Let's Make A Gamma World 7th Edition Character

[@DianaBell_MG]

I get the complaint about removing the war and agree, but damn that merging of all possible universes goes a long long way to explain the craziness in the game.

[@amelialonelyfart8848]

I'm in a weird spot where I think the set up would be legitimately cool for an indie or smaller publisher game, but knowing it's a WOTC product just makes it groan-worthy. Because while it could be otherwise pretty cool commentary on how well-intended science can go too far, in a WOTC product it's absolutely just a 'we don't want to alienate ANY consumer with POLITICAL COMMENTARY!'

[@timothymclean]

Just replace the LHC with some kind of Big Science Bomb. Contrary to what Amelia says, science is _not_ dangerous on its own, no matter how far it goes; the danger is in how people decide to _use_ that science. Like making a bomb so powerful that it could make reality collapse in on itself, or blanket the world in a dust cloud like none seen since the K-T Event.

[@leXie1337_chan]

The spirit of Gamma World lives on, in the Caves of Qud.

[@AdamLeisemann]

And for us non-video gamers, in the OSR game Mutant Future, which basically takes the rules of Labyrinth Lord and mutates them into a variant loosely based on Gamma World second Edition, with the additional touch of being able to play as an android. There's also the answer on how to play Mutant Animals without pre-made animal stats; it's aesthetic (so yes, this does mean that your mutant hippo has the same potential stats as your mutant mouse) and you get a natural weapon with a randomly determined damage die. Gamma World 4e is a bit more satisfactory in that regard, but it's something.

[@somik-i3x]

And Mutant Crawl Classic.

[@yb1829]

This character is a creeper from Minecraft except that they don't die when they explode

[@recurvestickerdragon]

my thought was the exploders from dead space with their one gnarly glowing arm

[@hellbreakfast1590]

Wow, if even this patient guy is like "these are choices they made." then it's bad

[@tabletopgamingwithwolfphototec]

Here in a flash. 📋 I would love "Let's make a character for ________". 1) RuneQuest ( all editions ) from Chaosium & other companies. 2) Arthur Pendragon ( all editions ) from Chaosium. 3) Traveller ( all editions ) from various companies. 4) Warhammer roleplay wrath & glory ( both editions ) 5) The Mutant Epoch from Outland Arts ( basically Gamma world 8th edition ) 6) Shadowrun ( all editions ) 7) Mutants & Masterminds ( all editions ). 8) Mutant Crawl Classics. 9) XCrawl Classics. 10) Fantastic heroes & witchery 11) Lion & Dragon : medieval authentic fantasy roleplaying. 12) Baptism of Fire. 📝 People can vote 🗳 on this by Typing in The Number as a reply.

[@GKahla]

RuneQuest 2nd edition, and Classic Traveller! OMG - I want to see a character die in character creation, please!

[@robotbeholder1340]

7

[@GKahla]

Your clear and delightful calling out the collectible-card-game core concept bolted clumsily on to the character creation shows how desperate Hasbro has been. They've felt this way since they first acquired WotC, and it wasn't until the pandemic that they thought to move into the virtual arena... When all you've got is a hammer, etc, etc. Terrible that they nerfed the GM's deck to lure you into the card market. But man, I do enjoy recalling the 4th edition campaign I ran for Gamma World. I ran it in Australia with the survivors repelling a giant ant hive attack from Papua New Guinea. Replacing "stock" critters from the rulebook with mutated Australian flora and fauna was the BEST use of Session 0 I've ever had. Thank you for covering this gem of a setting across its many editions. Cheers! 🍪☕

[@tabletopgamingwithwolfphototec]

Yeah the big mistake origin is essentially wizards of the coast stealing from palladium games Rifts.

[@amelialonelyfart8848]

Shitty business practices aside, shitty rushed production aside, shitty... a lot, aside, I do the core principles of 4e in general were just a little too ahead of their time. There's a reason why there are like 4 different VTTs dedicated to 4e, it sounds legitimately fun when you don't have to do constant bookkeeping on stuff like regeneration, elemental damage, at-will/passive effects etc. Basically, I think D&D video games would benefit way more from 4e rules than 5e rules but that is absolutely never going to happen.

