What Games do you think are Neotrad?

[pemerton]

Generally I think that neo-trad styles of play are not all that far from trad in terms of their mechanical design and a lot of their basic process. There are specific things that are HELPFUL, added ways to flag character concept elements, ways to trigger and manage plot arcs under greater player control, etc. However many trad games are played with some of that mindset anyway. A game like 4e can spin in that direction for sure, with the players selecting all the elements of character build, including all their items. There's a very rich milieu that ties into the character stuff, so it is VERY easy for the GM to understand "oh, I'm supposed to run something with Demons" or whatever.

Notice, though, how many of the "boxes" 4e D&D ticks:

*Asymmetric gameplay (GM doesn't roll in skill challenges; GM doesn't use PC-build rules to create combat antagonists);
*Clear agency for the PCs, at least sometimes (I'm a Dwarf so I fight giants; I'm a devotee of the Raven Queen so I fight undead and Orcus; etc);
*Chekhov's gun mechanics (getting rid of much of the mechanical cruft of earlier versions of D&D);
*Bounded bookkeeping (fewer lists to be reference in play (cf during build/prep), monster builds on a standard template, etc);
*No rule zero.​

I think some of the more trad RPGs do have both build and resolution rules that favour GM-driven play in virtue of GM-driven prep (especially the need for map and key resolution in so many RPGs). So even when the mindset is there, the execution is harder - similarly, and as mentioned in another current thread, my group was trying for something like "story now" with Rolemaster, but there are features of RM that don't help and indeed actively hinder.

 

[pawsplay]

I'm not sure where silver weapons come into it.

I'm talking about a system like AD&D, that has - for instance - a price list for animals that will almost never come into play. Or Rolemaster, that has - as part of PC gen - rules for generating hand, foot and head size. These systems have rules that do not satisfy the "Chekhov's gun for mechanics" principle - it is not implicit in the system that these rules will be used, and it is certainly not implicit that they will be used regularly.

They are there to serve other purposes - roughly, a sense of "completeness" that is part of a certain simulationist ethos in RPG design.

Silver weapons do exist to be used. You don't have gold weapons, copper arrows, etc. just to have them. And the prices for animals are in there, because players sometimes want to buy animals. There are a lot of other things someone could buy, that don't have price lists in AD&D. But it's strange to say silver weapons exist out of a sense of completeness... they exist to overcome the invulnerability of lycanthropes and some other supernatural creatures.

Animal prices are relevant in the same way the street names of Waterdeep are relevant. That's worldbuilding information. Not a set of hooks, but just generally relevant. It's not philosophical or part of some deep design paradigm.

I've never played a version of Rolemaster that has head and hand size, although I'll take your word it exists. That just sounds like irrelevant detail.

 

[pemerton]

it's strange to say silver weapons exist out of a sense of completeness

I have not said a single thing about silver weapons in this thread. I don't know how they're relevant.

Animal prices are relevant in the same way the street names of Waterdeep are relevant. That's worldbuilding information.

The point of the blog is that neotrad play eschews that sort of thing:

Players Characters are created with a specific mission or assignment, or other meaningful tasks to fulfill in the game. They are not simply created as part of the fictional world, they have a close link with the game itself. . . .

mechanics should not appear just to give unlikely options or false promises. Once a rule has been designed, there should be a fair probability that it comes into play in every session. In this way, players can be sure that everything they learned is useful and the GM has not to memorize useless rules. This is also true for the character sheet, it should report only skills or traits that are effectively used by players.​

There are RPGs that do not exemplify these ideas. Rolemaster and AD&D are examples - and not the only ones.

 

[Umbran]

...Or at least played in a Neotrad way?

So, the main differentiator between the two styles is to which participants you look for driving the story. There isn't a whole lot of daylight between the mechanical needs for Trad or Neotrad play, and it will be hard to conclusively hang that on the system, unless the system is pointedly handing narrative control to players or GMs at specific points.

I will raise what to many is probably an obscure example: Ashen Stars. This is a Gumshoe-based sci-fi mystery procedural game, that nominally takes place in a galaxy in which the analog to Star Trek's Federation has almost fallen, and the part of the galaxy the PCs are in is has a heavy Wild West feel about it. The PCs are expected to be the crew of a small ship of freelance troubleshooters for hire, bopping around the galaxy solving murders, stopping wars from starting, and so on.

This whole setup kind of screams Trad play - if your group suddenly decides they want to strat a bakery instead of bop around the galaxy, unless the GM is good at coming up with mystery/procedurals around a bakery, you're kind of done. The game flounders if the players wander far fromthe assumed conceits. And, as a mystery/procedural, the setup of scenarios is largely in the GM's hands. But...

There's always a but...

