Numenera

I've been looking at getting into Tabletops for a while - I have the OWD basic rule book and have looked at a few PNP rules.

However, with the new "Torment" game coming out, I found out about Numenera and I was wondering if anyone had any experience with the rules and setting and could judge whether it was a good format for story-telling and mechanics.

I tend to be a bit... risk averse when it comes to complex rules and dice roles, so I prefer more fluid rules. Not against it per se, but tracking numbers isn't 100% my thing ;)

Thank you!

My group's been playing it off-and-on for awhile, and we're pretty satisfied with it. There's not a whole lot of number-juggling, since there's only three stat pools. Most of the player-side math is based around managing your pools, choosing how many points you want to pour into reducing die-roll difficulty. NP Cs are even simpler than that, being mostly a single-digit level with its attributes derived from that, with any exceptions or special abilities the GM feels like attaching to them.

The setting can be summed up as Clarke's Third Law meets D&D: a billion years from now, after eight sufficiently-advanced civilizations have come and gone, humanity and the various other sapients that call Earth home now are rising up from the ashes, using the leftover gadgetry from the prior worlds to do so. Their attempts look surprisingly similar to standard fantasy kingdoms on the surface. It works just as well as science fiction (if you emphasize the technological nature of the numenera) or fantasy (if you emphasize just how mysterious it would be to your characters).

One thing I would recommend you talk over with the prospective GM is the GM intrusion system. GM intrusions are where the GM offers you a few XP in exchange for making your character's life more difficult in some way, whether falling for a trap or inadvertently ticking off the NPC you're talking to. My group's GM tends to use it judiciously, when she thinks it would liven up a boring sequence or make sense from a story perspective, but an inexperienced or vindictive GM might end up abusing it.

Oh man, I got the corebook yesterday based on a recommendation from a friend and it's so amazing.

I'm already thinking up a character and a game I might run.

Huh, what a coincidence, I also have this game nowadays :P Bought it 'cause of Torment: Tides of numenera inspired me to check it out

Ah well, you probably don't live in same area of Finland I live in so eh probably won't matter....

Anyway, came here to ask about The Strange, another game that had kickstarter that involved Monte Cook. Does anyone have any idea of what that is like? I realize its not released yet, but I don't feel like checking out kickstarter page and scouring for after kickstarter news

edited 30th Jul '14 3:36:26 AM by SpookyMask

Huh, now that I've actually read the rules...

Seems it would be extra hard to find players for this game <_< Since this is really heavily storybased rp so players who want rules for everything(and are into combat) probably wouldn't find it as interesting and G Ms who like screwing over players kinda have extra tools for that. I could be wrong of course since I haven't ever actually played any of these games, but my impression is that people who play rps for gameplay and min maxing and using rule loopholes is really common along with people doing really insane things. I don't really have real idea of how common munchkin players are compared to role playing players so I might have scewed view based on people I've seen on Internet...

edited 2nd Aug '14 5:51:03 AM by SpookyMask

Well, now that I have actually played this and Pathfinder, I kinda realized that I had bit of wrong perception about roleplayers in that munchkins don't seem that common :P At least when it comes to new players

Anyhoo, awesome game, simple to play, gives great tools for more roleplaying than rollplaying experience, why the hell there aren't more posts here?

It is an indie RPG, which probably doesn't help exposure much. That said, this thread did introduce the system to me, and I'm in the midst of putting together a session for my group.

Since I haven't played it yet, can't really comment on how it plays, but I'm definitely a fan of the concepts behind its design, and the Ninth World is amazing. The idea of placing all the burdens of die rolling on players is definitely a nifty concept, and does help emphasize the narrative agency of the players. My RPG experience is relatively limited—having only played Dn D 4e and 5e, Mutants and Masterminds, 13th Age, Call of Cthulhu, and FATE—so my group hasn't really done a lot of narrative-focused systems (i.e., only FATE). Numenera definitely should help put us in the proper mindset, since it helps tone down the adversity in the GM-player relationship.

And the Ninth World is just so wonderfully diverse and weird that it practically sold Numenera to me. It's an excellent science fantasy sandbox, with tons of different ways to play in it. I really hope my group likes the system once we get a session off the ground.

