Pen and Paper RPGs

[TinCow]

BG definitely! Baldur's Gate 2 is perhaps the best CRPG ever. It combines excellent combat with epic story telling. The only issue is whether to labour through Baldur's Gate 1 first - I would say you should (as it is also excellent, although not as cinematic as BG2). You should be able to get a compilation of those two games plus the Throne of Bhaal expansion for a decent price.

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Personally, I really like the DnD 3.0/3.5 ruleset and suspect it is far superior to GWs efforts. None of the above games have such rules (only Icewind Dale 2). You should look at NWN2 if you haven't already - I am playing through it and while it is not as great as BG2 (what is?), it is a very solid game and much better than the NWN1 official campaign.

Best of all, the BG modding community has achieved some really remarkable things. The best is BG Tutu, which is a mod that will allow you to run BG1 on the BG2 engine. So... Kits, higher resolution, better interface, more spells, etc. And it's easy as pie to then continue right on from BG1 to BG2. I have played this myself all the way through (BG1, TotSC, BG2, ToB) and can confirm it works perfectly.

There is also a project that converts BG2 to the IWD2 engine, allowing you to play BG2 with the 3.0 rules. I have not tried this one myself, so no idea if it's buggy or not.

[King Kurt]

I recall from many years ago a couple of pen and paper RPGs which were good fun. Traveller which was based in a Science Fiction universe - a sort of Si - Fi D&D - a search of EBay might turn up something - I just quickly looked and found 45 items for Traveller .
The other was En Guarde! - this was role playing as a 17th Century gentleman in France - sort of the 3 Musketeers meet D&D!! You swanned around trying to increase your influence and personal fortune while wooing other people's wifes etc The last activity often lead to duels with enraged husbands - or other suitors - so there was a nice 1 on 1 combat system.
Back in the 80's when these things were all the rage, you could act out just about anything - Thinking about it, I recall a really good western set as well for all wantabee John Waynes. The other thing I recall was that a lot of these were a reaction against D&D which we all enjoyed, but all resented paying out lots of money for the every changing, constantly increasing sets of rules, books etc, etc. Most were a simple set of rules for you to have a bit of fun with some mates, preferebly after a drink or 2.

[Master_Thief]

Cheers for the response. I suspected dropping in the Baldur's gate thing would attract more people. It seems like that's the best route to go down with regards to PC RPGs. As I suspected D&D is quite popular. I really like the gritty setting of Warhammer but I think it would be best to start out with good old D&D, especially since the player's handbook is available for about £11 on amazon.

A couple more questions: -

How many of you play p&p RPGs online? And if you do where are the best places to play? I will, in due course, find actual opponents to play i'm sure (only three months 'till uni), but for now the web is the only place where i'm likely to get a game.

Also is D&D simply a rules set, or a setting as well? I always thought it was set in the forgotten realms but evidently not.

[King Kurt]

The very original D&D was just a set of rules so the dungeonmaster had to dream up the world where the action occured. This was either a dungeon with levels - a collection of rooms basically a la Mines of Moria or the wilderness where you travelled on a quest to find something. There were planned and random encounters with a range of charcters, monsters etc. D&D soon spawned a load of material so you could buy a ready made world - I had one called The City State of the Invincable Overlord which was a large town where you could have loads of different adventures - just buying the equipment you needed from various shops could be quite dangerious!!
I'm sure a trawl of EBay would throw up a load of stuff. The only problem was that D&D went through so many editions/ changes that you need to make sure what you get is consistent. The original box set of 3 rule books had about 5 or 6 supplements published over time then Advanced D&D came out and spawned a series of supplements. These were never very cheap. In reality the only limit on the game was your own imagination.

[Master_Thief]

That's cool. I have an imagined world, which I created a few years back that I could possibly use. I might check out forgotten realms though. There are a few perisitent world type play by post forums around that look interesting. Does anyone here play anything like that? (pretty similar to one of my earlier questions I know).

[Sjakihata]

http://www.sengoku.com/home.html

[TevashSzat]

There are actually some campaigns that you can buy from the publishers of the D&D handbook I think. Before playing it though, remember that it takes forever to do anything so you must be ready to invest a huge amount of time. Also, the stuff is very intimidating for new players since you must memorize alot of game concepts like attacks of opportunity, flatfooted, concealment, skill checks, modifiers, ect...