system that supports the world it’s based on while still enhancing it, or just the way that I can sometimes roll over 30 dice on a single roll. Yeah, one of those two. If I had to go with another, it would be Eden Studio’s Unisystem, because it’s very quick and easy and it was used on All Flesh Must Be Eaten and Buffy, two of my favourites.

    4. Currently every game I’m in is D&D 4E. Not that it’s a bad system, but it does get old.

  20. Amadan says:

    1) I guess it was called Basic D&D, at least in retrospect… not the 1st. ed white box, but the one with the Blue cover. Rapidly transitioned to AD&D 2nd, but there was a lag time while they were releasing the books.

    2-4) Hero System. I became a convert shortly after discovering Champions back in ’81, flirted with & played a number of other systems, but by the mid 80’s HERO was, as you put it, coded into my DNA.

  21. Strangeite says:

    Lukasa: “I didn't play AD&D long enough to think that THAC0 made sense.”

    It never made sense to me and I used it for years.

  22. lebkin says:

    1. I started with a D&D Basic set. I couldn’t tell you which. It had no box and it has disappeared into the sands of time save one lone D10.

    2. I am loving 4th Edition D&D. From a DM standpoint, it has easy prep, is easy to run, and gets my players excited. The vast amount of players make finding other opinions and resources online very easy.

    3. DMs get to play? How come no one ever told me? Seriously, I’d probably pick 4th Edition D&D, simply because its what I’m running, so it is what I know.

    4. D&D will probably always be our game, in its various editions. Everything else is just short diversions. And because of the age of my campaigns, I run a mix of 3rd and 4th.

  23. Hermes says:

    1) What gaming system did you start with when you were learning the game?
    DnD 3.5.

    2) What's your preferred gaming system when you're running a game?
    I’m designing my first game now, and I find the rules easiest to learn and remember in a d20 system (be it DnD or D20, the latter of which is what I’m using).

    3)What system do you prefer as a player? (For some people this is different from #2.)
    D20 again, for the same reasons, though this might change once I’ve played with more than DnD, D20 and WoD (which I find quite odd – the better you are at something the more likely you are to fail? Also, the campaign was a bit crazy, so that might’ve affected my view).

    4) And because we live in an imperfect world: What system do you actually end up using?
    We play a campaign, then change to something else, each taking it a turns and using a different system, so I’m okay on this front.

  24. Colonel Slate says:

    1. Mechwarrior 3rd Edition

    2. Mechwarrior 3rd Edition with Battletech thrown in, I’m surprised that no one has either of these yet!

    3. Favorite system is a toss up between Mechwarrior, or DnD the group I usually play with has brilliant ideas (And some times deaths) in both systems.

    4. Our own slapped together RPG that we use because none of us like the rules all the way in any of the books for any system, comes from being developers I guess.

  25. Pat says:

    1) First game I actually ran was using the TMNT rules (which I believe is a cut-down version of the Palladium/rifts rules).

    I’m going to sidestep all the other questions by saying I don’t have a single preferred system for playing or running games. I tend to pick systems based on the sorts of atmosphere I want to generate.

    For general action/adventure scenarios, I like quick freeform rules (Star Wars, Amber Diceless etc) that steer people away from calculating probabilities and towards doing cool-looking stunts etc.

    On the other hand, I feel that bling is a part of Sci-fi/Cyberpunk games, so I want a complex system with a lot of detail. Hit-locations for one-shot kills, range modifiers for weapons to encourage sniping or tactics and a system that can handle more-than-human stats without becoming annoyingly godlike. I tend to use the HERO system for those (the non-Superhero base of the Champions RPG) although I expect GURPS would do equally well.

    Mostly I like to run/play diceless games (Amber, Over The Edge etc) but frustratingly I can never find anyone else that likes to play them.

    Oh, and (4) -Currently I’m using a friend’s home-brew version of Mercenaries, Spies and Private Eyes (MSPE) with the magic system from Ars Magica bolted on. It works pretty well.

  26. BlackJaw says:

    I’ll follow the same concept noted above: The best rule system to play is the one that best fits the style of the game… and that the style of the game really depends on who’s playing.

    But enough question dodging:

    1) 2ed D&D (AD&D). I started with the Dragon Mountain Boxed set and then moved through Council of Wyrms and Planescape. Planescape is what sucked me in more then anything else. Council of Wyrms was nothing I ever played and I honestly think that’s a good thing. It wasn’t written all that well (in retrospect).

    2) I’d love to run a Sci-Fi game using Savage Worlds. I’ve got this setting I’ve been tossing around in my head for years now. The style would be cinematic (Savage worlds does this well) but the setting is semi-realistic: Artificial gravity means spinning, no FTL ships or communication, no humanoid or even intelligent aliens, no bug hunts, etc.

    I’ve also considered running a Super Hero game using Mutants and Masterminds 2ed. I think it’s a system that works well for what it wants to do, and it breaks with “Standard d20” significantly to do so.

    3) Honestly this is most limited by the other GMs and Players I’ve encountered. I’ve really enjoy playing D&D (3.5 and 4th) but that’s about all I’ve ever done as a player. I imagine there are other game systems I’d also enjoy, but I don’t find people to play with that are worth playing with that run them. A friend of mine back in CA use to threaten to run Call of Cthulu a lot. I wish he had. I would have enjoyed running a character that goes mad.

    4) Mostly I play the latest version of D&D because that’s the easiest thing to find going on, the easiest thing to find players for, and there is enough of both that you can find a game worth playing as a part of (player or GM.)

    I don’t go in for the concept that “D&D is only played by people that don’t know any better.” I run into a lot of gamers that have a bias against D&D because it’s D&D. They all use to play it, and they all “moved on” to “real games.” D&D is fun. If you can have fun playing it, it’s worth being played. It’s not the end all of game system, but if you want a game about kicking in dungeon doors, surviving the trap that was on said door, killing every ugly thing in the room, and then taking there stuff before moving on to the next room… well it invented the concept, and it’s still a blast. If you want angst roleplaying you go with world of darkness… and there’s nothing wrong with that. If you want complex story and interaction you have Burning Wheel (and it’s variants… Burning Empires looks fantastic.)

    That said: Every player has their own pool of favored settings or games that they play, or wish they could play (and thus buy all the books for without ever getting a game going.) Most GMs have a some custom or bastardized Home Brew rule set too. Yet, in most cases, everyone has D&D (and maybe 1 or 2) others that is the only overlap with the other players they know. Eventually, after you’ve played for a while, you can talk much of your group into trying something new, but it doesn’t always work out. Home Brew rule sets that people play generally evolved over time from some other game system that was, at some point, once “off the shelf.”

  27. Plasma says:

    I tried d&d once, back when I had real friends, and found it excessively complicated. I also tried something called I think Agone once (I played a very large minotaur named Fluffy Bunny. doing the voice gave me a sore throat)? But my friends were never very good at keeping a campaign going, and now the point is moot for tabletop, because I no longer have any RL friends to play with.

    However, I play on an online site called Vaxia (http://www.vaxia.org/simplemain.html), and I have for some ten years now (I am 21). Vaxia is the answer to all four of Shamus’s official Numbered Questions (my experiments in actual tabletop only came long after I had become used to Vaxia). I think of it more like a tabletop game than anything else, and indeed it began life as a tabletop game run by the founder and some of his friends. It has a system that is very simple for the players (seven primary Stats, seven secondary Stats automatically derived from the primaries, and as many (up to 15, but hardly anybody uses that many) general Skills as you want (things like “pyromancy”, “longsword”, “singing”)), but very complex for the GMs (we call them Story Hosts). Of course, the SHs have an automated excel file to help them (we call it “the Helper”, I’m not sure how standard that terminology is).

  28. Patrick says:

    1: AD&D 2nd Edition
    2: I haven’t found ppl who where willing to buy more than one system, so all I’ve ever known was D&D.
    3: D&D 4th is nice, and I prefer it to 3rd, which I prefer to 2nd, so I guess that’s my final answer.

    4: I like rules-heavy games. When the rules get in the way, however, I like to throw them out. 3rd Edition was nice for this.

    I’ve looked at systems like burning wheel (I like the skill system), but once I noticed that there where all these extras to tack onto the role-playing aspect, I dropped it. I prefer to have absolutely no restrictions on role-playing. Alignment in D&D was an eh thing to me, but it was loose enough that you can justify any action under any alignment. When you start having to tack on all this other RP baggage, I get turned off.

    In sort, telling me how the physics of your magical world is fine – telling me I don’t have 100% free-will in it is not.

  29. Tesh says:

    1. I started playing with TMNT as well. I went from there to GM the Palladium Robotech system, then flirted with GURPS but never made the move. I didn’t pick up anything D&D until Baldur’s Gate on the PC, and still haven’t played it as a tabletop game. I have an LoTR game that I borrowed from my brother in law, but haven’t played it.
    2. I enjoyed running the Robotech system well enough, but we were always using house rules. I suspect that would be the case with any system.
    3. Robotech and TMNT were fun as a player, but honestly, I had the most fun fiddling with character sheets and creating characters and optional rules. Even then I was more interested in design than in playing.
    4. I don’t tabletop game these days. My group lost interest as we started high school (early 90s). I’m still interested in design, and poke my nose into various systems now and then, but I still haven’t seen anything that really fires me up. Battletech is closest to what I’d want to play with these days, largely because of the tactical depth.

  30. Old_Geek says:

    1)D&D, before there was anything else. I don’t think it was the original box set, but I remember it was so old it didn’t come with dice. Just tiles with numbers on the other side that you had to flip over.

    2)I enjoy running GURPS. The combat mechanics are a little clunky, but its one of the few systems flexible enough to allow me to run a three way battle with mages verse space marines verse cthulhu monsters.

    3-4) Right now i’m fortunate enough to be playing in a deadlands campaign. The game world combines the old west, steampunk magic and horror. The mechanics combine dice, a deck of playing cards and poker chips. I’m playing a fire and brimstone Lutheran Minister who enjoys bashing satan worshiping undead with his staff, while my wife plays a sioux shaman who can turn into a bear. Hard to beat that.

  31. Ingvar says:

    1. I started out with the Swedish translation of “Basic RoleplayinG” (essentially the stripped-down mechanics of RuneQuest and/or Call of Cthulhu, the Swedish translation had a slight fantasy drag) and then continued with games with similar mechanics. First other mechanic was “Dungeons & Dragons” (the non-advanced variety), then AD&D.

    2. This is actually a damned hard question. Most of the time, I just wing it, without a specific system, but with rough guidelines (“make dramatic sense”, “don’t let routine sloppiness and/or stupidity lead to success”, “when in doubt, roll 2D6 – D12, the higher the result, the better for the players”) and I have found myself using Chill’s base system for con scenarios in the past (not ever for a Chill-like game, though). But, pretty much anything taht I know well enough that I don’t have to spend all my time looking things up is fine.

    3. Actually, I don’t mind the system at all. But recently (as in “the last 4-5 years”), it’s mostly been assorted GURPS settings. At the end of the day, as a player youre relying more on the rest of the group for amusement than the system per se.

    4. As above, mostly GURPS.

  32. Zippy says:

    1. Either Classic Traveller or Steve Jackson’s The Fantasy Trip
    2. D&D 3.5 (due to rules familiarity)
    3. Don’t get to be a player much!
    4. Ends up being D&D 3.5

    Q: What are the best superhero systems?

  33. Gnagn says:

    I started way too long ago to think about with Basic D&D in 1978, and quickly moved to AD&D as it became available.

    Not sure I really have a preferred system, mostly been defaulting to D&D3 lately because that’s what the players have wanted to play. I am about to start a game using Castles & Crusades, which is an OGL based update of AD&D 1e by Troll Lord Games. They’ve just released the first chunk of Gygax’s official version of his original Castle Greyhawk campaign, now called Castle Zagyg for reasons beyond their control. I’m looking forward to some old-school gaming.

    I’ve also always wanted to run a game of Unknown Armies, but you really need the right group to make it work properly and I just don’t have it.

    As a player, I’ll generally play whatever’s in front of me. The most fun I’ve had in a game as a player was the World of Darkness campaign I played in through most of the 90s, but that was more due to the Storyteller and the group we had, not so much the system we were playing in.

  34. unitled says:

    I’ve only just (as in, about two weeks ago) started playing PnP RPGs, but we’re using Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay, partly as I’ve heard good things about it, but mainly as it’s easier to motivate my friends to play if they already know all the lore. I love the random nature of the characters, and the fact that combat is pretty deadly encourages people to try things other than charging axe first into hand-to-hand combat.

  35. Nilus says:

    1) Advanced Dungeon and Dragons(before it was called 1st edition). Although I moved quickly from that to 2nd edition D&D.

    2) I really can’t answer this because it really depends on the type of game you are running. For a D&D style dungeon crawl I love D&D. For a pulp style action game I like Savage Worlds. I find that I enjoy a lot of different systems for many different reasons with very few I hate(Palladium). I have not interest in 4th edition(I think 3.5 is fine) but I think Saga Edition Star Wars(which is effectively 4th edition) does a much better job with the universe then the old D20 or D6 rules did for it. Honestly if I had to choose just one it would be Savage Worlds

    3) Again it depends on the game. But I much prefer to play in a 3.5 D&D game then run one. I don’t mind the White Wolf system when I play a game but I hate running a game with it(I had an Exalted game end because it became to much work to actually GM it long term, it was like 2nd job)

    4) D&D 3.5. We all have, we all know the rules. Thus its what we play. Right now we have a D20 L5R game going, A classic D&D game going and I am starting an Iron Kingdoms 3.5 game. Honestly I would have prefered to do that one with Savage Worlds but getting the group on board would have been to much work.

