Levels 1 to 3: Crypt of the Everflame

We started off with Crypt of the Everflame, the very first Pathfinder adventure written using the final rules sold at GenCon. It was a lot of fun and a great method of bringing disparate PCs together in order to move towards a common goal.

Level 3 to 4: Final Resting Place

I wanted to introduce my characters to the Pathfinder Society and make them want to join. I pulled out Dungeon Magazine #122 and used the adventure called “Final Resting Place”. It allowed me to use a character from Crypt of the Everflame, who is a member of the Society, to ask the PCs to rescue the body of a particularly famous Society member. I also thought it was a slick adventure with some interesting problems to solve. The players liked it and came up with interesting solutions to said problems.

Level 4 to 5: Heroes’ End

This is a fun adventure from Goodman Games’ “Dungeon Crawl Classics #48: The Adventure Continues“. Essentially, the PCs are transported to a fairy tale plane where they must defeat Rapunzel and The Old Woman in the Shoe in order to get back to their own world. The players were completely surprised by a) a talking book and b) the fact that the talking book tricked them into moving through a portal into another plane. In the end, they were able to defeat who they needed to defeat and made their way back to their own plane. Because of their actions in the fairy tale plane, I was able to move them towards the next adventure.

Level 5 to 6: Forest of Blood

This adventure, from Dungeon Magazine #103, was written by a friend of mine and it was a lot of fun. It had the PCs traveling to a small town that was having their annual Winter Faire. They completed what they needed to do because of the previous adventure and then decided to partake in the Faire events. Unfortunately, the town was attacked by a group of wolves and the PCs, after defending the villagers in danger, had to find out what was going on. It’s a great adventure and I highly recommend it.

Level 6: The Menagerie

At the moment, the players are standing outside of the store mentioned in this adventure from Dungeon Magazine #126 and are ready to go inside and save the day!

I have more adventures ready to go but may change them depending on what they do during the campaign. I love having the freedom to change the campaign as necessary without worrying that I am going to screw up the entire over-arcing storyline.

The play was finally performed and reviews for it are glowing! Pictures of the production are available here. This one’s my favorite:

GOBLINS!!!

Let me give you a little history about campaigns I have run. A few years back, I ran a 3.5 Eberron campaign that lasted 1.5 years and took the PCs from first to 21st level. That campaign consisted of me cobbling together separate adventures and tweaking them to fit the personalities of the PCs and the storylines that I had interwoven into the overall plot. I’m actually using the same adventures in the Eberron PbP I’m currently running, tweaking them as necessary and swapping complete adventures out as I see fit.

After that, a friend of mine ran a short campaign before having to turn over DMing duty to me since he was back in school. I decided to run the Savage Tide adventure path. The first session should have been a clue to me since it was a TPK. But, no, I just reset the campaign and went on from there. It was the deadliest campaign I have ever run with the PC death rate numbering in the twenties by the time we quit. We bounced around between other folks DMing until 4E came out. Once again, I decided to run an adventure path. This one was Scales of War. Unfortunately, it was miserable and, partially because of the AP and partially because we decided we didn’t like 4E, we stopped after the third adventure in the path.

Fast forward to a few months ago and I was DMing again. I decided to try out Pathfinder and run the Rise of the Runelords AP. We found that we really liked Pathfinder and even updated the PCs after the final rules came out. But, just as with previous AP’s, we ended up not liking it and stopped playing it.

To be fair, part of that is, of course, my fault as the DM. While AP’s are a good idea, there are problems inherent to them that I was unable to overcome.

1. It’s a huge railroad.

This actually became an issue in the very first session. With the way that one of the character’s background was written, it didn’t make sense for her to go along with the plot. It wasn’t that she was trying to be difficult, it was just that the AP clashed with her background. In the end, she changed her background to better fit but I hated the fact that she had to do that. In fact, during the second adventure, another player announced “But why would we do X? So far, we have no motive beyond find the macguffin.” That’s paraphrasing, of course, but he had a good point. There really was no reason for them to do it beyond “the town is in trouble and the sheriff is gone and we need you to do this.” But the problem was that if the PCs didn’t go from point A to point B to point C, it could throw off the rest of the Adventure Path.

