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Defending of Realm

Defending of Realm

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Stop me if you’ve heard this one. A dragon, a demon, and an undead walk into a kingdom. Oh, and an orc. Mustn’t forget the orc. These four generals are leading their hordes of minions in a march on Monarch City, and it’s up to the players to stop them. This is the cooperative board game Defenders of the Realm, designed by Richard Launius and published by Eagle Games.

The players have no army of their own to oppose the invaders. Instead they have one to four heroes of the sort you’d expect: paladin, ranger, wizard, sorceress, rogue, etc. The bad guys have several ways to win. The players have one: defeat all the generals, no matter how many of their minions remain on the board.

The mechanics of Defenders bear more than a passing resemblance to the board game Pandemic, but this isn’t a reskinned knock-off, as the fantasy theme is strongly integrated into the game. Miniatures add to the theme, with a unique plastic mini for each hero and general, and hordes of color-coded minions. (Sapphire, the dragon general, has the place of pride in the game, standing nearly two inches tall. However, the amorphous cloaked minions are my favorite.)

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Space Pirates, Ancient Ruins, and Supercarriers: A Look at Endless Space 2 Early Access

Space Pirates, Ancient Ruins, and Supercarriers: A Look at Endless Space 2 Early Access

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Aight. 14 hours in, 4 campaigns played/started, it’s the wee hours of the morning, going on afternoon. I think I’ll take a stab at writing a few words on the Early Access release of Endless Space 2.

First up, Bad Things! I Wish These Weren’t in the Game, But They Are

#1: Soft turn limits.

This is a bug. Every campaign that’s made it to turn 67-ish so far (Craver, Sophon, Voydani) suffers a fatal error. Suggested options include A) loading an autosave from a couple turns ago, and B) ignoring it. Autosaves did nothing. Same turn rolls around, yellow/red screen of death on my monitor. Ignoring it, amusingly enough, was more effective. I made it to turn 69 (thanks, game) before Terrible Things happened to my computer. I strongly suspect this bug exists due to issues in how the game covers faction deaths, because as the Cravers I had murdered the last Voydani Ark and was cleaning up stragglers.

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Talislanta Returns!

Talislanta Returns!

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Talislanta


Talislanta‘s back with a new Kickstarter, and if you love great world building, you need this book. Trust me on this. Really. Go buy it.

If you INSIST on hearing more reasons why, though, I’ll make my argument. And as an added treat, after extolling this wonderful game world I’ll show you an interview I conducted with Talisanta‘s creator, the brilliant Steven Sechi.

If you’ve never seen me gush over a Talislanta product here on Black Gate it’s because Talislanta has been out of print for a long while — since before I became the games editor of the print version of Black Gate. That doesn’t mean I haven’t mentioned it from time to time, usually when praising some other product. Occasionally I’ve felt compelled to say, owing to a product’s excellence, that “it’s the best world building I’ve seen since Talislanta.”

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Modular: The New Mongoose Traveller #2 — More Than Just a Science Fiction Midlife Crisis Simulator?

Modular: The New Mongoose Traveller #2 — More Than Just a Science Fiction Midlife Crisis Simulator?

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Seen from one angle, the Traveller RPG has always been a Science Fiction midlife crisis simulator, “40-somethings Innnnn Spaaaacccce.”

Seriously!

The character generation system is a mini-game that lets you play through your character’s career all the way into middle-age, a career that most of the time ends in disaster, and always ends with you mustering out to go “travelling.”

Kurtzhau (13) and I rolled up a party and ended up with:

  • A scientist, feeling the bite of age, who’d made a big discovery in his youth, but had been stuck in admin ever since and now craved adventure.
  • A senior NCO soldier forced by job cuts to muster out and now very much adrift in search of a purpose.
  • A pilot who’d unwillingly ended up in the Scouts and spent most of his time as a courier and now belatedly wanted to do something less boring.
  • A veteran of the Merchant Marine who really wanted to be a Free Trader.

You could put them all in a shared apartment and make a quirky sitcom about them. (We put them in a ship and sent them to our Dacre Sector.)

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My Favorite Game: Mount and Blade/Warband – Part Two: Playing the Game!

My Favorite Game: Mount and Blade/Warband – Part Two: Playing the Game!