  36. Illiterate says:

    1. Classic D&D
    2. 3.5 D&D or D20 Modern. Simple, easy to understand, everyone already knows how to play. Call me what you will.
    3. I really love playing classic WoD. Let someone else figure out the difficulties, argue with me for a moment over how many 10 sided dice I get to throw, and try to keep me from destroying the universe with ambiguously written rules. Hell no I don’t want to run this. Hell yes I’ll play it any day.
    4. Whatever anyone’s playing, I guess. Haven’t had a chance to play or run in quite a while. I’ll show up for kobolds ate my baby at this point. seriously.

  37. Gotelc says:

    1. I started gaming with 3.0 and a game whose name escapes me but the name had something to do with “rune” and “earth” or “bound” and the elves called blood elves (i think) had Thorns on their bodies.
    2. I prefer 3.5 but that is just because I know it best. I have dabbled with 4th ed. but not too much.
    3. I can play any system, from White wolf’s d10 system to Amber RPG Dice less systems. As long as someone can teach me the rules ill play anything.
    4. 3.5 because that is what everyone knows and owns.

    I have played many different systems, a lot of the older out of print systems because i play with older people who have a soft spot for them. I say any system that made it into a book form is probably very fun if you sit down and learn it. one the best pieces of advice i could give to anyone: Try every system, you will be pleasantly surprised by at least one thing that it has to offer. and you will probably have a hell of a time doing it.

  38. Nilus says:

    Zippy.

    For cape games I can’t recommend Mutants and Masterminds enough. Its a great system D20 based but with a lot of twists(they eliminated hit points for one). It gives you the feel of a Superhero comic and it can be easily scaled for street level heroes to cosmic Supermen.

  39. Perry The Cynic says:

    1. Champions. (Well, technically, Fantasy Hero.)
    At the time (long ago), I didn’t even know D&D existed. So I guess I’m atypical. :)
    2. GURPS. (4th edition, now.)
    I like “feels real” campaigns. Even if you have dragons and psionic assassins and troll armies clashing on the High Moor, the players should still be able to say “we soak the moor with oil and set a magical trigger that sets it on fire when a troll crosses this line” and have a game system that knows how to adjudicate the outcome without resorting to improvised bolt-on rules or just vigorous GM hand-waving.
    On the downside, GURPS is in many ways a game construction toolkit – it is world-neutral by design, and thus doesn’t have a world/culture/expectation set it comes with. For me that’s a great advantage. For some other people, it’s a deal breaker. For example, the folks at Fear The Boot seem to love domain-specific game systems – a different game mechanic for each world, to better express its feel. Not me.
    3. GURPS, obviously. But I’ll play almost anything with a good GM.
    4. GURPS when I GM; various AD&D as a player.

  40. 1. What gaming system did you start with when you were learning the game?

    The original brown books.

    2. What's your preferred gaming system when you're running a game?

    My own. http://adrr.com/story/ for examples.

    3. What system do you prefer as a player? (For some people this is different from #2.)

    I like to play using Runequest or Call of Cthulhu

    4. And because we live in an imperfect world: What system do you actually end up using?

    Runequest III

  41. wintermute says:

    1) Red box D&D

    2) That varies depending on the setting / feel I want. Deadlands, Cyberpunk 2020, WOD, Abberant… I suppose D&D 3.x is a default, though.

    3) Pretty much anything, so long as the GM can make it sing.

    4) D&D 3.x.

  42. 1. What gaming system did you start with when you were learning the game?

    My first Rulebook was Rifts, but I wasn’t able to get into a game using that system until after I’d gotten into other games. My first played ruleset was probably AD&D, although I got into a group of friends that each were running their own games, so really I learned AD&D, D6, D10, and Palladium all pretty much at the same time.

    2. What's your preferred gaming system when you're running a game?

    Each system has its benefits, but they really do fit best in their own settings so I’ll use based upon what I’m running. I like the D6 and D10 systems for handling skills, but I prefer the D20 system for combat. Our group is starting to use Pathfinder and I’m finding I really like that system.

    4. And because we live in an imperfect world: What system do you actually end up using?

    I have Palladium, the old World of Darkness, D&D 3.0 and 3.5, and have just gotten my hands on the Pathfinder stuff. I’ve looked through the D&D 4.0, and it looks pretty slick, but I’m not yet willing to spend any money on it. I’m playing now, we’re using 3.5 and pathfinder, but I’ve got ideas for a Eberron Campaign I’d like to run and it’ll probably make use of the 3.5 system or pathfinder if we find that it translates well. Of course if Eberron is released in 4th Ed, I may look into that as well.

  43. 1. Either D&D Basic (pre-AD&D 1.0) or Tunnels & Trolls, not sure. Went through over a dozen systems after that before settling on . . .

    2. GURPS. Fits my GMing style well and has hooks for whatever I need. Usually play it Lite though.

    3. Ideally, GURPS, but I’m not fussy and will try whatever the GM wants to use.

    4. GM’s whim. Latest were D&D 3.5, Serenity RPG, and CoC: Delta Green.

  44. Strangeite says:

    Karl Gallagher mentioning GURPS Lite reminded me of another benefit of GURPS.

    GURPS Lite. When I try to get a one shot game together with my friends (all of whom WERE roleplayers but ended up having families, jobs, etc.) it is very nice to be able to email them the free PDF of the GURPS Lite rules before the session. They are compact enough that they feel like they understand the rules, but not so complex to overwhelm anyone. I have in the past tried to play systems that they aren’t familar with and found that we spend too much time rules lawyering because of the aforementioned lack of rules knowledge. GURPS Lite solves this problem nicely.

  45. Stephen says:

    1. Started with my stepdad’s copy of red box basic D&D, moving on to AD&D 2nd when I went to the game shop and found out I couldn’t just go ahead and buy the 4th-6th level box as suggested in my available materials. I started buying Vampire shortly after that, so my gaming development was pretty parallel between D&D and WoD.

    2 & 3. I tend to prefer non-level-based games with a high degree of player agency: I tend to view players as having an equal stake in the story as the GM, and appreciate systems that make it easy for a player to tell exactly the story he wants within the framework set up by the GM. Specifically, I’m a fan of Nobilis, Spirit of the Century, Unisystem Lite, and many other games that include a full player plot-control resource mechanic.

    4. I have a hard time getting anyone to run or play anything that isn’t D&D or a d20 variant. Part of the problem, from a running a lot of D&D even though it’s not my favorite system side, is that D&D tends to be an easy toolkit for any kind of fantasy game idea, since it provides such a rich language for player character actions in such a world. Systems that focus less on game challenges feel like they require the setting to be much more thoroughly painted at the start of play.

  46. David B says:

    I started with D&D – the beginner box with the d20 that became round after a few rolls. I moved to AD&D with the DMG, Monster Manual and Player’s Handbook, and it was downhill from there. Later on, I discovered Hero, though.

    My preferred system to run, though, is actually Teenagers From Outer Space, mostly because I like the silliness inherent in the game, and the fact that it has very few hard and fast rules. Games get much more RP in a system where you’re encouraged to do whatever you like.

    As a player, though, I prefer Hero. I get a lot of customization options, and I find it easier to play within a stricter framework, but GM under a looser one. It’s a contradiction I’ve learned to live with. Gurps is acceptable as well.

    As for playing, well, mostly I’m not. But generally, I’ve come to regard all mechanics as basically the same on a short-term basis, and for the long-term, I’m playing online. WoW is my master now.

  47. Sam says:

    1. I started playing with D&D 3.5. Years and years ago, I apparently bought an AD&D sourcebook, mostly because the cover artwork was awesome in my young mind. I have no idea where it is, nor do I remember ever actually reading it.

    2. So far, I’ve only run 3.5 and Star Wars D20. I like both systems, but I really want to try about a half dozen more. Systems like GURPS, Unisystem, White Wolf games, and D&D 4th, although I’m having a surprisingly difficult time learning the last one, simply because the rampant changes they made from 3.5 are tough for me to absorb since I was raised on 3.5.

    3. I’ve enjoyed all of the systems I’ve played. 3.5, Paragon Superheroes, Star Wars, and Unisystem all have their own strengths and weaknesses, but it’s nice to try out different systems every once in a while. I’d actually like to play each of the systems I mentioned in #2 as well.

    4. I usually end up playing in a D20 variant of some sort. Both the Paragon Superheroes and Star Wars games are based on D20 or D20 modern, so it isn’t a big stretch from 3.5. I may be picking up the Unisystem again soon, so here’s hoping.

  48. Miako says:

    Back when I had friends, before they all ditched me for being a world class asshole…

    1. I drew up a character for medieval WoD. Played it as a larp character. Dunno if that counts. I don’t remember the exact order of things, but I was rapidly in a Mage game and a D&D game.
    2. Never GMed. No head for it.
    3. Rolemaster, Shadow World is da bomb.
    4. If I had friends, and a life, there might be an answer to this question.

    WoD broke my Werewolf Gm’s mind — “you mean his flaming sword does more damage than a nuclear weapon?” FAIL for Game Balance, folks.

  49. joe says:

    I started with 2nd edition D&D and Tunnels and Trolls (a bad knock off thereof). But later graduated to white wolf, which helped a lot.

    When I’m running I like systems that I have control over that are simple. MUTT (my own beast), true20, Window. Systems for storytelling.

    Usually I end up running Savage Worlds, MUTT, or something white wolf.

    but my favourite game to play? I’m not sure. I think any game can be good with a good ST and good players.

  50. Drew says:

    1. MERP (Middle Earth Role Playing) I was about 11, we totally misunderstood the system, and in no time at all we had made our characters into gods. Whoops. Damn good time, though.
    2. Rolemaster. Well, ideally. I mean, the system is kind of cumbersome, but it makes the most sense to me, and that’s important.
    3. D&D or Champions. I like rolling dice for damage instead of having lookups like in RM. Still, RM makes more sense to me anyway.
    4. The most imperfect answer of all: None. It’s rough, but I just don’t have the time to find a game anymore.

  51. Ian Price says:

    1. What gaming system did you start with when you were learning the game?

    Freeform. I learned to roleplay on the internet before being exposed to AD&D 2nd ed as my second gaming experience.

    2. What's your preferred gaming system when you're running a game?

    I prefer to have a system, and to run it by the book. The clunkier it is to run a system by the book, the less I like it. Other than that, it depends on my mood. I’ve recently enjoyed running:

    Ninjas & Superspies (With Mystic China supplementing it; a Palladium RPG)
    D&D 4th Edition
    World of Darkness (New, including Mage, Werewolf, and mortal characters)
    Home-brewed Systems (tailored to the game)
    Exalted
    Shadowrun (3rd ed)

    3. What system do you prefer as a player? (For some people this is different from #2.)

    One the GM is familiar with and running relatively by the book. I’ve recently enjoyed playing:

    Exalted
    RIFTS (the core Palladium RPG, in most ways)

    I need to start making more people run things for me.

    4. And because we live in an imperfect world: What system do you actually end up using?

    I’ve never ended up using a system I didn’t like for long without changing it. However, there are some games I’ve been wanting to play/run for a while and haven’t had the chance:

    Legend of the Five Rings (been too long)
    Seventh Sea (ditto)
    Aberrant (never finished a game)
    Adventure (only one shots so far)
    GURPS (see L5R and Adventure)
    Call of Cthulhu (nobody ever runs this around here)
    Wraith: The Oblivion (I want to see shadow-guiding done right for once)
    Heavy Gear (see GURPS)
    Battletech Mechwarrior RPG (ditto)
    Warhammer Fantasy RPG (ditto)
    Feng Shui (see L5R again)

    Edit: Hey Col. Slate, looks like you and I share some interests there.

  52. Gary says:

    1. I started out on Shadowrun. This one was great as it melded both of my young loves, Scifi and Fantasy. I always play a caster type, and it was kind of neat to be a wizard with a gun. :D

    2. Shadowrun was the best for creating games because of its standardized world and the backstory. You could graft on your own ministory in the bigger scope of the overall setup and have a convincing bit of circumstances to play through.

    3. I’m going to have to go with Shadowrun because as much as I like D&D I can’t seem to find a group that likes to roleplay.

    4. I most recently have played D&D 3.5. I quit about 3 months ago though because I was fed up with the lack of roleplaying in the group. So now, I play nothing. :P

  53. Cuthalion says:

    return to the well for another drought of that.

    I’m pretty sure you mean draught. Kind of the opposite meaning there.

  54. Claire says:

    Oh, oh, me too!

    1. What gaming system did you start with when you were learning the game?

    Oddly enough, I did things very backwards. I received HeroQuest for the Christmas of 1991. After about two weekends, we were over that, and realized we’d like it much better if it were more like some NES games we’d played (Dragon Warrior, Final Fantasy… we even had a mass combat system loosely inspired by Romance of the Three Kingdoms.) So, we hacked together an unholy mess of crap with a hodgepodge of ill-fitting statistics (in retrospect, very similar to the AD&D Player’s Option substats), and played alternately on a Risk board and the Heroquest board (which I still have, by the way.)

    We continued to incorporate new elements between sessions, as we encountered things we didn’t like (our mass combat rules started out far too fatal), and picked up new ideas (An uncle gave me a giant box of TSR’s AD&D trading cards, and we had a grand time extracting ideas for new magic items and mechanics from them, despite our laughable ignorance of D&D… we decided THAC0 would be gold, for one, because we couldn’t figure out a better use for it. I wish I still had the hand-written rules for that.