2. It’s very hard to tailor the campaign to fit individual PCs.

This is especially true if you play the AP as it is published. So if you start with module one before module two is published, you may end up changing something in module one inadvertently that has an effect in module two or in a later module. And even if you wait until all modules have been published, it will take a lot of effort to change things because so may pieces rely upon one another.

3. If the adventure sucks, you’re stuck.

The first half of the second part of Rise of the Runelords, The Skinsaw Murders, was awesome. The scene with the cornfield and the farmhouse was intense. And the Manor itself was incredibly well written. I had a great time running it and my players had a great time playing it. Unfortunately, a half does not make a whole. The rest of the adventure was meh at best. But, in order to advance through the AP, we were stuck having to slog through it, hoping it would get better.

So, yeah, we trashed it. We decided to start over and I vowed, yes vowed!, to never run an AP again. I’m going back to my tried and true method of picking individual adventures, making the characters more a part of the world, and tailor the campaign to fit the PCs rather than having to tailor the PCs to fit the campaign.

So far, the PCs are about halfway through Crypt of the Everflame, the first Pathfinder module based upon the final rules. It’s a fun little module and really gives the PCs a chance to become part of the community, rather than just write it into their background that “so and so really get along.” By the time they finish, they’ll be third level (we use the “Fast” leveling chart) so I needed to come up with a third level adventure. I also knew that I wanted to introduce the Pathfinder Society into the campaign. So I checked my resources and, lo and behold, I have an adventure that is not only really cool but it also has the perfect tie-in to get the PCs into the Pathfinder Society.

I’m still looking at other, higher level, adventures for the rest of the campaign, but the PCs haven’t established themselves enough for me to tell which ones would fit. But that will come in time and I’ll have fun trying to find the next “perfect” adventure for the group. As it stands, I’m more jazzed about this campaign than I have been in a long time.

I am honored at the interest in the play.

We are in rehearsal with a cast of 24 humans, 8 goblins, 6 elves, a gnome, a halfling, a demon and a fire leopard.

Again, I wish to repeat the sentiment expressed here. Paizo is the most amazing community the gaming world has to offer. It makes me a little verklempt thinking about all the hard work they do for all of us, for love of the game.

Having gamed the Rise of the Runelords, Crimson throne and preparing for the Council of thieves, it is CRYSTAL clear that the writers at Paizo have a mastery of story-telling, a dedication to gaming and the true spirit of community. Community not just for the sake of making a few bucks (though isn’t that the dream of all of us) but because they recognize something important in this game.

My school is Portland’s Arts magnet school. We were started by a group of parents only 14 years ago. These were parents who wanted the artistically-oriented kids of Portland to have the option of expressing themselves in a focused, arts-disciplined environment. Frankly, we have had some great successes and a few frustrations, but we continue to grow and take leadership in the arts and in education.

For the last couple of years we have had a group of young boys and girls who have seemed to operate in isolation, not quite connecting. This is the same group of skaters/video-gamers/”ne’er do wells that I was a part of 30 years ago (Crap! 30 years????). So I decided to use my art form (I’ve been a theater artist for almost those same 30 years) to give them a taste of DnD, the game the made such a difference to me. I wish you all could see these these kids. Involved, swinging swords, trying to figure out how to pronounce Elven, Goblin and Danish (Gnomish). They are reading every bit of background I can give them, working on costume designs, fight and dance choreography, Ameiko is fervently practicing her guitar. And best of all, many of them are starting to pick up Pathfinder books and connect Paizo to the world of the game.

The main party is drawn from town:

Finn, A young errand boy for the Rusty Dragon
Ameiko Kaijitsu, Owner of the Rusty Dragon
Milosh Hemlock, Son of Sheriff Belor Hemlock
Shalelu Andosana, Elven bounty hunter.
Abstalar Zantus, Priest of Desna
Veznutt Parooh, Gnomish wizard, owner of the Way North

Milosh and Finn are the only original additions. They are the focus of the Hero’s Journey arc of the play. Milosh to fighter, Finn to Wizard.