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warband_Troops

Okay – hopefully you read Part One of my look at Mount and Blade/Warband. If so, you’ve got an idea of what the game is about and got a taste of the combat portion. Now it’s time to look at the shiny parts of the game: selecting, fighting with and leading your band of warriors to conquer your foes!

 Troop Combat

I LOVE troop combat. Throughout the game, you are building up your band with cavalry, infantry and/or archers. You start out solo and begin recruiting with the first quest. I’m not sure what the maximum band size is, but I’m at 249 in one of my current games (it went way up from just over 100 when I started my own Faction). And I have over 300 more soldiers garrisoned in cities and castles I control, some of which I can draw upon to change the makeup of my band.

On the map, you can choose whether to encounter other units or try to avoid them (they may chase you down, though). If they are hostile, you can choose to fight, pay them off or surrender. Usually, you’re looking for trouble and you fight.

At game start, you can choose to allow quitting without saving, or to require saving before quitting. If you decide on the latter, if something bad happens, you’re stuck with it. You can’t just quit and reload: no do-overs. And bad things happen a lot. If you are defeated, you can lose your current band and have to start over. I don’t play hardcore. If you do, pick your fights VERY carefully.

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Modular: Castles & Crusades 7th Printing

Modular: Castles & Crusades 7th Printing

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castles crusades 7Troll Lord Games has just hit its funding goal for the 7th edition of Castles & Crusades Player’s Handbook, to be released in June of 2017. What’s Castles & Crusades and why should you want it when you have so many other fantasy games to choose from? Take it away, Troll Lords:

You’ll find with C&C that the game is easy to play, but more importantly is its versatility. You can take your house rules and drop them right on top of the C&C mechanic (the Siege Engine) and keep on playing. You are in control. Take the advantage/disadvantage system from 5E and use it with C&C. There’s nothing stopping you.

What’s even better, because the whole game is driven by attribute checks that have only loose guidelines, the game master chooses what attribute check the player rolls. If they want the wizard to swim better, make the character roll an intelligence check to swim the river. It’s your game. Take it.

How does the Siege Engine Work?

  • You are already familiar with Castles & Crusades.
  • You’ll find the same classes, races, attributes and many of the same monsters as in most other games.
  • To succeed at any action, you need to make an attribute check (unless the CK deems it doesn’t need one)
  • There are two types of attributes: Primary & Secondary
  • Primary attributes have a base chance to succeed of 12 on a d20. Secondary have a base chance to succeed of 18. The CK adds a challenge level based on hit dice and other circumstance. The character adds their attribute bonus and level to their roll.
  • You are playing C&C.

It’s fast, versatile and open. Allowing you to make it as complex or as simple as you desire.

I happen to agree with the advertising copy; Castles & Crusades is one of my very favorite role-playing systems because everything discussed above is quite true.

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Modular: Chaosium Announces New Version of RuneQuest

Modular: Chaosium Announces New Version of RuneQuest

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Runequest Quickstart Free RPG Day-small

Chaosium announced last week that a new version of its classic RPG will be released by Christmas 2017.

The new edition of the iconic roleplaying game RuneQuest will be formally known as RuneQuest: Roleplaying in Glorantha, or ‘RQG‘ for short, Chaosium announced today… RQG is built off the chassis of the acclaimed RuneQuest 2nd Edition (1980). This enables RQG to be compatible with RuneQuest Classic, the updated reprints of the RQ2 line which Chaosium recently kickstarted to great success.

“Fans had been referring to the new rules variously as ‘RQ4‘ and ‘RQ7‘”, said Chaosium creative director Jeff Richard, “But our new game is simply not a layer atop the Avalon Hill edition (RQ3) or the Mongoose variants that came after that. Nor is it built from the version Design Mechanism produced under license (RQ6). So, rather than try to give the new edition a number, calling it ‘RQG‘ neatly avoids any confusion…”

The products scheduled for 2017 release are the RuneQuest: Roleplaying in Glorantha core rules, a Gloranthan Bestiary, and a scenarios book featuring adventures by game design legends Steve Perrin (RQ1 & 2), Ken Rolston (RQ3‘s ‘rune czar’, Morrowwind, Elder Scrolls), Chris Klug (DragonQuest II, James Bond 007 RPG) and the ‘grand shaman of gaming’ himself Greg Stafford… The first new RQG product is the RuneQuest Quickstart, which will be available in June for Free RPG Day and at the Chaosium website from July 1, 2017.

