I will buy any Sine Nomine Publishing books unseen for their amazing worldbuilding tools, but I'm not particularly fond of OSR rules as a whole. I can deal with D&D 5E or Pathfinder 2E, but beyond that I have little interest in level-and-class systems.
this post was submitted on 05 Oct 2026
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Stars Without Number is the equally solid Sci-Fi equivalent. My players like their fantasy as DnD, but I plan to win them over with this.
I love the ship combat mechanics - everybody mans a different station according to their skills.
I also love the way that the galaxy keeps going outside of what the players are doing.
Yes, I love that Worlds Without Number have tools for deciding what factions and important NPCs do in the background while the PCs are doing other things. It's been my intention to create my own tools like that, but I think I'm going to try these tools first - both for my own solo play in WWN, but also for my Pathfinder 2E campaign that I run in the same world.
I also love the way that the galaxy keeps going outside of what the players are doing.
Is Stars Without Numbers packaged with rules to facilitate this, somehow?
Because that's just something a good GM should be doing, regardless.
I'm not the one you replied to, but yes, I believe it is. At least Worlds Without Number - which is based on Stars Without Number - has such tools.
Its probably the class system holding it back. I think its cool when its like a soda machine style system. You just pour in however much you want of that thing. But it seems most people like to "choose an archetype". They want to see wizard, mage, warrior, druid, all that stuff as something to pick cause thats easy and they know they get what they want (or close). They dont want to cook it from scratch.
Yeah, I think there's a lot of truth in that. It was probably a mistake to make tha class system like it is... It's sort of hard for a beginner to figure out of they can make a druid or monk as it is now...
Nah dont ever say that this class system is so fuccen sicc it makes me cry.
Why do you like it?
I like to be able to pick what I want and only what I want. I think the classical way of doing it like in DND is extremely restrictive and forces everyone into boxes. This way offers nearly infinite diversity in infinite combinations and I dig it.
Based on what you said, here are my reactions. Maybe they’re informative (or maybe not!):
- Loci/skills: this adds cognitive load compared to having minimal stats, like in Cairn. It’s also more cognitive load than something like Shadowdark’s no skills (since there are no skill checks).
- More options for combat and better combat than 5e: When I hear this I think this might mean crunchy combat. And that means more cognitive load.
I want to clarify that having complicated systems is not negative by itself. Cognitive load is relative to what people learn. If players are willing to learn a system well, then complicated games could be exactly what they want to play.
But I’ve had new players think Nimble is too complicated, when it seems trivial to me. That is why I favor systems that are even simpler than Nimble: Knave 2e, Cairn, Shadowdark…
At least in my local community, with 50 % of the games being D&D/pathfinder
D&D/Pathfinder >> Local games >> Other big names RPG (Vampire/Chtulhu) >> PBTA >> OSR and not being translated make it even less popular
I like it, and I'll suggest to my group when we finish our Pathfinder campaign in a couple of years.
Yeah great game. People prefer old TTRPG philosophies I guess which bring them to DnD
Not sure how foci is pronounced, but in my head I'm hearing 'fuck eye.'
Foe-kai, like cacti or fungi.. A plural of focus
It's a normal English word taken from Latin: the plural of "focus". The O is a long O in both words.