Midnight Pub

Playing tabletop RPGs in solo mode

~ostov

I'm wondering if anyone in the Pub has had experience with singleplayer tabletop RPGs?

I think Ironsworn is a good starting point for this.

But trying on a GM hat and a player hat at the same time is really hard.

But nonetheless, it's an interesting form of entertainment. Multiplayer RPGs require at least... players. And they are very difficult to find.

In addition, the plots are more "solid" than if you played together with GPT-3.

But often in Ironsworn the "play effect" disappears, because you are a GM and a player at the same time.

Perhaps this could be corrected by additional procedures (rules) for generating descriptions of locations, objects and NPCs, and of course the rules for emulating the NPCs themselves. But this is unfortunately not built into the Ironsworn rules.

But I love the concept of solo tabletop RPGs. These are games that are made "for you", with the setting that you want, and with the plot that you would like.

It was interesting to know your opinion on this matter, adventurer.

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Replies

~the_bebop_cowboy wrote:

I keep thinking about trying out solo TTRPGs. I see them often on itch.io which I tend to surf a lot. The concept intrigues me, somewhere between reading a book and playing a game of solitaire, but I worry that they will be a wasted investment of time. Seeing someone else interested in them makes me a little more curious. Maybe picking one up might be worth a shot.

~bummedbeetle wrote:

I also just started getting into solo-RPGs. I know the Dungeon Masters Guide from D&D has a lot of tables to roll from. Maybe it also helps to build out the world (or area, locations, NPC and stuff) before you actually start playing, so you can seperate the GMing and the playing parts, and don’t have to improvise as much.

Again, I’ve just played a tiny bit of Ironsworn: starforged. So I’m no expert on this.

Perhaps you could also try the co-op mode, but that makes it lose the whole “just for you” aspect.

~ns wrote (thread):

If I played a TTRPG alone, I know I'd be better off writing a book. TTRPGs are a puzzle, and I can't reasonably pretend to not know the answer if I'm both the DM and the player.

On another note, funny that you say the hard part is finding players. With 5e, I think the hard part is finding a DM!