Tommy's Take on Hell on Earth Reloaded

The Reckoners are gone, the world still sucks.

As you may know, I'm a pretty big Savage Worlds fan and a pretty big Deadlands fan (understatements on both of those things). I've never played Hell on Earth, though I own all of the Classic books. Hell on Earth Reloaded finally brings Hell on Earth to the Savage Worlds rules.

WHAT YOU SHOULD KNOW: Hell on Earth Reloaded is currently up for preorder, though the PDF is available. The PDF runs $24.99 and Hell on Earth does require the Savage Worlds rules, though it doesn't require any of the Deadlands books. For those who don't know, Hell on Earth is a possible future for the Deadlands setting, a post-apocalyptic crapsack world.

As is Deadlands tradition, this book is divided into three sections: The Player's Guide, No Man's Land and The Marshal's Handbook. The Player's Guide covers the players' setting knowledge, character creation, gear and setting rules. The setting is 2097, America is a blasted wasteland, and has been since 2081, when ghost rock bombs killed six billion people. Since it was ghost rock that powered the bombs, Ground Zero at each blast isn't an irradiated pit, but a Deadland. Even though it's the future, it's still very much the wild, lawless west, with society collapsed. Law Dogs take it upon themselves to defend the innocent and punish the wicked, Doomsayers are trying to eradicate what's left of humanity, Ravenites are Native Americans that have embraced technology, Templars religious zealots...and that's just a taste of the factions fighting for the soul of the Wasted West. Hell on Earth Reloaded picks up after the The Harvest, for those that played the Unity adventure back in the day, and the Reckoners have not been seen since.

Some classic Deadlands Hindrances appear in familiar or altered form, like Grim Servant o' Death (which causes folks to die around you), Heavy Sleeper and Slowpoke, as well as new Hindrances like Mutant (complete with a random draw chart to determine the mutation). Arcane Backgrounds include Doomsayers (who have mastered radiation), Junkers (the evolution of Mad Scientists), Sykers (psionicists), Templars (the evolution of Blessed) and Toxic Shamans (who communicate with the mutated spirits). Other Edges include Veteran o' the Wasted Waste, Don't Get 'im Riled (an old Deadlands standby that lets you add Wound modifiers to your Fighting and Fighting damage rolls), Law Dog, and even Harrowed is now available as a starting Edge. The equipment chapter is pretty extensive, including Scrounging rules alongside weapons, armor, equipment, drugs and vehicles (complete with list of modifications you can make to vehicles).

Harrowed in Deadlands could "Count Coup", stealing abilities from abominations...in Hell on Earth, ANYONE can count coup. Of course, you can also comeback from the dead as a Harrowed...if fate smiles(frowns?) on you.

No Man's Land pretty much focuses on the Arcane Backgrounds. Doomsayers have tried to master the radioactive storm, gaining mutations (often favorable), and have a couple of new powers exclusive to them, like Mutate!, which can force Mutations into others. The Harrowed section looks a lot like the one from Deadlands Reloaded, but Harrowed are largely the same, so it makes sense. Junkers get access to a huge variety of powers and a free version of the Gadgeteer Edge, with other Edge options including one that gives a bonus on Scavenging rolls. Sykers are the psionicists mentioned above, who have tapped into the power of the Hunting Grounds. They can fry their own brains, but can also get vicious Edges like Overkill that allow them to take on Fatigue in order to ramp up their damage with their powers. Templars are Knights who have a handful of Powers and some great Edges like Shield of the Saints (which prevents supernaturally evil enemies from ganging up on them) and Blessing of the Saints (which lets them roll a d10 Wild Die if they spend a benny). Toxic Shamans come in two stripes: Caretakers and Corrupters,a a Good/Evil flipside of the same coin.

The Marshal's Handbook covers...everything else. Like how spirits can speak through radios, as well as things like the Mutation table, Veteran o' the Wasted West table, Scroungin' tables and so on. Each of the important locations of the Wasted West is covered in this chapter, with relevant encounter types (as well as random encounter tables for the regions). For instance, Fort 51 used to be a Fear level 0 in Deadlands...but is now Fear level 6 thanks to a bomb being dropped on it. The City o' Gloom has now become Junkyard, with a reference to the new Smith & Robards catalog for those wanting to incorporate bionic enhancements. Denver, which seemed a focal point of activty in Deadlands (though maybe that was just our groups) is now under the control of General Throckmorton's Combine, and is a Deadland itself. Devil's Tower (one of the more polarizing locations in Deadlands lore, due to the adventure trilogy it's tied to and the inhabitants of the tower) also gets a decent sized treatment. Mardi Gras is now a city, oil is the alternative energy source (downright safe and friendly next to ghost rock), and there's even a tractor-trailor convoy called the Night Convoy, which serves as a callback to the infamous Night Train. There's even a line in there that implies that the Reckoners are not gone, just hiding.

The Monsters & Misfits section is a suitably impressive collection of Hell on Earth favorites, starting with a slew of automatons. Bloodwolves (vampire/werewolf hybrids) make their return, alongside classic Deadlands beasts like Devil Bats and Maze Dragons. Generic stat blocks about, with Doomsayers, Black Hats, Martial Artists and so on represented, ending with a section on named personalities, starting with Dr. Darius Hellstromme.

The book ends with an index and character sheet.

WHAT WORKS: A good, one book overview of the setting, covering all of the major bits of the Hell on Earth. A lot of the camp has been toned down, focusing on the world being a harsh and deadly place, and that's included here because I see so many people saying that can't take the Deadlands games seriously because of the "camp" (which I've never understood, but there you go). Even if you never use the setting (or use it straight), there's a good chunk of material to mine, from Edges to Powers to Monsters.

WHAT DOESN'T WORK: Hell on Earth no longer uses Fate Chips, which makes me sad as I have always associated "chips" with "Deadlands". It also makes the Fate Eater's name a little less "on the nose". Given the sheer amount of Hell on Earth material out there, and the treatment of the Deadlands Reloaded line, you can't help but feel like you should hold off diving in and playing before the rest of the (unannounced, as far as I know) books come out. The implication that The Reckoners are just in hiding takes some punch away from the Classic adventure in which your PC group can hunt them down and kill them on Banshee, though this is also mitigated somewhat by the realization that there might not have been a ton of folks that even read that, much less played it.

CONCLUSION: I love Deadlands, but I've always held the Weird West above the Wasted West (and Noir interests me more than Post-Apocalypse), but I've sure always heard good stuff from people who have PLAYED and not just READ Hell on Earth. If this is a standalone product, and I doubt it is, it's a "really good" product. If it's the first of a new line (like I figure it is), then it's a great starting point. For my money, it's really hard to go wrong with Savage Worlds...or Deadlands. I'd sure like to play a Law Dog...or a Templar...someday.

Tommy's Take on Reclamation

Reclamation is an interesting RPG...it's a post-apocalyptic RPG about hope. See, the title refers to the move to restore the planet, rather than let it fester in a post-apocalyptic waste.

