General Discussion

[IsabellaRose]

2 hours ago, Typical Blue Haired Dude said:

Been hearing about a TTRPG named Fabula Ultimate on other roleplaying forums. Apparently it takes influence from JRPGs, from what I hear. If anyone here is familiar about it, what are some things that set it apart? What are some scenarios where I would wanna run that over DnD 5e? Just curious!

I've read it and I'd like to play it, but I haven't yet. Two of my other groups played it and loved it.

From reading it, it looks like Fabula Ultima is what D&D pretends to be: a dramatic, character-driven, high-stakes, over-the-top adventure game where story is the engine and combat is one expression of that story, not the whole point. D&D is ultimately a tactical miniatures combat system with roleplay strung between initiative rounds. Fabula Ultima, on the other hand, assumes that big melodrama is normal, that emotional motivations matter mechanically, that characters change as the story changes, and that over-the-top, cinematic actions are expected. My friend described their game as "like a Final Fantasy cutscene seamlessly connected to a Fire Emblem character moment and a Persona relationship beat." 

Classes are modular and combo-focused. Each character picks two classes and blends them, much more JRPG-like. Classes synergize heavily, creating party role synergy without strict roles. Fabula Ultima builds characters like a skill tree in a JRPG.

Damage and death work like in JRPGs. Combat isn't a tactical grind; it’s fast, flashy, narrative, and tense because characters don’t just die, they hit dramatic thresholds. Often, characters become more dangerous when wounded... again, very JRPG. Another thing of note is that the GM doesn't roll dice, just like in Powered by the Apocalypse games. The GM runs the world, the players roll all dice and enemy attacks happen because players fail, not because the GM wins. It reframes the whole table dynamic and puts narrative flow above tactical turn-grinding. There are generally increasingly difficult "boss" fights, which definitely feels like a JRPG.

I also like that there aren't just items like "another +1 sword" laying around. The game focuses more on unique gear, relics tied to the story, magical items with purpose, and JRPG-style equipment sets.

D&D has “bonds” that don’t matter after session 0, but Fabula Ultima makes them part of the actual gameplay. Bonds are the heart of the system. Characters define Bonds toward each other and toward NPCs. These Bonds give dice in crucial moments, evolve over time, break, heal, twist, grow, and shape the entire story arc mechanically.

Ultima Points reward theme, drama, and intention. They're gained when PCs follow dramatic instincts and allow characters to supercharge actions to turn the tide of a battle and perform iconic moves. It's like D&D Inspiration, except you actually award and use it. 

 

As for what kinds of games you'd run with Fabula instead of D&D? Personally, any game (I'm pretty done with D&D), but my list includes:

1. Anything Where the Story Actually Matters. If you want actual character arcs, emotional bonds influencing outcomes, games that feel like anime stories, scars that change PCs, consequences that aren’t just HP loss, then Fabula Ultima crushes D&D. This is where D&D fails entirely, because its mechanics only care about hit points, AC, and DPR.

2. JRPG-Inspired Campaigns. Obviously. If you want something like Final Fantasy, Chrono Trigger, Xenogears, Fire Emblem, Tales of Symphonia, Persona, Golden Sun, or Skies of Arcadia, then Fabula Ultima is built exactly for that style of play. You could run them in 5e, but D&D can't hit the drama and characters arcs without heavy hacking.

3. Big Emotions, Big Villains, Big Swings. If your story has over-the-top villains, dramatic reveals, theme-driven transformation forms, summons that reshape battlefields, characters who yell attacks when they use them, rival fights that turn into friendship... this is your game. Yeah,  that's not mechanical, but still, D&D isn't built to support this. Fabula Ultima is.

4. Party-Focused Stories (NOT lone-wolf murderhobo stuff). If the party matters more than the individual, backstories interconnect, character relationships drive the plot, internal conflict isn’t sidelined by stat blocks... this is where Fabula Ultima shines.

5. Games Where Cinematic Combat Trumps Tactical Combat. Fabula Ultima is for battles that look like signature attacks, overdrives, cinematic finishers, spellstorms, summons that consume whole arenas, transformations mid-fight... the FUN stuff. D&D is just, “Okay, I cast Firebolt… again.”

6. Stories With a Strong Thematic Core. Fabula Ultima has an extremely powerful structure for coming-of-age arcs, fated heroes, tragic villains, found family, hopepunk fantasy, epic journeys that change characters permanently. D&D doesn’t do theme unless the GM imposes it artificially.

 

My two cents about why to choose FU over D&D - because D&D is a combat simulator that pretends it’s a roleplaying game. Fabula Ultima is a storytelling engine that treats combat as another tool for drama.

