If you were to...

[Andor]

If you were to try and run a PnP Academagia-ish game, what would you use?

 

Do you think you'd need to make a new game for it, and if so what would you use as the basis? Or would use use an existing system, perhaps with some adaptation?

 

I think D&D (particularly the current 4th edition, ugh) would be a poor fit, although magical academy games have been done with it. (The name of the game escapes me at present.)

 

Personally I's either use Ars Magica, or an adaptation of it. It's already similar is structure and even the stat range. For those who don't know, Ars Magica uses a Stat + Skill + Die roll mechanic for task resolution. For magic it uses a Verb + Noun system. So to (for example) fly you might use Rego + Corporum (Control/Move + Body) to levitiate your own body.

 

It would be quite easy to turn the Academagia Arts in Verbs. The nouns aren't quite as good a match for phemes, but I'm sure a little thought could resolve it.

 

Hmm.. Apparently you can now download AM 4th edition for free. Have fun everyone.

[Legate of Mineta]

I second Ars Magica. What a great game, what a great system.

[Burnheart]

I have always wanted to try PnP RPG's but i don't know anyone who plays them around where i live

[Schwarzbart]

One of my favorit RPGs thats still is selling is Feng Shui. Sadly Aberrant and BESM arent aviable any more (no I dont talk about the D20 thing from Aberrant).

The older Withe Wolf RPGs haved great Characters and descriptions of the World but you need a realy good GM to realy bring this worlds to live as it was planed.

(Your Typical Hack and Slay GM could maybe play low Ranking Sabat games or some Werwolf campains but then it was it.)

 

And thanks for this link!

[Vieux chat]

I third Ars Magica. That game is awesome if you want to play great magicians.

[Andor]

I have always wanted to try PnP RPG's but i don't know anyone who plays them around where i live

 

Tell me about it. I've been playing RPGs since you had to ink your own dice with a crayon. But I've spent the last 5 years damned to the nethermost depths of Florida and people around here don't like to do anything that involves words.

[Mikka]

No question for me. I agree with all others: Ars Magica.

 

If I was running it with one of my groups, I'd probably end up breaking out Mage the Awakening for them, though, as they have a love affair with the Storyteller/Storytelling (...which was owod and which was nwod, again?) system that's not easily broken. It would be much more complicated, though: MtA has a lower power level in most ways but a higher in some other ways, and while it's easy to divorce the setting from the system, the paradox and ability to do freeform magic would be harder.

 

I could also see running not exactly Academagia but a game very much inspired by it (as well as inspired by itself) using the Heptagram as Exalted's Dragon Blooded. (Heck, if I ever did a total conversion for the Academagia system, that would be it, I think.)

 

In general, though, Ars Magica. No other would come as close.

[Ranielle Limeleaf]

I modified the Dark Heresy system to play Academagia on pnp, it works for us ( even though the term start sort of made it hard to get together and play )

 

 

I've found that the various starting background options in chargen can be mirrored to Dark Heresy easily and I treat the perils of the warp as miscasts. Copious amounts of reflavoring needs to be done, of course, but we wouldn't have our games less deadly, and it's always good fun when you make someone's head explode and shower the person next to him in blood, who slips and falls down.

 

Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay would work as well, I suppose. I don't have the books for those, though.

[Sabin Stargem]

D&D 4th Edition for me. The classes are balanced, and fighting is pretty good when it comes up. Doesn't have any skills that cover magic in depth, but they can be added if necessary. One of the biggest draws is the Character Builder, which lets players to create and manage characters easily, which is very handy. I personally like playing a Warlock Doppelganger, Fey-Pacted so that I can trick and control people. (Glamour & Mastery, basically)

[mstevens]

Ars Magica is a fine suggestion. Here's some alternatives

1. RISUS: About as rules-light as you can get and still qualify as an RPG. Freely avaliable at the official site. If I was only running a one-shot, I'd need a compelling argument to use anything heavier.
   
2. Eldrich Ass Kicking: Also simple. Not free, but gives characters a bit more structure than RISUS. (which isn't saying much.) I'd use that if I was worried about a RISUS one-shot degenerating into random wierdness (IMX, this takes around 5-10 minutes. Fun wierdness, so I don't worry about it often)
   
3. Variant Wandering Monster High School: It's a game about fantasy high school! Easy to adapt to an Academagia setting
   
4. One-Roll Engine. Between the free Nain supplement, and Monsters and other Childish things, you should be able to put together a pretty good Academagia setting. I like the idea, and one-roll Academagia students would be a very cool thing.
   

 

A custom system is always a possibility - Personally, I'd hack someting out of the ORE system to better reflect the setting. I've always wanted to hack the ORE to use d12 rather than d10, and extending that to an academagia system looks quite doable (More games should use d12. Dodecaheadrons are the most stylish of the platonic solids ). But my GMing time is spoken for at the moment.

[Schwarzbart]

Ups didnt realy read the 1st Topic when I writen my first answear here, sorry.

 

Of the systems I have at home I would choose Gurps 4th edition for it.

The Spells and Phemes would be probably 1 point Perks each and the Magic Skills (Revision, Glamour, Religion ect.) would be vH Skills with 4 times the cost. For the non magical Skills I would use the normal Fantasy Skillset of Gurps.

I also have Mage the Ascension at home but as a GM I dont like this free casting system so I already would have to do some rework on the system and then I bether choose a system that asisst the GM to do so like Gurps.

There is also not a to small chance that I get out the papers for the Rollplaysystem I already started to devlope and put the finishing touchs on it to use this if I ever would be a GM again.

[Andor]

A game I clean forgot about when I started this topic is Witch Girl Adventures. It's an RPG aimed squarely at tweenage girls, but it could hardly be a better fit subjectwise.