    A couple of years later, I tripped over the RPG section at Waldenbooks and got us started on AD&D second edition, which we also modified relentlessly.

    2. What's your preferred gaming system when you're running a game?
    The only systems (other than the one we designed) that I’ve ever successfully GMed (meaning, convinced my friends to play) are D&D red box, 2nd, and 3rd. (Got out of RPGs for a few years and missed 3.5, avoiding 4.) Of these, I have the best memories of GMing D&D 2nd edition, probably because we played it much, much more than anything else. I’ve tried to get different groups of players into Vampire: The Dark Ages (guns are icky), Star Frontiers, Shadowrun 3rd edition, D&D 3.5, Call of Cthulu (Chaosium), and right now I’m working on All Flesh Must Be Eaten. (un-d20ized)

    3. What system do you prefer as a player? (For some people this is different from #2.)
    I had my best times as a player under D&D 3rd edition. By that time, I’d largely passed on the GMing mantle to another member of the group, so I actually got to play a lot. I experimented with a lot of different character ideas in 3rd edition, and found the system reasonably flexible (the new GM was fairly permissive with oddball feats/abilities/advancement, which only ruined games once or twice. Still not as bad as the deck of many things.)

    4. And because we live in an imperfect world: What system do you actually end up using?
    Nothing. =( Graduate students don’t have enough free time to game, and if they did they’d drink it, for the most part. I’m seriously considering inviting people over for drinks, barricading the door when they get in, and springing All Flesh Must Be Eaten on them.

  55. Greg says:

    What gaming system did you start with when you were learning the game?

    I started playing AD&D with my parents at about 8 years old.

    What's your preferred gaming system when you're running a game?

    I’ve not got a prefered system for running, I think the sort of players you’ve got and the style of game you want to run are more important. I’ve had fun running paranoia, call of cthulu, vanishing point, ad&d, varoius world of darkness games (mostly mage), HERO, Wushu, hell sometimes with systems I’ve made up on the fly (once with a system I made up while running the game). The system changes the tone of the game, but not the quality, that depends on the GM and the players.

    What system do you prefer as a player? (For some people this is different from #2.)

    As above, but with a much longer list of games, give me a good GM and good players and I don’t care what system they’re running (or if I have to learn a new one). I’ve been roleplaying with the uni society for years now (being a postgrad now) so I’ve seen lots of players come and go. There’s no correlation between game system and game quality, but there are between who’s playing & running and game quality.

    And because we live in an imperfect world: What system do you actually end up using?

    Right now I’m mostly playing vampire, zombies, AD&D (3.5 and 4.0), Aces & Eights and Cthulu. A big society means lots of opportunities to try different things :)

    Also I don’t agree that budget needs to hold you back. I can run most games from memory once I’ve played in them a few times (Almost certainly not the way the rulebook says, but that way is almost always imperfect anyway). Or you can get an interested player to loan you the rulebooks (since players almost always outnumber GMs) I’ve run games in loads of systems, but I only own 2 rulebooks.

    If all else fails implement the old “On the GMs birthday anyone who’s played in one of their games this year needs to buy them a sourcebook” policy. I do that in reverse, but my players know I’d rather recieve chocolate :P

  56. Greg says:

    *looks up*
    Claire lies! Postgrads have enough time to game :P
    Or maybe that’s just if they’re t-totallers ;)

    Also by “zombies” I meant “all flesh must be eaten”

    And I also got given heroquest early on, it’s a great way to get new gamers introduced :D Also the more recent Descent appears to be along similar lines.

  57. Cuthalion says:

    1. My own system I made with some initial help from a friend and some current help from my brother.

    2. Mine.

    3. D&D 3.5. I’ve been in games of a few other systems (BESM D6, BESM D20, D&D 4, and the one my brother made), but never for very long since I mostly only started this year. But I like 3.5. It helped me make sense of games like KotOR, which was really confusing before. ( 2 to all saving throws? What the poo does that mean? I’m not throwing this at anybody! It’s a piece of armor!) I also am a sucker for medieval fantasy, so…

    (In a side note, I always end up playing every character as a bard — lots of random skills with a few spells. So I finally made a Kobold Bard after my character died for reals at the breath of a dragon in the campaign I’m about to describe to you.)

    4. D&D 3.5 or my brother’s system. That’s just how it turned out.

    As for best memories, the guy DMing a 3.5 game I got into used a module called something to the effect of “The Forgotten City”. It was about a city named Cauldron in the crater of a volcano. I never ended up paying a lot of attention to the plot, but I roleplayed much more than I rollplayed.

    I was a halfling sorceror, since I hate prepping spells and I thought a halfling would be funny. During an early battle or dungeon thing — I forget — I rolled poorly and ended up frozen in this ember/magic ball for 2 weeks or so (in-game time). As such, I didn’t pay attention to the rest of the game until I was about to be released. At that time, the rest of the party ended up in a fight with some Spawn of Keist (sp?). Zombie things that turn you into zombie things.

    Someone got infected.

    We were losing the fight, very badly, so that the only survivor was the infected guy.

    He made a run for the city to get help.

    He ended up infecting the entire city.

    My halfling sorcerer suddenly woke up from his enchantment and found himself where the party had left him, inside the temple. He peeks out the windows into the trashed city of zombies. He tries to sneak out. He fails.

    We managed to epically ruin the entire campaign by destroying the significant city and most likely the world. It was awesome.

    The DM let us redo that part.

  58. Moridin says:

    1. Runequest 3rd edition. I was something like 13, when my friend had me give a try. We played a one-shot and I haven’t played with that group after that.
    2. D&D 3.5. I’ve read through many systems(including WoD, Gurps, D&D 4th edition and a few more)but I prefer rules heavy fantasy as a GM.
    3. So far I have played/GMed only D&D and Runequest, so I can’t say for sure, but Shadowrun and World of Darkness are 2 systems and settings I’d like to give a try at least as a player.
    4. D&D 3.5. With my current group I’m the only one who’s willing to GM and I’ll try another system if I get the books for another system. So far nobody in my group has been willing to give me any.

  59. Lunafysh says:

    1) What gaming system did you start with when you were learning the game?
    D&D Basic (the red book) and then D&D Expert (the blue books – one of which I actually found in my attic)

    2) What's your preferred gaming system when you're running a game? For a serious game – GURPS 4e. It is extremely flexible and basically all that we (as a group) play in, as it covers just about every genre you can imagine. For when I’m running at conventions – TOON, because I AM THAT SILLY!

    (It also helps that I’m one of Steve Jackson’s MIBs)

    3) What system do you prefer as a player? (For some people this is different from #2.) Shadowrun – I’ve only played it a couple of times, but the guy who ran it was a mastermind. The whole “rebirth” of magic is such a kick.

    4) And because we live in an imperfect world: What system do you actually end up using? GURPS, for the most part. I’ve recently picked up D&D 4e for my 9 and 7 year old boys due to the simple mechanics and the pregen characters in the module. I’ll keep it simple for a while, then wean them off the pablum, into more complex and diverse gaming.

    MIB 7004 Steve Jackson Games

  60. Bouks says:

    1. Started with the 3 D&D booklets, but AD&D 1st was just coming out and we changed over as the books were released. At my first session, the experienced players were looking over the brand new Player’s Handbook for the first time. :-)

    2. My preferred system really depends on the world I want to run, and I haven’t had time for world building for a LONG time. I would probably want to run the system I’m playing in now, Ars Magica, or for other settings I’d probably look for a GURPS version.

    3. Currently, I’m loving Ars Magica as a player – it’s very roleplaying focused rather than kill, loot, repeat, and it’s incredibly flexible.

    But I do have a soft spot for Warhammer Fantasy Role Playing – I went through a great WFRP campaign once, and like a lot of the system. But the magic system was weak. I also enjoyed Shadowrun, but didn’t like the combat system. I tried making a homebrew combination, but it had some issues that I never got around to resolving. Then I found ArM.

    4. I actually am playing Ars Magica, so that’s a bit of luck. :-) Frankly, I’d rather introduce people to a good system than make do with a bad one if the game is going to last more than a single session. For non-magi characters, the basics of the system can be distilled down to one page as long as the GM can help the players with their skills.

  61. I started with Palladium (Heroes Unlimited specifically), which is a strange place to start. I’ve pretty much played all of them by now.

    I usually use Sudhra as both a setting and a world. It’s a game/world of my own design; it’s popular enough that there are roleplaying groups sending me e-mails about how much they like it. Players of mine pass on the world to their circles and so on, so it’s getting around a bit.

    Although lately, we haven’t been using a system at all. Just sort of gather around and make stuff up. I got a good group so it works really well.

  62. Martin says:

    1) I started with Book you are the hero. One would read the book to the others and they would make the choices. we would flip to the right page and start reading it out loud. The reader would sometime add choices and invent the story. This eventually lead us to our first REAL system which was D&D (the boxed one).

    2) When running a game, I choose a system where the players know all the rules inside out. That way, I don’t have to look for those. I leave to them to sort it out. I keep the right to override any rules to keep the game interesting. I can then concentrate on the storytelling. With both groups, it’s D&D3.5, mostly the OGC version of it. That’s for the players, because behind the screen, if I want to try to disarm a player, I call for a roll that would probably disarm him… That keep the story interesting, as long as there are no abuse… I don’t want to railroad the player, I want us to create a real good story…

    3) I like to play ANY system where I can roleplay. When a system has too many stats, it becomes hard to roleplay. Ex: Bluff in D&D3.5… if all I need to convince the guard to let me go is a roll, why would I have to invent a really good story? So I like to play AD&D1st.

    4) We are playing (or supposed to play, as free time is hard to come by, these days) D&D3.5. We choose to allow big bonuses to skill check for roleplaying. Even to tumble and jump. The more spectacular or unexpected, the bigger the bonuses. (It’s good for the rating, we are saying, as if there where people watching a TV show)

  63. Scott says:

    1. Shadowrun 3rd. My brother got me into it during my earlier years in highschool.

    2. This one is tough, since I’ve only GMed Shadowrun 3rd and 4th (reeealy different systems, btw) for a few of my friends (including MintSkittle, #2 post), but I would like to try some homebrew systems or D&D 3.5… Or whatever comes up!

    3. Right now I’m playing a seriously stripped down version of Rollmaster. I think the only thing we use are the damage tables. It only works because our GM is a genious.

    4. Anything. As long as I can have fun with friends, new and old, I’ll play it!

  64. onosson says:

    I started with the “basic” boxes (red, blue) playing with my little brother, then got together with my friends and played AD&D (1st edition) for a few years. I haven’t really gamed since high school, not in real life. However, I did try and get my wife into it once, and decided to come up with something that leaned heavily on story and creativity as opposed to stats and strategy. Bear with me…

    Instead of dice, use a pack of cards (the reasoning behind this is that decks of cards are fairly common items, more easily obtained than dice imho).

    Your character has three stats, that’s it. Call them Strength, Dexterity, and Intelligence or whatever you prefer. Those are the best equivalents in d&d terms. You could use a point-based allocation method, or just draw cards from the deck to assign them (ignoring face cards for the time being). I called Strength “Body”, and it subsumed Con, HP and Str in D&D. Intelligence I called “mind” and it subsumed Int and Wis (Charisma I leave up to the role-player!). Dexterity I actually called “Luck” and had it subsume Dex as well as chance-y occurences that didn’t fall neatly into one category or another. You could count Dex as part of Body if you prefer.

    When you need to “roll” for something, you instead draw a card. Numbered cards and the Ace give you 1-10 for a check against your stat. Draw lower than your stat and you succeed. Draw higher and you fail. Draw equal, and you take another card!

    Face cards: you can use these in a couple of different ways, depending on your preference. The simple way would be to assign numbers, so that stats can go up to 13 (a 14 would automatically succeed at anything). Otherwise, they are “special”. The Jack is an AUTOMATIC fail, no matter what your stat. The King is AUTOMATIC success. The Queen – you get to keep her. When you save a Queen, you get to play her at another time – before you draw for a card you play the queen, and you get to draw TWO cards for that check and drop the lower one.

    That’s IT. Nothing else to the game mechanics at all. Emphasis on creativity and storytelling.

  65. Dragonbane says:

    1) AD&D, back in high school.
    2) DC Heroes. I like seeing what people come up with, and there is huge flexibility as a GM to just throw in whatever whacky thing I need at the time to keep things moving. I’m not a good GM really (don’t do it often) and i need my crutches.
    3) Shadowrun 2e, or a non-political 7th Sea Variant. I love the shadowrun world and like the system a lot. I love the 7th Sea system, but the world is kinda goofy. Maybe I should figure out how to add cyberware to 7th Sea…
    4) D&D 3.5. It’s better to have a good group with an ok system than a great system with a bad group.

  66. Ian Price says:

    Oh, favorite game memories:
    – That one time I was up all night and forgot which game I was playing in.

    – An L5R convention game where I was 1 raise away from derailing the plot by seducing one of the main characters instead of the person who was SUPPOSED to seduce him. (Was Living Rokugan, the “Lies, Lies, Lies!” module)

    – Mage: The Ascension. There was this bad guy, probably a nephandus, who attacked us. I manage to put a bullet in him, so he teleports behind me and puts a knife to my throat, sounding surprised when he says, “You SHOT me!”

    So of course I retort with, “Twice.”

    Dice rewarded my sheer balls, giving me only a little scratch from his knife as I turned out of his grip to shoot him again.

