Greyhawk? Nah… Savage Worlds plays nothing like D&D. The idea of hex-crawling and leveling-up due to fighting or finding treasures is impossible under Savage Worlds as written. You just don’t gain experience that way. That right there disqualifies SW from being an heir to any form of D&D, unless you usually ignore the rules of D&D and just play out your “stories” – which any system can do… or even no system, if you’d prefer.

The feats/edges system is a list of things your character can’t attempt unless they have the feat or edge, but that’s an issue to both games (3e and SW), so it’s a 3E problem SW didn’t fix. SW also has some wonky dice mechanics/probabilities, and the Toughness system combined with the “Shaken” system for damaging foes means you never get the sense that you are wearing down foes in combat – because, well, you’re not. Fights can last forever until someone gets a lucky roll and kills a foe outright. Not very D&D-like, is it?

Now, I have had SW since it first came out and have played it. It’s a fun game, but it feels like it wasn’t playtested too well, or was simply made by someone that didn’t understand (or didn’t care) about how dice and probabilities work. That’s ok, I guess, so long as you understand what it is. It does what it claims – fast, furious, fun – but it’s not like D&D, and doesn’t feel like D&D in play. Recreating D&D worlds with it doesn’t have the same feel at all.

I know people are out there playing “D&D” games with SW, but I don’t believe anyone who didn’t run rampant over the D&D rules could claim that it plays the same under SW as it did under D&D.

I must respectfully disagree with parts of Mr. Colby’s assessment of Savage Worlds. While d20 Feats may be “a list of things your character can’t attempt unless they have the feat,” for the most part, Edges are not like that. Usually, they either provide bonuses or negate penalties under certain circumstances. As for the alleged inability to wear down opponents, most of the time such a feature is undesireable. Who really likes keeping track of the individual hit point counts of a bunch of mooks? As for the Big Bad, that’s what Wild Card status, bennies, and Soak rolls are for.

My gaming group is in the middle of its second Savage Worlds campaign. We’ve played a lot of D&D over time as well as other games.

So far my Savage Worlds experience has been generally positive. It’s quick; I kept some stats and we can get through about 50% more combats in a game session than we can with D&D 3.5e. In terms of rule crunch, it’s certainly more like Basic D&D/OD&D than any of the 1e+ AD&D/D&D versions in that sense.

I don’t think old school/new school is a useful way of describing the system, especially because there is such a wide variety of campaign settings, from sword & sorcery to space opera to Victorian horror to the Vietnam War. But to describe its playstyle, it’s fairly gritty – though it has mooks, the fact that it has a four-step wound track and exploding dice means that a lucky shot can take you out. It’s pretty hard to die actually, but it’s easy to need to spend a month in the hospital . The one real problem we’ve had isn’t really the game’s fault – I think that relying on rules-heavy systems for so long has kinda affected our GM, and his descriptions and combat flavor are weak; rules light systems put burden back on the GM for more of the work.

We keep full session summaries of all our campaigns on my blog if you want to read through in detail and get the feel for what it’s like.
mxyzplk´s last blog ..Mock the Monsters!

IMHO (I think I’m calm enough to post rationally now…), PEG’s license arrangement is more about brand integrity than controlling direct competition. There are multiple pulp games, sci fi games, and Westerns in particular.

And, if they reject your application, if you really want to share your work you still can. Fan License. Or, you can be bitter and selfish, unwilling to share your work, see it become popular, and prove the naysayers wrong. I really don’t understand why one would NOT go ahead with the fan license if you were turned down. Seems, well, honestly? Quite stupid. But, as I said… IMHO.

You don’t have to play D&D as all about kicking in doors and taking stuff. In fact I know not one single DM that stills gives out XP. They award levels after set numbers of games or as it seems to fit in the story. Advancement systems are probably the single most hacked subsystem in any RPG. I myself give out a set 5 XP every two sessions in my Necessary Evil game.

I could not possibly care any less any more about the whole new/old debate, so I’ll leave that one alone. I did once, but I came to my senses.