Come see us. Support us if you can. And please keep supporting the folks at Paizo.

If you’re in the Portland, Oregon area, or will be in the middle of November, I strongly encourage you to go to this play and support both future gamers and the school. And, if you do plan to go, let folks know on this EN World poll.

This is absolutely, 100% real. In fact, you can check out the schedule for the school here and look for yourself. The best part is that James Jacobs himself has stated that “[s]everal of us here at Paizo are trying to figure out if we can spare a day off work to head down to see the play…”

I love it when kids show so much enthusiasm for RPGs and that schools support them! If you’re in the Portland, OR, area, go and let me know how it went!

(I found this via a thread on EN World.)

In Pathfinder, there is a group known as the Pathfinder Society. In short, they are “a loose-knit group of explorers, archaeologists, and adventurers who span the globe in search of lost knowledge and ancient treasures.” Reading a little bit more on them, I found a passage in the Campaign Setting that stated:

Agents are expected to provide detailed written reports of their exploits to their venture-captains, who then forward the most compelling records to the Grand Lodge in Absalom for consideration by the Decemvirate.

And this got me thinking that I could use this to reward my players while, at the same time, encourage further development of their characters. I sent the following note to my players:

If you want, you can write up a recap of a session, a specific portion of an adventure (for example, a dungeon crawl that only takes place as the middle third of the adventure), or of an entire adventure and post it; pretend you’re writing it for an audience.

For every recap you write for a session, you earn 1 Hero Point. If you write about a specific portion of an adventure, i.e. the dungeon crawl example above, you will earn 3 Hero Points. If you recap an entire adventure, you earn 5 Hero Points.

Also, in game, you might end up seeing them published for folks to read.

Personally, and I’m probably a little bit biased here, I think it’s a great idea. It keeps the players engaged out of the game, rewards them for character development, and provides material for the in-game world.

http://twitter.com/ENnies

For more info, check out this EN World thread: http://www.enworld.org/forum/general-rpg-discussion/258263-paizo-sets-price-pathfinder-rpg-pdf-9-99-a.html

Edit: $10 is a definite go! http://paizo.com/store/paizo/pathfinder/pathfinderRPG/v5748btpy88yj

As luck would have it, my source, the same source that slipped me the skills that were rejected during the creation of 3rd Edition, has sent me the new character sheet for 5th edition. It’s… interesting to say the least. For example, you level up after every fifth encounter, skills are all strength based, and you gain a feat at every level. There are some other changes but I’ll let you see them for yourself to draw your own conclusions.

Click each image for a larger view.

Click here to download the whole thing in PDF format

Here’s a list of what the Points give you

Action Points: Click here

Hero Points:

The key thing to remember about hero points is that awarding them to PCs, or not awarding them, is totally up to the DM.

On his turn, before determining the success or failure of an action, a player can announce that he is using a hero point to help accomplish the action. Normally, the hero point adds a bonus of +20 to the action, if the roll of a d20 dictates its success or failure. However, there are exceptions:

1. If used with an attack roll, and the attack roll would have succeeded without the hero point, the hero point doubles the damage inflicted by the attack or it allows the PC to make a “called shot,” inflicting a special effect.
2. If a character uses a hero point to act when it is not his turn, he can take a normal round’s worth of actions out of the regular initiative sequence with no special bonuses. He then returns to his normal initiative count.
3. If used when a character is being attacked by either a physical attack, a spell, or some other threat, the hero point can be used to add a +1d20 luck bonus to Armor Class or to a saving throw. If used with a saving throw for half damage or a partial effect, if the character would have made the save without the help of the hero point, he takes no damage or ill effect at all.
4. If used when a die roll determines that the character will die, the character avoids death and instead suffers a great and debilitating injury determined by the DM—the character gains a disfiguring scar, loses a hand, loses an eye, gains a limp, and so on. This is the only case when a hero point can be used after the result of an action is determined.
5. A character can use a hero point to make something work in a way the rules normally do not allow. This requires careful DM adjudication.

