Not Enough Digest Box RPGs

[Falconer]

What are some RPGs (real or imaginary) that you would like to see published in OD&D format: 3 digest-sized, stapled booklets in a box?

[tdenmark]

Mar 2, 2023 14:18:59 GMT -6 Falconer said:

What are some RPGs (real or imaginary) that you would like to see published in OD&D format: 3 digest-sized, stapled booklets in a box?

The GameCrafter recently started offering 6"x9" lidded boxes, which is the same size as the original OD&D box. They also print booklets, but unfortunately not stapled, they are in perfect bound format. I've been working on converting Warriors of the Red Planet to their specs and adding some other goodies into the box like character sheets and an introductory adventure.

[cadriel]

The first one that comes to mind is Greg Stafford's Pendragon. Book 1 is on creating your knights, book 2 is game mechanics and chivalry, book 3 is the lands and quest creation. The resulting game has a lot less text but does the basics of Pendragon (passions and traits, the Glory system, the annual turns). In an alternate universe I think something like this could've easily been the first RPG.

Another game from the BRP family tree that would fit is Call of Cthulhu. The breakdown would be similar to OD&D, though the Investigator book would have basic rules and skills instead of spells, which would be in book 2 with the Mythos beasties and tomes. Book 3 would be on the 1920s and adventure creation, as well as having the Sanity and other rules.

One that I wish we had from the 70s is a proper Barsoom RPG designed from first principles. Similar to Warriors of the Red Planet but without the dependence on D&D. Not that it's not a good system but I'd want it to feel more pulp-ish and less D&D in tone (for instance, I wouldn't want a D&D-like armor class system in Barsoom). First book would be characters and powers; second book would be creatures and treasures; third book would be focused on rules and creating Barsoom-ish places.

[barbaribunny]

It'd be especially nice if OD&D itself was reissued in that format!

Apart from that I'd like to see a lightly-modernised clone presented in that proper style, White Box for example. The same for Traveller too. No RPG will ever beat its original black box for looks, but Cepheus Light in the same format would be really nice at the table.

The Black Hack might be getting a third edition. If it does, the format would work really well for it too.

[Falconer]

Mar 2, 2023 14:47:13 GMT -6 cadriel said:

The first one that comes to mind is Greg Stafford's Pendragon. Book 1 is on creating your knights, book 2 is game mechanics and chivalry, book 3 is the lands and quest creation. The resulting game has a lot less text but does the basics of Pendragon (passions and traits, the Glory system, the annual turns). In an alternate universe I think something like this could've easily been the first RPG.

Another game from the BRP family tree that would fit is Call of Cthulhu. The breakdown would be similar to OD&D, though the Investigator book would have basic rules and skills instead of spells, which would be in book 2 with the Mythos beasties and tomes. Book 3 would be on the 1920s and adventure creation, as well as having the Sanity and other rules.

Right on. I also like the design limitation that the format implies. I love the idea of taking a RPG like Pendragon and being forced to distill it down to its core/heart.

Call of Cthulhu 3rd Ed. has three booklets: Investigators’ Book, Keeper’s Book, and Sourcebook for the 1920s. I always thought this was the ideal format for the game. Haven’t been able to get my hands on a set. If anyone knows, what are the page counts of those three books?

[DungeonDevil]

Not that I'm complaining about what we have, but I'd love to see a stripped-down, "retro" edition of AS&SH in 3 LBB format, with ghastly "Greg Bell" style B/W artwork and retro-accurate fonts and layout.

[Falconer]

Exactly!! The first edition of AS&SH has six volumes, but it is bound into two books. I thought it would be cool to rebind it into six. The books are also small, but bigger than digest size. Even better to strip the rules down, like you say, and re-layout into 3 books and re-illustrate in OD&D style. Then the additional content could be supplements (eg, one for the world, one for additional classes).


How about Star Wars WEG D6?

[jeffb]

Mongoose Traveller seems like an obvious choice.

Dungeon World

Met Alpha/Gamma World

But to be honest, my eyes are getting old so I avoid smaller digest books unless it is obviously light on the amount of text and high on the font size. I bought a digest sized book of Mongoose Traveller about 12-15 years ago and it was just the full size book shrunken down. I needed a magnifying glass to read that then, and never bothered learning the game because I couldn't read more than a few pages at a time without eye fatigue.

[geoffrey]

Mar 2, 2023 14:18:59 GMT -6 Falconer said:

What are some RPGs (real or imaginary) that you would like to see published in OD&D format: 3 digest-sized, stapled booklets in a box?