[@timothymclean]

3:10: I think the implication is that the Big Mistake _is_ us blowing ourselves up. Science Went Too Far, and we toyed with forces beyond our comprehension. Except that at real particle accelerators, we only toy with forces at the edge of our comprehension, and while the energies involved are high enough to really f*k up atoms, they're not going to cause problems for the world as a whole. "Science Went Too Far" is my least favorite type of sci-fi storyline. It doesn't matter what application the Science is being used for; science is framed as Dangerous from the root. 1:30: THIRTEEN DOLLARS FOR DICE?? I don't care if it comes with a cheap little officially-branded dice bag, that's highway robbery. 7:36: Another edition of Gamma World where you can play an octopus! 🐙 14:50, 15:53: It makes sense that a post-apocalyptic setting wouldn't have standardized prices or convenient markets. However, as a game, if resources are gonna matter, _you need some way to distribute resources._ A gunslinger will be pathetically weak if the GM is stingy with bullets and overpowered if the GM lets you loot replacement ammo off of every bandit you kill, and the game provides no guidance either way. Lots of D&Derivative games fall into this trap. They usually provide specific guidelines for encounter design and maybe some treasure tables to keep everyone up to WBL, but that's about it. When it comes to social situations or exploration, this lack of support is often treated as a feature; it forces players to use their imaginations to solve problems, and DMs to adapt to player suggestions. (In practice, it gives DMs free reign to ignore player solutions they don't like and encourages players to rely on solutions they have rules for, but you can't blame that predictable consequence on the designers who failed to prepare for it! Those guys are just playing D&D wrong!) 32:13: So this game just does not work if you aren't building your own deck of Alpha Mutation and Omega Tech cards. If you're building your own deck, you get to maintain a limited set of powers that actually fits your character concept and/or build; if you're drawing from the DM deck, you just get random bullshit that changes every encounter. Cool cool cool. I wonder if something like this could work if it was inspired less by _Magic: the Gathering_ and more by _Dominion,_ or some other deck-building board game. Character powers are still in some kind of card format, but it's somehow built into the core gameplay, and players can just choose what powers they want to put into their deck (limited by level or card points or whatever), and all the cards you need come in the box, though you can buy more as replacements or expansions or something. Of course, that sacrifices the revenue benefits of trying to turn D&D into MtG.

[@skittlesilly]

wotc knows gamma world exists... they mentioned it in the new dungeon master's guide under the tips to build a world in which you wish to add sci-fi elements. It's probably nothing beyond that, but I can dream

[@marktcole]

I always look forward to your GW content, zigmenthotep! Thanks, again!

[@MrVideo540]

My top 3 for a future Let's make a ______ character: 1. The Mutant Epoch by Outland Arts 2. They Feed on Fear 3. Dragonbane

[@grey_b7319]

7:46 "Because the big publishers really don't like giving you interesting things to do with the dice." Or maybe bc nobody knows how to roll a d48?

[@notsmrt4521]

I mean its just 1d4 and 1d8 rolled together (of course that also means the lowest you can roll is 11 instead of 1 but thats a problem with basically all cobbled together die types)

[@Azurus]

@@notsmrt4521 that would be a d32

[@recurvestickerdragon]

48 is four twelves or eight sixes so 1d4x1d12 or 1d8x1d6

[@cellardorable-e4v]

@@recurvestickerdragon before we just used the smartphone for something like a d48 we would use a d100 and multiply that with 0.48. Not perfect but fine.

[@timothymclean]

@@recurvestickerdragon Multiplying it like that gets you a wonky distribution and makes some numbers (like 17 or 31) impossible to roll. A d48 would be [(1d4-1)*12]+1d12, or perhaps 1+(1d4*12)-1d12. Neither of those is as complicated as it looks, but if you don't grok weird ways to use dice and the tables aren't set up to make it clear, it's hard to explain.

