New Cairn 2e - Is it worth it?

Discover Cairn 2nd Edition, a fun new TTRPG playtest! Quick character creation, flavorful content, and an interesting addition to backgrounds. Jump into the Cairn world and get inspired to level up your own gaming sessions!
Links:
newschoolrevol...
cairnrpg.com/w...
#Cairn2ndEdition #ttrpg #tabletopgaming

[@yochaigal]

You might like The Black Hack. It's roll-under, but otherwise has the sorts of things you mentioned missing from Cairn.

[@JMcMillen]

Roll under systems have been around since the early days of TTRPG's. Pretty much everything from Chaosium (Call of Cthulhu, Runequest, etc...) was roll under. Even TSR's Star Frontiers was a roll under system. This was quite common in the percentile based systems, but these days some designers just wanted to simplify the numbers by dividing by 5 and using a d20 instead of a d100.

[@CavernadoLekkis]

It is entirely possible to have long campaigns using Cairn. I don't see progression as a bad thing in Cairn. Progression isn't solely about larger numbers, as seen in 5e or Pathfinder. It can be interpreted as the players becoming well-known in the world, acquiring better equipment, learning new skills through their adventures, and even increasing their attributes (there's nothing in the rules preventing a player from gaining an additional STR point after overcoming a challenge). Moreover, it's a rules-light system, which means that the GM should adapt the rules as they see fit. In the end, it's a system with an OSR mindset, roll under, prioritizing narrative over strict rules, and so on-elements that many 5e/Pathfinder players might find challenging to grasp.

[@DungeonMasterJosh]

Totally, I was just saying that some players will want levels to look forward to and Cairn not having it was some common complaints I got from my players when I ran it for longer. Almost all of them said they wouldn't play it for a long term campaign. I agree with you though, I think it could work and be fun but you would need the right players (as some won't even give it a try)

[@ponocni1]

5:34 If you ask me, just add or subtract from the roll depending on how hard it would be. Guard dog. roll and add 5 to roll. Drunk guard. subtract 5. thats how i am running things, no fuss, works well.

[@DungeonMasterJosh]

Yeah, that sounds like a pretty simple way to handle that.

[@davidmc8478]

@@DungeonMasterJoshI think you wouldn’t even roll for sneaking past a drunken guard

[@ScaryPoke]

@@davidmc8478yea, you’d only have to roll to sneak past the dog. You roll when there’s a challenge. If there’s no challenge, then there’s no roll.

[@gazhavok568]

You lost me at your distaste for rolling under lol Call of Cthuhlu along with AD&D skills have done this pretty much since the start and rolling under I would say is almost more D&D than the modern roll over with big numbers mentality

[@ZeroCoolIsGod]

Your disconnect with the roll under system is it’s supposed to be a Saving Throw not a Skill Check. You only roll if there’s an immediate threat of harm. In your sleeping guard scenario, you would either let them succeed as long as they weren’t doing something stupid or you could make a luck roll. Or put something more interesting than a sleeping guard in between your players and their goal. A sleeping guard isn’t inherently bad game design, but you know… design your scenarios around the strengths of the rule system your using. To be fair though, Cairn takes its rules from Into the Odd and Electric Bastionland, both of which do a much better explaining how to use them right.

[@qsviewsrpgs4571]

You make some great points here and they're appreciated. Even way back in the day, with the old Moldvay set, etc., our DM would overide the Hit Points in the cases of a monster being asleep, charmed, held, etc., so that Initiative, attacks of opportunity, weren't a factor. A critical strike to the neck of a sleeping giant killed it outright in most cases. In rare instances that same giant might be granted a Save, depending on the context of the encounter. I'm glad to see that this has been taken into consideration officially through the Hit Protection system. Great video!

[@alejandroemilianoguzmantej8231]

I found the "soft class" to be really top in terms of class systems. In Mouseritter you have a vertion of that. But actually the thing that set your BG are the roll (1d6) for Hp (hit protetion) and pips (gold), that assigns you a bg with gear. low pips and low hp will get you bg with a spell and more typicall usefull gear and high pips and hp will get you a noble for example that only gets string and a crown or smth. Also if one stat of your mouse is 9 or lower you get to roll a second bg and get the gear, and if you get a 7 or lower in a stat you do that 1 more time, so 3 bg worth of gear.

[@PhilYanov]

If you've got a D&D group, not sure Cairn will be your jam. If you're looking to start up a group for a wilderness fantasy adventure and don't want to invest hundreds of dollars or hours into something just to see if you will like it, Cairn is spot on. I've got a weekend group six sessions in, and it's been plenty of fun. I love that a baddie fits on a post-it note.

[@Ptaku93]

5:53 ridiculous, sneaking past a passed-out guard shouldn't require a roll at all. At the same time, sneaking past a guard dog could just be a roll with disadvantage - roll 2d20 and beat 13 (or whatever your DEX is) on both. Easy!

[@user-ns2rj8wu3d]

Thank you for link to the Cairn 2e )

[@anotherelvis]

5:35 I think the idea is to replace a difficult skill check with a series of standard skill checks: Roll to sneak to the door, roll to open the door, roll sneak up the stairs. So in practice this corresponds to rolling with disadvantage in5E.

[@DungeonMasterJosh]

You could but honestly my opinion on this has changed with more time playing, it's not usually an issue and it runs pretty well just RAW

[@kyleharder3654]

Didn’t even know there was a second edition, I’m excited!

[@finncullen]

The "cutting the throat of a helpless foe" is an auto-kill even in D&D 5E - Firstly that's why you have DMs to adjudicate unusual situations, secondly that specific situation is noted as "this will kill you" is the outcome rules as written suggests. Can't believe I'm defending 5E, but that example was not a good one.

[@LorenMJ]

I let players sell their rolled gear if they want something appropriate to their goal.

[@AdlerMow]

I don't remember where, but there is a rule that when your target is subdued or unconscious anyone, even the weakest of the weaklings, can cut his throat or stab in heart and kill him without rolling. It actually makes sense, because why roll on something you are pretty sure. Even if you didn't get to kill with the first slash, what prevents you to cut in like on a piece of beef? That's why a good plan is much better than mindlessly charging in, even with a powerful character. Common sense and GM trust prevails, and that's why I wouldn't play some systems like D&D and Pathfinder, more because of the kinds of players I can run into (minmaxers and rule lawyers), but also the overblown nature of the systems themselves.

[@wiloma]

Page 4, under "Narrative Focus": "A dagger to your throat will kill you, regardless of your expensive armor and impressive training." Right on.

[@metakarukenshi]

not a boycott of DnD but we absolutely should

[@davidsandrock7826]

Boycotts never work. Or I guess I should say, rarely work, because only the sith deal in absolutes. Anyway, people generally have to just naturally stop buying something of their own accord. Getting people to boycott something, even for good reasons, is like herding cats.

[@sirshakletonfury4833]

New to rpg, to many acronyms. Struggled to keep up.

[@dziooooo]

You started to lose me at "rolling under is not intuitive to D&D players who want to see big numbers" and lost me completely at the difficulty levels. You're rolling a SAVE, not a skill check. The whole point is that there's a threat you're trying to avoid. If there's no threat (passed out drunk guard), you're not rolling at all, unless your players do something that MAKES IT a threat (sneaking past while escorting a struggling prisoner they're kidnapping from the palace). In OSR games you're not supposed to roll for everything, if the players have a good idea or ask the right question, they just succeed. If you really feel you need more granularity, add advantage/disadvantage mechanic on saves and you're all set.