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[Huesoo]

If you want a bad ass setting

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Read the Dark Tower series by stephen king, up until book 5. The books are pretty long so I say you should just read the comics, A great way to see how fucking badass the setting is.

[Grakelin]

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Why would you stop at book 5?

[MrWiggles]

I haven't read the rebuttal, but I found the reviews hilarious. Partly because I have read through the whole thing, only skipping the most boring tables. What I understood about it was that it needed one HELL of a restructuring. It also needs a lot of trimming and optimizing - not least the awful parts of it that, really, have their own place in this game. For example, there are separate rolls for some things (like rape) when it could all boil down to grapple and strength checks. Reading all of the DnD 4e manuals prior to reading the FATAL rulebook also helped a lot in understanding how to improve it.

Yea, I think the game is poorly received.

The rpg.net review was freaken funny though. I kept on snickering, it however wasn't a review. It was a mockery. I'm not sure why they decided to throw their professional decorum out the window for this review

Right now, I'm incline to believe that the sexuality is over pronounced. I'm not sure if this was done with purpose or by happenstance. If it was done with intent then that would make FATAL a soft core porn game, if its done accident, it could make it into a not so well designed game.

However, from a design perspective it requires not easy mental math. It requires square roots, division, a fair bit of subtract and decimal multiplication. This serves to slow down game play and probably bring calculators.

[Huesoo]

I ment stop at 4. 5,6 are shit. 7 is good.

[Grakelin]

All seven books are great. If you skip over five and six, you won't even understand seven.

[Huesoo]

Read them all.

[MrWiggles]

So, I open up Fatal, as I was going to start my review tonight.

I decided to do some what-fuckies and flip through a bit before I got started.

The page I stopped had pedophilia on it. Then rules when it drove you to commit the act. @.@

Alright fine, there was other p starting mental disorders, I went that cool. Its almost a universal no-no, but thats fine. I flipped back a page, more philias. I flipped back, nother one.

Then I managed to hit a pocket of three pages, were it didnt list one sexual mental disorder. I was feeling better. I went back nother page, and there were 4 of them. @.@

I glance through about 300 pages backwards. I got through the spells; where about 4 peeples must have written them.

There was the uncreative person. The flowery person. The creative person. The vulgar person. The sexual person. The vulgar person and the sexual person maybe the same one, but I'm not sure on that. As the Have Her Cadaver is just nother over pronounce sexual shock spell, but it didnt use any unnessicary vulgarity.

Then if we look at the random spell affects. It was a grab bag of clever, almost clever, and just verbose unwarranted vulgarity. The use of dick****/****pipe four consecutive times served no purpose. Its even wasteful writing as genitals would cover both.

So yea, working backward I got back through the spells, then magical items. Again, a wealth of uncreative magical items, perverted ones, flowery and almost clever.  Right then I thought sexual content of the book was in some sorta of attempt of satire, or something but just isn't bad enough to be good, and it doesn't go to far that its funny again.

Currently I am thinking they are trying to hide the sexual content through sheer vast pointless content. I'm not sure on this.

I got through the combat section, then I got ahold of a bell chart, that said base tightness. It was in relation to orifices, and had a five step equation to figure out the tightness based on the ratio of volume of the genitalia. What the hell?

I really can't think of a good reason to this in a game, if sex wasn't a highlight or intended important aspect of the game.

These rules on copulation were about a hundred pages before combat. This suggest to me that the copulation acts, are more important then the combat itself.

Going further back, we get to the skill page, where ejaculation is skill. @.@, but they also list cobbling, hatchery, barrel making, so ect. Again, it seems as if it trying to hide the sexual content with pointless fluff content.

We get to profession, where there a thousand of them. Most of them pointless to your average a fair with table top games.

Holy fuck doddles. Man. It sucks your soul dry.

Not only is it a mass of information, presented in the least interesting method, but most of it is of no consequence to the game.

There also no STDs, which for a game that has rules break down on urination, seems weird. Even the sex manual for AD&D had creative magical STDs.

