I discovered roleplaying through Lancer, and it made me love tactics with a little emergent behavior (with the occasional surprise super silly combo), the sort we also have in some tactical puzzle games like into the breach or tactical breach wizards. Do you know some tactical RPGs with combat that can almost feel like puzzles at times
THEME: Combat with Puzzles.
Hello friend! I think I have some solid recommendations here, but don't sleep on what I've already written about! You can check out some other recommendation posts at the bottom of this.
Celestial Bodies, by Charlotte Laskowski @binarystargames.
Adrift Among the Bodies of the Dead
For a generation after the calamity, the infinite dark between the stars felt cramped, crowded by refugees on ships meant for fewer people and shorter trips.
In the second generation, those who survived in their home-ships now cannibalized the metal skeletons of the less fortunate ships.
The third generation did not just expand their ships; they expanded their mecha and their operations. They fled to farther stars — populations in space stations and on surfaces booming as quickly as lives were lost in petty disputes.
The fourth generation discovered the Titans. No probe had yet reached these dead gods whose frozen bodies spanned hundreds of miles across.
You are the fifth generation.
Celestial Bodies uses an inventory system that feels similar to Mausritter; you have to fit your weapons and other gear inside a grid in order to carry everything. Your “puzzle’ involves constructing your mech to work effectively in battle according to the strategy you prefer. You’re also tracking resources gained and resources used; it seems like you have to keep fighting in order to get access to the things that keep you going.
Ultraviolence Radiation, by KintaroTPC.
Ultraviolence Radiation (UVR) is an experiment in action.
Deflect bullets with a knife!
Grab a guy and use him as a weapon against another guy!
Take a smoke break in the middle of a hail of gunfire!
Get your revenge and look cool doing it.
Featuring 100 enemies with unique Intros, Attacks and special things they do when they die! 28 Abilities to make the action hero you want to play! A rule set which takes inspiration from Beat-Em-Up arcade games and applied them to the Tabletop genre.
In Ultraviolence Radiation, one person is a player, while everyone else at the table plays the baddies. The fighter can’t use moves that draw from the same stat back-to-back; a limitation that points towards having to think carefully about what you’re going to do. There are also moves that have cooldown limitations; you can’t spam the same move, but rather have to time everything to make sure you still have access to good options. Additionally, the fighter has access to passive moves, which have no cooldown, and in some cases, might be consistently in effect. They also have interrupt moves, which can be used outside of your turn. This gives you a fairly complex list of options to choose from, which I think is an integral piece to a good combat game.
Mutation, by OneFootWall Games.
The World as we know it has changed. Two centuries from now a comet strikes Earth. This hunk of interstellar rock was an attack by some Klendathu wannabes. “Goddamn bugs whacked us, Johnny.”
It wasn’t really a comet or meteor, or even an asteroid. It was a seed bomb for terraforming sent by some alien species. This thing detonated a mile up over the Florida Keys and scattered radiation, some kind of bio-gel, and spores around the globe. It wiped out 80% of life on the surface. And we never even got to see the damn aliens…
The world was a little weird and quiet after that. But like Dr Ian Malcom in Jurassic Park says, “Life, uh, finds a way.”
A 3d6 system with a reasonable amount of crunch, distance matters in Mutation, and turns have an action economy. This plus the attacks, talents, psychic powers, skills, and gear which all constitute your character mean that you have a number of different distinct tools that can be used to overcome obstacles, especially in combat. Your character also has the opportunity to inflict and also take different conditions; having different ways to affect and damage your opponent feels like another layer of tactical precision to me.
There is a free quickstart if you want to take a peek behind the curtain before you buy.
Thrones and Threads, by OpalBreeze Games.
Throughout the land, warlords hire mercenary champions to try and dethrone one another. Once hired, these champions don cloth adornments embroidered with threads of vibrant colours that signify their allegiance. Endowed with formidable power, champions are tasked with cutting through enemy lines and destroying fortified strongholds until no obstacles remain between their forces and the enemy throne.
Thrones and Threads is a role-playing battle arena based on Songs and Sagas, product of Fari RPGs, developed and authored by René-Pier Deshaies-Gélinas.
This game comes with 5 pregenerated characters and feels very much like an arena battle; combat is front and centre. Each character has a special move that makes them unique, and many of their traits are determined by different sizes of dice. Because each character has flavoured ways of using their stats, if you are inventive in how you describe your characters’ actions, you’ll likely be able to play to your strengths.
Strike Force Omega, by potatocubed.
It is the far future. Humanity spreads across the galaxy. Led by a council of corporate interests, the Imperial Core reaps the benefits of plunder and exploitation on an unimaginable scale, teeming trillions of human beings kept docile by mass media and the never-ending war against every other sentient species humanity has encountered.
You were a soldier in that war. Not one of the grunts, given basic training and a gun and shoved towards the enemy, although you might have started there. No, you were part of Strike Force Omega. Omega, because you ended things. Given the best training and equipment, remade by your corporate masters into a terrifying god of war, and expected to achieve the impossible on a regular basis. Which you did.
But war has found you, even here. Not all the threats in the corp newsrooms are overstated.
The people of these worlds are frightened, but they will defend their homes against the oncoming tides – and they will fail and they will die. Even in their millions they cannot win.
War is what you were made for, after all. You’ve killed and destroyed for far worse causes than this, so why not take up arms one more time and maybe try to claw back a little part of your soul?
LUMEN is generally a great system for strategic combat, all about creating combos that make you feel powerful and effective. Strike Force Omega is a setting that allows you to play with both magic and technology, and it includes 6 sample campaigns, one for each enemy faction written for the setting. Since the lore and world-building is built in, your characters already have a strong reason for fighting, something that sometimes I struggle to put together in Lancer.
demon blade ultimate, by Peach Garden Games.
Take up your Demon Blade and do battle against the oppression of the imperial army, put an end to the shaded cities, and bring the people of the undercity back to the sunlight.
Demon Blade Ultimate uses the Arts Grid, a character creation and power system pioneered in the legendary Horse Girl Infinity by Jordan Cuddlefish. Choose powers from the grid, unleash powerful summoning magic, and know that nothing is truly beyond your reach.
The grid system in Demon Blade involves choosing three powers on a grid. The spaces between the thing you want to do and the thing you are good at determines the difficulty of an action. Advancement allows you to increase your strengths, making you more powerful as you play.
This game takes a lot from shounen battle anime, so expect narratives about striving to improve yourself until you can vanquish the evil that threatens your people.
My Dragoon Recommendation Post.
Fantasy With Tools Recommendation Post
Weapons & Weapon Customization Recommendation Post
Spatial Puzzle Recommendations
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