A not so great Traveller Session, report

Friday night is Traveller night, and I don't think I did too well. I believe my reffing was a little sub standard and I can't blame the illness for that!

Having blasted the Aslan and chased them away from their secret base the heroes were travelling back to Affran on the tincan ship when the Navy sent a Cruiser to intercept and take them on board. The evidence of the Aslan invasion has got the local Head  of Station very scared. He only has a few ships which are really only used to prevent piracy (unsuccessfully). The threatened invasion can not be countered with what he has on hand, and even sending for help, it will take months to collect together an amarda.

So he decided he needed the player's abandoned Aslan ship which they left drifting in the middle of nowhere as a kind of Trojan horse. So onto the cruiser which was stripped and emptied so that most of the free space could be filled with fuel bladders, and off into the middle of nowhere.

They emerged from jump and discovered a gravitational anomaly, right where the now disappeared cathedral ship had been. They dodged that and considered the best way to board their old ship. In the end they sent across a tether and pulled themselves across towards a hole punched by meteor. One of the heroes started drifting off when he lost his grip. At the same time the marines found themselves in a fight with the space-bugs down in the darkness of the hole. A line was thrown out to the drifter but the PC doing the throwing was attacked from behind by a bug. He was saved by a spectacular shot from Mr drifter!  Eventually he got pulled back to earth the ship, but only as the marines had had enough and were pulling back.

A short discussion ensued and it was decided to use the cruisers lasers to purge the hole of bugs. BLAM!  Bugs were cleared out, the meteor was vaporized and more of the ship was damaged, but at least there was a way in now.

They moved in, battled some more bugs and found that all of the still-pressurized sections had foul air, it was poisoned by the fuel leak they left when they abandoned ship.

Up to the bridge and then down to engineering. They transhipped a few engineers from the cruiser but these needed help as they were completely unused to Aslan equipment.

Two marines on patrol for more bugs went off air, and the PCs went looking for them, and discovered the big bad end of level boss bug chewing on the marine's remains. They engaged with laser rifles scoring some good hits but not enough to stop it. The huge beast laid into them seriously wounding both PC's before they eventually took it down.

Then time passed as the engineers started getting a minimum  portion of the ship pressurized with breathable air and the jump drive on-line.

And there ends the session.  I feel it was all a bit predictable. I think I may have given the players a little shock with the near-death experience. Next week I'll do my best to make it a little more exciting.

I've written a short piece of fan-fic set in the Ninth World, and that means it's set in the universe of the RPG, Numenera. It's actually posted on Doctor Felbrigg's Mechanicorium web site.

I found the concept of a priesthood built around the study of objects from another age fascinating.  Not really a religious as such but rather scientists dressed up in religion, it reminded of Asimov's Foundation series.

Solo rules for "Ticket To Ride"

I've had Ticket to Ride for a few years now, and have pondered the possibilities of solo play on many occasions, but only today did I put in the effort to actually get a working set of rules changes going.

I've played the following through and it works quite nicely.

The first thing to say is that this is a true solitaire rule-set, you play to see how high a score you can get, rather than playing against dummy players controlled by an A.I. Having said that, you will be playing against the game, as you  would in a cooperative game.  The challenge gets harder over time as you try to improve on your previous best.

Choose a colour to play with, any colour but black. We'll be using black to block routes as the game progresses.

Set the game out as normal.
Draw three tickets. You must keep these!
Draw two train cards to start off your hand.

Now, you start alternating turns, first you, then the game, then you, then the game and so on.

On your turn you can draw train cards or tickets or play trains as normal.

All double routes are active, but you may only use one, as per the normal rules.

On the games turn you draw a ticket. Find the shortest path between the destinations. Now place "one" black train on one of the route segments along that shortest route. You can not place black trains on both parts of a double route.  If the shortest route is occupied by either your trains or the black trains, find the next shortest route between the two points (even if it shares some of the same route) and play a train to block that route.In this way, every time the game "plays", it will block a route.

After you've played the black train discard the ticket. If you run out of tickets, shuffle the discards into a new draw pile. Likewise when ever you want to draw a new ticket you should shuffle the discards back into the draw pile first.

Continue playing until either your supply of trains gets to three or less, or the supply of black trains reaches three.

There is no bonus for the longest train. Instead you get a 10pt bonus if all of the destinations on your tickets are joined together in any way.

That's it. Nice and simple.

Yet another Classic Traveller session report

An excellent Traveller session last night. Our heroes were trying to organise a sale of one of their robots. They were looking to generate a bidding frenzy between the large houses on Affran. The first bid was 1MC, and they laughed at the bidder. So, that's two of the great Affran houses who now want their blood.

Their warehouse was attacked over night, in an attempted raid to steal the robots, but they took care of that with a few well placed lasers. the attackers were part of a mercenary company.

Then the Navy turned up needing their consultancy skills. The Navy considers them experts on the alien Aslan. This then, had them shooting out to one of the system's outer moons where a Navy listening post had gone quiet after a garbled message that mentioned the Aslan.

In then end, they found the listening post destroyed and the operators dead. Checking the security system and analyzing the digital records revealed that a small ship had launched from the moon shortly after the attack.

They backtracked the trajectory and this led them to another of the planets moons. There, they found a secret buried installation. When they examined the door, they found it was made for Aslan hands/paws. They blasted their way inside, losing a couple of their Marines (Vasquez and Drake) to an explosive booby trap. A pair of Aslan controlled robots appeared and took out Private Frost before they were taken down.

When they entered the installation there was a terrific explosion as an Aslan ship blasted of from a hidden silo. The P.C.s raced back to their own ship and set off in pursuit but only had an opportunity to take one shot, which they missed...

This is third Aslan incursion the team have happened across. First the illegal colony on New Horizon, the x-boat type ship that appeared in Imperium space and now a hidden base on this moon.

Video review - Maquis

This is my review of a free print and play WWII worker placement game

Another Classic Traveller session report

Role players never cease to amaze me with their ingenuity. I had a scenario all set up , and had thought through the possible outcomes, but in the end the players of-course do something unexpected...

It's a space game, classic Traveller. The PCs have a fantastic alien (Aslan) space craft, huge, well armed, armoured, and even a good jump drive. The last thing I ever expected, was that they would abandon it.

I'll admit that things might have looked a little tough...  The ship was being dragged slowly towards a massive mysterious alien ship by a huge inexplicable gravitational force. Asteroids and other space detritus was smashing into their ship as it too was dragged towards the alien. One of the impacts included some horrid space-bugs that tore their way into ship and started tearing apart the already injured Marine contingent in the Med-bay. The Hydro recycling system failed when the room was damaged by the strange gravitational forces. The Quantum Core interface had failed too. The Navigation systems were on the fritz and the jump-drive was smoking and sparking.

While all that was happening they detected the jump signature of a ship turning  up, but they couldn't see who or what it was.

