The return of the review

I could bore you with the details but let's just say that life got in the way.

I would like to start back up with a review of [i]Don't Rest Your Head[/i] by the folks at Evil Hat. Now that I have been able to play DRYH, I think I have something useful to say.

A buddy and I were able to sit down and play an impromptu game for about an hour (maybe as much as an hour-and-a-half) while the wives did - whatever it is that they do when we aren't looking. Keep in mind, he had no prior knowledge of the game and I had done no real prep-work up front. We just sat down and played. Inevitably, there were some things that didn't go well. The most obvious being that I got some rules wrong. Nevertheless, the game went off exceedingly well. My buddy fell in love with the system to the point that he ran out and bought DRYH.

So, first things first, let's talk about the system. The player - yes, the game is designed for one and one play, even for groups. The player had three Discipline dice to compete with the GM's 1 to 12 Pain dice. Successes are compared (1 to 3) and the highest number of successes wins. Since the player can be horribly outnumbered, you can add up to six exhaustion dice along with up to six madness dice. Madness dice are temporary - most of the time. Exhaustion dice represent the wearing out of the PC and so permanent. Rack up too many and you risk fallin asleep - the absolute worst thing that can happen to the PC in the Mad City. The highest die (or dice) dominates and determine how vicotry is achieved. It could be that the PC wins the contest but that Exhaustion dominates indicating that the contest has taken something out of the PC. When Pain dominates, things get a little darker, ugliers, etc. With Discipline, the PC gains something back and Madness means the PC runs the risk of snapping. Snapping can be bad because in the long term, you can become the very thing you are fighting against.

As far as the setting, let's see ... Take some urban fantasy, some horror, some suspense, some Alice McGee's Alice in Wonderland and throw in a blender. Set to frappee, serve over a twisted sense of humor and there you go. Basically, the PC has been up for an extended period of time. Perhaps too much caffiene, loud neighbors, new baby, whatever. At some point, the wall between what we think is reality and what is actual out there snaps. You find yourself in the Mad City a twisted version of your town (or in my game, [b]all[/b] towns) - aka the City Slumbering. The inhabitants are from various areas and are all focused on the role they play. A cop will always be on duty - unless he is in the coffee shop, etc. Most have no idea they are not in the "real" world - the City Slumbering - and couldn't help you if you asked.

The Mad City is inhabited by Nightmares of various power levels. The one I made the most use of was Officer Tock and his clockwork cop minions. It may sound cheesy and cute but done right it is downright creepy.

The game is rules light and heavy on player / GM interaction, which is a good thing in my mind. If you even think that you would like to play this one, pick it up, it's great!

HAPPY MOTHER'S DAY!

Spirit of the Century - Part 2

OK, it's been a few days and I used the time to read through SOTC and take some notes. Here is the full review.

SOTC is presented in a 6"x9" paperback with full color on the cover. It weighs in at 428 pages with sparse black and white pictures inside. The drawings are high quality and appear to be pen or ink. The sparse nature of the drawings is due to the fact that the folks at Evil Hat filled the rest of the space with rules and extremely useful examples. I would say that they crammed the text in but I don't want to give the impression that the book is unorganized. Just the opposite: this book is well laid out and easy to read.

The basic premise behind the game is simple. You are members of the Century Club - an organization that seeks to promoting science and cooperation among the world's people. The ultimate goal is one of ending the world's evils. Therefore, your characters play a role in shaping the world to come. It just so happens that your characters are actually Centurions, individuals born at the beginning of the new century (January 1, 1901 normally) that embody the spirit of that century (see the pun?). However, there are shadows of the century too and they aim is far less noble even if neither side is completely aware of it's own role.

This basic setting is sufficiently pulpy that you can work with it but you don't have to tie your hands either. Let's talk mechanics for a minute.

The game runs on skills; there are no attributes. That's not to say that some skills don't function like attributes when needed. While the skill MIGHT is used for anything with brute force behind it, it also governs how much you can lift and carry. Your characters are well above average and have five skills at +1, four at +2 . . . one at +5. Everything else is done at a neutral +0. Technically each +X has a name like Good, Great, Terrible or Mediocre but I can never keep them straight so I use the numbers. You only roll four dice. Each one comes up as a -1, 0 or +1. (You can use 1-2 as -1, 3-4 as 0 and 5-6 as +1 if you don't have FUDGE/FATE dice.) Add (or subtract) to your skill and compare to a difficulty number. Equal to or greater than that difficulty and you succeed.

