I applaud how you tried something new, and gave it a shot. I also think it is great that you realized that a game can be good (or even great) and still not be fun for you and your players. Sometimes being an adult _is_ fun.
Your review actually made me feel MORE interested in the game. But that's just a tribute to your clarity and coverage of every important element of the game. Great review!
That was a good review. Thank you. What I got from it was that if I decided to run this game with our game group, make sure to go through the published adventures and reorganize the information in a way that is easier for me to keep track of what is going (like by area, building, etc) and adjust these areas based on where you are on the countdown counter. Also, expand the player interaction options to make it more sandbox-like and less railroad structured (don't assume what the players are going to do, which is TTRPG 101, I would think...).
Thank you! And yes, that should definitely make it easier to run the published adventures. Good luck! FWIW, I do highly recommend my friend's adventure that I playtested. It's on DTRPG now, and the link is in the description. I thought he did a good job making it sandboxy and not assuming a particular course of action by the players.
Explicit investigation TTRPGs are an interesting challenge I've never mastered, I think because it fully depends on having very consistent worldbuilding and story execution to run an investigation, and when a system is pure investigation, you don't have a lot of fallbacks to smooth over any mistakes - for example, you can't just throw in a fun, mechanically-focused fight scene to advance a plot and improve the pace. It's also hard to make the plot come to the players, because usually in an investigation, you're either trying to prevent the plot from happening, in which case the plot happening is a fail state, or you're trying to discover what the plot was after it happened, in which case the plot is now over. This means that when the players get stuck, which can often happen in mystery, there's not a lot you can do to push them in the right direction short of giving them some answers.
Yes, those challenges are definitely real. To be fair, Vaesen does provide some support in form of Countdowns - a series of escalating events that you can trigger at appropriate times that push the story forward and get the players to act. These definitely helped, but didn't completely solve my issues.
I appreciate the way you've organized this as a sort of post-mortem. I've played Vaesen once and enjoyed it, but we didn't really get to dig into the castle mechanic. I have limited experience with YZE, and having your careful thoughts on this is really useful.
Thanks for the feedback! And who knows, your experience might end up being different. I have a lot of friends that greatly enjoy running and playing Vaesen.
I appreciate the thoughtful review, sharing what worked and what didn't. I'm new to the game so your thoughts offer further insight that may help me in learning and exploring this game.
Thank you for a very nice discussion of Vaesen. While I have a number of Vaesen books, mainly for the setting and their production quality and art, I still need time to go through them. Vaesen probably won't be my system of choice either (I prefer Monte Cook's Cypher/Numenera/Invisible Sun systems), but from what you've presented, I can see that FLP has a lot of interesting mystery/adventure ideas that I can learn from and integrate into my own games. Also, thank you for the information on your homebrew; I particularly like how you used Miro as a sticky board-that's a great idea. I use Milanote for game and art projects, so I'm going to set it up with something like your Miro board. Sidenote: Scrivenir, by Literature and Latte, might also be a good be a good writing and RPG session tool for mysteries/adventures with it's nice organization and corkboard options. (It's on my to do list.)
Thanks for the comment! Yes, there are a lot of great ideas in Vaesen. I'm sure they can be ported to your system of choice. As for Miro, Scrivener, etc: I love experimenting with productivity tools like this for RPGs. Sometimes even in a player facing way (e.g. I once ran a short Fate/ Dresden Files Accelerated campaign using Trello). Friends are getting good results from Capacities and Notion as well. Have fun!
Thanks for sharing your opinion. A video like that is way more interesting than "reviews" that are solely based on reading the book or playing a single one-shot. YZE didn't really click with me, even after trying several of them in one-shots and small campaigns. I really wanted to like them because settings and artworks are usually very nice.
Thank you! And I feel the same. Their production value is top notch. Great artwork, evocative settings, good layout, etc. Many of my RPG friends love the YZE games, and I really _want_ to like them.