• DMs can choose how fast to advance the PCs based upon three “XP tracks.” I’m not sure if that’s good or bad; just kind of meh. To me, it’s always been up to the DM as far as telling the players when they go up a level. The only reason it was necessary to really keep track of XP in 3.5 was because players sometimes had to spend XP for spells. Since Pathfinder no longer does that, I see no reason keep track of it. I guess it’s for players who must know exactly how much XP their character has.

• Attributes start at 10 for point buy instead of 8. This I like. I always thought PCs should be above average compared to NPCs. Otherwise, why would they be adventuring?

• Some classes have lists of bonus languages to choose from. I like this, too. It makes sense, for example, that a druid could possibly learn Sylvan.

• Sneak attacks work against everything unless the creature has immunity. No arguments here. I’ve always thought that sneak attacks were more about “hitting the vital area,” i.e. the area that would do the most damage to the enemy, rather than “the area that will cause the enemy to bleed more.”

• You can only have as many ranks in a skill as total hit dice but, if you have ranks in it and it’s a class skill, you get a +3 bonus to a check with that skill. Dunno how I feel about this. On the one hand, it rewards characters who are more skillful types of their class but, on the other hand, I feel it may pigeonhole people into playing more “typical” rogues, clerics, etc, rather than branching out.

• If a prestige class calls for a certain number of ranks in a skill and the skill is a class skill, you can qualify if you have the number of ranks needed minus three. This just seems overly complicated to me.

• If a prestige class calls for a certain number of ranks in a skill and the skill is not a class skill, you can qualify if you have the double the number of ranks needed. This goes back to my fear of pigeonholing players. To me, this tells people that “you can only be a [insert prestige class] if you are also a [insert character class here], otherwise you’re SOL.”

• Armor for Small characters costs half as much as armor for a Medium character. Makes sense to me.

• No more auto-stabilization. This one could be bad. So now, if a character drops below 0, they get a total of one auto-stabilize check instead of one every round. Definitely makes a cleric more useful!

• No more turn undead. Now you channel positive energy. Love it! 30-foot radius burst of positive energy that damages undead and makes them frightened (successful Will by undead negates frighten and halves damage). It also heals every living creature, friend or foe, in the burst. This was definitely one of the cooler changes for me.

• Bull rush, disarm, grapple, overrun, sunder, and trip are now combined into one thing: Combat Maneuvers. Seems cool but I’m not sure about the actual application. You roll a d20 and add your CMB (Combat Maneuver Bonus) against a DC of 15+the enemy’s CMB. I realize that, as you get better, you’ll be able to succeed more often, but I wonder, with such a high DC, if that’s going to dissuade lower level PCs from even trying grapples or bull rushes, etc.

That’s all I’ve found so far. If I’ve missed anything, please let me know. As it stands, I’m really looking forward to playing Pathfinder.

Ok. Now that that’s out of the way, here the scoop. I’m running a game for friends using the StuperPowers! rules. If you’ve never played a StuperPowers! game, I highly recommend it. Simple to play and it’s great for at least one night of hilarity. Anyway, this is the premise:

Calipornification!

It’s the year 2055. California has seceded from the union after a bloodless civil war because, in the end, no one cared that they wanted to leave. The main export of California is porn. It provides the income to keep the California “government” running so they can continue to give free handouts to the people that live there.

Unfortunately for them, popular porn stars have been disappearing right and left! The police and their Segways are powerless to stop the kidnappings and have no leads to follow. It’s up to your team of top-notch current- and ex-pornstars to find the root of this evil and bring back California’s cash-cow. Are you man/woman/hermaphrodite enough?

