as the basilisks demand...
July 9, 2023 10:07 AM Subscribe
Mork Borg is a rules-light tabletop RPG about low-fantasy skulduggery at the end of the world. In its bones are an excess of doom metal, over-the-top graphic design, and an excess of content, both in-house and fan-made. There's a free bare-bones edition for printing and previewing. Online random generators include DNGNGEN, SCVMBIRTHER, and THE MONSTER APPROACHES. A couple fan-made favorites are Forbidden Psalm ('miniature gaming at the end of the world') and the Mork Borg webcomic To Hell and Galgenbeck.
I tried to get into a session at Gen Con but they went almost immediately. Hoping that someone cancels. There's a Cy Borg version that looks like Shadowrun if it were fun. (P.S. before you @ me, I did try Shadowrun once, and even though the guy running the table was doing so to get more players in the game, it was a slog; maybe he was just the wrong guy to do that.)
posted by Halloween Jack at 11:08 AM on July 9, 2023 [1 favorite]
posted by Halloween Jack at 11:08 AM on July 9, 2023 [1 favorite]
I love the game materials and attitude so much. I wish I could find a game to play.
posted by doctornemo at 11:42 AM on July 9, 2023 [1 favorite]
posted by doctornemo at 11:42 AM on July 9, 2023 [1 favorite]
Man, this sure wasn't devised by a Gen-X'er. "Resistance is futile... Nanoo Nanoo!"
posted by Ursula Hitler at 2:39 PM on July 9, 2023 [5 favorites]
posted by Ursula Hitler at 2:39 PM on July 9, 2023 [5 favorites]
What fascinates me about this game is that there is very little to it, mechanics-wise. Most TTRPG game designs seem to pride themselves on mechanics -- being massive and broadly descriptive of every conceivable situation (e.g. roll 2d12 ice damage when you're stuck on an ice floe if and only if the ice floe is heading south, else roll 3d12), or on replicating a particular genre's narrative tics (e.g. FIASCO copying Coen movie debacles), or on doing something very minimal and elegant (e.g. Lasers & Feelings).
Mörk Borg is none of those things. Its mechanics are just OSR stripped to its very basics, and not necessarily elegantly or cleverly. What it has gallons of is vibes based in grimdark imagery and suggestive flavor text. I think it's notable how powerfully it's connected with players on the basis of a flashy exterior with a spit-and-bailing-wire chassis, and raises the question of what is it that actually makes a TTRPG work.
posted by HeroZero at 3:45 PM on July 9, 2023 [8 favorites]
Mörk Borg is none of those things. Its mechanics are just OSR stripped to its very basics, and not necessarily elegantly or cleverly. What it has gallons of is vibes based in grimdark imagery and suggestive flavor text. I think it's notable how powerfully it's connected with players on the basis of a flashy exterior with a spit-and-bailing-wire chassis, and raises the question of what is it that actually makes a TTRPG work.
posted by HeroZero at 3:45 PM on July 9, 2023 [8 favorites]
They won me over when I flipped through a copy of CY_BORG at my game store and found the following:
Player characters are encouraged to break every rule in the book, except for Rule #00: “Player Characters cannot be loyal to or have sympathy for the corps, the cops, or the capitalist system.”
posted by Parasite Unseen at 4:36 PM on July 9, 2023 [17 favorites]
Player characters are encouraged to break every rule in the book, except for Rule #00: “Player Characters cannot be loyal to or have sympathy for the corps, the cops, or the capitalist system.”
posted by Parasite Unseen at 4:36 PM on July 9, 2023 [17 favorites]
This is definitely on my list of games I want to play (it's a long one).
posted by gentlyepigrams at 4:56 PM on July 9, 2023
posted by gentlyepigrams at 4:56 PM on July 9, 2023
> Its mechanics are just OSR stripped to its very basics
Old School Renaissance?
posted by genpfault at 4:57 PM on July 9, 2023 [1 favorite]
Old School Renaissance?
posted by genpfault at 4:57 PM on July 9, 2023 [1 favorite]
Old School Renaissance?
Yes, I should have clarified.
posted by HeroZero at 5:41 PM on July 9, 2023 [1 favorite]
Yes, I should have clarified.
posted by HeroZero at 5:41 PM on July 9, 2023 [1 favorite]
Mörk Borg is none of those things.
Something Mörk Borg has in common with Mothership at least is a real love for a random event/item/etc table - roll "dXX and compare to this table" is all over the place in the new world of zine-based TTRPGs. So you end up with hella simple core mechanics, and instead of adding new mechanics for specialized stuff, you just add another random event table for anything interesting enough to warrant it.
(I am reminded of the sheer delight of getting to roll on the Krush Chart in rolemaster. Literally nothing else about that game was delightful, so the power of the random event table is confirmed.)
The difficulty of random event tables, of course, is that they get repetitive if you roll on them a lot. But luckily it's possible right now to play a new zine RPG every week and never run out, so isn't actually much of a problem in practice... (And lots of these tables are in adventures, which you presumably play through just once.)
But this is all kinda reflective of where the "indie" RPG scene is at right now - supply is suuuuper high as it's really pretty easy to crank out a pretty decent zine with a cool idea. So, you need to distinguish your work to stand out, but /also/ have a game that is simple enough that people will give it a shot, instead of falling back to play a game system they already know. As a result, we've got a flood of games with just amazing design and vibes and hella simple game mechanics.
posted by kaibutsu at 10:21 PM on July 9, 2023 [4 favorites]
Something Mörk Borg has in common with Mothership at least is a real love for a random event/item/etc table - roll "dXX and compare to this table" is all over the place in the new world of zine-based TTRPGs. So you end up with hella simple core mechanics, and instead of adding new mechanics for specialized stuff, you just add another random event table for anything interesting enough to warrant it.