Just a small obs on scandinavian folklore and the churches. Churches are almost always built on pre-christian "power sites". Its often presented as a destruction and victory of what was by christianity. But in reality its more of a continium and the whole conversion and the following peasant christianity was very syncretic. Churces are drenched in lokal superstitions, a lot of them rooted in modes of thought predating christianity... Everything is very fluent and mixed
I'm new to Varsen, I've only run 1 scenario (the one in the rulebook), and I really like it. I think some pf the problems you had won't be problems for me, but I appreciate you pointing them out, and some of the others definitely rang true for me (eg. the information really isn't easy to find on the fly). Thanks for the review, I appreciated tour insight.
I do not have the same amount of experience as you do, having played in 4 sessions and GMing 5 sessions but I appreciate your insights. I am thus far enjoying Vaesen as both a player and GM. I find the rules light aspect of the game very freeing. I started GMing by running a home brew mystery. I am currently running Dance of Dreams. Regardless of systems I find running homebrew easier than running a published adventure. I hope you find a system that fits you and your groups style. Thanks for the video.
Definitely not the only one! 😅 Honestly, one of the things I love about the hobby is how broad it is these days. So many different types of games and preferences. So there's no need for us to all enjoy the same games. And figuring out those preferences is part of the fun for me.
From my take away from the rules this seems like a system that benefits from having a structured GMing set up. Things like count down dice for the crisis tracks, note cards to give players and journals for everyone. That's not my preferred method either.
I think Vaesen occupies a slightly weird space. On the one hand, adventures are fairly structured. On the other hand, the tools that it provides to help with this are fairly limited. It definitely could be more helpful.
Appreciate this review! It's great to hear from someone who has also played the game and come up with different experiences and thoughts. I would say - however - you had me until you said that you had me nodding along with you until you said about the level of 'crunch' in the system. Gotta disagree there, the YZE is as light as it gets while making thing meaningful, all the other stuff is just fluff. I say that based not only on my experience but also feedback from players who dislike the complexity of say D&D or even Savage Worlds. Anyway thanks again! I appreciate you being open and honest on your thoughts. I have about 5 minutes left in your video as I write this - but I guess you've not played any other Year Zero Engine games?
Thanks for the comment! It's all relative. And yes, my YZE experience is limited: Vaesen is the only one I've run, but I've played a few one shots (e.g. Tales from the Loop, Coriolis, The Walking Dead). In terms of crunch, I'd rank it just below D&D 5e or Savage Worlds, and on par with 2d20 or Cortex Prime. My sweet spot these days is lower - e.g. EZD6, Warlock!, or Outgunned. I don't mind crunch when it really adds to the experience. But I was surprised how much crunch Vaesen combat involved, for example, given that combat is very much not the focus of the game (I only had 1 proper fight in 11 sessions). E.g. the initiative system felt completely unnecessary to me.
I also enjoyed the review, thanks! But in your comment you put 2D20 on the same level as Y0E, I’m a bit confused and I wonder how you came to this conclusion. 2D20 have different meta currencies- how does that put them at the same level?
@@SteveDahlskog Thanks for the comment. By "same level", I'm purely referring to the level of crunch / complexity. I feel that YZE often gets touted as very lightweight, but in my opinion its complexity is about on par with the 2d20 system and a few others. Yes, 2d20 heavily uses metacurrencies and feels quite different from YZE.
I'll have to pick up Vaesen to check out all those cool things. Maybe they can be lifted and dropped into something more playable for most. Honestly, seems like you need a ring binder on the table to play.
A ring binder with the most important pages might help, or even just sticky tabs in the book. Honestly, the rules really aren't that difficult. The challenge is more around the published adventures.
I was considering Vaesen for a homebrew "Dark Carnival" mystery-solving campaign, but perhaps it's not suited to that, partly because myself and my players tend toward silliness as well. Do you (or anyone here) have a suggestion for another system that's worth investigating?
