What's your favorite game system and why?

"Why?" is the keyword. I want to learn about cool game systems and I want YOU to tell me why it's your favorite game. My favorite game system would probably be Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay (2nd Edition). I love medieval fantasy, but there are some things about D&D/Pathfinder that I just hate (NPCs take hours to build and die after two rounds of combat, treasure / encounter scaling, constant game balance issues, etc.). Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay, on the other hand, is extremely simple to GM and doesn't require much calculations on the GM's part : if you want to make your players rich or poor, do it. The best thing about the game, in my opinion, is how hard it is : most games end up focusing on survival. The combat system is lethal and unforgiving and there's always a little risk of losing your character to a very lucky goblin wielding a fork. It's one of the only games I've played in which your character can receive crippling wounds, lose an eye or a finger or become mad after receiving too many hits on the head. You don't want to run into fight in the Warhammer Fantasy universe, and that's what makes it great : players have to calculate the consequences of their actions, no matter their level. They can't "hide" behind their eight class levels like some people do in D&D. However, that doesn't mean you can't be heroic and brave : in fact, a character who bravely charges into the fray is even more impressive when everyone around the table knows this character's courage might cost him his life. In a dark, realistic world, any act of heroism shines even brighter. And of course, there's the well-developed setting, the dark humor, the generally dysfunctional adventuring parties ("a rat catcher, a nobleman and a priest of Ulric enter a tavern...") and many other great things. So, what's your game and why?

My own... because I made it and it is good.

My standard for evaluating game systems is this: The more the rules support gameplay, the better the system is. The more elaborate and complicated the mechanics are, the worse the system is. So the best game systems, by my standard, are simplest ones that support the needs of the game. They fall within a "just right" Goldilocks zone. Systems that are too simple to do the job are just as bad as systems that are more complicated than they need to be. Of the games I've designed myself, Pocket Universe and Cavemaster and the upcoming 3rd edition of Villains and Vigilantes were written with that standard in mind. Anyone who's so inclined can check out PU and Cavemaster here: <a href="http://www.rpgnow.com/index.php?manufacturers_id=91" rel="nofollow">http://www.rpgnow.com/index.php?manufacturers_id=91</a>

Favorite is WFRP 2nd for all of the reasons Groovy stated. I love how characters progress naturally and organically rather than by levels. The combat is quick and dangerous. The setting is rich and interesting with a TON of recourses to pull from. @Kristin C. - You are talking about WFRP 3rd edition, It is not good. 2nd Edition of WFRP was done by Black Industries and is amazing. The system was then sold to Fantasy Flight who keept publishing 2nd for a while and used the system to make the Warhammer 40k RPGs (Dark Heresy, Rogue Trader, Deathwatch). They then came out with WFRP 3rd which was not well received and simply isn't a good game. After that they went back to the original system and came out with Black Crusade which is essentially a 2nd Edition of the Warhammer 40k RPG's which were created on a foundation of WFRP 2nd. Second favorite system is Legend of the Five Rings. Any big L5R player is going to hate my next sentience. I like 4th Edition of L5R the best. It is the edition I really started with, I had 3rd but never got to play it and it was hard to read. The system is amazingly good. Helps build really interesting characters that capture the setting well. Everything about it is well thought out and nicely done. The book also looks AMAZING. Honorable Mentions: The One Ring - it plays like Tolkien's works read. Captures the setting masterfully and has very interesting mechanics. Wonderful game, great art, first time I really felt like I was playing in middle earth and not D&D with a different skin. Starblazer Adventures - FATE is already a great system and Starblazers is the absolute best version of the FATE system. Supper easy to run and a blast to play. Note: This is probably my most consistent version of this list. I might throw some others on here every once in a while. Some games are my favorite just if I want a different style or mood for a game.

@Kristin C. - You are talking about WFRP 3rd edition, It is not good. This.

One of my favorite systems is one that a vast majority of people seem to have never heard of. CyberPunks 2.0.2.0. Made by R. Talsorian That's 2020, not 2030. 2030 got re-written and 'simplified', though I think they just kind of thrashed it. Granted, the netrunning is almost like an RPG within an RPG and I tended to avoid it at all costs because it would slow the game to a halt while your netrunner hacked a security system, or what have you. But I still found the game to be fantastic. The reason that I liked the game so much is because you could have a properly serious RPing session, like most of the D&D or WoD that I have played (granted the setting is nothing like either of those, really). Or you could go entirely over the top and have flocks of all out cyberpsychos ripping apart cities while your party comes to the rescue in a Punknaught (read as a couple of schoolbuses welded together) hovering down the street with a PA system blaring Flight of the Valkyries at full volume, while hanging out of windows and throwing teddy bears stuffed with C4. I always thought that system was pretty close to the best of both worlds. You just had to decide which way you wanted to take it.