Yeah. Things weren't looking great for them.

Then the alien ship that had started all the problems just disappeared and the gravitational waves along with it. They got the ship under control, but it was still infested with some very tough bugs. They opted to get the survivors into the shuttles and bug out (except for one N.P.C. who was locked up – poor mad Crow Gedes).

The other ship that had jumped into the system turned out to be an alien (Aslan). They used the Aslan shuttle they already had to false-flag their way into docking with the alien. It turned out to be an x-boat like ship, very little room but lots of jump-drive. They used their robots to rip out the air lock and "space" the Aslan pilot. Then fun and games commenced as they welded the human shuttle (they had one human and one Aslan shuttle) to the x-boat and rode it back to civilisation.

And so...next session starts with them on the star port having no ship, no money, and in orbit over a planet where the most powerful "Family" are likely to kill them on sight.  It's not looking good for the ex-crew of the S.S. Hairball.

Hollowpoint - an RPG review

I bought this RPG from LuLu the Print-On-Demand service. The book is 6 x 9 with an interesting two-tone cover in red and black. It features a silhouette of a man grinning insanely and pointing a gun past the viewer. The tag line on the cover really gives the tone of the game itself:

"bad people killing bad people for bad reasons"

That really does present the feel of the game, you might be playing mafioso hit men, hit men for hire, or even an FBI hit squad, going after some the other bad guys. The game is all about short sharp violence and your player characters are as likely as your targets to get taken down, and out of the game. In fact the referee is encouraged to go for the weakest P.C. To take them out!

There are really no good guys presented within these pages (rather like the 40K universe where everyone is atrocious) so pretty much everyone deserves what they get, even your character.

I've described it as an RPG, but the reality is that it's really more of a story telling game. The mechanics support a narrative approach with minimal die rolling. In fact the die rolls are pretty much reserved for conflict, and when you get there it's a dice pool mechanic, but not an ordinary one!

Your character has a number of stats, such as KILL, CON, or TAKE and each has a number of dice associated with it. When you come to roll the dice during a violent scene, you're not rolling and trying to get 5's and 6's to be counted as success' , rather your trying to get sets. A set is any number of duplicate numbers. You can use a single set to take an action. With an action you get to narrate what your character is doing and take a die out of an opponents set, possibly destroying the set.

So if you have a pair of 6's and an opponent uses their action to take one of those 6's, you no longer have a set and therefore can't take an action. If you have no sets for them to take a die from you take a consequence. What I like here, is that the consequence relates to the skill being used to attack you. If they attacked with KILL, you're going to get hurt, if they attack you with TAKE, they've stolen something from you. It's a huge narrative boon.

One feature I really love about this system is its very cinematic. Can you remember a film where the computer-guy is feeding info to the other guy sneaking through the bad guy's lair? This game's mechanism fits that like a dream. If the player is using their DIG (that's digging for info) skill they can use their rolled sets to help the other PC's. Perhaps they lock a security door, guide them onto the diamonds, or warn them where the explosives are.

As the game progresses, players try to inflict consequences on the bad guys and the ref works his hardest to do the same back to the PCs. In this game the referee IS the enemy, she IS playing to take you out. It's right there in the rules. Don't worry about that, the referee is as constrained by the story telling rules as the players, she needs good dice rolls too.

So what happens if the referee does take you out? You narrate an appropriate ending and jump right back in with a new PC. Simple and sweet. This game is not about character progression, it's about story telling in the best possible way.

So back to the physical book. It's novelette sized running to 110 pages, including intro, index, and a "flavour" section at the back. The cover is shiny and it has that new book smell.

I'm really impressed with the game, it oozes with its interesting theme and presents a system eminently matched to this original genre. Buy it now!

Deathwatch RPG – review

After a long slog I finally finished wading through the PDF version the "Deathwatch" RPG. This was produced by Fantasy Flight who have a a bit of a reputation for grandiose productions. They haven't broken the mold here.  The PDF is 402 pages long (far too long in my opinion for any RPG) and lavishly festooned with artwork.  And my-oh-my what artwork. If you're a fan of Games Workshop and their Warhammer 40,000 science fiction setting then you'll love the artwork. Mighty armoured warriors in dramatic poses wielding unseasonably large weapons to fend off the hordes of foes. Great stuff, really.

In this game you play members of the elite "Deathwatch", a secretive group of Space Marines drawn from the thousands of Space Marine chapters and forged into a "Kill team".  You are therefore playing the very tip of the Imperium's surgical strikes. If a jobs too tough or too important even for standard Space Marines it falls to the Deathwatch.. As you read through this book, you get a LOT of information about who and what Space Marines are, how they are barely human anymore and are instead super humans. This game is all about be bad-ass.

Nine percentage based stats form the core of a character. Then you start "tarting" up. Pick which chapter you marine hails from, this will give you a few tiny mods to stats. Then select a specialty, a role within the Deathwatch kill team for your character. Then a few calcs for your movement and wounds.  You also get a few Fate points which don't operate like FATE points, but instead allow you a few get-out-of-jail moments.

A nice touch next, with a die roll you determine some past events for your character, giving the chap a bit of a history.  You also get to add a "demeanor" to your character which can make him an outrageous ass, but also garners some mechanical advantage in some situations if you can worm it into the story.

There is also a long list of "skills" a.k.a. "advances" that can be bought and these generally end up giving your character a +10 here or there. I found it all rather boring to read, overly complex even. Lots of blather and inter-related requirements like a tech-tree all just to garner a +5% bonus when attacked from behind by something that's bigger than you.

...and don't get me started on the skill lists. Sheesh, more boring lists of descriptions for minor adjustments.

Your character also gets a number of "Talents". Which is another was of saying "skills". Again why these are broken out I don't know, maybe they needed more pages?

Once you claw your way free of these endless lists the book actually starts to shine. You start learning about the gear of the marines...lots of cool looking gear. Fascinating.

A big section on spells...I mean warp powered psychic capabilities. Some are interesting but many are well, just a spell list. Some flavour is added by making each marine chapter have different lists.

The rules of play start around page 205 and there are a lot of things to consider. They seem to have gone for the put-it-down-in-writing rather than hand-wavery approach. Combat covers thirty pages of double column. This is a min-maxers dream. With anything this complex there must be a thousand holes to fall through.

The games master section is pretty good, with some neat ideas for creating missions and creating the right "tone" of a 40K game.
Then comes the really good part of this PDF. The background material of the 40k universe. Up to this point all of the background material has been related to character generation and weapons. Now you start to learn about ...everything.  This I.P. Has a huge history and pretty much the whole thing is presented here is gruelling yet wonderful detail.

The endless war, foes on all sides, the apostasy, the constant struggle against the all powerful evils of the universe.  Utterly horrid, yet utterly absorbing and fascinating. A read through this section really brings home the nightmare future of 40K.

