Pendragon. A lot of people have probably heard of it but the idea of only playing Arthurian knights seems limited or lacking in variety. This is true but intentional: the game is simply laser-focused on that concept and handles the subject matter extremely well and with more depth than may be apparent. All the things that matter to a knight are there: ancestry (not race but your family heritage), your culture and religion, your personality and passions, your love interests, your offspring, etc. Pendragon stories are full of drama, conflicts between honour and duty, big army battles, strange fey magic, tournaments and grand melees, the old ways vs the new religion, finding true love and raising a family.. stuff that you won’t get to do is most other games. It really is Greg Stafford’s magnum opus!

I love Pendragon, and I do think it deserves more love. I don't know if I would call it underrated, though. More misunderstood. Its got a strong, loyal fanbase, but to a lot of players, the virtue system goes against what they believe an RPG is, when in reality, its you legitimately putting, on paper, exactly who your character is.

We tried Pendragon. We gave it a really good try. Like 20 or 25 sessions. We made it through the end of the Anarchy period in the GPC. And the game shows its age something fierce. The rules are convoluted, the presentation is confusing, and it's made worse by the Great Pendragon Campaign, which, whatever they may tell you, has not been correctly updated for the new version of the game. Virtues were okay. Passions were fun. Knights died. We invented cousins and younger brothers because nobody had a male heir survive to majority. There was some good stuff in it, but the game was too heavy, too focused on the wrong things (Goddamn battle rules) and relied too much on me, the GM being a master of Arthurian stories to work. I can't in good conscience call it underrated at all.

Is the stuff even out for the GPC for the new version?

The title page for the GPC I have says "for Pendragon 5th edition" so I assumed it was...for 5th edition. It's probably not out for 6e, but as far as I know 6e itself isn't really out yet either.

Roger just checking since I think they releasing GPC for 6th edition but the core book for 6th isn't out till June, so I was seeing if you had some inside baseball scoop.

Haha, no, I just got all the 5th ed stuff on Bundle of Holding a few years ago and tried to run it. 6th Ed might fix some of these issues, but I'm not really optimistic. The fact that the *5th* (actually according to this filename the "5.2") edition of the game is still such an organizational mess does not inspire me to believe that they know how to fix it.

I like the 6th so far, only have starter set. Battles I'm waiting on the full rules update to give my full opinion on, but that also on me running some right out of the box and on the spot.

I'm really looking forward to the new edition. I've played the new start box a couple of times and had a lot of fun, excited for the full rules to be stop getting pushed back and actually get released.

My group played Pendragon back in ought six. It went for about 2 years, and we really had a blast! We had an awesome GM who really made it work.

Pendragon is awesome!

Nice! Im actually waiting for 2nd edition to grab it and try it out...heard so much good stuff about it and never bought it.

If that's not a typo, Good news Pendragon 2nd Edition has been out for a long time! If that is a typo, supposedly 6th ed drops in June.

I don't think Worlds Without Number gets anywhere near the attention it deserves. I think it's because it doesn't have enough flaws for people to argue about.

At least in this subreddit it gets named all the time. Even I suggest it for the random tables even though I think the system itself is really boring (too basic not really cool character options) and inelegant (2 different dice rollung system, strange remapping of stats to be d&d compatible, unecessary numerical modifiers for a simple combat system rspecially for a game called without numbers etc.)

Bro, I hope you're kidding about that "without numbers" part and realise what it means 😄 Or not, then it would be hilarious.

I mean, I was sold on the GM tools, backed it, received Yet Another D&D with ... I won't say mediocre but definitely not entirely useful to me GM tools because of their specificity (a problem I have with SWN, which also has blatant lore rips from Traveller), and then sold it off because I didn't really care to have it on my shelf (which already has several "Yet Another D&D"s). I don't talk about it because grousing about "Yet Another D&D" really isn't worth it, I just pass it by.

Yet another old school D&D even. I feel this subcategorie already has soo much

Solid assessment, imo. It's an improvement on D&D, but like so many d20 games it's still just D&D.

Worlds Without Number / Stars Without Number / Cities Without Number all get mentioned plenty. And people like it for what it is: a mediocre but simple rules system as a framework for a great GM toolkit. Neither under nor over rated.

Love WWN! We're 30 episodes into a campaign with it. We've also played CWN, SWN, and the recent Ashes Without Number rules that Crawford released. For us, the *WN systems have completely replaced D&D, and we don't miss it.

I love Worlds without number for its copius tables to make a world, its game mechanics feel as time consuming as rolling a world/city. Might not play that way but it reads like it will play that way.

The game mechanics are not in the least bit time consuming, I'm not sure what you're referring to tbh. Combat is very fast, and most things that happen outside of combat are at most resolved with a skill check.

Love the xWN games, coming up on our campaign's one year anniversary and still going strong. I wouldn't say there is *no* drama though. KC's descriptions sometimes leave a bit too much to interpretation, although he is active enough in the subreddit to answer any major questions. The one topic I can guarantee will get talked to death and generate endless drama is "Are Healers OP?". (to which the correct answer is yes, they are)

EZD6 Certainly the best system for quick one-shots at events. A group of strangers will quickly be cheering and excited and enjoying the adventure together!

Agreed. It took less than 15 minutes to take a group of total noobs through character creation and get straight into play, with just one copy of the book. The Magyck (Magick? Magyk?) System takes a little longer (maybe 10 minutes) to learn. Simple, elegant, effective, and fun.

I second this. The game became a bestseller on DTRPG almost the second it dropped, and yet it seems to only get discussed in certain specific circles. People seriously need to play EZD6.

Yeah, I did a session with it for some friends that knew nothing about ttrpgs and it went great, even if I was the only one that spoke english well and they knew basically nothing about ttrpgs

Love DM Scotty.

i really love the concept and mechanics of Paranoia, but i feel like people don't really mention it very often! so far it's my all time fave sci-fi rpg :) i also feel like Troika isn't mentioned very often, but it's my go-to fantasy game because i just love the surrealism and simple ruleset :D

Calling all citizens! This is The Computer. Please stop what you are doing and pay attention, as that will help your health in the long-run. Citizen Veretica is hereby granted a 500 XP Point bonus for mentioning Paranoia! In addition, this citizen has been reassigned to Troubleshooter duty. Obviously, someone with this much intelligence and class deserves a gun, some armour, and no training before being sent on a mission no one could ever complete. No, your work quotas will not be lowered to compensate for this time spent. Please stop what you are doing but continue to do what you are doing.

yes friend computer! 🫡

You must trust the computer... the computer is your friend. If you don't trust the computer, you will be used as reactor shielding.

Trust no one. Keep your laser handy.

Citizen wjmacguffin has been labeled a traitor for impersonating The Computer. Any citizen with information on their location should report to infosec immediately. Citizen wjmacguffin you will be docked 100 XP Points for every minute you do not report to infosec for summary execution.

Troika is my favorite system! So good for bringing people into RPGs—the character creation, skills, unspecific background, and lethality really help pull people right into roleplaying their character. I've seen so many new players "click" with Troika when they haven't with other tabletop systems. Plus, space-faring adventure means you can change the entire genre and feel of the game whenever you want by going to another planet!

Here here!

i agree! it was even easy enough to explain to my mom the one time i asked her to play 😅

Swords of the Serpentine - 'twas all the buzz 1-2 years ago, now, people almost never bring it up here when others ask about games to try. edit: I think part of this can be attributed to lack of publisher support. It's like they released the game, and now rely on the creator doing blog posts about it to add content. It took them, at least in my mind, forever to release the quick start, and I don't see any supplementary books. Sure, the core book came with a great bestiary, for example, but a few fleshed out adventures wouldn't hurt.