Space-fantasy Star Wars Tatooine RPG using OD&D as a rules base. It all takes place on Tatooine, and it is weird. I don't want or need a Death Star or even an Empire. Gangsters and bounty hunters and monsters (such as purple worms!) and local warlords and strange aliens and malfunctioning droids and ancient ruins and such are all much cooler. And make sure to realize that Tatooine isn't nothing but a giant desert. Imagine the weird wonders underground, and near the poles, and deep in canyons, etc. Don't forget the mutant space dinosaurs! (C-3PO saw the skeleton of one.) Think in the direction of Alex Raymond's Flash Gordon strips from the 30s and 40s. Tatooine is Luke's Mongo. Space fantasy, not science fiction.

Jeff Rients has a couple of posts kind of similar to what I'm talking about (though I'd downplay the zanny and up the uncanny):

jrients.blogspot.com/2010/10/episode-i-mad-science-on-tatooine-part.html
jrients.blogspot.com/2010/10/mad-science-on-tatooine-part-2.html

As regards Jedi knights and the Force, I'd have that sort of thing be more historic/mythical background. Less is more on this score. And certainly no Force super-powers. What we saw of the Force in the '77 film is plenty.

[flightcommander]

I'm looking forward to the Mothership RPG which will be released soon in a digest-sized box containing several booklets.

[Punkrabbitt]

geoffrey

I am right there with you. I played a small solo campaign titled "Gangs of Tattooine" using the Five Parsecs From Home 2nd Edition rules. Good times!

[captainjapan]

I'd love to shrink Worlds of Wonder by Chaosium down, even smaller. The box it came in is fine, but that game could fit the digest format, easy. It's four books already: Magic World, Future World, Super World, and the BRP rules. Keep the box art.

On another note, I wonder if a cardboard cigar box would fit digest sized books. Some of the old ones are too pretty to cover. I'd just keep it as-is.

[machfront]

Mar 3, 2023 7:43:17 GMT -6 captainjapan said:

On another note, I wonder if a cardboard cigar box would fit digest sized books. Some of the old ones are too pretty to cover. I'd just keep it as-is.

Pretty certain someone, on these very boards I believe, used a wooden cigar box to store his home printed ODD 3LBBs. It was lovely.

But as to Flaconer’s query…outside of knee-jerking to: “Um. All of them.” Heh

Realistically…Fighting Fantasy rpg.
More specifically….something in between “the introductory role playing game” and “Advanced Fighting Fantasy”.
Again, as many have stated concerning other systems, this is something that, taking out the extra superfluous whatsits…could be distilled into one or two digest-sized, saddle-stitched booklets very easily.

Ugh. Now I really, really want it!

[DungeonDevil]

Now that I think of it, the rare, gonzo-scifi RPG SPACE QUEST could have been better served by being three booklets along the lines of Classic Traveller's 3 LBBs (little black books). Cramming everything into a single booklet with 4-5 pt. type is too much of a strain on anyone's eysight.

Advanced Fighting Fantasy (2E) would be pretty easy to reformat into the tri-booklet package.

[stevemitchell]

Empire of the Petal Throne? Not sure how I'd break it up.

[Vile Traveller]

I know, BLUEHOLME™! But I'm busy right now...

[Dohojar]

I would really love it if Call of Cthulhu was done this way. The Keepers rule book is great and all but it is a beast to use. And heavy.

[cadriel]

Mar 5, 2023 10:48:11 GMT -6 Dohojar said:

I would really love it if Call of Cthulhu was done this way. The Keepers rule book is great and all but it is a beast to use. And heavy.

Chaosium recently reissued the 2nd edition in a boxed set that I'd really prefer to use, although in my experience modern players seem to prefer some of the innovations of 7th edition (degrees of success, advantage/disadvantage, how opposed rolls work, different flow of combat, pushed rolls, spending luck). Fortunately there are some good online tools for CoC, I've played on Discord servers with bots that do a lot of the work for things like dice rolls. In person I'd rather just use the older version though.

[tdenmark]

Rolemaster, Chivalry & Sorcery, and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles RPG would all get my money if put in the OD&D box set format with those 3 stapled booklets. Throw in some character half-sheets too.

[jeffb]

Mar 10, 2023 15:45:10 GMT -6 tdenmark said:

Rolemaster, Chivalry & Sorcery

I'm not sure that Rolemaster and C&S (2nd) would even have their "introduction" fit in the entirety of a single "Little B---- Book". You would need a 3 box set of 3 booklets each for them.