    – When I was running an Adventure mini-series, focusing on reclaiming the superweapon used by one of the PCs when he was formerly a villain trying to take over the world. Awesome mainly in that it was a Suicide Ray, which struck fear in people’s hearts because they wanted to want to live.

  67. 1. What gaming system did you start with when you were learning the game?

    I started out RPGing with AD&D first edition (though my first D&D books were actually Red Box Basic D&D).

    2. What's your preferred gaming system when you're running a game?

    These days? Over the Edge is my go-to game, though Im fairly flexible.

    3. What system do you prefer as a player? (For some people this is different from #2.)

    OTE. Though variety is the spice of life; I’ll play D&D 3.5 or 4, or various Indie games like PTA or Dogs.

    4. And because we live in an imperfect world: What system do you actually end up using?

    See above. The last game I ran was OTE with mechanical bits stolen from an indie RPG, The Shadows of yesterday. Before that, Everway. Games I’m playing in are “OTE with occasional conflicts using Dogs in the Vineyard rules”, “D&D 3.5”, “D&D4”, and Feng Shui, but who knows? I could play Call of Cthulhu or somesuch next.

  68. DiscountNinja says:

    1. Advanced Dungeons and Dragons – no idea what version (I did play a game called Japan, but that only ran for three sessions, so I don’t really count it).
    2. Call of Cuthulu – I love the setting, the stories I can come up with, the type of players that tend to gravititate towards CoC games, the props and heck, I even love the moments when someone is an ass and gets the whole parties souls eaten.
    3. Can’t say I’ve settled on one – I’ve always wanted to play GURPS, Shaowrun and Spelljammer, but just can’t find a group that will (our games are decided by vote – they tend to prefer games more towards the hack n’ shoot). But Call of Cuthulu has given me the most fun over the years.
    4. I tend to end up playing Runequest – which is all well and good, but after 5 years I’m looking for a change.

  69. Simply Simon says:

    I’m still new to Pen and paper RPGs, and have so far only played Dragons and Demons Trudvang, the seventh edition of dragons and demons, A Swedish tabletop rpg.

  70. 1. What gaming system did you start with when you were learning the game?
    Ehm. I’d heard a lot about WoD first off, but I guess the first was WFRP, 2nd edition
    2. What's your preferred gaming system when you're running a game?
    Whatever serves the story idea. So I stay away from D&D with a ten foot pole, and usually play around with some WoD variant or more likely WFRP because I love the world so much. I’d like to mess around with Scion more.
    3. What system do you prefer as a player? (For some people this is different from #2.)
    WoD, or possibly L5R because of it’s interesting mechanics.
    4. And because we live in an imperfect world: What system do you actually end up using?
    To run, I’m currently running WFRP and Promethean, and playing in Shadowrun, WFRP, WoD:Innocents, L5R and WoD mortals. Although I’ve just finished the shadowrun campaign, and two of those aren’t running at the same time.
    And Dark Heresy starts in the next month.

    Yeah, I’m signed up to a bit too much at the moment

  71. Russ says:

    1. I learned through the imperfect, but usable Star Wars d20. Soon after that came D&D 3.0, D&D 3.5, and Star Wars Revised.

    2. I like a system that is based around a single mechanic and then extrapolates (sensibly) from there. I hate having a bunch of subsystems to monitor or tables to look up. I’ve found D&D 4, Alternity, Star Wars Saga Edition, and Savage World works pretty well.

    3. As a player, I’m a lot less picky. I like interesting settings and player options. I like a system that is loose enough I can come up with an idea and the rules don’t quash it. As a result, I’ll play most anything.

    4. I’m lucky enough to have two different gaming groups. One uses Shadowrun 4, which take a little while to learn, but it a rather good system. The other bounces around with a lot of systems, but the lowest common denominator for us is D&D 3.5. And while I love creating character for 3.5, I find the rules to be severely limiting and slow in play.

  72. Joe says:

    1) my mom gave me D&D first edition out of the blue when I was around 8 or so. Unfortunately, I was a bit too young to really grok it at that point, and even more importantly, I had few friends and even fewer that might be interested in RPG’s.

    2) generally, GURPS, for several reasons. One, levels feel a bit unnatural to me. Also, some of the sourcebooks are absolutely fantastic. High Tech is not only a great resource for the game, it’s actually a fun and interesting thing to read. But mostly, it’s a freedom sort of thing. To my mind, the best RPG’ing is when the GM and the players are working towards collaborative storytelling. It’s not GM vs. players, it’s a GM saying “I’ve got this idea for a novel I’m writing, I need you guys to help me reality-check how some of the main characters act, give them some personality, and I’d like us all to use this game system to reality-check the reality, and mostly I need you to help me figure out if it’s a good story.” So if you’re playing D&D, you’ve already got your world laid out for you, half the story is already written. That’s great if you wanted a story in that world. I like GURPS because it seems to be very geared towards helping you build your *whole* world from scratch, writing your novel from an empty piece of paper on.

    3) Whatever the GM answered for #2. Fun trumps everything. The GM, and his/her attitude is the largest determinant of whether the game is going to be fun. I think the two games I had the most fun in were using Rolemaster and Amber Diceless. In both cases, I’m pretty sure I enjoyed the game because it was a good GM running a system he liked, not any inherent advantage of the system itself.

    4) Sigh. Nothing. No one to play with. And no time to play, even if I could find a group. That’s just depressing.

  73. Ryan Speck says:

    My first system was the Marvel Super Heroes Advanced Set. I got it in some giant price club shopping mall when I was in sixth grade.

    My next system was the D&D red box when a comic shop finally opened in my town.

    As for the other questions, I haven’t actively gamed in about 13 years. Moreso because of a lack of people willing to play. Of course, I always went more for Paranoia or Tales From The Floating Vagabond than D&D or something. The only fantasy game I was interested in after a short while was Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay.

  74. Cat Skyfire says:

    I started with 1st Edition AD&D. I now use 2nd Edition. I read about 3.0…and 3.5. And a friend is going to look over 4.0. The biggest reason for sticking with 2nd Edition is the wondrous Core Rules CD Rom. It was freaking amazing. Character creation and updating in clean writing, and mathematically correct. The ability to print off encounters, and treasure. No more spending more time rolling dice than designing the adventure.

    I’ve adapted some things from later edition, but still use the basics of 2nd Edition My nephew railed against me for using 2nd Edition and not going to 3.0 and 3.5. I pointed out that many of the things he loved about the later system were, in a sense, already there. Special abilities and such are more about role playing and talking with your DM. I used the example of eliminating the Cavalier and Barbarian when 2nd Edition came out. Those classes were more about role playing than special skills. You want to play a knight with certain values and advantages? Talk to your DM, and I can guarantee you’ll be allowed to. You want to be Othgar the Barbarian? What is a Barbarian but a fighter with different choices and a different view on life?

    Some of the changes in the newer editions seemed more based on being able to better run computer games. A lot of the groups I’ve seen like -some- combat, but not a 3 hour set up for 12 orcs. If we wanted tabletop wargaming…we’d be doing tabletop wargaming.

    But, then…I’m an older player, stuck in my ways. You can have my d12 when you pry it out of my hand…

  75. Darkheart says:

    1. Ahh good old Red box basic D&D when ‘elf’ was a class.
    Then quickly onto Runequest 2nd ed.

    2. Running a game I tend towards’ Basic Role Playing’ system which is used in games like 1st-3rd ed Runequest, Cthulhu and as a system on its own.

    3. Probably still prefer BRP as a sytem when playing but am also partial to Shadowrun and have been very interested latley in the 4th ed D&D.

    4. Most often used systems are GURPS or BRP. this is because at the core they are only a system and fit so well into any genre. I’ve used these in fantasy, modern horror and scifi games with equal ease.

  76. Ouchies says:

    1. World of Darkness. The system was flexible enough that even though we only had “Werewolf” at first, it was used in other settings.
    Though D&D came a close second. I never liked it’s draconian mechanics.

    2. Mongoose Traveller. Though it’s really a flavor thing.

    3. It’s always a toss up between the previous WoD and Traveller.

    4. Big Eyes Small Mouth. Crazy, I know. Things always tend to degenerate at impromptu campaign inceptions toward BESM.

  77. Jabor says:

    I started with good old AD&D, and slowly went up to 3.5. Haven’t made the leap to 4th yet, and even when I do I’ll likely still play 3.5.

    A lot of my games are run online (over message boards and such), and I find that the new World of Darkness system is much more streamlined for that sort of thing than D&D.

  78. logicaly random says:

    Started with 2nd edition D&D, played with 3.0 and 3.5; I prefer 3.5 with some house rules.

  79. Wood says:

    1. I started with D&D 3.5. I’m only 17, and it was new when I got into the game.
    2. I prefer to run AD&D 1E, because of the simpleness of the rules. I also enjoy 4E for similar reasons.
    3. As a player I like D&D 4E because you can do so much at low levels and that’s all I can play usually as I’m mostly a GM.
    4. I end up using 4E. My friends and I love it.

  80. craig says:

    1. AD&D 2.5
    2. DnD 3.x or DnD 4.0
    3. Any.
    4. Whichever DnD version we can agree on.
    Really the system for me is pretty unimportant. The different rules, etc don’t matter because I never have had a complete hold on any system, despite having dm’d several times myself. I always wind up with DnD simply because most people who play at least have the PHB, and since I introduce a lot of new players to RPG’s, it is usually fitting to introduce them via the classic. I’ve tried other systems and have found them no better or worse. The only differences to me were setting, and player pool. I tried a warhammer variant which was really fun and which I played in person. I tried Exalted online and couldn’t like it less. All I need to enjoy an rpg is a fun group of people who are sitting in front of me, and that I don’t need to have a textbook memorized in order to play.

  81. Mike Lemmer says:

    1. I would say AD&D 2nd edition, but I never got a chance to really play it. It was Paranoia that got me hooked on tabletop RPGs permanently.
    2. Depending on my mood, either Paranoia or D&D 4E.
    3. Depending on my mood, either Paranoia or D&D 4E, with an occasional side jaunt into Call of Cthulhu. Hackmaster is too “PCs vs GM” for my tastes now, D&D 3E had overpowered casters while my favorite class (the rogue) required too much magical assistance to be useful at mid-levels, while Scion was just… meh.
    4. D&D 4E. It’s satisfactory and 90% of the gamers you encounter know how to play it; 70% of them are actually willing to play it, too.

  82. Calli says:

    I was introduced to 3rd edition D&D (back before it was called 3.0) by the man who became my husband, and though I’ve played some BESM and Call of Cthulhu (Chaosium, 5th ed.) 3.X still comprises most of my game experience, and thus it’s the system I’m most comfortable with on account of experience. One of these days I’ll take a stab at 4th, but so far time hasn’t allowed.

    I don’t run games, mostly because I suspect I’d be terrible at it.

  83. Emily says:

    1. I started with games of a Vampire: The Masquerade LARP, a 2nd Edition D&D Greyhawk campaign, and a GURPS space thing (I was recruited to the tabletop games after attending the first session of the LARP). I was attracted to gaming by reading Dragonlance novels as a teenager, but I have yet to play in a DL game.

    2. I don’t GM very much, but I really like to run Exalted. I can’t help but come up with handfuls of crazy, fun ideas when I read through the books, play as a PC, or see the characters that the players come up with. If you are familiar with the setting, the basic mechanics are intuitive. The Eden Studios BtVS Unisystem is incredibly easy to run, so I might use that some time; and Changeling: The Lost hits all the right buttons for me setting-wise, while still being something familiar and simple enough that I think I could run it. Those last two haven’t interested many of my fellow gamers, so I have little experience in either.

    3. The new World of Darkness Storytelling system is straightforward and simple, but has enough interesting settings via expansions (Werewolf, Mage, Changeling, Innocents, mortal), that I can get many different flavors of play without having to learn an entirely new system each time. One of my groups runs short-term games of various nWoD concepts, and it’s worked pretty well each time. If I’m going to go modern, this is the fast and easy way to do it (although my husband refuses to play it, so maybe not easy from a social standpoint). I also thoroughly enjoy working through the intricacies of Exalted from the player side, and I rarely struggle with the mechanics. It would be my favorite to play, if it didn’t make me think “but I want to run this!” each time I do.

    I am not too picky about the system I play, to be honest–I just want to be able to make an interesting character and be rewarded by the system for playing her in an interesting way. I don’t want to always worry about overcoming a challenge (“winning”). I’ve played A LOT of systems, and would play most of them again.

    4. I’ve played much more D&D than I would have in a perfect world. I enjoyed the system for years, but I am beginning to feel that I’ve done all I want with it. It may simply be that I need a break.

  84. Telas says:

    I started with AD&D 1st edition, back in 1979/80. I ran games until I left for college in 1985, and then played a little here and there, until getting back into it in 2003. I’ve played or run AD&D, Basic D&D (both versions), D&D 3.5, D&D 4E, Champions, Hero, Top Secret, Espionage, Star Frontiers, James Bond 007, Twilight:2000, RuneQuest, Savage Worlds, and a number of oddball games like Faery’s Tale and Og.

    When I’m running a game, I prefer a “rules lite” system like Savage Worlds that allows the entire gang to be creative without having to figure out how to apply the rules to what we want.

    When I’m playing a game, I honestly don’t care what system we’re using, as long as the rules don’t get in the way, and/or the GM is competent enough to use them gracefully. That said, I have always enjoyed playing Savage Worlds.

    As I am a house-husband with a 4 month old child, I don’t run any systems right now, although I am working on a SavageHawk campaign (Greyhawk reimagined through Savage Worlds). I am playing in a 4E game that’s pretty fun, but it’s still a bit too crunchy for my tastes.