"My only advice to you is simple: Do as much good as you can in this world for as long as you possibly can." - Nikolai Federick

WHAT YOU SHOULD KNOW: The PDF has copy and paste disabled, but is clickable, searchable and bookmarked, which is good since it runs almost 300 pages. The book is black and white, with art ranging from "alright" to "really good". The PDF is $14.95 and the hardcover is only $29.95, with a bundle available at RPGNow.

The Prologue lays out the premise: Essentially, the Sickness swept across the land, drove people nuts, and pushed the world to nuclear war. And sometimes people get completely consumed by The Sickness and its gets worse, they become part of the Mortis-Horde. So, yeah, it tosses a little zombie apocalypse in there on top of the "regular" end of the world. It's a good fiction piece that provides the set-up, hitting all the big points like the world is wrecked, but nature has adapted strangely (including maze-like forests sprouting up and deserts flooding), people gaining powers and people organizing into "cells" (setting up the perfect starting point for PC groups, may I say). More importantly, it introduces the reader to the Reclamation, which injects some hope to the setting.

The Introduction covers the basics in plain English: Post-apocalyptic, this is an RPG, breakdown of the character sheet, etc. The game doesn't use dice, it uses decks of playing cards. That is, a deck per person. When performing an action, you flip over one or more cards depending on your attributes and you add black cards to the total but subtract red cards...and aces are kind of a big deal, both ways. There's an optional rule for taking two cards off of the deck, called "Burn cards", to skew attempts at counting cards.

Character creation is handled through a few steps. First, you select your Mark, which is how the Fallout has affected you. You can be a Survivor, which means that you bear no outward signs of being affected by the Fallout (but you have been). The Magi can cast spells and bend reality to their wills. The Host have become part machine. Pariahs have become, essentially, monsters. Paragons have become something more...the next step in humanity. These all have little history bits to them, with information like where the Marks started, or linking them to aspects of our history and mythology.

Next, you pick a Generation, which determines your trait points and talents. Forerunner has more talents, God's Ten Percent has more trait points, Descendants are in between.

Then, you pick a Background: There more than a couple dozen of these, with options like Anarchist, Avenger, Dreamer, Nomad, Prophet and Warrior. Each one gives you a mechanical advantage in the game and a role-playing advantage. A Cynic, for instance, can spend a Drive Point to determine if someone is trying to screw them over, and can gain a Mark of Experience when they expose the truth about someone.

With that all done you spend Trait Points, spread out over 8 traits (Strength, Dexterity, Speed, Resilience, Intellect, Manipulation, Perception, Spirit), with 20 being the mortal limit, 1 being poor, and the rest scaling in between. Pariahs and Paragons can actually break those human limits, by the way. You also get a number of Secondary Traits (like Movement, Damage Bonus and Dodge) that are derived from your Primary Traits.

Next are Talents, which are divided into four groups (Scholar, Rogue, Leader, Hunter) and cover most of your basic skill options like Biology, Intimidation, Diplomacy and Stealth. There are 32 talents in all. Each one is broken down with flavor text, basic description and in-game examples of uses.

You also get Kewl Powerz, and some book keeping with things like Pain Points, Drive Points, Injury Points, Radiation Points, the Soul Path (which tracks from Despair to Hope) and thresholds for The Sickness.

Chapter 3 is the rules chapter, explaining HOW the system works. Essentially, your ranks in your talents (1-5) determines how many cards you draw, which you add or subtract from your relevant trait. Target numbers are listed on a simple chart, broken down into two types of actions, Measured and Threshold checks. The former involves degrees of success, the latter involves straight up success or failure. There are also Competition checks (contested stuff) and Luck checks, which are pretty much straight card draws.

Drive Points are kinda like bennies, action points, etc...you can spend Drive Points to re-flip new cards (hopefully removing a red card, for instance), add flat bonuses, even bend the rules a bit.

Once all that is out of the way, the book dives into Combat. Initiative is based off of your Speed (Alertness) trait and talent, and there are rules covering things like surprise. Interestingly, you set the Aggression Rank for your attack (from 1 to 20), with a lower rank meaning you are being more aggressive. You would always use that, right? Well, your opponent can either defend or counterattack...and counterattacking is easier, the less careful the attacker is. Nice bit of strategy there (and examples are provided all over the book). The amount of actions per round is based off of your Warfare skill.

Damage is handled with Pain and Injury Points. As you get hurt, you lose Pain Points. Then you start adding Injury Points. Every 5 Injury Points requires you to make a check to avoid passing out. Flipping Aces is a big deal in combat as well...black Aces are critical successes, red aces are critical failures.

Ranged combat has a slightly different set of rules (like no counter attacks), and there are contingencies for stuff like Headshots, Gag n' Stab (think stealth kills from modern video games), Quickdraw, even using terrain to your advantage.

You can even gain Epic Action points, which lets you do crazy, over the top stuff (but they are rare). And there's even optional minis rules (that are very detailed for being optional), along with an in-depth combat example. One other thing I loved in this chapter is how there are stat-free enemy profiles scattered all over the section. Good stuff.

The gear section is a bit different in this book, covering things like food, water and shelter, which are just as important as weapons (especially when you have Kewl Powerz). There's even an interesting paragraph on some Hosts serving as power sources. There's no laser guns, but there are plenty firearms to choose from, and damage for things like electricity and falling are covered here as well. Equipment purchases are handled with Resource Points, rather than cash.

Facing the Fallout covers a lot of the setting aspects, like The Sickness, including theories on what it is and where it came from (The Magi believe it came from a devilish being called The Usurper), and how gaining Radiation points makes you vulnerable to The Sickness...as well as the nasty part: The Marks are powered by Radiation. Using your Kewl Powerz can let The Sickness get its claws deeper in you.

It's all very cool and creepy, with multiple steps that can be fended off essentially by doing Good Deeds. The Sickness can leave psychic scars on you, and that's if you kick the effects of The Black Dream (the feverish state when The Sickness digs in).

Chapter 7 explains the Kewl Powerz in detail. Surivors can rack up Radiation to make Luck Checks to change events. Paragons have five Disciplines, each with their own effects, and can build their way up to Paragon Transcendence. Magi learn rites from four Traditions (Osiris, Gaia, Odin and Khronos), and there are a BUNCH of them (from tricks like Invisibility and entanglement, to making wounded enemies stop fighting you to resurrection). Hosts can "evolve", having a slew of powers they can gain in steps. For instance, they can grow claws...this allows them to form pistols...which allows them to grow shotguns (and so on). Pariahs can develop along different lines, like Daemons, Moon Beasts, Hercules, Psionics, Seraphim and more, each with their own powers. Vampires can regenerate by drinking blood, for example, then gain supernatural strength, and even gain the ability to enslave people. This all culminates in a Pinnacle Power. The Vampire's Nosferatu Power, for instance, activates all the other powers from his gene pool (aside from Enslave). Each gene pool has an Achilles Heel, though, keyed to the type of Pariah.

And yes...you can mix two types of Marks, and the last part of the chapter breaks down what each combination is like.

