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Might be my perception, but I am seeing quite a few of these cropping up. I guess some dude got tired of being forever gm and came up with these.

Any of you actually played or tried this stuff?
Far as I ken, ironsworn is one that keeps getting featured prominently when these things are discussed. Thing's free, even.

@MadPreacher @rusty_shackleford you think these would work? On the one hand we already play crpgs mostly single player and on the other hand, isn't solo play effectively LARPing?

Feels like a cringe marketing strategy for selling products people know will be difficult to convince a group to try.

Wait for AI DMs.

CYOA books have been with us for a long time.

One on one modules used to be a thing, though as I recall those were mostly so your buddy could level a character and sharpen his tabletop fangs. Still, I think it was kind of a neat concept.

AD&D 1E has rules in the DMG for running a solo game, so this isn't a new concept. The rules for it were dropped in subsequent editions. I don't know why either. As @Tweed points out that Choose Your Own Adventures have been around for a very long time.

The problem with solo play is that it gets old rather fast since there is no one else to share in the adventure. You might as well be reading a novel at that point.

Iron Crown Enterprises published a small number of quality Middle Earth Roleplaying-based solitaire adventure books under two separate titles(legal issues), "Tolkien Quest"(early books) and "Middle-earth Quest".
https://gamebooks.org/Series/270/Show

Not all of the ones listed were actually published, sadly. Worth checking out though, you are able to use the full MERP ruleset with it.

I tried DMing AD&D solo campaigns a couple of times, with two different people and neither one was particularly fun or engaging. If anything it's even more workload for the DM, and the player doesn't have anyone to bounce ideas off.

Role playing is best had in groups, small or large, but not solo.

Not worth it. They might hold your attention for a couple hours but you come away unsatisfied. Play a video game, read a book, *write* a book, draw a picture, get a job, anything else.

If only there were people to play with.

/tg/ talks about solo rpgs all the time but the concept feels so vain to me that I can't bring myself to try it. I can't precisely describe even to myself what separates it from reading a book or playing a single-player video game etc., but something feels categorically different.

WhiteShark wrote: ↑ April 18th, 2023, 02:07

/tg/ talks about solo rpgs all the time but the concept feels so vain to me that I can't bring myself to try it. I can't precisely describe even to myself what separates it from reading a book or playing a single-player video game etc., but something feels categorically different.

A free-form solitaire RPG is like reading a book you wrote, which is why it only works when you use pre-written materials. Which greatly limits the possibilities.

Probably best off looking into using some kind of AI to DM a session for you, they tend to be much better at remembering state now than when things like AI Dungeon first appeared.

rusty_shackleford wrote: ↑ April 18th, 2023, 02:09

A free-form solitaire RPG is like reading a book you wrote, which is why it only works when you use pre-written materials. Which greatly limits the possibilities.

Probably best off looking into using some kind of AI to DM a session for you, they tend to be much better at remembering state now than when things like AI Dungeon first appeared.

That's the thing, though: I know everybody uses pre-written materials but even then I can't work up the interest to try it. The idea that they're different because one has outside input from another human and the other doesn't occurred to me, but obviously that isn't true with pre-written stuff. So if that's not the difference, I'm not sure what is.

Actually, you bringing up AI just made it click for me. It's that the player has too much control over the world. The player is the one interpreting the charts. The player is the one deciding what the oracle rulings mean in the context of the game. Even with outside input, the player is still essentially the arbiter of the world in a solo rpg. That's the deal breaker for me. It's like reading a book you wrote, just with some advice from a friend.

I've never heard of Ironsworn before. Looking at their marketing page, it looks like it's not functionally different from Fighting Fantasy books or similar things.

ERYFKRAD wrote: ↑ April 17th, 2023, 16:14

any of you actually played or tried this stuff?
Far as I ken, ironsworn is one that keeps getting featured prominently when these things are discussed. Thing's free, even.

I have and its actually really fun! granted, i've never actually played with a group (i just dm for my brother on occasion) so idk how to compare. but as someone who's never played PnP before SoloRPG type stuff, i'd say its pretty good. especially systems like Ironsworn, it moves fast and there's not a ton of mechanical busywork. Combat is handled pretty well for solo purposes. nothing really tactical and strategic but still engaging and keeps you on your toes.

WhiteShark wrote: ↑ April 18th, 2023, 02:07

I can't precisely describe even to myself what separates it from reading a book or playing a single-player video game etc.,

its different because it requires active participation of you the player to engage with the mechanics of the game to run the game. you cant really engage in the same way with a book because all that there is to know has already been written down in the book so it just requires you to read the text. Videogames limit you to the scope of what the developers allow you to do. In solo-rpgs you can virtually do anything you can imagine your character to do, but still would have to roll for skill checks to see whether you fail or succeed on a certain action. a better comparison would be what separates it from just imagining stuff in your head, freeform style. .

I enjoyed the Lone Wolf series of gamebooks by Joe Dever.
They're not a proper PnP rpg, but they're excellent for what they are.