Kidding aside, you probably could do Rolemaster Express in a LBB format. As I recall my C&S 2E box had extremely small print and was in a 3 booklet (full size) format. I found it hard to get through and reference even with my young eyes, and youthful enthusiasm when it was new. Many FGU products were like that.


That actually gave me an idea-


I'd love to see Aftermath, Villains & Vigilantes, and Daredevils in a digest box size.

[distortedhumor]

I been tempted to make one of my hobby retroclones/house rules into this format.

Tunnels and Trolls could easily be done in this format.

[boggit]

I feel like there are way too many digest-sized OSR products as it is. A4/Letter size is much better suited for the technical manual type of document that a good RPG product should be like, whereas A5/digest size with single column is better suited for stuff that you read linearly from beginning to end.

[tdenmark]

Mar 13, 2023 9:07:37 GMT -6 boggit said:

I feel like there are way too many digest-sized OSR products as it is. A4/Letter size is much better suited for the technical manual type of document that a good RPG product should be like, whereas A5/digest size with single column is better suited for stuff that you read linearly from beginning to end.

For me it really depends on the RPG. For most basic games digest size is just perfect. Portable, great for on the go, and takes up little table space.

For more epic or expanded games such as Pendragon, Runequest, or Ravenloft (my personal favorite TSR era D&D setting - Domains of Dread is a masterpiece) I want a big deluxe book. Chaosium published a Paladin RPG akin to Pendragon and it is a hefty tome full of fascinating historical detail, but I have no interest in hefting it around, it is strictly for home games.

Digest is much easier to read though, like a paperback book.

[soundchaser]

I'd want John Carter Warlord of Mars to do this... jam the stuff into a box set (small) and ditch the landscape style, just give me a nice shrunk handy set of booklets.

[Starbeard]

I think just about every RPG would be best served in a digest box with booklets. Most of them could cut the word count by half or more, parse out the contents into independent booklets instead of long sections that require back-reading to make sense of (what was the deal in the 90s where everyone hid character generation deep in the middle of the book, anyway?), let the tables speak for themselves, and anything too complicated to fit into a few discrete booklets would be better served as supplemental or "advanced" booklets, even if they are packaged with the core product.

[Finarvyn]

Mar 16, 2023 20:12:12 GMT -6 soundchaser said:

I'd want John Carter Warlord of Mars to do this... jam the stuff into a box set (small) and ditch the landscape style, just give me a nice shrunk handy set of booklets.

And then call it ... "Warriors of Mars"

Seriously, a small boxed set with abbreviated rules is almost always my first choice. If a company wanted to make expanded rules they could go with full-sized books from there.

The John Carter RPG is really an odd duck, both mechanically and in format. The whole 2d20 system isn't very intuitive for me and I would love a small boxed set such as soundchaser suggests.

[Finarvyn]

Mar 21, 2023 12:13:59 GMT -6 Starbeard said:

I think just about every RPG would be best served in a digest box with booklets. Most of them could cut the word count by half or more, parse out the contents into independent booklets instead of long sections that require back-reading to make sense of (what was the deal in the 90s where everyone hid character generation deep in the middle of the book, anyway?), let the tables speak for themselves, and anything too complicated to fit into a few discrete booklets would be better served as supplemental or "advanced" booklets, even if they are packaged with the core product.

Agreed. Look at "classic Traveller" from the 1970's as an example. Simple boxed set of three booklets, but room to stick an addition couple books if needed (and I always kept Book 4 Mercenary in my box). Then a series of additional booklets to expand various facets of the rules so that a person could pick-and-choose or decide to use them all. This seems like an efficient model to me, rather than having several wordy hardbacks.

[captainjapan]

Empty cigar boxes make excellent game storage. The larger ones can even hold digest sized rulebooks with enough leftover room to fit my fingers. Cost: $5 each from the local tobacco store. These are much sturdier than the old cardboard types.

[tdenmark]

Mar 16, 2023 20:12:12 GMT -6 soundchaser said:

I'd want John Carter Warlord of Mars to do this... jam the stuff into a box set (small) and ditch the landscape style, just give me a nice shrunk handy set of booklets.

I'm working on the next best thing.

[tdenmark]

May 11, 2023 18:17:23 GMT -6 captainjapan said:

Empty cigar boxes make excellent game storage. The larger ones can even hold digest sized rulebooks with enough leftover room to fit my fingers. Cost: $5 each from the local tobacco store. These are much sturdier than the old cardboard types.

Our local cigar shop has stacks and stacks of these you can buy for a buck a piece, or talk them into an even better deal when you buy a stack of them. They are all kinds of useful. I use them as pochades.