The last chapter is the GMing chapter. A lot of it is pretty basic stuff, but this is also where the enemy stat blocks are, like the dregs, abominations, thugs, and so on. It's not a HUGE selection, but it's a broad one. A sample Haven is provided (set in New Orleans), as well as a sample protagonist group.

I didn't much care for the Epilogue piece, as it seemed too grim for a setting that appeals to me because of the hope of Reclamation.

The book ends with a character sheet and index.

WHAT WORKS: Reclamation. Seriously...I LIKE that there's this growing viral movement of "let's take back this world." That is reason #1 why I would pick this over other post apocalypse games. Reason #2 is the kewl powerz. (Seriously, there's some great options for Magi, Host and Pariahs, and the Survivors and Paragons have their own cool tricks, if not as flashy). Tons of examples, both short and in-depth. The flavor fiction is generally well done and kept short and to the point.

WHAT DOESN'T WORK: At times it seems like it might get over complicated, but nothing that a few cheat sheets can't handle. Some of the art sticks out like a sore thumb against the rest of the pieces. Needs more random tables.

CONCLUSION: The biggest thing that sells me on the book is the whole Reclamation thing, followed by the coolness of the Marks. I like the card deck game system, but some of the book keeping seems like it could get excessive at times. Way more plusses than minus, and probably the post-apocalyptic setting that has interested me the most in a very long time. It does need more random tables, though. You have a big, crazy, kitchen sink setting with fantasy, sci-fi and horror elements...you need random tables that you can draw cards against. That said, I always love a setting where the odds are stacked up against the PCs, and then they are expected to go save the world anyway. Big thumbs up.

Tommy's Take on A Touch of Evil

I *like* the photo art. Quite a bit, actually.

I like board games quite a bit, as I've alluded to in the past. Board games have become impressive creations these days, with miniatures, glossy game boards and so on. And A Touch of Evil is a game that nearly derailed my Savage Worlds group when we found it a few years ago.

WHAT YOU SHOULD KNOW: Retailing for $49.99 (but you can find it cheaper on Amazon), A Touch of Evil is the second board game released by Flying Frog Productions (their first being the best zombie board game I have ever played, Last Night on Earth). It is also probably my favorite board game ever. Set in the 19th century, in the mysterious town of Shadowbrook, A Touch of Evil is a monster-hunting game filled with twists, turns and secrets.

The players all play as travelers who have arrived in town, taking up the call to arms against a supernatural horror threatening Shadowbrook. The extra twist is that the town's six Elders have secrets of their own...they may be dirty gossips, they may be monster hunters themselves, they may be in league with the villain, and they may BE the villain itself.

The game uses a static game board, with the town in the center (divided into the Town Hall, Church, Blacksmith, Magistrate's Office and Doctor's Office), and has four "corner" locations (The Manor, The Windmill, The Abandoned Keep and the Olde Woods), as well as Fields, a Marsh, a Covered Bridge and a Crossroads.

You can play Competitively, Cooperatively or even Solo, moving around the board, investigating locations, encountering minions, unraveling the secrets of the Elders and trying to pin down the location of the Villain's Lair so you can attempt to destroy it.

Eight heroes are included in the base game, each with stats of Spirit, Cunning, Combat and Honor, each with a different number of Wounds depending on the character, and each with their own special abilities:

Karl, The Soldier - The simplest option to play as, having the highest Combat among the characters, three Wounds and the ability to ignore the first Wound in play. Note that not all encounters can be thwarted in physical Combat, though.

Heinrich Cartwright, The Drifter - Gets to draw extra cards (and choose the one he keeps), but isn't trusted by the Elders or other travelers (which can have an effect in gameplay).

Victor Danforth, The Playwright - He can take back any card that's been played whose title is a quotation, has high Spirit and Cunning and can draw Event cards more frequently than others (Event cards being good things, generally).

Thomas, The Courier - A stranger with a dead eye, Thomas moves more swiftly than the rest of the travelers, and can begin play knowing an Elder's secret.

Inspector Cooke - High Cunning and he can generally pick up more Investigation per action than anyone else.

Isabella Von Took, Noble Woman - Generally regarded as the most broken of the initial characters, in that if she's given the time and opportunity to hoard Investigation points, she can steamroll through most anything given her ability to spend Investigation to prevent Wounds.

Anne Marie, The School Teacher - Can't use anything bigger than a Pistol, but her Combat goes up for every Book she owns.

Katarina, The Outlaw - High Honor (Honor among thieves and such), hits more frequently than others, and is tied with Cartwright for the highest number of Wounds in the base set.

Each hero includes a mini figure and a character card, as well as a short bio in the rule book.

The four Villains in the main set cover the iconic choices for a horror setting like this, each having a token, a villain card (with rules for the Basic game and Advanced game) and a two-sided Minion Chart (Basic and Advanced). They are:

The Spectral Horseman - He likes to appear in a location and ride to Town Hall, attacking everything in his path before disappearing. He gets stronger with every kill, and summons hounds and ghost soldiers to do his bidding.

The Scarecrow - As the fear level in Shadowbrook grows, he gets stronger and stronger. He summons locusts and crows, and can turn the very environment against the heroes, though he does have a vulnerability to fire...if you can find him.

The Vampire - Looking like a classic Nosferatu, turning into mist, unleashing bats, wolves, succubi and walking dead, and he's even able to turn Elders into vampiric minions to do his bidding.

The Werewolf - He attacks before you, he hits more frequently than you, he can turn you into a werewolf...pretty much the only advantage you have is that he's easier to find than the rest because he doesn't cover his tracks very well. His minions include werewolves and rats.

Each of the Six Elders have Spirit, Cunning and Honor scores, which can be used in place of your characters if you have them along with you, and each has a special ability, with some elders being more useful against certain types of enemies than the other. If they go evil, you flip their card over to get a red-tinged, evil version of their portrait, with a new tagline for them.

Various events can force the Shadow Track down as the game goes on, and if it ever reaches the bottom, the town has collapsed into fear and chaos and you have lost. Throughout the game you can get Event Cards, either by landing on certain spaces or rolling low for movement (as compensation), which include things like ability bonuses (represented by tokens placed on your character card), "I Think Not" (which can stop the Shadow Track from moving, or cancel cards being played), Reassuring Speech (which can push back the Shadow Track if you play it in town) and Militia, which allows you to put Militia tokens in play on spaces, allowing anyone in that space to join the Militia in fighting any adversaries there.

These are countered with Mystery Cards, which prompt additional villain attacks, spawn new minions, turn the Elders against the heroes (for instance, forcing Magistrate Kroft to confiscate Guns in play, taking those weapons away as options for the heroes), and Weather Cards like Fog that reduce movement.

Exploring a location is a matter of card draws as well, with each "Corner Space" having its own deck.

The Manor has allies you can recruit like Lucy Hanbrook, as well as events like Nightmare (which lets you witness one of the Elders doing unspeakable things, allowing you to draw a Secrets card, look at it and add it to an Elder), Secret Passage (which, if found, lets you travel anywhere on the board) and items like the Sabre (which boosts you Honor and your Combat).