I'm no prude. Though it feels hard to not notice the sexual content of the game, when its on every other page. There are no verbose rules on making shoes, or weaving a basket or building a castle. There is are verbose rules on sperm count respecting recent ejaculations. The author stated in the rebuttal that FATAL is not a sex game.  I don't see how its not, when the only way to avoid the sexual content is invoking rule zero. Really, if you're going to censor out a main core of the FATAL system then why not play Chainmail instead?

I hope this content is presented in a better frame when I go through reading it page by page.

[Neruz]

Why in gods name are we talking about FATAL? Any intelligent human being just goes "Oh god FATAL" and that's the end of it.

[MrWiggles]

Why in gods name are we talking about FATAL? Any intelligent human being just goes "Oh god FATAL" and that's the end of it.

I dont like things that are popular to dislike. I prefer to dislike them based on my own form opinion. How do I do this without examining it?

I can't find where it was given a fair review.

The calm spiteful rebuttal wanted me to give it a fair shake.

I'm an amateur game design, and our unincorpated logo is 'Everything Can Make A Game' better. In truth, Fatal does its statical distributions fairly well. And there several things I like about its derived stats. LIke the use of square root of the age to determine starting level. There will probably be other things I like about as well. I think I may like its implied use of grappling to use touch range spells on unwilling targets.

For its 2k random magical spell, its use of 1d1000 and 1d10 to determine if its 1k or 2k is very nicely done.

[Neruz]

FATAL has pretty much no redeeming characteristics. Having extensively analysed it for one of my second year assignments it does absolutely nothing well.

I'm an amateur game design, and our unincorpated logo is 'Everything Can Make A Game' better.

Badbadbadbadbadbadbadbadbadbadbadbadbadbad. Design is about taking things away, not putting things in. Design is complete when there is nothing more to be taken away without compromising the core integrity of the idea, be it visual design or games design.

[Sean Mirrsen]

It does make you cringe well, doesn't it? FATAL doesn't need redeeming qualities, it just is. See it like a game design challenge. Can you design a game out of FATAL? Contrary to the very popular belief, just taking things away doesn't make design. You have to put things in before you can take them away. Sometimes, the core game idea doesn't work until a certain complexity point is reached, and FATAL's point is way up. Its design idea won't work without the utterly ridiculous things in it, so it really needs that mountain of crap it sits on. It's unplayable as it is, but it can be restructured and redesigned until it is. All you need is a bucket of nanites so they reform the crap into a solid steel support.

Aand yes, uncreative. This too. Possible mental disorder (on the author's part) aside, the tendencies throughout the rulebooks are characteristic of a certain not uncommon game design flaw - feature obsession. It's when you make a game with a feature no one's thought about putting in a game like this, and you compulsively shovel the feature into every crevice on the game's surface. Half-life 2 would be this if it went much further with its physics puzzles (alright alright, I SEE you've got a fancy physics engine, can this PLEASE be the last seesaw puzzle I encounter?!).

FATAL can still be something enjoyable (for normal people, that is), it just needs to be rewritten by someone with more creativity. And someone who's at least seen a normal set of rulebooks.

[MrWiggles]

FATAL has pretty much no redeeming characteristics. Having extensively analysed it for one of my second year assignments it does absolutely nothing well.

That, I disagree with. It statical distributions are done well. The range could be increase to make the extreme outcome more unlikly. It may do other things well, I'm not sure yet. I havent really began to read it yet.

I'm an amateur game design, and our unincorpated logo is 'Everything Can Make A Game' better.

Badbadbadbadbadbadbadbadbadbadbadbadbadbad. Design is about taking things away, not putting things in. Design is complete when there is nothing more to be taken away without compromising the core integrity of the idea, be it visual design or games design.

You misunderstood the logo. It suppose to convey that  all sources can help make any game better. Pull from everything. Pull from anything. How do you add more punch to an encounter? Well, has it happen in other sources, like movies, other games, comic, and books? What did they use to make the scene run well. What can we learn from it an incorporate for our needs.