So far, I have the following bad guys for the heroes to deal with:

• Dirty Sanchez
• The Circle Jerks (henchmen)
• The Cougar
• The Cunning Linguist
• The Beastmaster and his sidekick, Wolfpuss

I’m always on the lookout for good ideas. Any suggestions on enemies I should include or situations in which I should put the heroes?

Eventually, the PCs receive a note calling them back to the location of the fight in the woods. It turns out, if violence occurs within the elves territory, the creatures involved will be cursed. The elves have lived with this for years and assumed the PCs would not be affected. The elves wanted to see what would happen so they let them go, spying on them the whole time. Since they saw what was happening, the elves contacted them to come back. Note: Of course, you can have the PCs notice they’re being spied upon. It’s really up to the GM.

The curse was placed on the elves centuries ago by an old hag who lives behind a waterfall. The elves tried to drive her out but she cursed them in order to keep them from becoming violent towards her. Every time they try, the curse intensifies and they cannot get to her. The elves hope that the PCs, since the curse just affected them, won’t have their actions as harmed by the curse as the elves do. Note: It’s up to the GM whether the hag brought the wrath of the elves upon herself through her own actions or if the elves were the ones who started it all when the hag really just wanted to be left alone.

The PCs, hopefully, will go towards the waterfall and find that she lives behind it. They will take the tunnel, battling adversity along the way, and eventually find that the hag died long ago but her curse has been kept active by a goblin lackey who is keeping her dying wish alive. It is up to the PCs to convince him to stop it. Will the PCs kill him or will they talk with him? If they simply kill him, will that remove the curse or make it worse? Note: Whatever is still powering the curse after all these years is something the GM will need to make up.

Here’s a blurb from the front page of the Dino-Pirates website:

Here it is! The complete rules to the greatest game of pulp adventure ever created! DINO-PIRATES OF NINJA ISLAND is a swashbuckling role-playing game based on the very fine True20 system created and published by Green Ronin and you should TOTALLY buy a copy right now.

Here you’ll find all the rules you need to create characters and run adventures in the world of DINO-PIRATES OF NINJA ISLAND. These rules are complete and not missing anything you’ll need — except for the setting itself, which isn’t detailed here at all. So while there’ll be references to ninjas, dinosaurs and pirates throughout, you’ll find a lack of info actually telling you how all these various groups and factions get along (or even what they are).

But fear not because we will soon be providing a great deal of setting material online in a different format. In the meantime, why not purchase the original DINO-PIRATES OF NINJA ISLAND adventure, SLAVE QUEEN OF THE RUINED CITY? That’ll be more than enough to get you started.

If you do buy SLAVE QUEEN OF THE RUINED CITY, you’ll notice the sample characters there use the standard True20 rules, not the DINO-PIRATES OF NINJA ISLAND rules you see here. No worries! We’ve provided you with a download of the characters, properly set up for these rules. It’s okay, you don’t have to thank us. Just doing our job. The rest of the adventure ought to run just fine without any need for tweaking.

So what are you waiting for?! Get out there and download the danged thing by clicking on the banner below! Did I mention it was free?

For those who have played M:TA before, I ask you look over my character and give any advice you think would help (This is the first time I’ve ever played M:TA).

Shadow Name:

Virtue: Justice

Vice: Pride

Concept: Private Investigator

Path: Arcanus

Health: 7

Willpower: 4

Gnosis: 1

Mana: 7

Wisdom: 7

Size: 5

Speed: 10

Defense: 2

Armor: 3 (when Shielding spell is cast)

Initiative Mod: 9

Attributes

Intelligence: 2
Wits: 2
Resolve: 2

Strength: 1
Dexterity: 4
Stamina: 2

Presence: 3
Manipulation: 3
Composure: 3

Skills

Computer (Hacking): 2
Investigation (Crime Scene): 5 (Rote Skill)
Occult: 3

Firearms: 1
Larceny: 1
Weaponry: 2

Empathy (Lies): 3 (Rote Skill)
Intimidation: 1
Persuasion: 2
Socialize: 1

Arcana

Fate (+): 3
Time (+): 2
Mind: 1
Forces (-)