Sitting Duck already said what I was thinking about Edges “not” being feats, though I do think that they fill the same mechanical niche. One could also argue that they are more like Merits in WoD. More games need a system like Hindrances or Flaws.

And, I’ve run a Savage Worlds game that I “sold” to the players as “D&D, if it’s in D&D, it’s in here,” It felt like D&D to me, but apparently, I play D&D wrong. Which is odd to me. I can’t imagine why no one has corrected me since 1981.

I won’t speak for my players, but they all still re-tell the stories from that game over and over. It ran for about three sessions. Almost four years ago. That seems to be positive impression to me.

I’ve spoken to other gamers who have played the genre with both D&D (and multiple editions there of I might add) and Savage Worlds. They ALL prefer Savage Worlds. UNLESS, they’re going for some specific nostalgic kick.

See, Berin, I can be nice. Now give me another gorram apple.

Preaching to the choir! I’ve been commenting here and there that SW makes a better system for Eberron than v3.5 or 4e does. I’ve even tried pitching the thought to Keith Baker who hasn’t played SW yet.

You can see some of my thoughts about this scattered among the PEG forums, recent posts on the WotC Eberron forums, and in my own personal blog.

In fact, I almost feel like WotC looked at SW, saw some cool ideas, tried to translate them to 4e and failed.
Amaril´s last blog ..The Armageddon Virus and War of the Dead Forums at Daring Entertainment

Sitting Duck: You’re basically right about the edges, but there are still those which, by their inclusion, forbid a character from attaining certain qualities without selecting the edge. For example, the Attractive/Very Attractive edges. If you imagine a character as being attractive, then you *must* have these edges, and they are background edges to boot, meaning they must be bought during character creation.

Although combat edges seem mostly free of this problem, the background edges (and hindrances) sometimes tread on parts of character design that should probably be left out of game mechanics and portrayed using roleplaying. That has no bearing on SW’s appropriateness as a D&D replacement, but it does show that my earlier comment is at least partially still true in SW as it was in D&D 3E.

Dr. Checkmate: Nice try, but the probablilites *are* still off. You can’t even contradict me without making an exception, which proves my point. I’ll admit it has little direct bearing on whether or not SW makes a good heir to 3E D&D, nor does it mean SW isn’t fun or playable.

SW combat overall does not mesh well with D&D expectations or gameplay feel, however. I’ve tried it, it’s never going to allow for D&D type combats. You might think that’s good.. fine. But it does mean SW is a poor fit for D&D style campaigns, unless all you want is help telling your fantasy story. Any system can do that. Only D&D mechanically provides for proper exploration of traditional D&D style adventures. Some D&D-inspired systems might come close, but aside from a few superficial structural similarities, SW isn’t even close in actual feel of the gameplay. It’s a rollicking, fast-paced pulp game, which D&D is not.

I’ve run a Greyhawk campaign set in Stonehold using Savage Worlds. Works perfectly fine, if not better than D&D.
Amaril´s last blog ..Savage Eberron: Edges

Jack Colby says:
But it does mean SW is a poor fit for D&D style campaigns [...] Some D&D-inspired systems might come close, but aside from a few superficial structural similarities, SW isn’t even close in actual feel of the gameplay. It’s a rollicking, fast-paced pulp game, which D&D is not.

I strongly disagree that SW is a poor fit for D&D style gameplay. SW may be a poor fit for 3RD EDITION D&D style game play, but those of us who date back a little further recognize that Savage Worlds is exactly the way we used to play OD&D.

3.x is very tactical and number crunchy in nature. SW is definitely not that. It’s much more free-form, but I would posit that it’s much closer to the way people I have known have played the original D&D blue/red box, 1st and 2nd editions. It has a very strong streak of old-school game play style, even if the mechanics are different (i.e. – classless, point-buy). The “feel” of the play, to me, does harken back to Advanced Dungeons & Dragons, even with different mechanics.

And the best thing about it, it’s ONLY $10!!!