We have two bare minimum games right now. We have DICE! The System, and Arps. Both are multigenre game systems. DICE! was made in an effort to make a play by post system. It didn't work out. It however, is a great travel rp game. It can be played with one d6, and one sheet of paper and a pencil. It covers, fantasy, meka, dark fantasy, cyperpunk, and contemporary fairly well. We're hoping to do a free release of this one, though we need an artist.

[Neruz]

Contrary to the very popular belief, just taking things away doesn't make design. You have to put things in before you can take them away.

Well there's not much point trying to take the rediculous flying arches away when someone has already removed the foundations of your house with an orbital laser.

That, I disagree with. It statical distributions are done well. The range could be increase to make the extreme outcome more unlikly. It may do other things well, I'm not sure yet. I havent really began to read it yet.

Task #1: How do the statistical distributions improve gameplay in some way that cannot be done faster, simpler, easier and move effectively using a different and less anal system?

Or, as i like to call it; the Rule of Reduction. Can we do the same thing with less? Is this even neccessary in the first place? (The answers are Yes and No respectively).

You misunderstood the logo. It suppose to convey that  all sources can help make any game better. Pull from everything. Pull from anything. How do you add more punch to an encounter? Well, has it happen in other sources, like movies, other games, comic, and books? What did they use to make the scene run well. What can we learn from it an incorporate for our needs.

Oh well that's just a standard rule of creativity in general. Nothing special about that idea, artists have known about stealing shit for milennia.

[MrWiggles]

It does make you cringe well, doesn't it? FATAL doesn't need redeeming qualities, it just is. See it like a game design challenge. Can you design a game out of FATAL? Contrary to the very popular belief, just taking things away doesn't make design. You have to put things in before you can take them away. Sometimes, the core game idea doesn't work until a certain complexity point is reached, and FATAL's point is way up. Its design idea won't work without the utterly ridiculous things in it, so it really needs that mountain of crap it sits on. It's unplayable as it is, but it can be restructured and redesigned until it is. All you need is a bucket of nanites so they reform the crap into a solid steel support.

Aand yes, uncreative. This too. Possible mental disorder (on the author's part) aside, the tendencies throughout the rulebooks are characteristic of a certain not uncommon game design flaw - feature obsession. It's when you make a game with a feature no one's thought about putting in a game like this, and you compulsively shovel the feature into every crevice on the game's surface. Half-life 2 would be this if it went much further with its physics puzzles (alright alright, I SEE you've got a fancy physics engine, can this PLEASE be the last seesaw puzzle I encounter?!).

FATAL can still be something enjoyable (for normal people, that is), it just needs to be rewritten by someone with more creativity. And someone who's at least seen a normal set of rulebooks.

It could be enjoyable. There a variety of 'almost clever' in this book.

A lot of the tables, I would keep, and will probably use elsewhere. A list of thousand quaismediveal professions? That could come in useful. It seems like its character creation system as it is now, could generate a varied and diverse population. A potentially great GM tool, but a near pointless PC tool.

I am curios how it resolves the issue of historically accurate and mythologically accurate. As there is nothing that goes bump in the night, and assuming that human cultural would not deviant with actual monsters in great numbers, and other races living in the same town would affect something.

Something that I would change, is give it a more defined theme and world. Its idea of isolated 1335 AD Europe doesn't seem well executed right now. I might tone down the realism, and turn it into maybe Heavy Metal esque sex filled ultra violent fantasy world. I would want to give the sex a purpose, instead of being spread eagle on the dining room table.

[Neruz]

Here's a question though: Why do you need tables to generate a varied and diverse population?

Unless the PC's intend to fight the NPC's, they do not need to be statted. Why waste time generating such NPC's? This is the hurdle at which most NPC generators fall over; they assume that for some strange reason the DM will want to build an entire statblock for every person in a city.

In reality, a city is an environment, only NPC's that the PC's directly fight need to be statted, everyone else can run on narrative.