Why is BRP not that popular?

[badcat]

So, try to imagine how little I care.

They have games they like, no point in ruining BRP so they can like it too. It's simply not something that matters.

[Simlasa]

RPG.net is consistently one of the most irritating game forums for me to read... there is this constant juvenile one-upsmanship regarding what is 'best'.
All the statements I've read there about older systems (BRP) being 'dated' are no different than saying recent popular games (SOTC) are merely 'trendy'.
Liking a certain mechanic (ad/disads) or not is fine... but saying it's somehow manditory for an RPG to be 'modern' is just a load of crap.

[badcat]

The only times I have gone to rpg.net for months was to check on the progress of BRP...now I don't have any reason.

My blood pressure is much improved.

[Joseph Paul]

Hmm. I wonder how many of those 'trendy mechanics' BRP actually does have and people just don't know it? Ads and disads were an integral part of Superworld for instance.

Point buy system? Superworld.

What else is trendy? Apparently I am behind the times because names like Exalted, L5R, Wushu, etc don't mean anything to me.

Examining what is being sought by the market may lead to a better understanding of how to present BRP to those 'hip' gamers without having to actually change the game.

Joseph Paul

[badcat]

I fear there is no point in trying to sell BRP to 3.5 or Exalted players. It will sell itself enough to fly as is...or not.

The simple, brutal fact is that (as others here have pointed out) WOTC and White Wolf have the lions' share of the market, most kids prefer cards or computer games, and it most likely isn't going to change. I am going to do my part to expose others to BRP by trying to run it at a local game store, but believe me I ain't expecting any miracle nor do I think catering to those with 'modern, edgy' tastes by trying to make BRP more attractive to them (and likely compromising everthing that makes it the system I love) is going to help. Popularity isn't important to me, anyway. Especially when it comes to that crowd. If BRP became something they found attractive and interesting it would be time to move on, because BRP would be something as different from what it is now as 'D&D 4E' is going to be different from Dungeons and Dragons. That's just the way I feel, because I have been insulted to the point of ridicule too many times on sites like rpg.net for any sort of reconciliation of tastes or for there to be any possibility of common ground. 'Popular' be damned.

Oh, as to what you said about 'trendy' mechanics...one of the great ironies of all this nastiness about grognards and obsolete games is that as far as I can tell you can duplicate most any system mechanic I have seen with BRP and have an easier time running your game at that. But BRP is something that came out in 1978 and something that old has to be obsolete and dorky...so a game that has edgy 'artwork' and has reinvented the wheel with clunky dice mechanics that are different has to be better...how can you fight that level of ignorance, even if you want to, Joseph?

[RMS]

Originally Posted by Nightshade

1. It's narrow. Even a rune priest with a large amount of rune magic doesn't typically have a wide range of it, because that usually requires access to multiple cults, and that's anything but typical; its often in practice impossible to combine some spell access options in some settings (as an example, a Gloranthan priest is, for self-evident reasons, going to not be able to access both Lunar and Storm magics in any way that I can think of barring possibly Illumination).

I'll concede that. The magic is powerful, but for obvious reasons doesn't move outside the realm of the diety.

2. Its impressive in its own context, but not in an absolute sense by the standards many people are aware of. Using the most well known example, almost no rune spell compares to anything beyond a 5th level D&D spell, and even those that compare to lower level ones are usually weaker in at least some respect (there's essentially no significant area damage spells for example, and the few that there are have pretty small areas).

I'd argue that they're more powerful than the D&D spells because they have a much larger affect on the people casting them and their oppoenents. However...

There are perfectly good reasons why this is the case, but people asked why some people don't like BRP. That's one of the reasons why.

I entered in the discussion comparing various BRP magic systems to each other. The discussion was already off the original topic. I understand that some people don't like BRP. They're wrong of course , but they have the right their own opinion.

[Joseph Paul]

Originally Posted by badcat

I am going to do my part to expose others to BRP by trying to run it at a local game store, but believe me I ain't expecting any miracle nor do I think catering to those with 'modern, edgy' tastes by trying to make BRP more attractive to them (and likely compromising everthing that makes it the system I love) is going to help.