    If you’re taking this poll to see what systems we like, I cannot recommend Savage Worlds enough. It’s exactly as advertised: Fast, Furious, and Fun. Link to some discussion on it.

  85. Hawk says:

    1. D&D
    2. D&D
    3. D&D
    4. D&D

  86. Dannerman says:

    1. What gaming system did you start with when you were learning the game?

    AD&D 1st edition. We were not really ‘roleplaying’ at the time, but it’s still the game which I cut my teeth on, and it holds a special place in my heart to this day.

    2. What's your preferred gaming system when you're running a game?

    Hmm. Tough one. Depends who’s playing. When I’m running, it has to be a system I *know* inside and out. So D&D 3.5 for me as that’s the only system I can claim to really *know*. Although I’m not too shabby with Dark Heresy, either.

    3. What system do you prefer as a player? (For some people this is different from #2.)

    Anything well run, really. Although I do like systems where I can visibly watch my character get more powerful. I *live* to level up. (Although in CRPG’s I hate level grinding.)

    4. And because we live in an imperfect world: What system do you actually end up using?

    Mostly Call of Cthulhu if I’m playing. I don’t tend to run much these days but Dark Heresy is kinda cool if you’re a massive 40k fanboy like me.

  87. Kristin says:

    Started with CODA, Decipher’s take on the Lord of the Rings. It had some MAJOR issues (no healing potions, so after a battle of any size you pretty much had to wait four weeks before going and doing anything else, so you could heal). Since then I’ve done D&D 3.5 and 4.0, with some 3.0 stuff either upgraded to 3.5 or as was.

    I like 3.5 best, both to run and to play, but that’s just the familiarity talking.

    I wish I could find a game…

  88. Nilus says:

    Hawk,

    Since this is a rule system question which version of D&D. Brown book, AD&D, 2nd Edition, 3rd, 3.5, 4th. D&D rules have changes a lot over the years and I am going to have to doc you points on your final unless you are more specific.

  89. Nilus says:

    You know what shocks me. People saying they have played for years and started with 3rd edition D&D. Have I really been playing the hobby so long that I consider 3rd edition still relatively new(at least not old). I wonder for those of you who started with 3rd edition, how happy/unhappy were you when you found out about 3.5 and 4th edition?

    Oh and someone mention the Original Marvel Superheroes RPG. My group busts that out upon occasion for goffy one shots because character generation is so stupid. If done by the book its all just a bunch of random charts you roll on to determine origin, powers and everything else. So you can end up with a character who is a technology super with body armor as strong as cardboard, an electric punch, and the ability to breath underwater(this was an actual character my buddy generated). Our group has a saying that the hardest part of making a Marvel character is coming up with a name :).

  90. Eldiran says:

    1. I started with DnD 3.5.
    2. I definitely prefer to run DnD 4E. Unlike third I have a lot more freedom to ad-lib monster stats, rules, and pretty much anything really. I also appreciate DnD in general the most because the setting it gives you to work with is essentially a blank slate. I’m really not interested in premade campaign settings, since creating the world and story is half the fun of DMing (maybe more than half).
    3. Still 4E, even though I haven’t had the chance to play it. I have so many character ideas floating around and am eager to try the system, but I’m pretty much stuck as the DM.
    4. 4th edition. I’ve learned to make do with only owning the Player’s Handbook (and occasional glances at the .pdfs of the other two books). It works seeing as I tend to create my own monsters and items, even if said monster is already fully statted out in the MM.

  91. Wilcroft says:

    1. 2nd Edition AD&D. That version rocked, but sucked for learning (THACO charts and whatnot)

    2. 3.5, in either Dragonlance or Homebrew settings. I say this not because it has major advantages over other systems, but rather because I know the rules the best, and thus can improve GM (the best style, IMHO) and make quick on-the-fly rulings, which keeps the game (and the fun) going.

    3. Shadowrun 4e or Serenity. The versatility in character creation is immense, and I love the build point system. That, and the darkness of the setting and diversion from epicness and goodness is a refreshing change.

    4. Currently, I’m active in 2e & 4e D&D and Shadowrun 4e games, and am GMing 3.5 and Serenity games.

  92. Ben N. says:

    I started with GURPs 3rd edition, I love playing both D&D 4th edition and GURPS 4th edition, I prefer D&D for DMing, and I end up playing D&D with my group. Although I would looove to be able to DM a GURPS game appropriately.

    I got started on GURPS when I was in 7th grade, by reading the books and then discovering a group that played at my school. One of the players introduced me to D&D after that. Currently, I’m not interested in branching out to a new system, but if I could convince my group now to switch to GURPS, I’d be ecstatic. I have the 4th edition books and love them. (GURPS, not D&D).

  93. Brian Ballsun-Stanton says:

    1. What gaming system did you start with when you were learning the game?

    The question “learning the game” is an interesting one. There are two equally valid responses. The first, obvious one, is “what was my first RPG?” To that AD&D has to be the answer. However, my interactions with AD&D were mostly drooling over the rulebooks as opposed to formally playing. Yes, I did play AD&D a few times, but I don’t actually believe I was roleplaying.

    The second, more useful, response was, “in which system did I first learn to roleplay?” My friends were developing the indie RPG Pax Draconis and I started roleplaying under them. Of note, however, learning to roleplay is mostly system independant: you have to have a good and experienced GM first.

    2. What's your preferred gaming system when you're running a game?

    Right now, I very much like running Ars Magica v5 (sufficiently so that I actually purchased the books. Mainly, I like the fact that it quite honestly says “We obsessed over magic, here’s the result. You’ll like it.” But it appeals to my thinking modality.

    3. What system do you prefer as a player? (For some people this is different from #2.)

    Whatever the GM is running at the time. There are few (besides early D&D) systems that I absolutely refuse to play in and I can find interesting aspects of almost any system. Given a choice of systems however, I prefer GURPS or similar because they most ably support me building characters to requirement.

    I also like building D&D 3.5 characters as a mental exercise because it’s quite a lot like programming.

    4. And because we live in an imperfect world: What system do you actually end up using?

    Ars Magica and D&D 4e. Running two games. Ars is the more serious, and I’m using 4e as a beer & pretzels to teach RPing to some friends.

  94. Turbosloth says:

    1) 2nd edition DnD
    2) Varies, but at the moment i’m quite keen to run an All Flesh Must Be Eaten game
    3) Varies also, but i’m keen on world of darkness from the player end
    4) DnD 3.5. Invariably

  95. Epizootic says:

    1.D&D 2ED

    2. World of Darkness for its flexibility and simplicity (the ‘dot system’

    3. Anything Contemporary

    4. Usually Vampire:the Requiem, though I dislike it over Mage

  96. Lifestealer says:

    1. What gaming system did you start with when you were learning the game?

    The first TT RPG I played was Advanced Fighting Fantasy

    2. What's your preferred gaming system when you're running a game?

    Varies from game to game. I’ve most often run Aberrant games (WW version), ran Edgewalkers for an adventure (well worth looking into that if you like the WoD type of tone but don’t like the system), but about to be starting a game using Nine Worlds system. I tend to vary the system for the tone I’m looking for, Aberrant just has the edge as it’s the system I know best.

    3. What system do you prefer as a player? (For some people this is different from #2.)

    Again, varies from game to game, depending largely on the tone the game is meant to have-although Dogs in the Vineyard is a fun game, and surprisingly easy to run.

    4. And because we live in an imperfect world: What system do you actually end up using?

    Highly variable-currently playing in a Savage Worlds Deadlands game, a Shadowrun game, a WW oWoD chat, a MET V:tM LARP, a MET nWoD Mage LARP, soon a Hunter: the Reckoning game, not long played in a Runequest game and an Exalted game, also Hot War, Dread: First Book of Pandamonion, Sorceror, Amber, Scion: Hero, Dogs in the Vineyard, Primetime Adventures, InSpectres, Edgewalkers and many others. There’s a club whereby we have access to many different games, and several people are fans of the Indy games, which are often quite cheap and diverse options there, if you look for them.

  97. Aiken Drum says:

    What gaming system did you start with when you were learning the game?
    1st Edition Dungeons and Dragons circa 1979 with the occasional Tunnels and Trolls session thrown in.

    What's your preferred gaming system when you're running a game?
    A combination of 2nd and 3rd Edition D&D.

    What system do you prefer as a player? (For some people this is different from #2.)
    As long as the rules are consistent and logical and the setting is compelling I don’t really care. As long as a combat round doesn’t require umpteen gazillion calculations and table references. So no Rolemaster please.

    And because we live in an imperfect world: What system do you actually end up using?
    Umm …. as I’m the primary DM a combination of 2nd and 3rd edition D&D. Heh.

  98. Jeremiah says:

    1. AD&D 2ed. Started playing between my junior & senior year in high school. Before actually playing, I’d played a lot of the old SSI D&D games like Pool of Radiance & Curse of the Azure Bonds.

    2 & 3 & 4: My current preferred system, by far, is Burning Wheel. I think it’s a beautiful system. My favorite part is it’s awesome social conflict resolution system (Dual of Wits). It’s just amazing, and no matter how good you are at bending people to your will, chances are very good you’ll never come out of a DoW unscathed.

    BW also scales to meet your group’s needs pretty well.

    It’s also gritty. It’s all about what your character believes in and how far they’re willing to go and what they’re willing to do to prove and accomplish those.

    I also love the more narrative focus of the game. BW works best when the group sits down and does a World-Burning session: lay out the basics of a campaign world, what’s going on, etc. It makes for maximum buy-in on everyone’s part. There’s no reason players shouldn’t be completely interested in a game after participating in this.

    I like how details aren’t important until someone decides they are. Until someone cares about that un-named forest in the North, there’s no reason to give it a name or decide who lives there. I also like that even once the game is started players have a certain amount of narrative control. Want to establish facts within the campaign? There’s mechanics to do so.

    The players also have the ability to bring NPC’s into the game via the Circles ability.

    And with setting stakes for conflicts and the fact that failing a roll doesn’t necessarily mean you fail. It could mean there’s a complication. Fail that lockpick roll to get into the house? Okay, you still pick the lock, but before you can sleep inside, you’re noticed.

    Also story is very important story within BW. Need to climb that tall mountain to confront your brother’s killer? Who cares about the climb, the important thing is confronting your foe! The GM can “Say Yes” and allow you to make the climb and get to the heart of what’s important.

    And possibly one of the best parts? With books like the Monster Burner & Magic Burner, Luke Crane et al put a kind of Burning Wheel development kit in your hands. They basically describe how they created the rest of the game and give you the tools to customize your campaign as you wish. Need a new racial stock? Need some awesome new traits? Have a bad-ass new magic system you want to use? Those books hold the secrets of how the existing ones were created and show you how to make your own.

    Oh, and one last thing before this gets out of control: the Burning Wheel community is awesome. It’s great to be able to go to the BW forums and ask questions of the creators of the game as well as just talk about game mechanics and concepts with other players.

  99. mavis says:

    WEll my first rules where about 20 years ago – and where called mortal combat. Released by an English univeristy roleplaying society (maybe cambridge?) they have since utterly vanished with trace.

    My current prefered system is “spirt of teh century” an off shot of the fudge system. I’ll admit to not having used it much however so I might fall out of love with it again…

    As a player I like the simplicty of Cuthulhu – or maybe I just like the setting?

    And what do I actually end up running? Well I’m in hitatous at the momment not really running anything but I suspect the answer would be Cthulhu again. I can pick it up, and just run something, and we all have fun.

  100. WWWebb says:

    1- Like many, I started with the red box run by my dad. I have no idea what marketing campaign convinced a bunch of parents to buy something called “Dungeons & Dragons” for their pre-teens, but it must have been a good one.

    My first AD&D group fought demons with explosive javelins and Wolverine-style claws in their mid-level group…the Monty-ness put me off the system…or at least it put me off groups with a lot of house rules. My next group was run by a kid who loved designing his own systems (post-apocolyptic setting with giant insects was his favorite), but also splayed through Rifts, Robotech, and AD&D2E. I liked the diversity in settings, but all of us were crummy GMs when it came to anything but combat.

    At one point I played RoleMaster…ghah! The GM did his best but we were all terrified of combat because it would take two hours of charts and tables to finish off some thugs.

    2- I haven’t run a game in years. It would have to be D&D3E for me to remember the rules.

    3- My favorite system was Torg. I loved the cinematic feel and the flexible mixing of genres compared to GURPS or Rift’s over rulebook’ed mixing. The cards were another fun element.

    4- I haven’t found a new group since I moved a few years ago, and with small children, it might be a few more years before I do.

  101. Heph says:

    What gaming system did you start with when you were learning the game?
    Star Wars d20.

    What's your preferred gaming system when you're running a game?
    I’ve still never run a game, so no idea. I know D&D 3.5 best of all, so for ease’s sake, probably that.

    What system do you prefer as a player? (For some people this is different from #2.)
    D&D 4.0 or Star Wars Saga Edition (which makes a bit of a cross between 3.5 and 4th edition rules, with some additional crap thrown in that was cut for 4.0….)

    And because we live in an imperfect world: What system do you actually end up using?
    D&D 4.0, lately, though we’re still contemplating going back to 3.5.

  102. Pixelllama says:

    Wow, more than a hundred GMs in your audience.

    My answer to all four questions is a noticeably house-ruled version of 3.5. Well, I guess it wasn’t as houseruled when I learned to play/GM.

    But I don’t think I’ll ever switch to fourth edition.