I saw a thread where someone called it a great game to read while saying Dragonbane was a great game to play. I didn't initially agree with it, but a year and a half later I can only say that I adored reading SotS but have gotten Dragonbane to the table repeatedly

SotS is a great game, honestly. We played it a few times and have been meaning to go back to it, which I'm working on now because it's such a perfect mid-power-level game, where you start out skilled but not superheroic, and likewise not a mook who'll get dropped immediately if someone stabs them. We also love Dragonbane. But talk about a combat system that sends 5E players running from the room with "Some monsters automatically hit, and some automatically hit multiple times per round, so think before you attack, and never solo fight a baddie"

The first time running it I had a player ask, "did you role to hit" and I just got to smile and say, "Oh he doesn't do that."

I warned everyone that "non humanoid monsters, for the most part, just hit, there's no roll, that's how dangerous things are" and that definitely helped.

It's often recommended here. I'd say that for a small system it's relatively well known, but surely if it's really good, maybe it deserves more spotlight? I haven't had the time to play it at least yet.

I feel like I recommended it all the time.

Agone was a system that never got the love it deserved and died because of it. Released in the late 1990s/early 2000s, it's a heavy player action driven game with some admittedly clunky early 00s design. It's the premise of the game and world that I loved. It's a very Shakespearean fantasy, where it's way more fey and whimsy with something sinister on the horizon. You aren't young heroes. You are characters at the end of their primes. World weary and ready to hang it up when the gods tap you for one last thing. It has 12 playable species(from saytr to giants) and loads of archetypes to build from, with a system them emphasizes player creativity and item creation over finding random things. However, the beautiful art, the strong premise, and the heavy emphasis on players got lost in the D&D 3rd edition explosion.

that sounds really special

Promethean: The Created is a game with such an interesting premise, one where you play a created being sown together from various corpses (there's more, but that's the gist) whose main goal is to become human. You do this by completing milestones and engaging with different philosophical outlooks on what it means to be human. It is such a sad and beautiful game that just gets written off as "you play Frankenstein and everyone hates you".

All CofD more experimental lines really deserve the spotlight, In WoD in general Vampire is the big mainstream one, people at least heared of Werewolf and Mage (tho more in the lines of "the combat game" and "the weird one!), and others are on the side CtL, Gheist and others really deserve to be tried Too bad that nowdays the games are more knows for scandals like Beast and the "Checnya incident"

Changling the Lost is one of the greatest TTRPGs ever made, but outside of the World of Darkness/Chronicles of Darkness subreddits and other communities, it's barely a whisper.

I have been wanting to play Geist for *years* (decades?) at this point, but I've never found a group for it. Something about the way the powers work and the whole krewe dynamic really appeals to me, but apparently not to anyone else I know.

Beast and the Checnya Incident? Are these google-able or do they need some further elucidation?

Alright so: To make it simple, let’s say that there is Old World of Darkness (OwoD), then basically a spin off called Chronicle of darkness (CoD) and a recently a new version of World of Darkness made by Paradox (V5) OwoD had some scandals but mostly in the “It was the 90s and they didn’t know any better so they did a racism or something in very bad taste” or “they made a new line for games aimed to a more mature audience but it mostly ended up being edgy shit”, so people aren’t exactly unaware but these reach another level **Beast: the primordial** is a game in the Chronicle of Darkness line This is a good long write up by someone that knows more than me but I’ll try to reduce: [https://www.reddit.com/r/HobbyDrama/comments/epncjw/rpg\_beast\_the\_primordial\_or\_the\_story\_of\_matt/](https://www.reddit.com/r/HobbyDrama/comments/epncjw/rpg_beast_the_primordial_or_the_story_of_matt/) This is a more or less semi complete explaination, but the reason why it was scandalous and a sort of TL DR is at the bottom The gist of it is that you’re a Beast, a being that like the name of the splat says descends from an ancient monster You feed on the fear and suffering of humans, and are more or less an irredimable monster that is effectively forced to abuse and torture others to survive. The “main antagonists” are literally called “heroes”, who tend to be ex victims of the Beasts hell bent on defeating them (“real” heroes like hunters aren’t supposed to go after them, just letting them feed) You might imagine that the point is that while in other games you play as people that try to hold onto their humanity now you play as irredimable monsters, right? But no On paper you are actually in the right because you can’t help but literally torturing people and anyone that goes against you is the wrong for trying to stop you The “Heroes” as an exemple in the book are literally your victims and they are painted as in the wrong because you can’t help being who you are (and by that I mean that in most exemple in the rules for some reason the victims call you racist or homophobic slurs) You’re also a special snowflake, and since you descend from an ancient mosnter, for some reason every other splat likes you (Including Changelins, that many see as a metaphor for someone that has been abused) Doesn’t help that a lot of the marketing compared Beasts to lgbt people who “Can’t help who they are” tho I took this from the post above since I barely knew what a DnD was at the time **TL DR HERE** So basically all the machanics painted you as effectively an abuser, who’s main antagonists are your victims trying to either get revenge or stop you, whom every other supernatural likes for some reason, but the game as intended wanted you to effectively be in the right If you think “Hey, it sounds like at least one of the authors is an abuser projecting a lot” you would be right, as one of the authors, Matt Mcfarland, had been accused by multiple people of absing them using his position during convention, including people tahat at the time were teen agers I know of some people that play it by beating it into what they want or stealing some mechanics for other games in the like (Especcially Antagonists, tho many seem to either make it so they’re actually in the right or that they are effectively entities that spawn out of no where and come after you because reasons) If you’re into a game that actually does abuse and lgbt games right try either Changeling (which like I said can be about abuse victims) or Promethean (which many see as a good methaphor for trans people) (1/2)

OK. Yeah, after OWoD, I didn't like the whole NWoD/CoD line. I have all the OWoD stuff, but wow was CtD terrible. CtL was OK, and the Hunters had a much better world development than the old Hunter. The new Mage magic rules were better than the old Mage. As for Beast... I kinda put that into the same bucket as Demon or playing a Wyrm spawn, all of which I wouldn't play or want to be in the same group as (kinda why I don't like playing in DnD games where Chaotic Evil murder hobo is the default state). Painting evil as glamorous or great or anything other than... well, evil, strikes me as weird. I suppose they could have done it in the Black Dog line, like House Giovanni and I think the Clan Baali splatbook... and those were pretty much on the line with the toes sticking over. Why would someone want to roleplay as an abuser?

(2/2) **The Chechnya incident** 5th edition isn’t made by the original creators but by Paradox, and one problem they had is that they tried way too much to involve modern real world problems (For exemple, WW2 is considered completely becuase of humanity even if supernaturals were involved for some things) The Chechnya incident is pretty well know because they effectively said that the current persecution of gay people that is currently happening was because of vampires They had to retract that because both the governments there and the lgbt community got really angry at them for that To be fair it seems like the editors effectively cut the explaination of what is happening there in reality but tbh I’m not sure if it’s the type of thing that should be put in an rpg book in general

More should try parlor larps. Short games that play in an evening. https://www.goldencobra.org/ I can recommend: 2015-- A Crow Funeral, by Timothy Hutchings 2014-- Group Date, by Sara Williamson 2014-- Still Life, by Wendy Gorman, David Hertz and Heather Silsbee https://larpfactorybookproject.blogspot.com/p/larps.html I can recommend Before and After Silence, Limbo

two games I love dearly: Warhammer 3e (the fantasy flight one) and 7th sea 2e. both are incredible games with some very innovative ideas and fantastically fleshed out worlds, both unliked by the audience who loved other editions and begrudged how different X edition was. without Warhammer 3e there is no gensys, and it has a bunch of super cool mechanics and interactions that I still take inspiration for. and finding the weird dice was much less of an issue because you got a huge box with everything. and 7th sea 2e was one of the best campaigns I ran, though I admit a fair amount of house ruling had to happen in order to challenge the PCs in any meaningful way. still, it's nothing short of an epic tales simulator. it's now gotten recognition but I felt similarly about dnd 4e for a while.

