# You Know, Games OTHER Than D&D Exist, Right? tags: #thoughts The real irony here is that I think this describes 90% of RPGs which aren't **[[Dungeons and Dragons]]**. Hell, it may describe 90% of wargames that aren't **[[Chainmail]]**.   I mean, Hell, let's just talk about [[Powered by the Apocalypse|PbtA]]/[[Blades in the Dark|FitD]] in terms of these thoughts. It's certainly not an RPG lineage that is particularly new; at this point, we're talking well over a decade old.^[Holy Christ, checking the copyright page on **[[Powered by the Apocalypse|Apocalypse World]]**, it's 2010. 15 years.] I feel aged. (We'll use **[[Scum and Villainy]]** as our particular reference because I want an excuse to crack it open again.) ![[Scum and Villainy (cover).png]] Inherently, the system has a low number of HP, or more accurately, available wound levels. Most manifestations have between 3 and 7. *(In **S&V**, the issue is split between stress and harm. Stresses are burnable temporary tokens you can burn for many things but using them all inflicts permanent trauma. A character can take two level 1 harms, 2 level 2, and 1 level 3 harms before they are looking at death or other catastrophic, permanent consequences - but harm can be entirely non-physical as well. Bruised as a result of not taking that last corner well? That's a level 1 Harm, halfway to having lessened effect on all action rolls. Good luck with that.)* Armor class isn't directly comparable, but most playbooks have a thing they can call on once between downtimes to cancel out a serious consequence without burning stress. *(**S&V** has special armor which often applies to particular kinds of consequences as well as more typical sci-fi forms, but most of them have one and only one use each. Good luck with that.* *For example, the **Muscle** has the Battleborn special ability which grants a special armor to reduce harm from an attack in combat or push himself for greater effect during a fight. The **Scoundrel** can take Devil's Own Luck to burn his special armor to resist consequences of blaster fire or push himself when talking his way out of or running away from trouble.)* It almost goes without saying that particularly in the *[[Blades in the Dark|Forged in the Dark]]* variants, actually manipulating the fictional positioning of your character, as well as that of the group, can give you significant advantages on potency and/or position when in conflict with an enemy. Hell, one could argue that is literally the *entirety* of the game, in a real sense. So really what I'm saying is perhaps you should try playing some other RPG—any other RPG—rather than just trying to imagine something beyond the extremely limited and restrictive bonds of **D&D** as the only things that exist. I know, I'm crazy. This is a fool's errand.