So to summarise my thoughts. Crappy system. Brilliant I.P. If you want to play Space Marines from the 40K universe, buy this book, you won't regret it. Just please, for all that's good and sweet in the world, don't punish your players with these rules.  Try another system , perhaps "Three Sixteen, Carnage Amongst the Stars."

A Traveller session report

Last nights Traveller game went well. The PC's were woken by the sound of a near riot. It turned out that one of the children born on the colony was showing Psi abilities. An agitator was calling for the "witch child" to be put to death. The heroes broke it up and got off planet with the child and her family.

The colony ship had been stripped for resources so was not useable. That meant that if they wanted to get away from the planet they would have to take the abandoned alien Aslan ship.

They jumped into the Affran system hoping to find a home for the family. They played safe and broadcast their presence, lest they get fired on by Imperial forces who would only see an Aslan interloper.

They docked at the station were boarded by a Marine contingent who wanted to inspect the ship. Meantime the visited an administrator and made an application for residency visas for the family. It was during this interview that they learnt that Affran is a planet run by "Families" and that the Administrator considered the planet a "hive of scum and villainy." They also learnt that there is likely to be a negative response to a Psi capable child.

They then decided to use their contacts over at the Navy base and got in to see the Head of Station. While sharing a meal and a few glasses of wine, they spun quite a tale. They told of a secret combat mission into Aslan space where thousands were killed, but in the end they, the heroes of this tale, managed to capture the Aslan ship. The Head of Station fell for it!

They found that this part of the galaxy was inhabited by pirates, and that the HoS thought the Killown family down on the planet might be responsible as their ships didn't seem to get hit as often.

So they hatched a plan to pretend to be visiting nobles who just happen to be trying to place the family as they look around at the possibilities of setting up a trade route while secretly they want to find out if the Killown family are dirty.  The HoS has offered help, as he wants to stop the piracy.

Meddling Kids - review

I've just finished my read through of the "Meddling Kids" RPG. This game pitches itself firmly at new and young RPG players. It's tone throughout is pitched for the younger audience, and spends quite some time explaining how to play an RPG.

I like its advice for new G.M.s  this kind of info is what I missed back in the early days of RPGs where I went on a power trip thinking I was king of the work. This book starts out by telling the new G.M. that they are firmly there it make sure everyone has a good time and that it's not an adversarial position.

As you can probably tell from the title this game is aimed at creating a game with that Scooby Doo feeling. The art work throughout backs up that assumption. The player archetypes support that too with Jocks, Fluff, Brains, Goofs, Tempers, Sidekicks, and Innocents.  Your characters have a set of stats in the traditional style, these being Strength, Moves, Smarts, and Health. On top of that you have a bunch of Abilities to pick from. Abilities are skills, and bonuses to certain types of action.

One clever trick of this system, is that the Scooby Doo character in the party is an NPC of sorts run by the G.M. It doesn't have to be a dog, could be an ape, a ghost, a batty professor or anything that's a bit out-there. This character is there to help out the kids/players when they are struggling, perhaps by sniffing out a clue or falling into the trap.

There are three tropes of the Scooby Doo series included in the rules that I think are just perfect.

The chase when the monster appears, the P.C.s will run! They have to escape the beast in the most inventive way possible and the skills and abilities back that up. Instant disguise ability anyone?

You can't just beat up the bad guys here with clubs, you have to trap them. The more monsterous the monster, the bigger and more complex the trap has to be! Players have to devise an outrageous trap to catch the beast.

Finally, no one gets killed, they get "Bonked", which means that they sit out of the game for a minute or two. Simple and straight forward, no player elimination, everyone has fun.

While aimed at kids, I think this will be a fun game for anyone willing to jump into the spirit of the game.

Recommended.

A promo for my 3:16 campaign

Christmas is the time for sharing with your family, the giving and receiving of gifts... or if your me, the time to set up all the family computers as a render-farm for your animated promotion video!

Here's a new little promo video for a campaign book I wrote a couple of years back.

Planning a new gamebook

Having recently completed and published my gamebook "Dwarven Vengeance" I started thinking about a starting another. Despite it being a lot of work, I have really enjoyed the end result, so I wanted to start another one.

This time I thought I'd do a little market research about the subject matter. I went onto Role Playing Game Geek (RPGGeek.com) and posted a poll asking which genre would they be more likely to part with thier hard earned money for.  the poll ran for 15 or so days and got 49 responses.

The options on the poll were:

• Sci fi trading and exploration: 18 votes
• Pulpy noir detective (with tentacles): 9 votes
• Marines vs Bugs: 4 votes
• Dungeon crawl/landscape crawl: 4 votes
• WWII, pilot escaping occupied territory: 10 votes
• Other: 4 votes

I was hoping for Marines vs Bugs, but the omens have dictated otherwise.

This is a new genre for me, especially in gamebook form. It's set me a challenge. A gamebook needs a "system" of rules, those rules should match the expected game play. For instance it's no use having game rules for trading if there is no trading in the game.  So now I'm going to have to spend some time debating with myself what the focus of this new gamebook will be and once I've done that, how to implement a complimentary set of rules that fit the genre without over complicating something that needs to be really simple to fit the book format.

So now I'm collecting ideas and making notes about possible scenarios that could appear in the book. At the same time trying to avoid going too far down one line of thought without considering mechanisms at the same time.

At this point I know there are some limits on story. I polled a bunch of role players and "sci fi trading and exploration" means the RPG "Traveller" to them. The Traveller game has a number of tropes and associated expectations that goes along with the name, so those will be my focus to start with...

Target! Bearing 093 degrees!

I designed and released a card game called "Target! Bearing 093 degrees!" back in 2011 and its been on sale at WargameVault.com since then. Its only in the last week that I noticed that the people at WargameVault have stated that products with an associated video sell better than those without. So with that in mind, I've thrown together the following video promotion for the game.
Enjoy ... consume ... buy ....

Golo - a review of a Golf-dice-game

I saw this for 1.99 in my local corner store I would have passed it by as another piece of junk-ware-shelf-filler but caught sight of a D12 in the bottom. I checked it out and low and behold it had nine D12 in there. My first thought was that 1.99 was great for 9D12, so if nothing else it was worth picking up for that. Actually it turns out the D12s are not normal D12s, so it might not be worth it.

When I got home I pulled it open expecting the worst of Christmas junk-gaming. Not so. inside the plastic tube was a nice golfing score page and a dinky little pencil, quality stuff! The rules appear on the score pad so I was good to go...but wait!

There is also a little cardboard rule book, that repeats the rules and adds in a few pointless optional rules. Pointless to a gamer that is, but I expect a few after-christmas-dinner players will like to try them out.

I was blown away by the quality of the dice cup. Thick plasic, mug-sized and lined inside. I'd be happy with the price just for the cup!

