Dungeon Master Assistance

Where anyone over 18 can share thoughts and ideas on RPGs.

D&D 5E – ICRPG Conversion Guide


Conversion Book Cover - Small

Looking for ways to adapt more ICRPG into D&D 5e? Perhaps this can help.

Download your free 15 page PDF HERE.

Never heard of ICRPG? I believe that Index Card Role Playing Game (ICRPG) is only a little over 5 years old. The latest version (Master Edition) came out last month. Quoting from the Quick Start “How to use the ICRPG rules? Short answer: don’t.”
“Index Card RPG is a way of thinking. Your players invested in another system? No problem. … Take what is useful for you, and toss the rest!”

The basics are simple. Here are some examples.
Movement and distance are somewhat abstract. Everything is either close, near, or far.
Turns are always taken clockwise around the table.
In combat, your character can either move far, move near and take an action, or take an action and not move.
A target number is set for the room or encounter area. It becomes the AC for all monsters and the DC for anything else you may attempt.

I couldn’t find any good conversion guides, so I wrote this one. If any of this sounds interesting to you, I recommend downloading the free ICRPG Quick Start available on “DriveThru RPG”.

You might want to run an ICRPG session or two using this conversion guide. If you and your players think any of these rules would enhance your D&D 5e game, drop all of the ones you don’t like and just use the ones you like as house rules in your next D&D game.

Let me know how it goes.

Revision #1, 1/8/2022: Removed copyrighted text and images as requested by Alex from Runehammer Games.

10 responses to “D&D 5E – ICRPG Conversion Guide

  1. studiogeearch June 10, 2022 at 4:15 pm

    Thanks for publishing this Ronny! I’m looking at doing a similar conversion guide for Star Wars Saga Edition (SWSE) which is a WoTC revision of the original d20 Star Wars RPG rule set from c. 2000. As far as I can tell SWSE was fairly solidly based on D&D 4e, which I’m not completely familiar with TBH. My main sticking point is the relationship/conversion of Skills, Feats and Talents. Any assistance would be greatly appreciated

    Like

    • Ronny June 10, 2022 at 4:31 pm

      I don’t think I can be of much help. When 4th edition came out, after reading the rules I decided I didn’t like it and never played it. For 5th edition they appear to have dropped almost everything from 4th edition and created 5th edition by using 3rd edition as a starting point. (It is all that I was hoping 4th edition would have been.)
      Have you looked at the CONVERSIONS TO 5TH EDITION D&D by Wizards of the Coast? Here is a link:

      Click to access DnD_Conversions_1.0.pdf

      Like

  2. Ben September 11, 2022 at 9:58 pm

    I found this when I was trying to convert 5e modules to ICRPG – you made it a breeze and gave me some ideas for using even more 5e integration. I really appreciate your effort on this!

    Like

  3. Pingback: D&D 5E vs. Dungeon Crawl Classics | Dungeon Master Assistance

  4. Pingback: D&D 5E vs. Pathfinder 2nd Edition | Dungeon Master Assistance

  5. Joe March 8, 2023 at 4:49 pm

    I’m moving my gaming group to ICRPG from D&D 5e and this is a godsend. You saved me many hours of work, mister sir. Thank you so much!

    Like

  6. RPGMarshal June 6, 2023 at 10:32 am

    Unofficial but quality content for sure. Thanks 😉

    Liked by 1 person

Leave a comment