I wouldn't completely rule out Vaesen, depending on what you're going for. Worth taking a look to form your own opinion. However, it's very strongly centered around the Vaesen setting as well as the episodic structure with a headquarters that can be improved over time, etc., and the tone is quite serious. I'm not super well versed in the horror genre, so don't have a lot of recommendations. Other folks might have more suggestions. Aside from your overall concept (Dark Carnival, mystery solving) and tone (some silliness), what are you aiming for - what setting (modern / historical, fantasy), what will the players be doing (mostly investigation? Lots of fighting?), etc.? For a more pulpy / action oriented experience, Savage Worlds might be a decent fit. Or you could build something in Fate or Cortex Prime. If you're setting this in a fantasy or Renaissance era world, Warlock! might actually be a good option. Its tone is reminiscent of early WFRP editions, with a good dose of dark humor. It's not geared specifically towards investigation, but it does have a fairly broad list of skills and careers.
@DigitalHobbitRPG The feel I'm going for is P.T. Barnum, Victorian era. The concept is that the carnival performers have unique skills that they leverage in crime or mystery solving. There would definitely be fantasy elements. For example, the strongman actually would be extraordinarily strong, the fortune teller can actually see things, the contortionist can fit through much smaller gaps than physically possible, etc.
That sounds very fun, actually! But yeah, I don't think Vaesen would be a good fit. It still feels like Savage Worlds or Fate might work well here. I'm sure there are other good options, but I can't think of any others off the top of my head.
This is an excellent review. I certainly empathize with many of your points about the style of game just not being for you. I also think I tend toward a lighter more “fun” game in tone. I think Vaesen is beautiful and there’s parts of it I like a lot but… 🙂
Thanks for the feedback! Yes, games with a lighter tone are my sweet spot as well. I actually do enjoy somewhat grim settings, but my actual gameplay will almost certainly be more lighthearted and fun.
I share most of your views on the game. I love the setting and (mostly) the kind of mysteries it creates, but some of the specifics don't quite work for me. And there are some weird empty spots in the mechanics, as you noted.
Yes, I agree. And my sense is that the game is probably "good enough" for someone who's experienced in running mysteries and horror games, in spite of its rough edges. But it doesn't exactly make it easy or smooth for others, like myself.
Well thought out review, really liked it. Learned a lot, a bit of how-to-play would have been nice. New subscriber here, looking forward to binge your channel.
Thanks for the feedback! You're right, in hindsight I should have covered how to play Vaesen - at least the core mechanic. I can recommend this overview that some friends made: ruclips.net/video/HuRUr27nSV4/видео.htmlsi=Y5Z6ztwxdGeGvzQm
Yes my experience of the Year Zero engine is meh - its very swingy in play and the consequences of that swingyness can be quite harsh and compounding. It "just" works. I find the implementation in BladeRunner and Twilight 200 to be a bit better but the "push" issue still exists which is a clear weakness in all the games.
This is the only YZE game I've run so far, although I've played in a few other one-shots. I definitely want to experience a few more for comparison. I believe in some, pushing only risks a condition, but doesn't guarantee it. Tales from the Loop seems a bit more easy going, for example. I'm optimistic about the new Coriolis game that they just kickstarted, which seems to be very exploration focused and has multiple stress tracks.
@@DigitalHobbitRPG Curiously, three of the lighter YZE games (Tales from the Loop, Things from the Flood, and Vaesen, all designed by Nils Hintze) have the some of the most punishing versions of the Push mechanic. That is, a condition is automatically checked. Vaesen is a brilliant design to my eye, and I love playing and running it -- but I really dig the YZE vibes generally. There *are* a few glitches in the rules that could be cleaned up. (Less detailed / structured combat, the goofy take a condition to see if you can avoid a condition thing, and... maybe some advice on throttling the XP.)
I didn't realize that Tales from the Loop has the same harsh push mechanic. And I don't have experience running any other YZE games. There are still some games I'm curious about trying at some point (especially the upcoming Coriolis, but possibly also Alien and Bladerunner).
And yet many of my RPG friends are huge fans of YZE, so I'm still curious about where the disconnect is, i.e. in the engine itself or the other game aspects. Most of the games seem to emulate a harsh existence, where the sort of death spiral that the engine tends to bring fits the theme - even if I don't enjoy it. I'd like to try a YZE game at some point that's a bit more forgiving. Perhaps the upcoming new version of Coriolis, which is supposed to emphasize exploration?