Then you look at the system's advice to GMs for running the thing. And they heavily lean into the procedural aspects, with episodes of Star Trek and similar sci-fi as their North Star. And they load it down with advice on how to frame mysteries around hooks for various character types. And the GM is encouraged to have "B-plots", like most procedural shows do, to give a space for character development not tied to the main plot of the adventure/episode.

And then we run into a solid NeoTrad element - each player submits a personal arc for their character. The GM is expected to make these arcs the focus of many of the B-plots, and to have the A-plot run up against the personal arcs from time to time as well. And the player gets to update and maintain that arc over time...

But note that all of this is really advice, not intrinsic mechanics.

 

[payn]

One way to look at it MIGHT be that in Neo-Trad play the character is imposed on the premise and on the setting. In Narrativist play the premise is imposed on the setting and character, and in Trad/Classic play the setting is imposed on the premise and character.

This is the best thing ive seen yet for a shorthand on the topic.

This has helped me frame my playstyle in regards to the 6 cultures. When it comes to Neo-trad im more of a one shot gamer. Probably even going to use an established IP like my recent Cowboy Bebop KS. The experience is about embodying the characters for an evening and telling my version of their stories. I can see Supers leaning into this as well its a very episodic style. When it comes to narrative approach, I look to a short campaign something like Monster of the week or Bladerunner. Highly thematic in both setting and character space to the experience. Finally, I go trad for a long running campaign where the setting is the interesting driving piece along with a metaplot. Typically, a generic genre system that doesn't impose heavily the characters story (though the characters will continually rise in importance to the setting through play).

Im not saying these are the best or only ways to play them, im just saying its how I have utilized them.

 

[Thomas Shey]

The problem with RPGs is there are too many of them and I don't have time to play them all. Like @Thomas Shey said, supers games might interest you. I've heard Marvel Universe is good, and not as crunchy as Champions/Hero, but I haven't played it myself.

I suspect the issue there is where you stand on how much detail you want the system to handle in character definition. Some people are fine with just broad strokes, and if so, something like Supers RED is still going to do fine by you; it still easily has the same tendency to really focus on the character-as-defined and where they want to go.

The problem with swinging that way is that if you come from parts of OC or OC-like cultures that are fussy about how specific a character is in what it knows and can do, its not going to do it for you, and you just need something that will require a bit more handling. That doesn't necessarily mean Hero; there's a whole spread of options out there.

13th Age is a really good suggestion someone made earlier. Likewise, 4e D&D (probably you're familiar with it, but just in case), and maybe Blades in the Dark or similar games (Blood Red Blossoms is a free game based on the BitD chassis, made by the guy who did Fabula Ultima).

The only thing that's a potential issue with 13A is that, for all of its originality in some ways it can be relatively conventional in how it handles character death, so if you want that off the table you'll need to do so yourself.

 

[GobHag]

So, the main differentiator between the two styles is to which participants you look for driving the story. There isn't a whole lot of daylight between the mechanical needs for Trad or Neotrad play, and it will be hard to conclusively hang that on the system, unless the system is pointedly handing narrative control to players or GMs at specific points.

I will raise what to many is probably an obscure example: Ashen Stars. This is a Gumshoe-based sci-fi mystery procedural game, that nominally takes place in a galaxy in which the analog to Star Trek's Federation has almost fallen, and the part of the galaxy the PCs are in is has a heavy Wild West feel about it. The PCs are expected to be the crew of a small ship of freelance troubleshooters for hire, bopping around the galaxy solving murders, stopping wars from starting, and so on.

This whole setup kind of screams Trad play - if your group suddenly decides they want to strat a bakery instead of bop around the galaxy, unless the GM is good at coming up with mystery/procedurals around a bakery, you're kind of done. The game flounders if the players wander far fromthe assumed conceits. And, as a mystery/procedural, the setup of scenarios is largely in the GM's hands. But...

There's always a but...

Then you look at the system's advice to GMs for running the thing. And they heavily lean into the procedural aspects, with episodes of Star Trek and similar sci-fi as their North Star. And they load it down with advice on how to frame mysteries around hooks for various character types. And the GM is encouraged to have "B-plots", like most procedural shows do, to give a space for character development not tied to the main plot of the adventure/episode.

And then we run into a solid NeoTrad element - each player submits a personal arc for their character. The GM is expected to make these arcs the focus of many of the B-plots, and to have the A-plot run up against the personal arcs from time to time as well. And the player gets to update and maintain that arc over time...

But note that all of this is really advice, not intrinsic mechanics.

This is an incredible find, I haven't heard of the game at all before this but this is really interesting. Also I'm very looking forward to reading that GM advice.

 

[Thomas Shey]

Generally I think that neo-trad styles of play are not all that far from trad in terms of their mechanical design and a lot of their basic process.

Many of them I agree, but there's a fair number of what I think I'd call trad games that really, really want to do things where the characters are important, but not central. You'll see that in the resistance to allow players to insert setting elements into the campaign because the campaign structure is kind of assumed to take primacy over what the player wants.