Then onto the dice. Nine engraved dice in three colours. Two red for Par 3 holes, five white for par 4 holes and two red for par 5's. These are not numbered like ordinary dice. For instance a white dice has three number 4's and ranges from 3-8. It's a similar story for the other dice too.

The "par" numbers on each die are surrounded by a square and the 1-under by a circle.

Game play is Yahtzee style. Roll all the dice, lock one or more, roll the rest and keep going until you've rolled and locked them all. Then allocate the dice to the appropriate holes on your score pad.

You do this once for the first nine holes, and then again for the way back to the club house. Add up your final score.

That's it. Simple. Multi player solitaire if you have friends over, or a quick diversion if you're on your own.

Considering the price, I'm really happy with it. A quick round of golf on your table and an excellent dice cup!



Found in "It's a Gift" a corner store that sells toys, cards, small tools, stationary, sweets and garden ornaments.

A cautionary tale for gamebook authors

I write a gamebook a few years ago, and it didn't end well. Here's why.

Creating a character in Diaspora

"Diaspora" is a hard science-fiction role playing game based on the FATE system.  THe video below shows you how to create a character.

Creating a character in Basic Dungeons and Dragons

Here's a run through of how to create (roll up) a character in Basic Dungeons and Dragons...

Monster of the Week - Session report

Last night I played the "Monster of the Week" RPG via Google Hangout and it was a great experience. It never ceases to amaze me how wonderful the internet and instant communication around the world is. Of course you youngsters won't appreciate that as you've grown up with it. Yet, when I was a kid we were limited to maybe sending a letter and waiting weeks for a reply! Last night I played with a group that was spread across Europe... England, Norway and Finland. Wow.

Anyway the game was really fun and exciting. In short the five players were playing monster-fighting heroes working for a secret government organisation and in the business of destroying any monstrous or super natural threats to humanity.

We were led to a remote village in Norway by an ancient prophesy. We were short on detail but it was summed up as "Ooh spooky end of the world thingy. Stop it." Not a lot to go on, as you'll appreciate.

From there we trooped into town, booked a room in the local pub, visited the local church where our suspicions were raised. Never the less the party bedded down for the night in the pub, planning to rise in the early hours and mount an investigative raid on the church.

Alas for the bad guys they beat us to the punch and raided our room! Let's just say there was screaming, clashing steel, puncture wounds, blood and ended with two dead cultists wearing robes. We nicked their outfits and knives, then discovered that there were more bad guys in the street waiting for us. We tried to sneak out the back, but sadly had to behead another cultist we found on the stairs.

Eventually breaking out the back door, we did a runner through the moonlit nights and over a few garden walls, generally making our towards the church. When we got to the church, it was in time to see a parade of villagers leading their willing victims off into the woods. We took the opportunity to scout around the church, find their secret lair, and torch the place. "Q" the flaming church of doom.

One of our number donned some cultist robes and slipped in with the bad guys, and the rest of us slipped through the woods. We were somewhat daunted to discover we were outnumbered by about 10 to 1. As you can imagine, things promptly got interesting. My character led about 10 of them off on a chase through the woods while the rest of the party set to with the bad guys. The chief bad guy with a scarey mask was chanting for all he was worth trying to raise the big bad to doom the world.

My compatriots handled it pretty well. One zapped the masked priest so he couldn't complete the incantation, our disguised party member leapt at him with naked steel and the rest took that for a good idea. Hack, slash, poke, choppy chop and it was all over, the world was saved and the cultists woke from the magic spell that was over them.

The black helicopters turned up and the good guys went home to nurse their wounds.

Playing this game was a fantastic fun experience. The rules worked really well, and suited a pretty narrative style that I enjoyed immensely.

The Hangout experience on Google+ was awesome. It's not just a video chat, but it's also built-in die roller, chat, and document sharing. I'll be looking to play more games this way.

Creating a character in 3:16 Carnage Amongst the Stars

Here's my run through of how to create a character for the role play game 3:16 Carnage Amongst the Stars. My fave RPG.

Creating a character in "Monster of the Week"

Here's a little run through of how you generate a character for the "Monster of the Week" RPG. A very original and interesting process.

Creating a character in classic Traveller

In this video I run you through creating a Vargr character in classic Traveller

Video review of : ACHTUNG! Cthulhu

Legend of the Five Rings (3rd Edition) - Review

I'm reviewing the 3^rd Edition of L5R which comes as an A4 size hard back. It is full colour on a good quality glossy paper and runs to 318 pages.

The game is set in a world called Rokugan, with a theme that reeks of feudal Japan, with samurai etc, although it is not set in Japan, it is an entirely new world.

The world as presented in this book is totally enthralling and presented in a depth that I found amazing for a single book. I had expected the book to contain hordes of rules but the majority of the book is background material which I found a refreshing change.

The background contains not only samurai using swords but magic, monsters, gods and spirits all bound up in a cohesive background that is rich and appealing.

When I started reading this book I found it hard going. That's not a reference to the text because that reads very well, but the book opens with a history of Rokugan in seventeen and a half double-column pages. I found it a struggle. There was no introduction or overview to the world, but instead it opens with this detailed year by year break down of history. As I read through it was full of names and places I'd never heard off and I became a little downhearted. My impression was, "I'm reading 17 pages of history, not the current-world I'll be playing in, so what's the point." Only after I had got past the history and into the body of the book did this all start to make sense. When I had finished reading the book I actually appreciated having that kind of history, it gave the world such depth.

This game is not your typical hack and slash. Part of the reason that they have such a rich background is that they expect you to play court politics part of the time. To role play without waving swords needs to have that kind of background depth especially when you start.

And that is a problem with the game. If you are playing an in-court session and players don't understand the intricacies of the Clan relationships, that is, haven't read up on the history of the clans, they might be in trouble. As a games master you might set up a scene of delicate politics and in come your players with no idea of what damage they can do... It seems a little harsh to need your players to have read so much background material.

Let's chat about character generation....it took me a while to realise I'd been reading the char-gen for the previous ten pages. There's a long section in the book that details all of the clans and families there-in. It includes history, details of leaders and relationships. There is also a note about a stat modifier for that clan, it's kind of hidden.

And that explains an ongoing problem relating to char-gen in this book. It's split up across multiple sections, each section is drowned in background information. When you add to that, the simple fact that the section of the book specifically about char-gen does not include a table of these hidden modifiers, it comes across as really confusing. I didn't really know where to start. This is not a book you can hand around the table and expect the players to step through making a character, it's not coherent enough for that.

The rules system itself is very simple, achieving tasks is rolling dice and beating a set difficulty (or opponents defence value). You roll a number of dice based on stats, skills and situation but only get to keep a certain number of the die results ( roll six dice, but only count the best two results). It's a really neat mechanic. Having lots of dice is good, but after the roll you have to pick just a few. It is a neat way to keep a check on power creep.