  103. Althanis says:

    1) I started in the glorious days of the original D&D White Box.
    2) I really enjoy the Deadlands system. It’s very open-ended and suitable to many things at once without the mind-gouging overhead of GURPS. A close second is the 2nd Ed. AD&D system only because I ran many games during its tenure.
    3) I have enjoyed Deadlands the best of what I’ve played so far, although Fading Suns was also very enjoyable and easy.
    I also play in a Mutants & Masterminds 2nd Ed game and its a VERY well done superhero system.
    4) Currently I run a game in D&D 3.5 and another using Deadlands. I play in a Mutants & Masterminds 2nd Ed. game as well as a D&D 4th Ed. game.

    Honorable Mentions: Traveller, Cyberpunk 2.0.2.0, Shadowrun 2nd and 3rd Eds, Gurps 4th Ed, Fading Suns, & 7th Sea.

  104. food4worms says:

    1. Basic D&D (blue! box) with the AD&D 1st ed. Monster Manual.

    2. Right now my GM preference is a custom implementation of 3rd ed. FATE (hacked from the Spirit of the Century rules).

    3. The system I had the most fun playing was probably Arcanum.

    4. The group I play with now has a bad habit of playing GURPS, which no one likes, but which everyone knows.

  105. A Gould says:

    1. My first game was either Star Trek (FASA) or TSR’s Marvel Super Heroes. Still have the MSH, but I traded the Star Trek away years ago.
    2. I’ve only ran three systems – GURPS 3rd, D&D 3.5 and D&D 4. Of the three, probably the simplest to run is 4th. I love my GURPS, though…
    3. Really depends on what we’re doing. If we’re going for the hacking and the slashing, gimme 4th. If we’re going for deeper characters, GURPS 4th
    4. 3.5, and now 4th.

    Side note: I actually *own* a mess of systems (including the Serenity, Paranoia, and a pile of others. It’s just finding time and players…

  106. Kalil says:

    I started on AD&D first.
    Well, actually, I started with homebrew diceless ‘hero’ roleplays with some of my elementary school friends, and then moved into adapting video game systems, but AD&D was my first ‘real’ system.
    I think my favorite system is Exalted – as a GM, I love the world, and as a player, I love how it lets my characters be flashy and over-the-top.
    D&D 3.5 holds a special place in my heart, though, because character design in 3.5 is so much fun. It’s pretty useless as a /roleplaying/ system, but for min-maxing, it’s unparalleled in the amount of versatility it offers. Every game can be broken by a dedicated min/maxer, but no others can be broken in so many and such creative ways.
    My local group usually winds up playing Mage, L5R, or Exalted. Online, I usually wind up in Planescape campaigns – either 3.5 or 4.0.

  107. ludomastro says:

    1. What gaming system did you start with when you were learning the game?

    I actually learned the basics of role playing with a choose-your-own-adventure style book set in Forgotten Realms back when TSR still owned D&D. The bookmark was your character sheet and the “dice” were a drawing in the corner of the book. (You thumbed rapidly and stopped to get your result.) Good stuff though.

    2. What's your preferred gaming system when you're running a game?

    I’ve run D&D (3.5), Shadowrun (3rd and 4th Ed), StarWars (the old West End Games version). I have no preference provided that the group is having fun.

    3. What system do you prefer as a player? (For some people this is different from #2.)

    Definitely Shadowrun. I just prefer level-less systems.

    4. And because we live in an imperfect world: What system do you actually end up using?

    Typically D&D because my wife and our friends prefer it.

  108. Jay says:

    1) Chainmail (Early AD&D) in the 70’s, then AD&D.

    2) I love to DM Runequest (1st ed.) because the backstory is so fascinating. But I don’t DM enough to keep the players involved with the hundreds of different viewpoints.

    3) I prefer to play the Hero system. Any edition – I feel like I don’t need the rulebooks at all. I love coming up with different point based characters.

    4) I usually DM Iron Heroes or Hero system. They’re much easier to use on a short campaign than D&D and Gurps.

  109. LexIcon says:

    1) Started on DnD 3.5

    2) I’m split between DMing Shadowrun 4th ed. and nWoD (any setting/branch)

    3) I’ve enjoyed nWoD, but I’m looking forward to playing Godlike (or any ORE game)

    4) Pretty much only nWoD now. I like it, but I want to spread out a little.

  110. Poet says:

    1: GURPS. I almost never touched dice again.
    2: Storyteller System for the new World of Darkness.
    3: The same.
    4: Usually some d20 variant. We’re into Mutants and Masterminds right now, which is certainly a little simpler than, say, Hero System.

    I should also mention that someone recently found Call of Cthulhu 6th Edition in a bargain bin at our local shop. We’re all big fans of Lovecraft, and already played the d20 CoC. We’ll be hitting up percentile goodness soon.

  111. Face says:

    1) AD&D
    2-4) HackMaster, is my preferred game period. I’ll play other games, usually as one-offs, but if the group is good I don’t mind what system is being used.

    HackMaster can be a player vs. the GM game, but that’s not the way I usually see it being played.

  112. Derek K. says:

    1. D&D Red box. Good times, but I looked it over again recently. Wow. Yeah, no. I mostly grew up playing Marvel Heroes (or what it was called) though (as a young’un), and then moved to AD&D and WoD (First edition through nWoD).

    2. I love Shadowrun 2e and 3e. But I can run a 3.x game in my sleep, so it’s easier. Also oWoD, for the same reason, and because I love the setting.

    3. Shadowrun, Arcana Evolved (modified 3.0), 3.5, oWoD, nWoD, d20 modern/future, Star Wars Saga edition (a better version of 4.0 than 4.0).

    4. Typically 3.5. Although my most recent games have been Shadowrun, Deadlands, and 3.5

  113. adam says:

    1. The first game I payed was D&D 3rd edition. Started at age 11, basically with its release

    2. My Favorite game to run is either In Nomine, or perhaps Call of Cthulu. or all flesh must be eaten. Pretty much everything except shadowrun, as I can’t be keeping track of three completely different rule sets simultaneously for each of the planes action happens on.

    3. my preferred system as a player is, well, hard to say, I love systems, learning their quarks, most things about them.

    4. Soon I will begin running a game of Alternity.

  114. Gobberlerra says:

    1. D&D 2nd edition, though I think my first real games started with 3.0

    2. My personal preference is Ars Magica 5th edition, which I am DMing at the moment. The non magic rules can be a bit clunky at times, but the magic system is fantastic and I like the setting concept.

    3. Dunno, I don’t mind playing pretty much anything, basically depends on what other player’s are willing to run!

    4. At the moment I am running Ars Magica, was playing D&D 4th edition though never liked it that much and may be about to start playing GURPS.

    *Goes back to silently watching the site*
    Love the site Shamus!

  115. rose glace says:

    well, back in ’77 there really wasn’t an option — it was
    d&d — the original three booklets plus we had the luxury of
    greyhawk.

    i last played d&d back in the ’80s, though. it just failed too
    many reality checks for me.

    to play or to referee, i’ve always preferred games tailored
    to a genre; never been particularly fond of generic systems.
    our longest-running campaigns have been like that: torg,
    feng shui, runequest, deadlands, champions and most
    recently burning wheel.

    these days we’re back to burning wheel after dabbling in
    spirit of the century for a little while.

  116. Ben N. says:

    Hot damn, that’s a lot of responses. Guess gamers love to talk about their roots.

  117. DocTwisted says:

    1) Palladium’s Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and Other Strangeness, which was pretty much Heroes Unlimited with a focus on Human/Animal Mutants.

    2) I really love the openness of GURPS. You can have any setting, any power level, and it all still (usually) fits on one two-sided character sheet.

    3) I have *No* preference. I’m most familiar with Paranoia, Heroes Unlimited, and DnD 3.5. If the GM is good, and the other players aren’t griefing, the system is just the backdrop.

    4) I usually wind up playing DnD 3.5, because it’s the system most people are familiar with.

  118. Michael M says:

    1. This is hard to answer. When I was little, my best friend’s family let me play a game of AD&D1. Later in life, I got the D&D3 Starter. But we barely understood the game. My first REAL experience was Rolemaster 2nd Edition.

    2. Well, I’ve never gotten to run many, but I only had Rolemaster Fantasy RolePlaying to run, until now (I picked up a copy of Iron Crown Enterprises’ High Adventure RolePlaying). HARP takes what Rolemaster tried to do ages ago, and loosens the bolts. And the BEST part is that it’s an amazingly flexible system for GMs and Players both. Even MAGIC is flexible (you can pay extra spell points to increase the range of the spell, or the duration, or both!)

    3. Rolemaster 2nd was fun for me because the uniqueness of my character was on the page. Sure there’s some time-consuming battles, but our group was more social, so it gave a good opportunity for us to talk about other things.

    4. I don’t have a group right now, and don’t see myself getting one until after University. But I’m really interested in playing HARP.

    Our GM for Rolemaster made a LOT of house rules for the game to fit it into his Greyhawk-based setting, and added even more depth and complexity. This made it better for us, because the depth was in specializations. He worked on a system for monks to make Martial Arts more customized. He and I worked on a system to make Bards more customized. He added his own twist to things, and that’s what I like most about Rolemaster: It’s adaptable, and it fits my needs.

  119. Zock says:

    1. Twilight 2000 / RuneQuest
    2. Was 3.5 at one point. Now it’s something that is light, suitable for single shot games, and supports the game’s atmosphere.
    3. Depends vastly on the game. Exalted is fun for campaigns but suits only Exalted style games. I prefer easy, fast and weird systems in general (and single shot / short games).
    4. Currently: Exalted, 4E, d20 Modern, and GURPS. Past year: Paranoia & 3.5 as well.

  120. ShadowDragon8685 says:

    1. What gaming system did you start with when you were learning the game?

    D&D 3.5.

    2. What's your preferred gaming system when you're running a game?

    Star Wars Saga Edition. I know it well enough, and I like Star Wars. I’d like to GM for Exalted, but I don’t have enough of a grasp on the rules yet – and I have a pretty bitchin’ Star Wars plot already partially baked.

    3. What system do you prefer as a player? (For some people this is different from #2.)

    Exalted 2nd Edition. I just love it – being a superpowered, golden glowing badass who can, straight out chargen, deflect literally any attack ever with your sword.

    4. And because we live in an imperfect world: What system do you actually end up using?

    Well, at the moment, I’ve taken a “No game is better than unwanted game.” I’m sick and tired of traditional fantasy, no matter how much the elf-ears may make the best handles. So I either get to play Exalted, play (preferably) or run SWSE, or don’t game at all.

    Not, that is, that I would say no to Shadowrun 4th Ed if I heard of it. I still want to play my hacker, Skate, that I’ve been nursing as an ideal more than any one set of stats ever since the Matrix Online beta-test and SR3.

  121. Cybron says:

    1. My introduction to gaming was a bit weird. I started with D&D 3.0, but there weren’t really any people in my area who were into gaming when I started getting interested. I pretty much just played around with the rules by myself. I spent time rolling characters and NPC while going over the rule system. I was up to D&D 3.5 before I finally got a proper group together, so I guess that was my first real gaming system.
    2. D&D3.5. Straightforward rules system that can be manipulated and occasionally ignored to deliver a sufficiently cinematic experience. I’d like to try Unknown Armies though – I’ve GMed Call of Cthulhu and enjoyed that, and UA seems like it takes all the good stuff from Coc and just runs it through the blender, set to awesome.
    3. So far, 3.5 again. Flexible enough to do a wide range of very cool things, solid enough to set definite boundaries. Traveler looks good though – it seems like the above but even more flexible. Haven’t been able to find a good GM for Traveler yet though.
    4. Still running along with 3.5. Don’t feel like spending the cash for 4.0. We also occasionally play Call of Cthulhu, but only modules – I’m not adept enough with the horror genre to create my own adventures. I picked up traveler pretty recently, but haven’t put it to much use.

  122. froogger says:

    1. D&D, moved on quickly to AD&D. Still don’t understand THAC0, though.

    2. A homebrew system made from scratch. Been a few years, but it was based on the real world and it’s physical limits, gods and folklore mixed from all civilizations golden ages (no gunpowder or advanced engineering though, guess you could call it medieval). Twilight 2000 on a solid 2nd place.

    3. Same as 2

    4. Well, I find joy in the different settings, and consider the rules important, but not everything. Shadowrun, Twilight 2000 and MERP all have their charming aspects with very different settings, but lastly I played the homebrew one.

    Actually, the rulebook for the homebrew system (I didn’t write it, but I helped with research and playtesting) ended up at about 200 pages without illustrations. It was a beautiful world, very balanced and exciting. We sent it to a publishers who responded: “This is all very well, but how about changing it to a sci-fi setting?”. Thus missing the point entirely (of course, he was a sci-fi author, and this was before LOTR and Harry Potter) SIC

  123. K says:

    I started out with one of the two common choices for german natives: Das Schwarze Auge (the Dark Eye) or Midgard. I started out with the former, it was by pure chance, since I just bought the box without understanding what this was supposed to be.

    My preferred system is a hard question. It certainly chances from time to time, and I have not played very many systems, as my group consist of more than a few ultra-conservationists, who would never ever switch systems (or even settings). Currently, I’m running Herosystem which was my choice, and I’m pretty happy with it. But then, that’s mostly due to the homebrew setting. We’ve been playing DSA for roughly 10 years and I hate it as a GM, because it’s very restricting.