Next up: Aspects
Aspects are small descriptions about your character. Indiana Jones might have the following for aspects: Whip and fedora, I don't have time for this! and Snakes! Why did it have to be snakes? The first and last are obvious to anyone who as watched the movies. The middle one is best explained by this clip. Now the aspects can pretty much be anything you and the GM agree to but are best if they are double-edged. More on that in a minute.

Fate points
Part of the reason this is called the FATE engine is the use of fate points. Character start out with a number of fate points equal to their aspects (max 10). You can spend them to get a flat +1 to a roll but that is inefficient. If you can reasonably explain how the aspect aplies, then you can spend a fate point to either re-roll or add a static +2. Now if you only pay for things then you run out of fate points in a hurry. This is why having a double-edged aspect is a good thing. The GM can 'force' an aspect but must pay you a fate point. Why else would Indy reach back for his hat when a multi-ton door is slamming shut. Since he has the aspect Whip and fedora he could be forced to keep the hat. Fate points really are the currency of this game.

Stunts
If you want to bend or outright break the rules, then stunts are your friends. They add a little more flavor to the character and help define his niche. They can be stand alone or tiered for greater effects. You can even use them to "buy" a unique piece of gear that helps define your character. If you are looking for a point of comparison they are similar to feats in d20 but less confusion and more consistent.

Gameplay
Take this with a grain of salt as I have not had the change to play test the rules with a tabletop group. Play is more cooperative story-telling than rule dominated (more fluffy, less crunchy) and therefore, much of the action takes place without rolling dice. However, when dice are rolled serious consequences can hit the table. I find that I am moving toward this style of play even in rules heavy games like Shadowrun so the fact that gameplay is designed to run this way is great.

Personal take-aways
This is a great game. Period. It is an excellent pulp game. The system is fresh and offers a great deal of flexibility (just keep it in the pulp ballpark). If your group isn't centered on pen-and-paper 'video games' then give this one a try.

It was worth the wait

I haven't posted in a bit - no real surprise given the status of this blog - but I was diving head first into the two new role-playing games, I just got: Spirit of the Century and Don't Rest Your Head both by the boys and girls at Evil Hat Productions. (I'll call them EH from here on out.)

WOW! I decided to pick up Spirit of the Century (SOTC) for two reasons. I am impatiently waiting for EH to finish up their adaptation of The Dresden Files, so I decided to get SOTC and test-drive the rules for FATE 3.0. I can NOT say that I am disappointed. Secondly, I love the pulp genre and here were rules designed to let Victor Vigilante fight against the forces of the mad doctor Xavier Ellison and his plot to use unobtanium to take over the world.

What? You've never indulged in a little daydream of saving the world?

I have more than enough for two entries so I will focus on the shorter or the two for now.

The shorter in this case is the much shorter and nearly rules only book, Don't Rest Your Head. DRYH is definitely horror but also madness thrown in for good measure. If you were to take Through the Looking Glass (aka Alice in Wonderland), Dark City, a scoop of Steven King's dreams and your own nightmares, put them all in a blender and hit frappe, you would have something that looks like DRYH. The game has some unusual mechanics, but they work for the setting. You get what you pay for and then some. The nightmares aren't all bad, so are worse. My favorite in the basic book is the Tacks Man, a literal pin-headed bureaucrat who can pin parts of you to the scenery. Sure, your arm is fair game but he would rather pin things like your shadow, or your heartbeat, or the memories of your family.

Hope is a very limited quantity in the game and long term play looks to be impossible. The most likely outcome is exhaustion, leading to death or madness leading you to become a new type of nightmare in the Mad City. If you even think that you would like this game, go pick it up. The PDF is typically between 8 and 10 USD while the dead-tree copy will run you about 20 USD. I got them both in a combo deal from Indie Press Revolution for 20 USD plus shipping.