Merits

High Speech
Eidetic Memory
Fighting Finesse (Knife)
Disarm
Fast Reflexes (2)

Rotes

The Perfect Moment (Fate 2)
Fortune’s Protection (Fate 2)
Postcognition (Time 2)

Nimbus

Time seems to slow a bit

Dedicated Magic Tool: Silver Knife

Combat: Silver Knife

1. Characters in HEX can be hard to make, but not for the reasons you think.

We started off the session making characters. The mechanics of character creation in HEX is pretty simple. But even though the players, who had never played HEX before, found it easy to come up with a character’s mechanics, it took two hours for everyone to be ready to play. Why? Hard to find options? Asking a lot of questions on how to do things? No. The hardest part was actually coming up with a concept.

HEX is a pulp game. But what is “pulp?” What defines the genre? These are the questions my group faced. There are many examples floating on the Net of what forms of entertainment define pulp. From books like Tarzan or Journey to the Center of the Earth to movies like Jurassic Park or Lara Croft: Tomb Raider. I think the best thing to do before starting a HEX game would be to find good examples of pulp and send them to the group. Also, I would recommend sitting down and watching a couple of movies that help define the genre and discussing why it’s full of pulp.

For example, Jurassic Park. What makes it a pulp film? First, it has dinosaurs. Second, it has people fighting for their lives. Third, it has over-the-top scenes of danger, death, and survival. And, finally, it has dinosaurs.

2. The players don’t want to wait while the NPCs fight each other.

In the final battle, the group of four PCs, along with an NPC and six ape-men, fought a group of 13 Nazis, which included the BBEG. In the first round, I made the mistake of rolling for every Nazi and every ape-man as they fought each other. In the subsequent rounds, I ditched that and just described what was happening and removed a few Nazis and ape-men from the board as they died. It made the combat go faster and it focused more of the spotlight on the PCs and the BBEG. It also added a bit of cinematic flair to the encounter as the “camera” was focused on the PCs but you could definitely see a lot of action in the background.

3. Over-the-top is where it’s at.

Style points play a big part in HEX. Technically, they only allow you do things such as boost a Talent or take an extra action during combat. However, a friend of mine, Tom, ran a HEX one-shot where the PCs could use style points to do things they normally couldn’t do. I put this into place in my game as well.

Unfortunately, my players didn’t really get into the swing of this as much as I wish. They took advantage of it a bit but nothing really stood out to me as “over-the-top.” For example, one player was 30 feet away from the BBEG. His gas gun had a 25-foot range. I told him that rather than taking the penalty for firing beyond range, he could spend a style point to do something cool. He spent one and then proceeded to jump off the building and fire in mid-air. Granted, it was really cool, but I’ve seen it before. What I was picturing in my mind was the PC firing the gas gun not at the enemy, but rather at the rooftop of the building next to him. The camera would follow as the canister rolled down the roof, into the gutter, rolled a bit more, rolled down a drainpipe, and then landed at the BBEG’s feet, exploding gas onto him. But that’s just me.

Anyway, I think my players could definitely get into the swing of “over-the-top” if we played a long-term campaign with HEX.

4. Story trumps combat any day.

The adventure in the back of the HEX book is a great introduction to the setting. It only has one combat written into it but it still gives a great feel of what HEX is all about. A lot of perception rolls were made to notice strange phenomena occurring as they traveled to the North Pole. Hiding from the T-Rex was really cool. The scientist in the party decided to get a little too close to the natural flora, so I threw in a carnivorous plant which was taken out handily by the ex-Marine in the party (One shot. One kill). The point is, the story was so great and the players were so into the setting that they didn’t care that they really didn’t get to fight anything. They were enthralled with the fact that stuff was going haywire in the ship and that the person they found alive in the Hollow Earth thought he had been there for a little over a year when, in fact, it had been eight years.

And, really, this is true of any setting. You can throw combat after combat at the party but, unless it has a compelling story, the players are going to get bored.

