Ravenous Role Playing

Like yesterday, I finished off a booklet while at lunch. This time it is Dragon Warriors by Magnum Opus Press. The booklet took me through the basics of character creation, but only detailed two of the seven possible professions. The two they detailed were Knight and Barbarian, which are very similar. I wished they had provided me with Knight and Warlock or Knight and Sorcerer, just to get a bit of flavor of how the magic system worked. There was no mention of the magic rules other than to say they were in the main book. I needed a taste of the magic system, but maybe it’s too complex to fit into a freebie booklet. I’m not sure.

Free RPG Day 2009 - Dragon Warriors Cover

After stepping through the relatively simple character creation process, the Knight and Barbarian classes were detailed, but none of the rules for using their skills were provided. It was all just the flavor text. This makes it very hard to play the introductory adventure that comes in the back of the book. I guess the creators expected everyone to just hack their way through all obstacles since the next portion of the book went through, in good detail, the combat system.

This brings me to my beef with the system. After you roll to hit (lower is better), then you have to roll to penetrate the armor of the target. Each weapon has a different die to try to pierce the difference defense ratings of the various armors. Too complex for me. I’d rather roll to hit and roll for damage. In this case, there is no damage roll. If you hit and get past the victim’s armor, you do a set amount of damage depending on the weapon. I don’t like this. This doesn’t allow for “glancing blows” or “precise strikes” or anything like that. All stabs with a long sword are identical. With this system even critical hits do the same amount of damage. All they give you is automatic piercing of the armor.

Follow this was five pages about the world. They did a great job with world creation, and I wouldn’t mind using their setting in a different system. Perhaps Magnum Opus Press could have dropped the world information (since it’s not really used in the introductory adventure) and replaced it with some information about the magic system. This would have given a greater flavor for the game, I think.

Then two pages were dedicated to three monsters (one without a stat block) that were not used in the adventure. I’m not sure why they were in the booklet other than to just fill some space. It didn’t grab me as something that should be in there.

Lastly, the booklet ended with a two page adventure that is very linear, but this is OK for an introduction to the game. It’s hard to do a “sandbox game” in a mere 24 pages while still explaining the rules and regulations of the game system.

All-in-all, this freebie did not do its job. I’m supposed to be wowed by the content to such a degree that I want to run out and buy the full version (and a few supplements) and run the game right away. Instead, this booklet will go on one of my many bookshelves and will probably stay there for years until I accidentally stumble across it and wonder why I still have it.

Grade: C. I’m sorry to give such a low grade to any product, but this one is well deserved. Perhaps the full game system is much better. I don’t know. I won’t go find out, either. If they do another booklet for next year’s Free RPG Day, then maybe they’ll listen to me and forget trying to detail the world and give us more of the magic system. Some sample characters would be nice as well since the character generation rules were scarce in the booklet.

I managed to read the entire Corporation booklet over lunch today. It is a dystopic view of future Earth set in the year 2500 where corporations rule the world with an iron fist and the PCs are agents working for one (or more) corporations to accomplish the goals of the corporation. I love the concept as it is very cyberpunk-ish in nature, and that is my all-time favorite genre to read and game in. There are just so many possibilities out there when you introduce super advanced science with super degraded society.

Free RPG Day 2009 - Corporation Cover

The booklet started with an overview of the world and the five major corporations. Then there was a single page packed with details regarding the “other antagonists” of the world, which I really liked. Following this was two pages outlining the basic rules. I could tell the main system was more complex than the basics revealed in the book, but the core system presented is excellent, simple and elegant in its execution. Anyone could skim these two pages and jump right into the game. They did a top-notch job of giving just enough rules to run the game out of the booklet.

The center of the book contained four fully created and fleshed out characters complete with backgrounds and motivations.The latter half of the book was a short adventure through which to run the sample characters. The adventure is very linear in nature, but it was designed to show off the strengths of the system in and out of combat. I like it as an intro adventure, so a group could see if they wanted to move forward with purchasing the full game. The designers did an excellent job with setting things up to keep the game going well.

The last page contained a section of “Also in the core rules…” which really made me want to run out with what remained of my lunch hour and buy the game. I’ll probably wait a few weeks until after a conference I’m going to leaves me with a little spare cash, and I’ll see what I can do about adding this book to my cyberpunk collection (both fiction and RPG books.)

Grade: A. No ‘+’ on this one because I think the game system and weapons are a little too deadly. I think I’ll have to wait and see what the core rules present, and how long it takes to create characters. The character creation system was left out of the booklet (which is fine since they provided sample characters.) If it’s like Mythus and takes four hours to make a single character, then I’ll probably skip buying the book. If it only takes a few minutes to whip out a new character to replace the freshly dead meat, then it might be worth considering.

This 24 page booklet brought back some excellent memories of playing Paranoia with Buddy running the game. While the game system has changed a bit from what I remember it (though not much) the style, flavor and theme of the game has remained true to what the original creators envisioned 25 years ago. I laughed on every page, and laughed hard enough to almost hurt myself on most pages. This primer book really made me want to dust off my Paranoia collection and run a game or three. I’ll see what my gaming group has to say about that.

Free RPG Day 2009 - Paranoia Cover

The booklet consisted of 7 pages of player material which covered the basics of the environment and what to expect on a character sheet. Most of this material was game world information as seen from the players’ eyes. It also includes a sample character, which is well laid out and easy to make sense of despite the small page size.