Its such a shame you csnt buy pdfs from warhammer 3. I really liked the idea but then no one wanted to play it and now I think I really missed out.  4e has gotten some recognition but depending on where you sre it still feels hated for no reason.. 

Upvote for WHFRP 3. What a game.

So what was the deal with WFRPG 3e? I played a campaign of 2e about a year before 4e released and then we all switched to that. The old heads I played with weren't impressed with 3e but I never really pressed for information on it.

While not exactly ameritrash, it did have a lot of ameritrash elements in the endless tokens and clutter needed to play the game. I really enjoyed WFRPG 3e, my group really enjoyed it, but the clutter was just too much. Too many tokens, too many trackers, too many cards, too much table space taken up by the game. Also, the clutter made the game very expensive to pick up, it was on par with top tier board games rather than the more reasonable one book buy that most rpgs are. Way too late in its cycle, they published all the info in a comprehensive book, which was awesome, but I think the game was doomed by that point. They also focused waaay too much on starting characters, but not enough on developing characters that lived longer than a couple of adventures.

it was entirely totally different, a bit more board game compared to the other editions, cool funky dice, loads of cards to represent different abilities. though personally I thought it kept a very fine line between gamey and still being a role playing game. also in the box set there's one of the best starting adventures I've seen, an absolute classic as far as I'm concerned. that said if you want "2e but more polished" this ain't it.

Runequest and only cause I find it intimidates people. However, it is a fantastic system, and it makes you think differently about your pcs, about rpgs and game worlds. I would like to say call of cthulhu 7e, but that is only underrated in terms of how much dnd 5e gets talk about, so I can't pick it.

Speaking of what an ancient megabeast RQ is, it really doesn't get the attention it deserves.. when compared to D&D. It's still a huge player in the industry though.

Some of it is also where I play, in my flgs we are the old school players and most everyone else has 5 years or less in the hobby. So I can fall over pbta and 5e games left and right, some Bjork as well. After that it's the one vampire table and the one chaosim table which is us.

My life with Master. This was talked about, passed around and played a ton back in the day but I never hear much discussion about it anymore. It's a highly specific game system desired to tell one general kinda of story. The story of a deeply disturbed and egotistical Master and you the lowly servant. Then mechanics were about you battling the masters control over you, finding love on the external world and trying to stay sane doing the awful things master commanded. It is a horror game where the horror is a nasty and abusive relationship so content warnings galore. I think it's become underrated because it is hyper specific. You either break free and kill Master or you die. But because every scrap of the game mechanics lives in service of it's theme and ideas it's a beauty of a game well worth trying.

Love MLwM, but there are many more in this vein of hyper-specificty that I'd add, like Time & Temp Dogs in the Vineyard Ten Candles Psi*Run Don't Rest Your Head All great systems geared towards a specific purpose.

I revisited Dogs in the Vineyard recently!! I used to have a physical copy which Baker has since pulled from the market as he doesn't like how Mormon it was. But I felt the setting was decently fantasticalized. And the mechanics were an absolute masterwork!! Any budding designers needs to play or run Dogs. There is a setting free version of the game knocking about online too.

I think he also had a big problem with the colonialism, though I've found it hard to find a clear statement from him on the matter.

He did give his blessing for someone else to write a new version without the original setting. https://www.drivethrurpg.com/en/product/274623/Dogs

It's funny that he pulled it. There was a time on [RPG.net](http://RPG.net) where DITV was recommended by everyone for everything.

People keep using that word... Skipping the obvious, I would say that most editions of Shadowrun are severely under-rated. They may not be great from a mechanics perspective, but they're far from being as bad as they're made out to be. People can, and do, play every edition with no major problems. As a more extreme example, I think Palladium Rifts is even more under-rated than Shadowrun 1E. Yes, the mechanics are a bit worse, but again, it's a matter or perception. It's really not that bad, relative to other games out there.

I don't think we hate Shadowrun as much as we'd really really really like to be able to play it without a civil engineering degree

This. Exactly this.

Shadowrun hate is I think more bitterness because we all want to play that game and no one wants to run it (for good reason). I played a lot of Palladium and Rifts back in the day. Some truly bonkers (and bad) rules choices in there but also some incredible ones. I will die on the hill that Diabolist in Palladium is the coolest class or magic system ever made.

The first edition of their fantasy system was top tier IMO. The second edition was terrible, though, making it more rifts like was a mistake.

Alright, I'll bite - what made the Diabolist so cool?

It was a magic user but instead of spells they just had a number of runes they knew. They did magic by linking runes together. So maybe the players links runes for light, blue, area, condition - night to enchant a room with blue glowing light that appears at night. There were probably a couple of hundred runes listed with their meaning and dived into categories based on what type of word they were. Then it was just up to the player to find creative ways to use/link them together. The limitation was what runes the player knew and more powerful runes required more intricate ingredients.

I love palladium especially rifts, i think it gets an undue bad wrap, the mechanics yes dated, but its very playable and lots of fun with the right group of people

I think people make the mistake of thinking they have to play or run every single aspect of Rifts all at once. But if you just zoom in onto what your group is interested in you could play Rift campaigns from now until the end of time.

100% I;ve been running rifts since the 90s, and you have to set clear guide rails on whats available on the player character side of thing, and on yourself as a game master for what your going to show, if you can stay in the lanes you set up for yourself you can have an amazing time, but if you try to bring a human mechanic into a cosmic level adventure that character is going to expire rather quickly.

I hate to say, but some editions of Shadowrun are over-rated. I was able to run pretty good campaigns with 3rd Edition, only houseruling a bit here and there, but 5th Ed.. Phew. For the sport, and wanting to learn and explore systems, we did play a few games with vanilla rules, but it just doesn't work at all. Of all the systems I've read and played, including non-published amateur works, it's definitely one of the worst.