[@Varatho]

The skill check difficulty going up with your level is because the difficulty checks in 4e also scaled up with your level for some inscrutable reason. This skill treadmilling was a known point of contention for the system because it meant you didn't see the effects of getting better with your primary skills/stats/saves when you leveled up, but you felt the pain of your secondary skills/stats/saves effectively getting worse in comparison to the challenges you were facing.

[@tabletopgamingwithwolfphototec]

@Varatho It's done that way because the actual goal of the system ( this applies to pathfinder 2nd edition as well ) is role protection. Basically ensuring that the character ment do a thing is the most likely one to succeed. An the character not ment to do a thing will fail at it. Such as the wizard will succeed more times than not at a arcana check. But the dumb barbarian will fail almost every time at a arcana check and always fail a moderate to hard arcana check.

[@Varatho]

​@@tabletopgamingwithwolfphototec I recognize it's done on purpose, but the decision is still bad. While this prevents the barbarian from doing an arcana check, it also prevents the sorcerer and cleric from doing one too. If you aren't all in you can't perform at all, which is bad for people who like to play pinch hitters who can step into a comfortable 2nd place position on their team when the primary person is incapacitated or otherwise occupied. Even more punishingly, it makes it so every character has a glaring weak defense that only gets weaker in comparison to the creatures that they fight, which isn't fun when you run up against it.

[@timothymclean]

Steelmanning it for a second: If monsters get stronger as you level up, why not have skill challenges do the same? Breaking out of Devil's Advocate mode: You fight _different monsters_ as you level up, so the harder skill challenges should also be different from the low-level ones.

[@Daehpo]

@@Varatho The skill treadmilling really makes the thing feel more artificial. Might as well just say to hell with it: If you're character is skilled at it & it's hard, you roll. If it's easy, but you're character is unskilled you also roll. Otherwise, don't roll; your character either automatically does it(easy + skilled) or fails(unskilled + hard).

[@Varatho]

​@@timothymclean Because the challenges don't get equally more challenging for everyone. The skill celling may stay the grow at the same rate, but the skill floor stays the same. Meaning your character who used to be at least halfway passible at a skill challenge is now incompetent at it, because the system math doesn't allow for you to be "just ok" at a skill at higher levels.

[@robotbeholder1340]

I would love it if you made a character creation video on Ars Magica.

[@matthewpopow6647]

Okay. Let me give a horrible defense of the cards based on how my group at the time did it... we llokes the cards up on line and built out our decks like that. There was ZERO reson to actually buy them for a non-competitive game with a group of friends.

[@МаксимЩербаков-ю9п]

Firstly, really happy that I could see this video being made live. Secondly......yeah, it is the most 7th edition of gamma world out of all 7th editions of gamma world (seriously, who decided to put trading cards inside a TTRPG?)

[@DianaBell_MG]

WOTC who made so much money selling pokemon cards they were able to make this game.....

[@timothymclean]

@@DianaBell_MG WotC hasn't been involved with the Pokemon card game since 2003. _Magic: the Gathering_ is the relevant card game here.

[@somik-i3x]

To finish Gamma World, maybe doing a Mutant Crawl Classic to finish the serie of Gamma World.

[@skittlesilly]

that and mutant future

[@Bluecho4]

On the subject of thrown weapons, I would argue, from a narrative standpoint, your character's supply of ammo doesn't need to be infinite. They just need to have as many of them as needed to supply any given combat. Because they would just retrieve their thrown weapons between combats. Having something like ten throwing knives is _excessive,_ yes, but hardly impossible or even unreasonable. You can strap that many knives to your person, and access them quickly. Bandoliers, thigh sheaths, even one's boots can all hold knives. It's like saying walking around with a quiver for arrows is impossible, because how could you hold infinite arrows? You're not. You're holding a dozen or so, and retrieving them. (That said, carrying around a sack of rocks as one's primary ranged attack IS fun as heck.)

