So I heard of this game 'Blade of the Iron Throne'. It is said to be the 'spiritual successor' of the game 'The Riddle of Steel'(TRoS). Is it any good? Has anyone tried it?

Hi.  Noticed that this thread didn't have any replies, so I figured I would try to help.

Googling "blade of the iron throne review" found me two good sites:

http://boardgamegeek.com/threa...-with-a-touch-more-n has a little description from someone who is officially promoting the game talking about what went into the development of BotIT, and a few of the changes between BotIT and TRoS.

http://rpggeek.com/rpg/21097/blade-of-the-iron-throne is more of an actual review, going into detail over a lot of the little things.

In a brief summary of the two, it appears to be a much less complicated version that adapts much more easily to different GM/group playstyles.

I followed the link to the second review, and it didn't have much information.  It talked about a maneuver system, but didn't actually give me any details about what it is or how it works.  It told me that "true" Swords & Sorcery should heavily emphasize the swords and only NPCs should really have sorcery mastered.  It talked quite a bit about player-driven or GM-driven plots, when that's really just player/GM styles and aren't necessarily driven by the system itself.  As anyone who was ever part of the Camarilla or any other LARP can say, a given system can be player driven or GM driven and that's not necessarily dictated by the rules.  "But what about when D&D players play a published module?"  Well, go take a look at the published Blade of the Iron Throne scenarios.  Motivation, whether player or GM, isn't written into D&D or World of Darkness or Shadowrun or any other major RPG, it's decided by the group of people that'll be playing a game.  Anyway, the review went on quite a bit about the game, but didn't really give me any details about the game.

So, I went and looked at the first review linked.  Two years and 2,000 posts?  That's about 3 posts a day, that's a tiny number.  I'd hazard a guess that almost nobody plays this system, or that if they do this must have been a conversation between just a few people.  Then the guy says that they took most of those 2,000 posts and ignored them because they just spanned too wide a gamut and it would have been impossible to bring together everything those posts talked about into one cohesive system.

I see there was a kickstarter for Blade of the Iron Throne.  Completely different discussion, but after the Oculus Rift, I'm never kickstarting anything else unless one of the kickstarter rewards is a single share in the company putting the thing together -- I'm not going to back someone so they can get a 2 billion dollar payoff and not share any of that with me.  By the way, anyone else immediately think of Conan with Arnold Schwarzenegger when they hear the phrase "The Riddle of Steel"? :)

Ok, so I went and found [something I can't link to as there's adult content which I mention later] to read about the game for myself.  What is a roleplaying game? Interesting, and I quickly scrolled past this page.  Basic Rules. Ok, d12's and d6's. There's a whole table dedicated to telling me that for every skill/attribute point I have, I roll one more die. 4=4, 7=7, 2=2, etc. <sarcasm>Great use of space.</sarcasm> Basically, the game is the same as World of Darkness, but instead of rolling d10's with a TN of 8 you're rolling d12's with a TN of 7, so a 30% greater chance of not getting a success on any particular die.  Anyone that complained that it's too easy for a master taxi driver to eventually screw up his driving roll during normal semi-stressful rush hour traffic and have his taxi license pulled in World of Darkness by not rolling any successes will find themselves botching even more often in Blade of the Iron Throne.

This game heavily emphasizes Swords in Swords & Sorcery -- whatever you pick for sorcery at character creation can never be increased.

I don't know what it says about me that I didn't notice that there was a topless female on every other page until about 10 minutes after I'd been reading the document.  I'm dinging them points for that too.  Cheese, if there's a document, I want to be able to read it in a public place and casual nudity like that precludes this.

Going off other things from the main website, during combat you don't go around the table with people taking one action, you keep playing a little chess game between one person and the GM until a combatant is wounded (or killed or whatever) and then you can finally move on to another player.  In my opinion, this is going to heavily emphasize near-solo games.  If I have to wait 15 minutes in each combat for every other person at the table before I finally get to step into the literal limelight, I'm going to use combats as a chance to go to the bathroom, refill my drink, etc.  That's a problem, in my opinion, combats should be quick enough to keep downtime for each player to a minimum.
This message was last edited by the user at 16:27, Mon 07 Apr 2014.

I'm glad you guys said something and saved me the $10. I'll get something else on drivethrurpg.