Not sure what that has to do with it. It's not a race. ;) FWIW, our sessions tend to be on the shorter side. Probably 2 hours of actual game time, 2.5 max. Shorter mysteries took us 2 sessions, so pretty similar to your 4 hour sessions. But some mysteries required more time, or benefited from breathing room to roleplay some of the engaging scenes.
@@DigitalHobbitRPG Never said it was a race. I can understand wanting to take your time too. Especially, if you add in leveling up, upgrades to HQ, backstory, and dark secrets. Play the game that is fun for you. I do think that 2 x 2 hr games are less play time that 4 hr games though because there is a certain sitting down, getting comfortable, being reminded of the past session, etc. that takes time out of the 2x2 hrs.
Yes, and my group actually really enjoyed these meta game elements, such as HQ upgrades. I think even accounting for socializing, recapping the previous session, etc., we usually net at least 2 hours of actual game time, sometimes a bit more. But I still agree with your point that 2 of these shorter sessions still result in relatively less progress than a single longer session.
References to christianity is the fist thing to go in any game I pick up; be it D&Ds paladins, clerics, angels & alignment worldview, the vaesen you mentioned here, holy water, crosses & vampires etc etc. It all goes in the trash.
It depends on the game for me, but in this case that would have been my preference, especially since many of the underlying myths date back much further.
@@DigitalHobbitRPG Part of what's going on in Vaesen is using the church as a source of conflict as well, though. They're not the "good guys," and are in fact slightly bound up with the schism in the Society!
@@AnonAdderlan If you're asking why I don't like that some of the Vaesen are tied to the Christian church: The conflict between the "old ways" and the "new ways" is at the heart of Vaesen. And many of the Vaesen (Giants, Trolls, Vaettir, Ghosts, etc.) date back to old Nordic folklore, long before Christianity. I feel that having Vaesen tied to relatively recent history (in the form of Christianity) weakens that focus of the struggle between the old and the new.
I wouldn't go that far. I do think there's a lot of room for improvement in their products, and the YZ core mechanic is fine, but not groundbreaking or perfect in any way. But there are also a lot of great things about their products, whether I personally like them or not. The settings are evocative, and they are good at keeping the pressure on the player characters (although that's not my preferred mode of play). Many of my friends are having a great time playing or running Vaesen, The Walking Dead, Bladerunner, and other FL games.
@@DigitalHobbitRPG My issue isn't with the systems but with the books/pdfs. A game text should be a useful tool for the game first and an object d'art second. FL have their priorities backwards and it harms the games by proxy.
@@adolexical I agree, their production values are great. Dragonbane is a very solid boxed set. Free League is definitely not the only company that makes highly usable RPGs. For example, I'm a big fan of Two Little Mice, particularly the Outgunned RPG. Granted, my bias is towards more lightweight games these days, so this hits a great sweet spot for me. But it's a very usable product, and also comes with a great boxed set. That's just one of many examples, though. Savage Worlds is more traditional, but also produces great products for example. And there are dozens of amazing and highly usable indie games, such as Mothership, Mausritter, Outcast Silver Raiders, EZD6, Shadowdark, and many more.
I applaud how you tried something new, and gave it a shot. I also think it is great that you realized that a game can be good (or even great) and still not be fun for you and your players. Sometimes being an adult _is_ fun.
Thanks, Wayne! Totally agree. And I'm glad I ran it.
Your review actually made me feel MORE interested in the game. But that's just a tribute to your clarity and coverage of every important element of the game. Great review!
Thank you, that's great to hear, and very much what I was hoping for! I hope you have a great time with Vaesen.
That was a good review. Thank you. What I got from it was that if I decided to run this game with our game group, make sure to go through the published adventures and reorganize the information in a way that is easier for me to keep track of what is going (like by area, building, etc) and adjust these areas based on where you are on the countdown counter. Also, expand the player interaction options to make it more sandbox-like and less railroad structured (don't assume what the players are going to do, which is TTRPG 101, I would think...).