[@BasketOfPuppies642]

This is gonna be my first episode viewed while high. Very excited to see where tonight goes.

[@morale6014]

Dont worry, you will after a while get down to making a character in under six minutes.

[@Metal_Maoist]

While we're already on games based on D&D 4th edition, I'd love to see a Lancer video sometime!

[@Badass_Torchic]

Review /Make characters suggestions: Paranoia (1e, 2e, 5e, XP, Red Clearance Edition, All new shiny edition) Fiasco (Classic, Card) Ryuutama Dark Heresey(1e,2e) 13th Age Troika! Dragon Ball Z: The Anime Adventure Game Metamorphosis Alpha ( 2e, 3e, 4e, 5e, 6e) Mutants & Masterminds (1e, 2e, 3e) Savage Worlds (SW, SWEX, SWD, SWDEE, SWADE) Lancer Sword World RPG (2e,2.5e) Fading suns Feng Shuei Big Eyes, Small Mouth Traveler (Classic, MegaTraveller, TNE, T4, T20, Mongoose 1e, T5, Mongoose 2e) Shadowrun (1e, 2e, 3e, 4e, 20th anniversary, 5e, Anarchy, 6e) FATE (Core, Condensed, Accelerated) Shadowdark Old-School Essentials (Basic, Advanced) Alien the Roleplaying game (free league) The One Ring (1e, 2e) Tales from the Loop OVA anime rpg Star Wars (d6, d20/SAGA, FFG) Zweilhändler Star Trek (Heritage Models, FASA, Last Unicorn, Decipher, Modiphius) Alternity Empire of the Petal Throne Dungeons & Dragons (5.5e) Cypher System Numenera Mouse Guard GI joe rpg Legends of the Five Rings (1e, 2e, 3e, 4e, FFG) Marvel Super Heroes (TSR) Marvel Heroic Roleplaying (Cortex) DC Heroes (Mayfair) (1e, 2e, 3e) Palladium Fantasy (1e, 2e) Pendragon (1e, 2e, 3e, 4e, 5e) Anima: Beyond Fantasy Cyberpunk (2013, 2020, V3.0) Genesys Rifts (1e, Ultimate Edition) Scion (1e, 2e) Exalted Achtung! Cthulhu Delta Green Exalted (1e, 2e, 3e) Apocalypse World and PbtA (idk what you'd do??) Blades in the Dark Mothership Dogs in the Vineyard Alice is missing 7th Sea Shadow of the Demon Lord Mutant: Year Zero Ars Magica (1e, 2e, 3e, 4e, 5e) HERO System (1e-6e) AGE system(Fantasy AGE, Dragon AGE, Modern AGE) Cortex (Classic, Plus, Prime) Witcher TRPG Mörk Borg & Borg games Knave (1e, 2e)

[@therealpersephonechannel1134]

Gee considering how fast the character creation is I can't wait to see how it was stretched over 45 minutes😊

[@tabletopgamingwithwolfphototec]

43:14 Half true argument. Hasbro has licensed the right to published ttrpgs based on Hasbro IPs in recent years. 1) Power rangers the roleplaying game. 2) My little pony the roleplaying game 3) Gi Joe the roleplaying game 4) Transformers the roleplaying game. All 4 of these are produced by Renegade studios. I have covered some of them.

[@timothymclean]

I noticed and glanced at a Power Rangers the Roleplaying Game adventure book the other day, and assumed it was a hastily-reskinned version of D&D 5e. I didn't see a core rulebook so I can't say for certain, but it feels like a Hasbro-ified version of the d20 Modern Gambit.

[@tabletopgamingwithwolfphototec]

@timothymclean It's built of of the essence20 system. Which is similar but has several different components to it.

