Ugh, too many things.

Mostly I want to finally try running something with my homebrew Dragon Teeth, which is basically a very pared-down and generalized version of D&D 5E with significantly different magic rules.

But what setting and adventure to run? There are too many that interest me, and gamer-attention-deficit makes it tough to focus on getting one ready for play. They include:

Tomb World / Sepulcral Realm - Basically a world where undead have monopolized all resources and the living are rare and have an increasingly difficult existence. To the point that they can’t gain enough food to sustain themselves.

• This is the closest I have to running something. An adventure maybe 1/3 written about a community caught between bad luck and an inflexible contract.

Dark Sun - Nothing written, but an idea that has been stuck in my brain for years about convict-laborers sent on an archeological mission by a Sorcerer Queen trying to unearth something to weaken the position of a fellow monarch.

Space horror - Various Mothership and similar published scenarios that’d be interesting to try.

Astral voyage - Have some ideas about fantasy and/or sci-fi adventures traveling through Astral space on various mundane or transcendent errands. But nothing concrete unfortunately. Kind of intended to finally make use of my Astral Navigator’s Handbook.

Also a few other slightly more traditional pre-published fantasy adventures/worlds.

I frickin love GURPS Ice Age supplement. But never have run it for two reasons:

1. After years of consideration I’ve come to the conclusion that I just don’t particularly like GURPS as a system.
2. I can never think of stone age scenarios that feel compelling in my mind. Not sure what quality would quite seem satisfying.

But still have some fascination with a dawn of humanity type setting.

I figured out the problem:

It wouldn’t let me post a comment-to-a-comment when the language was set to “Undetermined”. Setting the language of the individual post to “English” allowed it to work.

Weirdly this option wasn’t available to me on Jerboa. Only on the browser site.

I tend to have a few standard recommendations for requests like this, but some don’t necessarily fit as well with the wizard-centered setting you’re suggesting.

The ones I think might fit best include:

Little Wizards - (also in paperback ) This is almost exactly what you are asking for: Characters are young magicians in a relatively mundane world. Might be stretched slightly to run Harry Potter or Kiki’s Delivery Service type of setting. The art is colorful and evocative. In the game system failure can cause setbacks and require new solutions to problems, but total defeat or death is not specifically represented.

Risus – A very simple, very general system, not attached to one particular genre or setting. Some adventures here. You could easily use it to run many types of games. The author also has a lot of advice on running a game here.

Folklore: A Rules-Light Roleplaying Game - Another simple, universal game that can probably do any genre. At only four pages (pamphlet sized) this is one of the shortest, simplest. But pretty much no existing material for it.

Hero Kids - Cheap, relatively simple fantasy roleplaying game. Mostly for tactical play. Should work pretty well with kids who are into miniatures or board games. Many character choices and adventures. Probably not closer to Harry Potter type themes, but it does have several types of magicians.

Also, only mentioning the following in case you need something really closer to regular D&D rules, but simpler than standard 5th Edition D&D:

Swords & Wizardry - This is a clone of an earlier version of D&D, but with things cleaned up and made more elegant and clear. There are different editions of this game, tailored to the amount of additional information and detail folks want.

Old-School Essentials - This is another game designed in a similar way, but based on a different earlier edition of D&D.

I can think of three options, none are perfect, but each could be tinkered with to get what you want:

In the Light of a Ghost Star – This is much further in the future than you intend. But it has incredibly simple rules which are easy to customize. Also I made a psionics supplement for it here. I had pretty good success running it.

Mutants & Machine-guns - A loose, fairly tongue-in-cheek system. Free.

Mutant Future - Basically a cleaned up clone of early edition Gamma World. Less light than other games mentioned.

Mutants & Masterminds is a neat system, and flexible enough that you can use it to do a lot of different things.

But if someone is asking for a game that is “simpler than 5E”, then Mutants & Masterminds would not be my first suggestion. Depending on what you’re trying to do, character creation could get pretty detailed.

Oh boy. Buckle in, this is going to be a long one. This question crops up periodically on a number of other social media sites, and below is my answer to previous inquiries:

I think for some people, 4th Edition was exactly the sort of game they were interested in. But conceptually it was a departure from the aspects of 2nd edition, and even 3rd edition, which I’d come to enjoy.

Folks have said it was too “videogamey” and certainly it did seem to use some team-videogame concepts, though I wouldn’t say that was exactly what rubbed me the wrong way.

Nearly a decade back, I ran a 4E game for maybe 6 months or more at the insistence of a local group, and participated as a player afterward for a few more months.

Going into the experience, my main gripe was heavier reliance on “dissociated mechanics”, and that the powers and tools available were generally even more exclusively geared toward combat than previous editions.

But a more tactical, less roleplaying-related, game has some slight appeal to me. So, setting all my issues aside, I tried to enjoy it as a more combat intensive game. Unfortunately, even in combat alone, 4th Ed. just had too many bits that stuck in my craw:

• Geared to win - Most combats it never felt like the characters were in much danger of dying. There was only one I can remember that was really a “close thing”.

• Slog Combats - Despite not straining the characters much, a standard combat would usually take the majority of the evening, even against relatively weak opponents. This might partly have been an issue of people not having all their powers perfectly memorized and planned, but in some cases it was just a hassle of hit/miss whittling down a massive pile of opponent hit points every time. In general we would get into one combat per session, and it would take up most of the session.

• Level Wiff Factor - If average combats didn’t seem much challenge, then combats against high level opponents were an exercise in missing and missing again. Unlike previous editions, 4th Edition, armor class escalates right along with everything else. So enemies of different levels are extremely difficult to hit.

• Equipment Wiff Factor - A couple of us realized late in the game that, unlike previous editions, expected PC equipment bonuses are heavily factored into the challenge rating of monsters. To the extent that the GM is literally required to keep providing you with equipment appropriate to your level. If you don’t have the equipment power level mandated by your character level, you will miss a heck of a lot more.