    Even as a player, I don’t like DSA much, since again: it’s very restrictive. It has a very, very deep setting and extremly detailed rules (to fit the setting), it’s also low-magic. Which results in playing the same game everytime, since it’s hard to spice it up when you can only do the same mideaval stories over and over. As a player, I would want a system that allows me to improvise cool stuff. None of my known systems really fit the bill. But then, I’m mostly GM anyway.

    Right now we still play DSA in one group (I’m ok with it, but certainly not thrilled) and HS in the other which I GM and have a ton of fun with it.

    As for D20: I have only played a single game of AD&D whose only saving grace was the incredibly good RP. The system itself is a horrid steaming pile of disastrous dog-poopoo.

    I’m itching to play SciFi/Space Opera next, but not while I GM and write my thesis. ;)

  124. Nine of Swords says:

    Hmm. I’m probably the most boring person here, if my answer is any indication. For 1-4 I’ll answer “D&D 3.5”. That’s not to say I haven’t and won’t play other systems, though there are some that I won’t–my only experience of 2nd edition is from Baldur’s Gate 2, in which it was all very confusing and inelegant, even with the 3rd ed adjustments. I’ve played Castles & Crusades, which is basically streamlined 2nd/3rd ed. But I found some parts of it archaic, and the other parts involve giving the GM more power than I prefer. I’ve played FATE–I really like FATE, but it’s hard to get rulesets except for Spirit of the Century setting, and it’s not really designed for the longer campaigns I prefer. As for 4th Ed. I like it okay, but it’s really not my thing.

    I haven’t really played anything else. I don’t mind giving other games a try, of course–I’m only hesitant when it comes to the gothic genre of games. I prefer games where I’m running towards the action, not away from it. And where the DM doesn’t have absolute power. I played a few other systems from cons, but nothing I’ve gotten stuck to.

    So yeah. I like 3.5 D&D. I like all the rules and the way the system interlocks–I can memorize almost everything. I can handle exceptions and unusual circumstances by adjusting rules. I like that it is mostly balanced (as long as you do a bit of your own balancing or check the errata). I like the supplements. I like that the DM’s power is tempered by a need to adhere to the system (I’m not a rules lawyer, but I like consistency and I prefer DMs who justify their decisions related to the rules). It’s not perfect, sure. I mean, it uses d20, and I have notoriously bad luck. I much prefer the fudge dice (4d6, each dice representing a value from -1 to +1).

  125. Ian says:

    I actually did live roleplay before table top so I suppose technically I should say the first System I used was The Portly Pixie all those years ago.

    When Running a game it’s a tough call between 7th Sea and DnD 4th edition. I’ll probably have to go with DnD though because it’s so much eaiser to balance combat encounters.

    Playing… I get to do so little of this lately but I’ll go with Call of Cuthulu with the point I think it would be 4th ed DnD again if I ever actually got to play.

    When I’m running it’s either GURPS, DnD-4th or 7th Sea. Useually DnD.

  126. anonymouse says:

    I’m pretty new to gaming, only started two years ago, and with a group of experienced players, so I learned the ropes with Warhammer, which was fun. I’ve never run a game, but as a player, I tend to stay away from the high fantasy settings like Forgotten Realms. My current favourite is Serenity, but I haven’t tried many things yet, and I love new challenges. My group just decided to go for D&D 3.5 next, but I hope that’ll be okay, as we’re playing Eberron, not Realms. The setting really is more important to me than the system, as long as the system works (at least most of the time).

  127. Blue Painted says:

    1) RuneQuest — which we are revisting for our 20th Anniversary (P)run(e)Quest :-)

    2) GURPS 3rd. I’ve run GURPS 4th but it’s too fussy. Looking into using Fudge for my next on (WWII in Belgium)

    3) Whatever GM requires

    4) GURPS 4th (shame!)

  128. Zaxares says:

    Running late tonight, so answers will be shorter than I would like:

    1: The venerable basic D&D (Red Box). Waaaaaay back when wizards were called magic users, and elves and dwarves were classes. (Fighters were still called fighters though.) Ironically, I actually got turned off D&D for a bit because I had a sadistic cousin for a DM whose sole goal every session was to do his darndest to kill off all the players.

    2: D&D 3.5. It’s starting to become incredibly bloated, but it IS a fairly streamlined and established system. I’ve yet to try out 4E, however.

    I do love the occasional Star Wars or Call of Cthulhu game though.

    3: Still D&D 3.5, although this may change depending on how my experience with 4E goes.

    4: I’m lucky. I still use D&D 3.5.

  129. Moridin says:

    Nilus, #89: 3.0 was released eight years ago. It may seem new to you, but for gamers in their early to mid twenties it came out when they were teenagers and starting to game.

  130. Jon Ross says:

    What gaming system did you start with when you were learning the game?
    — Learned the game via Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and then moved through all the other games from them, Heroes Unlimited and so on… Then switched systems every three months or so based on which had the most interesting cover/interior art while I was still in junior high/ high school and no restrictions on my spending month from working.

    The classic red box was also mine for years before I ran a game in it (I found it in my parents collection when I was nine), but the first I played was TMNT (12?).

    What's your preferred gaming system when you're running a game?

    — I don’t really have one. It comes down to what style of game my players are looking for. If they want something quick and rules light Twerps can be pulled out and used without the rulebooks even. Other times the mix of players is into heavy mechanics and logic. Knowing how a half dozen people can with the right gear drive off thousands of attackers.

    That aside, Paranoia is perhaps my favourite to GM because I don’t need to really justifity anything that happens as long as it’s a clever pun or stupid trick. (My favourite moment currently from that game is when the players were to paint the X’s on the wall for an invisible cruise missile test, using explosive paint that would go off whenever the paint crossed…)

    What system do you prefer as a player? (For some people this is different from #2.)

    I’m hungry for any game and will turn down nothing. I even played in an episode one inspired Star Wars game last month. But the one I liked the most was Deadlands as a player, because it was the only game system that I have ever been a player in that I hadn’t already read the game master section and knew much of the background history, secrets and stats of things.

    And because we live in an imperfect world: What system do you actually end up using?

    Whatever comes to hand really.

  131. Derek K. says:

    I only made it through 90 or of the comments, but:

    I add question 5!

    What game do you wish you could play?

    For me, it’s Paranoia (I had a module called the Complex of Dimness that I *loved* but didn’t play) and In Nomine.

    I adore IN. I’m a sucker for anything to do with Christian myth (angels, demons, what have you), but I’ve never really played a good game of IN. I’ve played a few that were fun for a bit, but then lost steam quickly (playing demons was, on reflection, a difficult choice), but I think you have to build the game to work, not just let people pick whatever they’d like.

    But I love the system, and worship (pun intended) the setting.

    Also, re: Serenity: the RPG: I feel for you. We ran a Firefly game pretty successfully using d20 Modern and a bit of D20 Future. It was far better than that RPG. The RPG was spectacular for maps, backstory, etc, but the game itself hurt.

  132. Unconvention says:

    1. Started with a single session of Basic (Red Box) D&D. That was enough to get me hooked. Since then I’ve run and played a pretty wide variety of games, including many home-brew systems.

    2. In putting a system (often introduced through the medium of a character sheet), in front of a player, you’re inviting them to play in accordance with the tone of that system, and an ideal system will support the tone of the game you’re trying to play. So, for example, I’ve never cared for GURPs, or its equivalents, precisely because they lack any distinctive flavour; in trying to be all things to all games, they are bland and lacking in character, and bring nothing to any individual game.

    And there is no single set of rules, stats and abilities that would be ideal for all games: to take TV-influenced crime-fighting as a relatively niche genre, I’d want a system for a Miami Vice game to be somewhat different to that for a Poirot game. A player in the Poirot setting with half a page of gun skills effectively has a big button in front of them saying ‘shoot someone’. Why is that button there? What does it add? Obviously a good role-player can ignore such an invitation and keep wielding instead the weapon of his little grey cells, but if I’m looking for an ideal system for a particular game (and I always am) then players shouldn’t have to ignore the clues I’m giving them.

    The best games are the ones in which the expectations of GM and players for the game are in concert. With your choice of system you as the GM are sending a message to the players about the sort of game you’re intending to run. Dropping Toon character sheets on the table is giving your players a message about what is expected of them for them to be able to contribute to the joint experience. If your game features 100 ton weights falling on people who can then be revived with a bicycle pump, then all is well. If however your game features a hard, gritty plot about drug abuse and incest, in a setting with real world physics, then you may have missed the mark, and more importantly may have set your players up for a confusing, disjointed and unpleasant experience.

    All of which is to say I have no preferred gaming system that covers all games I might run.

    3. I refer you to my answer to #2.

    4. When I don’t have time to find that special system that perfectly fits my game, I generally run a variant of the Chaosium Basic Rules (the set that came with the old box set of Call of Cthulhu). It’s quick and light, and easily modified or extended. Also, lots of players my age (i.e. the people I most likely run games for) have some experience of playing Call of Cthulhu or Runequest, and therefore get the system immediately.

  133. Mike says:

    1. Chainmail and the four D&D booklets
    2. Homestyle D&D 2nd
    3. GURPS
    4. Homestyle D&D 2nd

  134. Bai Shen says:

    1. Robotech, TMNT and other Palladium titles plus D&D
    2. Palladium, Shadowrun, and moving into GURPS
    3. Deadlands(original, not d20), Shadowrun
    4. Right now I’m running a Rifts game while I work on a fantasy world for a GURPS campaign.

  135. Sungazer says:

    1. AD&D 2nd Ed.

    2. The only game I ran was years ago, and I did a heavily modified version of AD&D 2nd Ed. as it was the only system I knew inside and out.

    3. I’ll give any system a shot, and the ones I like generally have a good GM running them. Someone who is not only knowledgable, but flexible.

    4. I want to try running a Game of Thrones D20 game. As well as a Deliria one. I’m playing D&D 3.5 and Earthdawn right now.

  136. Mari says:

    1. Oddly enough, I didn’t start with D&D like most people. I started out with DC Heroes 2nd Ed. It’s dead now but not for the lucky few who actually still have their books. It was an awesome system. I’ve taken elements of it to a lot of other games.

    2 & 3. I’ll do these together because it’s the same answer: I prefer to run and play the system that fits the mood and theme of the game.

    4. I often, however, end up adapting or tweaking d20 to pretty much all games because it’s just easier when you’re playing with n00bs (which I often am).

  137. Heather says:

    My first game system was World of Darkness, old version. I quickly migrated from that to D&D 3.0 (I came to tabletop gaming late in life), dabbled in several other systems, and recently started running a game in the new World of Darkness system, which I love enough to marry it and have its babies.

    One of my favorites to play was TORG, which unfortunately went out of print a decade before I started gaming. I also really like Gurps, but my gaming buddies don’t, so I don’t play it much.

    So I run World of Darkness and mostly play D&D 3.5 I’d like to play Shadowrun and D&D 4.0 and some different d20 settings, but there often isn’t time/interest/money to make that happen.

  138. Doug Sundseth says:

    1. White box OD&D
    2. Hero, usually Fantasy Hero
    3. 7th Sea or Hero (The idea of paying for disadvantages in 7th Sea is brilliant; I’ve considered porting it to Hero.)
    4. Mostly 3.5, some 4.0 (which I find tedious)

  139. Jeff says:

    1. I started with D&D 2e. First exposure to RPGs.
    2. I tend to run D&D 3.5 but I hear good things about 4e, just no experience with it yet.
    3. I don’t really have a preference. Shadowrun, Savage World, and D&D – it depends more on the campaign. Just no GURPS. Ick.
    4. The three listed aboce – really, it’s more the campaign and DM than the system. Except GURPS. No GURPS.

  140. General Karthos says:

    1. I started with an amalgamation of D&D 1st and 2nd Edition. (I started the Friday BEFORE Third Edition came out. So I always say I started just in time. One week more, and I would never have known 1st or 2nd Edition.)
    2. When running a game I prefer either 1st edition D&D with about a half-dozen house rules (slightly modded initiative, my own form of character creation, maximum HP at first level, stuff like that), or 2nd Edition Star Wars RPG, a game using the D6 system.
    3. As a player, it really makes little difference to me, provided my GM is skilled. I think that my favorites to play in are the same as my favorites to run, though I might add Star Wars Saga Edition to my list of favorites to play in. (I haven’t run any Saga Edition games, and the odds are that I -won’t- run any Saga Edition games for a time.)
    4. My world is imperfect. I don’t get to play much face-to-face and when I do play face-to-face I am usually forced to play 3E (or now 4E) D&D or 3E Star Wars. The only time we get to play my favorite systems are when -I- am running the game. And that hardly seems right to me. But it’s hardly unusual either. (I do play online roleplaying games at http://www.roleplayinggames.net a lot, and I do get to play the systems I enjoy up there, but online role-playing is very different from face-to-face. A lot of fun, but definitely very different.)

  141. Miako says:

    Players Versus GM. Been there, done that. WW old world of darkness, werewolf edition. My character had high degree of empathy. To the point where she would roll and generally be able to suss out the motivations of any friendly or quasi friendly entity… including ghosts.
    and we had the ahroun who thought that having a sword that gave more damage than a nuclear weapon was AWESOME.

    Okay, so I liked my character better than I liked the Ahroun — and I totally sucked at roleplaying!

  142. Miako says:

    Rolemaster has two hour long fights with bandits for a reason : they’re awful dangerous and they net good exp.

    The fun thing about Rolemaster is people have a harder time ruleslawyering, as you get gazillions of options that you can change on the fly.