Thank you! And yes, that should definitely make it easier to run the published adventures. Good luck! FWIW, I do highly recommend my friend's adventure that I playtested. It's on DTRPG now, and the link is in the description. I thought he did a good job making it sandboxy and not assuming a particular course of action by the players.
Explicit investigation TTRPGs are an interesting challenge I've never mastered, I think because it fully depends on having very consistent worldbuilding and story execution to run an investigation, and when a system is pure investigation, you don't have a lot of fallbacks to smooth over any mistakes - for example, you can't just throw in a fun, mechanically-focused fight scene to advance a plot and improve the pace. It's also hard to make the plot come to the players, because usually in an investigation, you're either trying to prevent the plot from happening, in which case the plot happening is a fail state, or you're trying to discover what the plot was after it happened, in which case the plot is now over. This means that when the players get stuck, which can often happen in mystery, there's not a lot you can do to push them in the right direction short of giving them some answers.
Yes, those challenges are definitely real. To be fair, Vaesen does provide some support in form of Countdowns - a series of escalating events that you can trigger at appropriate times that push the story forward and get the players to act. These definitely helped, but didn't completely solve my issues.
I appreciate the way you've organized this as a sort of post-mortem. I've played Vaesen once and enjoyed it, but we didn't really get to dig into the castle mechanic. I have limited experience with YZE, and having your careful thoughts on this is really useful.
Thanks for the feedback! And who knows, your experience might end up being different. I have a lot of friends that greatly enjoy running and playing Vaesen.
I appreciate the thoughtful review, sharing what worked and what didn't. I'm new to the game so your thoughts offer further insight that may help me in learning and exploring this game.
Thanks for the feedback, glad it was helpful! I hope you have fun with Vaesen.
Thank you for a very nice discussion of Vaesen. While I have a number of Vaesen books, mainly for the setting and their production quality and art, I still need time to go through them. Vaesen probably won't be my system of choice either (I prefer Monte Cook's Cypher/Numenera/Invisible Sun systems), but from what you've presented, I can see that FLP has a lot of interesting mystery/adventure ideas that I can learn from and integrate into my own games.
Also, thank you for the information on your homebrew; I particularly like how you used Miro as a sticky board-that's a great idea. I use Milanote for game and art projects, so I'm going to set it up with something like your Miro board.
Sidenote: Scrivenir, by Literature and Latte, might also be a good be a good writing and RPG session tool for mysteries/adventures with it's nice organization and corkboard options. (It's on my to do list.)
Thanks for the comment! Yes, there are a lot of great ideas in Vaesen. I'm sure they can be ported to your system of choice.
As for Miro, Scrivener, etc: I love experimenting with productivity tools like this for RPGs. Sometimes even in a player facing way (e.g. I once ran a short Fate/ Dresden Files Accelerated campaign using Trello). Friends are getting good results from Capacities and Notion as well. Have fun!
Thanks for sharing your opinion. A video like that is way more interesting than "reviews" that are solely based on reading the book or playing a single one-shot.
YZE didn't really click with me, even after trying several of them in one-shots and small campaigns. I really wanted to like them because settings and artworks are usually very nice.
Thank you! And I feel the same. Their production value is top notch. Great artwork, evocative settings, good layout, etc. Many of my RPG friends love the YZE games, and I really _want_ to like them.
Just a small obs on scandinavian folklore and the churches. Churches are almost always built on pre-christian "power sites". Its often presented as a destruction and victory of what was by christianity. But in reality its more of a continium and the whole conversion and the following peasant christianity was very syncretic. Churces are drenched in lokal superstitions, a lot of them rooted in modes of thought predating christianity... Everything is very fluent and mixed
Fair point, thanks for sharing this!
I'm new to Varsen, I've only run 1 scenario (the one in the rulebook), and I really like it. I think some pf the problems you had won't be problems for me, but I appreciate you pointing them out, and some of the others definitely rang true for me (eg. the information really isn't easy to find on the fly). Thanks for the review, I appreciated tour insight.
Great to hear you're enjoying it. Have fun with your next Vaesen mystery!