Alas there is a proof reading oversight here. The book says "here's a table of example difficulties"...but the table is not in here. As a games master, I have no guide to what would be suitable difficulty levels.

There are the other usual items for a fantasy game, including a list of spells for magic users and a rather short unillustrated list of monsters. The game is not focused on smashing monsters and taking their treasure, hence most of the monsters here are intelligent beings. The games focus is on dealing with other humans rather than monster bashing.

So let me wind this up by saying, I want to play in this world, I'm excited about it. However, I don't think I want to do it using this edition of the rules. The poor cohesion of char-gen and the missing table make that too difficult.

De Profundis, a review

Ahhh De Profundis, what art thou? I mean, apart from 110 PDF pages of text with the occasional photo touched up to look like an old photograph.

Simply put it's a Story Telling game where people can use the framework it sets up to create a living story in a Cthulhu Mythos world. Although it does drift off-topic a little to suggest how you can use the same ideas to play in other worlds, such as love affairs in Spain during 1850, that is quite obviously not what they were aiming at. This game is soundly rooted in Lovecraftian horror.

The game presents no rules, no conflict resolution, no list of investigator skills and no list of weapons or monsters to help the GM, because there is no GM. When playing, everyone takes an equal role in helping to tell the story, a true collaborative story telling experience.

A word of warning before I go on. This book is written weirdly and you may find the going a bit heavy. It's written as a series of letters ( an epistolary approach ) . The letters are written in-character by a person that has found a creepy book called De Profundis. As the letters go on this mysterious book is revealed to contain a game about writing letters...which is what the game De Profundis is really about. So it's a bit of a circular-reference and odd.

...and that's all there is to the core of De proundis. You and your pals, write in-character letters to each other. With the preceding sentence I just presented the core of the game. You might now be thinking, "well if that's all it is why should I buy the game?" That's a good question. Yet I recommend that if the idea appeals to you, you should get your hands on a copy of the book (or PDF).

The confusing presentation of the game I mentioned, is actually a mood and an attitude that you need to adopt to get the most from the idea. Most of the text of this book presents the correct attitude and mood required for the game. It suggests how to best approach the letters, how to form your mind into the right receptacle to best appreciate the half-insane letters you'll be sending or receiving. I think it very unlikely that the game will be as good as it could be, if any player has not spent the time to read these rules and appreciate the attitude needed to play.

With the appropriate attitude and approach you will find yourself hand-writing letters on quality paper with a fountain pen, and paper-clipping photos (with a little Photshopping perhaps) of weird and inexplicable things to the letter before posting. Thus you see that the game will take time and effort and a love for the game. It's not a case of turning up on Saturday afternoon with pop n chips. This is a game where you're going to sit at a table in a darkened room, suck on a faux pipe wearing glasses you don't need, just to get in the mood to play your part and write a letter.

If you want to play this game, you'll be setting aside a couple of hours a month for the next few years and really exercising your mind as you get into character.

I give this game-book a big thumbs-up.

Review of Dragon Magazine #3

A latter day RPG gamer takes quick glance over Dragon magazine number 3 (1976!) working out if it's worth buying today.

Cover - a science fiction pencil sketch that I would rate at a 10 year old level. Not the best sales pitch!

Dragon Rumbles - A sardonically amusing defense by the editorial staff of their inclusion of fiction within the magazine. Getting defensive already!

Does anyone remember - Gary Gygax regales us with memories of defunct play-by-mail wargames. Zero use to the modern role player.

Notes on Women & Magic - Gadzooks the world was a different place back in '76. Female PC's should not have Charisma, replace this with "Beauty", and Lawful females may not "use Beauty". Sex as a weapon! This article goes on to lay out a series of feminine titles for the various character levels before explaining how women can use special sex specific charm spells on male opponents. Oh dear, it's somewhat back unenlightened.

The Search for the Gnome Cache - Chapters 3 and 4 of the fiction continue. It opens with smut, dodges past a bar room brawl that offered the chance of some action and finishes up with an uneventful start of a journey. Like the previous unexciting installments, meh.

Birth Tables - This article offers some good options for creating  some background for your character. From social rank of parents, monetary allowances, parental occupations and levels. This is a quickstart for building a character around your stats with a few rolls of dice.

Wargaming World - Entirely useless "current" affairs for wargamers.

Mapping the Dungeons - More names and addresses for DM's, my oh my, how carefree we used to be.

Out on a Limb - Readers letters, yawn. Although I liked the one moaning about the fiction!

A Plethora of Obscure Sub Classes - This is an interesting presentation of some new "unofficial" classes. Namely Healers, Scribes and Samurai. These are really just variants on existing classes, but do give you something to think about and consider for adding flavor to your game.

A new view of Dwarves - An interesting take on the Dwarf character, and presents a series of abilities that transform Dwarf from "poor fighter" to "something useful" to the party. It certainly does that, with new abilities and possibilities presented.

New Subclass, the Beserker - Wowzers, this may the first presentation of the Beserker class, not a lot of abilities associated with being a beserker but many behavior rules. I like this.

The Idiot Class - Errr. A class that specializes in acting goofy, in order to confuse the enemy. Printing this was a waste of paper.

The New Category: Jesters - See above. Only with "funny" spells including at 6th level, the "Die Laughing" spell...

GenCon IX's D&D Elimination - A report about a long gone con'. Useless.

=======================

That is all folks. This edition is better than the previous two ...but not by much. It has some interesting tables and even a class or two you might want to lift.

Worth 12c to a modern gamer.

Mekton II - review

Mekton II is an mecha/anime RPG dating back to 1987. This edition is large A4ish paperback and 94 pages long. Thin card cover, colour illustration on the front with black and white throughout.
Inside, the rules open with the title “Danger! Romance! Giant Robot Combat!” which gives you an idea of what the game is shooting for. The designers have crafted a relatively light game, but by “relative” I mean relative to games of its vintage.

The book jumps straight into character creation with you generating D10 based statistics for Intelligence, Reflexes, Cool, Tech Ability, Luck, Attractiveness, Education,  Body Type and Movement Allowance. There’s a nice table relating to statistics that details what each value for each stats means. For instance a Luck score of 2 indicates “The gods hate you”, and an Intelligence of 8 indicates “Gifted”. This really adds some flavor to the bare numbers.

The next step is to work through a “life path”. This generates details of your characters family and fiends. Are your parents alive? What’s your goal in life? Does your brother hate you, what about your boss? After you’ve worked through these tables you’ll have a whole relationship network set up.
The next step is to buy skills. These are linked to career with each having a set of associated skills. You spend a number of points based on your Education stat. Skills, like stats range from 1-10.
The skill system works by you adding your skill to a stat to a D10 die roll and trying to beat a difficulty level, with all the usual modifiers.