Looks to me like Genghis was looking at the free beta version posted last year. The game has changed since last year (including the removal of the skills/attribute table mentioned by him). I must admit that I did not find his review very helpful (actually a bit obnoxious) so here is my take:

Pros

First things first: the combat system is without a doubt the game's main claim to fame. And it is indeed an incredible melee combat system. Its ranged and magic components are fine, too, but melee is where it really shines and, so long as you like your combat visceral and plausible, could well be your favourite combat system ever.

Concerning the style of combat that Genghis describes as boring because it focuses on one player's multiple actions - In real play this system actually works out much nicer IMHO than the traditional IGOUGO system. In a trad system what mostly happens is a boring result - such as a miss -  and then you move to the next player. In this system I guarantee that something (at least one thing!) interesting will happen before you pass the baton to the next player.

It's very tactical and character equipment is very important, but less by being an arms race to get every character decked in the best armour and weapons they can and more in terms of the way different gear interacts.

Spears are extremely good at keeping others far enough away that they can't counter-attack effectively - until the enemy manages to get past its point, at which point its very length may prove a hindrance to yourself.

Swords are very good at cutting up lightly armoured opponents but require precision or luck to hit lightly armoured or un-armoured spots like (often, depending on character equipment) neck or face to do much of anything against opponents in hard armour.

Maces are somewhat cumbersome and have a short reach but are tin can openers par excellence.

A greatsword has a long reach and does really good damage, but then you forsake the possibility of using a shield, and shields are great. And so on.

There's also a huge range of different offensive and defensive options in the combat system (all the way down to, and I'm not kidding, the sort of "I step forward as if it attack, then abort, to get you to unbalance your stance in response before I go on to do something entirely different). That said, the combat system works entirely well with just the basic maneuvers and indeed I'd recommend groups start with just those. It also models things like momentum (it's really hard to attack effectively without leaving yourself open if your opponent has the initiative until you wrest it back, which you can do by defending yourself well enough) and differentiates between the sort of instantaneous jolts you get from being hit to long-term impairment by actual damage.

Other than that, the game mechanics are serviceable (with a strong narrative/story game influence) but not exceptional. Except, and this is in my opinion an even more important facet of the game than the combat system... Magic is covered in a very gritty  S&S fashion. It's presented as something inhuman, even eldritch, and definitely has a feeling of a two-edged sword about it. This is not a game where there are pointy-hatted wizards with magical artillery who cast spell after spell and then suddenly run out. Instead, magic is a lot more subtle and casting spells is always a balancing act between effectiveness and avoiding (cumulative) repercussions that take a fair long while to bleed off.

The Passion Attribute system. Which is in my own opinion literally the best game mechanic I've seen in any RPG ever. The idea is that all characters are built with a listing of motivations, like "Hates Lord Agrawak", "Loyalty to the kingdom of Callis", "Find One's Place in the World", "Reclaim the Throne of Justan", and so on. Whenever acting in pursuit of goals in alignment with the character's Passion Attributes, characters get bonuses to their effectiveness to reflect their drive.

In addition, for taking risks in pursuit of such goals (entering combat, making enemies, wagering their fortunes, etc.), their scores in the PAs grow. And the PAs also function as the experience system.

So, when the players decide the plot points - and their characters mechanically only earn xp when those plot items are addressed...then that is a true system driven plot and not just magic pony wishful thinking. This is far different from what Genghis described in his review.

Continuing on, what this means is that the characters, who are by the baseline mechanics somewhat exceptional but thoroughly mortal, can engage in larger-than-life adventures with a fair chance of coming out ahead, so long as they pursue things that actually matter to them.

This is a very strong inducement for players actively driving the plot rather than passively waiting for plot hooks, which is a perfect fit for my own GMing style at least. It does require GMs to run the game flexibly, though - you can't really do pre-scripted adventures in BotIT and expect things to work out the way they would in D&D or something.

Cons

The combat mechanics are heavy. Not too much heavier than Runequest 6, but not insignificantly so, and definitely heavier than Savage Worlds. In addition, the way combat works is a huge shift in paradigm, meaning it feels a lot heavier and slower than it is until players get accustomed to it. And, to be honest, some less mechanically apt players may end up struggling with it for a long time, making their characters much less effective (and/or much more dead) than they should be, based on their on-paper capabilities. It's advised to run some test combats before starting a real game just to get players (and the GM!) familiar with the way combat works in the game to avoid early character deaths and/or permanent mutilations.