5. Rolling lots of dice is great.

Since HEX isn’t d20, you end up rolling a lot more dice. For example, the BBEG’s defense roll was made using 10d6′s. The number of evens on the dice was the number of successes gained. I’ve always loved being able to roll a lot of dice in D&D when doing damage so it was a a blast to roll so many dice every time the players shot at the BBEG.

6. Trying different genres of RPG is a lot of fun.

I’m lucky to be in a group willing to give different RPGs a shot. Sometimes it works; sometimes it doesn’t. But it’s always fun and it’s always a learning experience. In this case, it was a lot of fun and everyone had a good time playing.

Conclusion

HEX is simple and fun to play. I can definitely see making a long-term campaign based upon it. Right now, we’re playing different RPGs because we’re not getting together as much because of the holidays and because we stopped playing 4E. But I definitely think HEX would be something we come back to in the future.

FADE IN:

INT. SMOKEY ROOM – DIMLY LIT – SINGLE LIGHT OVER TABLE.

WIDE SHOT – POKER TABLE IN FOREGROUND. COMMUNICATIONS EQUIPMENT AND PRIVATE TYLER IN BACKGROUND.

SERGEANT KOWALSKI sits at poker table with his Army buddies. He wears his fatigue pants and a white tank top. A cigarette dangles from his mouth. He is dealing cards as he speaks.

SERGEANT KOWALSKI (mockingly)
Come on, TYLER. We’ve been listenin’ to them Krauts for months now and we ain’t heard jack shit.

PRIVATE TYLER sits intently with headphones on, waiting with his stub of a pencil to write in an empty notebook.

PRIVATE TYLER
SARGE, we still got a job to do. Them Nazis is movin’ too quick. They’re scarin’ a lot of people higher up.

SEARGEANT KOWALSKI (laughing)
Whatever you say, TYLER. You just don’t want me to take more of your money.

Other soldiers at table laugh.

CAMERA STAYS FOCUSED ON SERGEANT KOWALSKI AS PRIVATE TYLER SPEAKS.

PRIVATE TYLER
Not my fault you deal from the bottom of the deck. Why…

SERGEANT KOWALSKI (turning towards PRIVATE TYLER)
Oh please continue, TYLER. I’m looking forward to hearing…

Tyler is writing FURIOUSLY in the notebook. All of the soldiers go silent.

CAMERA SLOWLY PANS THE SOLDIERS TO SEE LOOKS OF CONCERN AS PRIVATE TYLER CONTINUES TO WRITE.

CAMERA SHIFTS BACK TO PRIVATE TYLER.

PRIVATE TYLER stops writing and SLAMS the pencil onto the notebook. PRIVATE TYLER looks at Kowalski.

PRIVATE TYLER (curtly)
Call the Major.

QUICK CUT. INT. OFFICE HALLWAY. FOLLOWING MAN IN THE BLUE SUIT CARRYING MANILA FOLDER.

The MAN IN THE BLUE SUIT turns into an office. Behind the desk is Army COLONEL HOLLAWAY. The MAN IN THE BLUE SUIT puts the folder on the desk.

COLONEL HOLLAWAY (worriedly)
Are you sure about this?

MAN IN THE BLUE SUIT (through teeth clenching a pipe)
Unfortunately, yes.

COLONEL HOLLAWAY leans back in chair and sighs. Picks up folder and flips through it. Throws folder back on to desk, pictures of two main characters slide out.

COLONEL HOLLAWAY (resignedly)
Call them.

BLACK SCREEN

If this was a real campaign, I would then play out scenes for each PC meeting the Man in the Blue Suit and being invited to an important meeting in New York. Since it’s not, everyone will just already be at the meeting.

One thing I really like about HEX is the fact that, since it’s pulp, it’s really easy to make it move-like and use so many great films as inspiration.

At this point, I’m not holding my breath. A word of advice to all future RPG publishers: If you ask someone to review your product, make sure you get them the product within a month and a half. Otherwise, it makes you look unprofessional.