The Abandoned Keep includes cards like Collapse (which causes the floor to give way, making you take Wounds and lose cards AND draw a new card at the Keep), Old Prison (which can give you clues if you roll well enough with your Cunning), weapons like Rogue's Rapier (bonuses to Combat, Honor and Cunning) and enemies like the Spectre (which has to be fought with Spirit and not Combat).

The Olde Woods include cards like The Witch of the Woods (which can either give you a bunch of Investigation or can cost you clues and dump you off at Town Hall), Timber Wolves (who are more ferocious the more allies you have), Franklin the Old Hound (a useful ally) and Crossroads (an eerie encounter with an owl that can give you clues if you roll well enough on a Spirit test).

The Windmill gives you chances of things like Pitchfork (which boosts your combat but can break), Wicked Altar (which can give you Investigation, but also exposes you to attack), Whistling Wind (which can give you a Lair card for free if you roll Cunning well enough) and Murky Water (dipping your hand in can net you Investigation, an Item card or merely a Wound).

In Town, you can spend Investigation to buy Items that can help you, like some weapons, Torches (which fend off Weather cards), and even neat items like Tools of Science that allow characters to use their Cunning in place of their Combat, which can be a huge game changer for some characters.

When you gain a Lair card, usually by purchasing them with Investigation (they get cheaper as the Shadow Track goes down and the Villain gets stronger), you can initiate a Showdown with the Villain by going to the Location on the card and spending the amount of Investigation listed to "find" the Villain. Not all Lair cards are created equal, however. One Manor Lair card, for instance, lets you immediately recruit Town Elder Lord Hanbrook to your side, while another Manor card makes you immediately roll an Honor Test and, if you fail, an Elder is killed.

Combat is handled by rolling a number of dice equal to your relevant trait (usually Combat) and every 5 or 6 counting as a hit (unless you or the Villain has a trait that says otherwise). There is no player playing as a Villain, you just take turns rolling for them depending on who is fighting the Villain (or their minions).

If you defeat the Monster in a Showdown, you win. If the Shadow Track bottoms out, the Monster wins. If you are playing Solo or Co-Op and the Villain KOs all heroes in play at once, you lose.

Multiple expansions have been released, free, premium and even fan-made, and I plan on covering the official ones at a later date.

With the exception of the map, which was drawn by Matthew Morgaine (who also portrays Heinrich Cartwright), virtually every piece of art in the game is a combination of photography and special effects. Some folks have scoffed at how some of the characters (especially villains like the Vampire) look, but I've always thought it added a certain charm to the game.

The game also includes a soundtrack CD, which I've actually kept in fairly regular rotation in my CD player. Yeah, I'm a fan.

Lastly, there are optional rules, like Team Play and the Showdown Chart, which can add extra chaos to the Showdown with the Villain, but can also dramatically extend gameplay.

Showing off the Werewolf, Lucy Hanbrook, some of minis and more.

WHAT WORKS: Theme, theme, theme. The whole game oozes it. When I had a regular roleplaying group, there were many times that our planned adventures got derailed for playing this instead...and that was BEFORE I got the expansions. The different combinations of cards, characters and villains have provided a flexibility to the game that I didn't even expect, and aside from a time or two when the Noble Woman overtook the game, I haven't experienced nearly as many balance issues with this game as I have with others.

WHAT DOESN'T WORK: The more you add, the bigger the set-up time is, unless you keep things VERY organized. There's technically no solo rules in the base set, but you can push the Coop rules there with little effort. I have had one person play it with me who could not wrap their heads around Investigationt tokens as an abstract for all currency in the game, from buying items to powering abilities to finding the Villain's Lair.

CONCLUSION: Look, I don't have a lot of bad to say about this, because the proof is in the fun, and after my first time stumbling through a game, I haven't had a bad time playing this, whether solo, with my kid, or with a whole group of buddies. The villains all feel distinct, the characters all feel distinct. Yeah, you can have bad runs where the dice or cards fall against you, and there are certain combinations of Hero vs Villain that are easier or harder, but there's not a villain that we haven't both beaten or lost to. I've heard the game called Arkham Horror-lite, and I've heard it called a rip-off of Arkham Horror. I've recently played Arkham Horror for the first time, and so far I prefer A Touch of Evil (though they both have their merits). I like the feel of it all so much that I've even been tempted to turn it into a Savage Setting a time or two. I firmly believe it doesn't get enough love at all.

AetherCon - You Going?

Grab your virtual dice bags folks and mark down November 16-18, 2012 on your calendar, as the AetherCon Online RPG Convention is coming to your computer! Best of all, it’s FREE!

We will be featuring tabletop RPGs of all types throughout the weekend, highlighted by four three-day tournaments of Pathfinder Call of Cthulhu, Pathfinder, Savage Worlds, and Shadowrun. Game tables will be run on the powerful, yet easy to use, Roll20 browser-based virtual tabletop. Learn more with the Roll20 tutorials and the Roll20 Live Stream.

Grab your virtual dice bags folks and mark down November 16-18, 2012 on your calendar, the AetherCon Online RPG Convention is coming to your computer. 

We will be featuring tabletop RPGs of all types throughout the weekend highlighted by four three day tournaments of Pathfinder, Call of Cthulhu, Savage Worlds, and Shadowrun.

Additionally vendors, industry guests, and artists are also in our plans. We will be releasing free downloadable wallpapers throughout the months leading up to the con. 

Members of the Artists Enclave currently include Paul Abrams (TSR, Shadowrun); Alex E. Alonso Bravo (DC Comics, Pixar, AEG); Brent Chumley (AEG); John L Kaufmann (Shadowrun); Eric Lofgren; (Paizo, White Wolf, Mongoose Publishing), Chris Malidore (Fantasy Flight Games, PEG), Patrick McAvoy (WotC, AEG, Fantasy Flight Games), Brad McDevitt (Chaosium, CGL, Battlefield Press), Jesse Mead (Fantasy Flight Games), Aaron B. Miller (WotC, AEG, Open Design), and Stanley Morrison (AEG) among others.

Additionally, to date game publishers confirmed as taking part in AetherCon either through prize support, supplying guests, or taking a vendors booth include: 

Battlefield Press, Catalyst Game Labs, Chaosium, Chronicles of the Void, Flying Buffalo Inc., Immersion Studios, Imperfekt Industrees, Kenzer and Company, Paizo, Pinnacle Entertainment Group, Stardust Publications, Sundered Epoch and The Design Mechanism.

Confirmed guests to date are Wedge Smith and Doug Bush (Chronicles of the Void), James Sutter (Paizo),  Steven ‘Bull’ Ratkovich (CGL), and Lawrence Whittaker and Pete Nash (The Design Mechanism).

Confirmed games to date include:

All Flesh Must Be Eaten

A Thousand and One Nights

Atomic Highway

Call of Cthulhu

Castles & Crusades

Dark Heresy

Dragon Age

Eclipse Phase

Fantasy Craft

Labyrinth Lord

Legend of the Five Rings

Leverage

Mouse Guard

Mutants & Masterminds

Paranoia

Pathfinder

Pathfinder Society

RIFTs

Savage Worlds

Serenity

Shadowrun

Time Lord

Star Wars WEG D6

Swords and Wizardry

and more are on the way.