• If you want tactical grid combat - D&D.
• If you want story-first, character-driven, anime-style epic fantasy - Fabula Ultima.
• If you want emotional arcs to matter mechanically - Fabula Ultima.
• If you want classes that encourage creativity instead of locking characters in boxes - Fabula Ultima.
• If you want sessions that feel like watching a JRPG anime come alive - Fabula Ultima.

Fabula Ultima is simply the better tool for running emotional fantasy, cinematic fantasy, stylish fantasy, narrative fantasy, or anything that isn’t “simulating hit point loss.”

[WritesNaughtyStories]

Thank you, Izzy!

[IsabellaRose]

I read it voraciously, but ultimately I'm still not a fan of class-based systems.

[Rob4ix]

18 hours ago, IsabellaRose said:

I read it voraciously, but ultimately I'm still not a fan of class-based systems.

I personally am not a fan of classes too, but fabula ultima does stick out to me as a great middle ground, since really, you dont acquire classes you acquire specific perks of a class, so its closer to perk based systems like in fallout, despite there still being classes 

[IsabellaRose]

34 minutes ago, Rob4ix said:

I personally am not a fan of classes too, but fabula ultima does stick out to me as a great middle ground, since really, you dont acquire classes you acquire specific perks of a class, so its closer to perk based systems like in fallout, despite there still being classes 

I definitely found it much more approachable from a narrative perspective than so many of the games I grew up playing. All the old stuff was very simulationist - combat simulations, resource management, etc. The waves of games that turn telling a narrative into mechanical elements really hit my zone, even though I bounced hard off of them after decades of old style games under my belt.

[WritesNaughtyStories]

When it's played in a particular way, the simulationist games can develop emergent narrative from what happens, but they're often used to string fight scenes together, which isn't that much fun. For stringing fight scenes together something like Feng Shui is a much more useful tool. 

I'm curious to see Cortex in action as it looks to me like it builds narrative with it's mechanics in a strangely granular way. Apocalypse World builds its stories in a similar way, but is far more loose with its structure.

[IsabellaRose]

12 hours ago, WritesNaughtyStories said:

When it's played in a particular way, the simulationist games can develop emergent narrative from what happens, but they're often used to string fight scenes together, which isn't that much fun. For stringing fight scenes together something like Feng Shui is a much more useful tool. 

I'm curious to see Cortex in action as it looks to me like it builds narrative with it's mechanics in a strangely granular way. Apocalypse World builds its stories in a similar way, but is far more loose with its structure.

From my perspective and the way I enjoy playing, Cortex Dramatic sort of forces narrative choices that I wouldn't always make for my character (like if I stress out my Angry stress track, storming off in a huff), but that work in the context of a dramatic scene and dramatic storytelling. I like that sometimes my characters' emotions will get the better of them.

I also like that sometimes I'll have the choice to do something that does NOT benefit the team or our goal (but that's totally in character) to earn a plot point for later. I like that those choices carry mechanical weight.

But one of my favorite aspects is that in order to earn dice for your Growth Pool, the only way you can improve your character and get better at the things you do, you have to either challenge your values and relationships, working at odds with the things you think you believe and the things you think you know about the other characters, or you have to take stress. Taking stress, essentially "damage", in the game is one of the only two ways to earn dice to make you grow. It's almost like they baked the philosophy that "what doesn't kill you makes you stronger" right into the game, and I think that part, and the challenging your own beliefs and assumptions about people, are the cornerstones of improving your abilities. I don't know of any other game that makes your values and relationships the key to being able to act, and makes those other two bits the keys to getting stronger.

[WritesNaughtyStories]

I sometimes wonder if it's an instinct to "win" that requires us to create frameworks that encourage us to make interesting narrative choices. In any simulationist game we could make fun and interesting choices based on who the characters are rather than the tactical puzzle. But it's often the tactical puzzle we engage with rather than the story we could build if (when) we engaged with the motivations that create the tactical puzzle.

I like that we're finding ways to spur our attention to the story and making that the puzzle to optimize.

[IsabellaRose]

That's exactly why I click so well with narrative-focused games. The mechanics, achieving the "win scenario" requires making interesting narrative choices that aren't always in your characters' best interests. I imagine all those min/max players dislike this kind of game.

That's the thing to me, really. Games are designed with mechanics, and the mechanics are the thing you engage with to play the game. If your core mechanics are combat, you will resort to combat to solve every encounter. That's the problem with D&D. You can "flavor" things, but you're still playing a class. You can add systems, subsystems, things to try to drive the narrative, and do all these things to try to make the game more narrative, but at the end of the day, it's a combat simulator with roleplay tacked on as an afterthought. No amount of "updates" or "improvements" are going to make it less of a combat simulator. That's what it's built on. That's why I get so bored playing it... all my fun roleplay is overshadowed by a 2 hour long slogfest of dice rolling and tactical decision making. If I want that kind of combat, I'll just play a wargame.