I do not have the same amount of experience as you do, having played in 4 sessions and GMing 5 sessions but I appreciate your insights. I am thus far enjoying Vaesen as both a player and GM. I find the rules light aspect of the game very freeing. I started GMing by running a home brew mystery. I am currently running Dance of Dreams. Regardless of systems I find running homebrew easier than running a published adventure. I hope you find a system that fits you and your groups style. Thanks for the video.
Great to hear you're enjoying Vaesen. Totally agree about homebrew being easier to run, especially for this type of game.
Excellent review, critics coming from actual gameplay experience
Thank you! Yes, while I often think I have a good sense of whether I'll like a game after reading it, I can't really know until I get it to the table.
Damn, must have been some pretty good gameplay…
Thanks for posting this, I thought that I was the only one. 👍
Definitely not the only one! 😅 Honestly, one of the things I love about the hobby is how broad it is these days. So many different types of games and preferences. So there's no need for us to all enjoy the same games. And figuring out those preferences is part of the fun for me.
Very good and honest review! Thank you for your point of view and another opinion on a good RPG.
Thanks for the feedback, glad you enjoyed it!
I'm with you about the light hearted games! Thanks for this review, great to get insights from someone who has played the game a fair bit :)
Thank you! 😊
From my take away from the rules this seems like a system that benefits from having a structured GMing set up. Things like count down dice for the crisis tracks, note cards to give players and journals for everyone. That's not my preferred method either.
I think Vaesen occupies a slightly weird space. On the one hand, adventures are fairly structured. On the other hand, the tools that it provides to help with this are fairly limited. It definitely could be more helpful.
Appreciate this review! It's great to hear from someone who has also played the game and come up with different experiences and thoughts. I would say - however - you had me until you said that you had me nodding along with you until you said about the level of 'crunch' in the system. Gotta disagree there, the YZE is as light as it gets while making thing meaningful, all the other stuff is just fluff. I say that based not only on my experience but also feedback from players who dislike the complexity of say D&D or even Savage Worlds. Anyway thanks again! I appreciate you being open and honest on your thoughts. I have about 5 minutes left in your video as I write this - but I guess you've not played any other Year Zero Engine games?
Thanks for the comment! It's all relative. And yes, my YZE experience is limited: Vaesen is the only one I've run, but I've played a few one shots (e.g. Tales from the Loop, Coriolis, The Walking Dead). In terms of crunch, I'd rank it just below D&D 5e or Savage Worlds, and on par with 2d20 or Cortex Prime. My sweet spot these days is lower - e.g. EZD6, Warlock!, or Outgunned. I don't mind crunch when it really adds to the experience. But I was surprised how much crunch Vaesen combat involved, for example, given that combat is very much not the focus of the game (I only had 1 proper fight in 11 sessions). E.g. the initiative system felt completely unnecessary to me.
I also enjoyed the review, thanks!
But in your comment you put 2D20 on the same level as Y0E, I’m a bit confused and I wonder how you came to this conclusion.
2D20 have different meta currencies- how does that put them at the same level?
@@SteveDahlskog Thanks for the comment. By "same level", I'm purely referring to the level of crunch / complexity. I feel that YZE often gets touted as very lightweight, but in my opinion its complexity is about on par with the 2d20 system and a few others. Yes, 2d20 heavily uses metacurrencies and feels quite different from YZE.
Good assessment of your experience. I enjoyed listening to your report and thoughts on your reactions~
Great to hear, thanks for the comment!
I'll have to pick up Vaesen to check out all those cool things. Maybe they can be lifted and dropped into something more playable for most.
Honestly, seems like you need a ring binder on the table to play.
A ring binder with the most important pages might help, or even just sticky tabs in the book. Honestly, the rules really aren't that difficult. The challenge is more around the published adventures.
I appreciate this kind of reflectictive review👍👍
I was considering Vaesen for a homebrew "Dark Carnival" mystery-solving campaign, but perhaps it's not suited to that, partly because myself and my players tend toward silliness as well. Do you (or anyone here) have a suggestion for another system that's worth investigating?
I wouldn't completely rule out Vaesen, depending on what you're going for. Worth taking a look to form your own opinion. However, it's very strongly centered around the Vaesen setting as well as the episodic structure with a headquarters that can be improved over time, etc., and the tone is quite serious.