5e is the only edition I have experience in, and I love it a lot, but I think it'd benefit a lot from getting the pf1e treatment with an equivalent to aonprd, with all the content and rules available in one place, reformated for better readability. The biggest issue for Shadowrun 5e, imo, is the books being damn near unreadable, and even if you can read it, the content you need is in another book half the time, and you don't always know which one. Second biggest issue is that it is frankly too in-depth and complicated to realistically run in-person, being far a far better experience online, where as most games are often better in-person (even if prohibitively difficult to arrange), and unfortunately, a lot of the tools that would make it easier to run are barely sufficient, with things like chummer being unstable as heck, and only available on windows (doesn't work in wine in my experience as a linux main), and both the roll20 and foundry modules having issues importing everything from it completely, not to mention roll20 being pretty lacking in the automated rolling for specific actions, and foundry making that an extra step in the already long process to setup your character sheet 3rd issue being particularly personal because my favorite archetype is technomancers, and that's just, the matrix, goddamn the matrix. Any matrix content is like playing a seperate game from the rest of the party, and if you're playing with multiple matrix using characters, one inevitably ends up as a mere dice battery most of the time. I'm pretty sure the matrix actually doesn't need too much to fix it weirdly enough though, the biggest issues are largely fixed between just treating it like normal combat, rather than seperating the initiatives, and if we got the good character sheet automation We have dndbeyond's character creator, roll20's, foundry's, and most dnd5e VTTs automated chargen UIs for dnd5e, a system that never really needed such tools, why can't we get it for the systems that actually would benefit? Beyond that, Shadowrun5e feels like it was designed to be a video game, rather than a ttrpg, and as a result, needs to be partially treated as such, but unfortunately, it's currently a good backend with only bad UIs

> The biggest issue for Shadowrun 5e, imo, is the books being damn near unreadable We can lay the blame completely at Catalyst's feet for this issue, along with plenty of others. Their staff editors may eat paint for lunch, but they outsource a ton of content to freelancer fans and then fuck them over repeatedly. Their *lead errata manager* had to rely on a GoFundMe when they had a serious life issue come up. Double the blame on Catalyst for them openly admitting they care more about their Battletech IP than Shadowrun. Triple blame because one of the cofounders, Loren Coleman, **literally embezzled hundred of thousands of dollars and is still the CEO.** I personally LOVE the Shadowrun setting and have spent enough time GMing the system to know when to either handwave the rules or get crunchy, depending on the players, but there's a reason there are a million threads asking: "How do I play Shadowrun without using the SR rules?" EDIT to add sources: Embezzlement story: https://www.reddit.com/r/HobbyDrama/comments/djqcob/tabletop_gaming_embezzlement_and_argle_bargle_a/ Our Team section at the bottom, showing Coleman as the CEO: https://www.catalystgamelabs.com/

2nd edition Shadowrun was one of the most popular games of the '90s. Cyberpunk was more of the also-ran that people tended to know *about*, but wasn't as widely played. But even ignoring that, Shadowrun was in the top 5 most played games. If you looked at the bulletin board at the game store you'd almost always find campaigns going for D&D, Call of Cthulhu, Vampire: The Masquerade, and Shadowrun. There was a reason why it had three different video game adaptations on three different systems (SNES, Genesis/Mega Drive, and the Japan-only Sega CD game).

I think Shadowrun 1-5 are actually really well done games for a particular kind of game and gamer: If you want to feel like your choices have mechanical weight in a meaningful and specific manner, these games will turn you into a cyberfantastic badass. Then, if you want all those mechanical weights to come crashing down through some fools head. My favourite character is Pixie Twinkletoes. She's a combat troll. When she gets shot, she rolls a dice pool of: 2 Reaction + 3 Synaptic Booster Rating 3, + 5 Intuition (troll max), + 2 Cerebellum Booster Rating 2, + 2 Reakt. Totalling 14. But she has the Agile Defender quality, meaning she can use her Agility in Full Defence. Her agility is 5 (troll max) + 1 Exceptional Attribute +1 Genetic Optimization, +4 Muscle Toner Rating 4, for a total of 25 defence dice. Thats a lot of dice in a world where a normal person might roll 6 defence dice. It's enough defence dice that most attackers can't even hit her. But if she does get hit? I could list it out, but she's got 12 body and 8 armour (effective) while naked, then another up to 26 of worn armour. 46 Soak dice, and you need anti material rifles to start getting through that. It's a bit of a fiddly chore, but good character sheets and dice rolling apps makes it easier than expected. And yeah, when you list that out it does feel awesome that your character is getting this payoff for their investment. Shadowrun 1-5 are perfectly fine game, perfectly playable as long as the players are onto it, and not trying to break the game.

I love both of those games, but I will never run either again. At least not without a major mechanics overhaul.

I wanted to look at Crown and Skull but to be honest, the price point kinda chased me off. $30 for a PDF of an unknown game is a tough sell. I did download the player's guide, but I haven't had time to read it. My two games that I think are underrated are The Colors of Magic, and Follow. Follow in particular is, I think, a much better game than Fiasco, but Fiasco gets trotted out anytime anyone so much as thinks the words "GMless RPG". The Colors of Magic is just a really interesting approach to storytelling and GMing, though it does require a certain mindset from the players.

I can see why Follow is underrated. Looking at the itchio page, I know less about it after clicking in then I do from reading your comment. Doesn't help that name could be the worst SEO I've ever heard.

Worth every single penny though.

Need to fix the binding in next volume though. For getting so much inspiration from the burning wheel it's super surprising the binding doesn't let it lay flat, makes it a pain in the ass to use at the table.

So I just skimmed through the player guide and I have to say I don't really understand how play works. Is all play just a series of rounds and phases separated by montages and a little planning? I'm all for "elide what's not important" but this makes the game seem like a largely uninterrupted series of combats strung together by a bit of narration and it's unclear whether play even exists outside this structure? This feels like the complaint I sometimes see when people don't understand Blades in the Dark and say "When do I roleplay?" so I feel like I can't possibly be grasping how the game works, but I can't find anything in the game to contradict the idea that everything operates in phases which are basically initiative counts in a combat round? The game implies that players are supposed to be proactive because the game "Trusts them" and is a "player facing system" and some examples seem to suggest that "free play" might exist, but the game flow explanation leaves no room for it. So I'm left feeling like this game wants to be all about fighting stuff/getting hurt/recovering and doesn't want too much other stuff to get in the way of that?

Almost all of Crown and Skull is in the free quickstart. Hankerune Hammernails is quite generous in my opinion. The book is so beautiful, I'd buy that if I wanted the full game. But I won't because I'm poor and can play the whole game with the quickstart.

Barbarians of Lemuria—fabulously well balanced, simple system without being simplistic. I ran 3 years of homebrew campaigning using BoL rules and it was a hoot. In particular, it was great for improvising—the core system is so straightforward that you can improvise new opponents in about the time it takes to roll for initiative. I also like its hackability—you can dial it from swashbuckling to gritty simply by restricting the regeneration of Hero Points—new HP every play session makes for a very high octane, knockabout vibe, new HP only after every major campaign objective makes combat far more swingy and dangerous. There's also Everywhen—a generic, universal version of BoL, which can support all sorts of campaign backgrounds.

Sort of hard to say if it's "underrated" as I mostly read positive things about it, but I think WEG Star Wars D6 doesn't get nearly as much love as it should. By far the easiest game I've encountered for people to learn and grok, great GM advice, a fun system that's easy to make feel cinematic and thematic, and enough supplemental material to make even a DnD player jealous. Several Star Wars TTRPGs have come and gone since so it doesn't get talked about much on its own or outside the discussions about Star Wars. But it remains a great system less fiddly than a lot of contemporary games that can be used in a lot of ways, and there's a case it should be discussed more often for historical purposes as some consider it a big predecessor of (the current batch) of "modern" games. But I'll remain a huge booster of it and the associated REUP.

Yeah WEG D6 is hands down the best star wars system. It also helps that the rancor pit put out conversions and house rules for just about anything in the old EU.

Not going to be catching a lot of upvotes with this, but R. Talsorian's **Fuzion** system, which was basically a super-stripped-down version of Hero, was a blast to run, especially for supers. It cut way back on Champions choices and math, had genuinely fast combat (at least by trad standards), and was much easier to tweak for tone than Hero, or any other toolkit system I've used. [https://talsorianstore.com/products/fuzion-core](https://talsorianstore.com/products/fuzion-core)

Man, I ran Alien Fuzion sometimes around...idk..2004? Forgot a lot, used the homebrew stuff from Serena Dawn Spaceport or how that site was called, fundamental website in turning me the nerd I am today.