If you’d like to play in a game use our Player Pre-Registration Tool.

If you’d like to run a game use our  GM Pre-Registration Tool.

If  you don’t see your game in our lineup, would like to lend a hand, or need to inquire for any other reason, feel free to use our Contact Us page to do so.

Be sure to visit our websites and show your support for AetherCon via Facebook, Google+, and Twitter.

Website:  http://www.aethercon.com/

Facebook:  http://www.facebook.com/AetherConRPG

Twitter:  http://twitter.com/#!/AetherCon

Google+:  http://www.gplus.to/aethercon

I don't know for sure how much participation I'll personally be able to have with AetherCon, but I've been playing around with Roll20 and it seems pretty great...and, for someone like me who lives in the middle of nowhere, this just sounds like an awesome idea, and I hope it turns out to be huge.

The Michael Rohan Memorial Bundle

From Fabled Environments:


Fabled Environments is proud to announce a Charity Bundle to benefit the Michael Rohan Memorial Fund. This bundle, slated to be released July 2nd through OneBookshelf (DrivethruRPG/RPGNow.com) contains great submissions from Pinnacle Entertainment Group(the folks that brought us Savage Worlds), Fat Goblin Games, Reality Blurs and others. There is even amazing original artwork from Aaron Acevedo.

The Michael Rohan Memorial Fund

On June 10th of this year, the Creative Director of Silver Gryphon Games, Kevin Rohan, lost his 6-year-old son in the aftermath of a tragic accident while swimming at a local water park. This loss has deeply affected the Rohan family as well as the friends of the Rohans and hundreds of families that they are close to and through out the community.

Seeking to turn this tragedy into community outreach, the Rohan family has decided to start the Michael Rohan Memorial Fund which will be used to help pay for swimming lessons for local families, assistance for CPR and lifeguard training, as well as help with grief counseling in the wake of a tragic loss. There are plans for more and bigger things as well, and with the appropriate funding we will be able to achieve some great things and extend our assistance beyond just our local communities. 100% of the money raised through this bundle will go to the fund and will allow us to begin helping other families almost immediately.

My thoughts:

The Rohans have been truly inspirational with how they have worked to make a horrible tragedy into a positive for the world. Support this bundle, please...not because it's $176 worth of amazing products for only $12, but because it's a good thing to do...the rest is just icing on the cake.

Tommy's Take on Civil War Event Book Essentials Edition

Psst...the good guys aren't teamed with Venom.

Civil War was one of those mixed-bag kinda stories. Great concept, some great stories within the event...horrible execution. It's also the first Event Book for the Marvel Heroic RPG.

WHAT YOU SHOULD KNOW: This review covers the Civil War Essentials Event Book...the difference between that and the Premium version is about 10 bucks in print and 6 in PDF, and the Premium version includes the Operations Manual from the Marvel Heroic rules (that is, the rules to the game, just not the Breakout Event), meaning a difference of about 136 pages. Essentially, no pun intended, Margaret Weis Productions is all about options. When looking at the cover (featuring Pro Registration forces squaring off with Anti Registration forces), you can tell the good guys from the bad guys because one side has Spider-Man and Captain America and the other side has Venom. As in, the psychotic Max Gargan Venom. But I digress.

Mike Selinker does the intro, bragging - and rightfully so - about how he made Captain America the best character in Marvel SAGA (and he really is, or he's very close) because of the Edge mechanic (and about how he got to brag about this to Joe Simon, who co-created Cap with Jack Kirby). From there, it dives right into the event.

First off, I want to note something: Pretty much any time there's a page reference, you can click it and go there. That's in addition to the bookmarks, table of contents and index. That deserves some kudos right there. The Preparing for the Event chapter does a breakdown of the event, as well as recommended number of players (4-6) and some optional rules (like Troupe Play, so your group can cover all the major players of the Pro or Anti Registration sides...or even both sides, if the group wants to cover ALL sides). There's also rules suggestions on making Scene Distictions more dynamic, by adding extra features that people can use by spending Plot Points. Advice is also given for covering Watcher-Controlled Support Characters, addressing multiple characters getting unwieldy (something that was never really addressed in Marvel SAGA aside from hand waving it).

And then...the Civil War Sourcebook itself. The first thing it tackles is the Superhuman Registration Act, as well as making the Pro and Con arguments for it. It also tackles what's at stake for each side, as well as a sidebar on people playing characters who choose different sides (depending on the interpretation, you could easily flip Captain America and Iron Man, especially Ultimate Cap and Movie Iron Man). Lastly, there are bullet points for what can happen if the Act passes or fails, and the consequences thereof. A full dozen new Milestones are included, all event specific, such as Evil For Justice (recruiting Supervillains to your side), My Ally, My Enemy (where you and a close friend wind up on opposite sides of the conflict), or Convert the Enemy (where you become focused on swaying heroes to your side). There are also a number of Factions, with advice on playing Civil War from their perspective (complete with their own Unlockables), like Atlantis (including Unlocking Namor, with a number of implications as to what that means), Wakanda (would you like the blessing of the Panther God?), AIM, Hydra, SHIELD, The Media and even The Illuminati (the behind the scenes power players like Iron Man, Mr. Fantastic, Professor X and Dr. Strange). I should note that there are tons of major and minor datafiles all over this thing, from Hydra Agents to J. Jonah Jameson to Man-Ape. The section ends with a number of important locations involved in Civil War, complete with Scene Distinctions for them (like Artifacts From Avengers History in the Avengers Mansion Ruins and the Statue of Liberty serving as a Beacon of Hope).

When it's time for the Event to begin, it's all broken down into Scenes. Buildup Scenes include Titanium Man attacking Washington and Thor's Hammer crashing to Earth (and Doom trying to retrieve it). This includes datafiles for Doom, Titanium Man, Doombots, Thor's Hammer...and options like crazy. Like, say, allowing a hero to pick up Thor's Hammer and just what all that MEANS...with options for it both being a temporary measure to fend off Doom or a permanent one! To prove that it's not all slugfests, one of the Buildup Scenes even takes place with a hero appearing before Congress. The event proper begins with the aftermath of the Stamford explosion and covers a number of Scenes which could become whole sessions in and of themselves, like hunting Nitro (believed to be the sole survivor of the Stamford incident), appearing before the Commission on Superhuman Activities (complete with a chance to actually flip Henry Peter Gyrich to the Anti-Registration side, if they so choose). Act One ends with a roleplaying scene involving numerous heroes gathering to discuss the SHRA.

In Act Two, the SHRA has passed, because there's no Event without it. The Scenes get even more flexible here, as the PCs could be on either (or both!) sides of the Act. The Spider-Man unmasking scene is presented with more options, with Spidey only being used as an example, and even a suggestion for an underhanded twist like a Life Model Decoy being used to unmask in the hero's place! Other Scenes include hunting/eluding friends, the wedding of Storm and Black Panther (complete with Storm datafile), investigating Atlantean sleeper agents, culminating in an epic Superhero Battle Royal involving Thor's clone (though there are other options provided,  like the Sentry and a Hulk Robot).