I'm not super well versed in the horror genre, so don't have a lot of recommendations. Other folks might have more suggestions. Aside from your overall concept (Dark Carnival, mystery solving) and tone (some silliness), what are you aiming for - what setting (modern / historical, fantasy), what will the players be doing (mostly investigation? Lots of fighting?), etc.?
For a more pulpy / action oriented experience, Savage Worlds might be a decent fit. Or you could build something in Fate or Cortex Prime. If you're setting this in a fantasy or Renaissance era world, Warlock! might actually be a good option. Its tone is reminiscent of early WFRP editions, with a good dose of dark humor. It's not geared specifically towards investigation, but it does have a fairly broad list of skills and careers.
@DigitalHobbitRPG The feel I'm going for is P.T. Barnum, Victorian era. The concept is that the carnival performers have unique skills that they leverage in crime or mystery solving. There would definitely be fantasy elements. For example, the strongman actually would be extraordinarily strong, the fortune teller can actually see things, the contortionist can fit through much smaller gaps than physically possible, etc.
That sounds very fun, actually! But yeah, I don't think Vaesen would be a good fit.
It still feels like Savage Worlds or Fate might work well here. I'm sure there are other good options, but I can't think of any others off the top of my head.
This is an excellent review. I certainly empathize with many of your points about the style of game just not being for you. I also think I tend toward a lighter more “fun” game in tone. I think Vaesen is beautiful and there’s parts of it I like a lot but… 🙂
Thanks for the feedback! Yes, games with a lighter tone are my sweet spot as well. I actually do enjoy somewhat grim settings, but my actual gameplay will almost certainly be more lighthearted and fun.
I share most of your views on the game. I love the setting and (mostly) the kind of mysteries it creates, but some of the specifics don't quite work for me. And there are some weird empty spots in the mechanics, as you noted.
Yes, I agree. And my sense is that the game is probably "good enough" for someone who's experienced in running mysteries and horror games, in spite of its rough edges. But it doesn't exactly make it easy or smooth for others, like myself.
I think the structure they provide is intended to help with that, but when there's so much to track it doesn't help enough.
Agree 100%.
Well thought out review, really liked it. Learned a lot, a bit of how-to-play would have been nice.
New subscriber here, looking forward to binge your channel.
Thanks for the feedback! You're right, in hindsight I should have covered how to play Vaesen - at least the core mechanic. I can recommend this overview that some friends made: ruclips.net/video/HuRUr27nSV4/видео.htmlsi=Y5Z6ztwxdGeGvzQm
Yes my experience of the Year Zero engine is meh - its very swingy in play and the consequences of that swingyness can be quite harsh and compounding. It "just" works. I find the implementation in BladeRunner and Twilight 200 to be a bit better but the "push" issue still exists which is a clear weakness in all the games.
This is the only YZE game I've run so far, although I've played in a few other one-shots. I definitely want to experience a few more for comparison. I believe in some, pushing only risks a condition, but doesn't guarantee it. Tales from the Loop seems a bit more easy going, for example. I'm optimistic about the new Coriolis game that they just kickstarted, which seems to be very exploration focused and has multiple stress tracks.
@@DigitalHobbitRPG Curiously, three of the lighter YZE games (Tales from the Loop, Things from the Flood, and Vaesen, all designed by Nils Hintze) have the some of the most punishing versions of the Push mechanic. That is, a condition is automatically checked. Vaesen is a brilliant design to my eye, and I love playing and running it -- but I really dig the YZE vibes generally. There *are* a few glitches in the rules that could be cleaned up. (Less detailed / structured combat, the goofy take a condition to see if you can avoid a condition thing, and... maybe some advice on throttling the XP.)
I didn't realize that Tales from the Loop has the same harsh push mechanic. And I don't have experience running any other YZE games. There are still some games I'm curious about trying at some point (especially the upcoming Coriolis, but possibly also Alien and Bladerunner).
A fist bump from someone who also uses Miro!
🤛
What was the name of the playtest scenario?