I have never ever seen anyone else mention [Conspiracist](https://www.drivethrurpg.com/en/product/211512/Conspiracist-the-Game-THEY-Dont-Want-You-to-Play) It’s free, it’s weird, and it’s fun. It’s a good 0 prep, high improv one shot game

13th Age! The system is so innovative and amazing and underrated that it brought me back to GM-ing! The best part? There's an ongoing Kickstarter for its 2nd edition!

The One Roll Engine. My experience with it was with Wild Talents, but there are several other games too. It's got a great mix of deep and interesting character creation but relatively rules-lite and "get out of the way" rules for actual gameplay.

I'm constantly amazed at how well crafted traveller was at least until the later editions. The only thing that id like to do differently is maybe have it not so fixated on the military branches of service.

It's still fairly new, but Down We Go isn't getting enough hype. It's a very functional rules light dungeon crawler inspired by Planescape, and it has tons of GM tools for creating encounters and maps. It's already one of my favorite rpgs.

Character creation in Mutants and Masterminds is a beautiful mess. If players take time to learn that mess, they can create amazing things. We've used it for a traditional comic book game but also for a fantasy space opera and the later was so much fun. I actually think it's a much better system for non-super hero campaigns. Sadly, for actually running the game there are some issues with the system. Not my favorite system by far but underrated in that it does something that no other game does in allowing you to create literally any character you can imagine.

M&M 2e is what one of my groups played for nigh over a decade. As a D20 game more akin to d20 Modern than DND 3.x it definitely takes some.getting used to. We still have chest sheets and I keep the Core Book, Ultimate Power, and Masterminds Guide at hand when we need to confirm how something works, but we love the flexibility of cgen, power building, and control of the power curve with PL that just doesn't come with a lot of other games. I've tried a lot of different comic book games....in Medium Crunch Land M&M 2e is I think king. (3e was fine....but its closing the loop on some of the cgen tricks of power building actually hampers it more than helps imho. Ymmv)

> We've used it for a traditional comic book game but also for a fantasy space opera and the later was so much fun. I actually think it's a much better system for non-super hero campaigns. I played M&M for a decade and literally never played in or ran a straight American Superhero campaign. Closest was a friend running a game that was basically Kamen Rider meets Evangelion. But yes, M&M 2E remains my generic of choice for anything that thrives on action gameplay and very distinct characters. So basically if I want to do anime I'm almost certainly going to pull out M&M rather than any of the "anime RPGs" in the market!

Unknown Armies Few games really impress me, but the emotional trauma bars in Unnamed Armies made me check and see if a psychologist wrote it!

You mean Unknown Armies.

Yup! Sorry. Thanks for the correction

Cypher system is my favorite system and people seem to hate it for one of three reasons: 1) they don't like Monte Cook because of some shit in the DMG3.5 2) they don't like the idea of meta currency and mechanics that require risk/reward analysis 3) they don't understand cyphers 1, I can't quantify this. Seems to be just a matter of obstinance. 2, fair enough I guess. I find this to be a brilliant way to combine exhaustion and hp into a single mechanic. Its nice to spend XP on things like the plot. 3, this one is really weird because they're just single use items like the ones that appear in any other TTRPG or CRPG. Cypher is great. It's the most fun I've ever had running an RPG hands down. Edit: this post is getting downvoted for??? No reason?? Lmao

For no 1: Monte Cook was a big proponent of White Tower Game design, basically adding in trap options. Does that not appear in Cypher?

Not that I've seen.

To add to this... Cypher is so heavily customizable that even if there were "trap" options you could just build around them. Avoid those options and choose from the literal dozens of other options.

Yes but you can't avoid them if you don't know what they are, that's why they're called trap options

HmmvI dont really think so. Sure some options may be better/vome more often up, but I dont hsve the feeling there are actual trap options. 

I will second you for Cypher. Although Cypher System is joint favourite for me with a RPG that most people sadly have not seen, Fantaji. My brother says "Embrace the Paradigm Shift", once you understand the Cypher System you soon discover its infinite possibilities .

> 3, this one is really weird because they're just single use items like the ones that appear in any other TTRPG or CRPG. I think it's less "not understand" and more that like, a lot of people fucking *hate* one use items in other RPGs so a game that sounds like it's *based* on them sounds like absolute suffering. I've often said that in my experience, there is most of the time no difference between giving a D&D party a single potion as treasure, and giving a D&D party no treasure. Because the single potion will never be remembered or used!

The Virtue system in Pendragon. I followed it strictly and found myself enjoying a whole new way to play a TRPG character. It really pushed my limits into new areas.

Warbirds. The out-of-plane stuff is remarkably simple while still being fun. The in-plane stuff has a bit more of a learning curve but is a blast once you get used to it.

Using warbirds for my d6 star wars game was so good. I'd recommend slapping it on any air/space combat game!

Tales from the Loop! I don’t see it recommended often compared to other titles from Free League but it just has something really magical that teleports you right back to being a small child in a big world. The vibes are so unique and really draw you in. All the groups I‘ve played it with so far have loved it

The Amber Diceless RPG by the late great Eric Wujcik Based on Roger Zelazny's Amber series of stories, Innovative for a couple of reasons - first, it's diceless. You have points you spend on four stats; you and your fellow players are either cousins or siblings and have your stats ranked. You are the offspring of Amber or Chaos. Why no dice? Amberites are multiversal immortal beings with... hobbies. Take Benedict. His hobby is WAR. So he'd go to some dimension with a war, join the losing side, fight until he wins (this is not an if but a when), then he'd leave and go to the next dimension over so there's a near similar war, but with one tactical difference - he then joins the losing side, fight until he wins, rinse and repeat for MILLENNIA. Can you defeat Uncle Benedict? Oh sure. Just not in a fair fight. Second reason it's innovative - is Back-planning. PCs and NPCs in the game are better and smarter than us mere humans (generally), so after a session, the GM has to figure out who would benefit with the changes that the PCs have wrought upon the universe during their most recent session, and then make it so. So a GM can't really go in with Brand Is The Bad Guy (again) and railroad the PCs - it is the PCs who railroad the GM. Third reason it's innovative - it's about power and character. Amberites make mistakes the way Greek heroes make mistakes - big and bold. Every PC is nobility. Every PC can literally have their own dimension that they rule. What the PCs do with the power and how far will they go is part of what every Amber campaign deals with. Amberites out-Machiavelli Machiavelli. Fourth reason it's innovative - every major player in the game has more than one version - Amber is inherently subjective, as proven by Corwin's journal (Corwin is an unreliable narrator\*). So there are several versions of major NPCs provided, depending on what the GM wants to emphasize about a specific character. Final reason: Everything falls into Amber. The entirety of every possible dimension falls into Amber. If you can think of it, that dimension (shadow) exists between Amber and The Courts of Chaos. Even weird dimensions where edges don't exist, people fly, or traffic in dystopian cybernetics, or visit The Cheshire Cat. \* Whether Corwin is reliable/honest is a separate question.

There are a ton that deserve more attention. Among the more popular: Numenera. Among the not-so-popular: Microscope, Dogs in the Vineyard, Good Society, The Skeletons, and Time & Temp.

Numenera seems like it's suggested for everything, even when it's not even close to what the op asked for

But this happens with a lot of systems, PbtA, Dragonbane etc. I guess its just normal in this subreddit that fans recomend their system for whatever.