Well what I meant when I asked about what was trendy was for others to present their thoughts on current trends as I certainly appear to be behind on those. I would like to see just what the trendy game mechanics are because I agree with what you wrote right after that:

Oh, as to what you said about 'trendy' mechanics...one of the great ironies of all this nastiness about grognards and obsolete games is that as far as I can tell you can duplicate most any system mechanic I have seen with BRP and have an easier time running your game at that.

... if by 'duplicate most any system mechanic' you mean that BRP can arrive at the same result. I really don't see any point in throwing on trendy mechanics for the things that BRP already does well (for those things that it doesn't address or does not do well...that is what companion books are for.) Knowing what the point of an exploding dice mechanic is allows the grognard crowd to explain why it is clunky and why BRP accomplishes task resolution better. So far the only thing I have seen out of that mechanic is a great way to obfuscate just what your chances of succeding are. Mind you I am not saying that BRP needs to adopt a trendy mechanic but that BRP proponents need to know how to present the game in the best light possible.

But BRP is something that came out in 1978 and something that old has to be obsolete and dorky...so a game that has edgy 'artwork' and has reinvented the wheel with clunky dice mechanics that are different has to be better...how can you fight that level of ignorance, even if you want to, Joseph?

Well exposure helps so run those demo games! My thought is to get to know the arguments for trendy mechanics and have something better to counter with than 'hey it is a different style of play'. Also remember 'what is old is new again'. The clean, functional systems of BRP may be the next trendy thing. But you may want to consider giving that cover a plain brown wrapper so that you don't scare off the 'moderns'.

Joseph Paul

[Nightshade]

Originally Posted by badcat

So, try to imagine how little I care.

Then you presumably don't care why the game isn't as popular as it could be, which was the topic of the thread. Lose the chip off your shoulder.

[Nightshade]

Originally Posted by Joseph Paul

Hmm. I wonder how many of those 'trendy mechanics' BRP actually does have and people just don't know it? Ads and disads were an integral part of Superworld for instance.

It didn't actually have an advantage system, justa disadvantage one, and it was only relevant in terms of the pool of super power purchase points.

Point buy system? Superworld.

Even in Superworld, attributes defaulted as rolled; there was an optional point buy system, but that was true in RQ3 too, far as it goes. However, in general, any reference to Superworld is going to be moot for most people as its been out of print so long.

Examining what is being sought by the market may lead to a better understanding of how to present BRP to those 'hip' gamers without having to actually change the game.

Joseph Paul

While some issues of presentation can help, I think you're going to only get so far because, bluntly, BRP _isn't_ a game suited to many of those people. As I was trying to note, there are perfectly legitimate desires many of them have that BRP just doesn't supply. That doesn't mean it isn't a valid design, just that sensibilities have moved on in what's desirable.

[Nightshade]

Originally Posted by RMS

I'll concede that. The magic is powerful, but for obvious reasons doesn't move outside the realm of the diety.

But that is an issue for those wanting a high-magic system.

I'd argue that they're more powerful than the D&D spells because they have a much larger affect on the people casting them and their oppoenents. However...

I'm not particularly convinced this is true when compared to many post 4th level spells, honestly. The limitation usually is the fact that there's a functional cap on most rune magic in that there's no fixed power spells about 3 points; that means unless you're writing your rune magic to no common standard, there's a cap beyond how powerful a rune spell can go, and given that the exemplars here tend to be things like Slay Living (its been a while so I may be confusing the name with a spell from another system--the spell that's usually only reusable by Humakti in Glorantha) or Sunspear, those are functionally the top end of the power level, and those aren't compareable to 6th or higher level spells in D&D, or some of the more potent magic that can be found in other systems.

I entered in the discussion comparing various BRP magic systems to each other. The discussion was already off the original topic. I understand that some people don't like BRP. They're wrong of course , but they have the right their own opinion.

Well, at least part of that discussion seemed to be discussing the absolute power of the magic systems available, so I still felt it appropriate to comment.