#TTRPG

[@danvince2360]

People keep saying the Lynch movie was bad, and yet 37 years on we're still talking about it.

[@brianblather]

It was truly a shame that we will never see all of what Lynch wanted to show. So much was left on the cutting room floor. It's a shame that he felt so strongly about the editing result that he found he did not get what he wanted. Still one of my top 5 Lynch films though.

[@PrintAndPlayPodcast]

I ran a very successful DUNE game using grim's fave the FATEsystem. Players were all part of a single Fremen troop, freeing a remote village from Hakonnen overseers. It was very hands on blades.

[@Dracopol]

If you know Fate Core, you might as well play Baroque Space Opera. It is weirder than Dune. The Tyrant has ruled for 149,000 years and has set up 13 Houses of the Pharisto to divide human activity, made of genetically modified humans like himself. The technology is advanced but hidebound and used to oppress unmodified humans. There is FTL, nanomachines (the Dust), genetic modification, psionics (Prana), a decayed galaxy-spanning Internet called the Pattern, aliens, and a part of the galaxy outside the Tyrant's control. The Houses intrigue and have proxy stuggles but the Tyrant forbids direct conflict.

[@xylord18]

I should have guessed you were a Dune purist. I won’t argue that KJA is of the same caliber that Frank was. But I’m thankful for him having filled in so many gaps that Frank left in the Duniverse. And while they’re not even close to the depth of the original 6, they’re fun stories that paint a better picture than I ever could myself. I view the original 6 as first hand accounts of what happened with the expanded books as a flawed second hand history, but well worth the read.

[@gommechops]

I completely love the Lynch film, I know I am going to like this review regardless now.

[@WizardJim]

I love the Lynch movie, but true to the spirit of the novel? It changed the core message of Dune from "beware giving yourself over to charismatic leaders" to "messianic movements are where it's at, baby!" and Jodorowsky's vision was even worse!

[@charlessmith5465]

Jodorowsky's vision was Gonzo.

[@Eron_the_Relentless]

"What are you supposed to do?" is a question that needs answered at the beginning of designing a game, a finished product should never get published without a very clear idea of what players are doing. Looking at you, Wraith: the Oblivion. I don't see Dune as a RPG material. The board game is brilliant though. With it's broken economy and treachery (and primary goal of racing for spice because spice fuels everything), it's probably the closest I've seen to a board game adequately adapting the source material into gameplay. I see Dune is really a story of houses, not a story of persons. I haven't bought into any Mophidius 2d20 games, they just don't seem to rub me the right way.

[@trpdrspider8372]

+1 for that Wraith call out. That kinda sums up the greatest weakness of the Dune game.

[@VisionStorm1]

Yeah, Dune is one of those IPs that I freaking love, but every time I see people bring up the idea of a Dune RPG, I think "WTF would I do in it?" Play a spice miner that sits in a crawler all day waiting to get killed by a worm? Dune is more about factions playing off against each other and heavy on the metaplot. If you're not Paul Atreides you have nothing to do.

[@PrintAndPlayPodcast]

Watch Garblag Games channel, they recently ran this game. Very clever scenario combining politics and action

[@jacobscott2473]

I love Lynch's 1984 Dune, the 3 hour director's cut version specifically; the pacing isn't great and the Baron isn't as menacing as he is ridiculous, but the costumes, sets and general vibe really do it for me. God Emperor of Dune is probably my favourite in the series, but I am still reading the last book technically. I'm so keen to play this RPG, but I don't know where I'll find more players who share my drive for Dune

[@VengerSatanis]

I also love the Lynch 1984 movie... so, good start!

[@midnightgreen8319]

I like rules. That said, if something presents a danger of breaking a game, I'm in favor of changing things.

[@Dracopol]

Were there really so many drugs in Dune? I only noticed the Spice, and a mention of Semuta, a combination of drugs and music.

[@juddgoswick2024]

The Juice of Sapho for Mentats is another example. Many of them are variations on Melange: spice gas, the water of life, the serums of the Facedancers. The other big feature in Dune's setting are meditative states and psychological conditioning regimens, which may also involve pharmacological and biological enhancements.

[@PostmortemVideo]

LOTS of stuff from Ecaz, and Tlielax products.

[@Dracopol]

@@PostmortemVideo What is Ecaz?

[@Dracopol]

@@juddgoswick2024 Those seem to be job-performance drugs, not the drugs used to addle and stupefy American youth in the 60s. Did you know there was a time youth would shun marijuana? It reminded them too much of Mexicans, where the drug came from to the United States, and they didn't want to end like that...

[@Yr_218]

@@Dracopol Ecaz is the home planet of fogwood, a plant that can be shaped by the power of human thought.

