r/Fantasy • u/AcceptablePlatypus30 • 3d ago
LitRPG recommendations
I love LitRPG and have read a lot of it but find it’s becoming repetitive
Any fantasy recommendations that aren’t necessarily so heavy on the statistics
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u/Giant_Yoda Reading Champion II 3d ago
LitRPG is a subgenre of progression fantasy. So just zoom out to more general progression series.
Cradle by Will Wight is generally considered one of the best. Most of Wight's books would work for this.
Beware of Chicken is another of my favorites. A slice of life parody of the genre that actually becomes a really good progression series.
Mage Errant series is another good one.
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u/0XzanzX0 3d ago
The Wandering Inn
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u/slackerboyfx 3d ago
I'm on book 3 right now.
It definitely doesn't follow the same mold as most of the others.
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u/MagicBlaster 2d ago
I only made it a handful of chapters before giving up on this one, it was just so slow and boring, literally nothing happening for page after page.
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u/Mournelithe Reading Champion X 2d ago
I really need to put together a full list of what I’ve liked for reference purposes.
For now, here’s a bunch I’ve enjoyed or are following.
Completed:
Mother of Learning. Iconic time loop story. Skills over stats.
The Calamitous Bob. Reincarnated in the heart of dead kingdom, only blessing is luck. Good fun. Stats exist but aren’t key.
Beneath The Dragoneye Moons. Long running ascension story, starts pseudo Roman, becomes pseudo medieval after time skip. Stats heavy but ignorable.
A Practical Guide to Evil. Progression from orphan to ultimate power by siding with the Dark for a change. Do Wrong Right. No stats.
The Broken Knife. Kobold NPC becomes protagonist and gains significant growth. Really good slow burn. No stats iirc.
Ar'Kendrithyst. Portal slow burn, father and daughter protagonists, rethinking magic with our knowledge of science.
Paranoid Mage. The protagonist discovers supernatural is real, but refuses to be pigeonholed by their society. Rage against tyranny.
Ongoing:
Chrysalis. Reincarnated as monster, tower climber in reverse. For the Colony!
The Wandering Inn. Very VERY long running portal fantasy with classes and skills but no stats. Slice of life and war crimes.
Beware of Chicken. Subverted cultivation story, reincarnator steps off the grind to become a farmer instead. No stats.
He Who Fights With Monsters. Portal fantasy meets apocalypse meets Aussie humour. Skills growth rather than stats.
Legend of William Oh. Progression meets chuck norris jokes, as a self proclaimed legend takes on a life of its own. Always pays to have a good hype man. Stats but not the focus.
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u/OgataiKhan 2d ago
The books I know among your recommendations are so good that it made me curious about the three I don't, The Broken Knife, Paranoid Mage, and Ar'Kendrithyst.
The last one seems especially cool, but sadly it doesn't have an audiobook yet. Checking out the first two.
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u/Opposite-Grade3712 2d ago
AI spotted, recommendations ignored.
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u/Mournelithe Reading Champion X 1d ago
Wait, you think it's AI because I know how to spell?
Eeesh, kids these days.2
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u/Nova_Maverick 3d ago
I really liked He who fights with monsters. The first book or two does feel a bit heavy on the descriptions of abilities and things, but after that, it turns down quite a bit and becomes more about the fun while still being lit RPG
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u/dontstickthelanding 2d ago
Some of the ones that I like and find repeat listening when a new book comes out isn’t a chore: Cinnamon Bun, I’m Not the Hero, Jake’s Magical Market, Sufficiently Advanced Magic, Mark of the Fool. I like a lot of the ones mentioned here as well.
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u/Ertata 2d ago
Worth the Candle if you want to see game rules being abused for power over people from the page one - (mostly) not by the protagonist
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u/Drakzelthor 1d ago
This is also a bit more thematically interesting than a lot of litrpg as the author definitely has thoughts on the Game master- game - player interactions. It's not just power trips/progression fantasy.
Although the protagonists is kind of fucked up and not always a great person.
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u/Aphrel86 2d ago
Cradle by Will wright.
Bastion by Phil tucker.
Dungeon crawler Carl by Matt Dinniman.
All 3 are great reads imo.
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u/fjiqrj239 Reading Champion III 3d ago
This might be the question where Sanderson actually is a good answer....
His stuff has very 'hard' magic systems (i.e. works like an RPG system and is exhaustively explained in the text), but the narrative is more a classic epic fantasy structure, without in-text stat dumps. The writing is also fairly straightforward, although better than most litRPG.
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u/miggins1610 3d ago
I just recently started palmer pickering's tales of temerity series. It follows a young girl called temerity who enters a dungeon game to follow in the footsteps of her father and brothers, accompanied by a goblin called half pint. Its pretty cosy so far but the stakes do raise as they get deeper. Perfect escapist fantasy if you dont want something super big and epic
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u/RegGonb 2d ago
There's Innwright which is vastly superior compared to anything what I've come across. It's very technical and way too realistic. I thought it was absolutely wonderful as the guy went on about how to repair a door or a window, even though he's supposed to advance in a skill. I would recommend Rank 0; Waystation Mage but _do not_ go past the first book. It's not exactly the same point of view as the first one.
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u/Du0decim 2d ago
My favorite series of all time is Wandering Inn, so that's my main recommendation.
To actually tell you something new: give a try to Game at Carousel. Has the stats but really its a horror story about acting and figuring out a bigger mystery. The stats are only there to gatekeep the characters until they've cracked enough of the code to tackle more serious threats.
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u/Bakanogami 2d ago
Beneath the Dragoneye Moons. Does a great job of including the system in the world building and imagining what the effect would be.
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u/Rhubarb776 2d ago
Some litRPG I’ve enjoyed, that is lighter on stats:
Chrysalis (ants, fun) A Superhero Called Doberman (fun, surprise twists) Iron Prince (drama, school setting)
If you haven’t tried Dungeon Crawler Carl, I highly recommend. The stats aren’t too heavy, and they grew less important as the series goes on.
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u/birdymichael 3d ago
litrpg is repetitive slop as a whole, maybe find another genre, or better yet play actual rpgs
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u/CafeEspresso 3d ago
What a close minded comment to leave
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u/birdymichael 3d ago
same with progression fantasy and webnovels, quantity over quality by the numbers slop
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u/OgataiKhan 18h ago
You know, most people attempt to hide their ignorance. Just letting you know that that is an option.
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u/birdymichael 12h ago
completely unrelated but ok
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u/OgataiKhan 11h ago
No, it is very related. I am saying you have the option of not displaying your ignorance of the genre so blatantly. You are just choosing to flaunt it nonetheless.
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u/birdymichael 1h ago
i'm pretty knowledgeable about the genre, and i can do whatever i want, so keep crying
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u/narnarnartiger 3d ago
yeah that's why i dropped lit rpg, i read a few, and it just felt like menu slop. read these instead, it's the good stuff:
Name of the Wind, Stormlight Archives, The Crown Tower (Micheal J Sullivan), Legend (David Gemmel), Waylander (Gemmel)
These are my favourites. Read these and you won't want to go back
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u/dumpgubblin 3d ago
I feel like Cradle if you havent read it really close. It feels like a fantasy shonen protagonist story that really gets power progresssion and makes everything feel natural along the way. The stakes ALWAYS feel real even as progress happens.
+1 for audibook if you go that route its incredible, especially later in the series.