The book now moves into kit and equipment. There's a table of weapons followed by the descriptions  of all the high tech kit you would expect from a any sci fi game, including vehicles and mecha.

The next 17 pages of the book detail the man and mecha combat rules. It’s a tactical combat system based on hexes. Mecha combat works the same as man to man combat but with bigger hexes, which means you don’t have to learn two systems.

The next few pages details the medical rules, so they obviously expect your characters to get hurt!
The really juicy bit comes next. Building mecha oh delightful tech crunch. Pick a size (weight) of mecha, add armour weapons and other bits of kit. I love this stuff.

The final section presents an adventure and default world in less than 20 pages.

I love this game. The character creation is a delight, the skill system simple. Admittedly I don’t use the hex based system of combat as I always prefer the more narrative style. The book looks good with line art on almost every page, it exudes theme and the rules back up that theme without getting in the way of quick game play.

Spell Law (for Rolemaster reviewed)

Spell Law is the magic system that “bolts on” to the Rolemaster. Although it does come as part of Rolemaster, the only reason not to bolt-it-on would be because you don’t want magic in your game.

I’m confused by the layout of this book. It opens with Guidelines for using the book, followed by descriptions of the three magical realms and THEN has the Introduction.  Rather an odd way of doing things in opinion, however it’s no more bizarre than the layout choices in the other Rolemaster books.

Wait, whats this coming up next? Another description of the three magical realms! Odd. Anyway, the book goes on to describe the various types of magic using characters, fourteen of them! What other game covers fouteen magical magic user classes, none I can think of.

Next up are the actual rules for acquiring spells, casting spells, armour vs spells and surviving spell attacks.  Also covered are magical research, magical objects and and wole bunch of edge-case  optional rules. This all totals up to 24 pages of small two column layout. It’s some dense stuff. If your used to D+D simple spell mechanics, you’ll find this a quite overpowering amout of detail.

I absolutely have to quote from rule 8.3 it’s a classic.

[size=18]“8.3 Base Attack Spells.
Base attack spells include all spells which are non-attack spells”[/size]

Ohhhh.....kaaaay.....

Let’s move on before out brains explode.

Next up in the book are spells lists for the “Channeling” realm of magic.  Spells within Spell Law are organised into lists. Each list has up to 20 spells in it. Each list is themed for such things as Detection, Weather, Fire, Light etc, etc. Each spell on the list has a “Level” and this refers to the casters level. If a character has learnt a spell list they know all the spells on the list but can only cast the spells of their own level or lower.

As an example the “Detection Mastery” list has spells on it for every level 1-20 then has spells for levels 25,30 and 50. The spells generally get more powerful.

Not all lists have spells at all of the lower levels, for example, the “Barrier Law” list does not have level 1 or 3 spells.
Mostly the spells are laid out in three columns but this changes to four at one point and the font size drops from small to tiny!
Then the books breaks into a series of tables that refer to bonuses and penalties to various magic based rolls, and more for the attack based spells.  They’re written in a bizarre olde-world font that makes then darned difficult to read.

There are also some full page critical hit charts. These are brilliant, just like the ones in the “Arms Law” book.  These give some great results, like: “Blast burns both of foes arms and all of upper chest. Foe loses use of both arms and is stunned for nine rounds. +15 hits.”
That’s some pretty cool effect.

Then come the spells lists for the “Essence Realm” and those for the “Mentalism” realm.

There are a metric ton of spells in this book. Most of the spells on each list are variations on a theme and can start to feel a bit samey. Yes there are always those critical hit charts to look forward to.

The book, is an awful mess, and I couldn’t bring myself to read all of the lists, there are just too many. I think this is really for the seasoned gamer with time on their hands.

Arms law and Claw Law

Arms Law describes itself as the first "system" to be bolted onto the Rolemaster role playing game.
It gives you rules for combat and...well that it really. 72 pages of combat related rules and data, nothing else!

The text is laid out in a tiny font spread across two columns.

The book starts with some term definitions that will be used in the following rules, nothing too in depth here. What does "Defensive Bonus" or "Orientation Roll" mean, that sort of thing. Then it starts to get meaty. The 9 phase Battle Round Sequence is presented and explained quite clearly.

The thing about Arms Law is that it is a detailed system. It takes some time explaining all of the various things that would effect a characters defensive capabilities , including the 20 differing levels of armour your character can be wearing! Then it moves onto describe a much shorter list of various offensive capabilities, such as "Expertise", "Magic Items" and "Experience".

In the next section it describes how you resolve combat attacks follows that with how to manoeuvre characters within the combat scenario. I really do like the fact that under this system you can attempt to leap from the horse into melee, and a die result indicates you achieve 30% of your task. Interpretation can be fun!

The next two pages cover all of the various bonuses and penalties that can get applied during combat. Bonuses for flank, read attacks, penalties for being wounded, bonuses due to spells, and penalties for using to swords. It's all here.

Then starts the insane craziness (and the beautiful beating heart) of the arms law system. The Charts!

A chart for fumbling your weapon.
A chart for manoeuvring in combat.
Critical wound charts for each of the following: Slashing, Puncturing, Crushing, Large creatures,  Super Large creatures.
Separate attack charts for : Dagger, Falchion, Hand Axe, Main Gauche, Scimitar, Rapier, Broadsword, Short Sword, Bare Fist, Club, War Hammer, Mace, Morning star, Whip, Bola, Composite Bow, Heavy Cross Bow,  Light Crossbow, Long Bow, Short Bow, Sling, Battle Axe, Flail, War Mattock, Quarterstaff, Two-Hand Sword, Javelin, Lance, Pole Arm, Spear.

That's a lot of tables and it's only one per page. These tables are in the smallest printed font I have ever seen, and they need to be to fit on one page. 22 columns, and rows for all of the possible values between 28 and 150!

But we're not done yet.

We have tables for Beak/Pincher, Bite, Claw/Talon, Grapple/Grasp/Envelop, Swallow(!), Horn/Tusk, Ram/Butt/Bash, Stinger, Tiny Animals, Trample/Stomp.

So that covers the Claw-Law part of the title. Phew, I was getting worried. But wait!  There's more!

Tables for: Martial Arts striking, Martial Arts sweeps & throws and one more for Fall/Crush damage.

Strangely separated from the other critical charts we have a few more critical wound charts: Grappling, Martial Arts Strike, Martial Arts Throws, Tiny Animals, Unbalancing

Let me elaborate on all of the critical wound charts. These are where the real fun comes in when using this system.  The results of a critical wound range from "A" the lightest to "E" the most dire, and each has a range from 1-100. Thus a character might receive an "E" Slash critical. This means you turn to the Slash Critical table, roll a D100 and cross reference E and the die roll.  For example if you inflict an "E" Slash on your enemy and roll 66 for the critical, the table relates the following.