[@KraftyMattKraft]

All I could think of when I read through my PDF of Dune (I'm still waiting for my hardcopy) is how great this would be as a duet, or 1 on 1 game. The asset system, with personel, spies, and even whole platoons being assets that can be moved and manipulated, it would be easier to run this as a single player and single referee game. This would also be a great LARP game, with players holding court, etc while moving unseen or hidden assets across the political space of live action.

[@robnecronomicon1570]

Great review man... I might pick it up at some point. I'm a big fan of the old film too, I love it.

[@makkeiura8354]

Always loved Lynch's Dune. Got me into the books and expanded thinking on film, art, books and gaming. And Lady Jessica is damn hot. Points for the praise of McNelly and collaborators "Dune Encyclopedia." Such a crime it is not in print. I am old enough to remember the mini drama surrounding the Last Unicorn Books RPG. Hah.

[@PostmortemVideo]

Me too.

[@makkeiura8354]

I remember discovering the film first by reputation and finally renting it on VHS... then watching it about six times just to begin to appreciate it properly on a surface level.

[@Quotheraving]

I highly recommend the burning wheel based "Jihad: Burning Sands" in my humble opinion it's currently the best take on a Dune rpg... by a country mile. Plus you can pick it up as a pdf download for free.

[@gommechops]

I would struggle I think with some of that lack of granularity as you put it, around some aspects of play. Our group is about to try the Quickstart and I am looking forward to seeing how the abstract elements of play work. I wonder what could be done about it as time went on, bringing something with more to it from somewhere else to beef up duels etc. Also I do not like the fact it is left for the GM to kill off players, it can work in some situations where the player is given some options of how to proceed with the warning that failures in some choices could be fatal but not all the time. You want to feel like you can carve your own luck out for yourself and adapt to randomness the best you can, moments like that are some of the sources of memorable events in gameplay too so it is a shame to lose that.

[@natel7151]

100% agreed on this rulebook. I want to love "Dune", but it's frustrating. Buy into it for potential if all the systems begin to be put into better and more useful context, like what you are supposed to do with a House... but then all the published stuff crams you into Arrakis, doing the normal Arrakis-Dune kind of universe. The game just lacks guidance outside of Arrakis, and that includes the politics game... where there are some rules, but no real advancement for your House. It's all so abstracted. At the end of the day, I can't figure out how to use it without some extremely strong and cooperative players. Other than that, you dump them on Arrakis and yee-haw up some Sand Worms. Kind of disappointing that way, but worth it for the potential of what it could be. It's ambitious and fascinating as a universe. If the novel "Dune" is impossible to present as a movie, this "Dune" rulebook is like the impossible RPG in my mind. There's so much there, but not enough of it to where I feel like I can do anything with it unless I re-write everything and have amazing contributors on the players' side of the table. (And YES, Star Trek is unreadable. LCARS is garbage as presentation in terms of readability. I found that Dune's 2d20 was so much more accessible than Star Trek despite the simplicity of the Star Trek setup.)

[@juddgoswick2024]

House Ordos is not in the game...yet...yet... 🐍. I gather that a good way to run this is to have players make characters at an intrigue level and a follower level, like Ars Magica. Then the machinations of their House or bloc can be played out on numerous levels.

[@Yr_218]

Yeah, David Lynch directing Dune was like Laibach covering a song, he made the source material his bitch.

[@kgoblin5084]

"I unabashedly like the 1984 Lynch film version of Dune..." => It has to be asked, but which version of the Lynch film exactly :D. I somewhat kid, I also love that film to death. Short of Jadorowsky's unachieved pipe dream I think it the only Dune film adaptation worth mentioning (stylistically it blew the direct-to-TV series out of the water); despite the director's own dislike of the end product I think so much of his vision shown thru regardless of pernicious editing. But it was also undeniably a clusterfuck production wise.

[@PatrikStandar]

Must say I think the rules are really good for political games and I really love the Fate System throwbacks in the system (very big fan of the abstract nature). What I really dislike in the game is its pre-written scenarios. I really dislike Scenes and Acts in released scenarios, it make things too railroaded.

[@FMD-FullMetalDragon]

I prefer John Carter of Mars and Dishonored for 2d20 system games.

[@28mmRPG]

lol... too true. Dune.... What do we do here? It's like Lord of the Rings, Players: "Well, we all know where this is going, so what do we do while Frodo saves us all?" Books like these need to become effective "toolkits", much like TRAVELLER does, the original D6 Starwars RPG was a good example of an excellent toolkit based on the backdrop of the Empire.

[@PrintAndPlayPodcast]

In LOTR (MERP?) the big mission is sneaking a barrel of beer from Bree back to hobbiton and consuming it, without mom finding out!

[@theclash24]

Only the art is good

[@sunsin1592]

About the only thing worse than Modiphius' 2d20 system is its misguided woke politics. They ruined Conan so I'll never buy another product they make. But I respect your opinion, so I tuned in.