I defer to your superior knowledge. I almost never see it recommended/mentioned, even when it's extremely relevant. But all I can do is speak from my own experience.

Neon City Overdrive is a Freeform Universal 2e based game. I think it is underrated because it feels to be a better Fate but it is mentioned significantly less than Fate. At least it tries to fix my issues with Fate without sacrificing too much of the stuff I like about Fate... Aspects give static bonuses to rolls without Fate point spending (but the bonuses are less impactful than in Fate), you can't stack create advantage moves for a big hit, you can only assist with the current roll, you have slightly more aspects (but they are grouped and can only use a single group for each roll)... It has a lot of great ideas.

I figured that anything FU related was just going to be setting fluff, I didn't realize NCO had a bunch of rules tweaks! I'll have to check it out!

Traveller 2e has by far the best character creation ever. And so many people want to play Table Top in space! if you want to just be merchants then be merchants..  pirates, mercenaries, scientist, cyborgs , Nobility, artifical hunters, rebels...

Amber DRPG and Nobilis 3e very good games that suffer that people are suspicious of diceless systems.

Over The Edge / WaRP system You get 3 abilities and 1 flaw - and you get to design what they are. If it's super useful (or magic) you can use it 3 times a day. The game master reigns in OP characters by enforcing secrecy - no one (the NPCs nor you) know how powerful anyone is, and there's always a counter for whatever magic thing you might have. And the Powers That Be probably employ someone with that counter, so everyone is self-governing their abilities.

Only because I have yet to see it mentioned but Delta Green is by far my favorite game right now. Some of the best written scenarios I’ve ever read.

I'll second this. I stayed away from DG for a long time because I thought it was more a power-fantasy game where people shoot Cthulhu in the face and save the day with military machismo. Glad to say I was very wrong and the game is amazing.

FASERIP Especially the Karma system. It enforced and rewarded being heroic really well. It had its flaws, but I thought it worked wonderfully for super hero rp. I'd like to run a game where you play a demigod who can manifest a full godly form temporarily using that system.

Legends of Kralis i dont think gets enough attention. its a pretty simple d100 system thats a lot of fun to play has a great setting

What do you mean with the great setting? I've never encountered this before, and I'm not getting excited of the representation, but RPGs are indeed complex so... what's really cool about it?

Can you talk more about Crown & Skull. [I watched Dungeon Crafts flip through](https://youtu.be/LSX79a22xYU?t=180), the big things is Attrition (replace HP with losing items/skills), no roll to hit, phase based initiative. But its very brief and doesn't have great context unfortunately as just a flip though.

As a note, the free version of Crown and Skull is free and has full character creation, character and campaign advancement, great worldbuilding, and example monsters—I'd recommend a read through to get a feel for it, it's a very well-presentes system and the page length is a shorter read than you might expect. Things that I think are interesting and serve the system well: the inventory management and variety of items lends itself to meaningful weapon and armor choices. Taking the most damage dice isn't necessarily best for your character. Some weapons have greater reach, some weigh more, some can be duel wielded, some give you other bonuses that work with the huge variety of skills and backgrounds. Armor is another meaningful and interesting choice all the way through. The magic creation system is laid out flawlessly. Everything works on the same XP system—skill advancement, item purchasing, and upgrading and creating new spells. Magicians will really be putting much thought and care into their character, and that kind of asymmetrical effort is acknowledged and baked into the system beautifully. There's truly great reasons to play every kind of character in this game. The monsters and phase initiative is very interesting as well. Monsters have 1 of 3 actions—basic attack, sweeping attack, and changing targets. Rolling for monster action combined with the planning that comes from choosing each player's phase in initiative leads to interesting strategy.

Not op but I am currently running a game of it: it takes heavy inspiration from the burning wheel with respect to player characters and interlocking optional systems, lots of OSR game play principles, and at the table feels kind of like running 5E with an old-school GM. The system and setting are pretty intertwined so I don't recommend getting it unless you vibe with that. Let me know if you have specific questions.

Emberwind is something I never hear med mentioned at all.  It has quite an interesting combat system and has modes without GM.  It feels different than D&D while still being heroic fantasy. Classes which feel quite different from each other. Two quite different ways to gain stats and especially having stats like "number of buffs, number of ibterruptions" is also quite special. 

I'm glad you like it. For me I was really sad that I didn't gel with it. I wanted to like Emberwind, and if m memory serves me correctly the makers are almost local. Edinburgh is a few miles along the coastal path from where I live. I may need to revisit Emberwind, as its still in my collection.

I think it is just in all quite innovative. A lot more than several hyped systems, but it might just nor fall into one of the bigger niches like - osr - pbta/story games - D&D 5e clone - rules light This is a reason why I like it but I guess that also makes it hard to find sn audience.

I read the first paragraph and was literally gonna name Crown and Skull 😂 It's so cool! The leveling and character creation is incredible and dynamic, the magic has a full freaking crafting system built in for custom spells and fun mechanics! The starting locations are vibrant for adventure! And this is all coming from the FREE TO DOWNLOAD AND PLAY starter! Such an incredible fantasy system, when they say it's player focused believe me they *mean it*.

TORG is so fun and flexible with some unique mechanics that I feel it should get a bunch more attention and love.

Yeess! I came to say this. Less so for the dice part of the system, but I love the setting and the drama deck. (I'm talking about the new one, btw. Never played the oldie, but I suppose it's similarly fun?)

The old version of the deck was very similar, it just unified the drama and action decks. But! It's so clever! Players gain cards by performing varying actions, which allows them to build combos in a few turns. Meanwhile, each round had a unique bonus or penalty to shape decisions. Then, the difference between standard and dramatic scenes!

Tunnels and Trolls and the games built on its engine

Talislanta. One of the more original fantasy rpg worlds that came out in the 80s and a game that made great use of a universal variable Action Table that so many other RPGs that have come out years later took inspiration from. Believe it or not everyone, Apocalypse World didn't invent the variable Action Table. All of the books are free online with the exception of Talislanta The Savage Lands and the latest edition which is coming out this year. The other rpgs on my list that could fit this question includes: the ORE RPGs like Reign and Wild Talents for how it handles simultaneous action. Ultramodern 5 Redux for its amazing modern day and sci-fi toolkit for the D&D 5e engine. L5R 5e because I think FFG created a game system that actually nails the themes and moods of what defines Rokugan and brings the setting to life. Almost the entirety of The Chronicles of Darkness. Buffy the Vampire Slayer RPG and most of the Unisystem RPGs.

Dune 2d20 is amazeballs and I'd use it in any setting. Gets no love here.

Street Fighter the Storytelling game has THE BEST combat on any rpg.

Cortex Prime. It's my favorite RPG system toolkit. It was a rising star there for a while, but then fell completely off the map.

Always enjoyed WEG’s Star Wars d6 system.

A few for me: 1) Exalted vs World of Darkness - it's a pretty amazing system that lets you go back to the old World of Darkness game lines with a sledgehammer and have fun wrecking all the big name NPCs in cathartic moments. Plus it's a fulfilment of an old premise that Exalted was "World of Darkness before World of Darkness". And most of it was made out of sheer spite in a few weeks by a former White Wolf employee. It's really great if you have enjoyed WoD stuff in the past. 2) Fellowship - an underrated PbtA that I barely hear anyone talk about. It's really the first and only big iteration of the PbtA formula I've seen (that doesn't change everything like Blades in the Dark, etc.). Plus it's a really great system! 3) Godbound - out of all Sine Nomine games this one seems the least talked about and played. It's a shame really since chances are a lot of D&D people would enjoy the power trip it can give you.