And, incidentally, I’ve always thought it was wonky that regardless of my skill level in d20 I have an equal chance of critical failure (1) or critical success (20). The difficulty of the task doesn’t even effect this. That’s crazy to me. 5% or 5%. All the time. Chances of simple success improve, chances of simple failure are reduced, but at 1 or 20 thing never changes.

Excepting combat and improved critical thresholds.

I guess I don’t understand what people mean by “plays differently.” I mean they are different games, different rules, different dice, but you cops and robbers is cops and robbers. Different priorities maybe? For me, it’s more important that the rules (d20 or SW) facilitate a certain style of play. Not game play. If I’m concerned about the game, I’ll play a board game. I can play, as has been pointed out, with no rules at all. Hell, I think Calvin Ball may be the ultimate model of for RPG development, but I think Chess and Monopoly are RPGs, too, so what the hell do I know?

I think we’re arguing over things for which we all have different definitions, and for the most part, no one will sway any one else. I don’t think the critique of SW’s probability curve is a really good one. I get the impression that others do. I’ve already spoken my piece about what I think of d20′s “curve.” Nuff said.

So it comes down to aesthetics; to style of play. The way I play (as DM or player) D&D as a genre, SW is a better system than d20. Y’all can keep your d20 D&D.

Wait, no, this isn’t an edition war. That would be me extolling 1e vs. 2e or 3.x vs. 4e. I’m responding to the thesis that SWex is the heir of D&D, in particular 3e. My argument is that to be an heir, SWex would have to share traits with 3.x I posit that it doesn’t and therefore isn’t. The fact that SWex can be used for fantasy gaming, and I would argue, very successfully, does not make D&D’s successor.

All versions of D&D have been resource management based games. How far you got in the dungeon/adventure was a factor of how well you managed the expenditure of resources in any given encounter. Think about all of things you keep track of in any version of D&D — money, xp, hp, spells remaining, wand charges, per-day abilities etc.

SWex does not deal with resources in the same way. The only resources to be managed in SWex are spell points, bennies, and wound levels. Technically, according to the rules, you have to record xp, but not nearly to the same level of detail as any version of D&D.

Resources are not the limiting factor in SWex, your capability vis-a-vis difficulties is. You don’t get beaten because you have used all your encounter or per-day abilities in the last fight and you pushed a little too far. You are beaten because your opponent or obstacle is more difficult than you can handle, period.

When SWex is used in a fantasy mode, I see it not as an heir, but more as an evolutionary leap. It represents a break with accountancy-based RPGs and a step towards RPG rules designed around actual RPGing, as opposed to wargaming on a very small scale.

“SWex does not deal with resources in the same way. The only resources to be managed in SWex are spell points, bennies, and wound levels. Technically, according to the rules, you have to record xp, but not nearly to the same level of detail as any version of D&D.”

Power Points instead of Vance, the addition of bennies (unless one is playing w/ Action Points), and wound levels versus HP… I’ll concede that those are different forms of resource management. But, all the other resource management remains. Ammo. Rations. Hirelings. Power Points recover differently from spells and all, but it’s still resource management.

Wait… You mean teh Intrawebz don’t guarantee my satisfaction?!

I’ll hedge my bets on the “SWEX is the heir to 3E” comment by saying that “SWEX is a better heir to 3E than 4E is”. And it is a resource management game. The resource is Bennies, and when the GM is out of them, you’ve almost killed the BBEG.

I’d also add that SWEX is not a cut-and-dried game. There’s a lot of nuance written into the rules. Moreso than any other game I’ve played, you really have to play quite a bit of SWEX to see what’s going on behind the scenes. Players who had all kinds of issues with the game on first reading it have come around and embraced it as their game of choice.

Jack Colby – You do not need to take Attractive (the Edge) to be attractive (the adjective). You do need to take Attractive if you want your attractiveness to affect interpersonal game mechanics; there’s a big difference. FWIW, one of the first things to get changed in a SWEX game is the ‘background’ nature of Background Edges, especially if they can be reasonably explained. (Makeover, anyone?)
Telas´s last blog ..The State of the Stew, 2009