While Hero isn't unlimited in the kind of setting elements it lets you put it, because of its origin as a superhero game it very much leans into a character coming into the game with a bunch of those trailing along, whether as Disadvantages (Hunteds, DNPCs) or purchasable abilities (Reputation, Wealth, position related Perks, Bases, Sidekicks). To some extent some other build systems do this too, but usually not to the same degree as they're coming in from genres originally (GURPS originally emerging from The Fantasy Trip for example) where it isn't as intrinsically common.

Its an evolutionary accident with Hero, really.

There are specific things that are HELPFUL, added ways to flag character concept elements, ways to trigger and manage plot arcs under greater player control, etc. However many trad games are played with some of that mindset anyway. A game like 4e can spin in that direction for sure, with the players selecting all the elements of character build, including all their items. There's a very rich milieu that ties into the character stuff, so it is VERY easy for the GM to understand "oh, I'm supposed to run something with Demons" or whatever. Mainly the difference between that and Narrativist play is whether character concept prevails over premise. In Narrativist play the premise imposes on and shapes the characters, forges them into something new. Character is more of a static concept, or develops along a preplanned arc in neo-trad play.

I'm not sure "pre-planned" is always true, but it I'd suspect that entirely unexpected trips in development are usually unwelcome, and if forced really unwelcome. I can see cases where aspects of a character have a--spread?--of potential ways they can go that's fine.

 

[Thomas Shey]

So, the main differentiator between the two styles is to which participants you look for driving the story. There isn't a whole lot of daylight between the mechanical needs for Trad or Neotrad play, and it will be hard to conclusively hang that on the system, unless the system is pointedly handing narrative control to players or GMs at specific points.

I think the mechanics of how a system handles death can be at least somewhat relevant; while I suspect most Trad games don't really want sudden death to be easy (because character loss tends to disrupt plot development), I'd bet on the whole they're a lot more tolerant of death outside player acceptance than Neotrad would be.

(One of the design accidents that is why I think Hero is functional here is that its source as an originally superhero game is that there's a lot of structural features and build tools that can make it very hard to get "accidental" death occurring, barring gross GM misestimation).

I will raise what to many is probably an obscure example: Ashen Stars. This is a Gumshoe-based sci-fi mystery procedural game, that nominally takes place in a galaxy in which the analog to Star Trek's Federation has almost fallen, and the part of the galaxy the PCs are in is has a heavy Wild West feel about it. The PCs are expected to be the crew of a small ship of freelance troubleshooters for hire, bopping around the galaxy solving murders, stopping wars from starting, and so on.

This whole setup kind of screams Trad play - if your group suddenly decides they want to strat a bakery instead of bop around the galaxy, unless the GM is good at coming up with mystery/procedurals around a bakery, you're kind of done. The game flounders if the players wander far fromthe assumed conceits. And, as a mystery/procedural, the setup of scenarios is largely in the GM's hands. But...

There's always a but...

Then you look at the system's advice to GMs for running the thing. And they heavily lean into the procedural aspects, with episodes of Star Trek and similar sci-fi as their North Star. And they load it down with advice on how to frame mysteries around hooks for various character types. And the GM is encouraged to have "B-plots", like most procedural shows do, to give a space for character development not tied to the main plot of the adventure/episode.

And then we run into a solid NeoTrad element - each player submits a personal arc for their character. The GM is expected to make these arcs the focus of many of the B-plots, and to have the A-plot run up against the personal arcs from time to time as well. And the player gets to update and maintain that arc over time...

But note that all of this is really advice, not intrinsic mechanics.

I suspect most games that lean into serial TV shows as their model are going to show some visible Neotrad tendencies (as most of the time such shows have established characters that stick with the show (barring outside events) and mostly reveal more about themselves rather than change significantly (there are exceptions, but I think they're mostly the writing equivalent of a player going "this character isn't really working as is and I need to tune it up in some way if I'm going to stick with it"); the only question, as you say, is whether they bake them into the mechanics or just in the intended GM-style.

 

[Pedantic]

I've had a thought swirling in my head about a trad/neotrad difference that I think might fit here, that popped up in an episode of Worlds Beyond Number. There's all kinds of improv stuff going on there at an extra system layer in general, but one thing in particular stood out, that I think might be normative. Brennan, the GM, elides the occasional decision about what the characters do. He'll pick up after establishing "while you're walking toward the mountain" without actually having a player establish they are walking to the mountain.

I think this is a significant difference, because that's generally not acceptable in trad. You can't declare actions as the GM for the PCs at all, barring extremes like actual mind control. However, I don't think it's actually a problem in neo-trad, so long as it's done with respect to the character's established arc and traits in a neo-trad game. When it happens in WBN, it's nearly always followed by a prompt for the player to elucidate on what their character feels or experiences in the proposed situation, or a choice for them to make.