The working title is "The Invading Wood", but I don't think they've released it yet.
Tried to run several Year Zero Engine games, never works out in the end. Can't make this engine work.
And yet many of my RPG friends are huge fans of YZE, so I'm still curious about where the disconnect is, i.e. in the engine itself or the other game aspects. Most of the games seem to emulate a harsh existence, where the sort of death spiral that the engine tends to bring fits the theme - even if I don't enjoy it. I'd like to try a YZE game at some point that's a bit more forgiving. Perhaps the upcoming new version of Coriolis, which is supposed to emphasize exploration?
4 mysteries in 11 sessions?!? No wonder you didn't have a good experience! The games I play finish a mystery in 4+ hours/ 1 session.
Not sure what that has to do with it. It's not a race. ;)
FWIW, our sessions tend to be on the shorter side. Probably 2 hours of actual game time, 2.5 max. Shorter mysteries took us 2 sessions, so pretty similar to your 4 hour sessions. But some mysteries required more time, or benefited from breathing room to roleplay some of the engaging scenes.
@@DigitalHobbitRPG Never said it was a race. I can understand wanting to take your time too. Especially, if you add in leveling up, upgrades to HQ, backstory, and dark secrets. Play the game that is fun for you. I do think that 2 x 2 hr games are less play time that 4 hr games though because there is a certain sitting down, getting comfortable, being reminded of the past session, etc. that takes time out of the 2x2 hrs.
Yes, and my group actually really enjoyed these meta game elements, such as HQ upgrades. I think even accounting for socializing, recapping the previous session, etc., we usually net at least 2 hours of actual game time, sometimes a bit more. But I still agree with your point that 2 of these shorter sessions still result in relatively less progress than a single longer session.
@@DigitalHobbitRPG No worries. Enjoy your next game.
References to christianity is the fist thing to go in any game I pick up; be it D&Ds paladins, clerics, angels & alignment worldview, the vaesen you mentioned here, holy water, crosses & vampires etc etc. It all goes in the trash.
It depends on the game for me, but in this case that would have been my preference, especially since many of the underlying myths date back much further.
@@DigitalHobbitRPG Part of what's going on in Vaesen is using the church as a source of conflict as well, though. They're not the "good guys," and are in fact slightly bound up with the schism in the Society!
Yeah, I've mostly come to terms with that. I just don't like that some of the actual Vaesen are tied to the church, such as the Church Grim.
Why?
@@AnonAdderlan If you're asking why I don't like that some of the Vaesen are tied to the Christian church: The conflict between the "old ways" and the "new ways" is at the heart of Vaesen. And many of the Vaesen (Giants, Trolls, Vaettir, Ghosts, etc.) date back to old Nordic folklore, long before Christianity. I feel that having Vaesen tied to relatively recent history (in the form of Christianity) weakens that focus of the struggle between the old and the new.
Free League makes very pretty but functionally useless products and it's a problem I have with the entire range.
I wouldn't go that far. I do think there's a lot of room for improvement in their products, and the YZ core mechanic is fine, but not groundbreaking or perfect in any way. But there are also a lot of great things about their products, whether I personally like them or not. The settings are evocative, and they are good at keeping the pressure on the player characters (although that's not my preferred mode of play). Many of my friends are having a great time playing or running Vaesen, The Walking Dead, Bladerunner, and other FL games.
@@DigitalHobbitRPG My issue isn't with the systems but with the books/pdfs. A game text should be a useful tool for the game first and an object d'art second. FL have their priorities backwards and it harms the games by proxy.
@@adolexical I agree, their production values are great. Dragonbane is a very solid boxed set. Free League is definitely not the only company that makes highly usable RPGs. For example, I'm a big fan of Two Little Mice, particularly the Outgunned RPG. Granted, my bias is towards more lightweight games these days, so this hits a great sweet spot for me. But it's a very usable product, and also comes with a great boxed set. That's just one of many examples, though. Savage Worlds is more traditional, but also produces great products for example. And there are dozens of amazing and highly usable indie games, such as Mothership, Mausritter, Outcast Silver Raiders, EZD6, Shadowdark, and many more.