In Act Three, the pro-Registration forces are running across the moral Event Horizon, with supervillains being actively recruited to hunt anti-Registration heroes, captive anti-Registration forces being locked up in the Negative Zone and more good stuff. This adds a slew of new datafiles, like Songbird, Moonstone, Venom and Bullseye. The Thunderbolts debut scene includes options like making pro-Registration PCs "ride along" with them, or anti-Registration PCs injected with the same nanotech to work alongside them. Other Scenes include negotiating with Atlantis (and hopefully getting Namor and his resources on your side), busting AIM or Hydra (complete with Nick Fury datafile), getting to the truth of Norman Osborn's actions in Civil War (complete with a variety of options again, such as him being under control of Namor, who is using Osborn's attacks on Atlanteans as an excuse for war, or maybe it was Chameleon all along, and not Osborn), both sides of a Negative Zone Prison Raid (busting heroes out or stopping a break in), complete with a second epic brawl between both sets of forces that spill onto the streets of New York. The last scene also ups the lethality, assuming people will die. Act Three ends with a number of options for wrapping things up, no matter which side wins and includig a Third Option where the heroes band together against a villainous force (my favorite option, which isn't listed in the book, involves Nova crash landing on earth with the dire warning that "The Annihilation Wave is coming!").

A sidebar details the three books coming to supplement this event: Fifty State Initiative (which covers what happens in the aftermath of Civil War), Young Avengers/Runaways (which covers the teen heroes, including the New Warriors) and the X-Men (which covers the X-Mansion's residents and the Sentinels sequestering them).

Friends and Foes includes a crap ton more datafiles, starting with Ant Man (Erin O'Grady), the obscure Bantam, the Serpent Society, Doc Samson, the Kingpin, Sentry (complete with a d12 strength), Vision and more.

And THEN we get FULL datafiles for 32 heroes, including Captain America, Iron Man, Spider-Man and Wolverine, as well as folks like Cable, Punisher, Moon Knight and Goliath...oh, and Deadpool. Each with bios and two sets of character specific milestones.

The book ends with a glossary, a clickable index of datafiles and a bibliography.

WHAT WORKS: Well...there's a crap ton of new datafiles, including Dr. Doom (held up alongside Magneto as an inexcusable omission from the rulebook). There's a LOT of leeway and options given for playing out Civil War with your own twists. New optional rules like Troupe Play and handling multiple support characters is great. Oh, there's a table of contents, an index, bookmarks and EVERYTHING IS CLICKABLE. Except links to the Operations Manual, but I would bet those are included in the Premium Version.

WHAT DOESN'T WORK: No Baron Zemo. No Winter Soldier. What? I can't complain about MY favorites not being included? The art is really pixelated a lot of the time, but I am assuming that's a digital only artifact and hopefully they'll fix that for the print versions. If you absolutely hated Marvel Heroic, I don't think this is going to convince you otherwise. For a pre-written adventure (essentially), it'll get steadily harder to run straight out of the book as the twists and turns mount (though that certainly has it's own pluses, as it's not really a railroad at all).

CONCLUSION: An incredibly promising start to the Event Book formula, as there's a huge amount of options included to customize it yourself. The pixelated art doesn't bother me in the digital book, but I would be annoyed to have it present in a print book. Just a huge amount of information, including new datafiles, and while having many of them mixed around the book could annoy some, if you're working from the PDF this thing is so user friendly to navigate that it's not a big deal. Heck, maybe someone wants to play one of the characters not included as a full datafile (with Milestones) here (like Ant Man or Patriot)...just slap on a pair of Civil War milestones that make sense and run with it. If you didn't care for Marvel Heroic, I don't think this is going to sway you...but if you're a fan of it, there's a lot to like from this product.

Tommy's Take on The Dark Woods

The Game Arts Guild were responsible for the interesting RPG Squawk a while back...now they've released The Dark Woods, which is a very specific RPG, straddling the line between board game, RPG and story game. The most important question, however, is "is it good"?

WHAT YOU SHOULD KNOW: The PDF is only $4.99 at RPGNow, but you can order the softcover for $7.99 and a bundle for $9.99. The game is built for 4-8 players, but doesn't use a GM. The book is pretty small, only 37 pages (inclduing covers). The premise is that The Dark Woods are ruled by a dragon sorcerer and his minions, and the PCs form teams to fight past each other and take on the dragon sorcerer. There's no GM, so each each side alternates between playing their sorcerers and playing the enemies the other side is fighting.

The Dark Woods are filled with denizens from boggarts to dryads to dragons to nagas to humans (who almost always become corrupted and wind up transforming into something else) to varana (humans who have turned into lizard men) and more. Pretty much all of these have pictures accompanying them to help you out.

The rules are given next, using a single d20 and adding modifiers in order to beat a difficulty number. Each character has three defenses, which are derived from various abilities and include Agility, Intelligence and Strength. In addition, they have a Toughness ability which helps determine Hit Points.

Next are the breakdown of abilities, with pretty much everything having Toughness. Next are Attack abilities, which include Shooting, Knockout and Wrestling. Stalking Abilities are Stealth and Detection. Movement Abilities cover Acrobatics, Flying and Swimming. Support Abilites are things like Healing and Command. A 1 page rules summary follows, with a combat example following that.

From there we get to character creation, with abilities purchased by spending 24 character points. Toughness is the most expensive, and the one that everyone must have. A handful of sample characters are provided, including a dragon sorcerer not unlike the Big Bad, a human big game hunter and a Morlock necromancer. Once PCs are created and paired off, each team has to pick an association to belong to, with options including Necromancers and Rangers, and each faction having special rules in place for when they encounter certain types of creatures in the woods (like Necromancers that encounter undead immediately forcing them to attack the other team instead).

A map is included, and the teams move around the map, encountering enemies along the way (sometimes set for the map space and sometimes based on a random roll). As you beat enemies, you can drain their essence and gain more power. Stat blocks are listed for everything you can encounter.

Rules are provided for extending the game, which basically just entails whoever overthrows the Dragon Sorcerer becoming the bad guy for the next game, as well as six sided die and card variants for people who don't own - or hate - d20s. A short story is included for flavor, as is an index.

WHAT WORKS: A nice mix of stock fantasy elements combined with some new and/or relatively rare fantasy components. Simple system with easy enough character generation, good for a pick-up game. A ton of art for a tiny book, it never gets in the way and especially does a nice job of depicting the more uncommon elements.

WHAT DOESN'T WORK: Honestly, the book feels like it was almost laid out backwards. I'm used to flavor fiction at the beginning of the book and not the end, and I almost always prefer character generation before rules.

CONCLUSION: I'm not sure I'd call it an RPG aside from the character generation, and I'd be hard pressed to call it a story game. It's really almost a board game in a book, but given how easy the map is to print, and the low price point, I don't think that's a bad thing. If the physical book is laid out the same as the PDF is, I'd recommend getting the PDF over the book and just printing out the map, since the map is almost smack in the middle, then using some kind of tokens or figures to track movement around it. Definitely has the potential for a fun beer and pretzels type game.