Being outnumbered is a huge disadvantage and without use of the terrain rules to increase one's odds, any character is not going to be long for the world, and reckless taking of chances is also not conducive to long-lived characters. On the other hand, with PAs firing up to give the characters a boost and reducing risk-taking to calculated ones, character mortality is much less than a surface inspection of the system and the reputation of its forebear, The Riddle of Steel, would suggest.

The Passion Attributes, as intimated above, may well require a different style of GMing from what one is accustomed to. Adventures should be run as more flexible situations where the PCs are dropped to interfere rather than a series of scripted scenes which are liable to run off the rails.

Finally, an odd thing about it: it's a dice pool system that used d12s. So you may have to invest in more of those unless you for some reason have a fair amount of them lying about.

So there's my take on the game, as balanced as I can make it. Hope this helps you decide whether the game would likely work for you or not.

Well if the game is different and most of what I said has has been made obsolete, feel free to ignore my thoughts on it.That's cool, people can agree to disagree. :)

Perhaps this is like the "new" World of Darkness rules that came out back in 2004 and the God-Machine Rules Update that came out in 2013.  They're different enough with how xp is gained (2004, by personal roleplaying and personally meeting story objectives) and how Experience is gained (2013, by character and group roleplaying, and meeting personal and group story objectives -- you can even get a trait bump to your Experience gained for helping someone else meet their personal roleplaying objectives even if you don't meet yours) and how they're spent (quadratically for xp and just like character creation on dots for Experience) that it's basically a new system, even though it has the same name, is published by the same company, and ostensibly is the same thing until you start to look more closely.
This message was last edited by the user at 00:36, Fri 09 May 2014.

Um, actually, a d12 with a TN of 7 is a 50% chance of success (7, 8, 9 ,10, 11, 12 ... that's half the die), whereas a d10 with a TN of 8 is a 30% chance of success (8, 9, 10 ... 3 out of 10).

You're right.  I must have mixed up some numbers.  Next time I should show my math so other people can more easily see where I went wrong. :)

In reply to pbj44 (msg # 5):

I assume such heavy mechanics have no place in a Play by Post forum game such as on rpol.net? In any case pbj44, thank you for your review. I will consider giving the game a second chance.

The description of the melee combat system makes it sound very GURPS like, especially with the Martial Arts rules added in.

I bought the game 'Blade of the Iron Throne' on rpgdrivethru. While I love it completely as a Sword & Sorcery game, I doubt I will find anyone wanting to play it. That said, if you are looking for  Sword & Sorcer game BoftIT is a splendid choice.

Casts Lesser Thread Resurrection


Having played my fair share of GURPS here on RPOL, I think there are certainly stylistic similarities:  Both systems, particularly when you throw GURPS Martial Arts into the mix, emphasize players' tactical decisions to a great deal, not just in what you decide to do for each action ("Attack!"), but how you decide to do it ("Defensive spear thrust to the armpit!" in GURPS, or "Feint & Thrust with 8 Dice to the Belly!" in BOIT).  Both systems make getting hit a Very Bad Thing, and most fights are going to be over in just a few successful blows, especially if anything particular crunchy or squishy gets hit with any force.  Both systems put a great deal of emphasis on the differences between weapons in terms of their reach, weight, balance, and design.  Both systems will kill you dead if you don't know or pay attention to what you're doing.


This has pretty much been my experience so far.  I have the book, I love the ideas behind the system, and I'd love to take it for a spin, but I can't find any chance to actually play it because it's basically unheard of.  Any attempt to find a game or drum up interest is met with, at best, crickets.

As far as how the combat would hold up in a PbP format?  Well, GURPS combat can be pretty heavy, too, no question about it, and I've seen it done pretty well here on the forums (including a number of arena-style games), even with even-heavier optional rules slapped on top of it (like Douglas Cole's The Last Gasp).  There may be one or two small tweaks necessary to accommodate the PbP format, but I don't think it would fare any worse.

The system (and the book) is not without faults, but I've yet to encounter a system that is.  The biggest strikes against Blade in my opinion are all centered around the actual book (the layout and organization are, to put a fine point on it, horrible, which makes it hard to digest the rules, and the "margin" artwork just further gets in the way of navigating the text on top of being cheesy, unnecessary, and R-rated).  But as an actual role-playing system (and, or course, as a Sword-and-Sorcery role-playing system in particular), it seems to have a lot going for it.

Unfortunately, RPOL popularity is not one of those things.