The remainder of the book is for Ultraviolet clearance only (e.g.: The GM for you non-Paranoia citizens.)

The next three pages cover the history of Alpha Complex, the current state of affairs in Alpha Complex, Service Groups, Mutations and Secret Societies. All things the game is built on. After this, the book delves into the very simple rules of the game. This is one thing I like about this system. It’s simple, straight-forward and does not get in the way of the role playing involved with the game. I wish more game systems were like this one.

The rest of the book contains Tube Jam which is a well thought out and great introductory mission for new GM’s to the Paranoia system. It covers almost every aspect of the game from briefing to debriefing and all of the fun that ensues between the two. There are even some great R&D items in the booklet that had me crying with laughter.

The book ended with five troubleshooters (characters for you non-Paranoia citizens) that can be used in the mini adventure published in the book.

All told, the booklet is a great introduction to the game, and if I didn’t already own the classic Paranoia, I’d run out and buy the most recent incarnation. I just love the classic version too much to see myself shelling out what few bucks I have on the new stuff. Someday, I may do just that, but not anytime soon. Maybe I’ll talk my group into letting run a night or three of class Paranoia and see how it floats.

Grade: A+. It contains everything needed to run the game, and is a great enticement for players to run out and spend money on the full version.

Instead of starting with a book to review, I decided to grab the lone CD to see what it held for me. The CD contained a piece of Windows software by the name of Hero Lab by Lone Wolf Development. The software was a demo version of Hero Lab which would not allow me to save/print, but that’s OK. It gave me a taste of the software. It also came with a handful of systems, and I toyed around with all of them. The systems it came with were Cortex (which was broken), d20, Mutants and Masterminds, Savages Worlds, and Vampire: The Requiem. I was familiar with most of the systems, so using the software was very easy.

Free RPG Day 2009 - Hero Lab CD

The interface for the software was top-notch and flowed quite well. The conflict resolver was very well written, and it guided me through making a handful of characters, even if I couldn’t do anything with them.

Did the demo entice me to run out and spend $30 on the software? Nope. I suppose if I liked making characters electronically, I would go for it. However, I’m a very old school character creator. Give me a handful of dice (unless it’s a point-buy system), a sheet of paper (or maybe a good character sheet), and a pencil (with a good eraser). That’s all I need for creating characters. The only exception I make to this is the Hero Builder for Hero Systems. It just streamlines everything so well, I can’t help but use their creator for new characters, especially when I’m running the game and have to come up with bad guys on the fly.

The main downside to the software is that each system must be purchased separately. If you play in three different game systems and want to use this software for all of them, you’re looking at a total layout of $70. It’s $30 for the software and a system. Then it’s $20 per system after that. With a pricing structure like that, things can get pretty steep pretty fast.

Grade: A-  (The ‘-’ part of the grade reflects my personal preference towards pencil/paper character creation.)

Free RPG Day, 2009 has come and gone. Here is a list of the loot provided by the wonderful vendors of the 3rd annual Free RPG Day. As you can see on the right, there is an awesome looking d6 with the “ones digit” replaced with commemorative text announcing where the die came from. I’m not sure which dice bag to throw the die into, but it will probably go into the rarely used Hero/Champions bag. You can never have too many d6s for that game!

Awesome d6

As you can see in the image below, there were quite a few books handed out this year. There were no empty spaces on the table when I arrived at my FLGS early in the morning, so I think I managed to get my hands on everything. The full-sized items I picked up were:

• Geist: The Sin Eaters
• Hero’s Bane: Quick Start Rules
• Hearts of Chaos: An Amethyst Free Adventure
• D&D: Khyber’s Harvest
• Castles & Crusades: A Primer
• Pathfinder RPG: Bonus Bestiary
• Rogue Trader: Forsaken Bounty
• Hollow Earth Expedition: Free RPG Day Adventure 2009

The half-sized items that ended up in my bag were:

• Paranoia: Citizen’s Guide to Surviving Alpha Complex
• Dragon Warriors: Introductory Book
• Corporation: Grab the Cache

Lastly, there was a CD included in the pile as well which claims to include software called “Hero Lab.” This appears to be character creation software, but I haven’t loaded up the CD just yet. I’ll find out in the next day or five what’s on the CD and let you know.

All-in-all, I’m quite impressed with the haul from this year. The highest production value items (at least at first glance) appears to be the D&D adventure from Wizards of the Coast. However, that does not ensure it will be a quality RPG item. I’ll be reading and reviewing each item over the next couple of weeks to let you know what I think of each one, and whether or not I am enticed to run out and purchase the full version of the game.

The Loot from Free RPG Day, 2009

Don’t forget that this Saturday (June 20th, 2009) is Free RPG Day! You can find out more details here: http://www.freerpgday.com/

Click the link for the store list (it’s alphabetical by state, not store name) and see if your FLGS (Friendly Local Game Store) is participating. Make sure to call them just to make sure they will have stuff.

I took part in this last year (as a consumer) and picked a wide range of very good (and some not so good) stuff. This year, I’ll be reviewing the items I picked up at Free RPG Day as I get the time to do so. I can’t wait to see what goodies are in store for us gamers this year!