(I am reminded of the sheer delight of getting to roll on the Krush Chart in rolemaster. Literally nothing else about that game was delightful, so the power of the random event table is confirmed.)
The difficulty of random event tables, of course, is that they get repetitive if you roll on them a lot. But luckily it's possible right now to play a new zine RPG every week and never run out, so isn't actually much of a problem in practice... (And lots of these tables are in adventures, which you presumably play through just once.)
But this is all kinda reflective of where the "indie" RPG scene is at right now - supply is suuuuper high as it's really pretty easy to crank out a pretty decent zine with a cool idea. So, you need to distinguish your work to stand out, but /also/ have a game that is simple enough that people will give it a shot, instead of falling back to play a game system they already know. As a result, we've got a flood of games with just amazing design and vibes and hella simple game mechanics.
posted by kaibutsu at 10:21 PM on July 9, 2023 [4 favorites]
rolemaster owned, and was considerably more elegant than it normally gets credit for.
I've played mork borg and it's got style out the wazoo buutttt certainly the adventures I played were no great shakes.
posted by Sebmojo at 2:22 AM on July 10, 2023
I've played mork borg and it's got style out the wazoo buutttt certainly the adventures I played were no great shakes.
posted by Sebmojo at 2:22 AM on July 10, 2023
I love this game, and love showing off the rulebook to non-gaming friends.
I've gravitated to rules-light systems such as Mörk Borg and Mothership lately. They put more onus on the game master to adjudicate (the many) situations not covered in the rules, but in general the "the task succeeds unless failure is interesting, in which case make an appropriate roll" rule of thumb works pretty well.
Running Mothership at GaryCon last year, I had one player who could not wrap their head around the fact that actions in combat are not defined. "What can I do as an action?" "Anything you want, so long as it's one thing that takes about ten seconds or less."
posted by Gelatin at 4:58 AM on July 10, 2023 [1 favorite]
I've gravitated to rules-light systems such as Mörk Borg and Mothership lately. They put more onus on the game master to adjudicate (the many) situations not covered in the rules, but in general the "the task succeeds unless failure is interesting, in which case make an appropriate roll" rule of thumb works pretty well.
Running Mothership at GaryCon last year, I had one player who could not wrap their head around the fact that actions in combat are not defined. "What can I do as an action?" "Anything you want, so long as it's one thing that takes about ten seconds or less."
posted by Gelatin at 4:58 AM on July 10, 2023 [1 favorite]
I'm not experienced with RPGs, and I gotta say, after going through the excruciating process of Pathfinder character creation with an experienced DM, reading through MÖRK BORG was like drinking water for the first time.
posted by jy4m at 8:48 AM on July 10, 2023 [1 favorite]
posted by jy4m at 8:48 AM on July 10, 2023 [1 favorite]
I bought this a couple-three years ago and dug it, but haven't gotten around to playing it. My RPG attention these days is almost solely on Ultraviolet Grasslands, which anyone who likes Mörk Borg would probably enjoy immensely.
posted by heteronym at 9:15 AM on July 10, 2023 [3 favorites]
posted by heteronym at 9:15 AM on July 10, 2023 [3 favorites]
I'm not experienced with RPGs, and I gotta say, after going through the excruciating process of Pathfinder character creation with an experienced DM, reading through MÖRK BORG was like drinking water for the first time.
In that case, SCVMBIRTHER (linked in the OP), which generates entire characters with a single click (since it's all random anyway), must be like a gin and tonic.
posted by Gelatin at 9:25 AM on July 10, 2023
In that case, SCVMBIRTHER (linked in the OP), which generates entire characters with a single click (since it's all random anyway), must be like a gin and tonic.
posted by Gelatin at 9:25 AM on July 10, 2023
If you're after 75 minutes of informed discussion and analysis from three game-industry veterans, my pod-colleagues Greg Stolze and Ross Payton and I did a vivisection of MÖRK BORG (the name is always capitalized) earlier this year, as an episode of our RPG analysis podcast Ludonarrative Dissidents.
posted by Hogshead at 10:41 AM on July 10, 2023 [3 favorites]
posted by Hogshead at 10:41 AM on July 10, 2023 [3 favorites]
I want to try solo rpgs, and I love the design of Mork and Cy but... it's a bit too abstract and weird I need beautiful design that makes sense but still has a flow. This is too much flow, others are too grid/chart.
Anwyays, I think the solo rpg that most sounds interesting to me is the one with the giant tower. Quinns talked about it. Colostle also looks cool. I just picked up the Free RPG day Loup Garou interactive "choose your own adventure" graphic novel/gamebook.
Looking forward to reading the rest of the comments....
posted by symbioid at 12:38 PM on July 10, 2023
Anwyays, I think the solo rpg that most sounds interesting to me is the one with the giant tower. Quinns talked about it. Colostle also looks cool. I just picked up the Free RPG day Loup Garou interactive "choose your own adventure" graphic novel/gamebook.
Looking forward to reading the rest of the comments....
posted by symbioid at 12:38 PM on July 10, 2023
I just want to say I approve of this post. I'm waiting for the Mothership 1st ed boxed set right now, btw, hope to get to run it with my group.
posted by Harald74 at 5:39 AM on July 12, 2023
posted by Harald74 at 5:39 AM on July 12, 2023
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posted by zamboni at 10:40 AM on July 9, 2023 [5 favorites]