"Sever foes arm. +12 hits. Foe expires in 12 rounds, drops immediately, +10% to your next swing."

Everyone of these critical charts is stuffed full of these beauties. This is the bit that people remember fondly.

Following all of these charts are some additional rules, for adapting historical weapons, explanations of how to interpret animal attacks ( and a few more charts to help you out). A special section of rules for martial arts giving differences for the various major schools and techniques.

That's it. Frankly its enough. There is so much "data" in this book it truly boggles the mind. It's a worthy read. These rules are supposed to be independent of the Rolemaster system and adaptable to any fantasy role playing game. I'm not so sure that was true back in 1984, and it would be hard to mash this into modern systems. Having said that, I do think tacking those great critical wound charts onto a D20 system might well be fun!  But beware using the critical fumble charts..

Hand Arms Fumble result of 100: "Bad taste and poor execution. You attempt to maim yourself. Roll a "D" slash critical against yourself."

Character Law & Campaign Law (Rolemaster 2nd Edition)

Let me give a you a little background to this review. I played Rolemaster way way back in the day. I didn't own the books, I wasn't the GM, but I played it and had a great time. Since then played and GM'ed Rolemaster's little brother "MERP" and really enjoyed doing so.

I saw the three Rolemaster books on eBay and snagged them, thinking "this is a great system and going to be a great read".

So here I am to present you with a review of the first book of three "Character law and Campaign law".

This book is split into three sections, RoleMaster, Character Law, and Campaign Law.

The RoleMaster section is about 24 pages (including the contents list). The text is split into two column layout and uses a tiny font.  This first section is also printed on grey rather than white which can make bed-time reading difficult due to the lack of contrast.

The introduction covers the "what is rolemaster" and the "what is roleplaying" sections somewhat poorly.  There are many words but no real clear description and with no example play this wouldn't be a good introduction to a total newbie.

The book makes a strange choice next. We go straight from introduction into rules for healing and death. Stat loss, recovery rates, types of injury, loss of soul are all covered. It's a poor way to start, The reader has no idea what half of the terms mean at this point. Then come Disease charts, Poison Charts, again referring to terminology yet to be explained.

The introduction of rules relating to subjects you don't know about continues with Movement, Encumbrance, walking pace etc, with constant forward references to sections you haven't reached. The problem with these references, is that they are "forward" to things that have yet to be explained and not “backward” as reminders. Without reading the other sections first these rules are somewhat confusing.

Next up are equipment, coinage and magical item rules, again the newbie reader will most likely be totally lost here. The rules are very detailed and exacting.

Then come a series of charts. Charts are the strength of the Rolemaster system, and as reference these are without comparison.  Resale values charts, Purchasing prices, Armour charts, Magical Item costs, Food, Lodging, Transport, Weapons, Herbs, Intoxicants and Poisons.  Lots of detail in each chart and rules for each where applicable. Excellent reference material.

At this point we get to the Character Law section of the book.  This starts out with definitions of game terms such at experience, skill-ranks, action, defensive bonus etc etc etc. Once again someone new to this system is going to have trouble reading through this, there are so many new terms and each is defined outside any context. As an example, defining defensive bonus before even entering the combat section of the rules doesn’t help get it straight in your head.

Finally we get to Character gen. Sadly it’s as incomprehensible at the preceding sections., perhaps worse. 2 pages detailing stats, the differences between temporary and potential, development and non-development, primary stats, stats bonus’ calculating hits based on stats...only at no point in this section does it mention rolling dice to determine you statistics!  The next couple of pages give you statistic based tables for getting bonuses and penalties and utilising stats in contests.

Next we jump into Skills and Ranks. This section fortunately is better composed. The skill rank and development system of Rolemaster is complex, with skill groups, the player having to choose the advancement rates for each before even allocating points to them. Yet I think they’ve managed that pretty well.

The rules spend some pages on using these skills and presents some tables (rolemasters strength). For instance the Maneuver and Movement table is introduced here (one of my favourites) in relation to the movement skills.

The basic skills are covered and explained before dropping into magical skills, including descriptions of the various magical realms that a character may choose from. Sadly in another round of confusing layout choice we drop back into the descriptions of more mundane skills!

Next up are professions. Each is described along with the “magical realm” each belongs to (although fighting professions belong to a non-magical realm). Sadly the layout man has hiccuped again. Having described the professions but not supplied related character gen rules, the book jumps into Experience levels, advancing your character and spending xp.

Now come the various races and cultures that a character can belong to each is descibed and limits and bonuses described. The next section describes the softer bits of generating a character, the background, personality, alignment etc.

Only now do we come to section 10, creating a character. There are 13 steps to the process each of which refers back to the preceding 56 pages. I think the layout guys was trying to introduce you to the  concepts before introducing the process. A nobel ideal, yet a few paragraphs of introduction would have sufficed, followed by bringing in the 13 point process and the associated rules in order would have created a cohesive logical process. It is all back to front here.

The last 14 pages of character law are “optional rules”. This is a list of disparate rules that can be “injected” into the system across all aspects of play. Reading through this list I’m confused as to why they are introduced as optional, they all seems to fit the system and should have been presented in the appropriate place, not as a seperate section.

The final section, is Campaign law, once again printed on a grey background.  

I like this section a great deal. It’s designed for the GM to help through through the production of a game-world and a campaign. It gives you great list of things to consider when building your woulrd and campaign, and by responding to each bullet point you’ll cover most of what you need as a GM to make a complete world.

There are some charts here for such things as weather and animal distribution which can help you fill in the environmental “culture” of the world.  There is much more but it is all “offline” content, not to be used during play. Although there’s nothing outstanding or amazing here, it is a good reference section. The section on developing sentient “cultures” is very good.

The campaign advice is good too, and includes a few gems such as advice to avoid rail-roading although back in 1987 it was called “contrivance”.

So in summary, what do I think of the book?

It’s an awful mess. Disorganised beyond comprehension. Hard to read (small font, grey backgrounds). It would be a crime to give this to a new player. The system too, is very old school and complicated beyond need.

Mekton Empire - Review

 [Mekton II is an Anime RPG about giant fighty robots, written in the 1990's. This review is for an expansion to the original game.]

What we have here is a campaign type book, expanding the default universe from just the single world of Algol to a complete universe. At least that's what the blurb says. I'm not so sure.

The basic: Softback, A4'ish in size. Thin card cover in colour with black and white interior. 132 including index.

Starting with the cover itself. Yuk. It features a multi-coloured Mek that looks like something from Go-Bots, which is not something I like in my Meks. I prefer military colouring, or at least sensible colours. The back cover is black and white image of a battleship, I prefer that to the front cover.

Introduction:

This short section is exactly what it should be, it tells us what the book is about. Nice.