[@sebwiers1]

There are some strong parallels with Pathfinder Second Edition here. People often cite the connection from D&D4e to PF2e, but rarely mention GW7. And yeah, they whole deck thing was a huge load of crap - PF2e went the exact opposite direction in making all the options freely available to share. Even if I don't like 5e, it's sad WOTC can't do what Piazo does with Starfinder, and make it 100% compatible with their main game... as an alternate setting. That would fulfill their "5e or flip off" mandate while potentially keeping Gamma World alive, or even making it more popular.

[@altejoh]

Got plenty of people constantly telling me i should try this game because "it's dnd 4th edition, but with all the flaws ironed out", at least in terms of combat - which certainly has my interest piqued - but the fact that it has a card game mechanic shoved in makes it incredibly difficult for me to get invested enough to see if that is true over a decade after the fact >.

[@therealpersephonechannel1134]

23:28 holy crap! did anyone actually used that rule? we certainly didn't! I created actual pile of loot that made sense according to the scenario🤷🏻‍♀️

[@tipulsar85]

I still would not be surprised if the CCG portion were to be revived some month soon for current edition of D&D. Because Chris Cox demands it. He is already demanding "AI created" shoved in to where it isn't welcomed. To paraphrase the theme of a nearly forgotten 90s cartoon, "It's what boardroom wants, why bother to complain?"

[@timothymclean]

If WotC was willing/allowed to make big changed to 5e, they would have done so with the 2024 rules. Granted, if those big changes also promised big revenues, that might override their reluctance to alienate existing fans and potentially spawn another Paizo. But I can confidently say that when that happens, WotC will not make the same mistake again. They'll make a new mistake, or at least one they haven't made in a couple decades.

[@tipulsar85]

@timothymclean you probably missed the time they added special cards to 4e's Encounters seasons. Yes, ccg elements in rpgs were NOT limited to Gamma World. They actually tried it on those of us who played D&D 4e at the FLGS. If you were lucky, then the store DM ignored that.

[@ValdVincent]

Hay you know there was a 2016 new edition of Metamorphosis Alpha right? Also I can totally see 5e making a Gamma World setting book, put next to the Rick and Morty one.

[@hugswanted7954]

They haven't actually made a dnd rick and morty book have they

[@timothymclean]

@@hugswanted7954 They did. I've seen it. Never read it, but it definitely exists...for some reason.

[@somik-i3x]

20 $ if Paizo release collectible card for TTRPG, the fans are gonna said it's the most inovative system ever. Maybe I am a bit bias here.

[@tabletopgamingwithwolfphototec]

❓️ What would People want changed in D&D Gamma world 7th edition.

[@pipedreamer9781]

The biggest disappointment of DND Gamma world to me is how it's just a parallel to DND in mechanics. Gamma world has a chance to be more survival heavy with alot of unique horror elements, but it ultimately becomes another power fantasy of becoming an unstoppable high leveled murder hobo with little in the way of consequences for not preparing for a journey. While some of that is up to the DMs discretion, the mechanics emphasized don't seem interested in the high stakes of wasteland survival.

[@timothymclean]

@@pipedreamer9781 A good wasteland survival TRPG cannot be made from the D&D framework. D&Derivatives center character advancement and combat, rather than scarcity and exploration. You practically need to start from first principles; design the scavenging mechanics, figure out how to turn those into a compelling tabletop experience, build the rest of the game around that.

[@andrewwoods7455]

hello

[@Enkidu659]

Disappointing end for gamma world, but with WOTC, who's surprised? Out of all pf th, whoch would you recommend playing?

[@NancyLee-r5f]

Thank you so much for this amazing video! Could you help me with something unrelated: I have a SafePal wallet with USDT, and I have the seed phrase. (alarm fetch churn bridge exercise tape speak race clerk couch crater letter). How can I transfer them to Binance?

[@recurvestickerdragon]

that sounds like something a cryptobot would say

[@Rusty_Raider-V2]

Could you do Mutant Future characters?

[@PrinceSolarLunarEclipse]

Well, you got me to buy a membership for this. You'll hopefully keep me on it in the future as well.

[@zigmenthotep]

Don't worry, the quality content and powerful rush of early access will keep you coming back