Tragic News

I'm only mentioning this since the news has gone public now among the Savage community, but Kevin Rohan of Silver Gryphon Games recently suffered the most stunning a tragic loss imaginable when his 6 year old son  Michael passed away after an accident at a public pool.

There are no words to express how horrible this is, and even though I have only dealt with Kevin in a Publisher-Reviewer capacity, the news brought me to tears. My heart and my prayers go out to Kevin, his family and everyone affected by this tragedy.

For those who have the means and the inclination, the Rohan family has set up a memorial fund in Michael's memory. If you would like to make a tax-deductible donation to the Michael Rohan Memorial Fund, mail a check to: State Bank of Spencer, 728 Grand Avenue, Spencer, IA 51301, Memo: Michael Rohan Memorial Fund. Any questions call Mike at State Bank: 877-551-6580.


Thank you for reading this, and keep the Rohans and their family, extended and immediate, in your hearts in this trying time that no one should ever have to endure.


Tommy

Tommy's Take on Streets of Bedlam

Jason L Blair, of Little Fears fame, recently released his first Savage Setting: Streets of Bedlam, which intentionally shortens to SoB. I like Savage Worlds, I like Blair's work, and I backed this on Kickstarter.

WHAT YOU SHOULD KNOW: The PDF is 255 pages and currently available on RPGnow...still lacking a few finishing touches before it'll get sent to the printers, where it'll seemingly retail for $30. The book is in black and white, fittingly, and drawn by Shawn Gaston. It also has much saltier language than your average Savage Worlds book.

The book is divided into five chapters plus an introduction, and requires some version of Savage Worlds (though it was written for Deluxe, but there's not a lot of hard work moving from edition to edition).

The Introduction provides an overview to the feel of the setting, citing things like Sin City, Boondock Saints and Assault on Precinct 13, and Mr. Blair also said in a chat that emulation of movies like Payback and Four Brothers was certainly possible. Again, this chapter is just a broad overview of the inspirations and source material, as well as a brief breakdown of Bedlam, which is actually two cities (Bedford and Lamrose, the former being the money of the city, the latter being the wrecked out remnants of a blue collar city). The chapter serves as a nice, brisk introduction to what Streets of Bedlam is all about.

Chapter one dives into the city itself, a neo-noirish Gotham that is split in two distinct halves by the Artifice River. In Lamrose, the prostitutes rule Bricktown, the Lamrose side of the river is dotted with crack houses, we have casinos under various management, a Little Italy and a Chinatown. On the other side of the river, Bedford is where the rich and the righteous live, with fake swamps, theatres, cathedrals and a pair of pro ball teams (football and baseball). A handy list of local slang is provided, and it's not so long or dense as to become distracting. There are Italiant, Irish and Polish, and Triad mobs in town, and the cops are little protection. A handy quick-list of businesses and street names are provided, with shoutouts to authors like Elmore Leonard and Ed Brubaker.

Chapter 2 is character creation, which is standard Savage Worlds creation...with a little twist. For one thing, you start an Archetype, a pretty specific foundation for your character (with the option of a Citizen, who is essentially a blank slate). The Archetypes have required skills, as well as free Edges and Hindrances, and then you customize from there. I rather like the descriptions for this game, being three sentences: A physical description, a social one and a mental one. An example of an Archetype is a Badge, catch-all for the cops. This one gets extra Reputation for certain actions, but you also get to choose whether you are straight or dirty, with the former giving you an enemy for crossing the wrong person and the latter providing extra money...but meaning you're in the pocket of someone. Others include Boss (as in gang bosses), Valkyries (the now militant hookers), Drifters, Hitters (Hitmen) and even Marv-like monsters, each with their own customization point even before you buy your skills and Edges.

Chapter 3 gets into the rules changes, providing suggestions for Setting Rules and adding in new Skills, Edges and Hindrances. Some of the Skills are expected, like Interrogation, and others are interesting, but odd, like Eyes of G*d, which allows you to tell whether or not someone is a very bad guy. Edges include things like Street Cred and Sucker-Proof, which provide well explained bonuses, as well as one (Heart on Your Sleeve) that reads like it should be a Hindrance and a couple of Edges that are described, but either have no - or poorly explained - mechanical benefits (like Protected or Entourage). Hindrances include Infamous, Priors (you have a record) and Trigger Happy (where guns are your first solution). Rep is explained here, a stat similar to Charisma, which can fall under three spheres: Public, Underworld and Authority. Interrogation rules are present, as well as an interesting system for Investigations, using card draws to determine the crime, the clean-up and the escape, complete with an example. There's also a Dramatic Damage table, which is basically just flavor, and a system for Roles, which include things like Hero, Sidekick, Love Interest and Plot Device, and can change each session. Each role gains a couple of new effects it can spend bennies on (like Sidekicks pumping a hero's ego up). There's also a bit of a GM section here, pushing for you to jump into the middle of the action and keep it hot, before providing a selection of common story/mission/adventure types (like the ever famous Man on a Mission).

Chapter four is a huge listing of NPCs, made up primarly of Kickstarter backers, like intrepid reporter Shane Hensley, Underworld icon Gareth-Michael Skarka, and drug pusher Nathan Reed. The first 14 of these are tied directly to the archetypes to serve an iconic function. The rest of the Kickstarter backers are named, with mini bios, to fill out the city, with a nice selection of attribute arrays and skill sets provided to mix and match stock NPC stats on the fly.

Chapter 5 gets into the GMing proper, starting with an outline for neo-noir adventures for folks to follow. This leads into an interesting variation on the Plot Point Campaign, with the characters starting off at the scene of a murder, and allowing them to follow up on the clues and plot threads they choose, directing you to scenes in an almost Choose Your Own Adventure-like manner, rather than the more structured Plot Point Campaign set-up. In true Neo-Noir fashion, the whole thing takes many twists and turns and has the potential to end in a way that burns the characters even as they deal with the murderer. Interesting arrangement for the PPC, and not in a bad way. A handful of "Orphan Stories" follow, essentially overgrown plot seeds.

The PDF ends with a note from the author, a placeholder where the index will be, a quick reference sheet, an Episode tracker sheet, an Investigation sheet and a character sheet.

WHAT WORKS: The writing is very crisp without getting at all cute. Nothing is hard to read here. The art sets the scene incredibly well. I love the Archetypes set-up for character creation, especially since there's still so much room for flexibility, and the Plot Point Campaign structure is a welcome change of pace. The city is a wonderful mish-mash of Neo-Noir tropes, giving you everything you need to play around, providing landmarks without roadmaps so everything is where you need it to be.

WHAT DOESN'T WORK: Heart on Your Sleeve is either the worst Edge ever, or a misplaced Hindrance. Entourage and Protected could also use mechanical support. Bookmarks in a PDF are always great, and they don't exist here. I'm one of the few Kickstarter members who isn't a character in the city, because I'm not a fan of "vanity rewards". It takes me out of the setting seeing Shane Hensley or Gareth-Michael Skarka as NPCs in the setting, though I understand why vanity awards are present in KIckstarters.