A History of the Bendar Spiral Galaxy:

This made up of a few things. It starts over a descriptive overview of the galactic empire. Very nice and interesting. Then comes a 5 page timeline... but about half the entries are blank. Let me confirm that for you, 5 pages, mostly blank. This is supposedly so that you can fill in the blanks and make the universe your own.  That's an odd concept for such a campaign book. Why did I but it, if I have to make stuff up and write it into the book?

Next is a biographical section, listing lots of NPCs and giving many a head shot. the entries are short, descriptive and good summaries. But again the "this book is a tool box" idea comes into play once again. There are no stats, and no place in the presented universe to place these NPCs, that's for you to decide. It even has space where you can write in the birth and death years of these characters. I ask you, why would you create a dead NPC?

Guide to the Bendar Spiral Galaxy:

This section starts with a list of tables of planetary stats, such as tech level, atmosphere, port facilities etc. Each level is given a number and a code.  Quite Travelleresque, but no system for generating planets.

Next comes a list of planets, each entry has the planet stats and short good description of notable points, such as predominant life form or resources or government. However there is no place for these planets, no galactic coordinates. You have to assign them to the map yourself, more on the map later.

Races of the Bendar Spiral Galaxy:

Nine races, all but two humanoid. One is human, one is manga-people (big eyes) and one is pixies. All in, rather unimaginative.

Next up are organisations, military, political and commercial which span multiple planets and races. Some good stuff here, great ideas and starting points for adventures.

Creatures of the Bendar Spiral Galaxy:

Four pages, four entries each...not many creatures in this galaxy! However they do look good, handy to pull out at short notice.

Technical Guides:

Guns, armour, space suits, kit and some nice looking mecha. Stats for everything. Nice.

Next up space ships. They state here how spaceships in anime are only bases from which to launch plot, and their intention was to creat such plot-ships in these rules. To that end the stats for ships are pretty simple and ships come in just a few basic classes.

I think they've got the rules down here, just enough no build the plot and run through some battles without is becoming a big heavy wargame. bonus points for some wonderful ship art.

Mysteries of the Galaxy:

This section is a great idea, badly presented. These are cool plot hooks for adventures or entire campaigns. They are good ideas! Yet , once again the section has "blanks" for you to fill in. Wasted, white, empty space.

New Rules for Mekton Empire:

The main segment here, and really the best part of the book, it the rules section on Psionics. Based around a new statistic, characters may have trained or wild Psionic talents. Lots of great powers are listed and explained. This section is very well thought out and fun to read. It sparked off no end of ideas for me.

Space Combat is explained next, and how it different from the usual planet side combat. Meks in space, spaceships line of sight etc, are all laid out here

Building the Better Beast:

Two pages of rules for creating new animals to populate your planets.

Next, four pages of Life Path alterations to the basic rules life path. It has the same boxed tables layout, but only shows the new tables, rather than re-presenting the entire life path system. For the new races, you'll need to reference both books.

Then comes the detailed index. But this not the end!

Last but one, comes sheet of starship silouhettes for you to cut out. (Eek! Cut up your book! No!)

The final thing is a colour star map that folds out to double page spread size. Alas, it is again a good idea badly implemented. It was good in its day, I guess. It was printed in 1990, so they didn't have access to the great free public domain art of NASA. A grid is overlaid on a spiral galaxy that looks like it was simply and quickly done with an air brush. Various places on the map are marked with round coloured (and ugly) spots. These are planets. But which planet is which? Well that's easily solved. You have to go through the section that listed a bunch of planets and assign them to the map. They've even left spaces for you to do that at the side of the map.

There you have it. But what do I think?

The designers/writers of this book produced a thing that is not quite sure what it is. A tool box, and/or a campaign book.

I have no interest in the sections where I have to fill them in myself, that's not the point of source book. If it's a tool box, why have they written so much detail in of actual places , people and events?  This leaves me with a galaxy where only half of it is mine. I don't like that feeling.

I've created sectors in Traveller, clusters in Diaspora, I'm not afraid of making my own universe. But this approach left me cold.

I'm really happy with the starship design, the Psionic rules, space combat, guns, armour and kit sections. I will drop these into an existing Mekton game at the drop of a hat.  I may even lift some of the ideas, planets and people, for a game here and there, but those sections will not be automatic reference points.

I am glad I've added this to my collection.

Pandemic

Our little group got together and we played a game called Pandemic. This game has been around for a long time now, must be a few years but I've never played it.  I have made and played a Print n' Play game called Pandemic-Express which closely simulates Pandemic but uses dice instead of cards.

I was looking forwards to playing the game and was not disappointed. There were three of us playing and I got the role of ... er ... the guy who can build research stations. 

There are many roles in the game and everyone gets to choose one role, each of which has an ability that breaks the basic game rules. I like that there are more roles than players, that'll give the game some replayability.

As to the components, I was pretty impressed. The board was very nice, a good heavy weight and richly coloured. the cards were very nice too. Clear text etc, but I was a little a little colour problem with blue/purple. the cards and board colours didn't match too well.

The disease cubes were semi transparent plastic, and I believe that they were painted wooden cubes in a previous version. I'm glad to have played with the plastic ones, I prefer them to wooden cubes.

I glanced through the rulebook and it looked pretty good too. I actually downloaded and read a quick-play guide from the interwebs so I didn't have to refer to the manual for actual use.  the chap who owned the game was playing for the first time too and he didn't feel the need to constantly refer to it, and that suggests that it is well written.

I loved the game, the fact that we lost had no impact on that! the interaction and planning steps were great fun, and the tease of having just lost and then working out that we might have won, if only we'd dome something slightly different was great.  It appears to be a game where you must work together, you must interact if you want a chance of winning. Playing on your own, trying to collect cards and keep on top of the outbreaks is just impossible.

Lots of consideration on your turn and other peoples turns keeps you involved in the game all of the time. Great!

This is a game I'm looking forward to playing again sometime soon!

Settlers of Catan - review of sorrts

On Thursday I played Settlers of Catan for the very first time. I've known about the game for years, but never bought a copy for myself.  Whenever the opportunity came up, I would look around and there was always some other game that looked more exciting or more like it would appeal to my family. Always some other priority.

On Thursday I actually got to play someone else's copy of the game. I was very happy with the look and feel of the game. the components were perfectly suitable. Everything was colourful, the rules were clear and the bits and cards felt good to handle.

I liked the look of the board, although I do have one very minor complaint. I wish that the hexes that make up the main board had symbols on them to match with the resource cards themselves. It's just a very minor niggle.

I liked the way it played, a turn could be very quick. Roll the dice, grab the resources, a quick trade perhaps, then play the resources that you worked out you were going spend while everyone else was taking their turns. Very simple, very straight forward.

But what did I think? I liked it. I didn't love it. I will happily play it anytime, there is enough social and game interaction to make this a game I will always play if someone offers it up. But the theme is not one to inspire me to pick it myself when I have so many other games to play.