  143. Bryan says:

    I started on D&D 2e
    My favorite system to run is Exalted, as it has an absolutely spectacular world, and I never have the time to develop one of my own, also it’s really great to have the really powerful characters, and… creativity being able to be rewarded by giving bonus dice to characters for really cool or well-described actions.
    As a player, I’m a big fan of GURPS, simply due to its openness, and variability.
    In the real world, D&D is the primary game system used, which… really is unfortunate, but it turns out being much easier as everyone I game with has it and knows how it works

  144. Jamey says:

    1) AD&D
    2) Mage: The Ascension (Revised)
    3) Mage: The Ascension (Revised)
    4) Currently same as 2 and 3, plus a 7th Sea game.

  145. Vadimirin says:

    1) I started with DnD 3.5 and Shadowrun about the same time, stuck with DnD when the Shadowrun GM skipped around on different White Wolf games.

    2) When I’m running a game, I love 4th Ed. I haven’t tried my GMing skills at anything else yet, I started GMing when 4th Ed came out because I knew I’d know it as well, if not better, than any of my players.

    3) My favorite game to play in would have to be Exalted. It’s billed for what it is; The most bad ass crazy anime you can think of (Think Samurai Shamploo), make it 5x as crazy, add magic, now add 25′ tall Gundams.

    4) Usually I end up with a 3.5 game, an Exalted game and something else just floating around.

  146. Arson55 says:

    1. 2nd edition AD&D
    2. White Wolf’s Storyteller system.
    3. I wish any of my friends were willing to run a game. Any game. I hate DMing. Because I’m the only one who ever did. Besides one one-off only partially conceived game. I hate my friends.
    4. 3.5 D&D

  147. Vertigo says:

    1. 3.5 AD&D
    2. 4th edition D&D, takes a lot of the strain off DMing so I can focus on other things.
    3. Dark Heresy, love the setting
    4. 4th edition

  148. Cthulhu says:

    Started playing Rolemaster.
    Prefer GMing Rolemaster.
    Prefer playing Rolemaster.
    /end fanboyism
    usually end up playing D&D.

  149. Adam S says:

    1: I started gaming when and older friend lent me his old AD&D rulebooks and ruthlessly annihilated my sister and I in a dungeon crawl that lasted all of three rooms. Needless to say, I was hooked. (On GMing.)
    2: Mutants and Masterminds, 2nd ed. It runs smooth as butter, and except for character creation, is a blast to play. RPing as villains NEVER gets old.
    3: M&M, again. I love dramatic monologues, either heroic or villainous, or villainously-heroic. (I played a reformed villain, and enjoyed it immensely.)
    4: D&D 3.5. Character creation is quick, and LotR-style campaigns never fail to entertain.

  150. Taellosse says:

    1. I started with White Wolf, which isn’t actually a single system, it’s, like, 5, but they mostly play all right together. I personally played with the Werewolf system, but many of the other players were playing vampires.

    2. I’m not sure I can answer this one fairly, as I’ve only run 1 game so far. I did that one in GURPS, though. I’m toying with the idea of running something with the new D&D, assuming I can get a few players and a set of books together, just to try it out. Not having read it yet, though, I’ve got no opinion of the system.

    3. Definitely GURPS. At least, so long as there’s a competent GM (which, of course, is always kind of important).

    The above responses have to be put into the context of my comparatively limited exposure to different systems. I have played in the aforementioned World of Darkness setting (this was a while ago, now–I understand all their systems have changed significantly in more recent editions), and in a handful of D&D 2nd edition games that had varying levels of adherence to the base rules. I’ve played in a single session at a convention in D&D 3.0, and read a couple of 3.5 supplements. I played in an abortive D20 Star Wars campaign that only lasted a handful of sessions. I own a copy of the Player’s Handbook for Shadowrun 3rd edition, but have never played it. I’ve played several GURPS games in 3rd edition, and a couple in 4th, and run one that recently ended before completion, also in 4th. I’m currently in the process of preparing to run another game in GURPS 4th, with a single player. I’ve heard of a number of other systems, but neither read nor used them, including Hackmaster, Call of Cthulhu, and more.

  151. Flying Dutchman says:

    I started play with D&D 3rd edition at a pretty young age. We eventually partially upgraded to 3.5, using some of the rules we liked and some not. We eventually made our own Sci-Fi Space Opera system, a spin-off of the d20 rules set, and currently under construction is a completely new system with total freeform and focus on roleplaying and realism in combat situations.

    I prefer, as a DM, still our house-ruled D&D 3e, its the system I know best, but when I’ve completed the beta of our own set of rules in a few months, I hope it’ll grow on to me as D&D has.

    As a player, I prefer Mage; which is completely freeform (at least, we played it like that)

    The system I’ll end up using is the system that truly enacts “sky’s the limit”; I find all three systems I’ve tried to be very limited, which is fun in a certain way, but not at all realistic.

    @ Ludo; we played “l’ouil noir”, the Dutch version “Oog des Meesters”… I didn’t really like it that much. Didn’t know it was in French though…

  152. Ethan says:

    What gaming system did you start with when you were learning the game?
    I started with AD&D (1st edition), though I doubt that we were actually following many of the rules.

    What's your preferred gaming system when you're running a game?
    Rifts/Palladium or D&D 4th ed.

    What system do you prefer as a player? (For some people this is different from #2.)
    Rifts/Palladium or D&D 3.5.

    And because we live in an imperfect world: What system do you actually end up using?
    I’m currently running D&D 4 and playing in a D&D 3.5 campaign.

  153. Dave says:

    1. Metamorphosis Alpha
    2. D&D.. I guess 3.5.. the players seem to know it best so combat goes well.. I wish people would play GURPS… or.. if I could find anyone who’s heard of it.. Theatrix.

    I also now DM with Neverwinter Nights.. honest. Check it out.

    3. Whatever system the GM actually feels comfortable with.. I once ran a game where the players could roll up a character with any rules they wanted.. and we used their system for their character.. it was pretty cool.

    I love playing DM’d games of Neverwinter Nights.. even in a DM’d campaign that takes place in modern times.. on a space ship… with aliens..

    4. Neverwinter Nights.. I don’t have to clean up the house.

  154. Michael says:

    1) DnD 1 (back in ’91)
    2) DnD 3.5
    3) DnD 3.5
    4) DnD 3.5

    Normally, every new campaign we us the most current version of DnD. In retrospective, ADND2 was awful, wo played it though. Guess next campaign will be DnD4, but only if we come to the conclusion that high-level combats will not be umplayable, hour-long calculator orgies as in 3.5

  155. mister k says:

    1)Advanced Dungeons and Dragons was the first system I ever played, with a school teacher as dm who enjoyed repeatedly killing our low level characters. Ah, the amount of level 1 wizards with d4 hit points I got through…..
    2)Currently, the only system I have run is Dark Heresy, which I enjoy the fluff of, but the combat system is clunky and depressing.
    3)L5R is pretty awesome, but I am just about to try WOD for the first time, so we shall see
    4)Bit of everything, at the moment, as I am lucky enough to be surrounded by many choices. Time is more a limitation on me than variety…

  156. #1: The first game I ever picked up was Palladium’s Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and Other Strangeness. The first game I ever started playing with a group was Shadowrun.

    #2: In my highschool days, I was running Shadowrun 2.0, but when I got married and found friends that wanted to play D&D, I was running 3.0. Now that I’m divorced, the game I’m about to run is D&D 4e, with a homebrew realm.

    #3: I like the D20 system. The system in Exalted was also interesting for me, and it was a lot of fun to play. Shadowrun has become too odd since the 2nd Edition (I saw the 4e books the other day, and couldn’t compare the excitement I had in the old system to the new system.)

    #4: I’m liking the look of D&D4e. I think any tabletop games I play (as well as run) in the future will have to run from that system. There’s a more epic feel to it, imo.

    #5: D&D4e

  157. felblood says:

    Not that anyone will read this down here, but whatever:

    1: DnD 3.5 ‘cuz it’s what they had at the local game shop, when we decided to teach ourselves DnD.

    2: BESM 3rd Edition. Whatever setting I feel like running this week, can easily be crammed into the effects based system. I don’t even have to stat new monsters. I can just pull out genaric melee fighter 6/3/3 and tell them he’s an orc, or a wookie, or a space slug man, or a town guard.

    Mixing up the magic/psionics rules based on setting takes a bit more work, but once you get the knack for it, changing genres takes a few minutes. –assuming you know where you’re going when you leave station, and you’re not just winging it, which takes longer.

    3: A tie between the preceeding.

    On the one hand, building a character with four different classes and some obscure feats, to get the feel i’m shooting for, so he can knock of battalions of cookie cutter guys whose HP my cousin knows by heart, is great fun, if you have the time, and you’re in the right mood.

    On the other hand, if you want to play an interesting concept character, without worring about what prestige classes it’ll take, or what level you’ll need to be before you central gimmick is available, BESM or some other Tri-Stat brand, is fast and virtually stress free.

    4: None. Plans are to move our games to thursdays, because of the months long delay, caused by one player’s wifes quest for a deer, this season.

    I’ll believe it when I see it.

    Speaking of— I’d better find my genaric NPCs templates before Thursday. I’m supposed to GM.

  158. Namfoodle says:

    1. Basic D&D boxed set, then quickly upgraded to AD&D 1st edition.

    2. Right now I’m running a D&D 3.5 game using the Pathfinder Campaign materials published by Paizo. I know the 3.5 rules well, and so does my gaming group. The Paizo materials are really well done.

    3. I like playing D&D 3.5, it’s what I’m most familiar with. I liked playing Rolemaster back in the day, the Crit charts were fun. Iron Heroes is fun too, but it’s basically a variant 3.5 system.

    4. Except at conventions, I almost always play D&D 3.5.

  159. Changling Bob says:

    My first experience of roleplaying was 3.5 D&D. I’d had it for ages before I started playing, then jumped right in the deep end GMing rather than playing, but that’d be the first.

    My favorite game to run is Paranoia. And in this case, by ‘run’ I mean ‘kill PCs and ignore the rules in as entertaining way as possible’. Last game I ran I didn’t have enough prep time for actual character generation, so horribly combined the system with Risus, only instead of using d6, using a pool of dice consisting of whatever I had at the time. I also had at the time a scatter die and an artillery die from Warhammer. They were frequently rolled.

    My favorite to play is probably Exalted, although this is probably skewed by the proportion of the time that I actually get to play instead of GMing, but leaping at 70mph with a giant hammer is good fun.

    Currently, I’m playing in a Serenity game, as well as sharing DMing a D&D 4e. I’ve also got a Changeling (nWoD) game lined up for when Serenity finished. The joys of chairing a roleplay society at uni :)

  160. Brandon says:

    Started with AD&D 2nd edition, initially by way of the SSI Gold Box games (Champions of Krynn popped my D&D cherry).

    Played this for years before taking a brief detour into Earthdawn, an extended detour into GURPS, then some muddling around with BESM 2nd revised and D&D 3.0 and 3.5.

    I own dozens of other games that are better (on paper) than any of these systems I’ve actually played, but I’ll be damned if I can find anyone to actually play them with me.

    So, looking for Cleveland area players willing to try something new ;)

  161. Jordan says:

    1. First game ever was Star Wars D6 RPG.
    2. Favorite game ever to GM was a homebrew world using slightly modified 7th Sea mechanics. My wife’s character once yelled out “I want Opium!” While attempting to get inside of a cultist lair in the middle of an upscale district of town. She was promptly grabbed and taken inside before the party could react and save her. It has become our groups cry whenever someone does something crazy, but just crazy enough to be worked in.
    3. Favorite to play is Warhammer Fantasy Role Play 2nd ed
    4. We bounce around between games. Current game is WFRP 2E.

  162. Ronald Bacon says:

    1. I started in high school with D&D 3.0. (I’m 19)
    2. D&D 4e tends to be my favorite system to run. I’ve memorized it and set-up is fairly easy for me.
    3. I LOOOOOVE GURPS. Probably because of the variety of characters you can have. A game we have on hiatus is a modern paranormal game that uses all kinds of genres. We’ve seen everything from magic to aliens to angels.
    4. Right now I’m running a 4e game, a Serenity game, a Scion game, AND I’m playing in a 3.5 Ravenloft game. (as a Samurai no less!)

  163. Elvenblade says:

    1)D&D 3.0
    2)D&D 3.5
    3)D&D 3.5
    4)D&D 3.5

    3.5 is great.

  164. Roninsoul7 says:

    1. The game system I started with was way back in grade 4, Marvel Superheroes, and interesting system that worked off of d100’s.

    2. My preferred gaming system when I am running is actually the second edition Shadowrun.

    3. My preferred gaming system when playing… I am almost always running the games for everyone else, the few times I get to play something I like is the Heroes Unlimited second edition. Super heroes, but nothing on the level of superman.

    4. In my imperfect world, DnD of some sort is what I usually end up running. It is the most widely known tabletop game out there, and so usually the one everyone wants to play first (I have had people who don’t even like the idea of tabletop gaming know what DnD was roughly.)

  165. plugav says:

    1. Oko Yrrhedesa (The Eye of Yrrhedes) – a simple, d6-based system meant as a gateway to RPGs, designed by the guy who wrote the Witcher books.

    2. Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay 1st edition, stripped to its most basic mechanics. My second game. I like the low magic setting and that the system doesn’t force power gaming as I feel D&D does.

    3. Warhammer 2nd edition. Because it does things better than 1st edition (but I don’t own the book and haven’t even been GM for a few years now).

    4. D&D 3.5. A system I don’t like and can’t seem to master. My DM’s an amazing storyteller, though. And we only have time to play one campaign, so it’s always this one.

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