CONCLUSION: I think Jason L. Blair has done a fantastic job of crafting a unique Savage Worlds experience while retaining the Fast, Furious, Fun feel the game exudes. Great new additions to the rules, a big sandbox to play around in and promises of more to come. Streets of Bedlam is the "over the top" cousin to Wellstone City, serving a similar niche in an ultraviolent and extreme manner. My biggest disappointment is that I didn't have the extra at the time to kick in for the print copy. Recommended if you love Sin City or crazy Mel Gibson revenge movies, and I love both.

My fellow blogger Darren G. Miller, who is present in the game as an NPC, offered up his thoughts over at Geekcentricity.

Tommy's Take on Castle Ravenloft

I'm a pretty big fan of Ravenloft. Even as I've decided I don't really care about every trying to run D&D again, I still love some of the settings, with Ravenloft the foremost among them. I also don't really care for D&D4e at all...but I did get the Castle Ravenloft board game by Wizards of the Coast, which does a hefty combination of the two.

WHAT YOU SHOULD KNOW: This is a high end board game, with lots of minis (unpainted D&D minis), map tiles and so forth. It retails for $64.99, but you can usually get it for around $20 less at Amazon.com.(And buying from Amazon through that link helps support this blog). It's recommended for ages 12 and up, but my eight year old and I have played multiple cooperative games together. It supports anywhere from 1 to 5 players.

The "story" of the board game boils Ravenloft down to its basic elemements: Strahd and his nefarious evils are lording over the village of Barovia until a handful of heroes move in to stop him.

The system uses a streamlined 4e...streamlined to the point that the heroes are distilled down to Armor Class, Hit Points, Speed, Surge Value and Powers. Yep, Healing Surges are present here (the default being each group having two), with characters who are reduced to 0 health coming back at half strength.

The game is played without a GM, with each monster and villain have a list of tactics that pretty much govern everything they do (move closer to hero, what attacks they use in which situation, etc). The game board is made as you go, using a series of map tiles that range from big, open rooms and hallways to Von Zarovich family tombs, laboratories and magic circles.

Each turn is simple: Each turn you can Move and Attack, Attack and Move or Move Twice. If you end your turn at the edge of a tile, you flip over a new one (which guarantees the arrival of a monster). Every player's turn has a Villain Phase, in which the "Boss" of the adventure, if active, takes his turn, followed by every monster whose card you control taking a turn. Additionally, there are Encounter Cards which are played if you draw tiles featuring black arrows, and these are almost always Very Bad (and are also drawn if you fail to explore on a turn).

Combat is simple: Roll d20, add your attack bonus (based on the attack you are using and any relevant magic items), compare to Armor Class and apply damage. Most non-bosses only have 1-2 HP. You get a magic item for killing them and add their card to the XP pile, which you can use to block Encounter cards or level up to level 2 if have enough XP when you roll a 20 during gameplay (granting you an extra Daily Power, boosting your stats and giving a Critical Hit bonus).

Each Adventure has its own goals, and usually additional rules, giving a sense of variety even though the gameplay is pretty basic. Usually you have a boss fight of some sort to deal with, and occassionally a secondary goal.

The Daily, Utility and At-Will Powers - as well as each character's unique ability - make the characters feel different as well.

Hero options include a Human Ranger (who can "Explore" tiles she's not next to, and has lots of ranged attacks, as well as powers that allow her to either put space between her and the bad guys to open up her ranged attacks), a Dragonborn Fighter (who can breath fire, give an AC bonus to any ally on the same tile, and force monsters into combat even if they aren't adjacent to him), a Dwarf Cleric (who can heal himself and others, and has a few Powers like Bless and Flame Strike which'll be familiar to long time D&D fans), an Eladrin Wizard (who gives his allies bonuses to hit due to his knowledge of monsters, the ability to make a short range teleportation and some classic Wizard Powers like Magic Missile, Dispel Magic and Shield) and a Human Rogue (who gets a bonus to disarm traps, and has a lot of sneaky, high-probability, low damage attack options).

Most of the monsters feel very "Ravenloft", with Zombies, Ghouls, Skeletons, Gargoyles and Wraiths, as well as more esoteric choices like Burning Skeletons. Wolves, Spiders and Rat Swarms also feel at home, though I probably would have left Kobolds out.

The Villains include a Kobold Sorcerer named Klak, a Howling Hag, a Werewolf, a Flesh Golem, a Zombie Dragon, a Dracolich named Gravestorm and Strahd himself.

Treasures you can find include items like Thieves' Tools, Magic Swords, Holy Avengers (which provide an extra bonus against the undead), Crystal Balls and Potions of Healing, as well as Blessings that let you move faster for a turn, heal a hit point or even regain a spent Power.

The Encounter Cards are very flavorful, including things like Animated Armor attacking you, bat swarms filling the Castle to provide penalties to ranged attacks, Strahd getting into your head and forcing you to make an attack against an ally, and even a few Encounters that can go either way, like a movement in the corner of your eye that can either be a sneak attack or a friendly spirit who restores one of your powers.

The game includes 13 adventures (I've played 11 of them), from a solo scenario in which you have to escape Strahd's tomb before he wakes up, to an escort mission in which you have to lead a villager to the Dark Fountain before he transforms into a vampire, to a seek and destroy mission in which you play each of the five heroes (one after the other) taking out as many of Strahd's followers as possible in a blaze of glory, to a two-part mission in which you attempt to finally hunt down and destroy Strahd himself.

Additionally, Wizards of the Coast provides a few free adventures, and this game is also compatible with its sister games Wrath of Ashardalon and The Legend of Drizzt (and you can make your own scenarios, of course).

WHAT WORKS: The minis are great, and will see play in games outside of just this, I'm sure of it. Gravestorm is a particularly impressive centerpiece, although the Flesh Golem is amazing as well. The Heroes all feel unique with their various abilities, and the theme feels about as close to Ravenloft as you can get in a hack and slash dungeon crawler.

WHAT DOESN'T WORK: It's HARD. Like, almost TOO hard. I think that we have only won once, defeating the Kobold Sorcerer. It is a meatgrinder, in part because so many of the monsters and encounters inflict a point of damage even if they miss (as opposed to 2 or 3 if they hit). The rulebooks really needed tighter editing, and it is REALLY easy to overthink the rules sometimes (Tip: Whatever the card, rule, etc, is, read it literally. That's usually the right answer).

CONCLUSION: If I got to roleplay more, the game would have been worth the price of admission for the minis alone. That said, the production values are fantastic and the gameplay is fun, if very difficult. I've had a blast playing with my son, in part because he takes it upon himself to roleplay his character, talking in character as we adventure through the castle, which usually sparks me into doing the same. It would just be nice to actually WIN sometime. Now I know how everyone that played in my Ravenloft games felt. Still, I don't regret the purchase at all. Probably not the best "gateway game", though, given the Meatgrinder effect.