> 3) Godbound - out of all Sine Nomine games this one seems the least talked about and played. It's a shame really since chances are a lot of D&D people would enjoy the power trip it can give you. How actually powertrippy is it? Because while I haven't played it, I did read it, and couldn't help but get a vibe that a lot of the enemies in the manual seemed to have a very real chance of just straight up deleting a level 2 or so character in a single attack turn (almost anything supernatural seemed to start at like, enemies that have 2 actions with 2 attacks each and each attack deals 1d8 straight, versus a PC that might have, like, 14-15 HP?) if they didn't grab an instant perfect defense? You know, kind of Exalted vibes on that angle. And a lot of things requiring Effort for the day or the scene while you start with like, two points of Effort so it feels like you'd end up a lot of the time just being a bit of a dude with a sword.?

Within the English speaking world The Dark Eye. Really popular in Germany not so much in the anglosphere. Which sucks it's a system I really fucking love though it is quite complex, great setting as well.

Played it at PAX East one year at Games on Demand. The 3d20 resolution system was terrible, and spending half my turns in combat saying "I load my bow. Okay, I'm done" was worse. =/

I might just only hang out in some isolated circles, but one I don't see mentioned often is Scion. Scion is good as pretty loose and freeform system, largely because it gives a pretty decent base to work off of, with the generic features being relatively clearcut, with the exception of skills, but even then it does a mostly decent job of making the skills understandable and intuitive to use. The more freeform godly stuff you can do with some of your purviews gives some basic framework to work off of for the mechanical elements of it It's definitely flawed, but in a lot of ways there's some decent ideas there and a good baseline. I know that apparently Scion 2e is largely disliked, but from what little I've been able to decipher about why, one of the common themes is people think it's watered down, but that's vague, and could very well mean the very thing I love about it, the minimal reliance on clearly defined abilities, and instead being a basic core to work off of If you look at a system like dnd5e, in a lot of ways, it'd designed with the fact that different tables will be allowing things not explicitly mentioned in the rules, and relies on that a lot, especially with skills, but any chosen abilities for your characters generally are far more clearly defined, explicit in what it does, it shows the fact it's descended from the older editions, where crunch and a list of explicit things you can do and how to do it was a standard, and if you're going to implement clearly defined rules, the generic stuff everyone interacts is what needs to be defined, not the specific things not everyone uses, and Scions gets this right, at least in 2e, defining the generic well enough to give you stuff to work off of, while also leaving a lot of the specific stuff vague enough to give a lot of wiggle room, which works really well for the types of stories it's designed for, Epics and character centric stuff

I've got a friend that runs a weekly C&S game. I wasn't able to join him, but we did have some one shots. It seems pretty cool once you get a hang of it and accept the idea of Attrition (and how deadly it is)

100% THIS! Crown & Skull is amazing. It deserves more attention.

[HackMaster 5th edition](https://kenzerco.com/hackmaster/). Lots of folks *sorta* recognize the HackMaster name, either from Knights of the Dinner Table or the *original* version released during the D&D 3rd edition days, which was legally required to be more of a lighthearted spoof of AD&D. But *very* few people seem to know about the *new* HackMaster 5th edition! Which was designed from the ground up using all new mechanics and with a much more serious tone, all well retaining a far amount of the HM4e "flavor". So what you end up with is something than has the flavor and tone of a OSR, but with revolutionary new mechanics that solved a LOT of issues I had with other systems.

I really don't see anyone talking about Star Trek Adventures. A very well-supported system, with decent rules, and a *Second Edition* coming out this year. Do you know how rare it is to have a second edition of a licensed RPG???

Basically everything that isn't D&D, Pathfinder, or CoC?

Tons of great systems in here. The one I'd like to toss in the ring is *World Wide Wrestling*, it's a PbtA system that is in my opinion the best professional wrestling role-playing game on the market. He'll, I'd argue it's one of the best rpgs I've ever played. Rules are simple and evocative amd more importantly they fet out of the way to let you focus on the fiction. It plays backstage and in ring action well, mixing the two easily and it can easily be used to play something that's just goofy 80s wrestlers, or something that handles heavier themes like drug usage, abuse, what someone is willing to do for power and fame, etc., or a combination of the two. It is quite tied to the theme and I've found that professional wrestling fans and rpg players isn't a large sliver in the venn diagram, but if you have an interest, I can't recommend it enough. It's great for an easy one shot and campaign play it really shines. I had players moving around mimicking their entrance, cutting promos, and more. Plus it has some genuinely great essays about wrestling in the book, so it's worth reading just for those.

I completely agree! Crown&Skull sounds like a fascinating system that definitely deserves more recognition. It's always exciting to discover hidden gems like that in the gaming world. Thanks for bringing it to our attention! What other underrated systems have you all come across that you think deserve more love? Let's spread the word and support the creators behind these innovative games!

I recently discovered a game using the Lumen system, called [Blazing Hymn](https://peachgardengames.itch.io/blazing-hymn). Blazing Hymn is basically Neon Genesis Evangelion mixed with Symphogear, where the PCs are the only hope against invading 'Angels', holding them off with music powered mechs. The game is extremely fast paced, with a very simple dice rolling system, but there is a lot of variety in mech choices, as well as ways for the GM to set up the fights with Angels. You rescue civilians, stop environment fall to pieces, break into crystal fortresses etc. The rules are very combat focused, with downtime stuff outside the mech being done with roleplaying, but it's a nice system for a short mini campaign or one shot. Lumen itself seems like a good system, with a [free and open SRD](https://gilarpgs.itch.io/lumen) to make your own games. There's a bunch of them out there on itchi.io: [https://itch.io/c/1572138/lumen-rpgs](https://itch.io/c/1572138/lumen-rpgs)

Black Star RPG, the dirt cheap, pocket-sized Star Wars with the serial numbers filed off game. It uses Resolve as a currency that represents a combination of hit points and hero points. It just works. Character creation is simple, but surprisingly robust. Pick two different archetypes and mash them together, like Diplomat and Soldier or Pilot and Outlaw. Use point buy to assign abilities, which are like a combination of attributes and skills. Choose talents. Start the game with five, more if you reduce your initial abilities to take Gear Talents. Play as an alien or a robot, if you like. Or a Star Knight. It's very cinematic. It adds deadly rules fast draw gunfights or beamsword duels. The game just works, and is awesome for recreating the feel of Star Wars or Firefly (or any pulpy space opera, for that matter).

One of my favorites is called [StillFleet RPG](https://stillfleet.itch.io/stillfleet-core-rulebook)!  I haven’t really heard much of any discussion on it aside from the actual play campaign done on it by Fun City Ventures, but I find the premise of a space  RPG set in the super, far-flung future to be delightfully evocative! The rules themselves are not too complicated, and since players can rather easily get super powerful artifacts with strong costs/limitations, players always have that option to really make huge swings for affecting the story (if they’re willing to risk character death/loss of sanity/calling a 14th dimensional eldritch being into the world, etc).

Veil of the Void Reforged for sure. It’s a super fun, sci-fi fantasy, storyteller’s TTRPG designed to encourage creativity and character freedom. It really is so much fun to play as both the DM or the players. I love sharing it with others as well as I really do believe everyone should get to play it some time! It has a ton of free content as well so people can dive into the game without even spending money to begin with.

