Today’s review is of Hearts of Chaos, also by Goodman Games. Hearts of Chaos is an Amethyst adventure.

Free RPG Day 2009 - Hearts of Chaos Cover

The Amethyst system uses the core 4e rules and expands on them to allow for a modern-ish setting. Why modern”-ish”? This is because the world of magic, fae, dragons and creatures of the imagination have invaded the modern world. The characters can be pulled from traditional fantasy or the modern “techan” realm. I really like this idea as it reminds of one of my favorite RPGs of all time: Rifts.

Goodman Games does an excellent job of setting the scene within a short period of time before getting to the adventure. The rules additions are clearly explained, and the setting is well done. Once the adventure portion of the book starts, the quality really steps up a notch.

The traditional overview of the adventure is given along with a brief description of each of the encounters. Then the details roll in and the writing is very well done and very streamlined. The module is even well balanced and very playable, which is the opposite of the other half of the physical book, Immortal Heroes. I applaud Goodman Games for a job well done.

I really like the adventure, and I may run it for my group as a one-off game while our GM for the current Rifts game is out of town on a motorcycle trip with his biker buddies.

The only downside is that five pre-generated characters for the adventure are only available online. They are not provided in print format. This was a fact that I overlooked the first read-through, and when the book ended, I was left wondering where the promised sample characters were at. After a quick skim of the text, I focused in on the words “available online” and went seeking the characters. If you are in the same boat I was in, then here is the easy link for you to download the characters.

Grade: A+ — After reading Immortal Heroes first, I didn’t have high hopes for the game balance capabilities of Goodman Games, but they have totally redeemed themselves in this half of the book. I’m quite impressed with the writing, balance, feel and flow of the game. If I didn’t already have a bajillion dollars invested in Rifts books, I might run out and pick this one up ASAP. As it stands for me, personally, I’ll wait until I have the spare cash for the book, and then pick it up. Good job, Goodman Games!