The products will not be kickstarted. The Art for the RuneQuest Quickstart is by Andrey Fetisov; old-school gamers will recognize it as an homage to Luise Perrine’s much-loved cover for the classic 2nd edition.

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My Favorite Game: Mount and Blade/Warband – Part One

My Favorite Game: Mount and Blade/Warband – Part One

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Mount and Blade banner

I have spent a lot of hours on a lot of different PC/video games over the years – mostly of the fantasy/RPG variety (though Out of the Park Baseball is my favorite simulation game). And from Temple of Apshai to Dungeon Master to Baldur’s Gate to Age of Conan, I’ve quite enjoyed them. But Mount and Blade (and the stand alone expansion, Mount and Blade: Warband) holds a unique spot for me and several years after last playing it, I’m in up to my elbows again.

I spent my first round playing the original, Mount and Blade (M&B). Now, I’m playing Warband. There are some gameplay differences, the most prominent being that the latter includes multiplayer. However, I have never tried that option and don’t plan on doing so. Mount and Blade and Warband are overall, quite similar and I’ll be using the phrases interchangeably, distinguishing between versions when relevant.

The Game

M&B is a combination first person combat and strategy wargame, with some role playing elements. It is a sandbox, without a storyline. The latter is both a strength and a weakness. You create a character, form a band of troops and roam around the land, solving unrelated quests, fighting enemies and either serving a liege or carving out your own kingdom (creating your own Faction was a Warband addition). You won’t survive long if you don’t build a strong war band, and recruiting, commanding and building up your troops is really the heart of the game.

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Modular: Star Trek Adventures is Versed in Multiple Techniques

Modular: Star Trek Adventures is Versed in Multiple Techniques

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startrekadventuresThis week marked the -46th anniversary of First Contact Day, the date in 2063 when Zefram Cochrane was the first human to create and engage a warp drive (time travel situations excluded), as depicted in the film Star Trek: First Contact. As such, it seems appropriate to look at the state of affairs with the upcoming Star Trek Adventures roleplaying game, slated for a 2017 release from Modiphius Entertainment.

Modiphius has been playtesting the game since late last year as an open live playtest, using gamers from across the world as guinea pigs to find bugs in their design and crowdsourcing improvement suggestions. In addition to the Alpha set of rules for playtest, the Round 1 included a generic “starter” adventure that all of the playtesters could run through. I discussed my thoughts on this shortly after I playtested it, back in December, playing the group with a mix of Star Trek enthusiasts and their less-enthusiastic spouses, all of whom are relative novices at roleplaying games.

Earlier this year, based on feedback from the first round, Modiphius released a second round of playtest, as well as new adventures focused on the specific ship that you signed up to test for, allowing them to test science/exploration missions vs. combat-oriented missions vs. diplomacy missions, and so on. The new set of rules contained updates to earlier rules, but also a key new gaming system: starships. Once we provided feedback on the Round 2 playtest, playtesters were given access to the character creation system.

So let’s take a moment to dive into Star Trek Adventures …

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Modular: The New Mongoose Traveller #1 — First Impressions

Modular: The New Mongoose Traveller #1 — First Impressions

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Traveller is 40 years old and there’s a new edition!

Jake squeezes between some crates.

Silence.

He exhales. It seems he’s evaded the Imperial black ops team. Now if he could just find his mates in the darkened warehouse. He pushes a little further between the crates. There in the space between the aisles is the alien weapon that started this whole mess.

Jake looks left and right then ghosts into the open. Breathing hard now, he reaches out and picks up the alien artefact. Despite its bulk, it’s surprisingly light and he hefts it higher than he intended.

Lights flash along its stock. It emits a, “Whirrrrrrrrr PING!”

Shadowy figures pop up around the dimly-lit warehouse. The air fills with bullets.

One slams into Jake, punches through his chest armour. Almost spent, it still smashes his rib cage.

Everything goes dark…

Yes, this is the new Mongoose Traveller, the latest incarnation of a roleplaying game so influential that the book and TV inspirations listed in its introduction all arguably owe something to early versions of the game.

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