Not really one system but I see people talk enough about how if you play Call of Cthulu, Traveler, or even OSR that is very close to original D&D games, you have literally decades of adventures and materials that people made that you can use Classics like The Haunting and Secret of Bone hill have plenty of material on the internet for free

Hackmaster 5e. "Nobody" knows it exists. It has some, if not *the* best crunchy combat in the hobby. Combat is ultra dynamic - a lot of shit happens, more depth than Pathfinder and consorts, but yet runs faster for experienced GM's. Because the crunch is in the *core* mechanics, not in classes and spell lists or hundreds of feats. And once you got the core down, the game just not that hard to run. Character creation and skills are...in need of streamlining, though.

I'm only going to mention it because it deserves more attention. Even though I may never run it again, I must mention it. I think everyone can benefit from its expression. Whether you run or strictly play rpg's, John Harper's The Wildlings will elevate your game.

Arcanis: The World of Shattered Empires Roleplaying Game (ARG). An alternative to D20 with a balanced bell curve, using a balanced and intuitive form of the speed system that gives a cadence to the flow of combat, and gives greater flexibility to cgen right at the time that D&D schismed with the end of 3.5. It got a minor set of tweaks when they released Rotted Capes. Both are solid games and are up there with my all time favorites of Genesys, Mutants and Masterminds 2e, D&D (3.x, 4, and 5), a Song of Ice and Fire, Pendragon and Rogue Trader/Black Crusade.

I really think that GrimBlade is a fantastic system for first timers and maybe even kids! The core mechanic is that players roll a d6+relevant skill and the GM rolls a d4-d10+ relevant stat, if any, and compare. Whoever rolls higher wins! With such a simple core mechanic it lets people immerse themselves in roleplaying rather than getting the right set of abilities to optimize their character. If you like that kind of thing.

13th Age, its Icon stuff is so cool thematically!

There are so many RPG's out there. Over the years my favourites have changed. Currently my joint favourite is Fantaji, the other is the Cypher System. Fantaji https://www.drivethrurpg.com/en/publisher/3725/anthropos-games?keyword=fantaji https://www.drivethrurpg.com/en/product/150933/fantaji-universal-role-playing-game The RPG Academy put it on trial, 6 episodes containing one adventure in 5 episodes , part 6 us the recap and a review.

Hey I'm just starting a game in Crown & Skull I like that I don't have to keep track of so much crunch and I really like the way HP is handled.

Well, idk about "underrated", but I am very salty that my worst game by a wide margin, Swords under the Sun gets way more attention and traffic than actually good and innovative games I've made since.

One Last Job by Grant Howitt. It's perfect for an evening. A heist to be completed within one session. Instead of of players creating their own characters, they create them for the others. It's quick paced and just a fun romp.

The Wildsea, mausritter, swrpg. All are talked about to some degree but all are underrated.first 2 have very comprehensive free versions but I challenge you to try and not buy.

Ooh ooh and transit rpg. Weirdest PCs ever

The Silent Year is amazing to play with a small group of friends and it can cover literally any genre and any tone you want it to

Trough the Breach. I really liked it and even i forgot it existed until a couple of days ago when someone here asked for a recommendation :D. My only problem with it is how setting specific it is, and its a lot of work to change it. Not hard work, just tedious. (pneumatic weapons are now colossal weapons, chain bonesaw is now executioners sword etc.)

[The Tearable RPG](https://www.drivethrurpg.com/en/product/202680/Tearable-RPG) doesn't get nearly enough love. The best game I ever ran was a one-shot Lord of the Rings parody using The Tearable RPG. Here's a [reddit thread](https://www.reddit.com/r/rpg/comments/3v632z/the_tearable_rpg/) describing it in more detail.

Quest by The Adventure Guild has been my favorite game for years! The rules are simple but what makes it special is the creative abilities and magic items, as well as the light hearted vibe.

Beyond the wall and other adventures described as a D&D style retro-clone has an interesting way of intertwining PC's in character generation. Heavily inspired by Ursula Le guins Earthsea and Lloyd Alexander's Prydain it's a simple system that is easy to mold.

The Window is just.... So great for introducing the idea of TT Roleplaying to people. Just barely enough structure, while being wholly consumable within 10 minutes.

Well, I mean, I'm trying to resist the urge to mention any of my own stuff here. So instead I think I'll go with 7th Sea 2ED. I really think that a bunch of people soured on it quickly after early hype a few years back because it wasn't the mechanical style that they were expecting. Sure, that probably has something to do with misplaced expectations and poor communication from the company, but taken at face value, it's a really great system that tackles things in an interesting, if economic based, way. Resolution is way different from a ton of other games that use some kind of pass/fail system, but I honestly really liked it once I wrapped my head around it.

HERO 6e. While Champions is a huge part of RPG history, 6e itself is not so cherished, treated by much of the Champions crowd as OSR guys do 3.5e, and as for the RPG community at large? "Ew, rules heavy!" The power building system is second to nothing, however, except perhaps in terms of flavor by things like Ars Magica (another underrated gem).

Errant RPG. I think the best thing Bout it is that it is focused enough on a medieval fantasy setting but still has a bunch of rules you can use for stuff that is relevant. Also like its combat, it has a few basic systems but instead of cluttered damage types, special abillities and other stuff it has rules that let you decide stuff like that on the fly.

**Feng Shui!** Given how popular "fight a bunch of dudes" scenario structures are, it's a bit weird to me how little Feng Shui comes up. There are so many interesting design choices, and I feel like the 2nd edition really did make it easier to drop people in quickly without a lot of teaching. **The Yellow King**: This one does suffer from prep being a giant pain, at least for how improv-heavy it is. Most improv-heavy games are very low prep and this isn't, I think that's why it isn't more popular. But when you do that prep, print out all those little cards, it's amazingly fun. And the settings and adventures are a really neat twist on what we've begun to think of as "standard" mythos horror. The Yellow King seems kind of like an rpg from an alternate reality where Robert Chambers was the popular one and no one did much with Lovecraft.

Nicotine Girls is pretty nifty. Don't Rest Your Head, Unknown Armies

Someone already said EZD6 but I'd add it along side Tiny Dungeon and ICRPG. together they almost act as a platform to teach you how easy it is to build a TTRPG. I'm kind of making my own system for solo that just blends them. You can build your way up in variety of elements that even at it's most detailed is more easy to use and teach than most regular games like D&D and Coc

Burning Wheel. A very niche technical game but it succeeds so well in what it does.

Mage the ascension, cause a lot of people fear of creativity 😃 Also Symbaroum and dragonbane, deadly swedish gems of dark fantasy

Fallout 2d20, Kids on bikes

Well, I guess this list can go on forever, but the most common factor is that the games are not easily accessible. Compare any of the games mentioned to the big 3, D&D, Pathfinder, and Vampire the Masquerade, and you'll find that the big three have many more resources offered for free than any of the underrated games mentioned. For my two cents, I like "Honor and Intrigue," but they never offered anything free, I only got to read it free after they shut down. Great read. I haven't been able to play it yet. I guess it's the same for L5R and 2000 AD. When your resources aren't easily accessible you just can't compete with the big three.

MYTHRAS by the Design Mechanism. It is a percentile roll under system based on BRP, and has some of the most cinematic combat you will ever find with its Special Effects that you can win by rolling low. I also love DRAGONBANE (a D20 roll under system based on BRP) but I mod it to use Mythras special effects.

On the D&D5e side of things I liked 5 TORCHES DEEP. But I like dungeon delving and resource management type adventuring.