Synopsis

The RPG is described as “[t]he Post Apocalypse, High Tech, Fantasy, Western, Role Playing Game.” It definitely tries to be all of those things.

Layout and Art

It was sent to me in PDF format and runs 88 pages with the front cover, contents, an appendix, and a character sheet. The layout of the book is nice and it flows well.

The artwork is definitely amateurish. With so many free, “for public use” graphics options out there, I would have preferred they used those.

Introduction

The first chapter sets the tone of the world and lets you know that it’s set in the early- to mid-2080′s. From 2010 to 2030, the world was at war and the economy of many nation’s collapsed. Out of this, one man is able to take control of most of the world. People start to develop abilities such as “code slinging” (magic) and the leader sees them as a threat.

Character Creation

There are five archetypes to choose from and each character has many qualities available to help define themselves.

Average Joe/Plain Jane – The “rebel without a cause” kind of person. One who wants to fight for something and now has a reason to do so.

Code Slinger - The “spellcaster” who uses technology (the Code) to bend reality to your will.

Cyber Mystic – A “shaman-esque” character who teaches the ways of the Code.

Gun Jack/Jill – Gunslinger.

Mutant – Self explanatory.

Assigning Attributes is done by rolling 2d6 four times. You then put the three highest numbers in Social (how you deal with other people), Physical (hit points, physical prowess as well as how you deal with poisons and drugs), and Mental (remembering things and saving against Code Slinger spells). You place the lowest number in Flaws.

Qualities are chosen next. There are physical, social, and mental qualities and you place points into qualities based upon the number you’ve assigned to an attribute. So, for example, if you rolled a 10 and placed it in your Physical attribute, you have 10 points (levels) to put into physical qualities such as Archery, Lock Picking, Stealth, etc.

You can choose from two categories of qualities; standard and capped. Standard qualities can never have more levels in them than half your current Attribute rating (rounded down). Capped qualities can never have more than two levels in them.

With that said, you can put as many levels in standard Flaw qualities as you want. And capped Flaw qualities can only have one level put into it but it costs two points to do so.

Spellcasting

This is one area that I did not like. Players are encourages to write their spells (Code) and the GM is to have the final say. There are 18 example spells given as reference. To create a spell, the code slinger must roll equal to or under their Para-Coding skill. A successful roll means they create the spell. The problem comes in to play if you want to have it last for longer than an instant or want it to extend beyond three feet away. Then you start taking penalties and the number you must roll at or under starts to go down. But if you start putting limitations on your spells, then you get bonuses.

Honestly, I just don’t see the point. So you’re saying I’m a spellcaster but it’s really difficult to create spells unless I make them really harder to actually use?

Strengths

I like the setting idea. It’s a world that has been plunged into war for years but the people survived. What was once a technologically savvy world is now more like the old west but there are still folks who live with, and thrive upon, science, some bending it to their will. But, of course, they have to be discreet or become hunted.

I really like the weapons that are available to the gunslingers. I mean, who doesn’t want an arm cannon?!

There are lots of very well detailed monsters and npcs/groups that can be used to create interesting scenarios.

I liked the method of making checks. You make checks against your qualities based upon a d6 and want to roll at or under your level. You roll Attribute checks with a d12 and, again, want to roll at or under your level. So the lower the better.

Weaknesses

The world itself isn’t very well defined. Beyond an initial timeline of how we get to the current point and a description of a typical outpost (with an example town), there’s not much that tells me what still exists and what doesn’t. I wish the world had been fleshed out a little better.

Penalizing a player to create spells that do bigger things is not something I would do nor would I want to have to deal with as a player.

I really don’t like the art.

Conclusion

It’s an interesting idea. The mechanics are pretty easy to follow and the world would be fun to explore if you had the right GM (or were the right GM) who’s up to having to flesh out a lot of it. However, the spellcasting system leaves a lot to be desired. I think if the spellcasting was tweaked a bit and if some world information was created, it would be a lot better. But it’s definitely a solid effort from an independent RPG developer.

Overall, I give it a 3/5.