Hate to necro this, but at least it's not too out of date. Anyway, finally had my first session with my group, starting them off with a simple temple run. Honestly, it really wasn't very weird beyond the monsters I involved: a cragworm to chase them into the temple, some tentacle-moles I created, steel spiders, and a guardian robot that became a writhing mass of tentacles as the boss. Nothing extraordinary, but I got a good grasp of the system.

And it astound me how tough T1 adventurers are. My boss was based on the travonis ul in the corebook, with lower defenses but more armor, and they still brought it down after a long fight. I definitely screwed with the intended balance a little, with an easy aggro mechanic tied to the temple's artifact, but still. Something I'll need to keep in mind in the future.

Bah, if it wasn't weird, then you should have reminded players of weirdness :p Or made up weird stuff as you went along.

(in our first game each time one of players was like "Okay, I'll order eel" I asked GM "So what does Ninth World eel look like?" to ensure everyone got the idea of what the setting is like :p)

Anyhoo, like you noticed, tier 1 characters aren't intended to be weak and easily defeatable, they are intended to be like seasoned adventurers. Though tiers don't really mean that much balance wise in this game, even though tier 6 characters are pretty uber powerful, high tier character can be defeated by tier 3 monsters :p Probably not very likely but still

Also, waaait a sec, how the heck did you use modified travonis ul with more armor? <_< It starts off with 3 armor meaning that if it had more armor, wouldn't characters with heavy weapons be only ones who damage it?

edited 11th Apr '15 11:05:23 PM by SpookyMask

Yeah, I'll definitely keep it in mind for next session, when they get out into the wider world.

As for the travonis ul, I bumped up the armor to 4 and dropped its Defend action first to 4, then to 3 when they had damaged it enough. It was basically designed to force them to use effort more often, since it's one of the core mechanics of the game that really differs from d20, which is what my group's most familiar with. I kept its attack difficulty and damage high, while also removing the other special abilities (multi-attack and stun).

So actually, not very much like a travonis ul after all >_>. I just really liked the concept and wanted to try throwing a high level monster at them and have them seriously fight it (I did send a cragworm at them at the start, but that was more environmental flavor than an actual fight).

I guess you lowered its health and difficulty level by lot as well? O-o; Since otherwise only way they would win is 1 point chip damaging with effort and medium weapons while their health is continuously dropping because of the using effort. Plus any damage from abilities as well of course

Yeah, I designed it to be a giant tactical exercise. My group's formed of two glaives, a nano, and a jack. The boss was created as the artifact's guardian; whoever picked it up would instantly hold its attention. So the tankier glaive picked up the artifact, while the second—who did have a heavy weapon—and the nano—who used an esotery that ignores armor—whittled it down. The jack wasn't as necessary in combat, but did help out in exploring the temple before the fight.

Here, some Cypher Device and Rumor generator I use when I get fucking lazy! Migh as well share it for others.

edited 14th Apr '15 1:22:44 PM by YoKab

The system used for Numenera and The Strange is now official with a hot new site!

A Kickstarter campaign in order to expand the setting

Really would like to play or run this but not happening anytime soon xD Darn obscure stuff I like!

edited 17th Aug '15 11:38:03 AM by SpookyMask

I'm still trying to collect a group for this. Weirdly, my work seems to have a fairly extensive tabletop society! Woo for big companies! May try to intro them to this, see if it's something we can get going.

Have ordered a set of rules to try to expand my brain exposure to it.

Whee, got the into the night from kickstarter

Does anyone else have it too so I can talk about it? :D

edited 27th Sep '15 8:13:02 AM by SpookyMask

Yep, got it from the Kickstarter too.

Mostly skimmed the parts I was interested in, haven't read it cover to cover.

I was expecting new descriptors or playable races...Suppose they're saving that for CO 2.

But the art is good, and the beasties seem cool.

I wasn't expecting really any player material <_< I mean, yeah, Ninth World Guidebook had maybe few stuff, but that wasn't player book either xD

"Into the Night" is out

I particularly like the otolins. Living machines and biomechanical creatures are cool.

Actually as written, it seems very apparent that they are intended to be added as a PC race in a future supplement. I think?

That is a possibility, they have been adding non-human playables in the recent year.

Not sure why you would think that from the text though .-.