Basics: Ah, a nice normal day WHAT IN THE SARENRAE! Balls of blood appear around Absolom station and pop out monsters made out of blood that attack everyone. Can you save them all?
Mechanics or Crunch: This scenario is combat-heavy with a bit of skill-based challenges where you attempt to stop all the violence. It’s combat heavy, so a social character will be a bit out of sorts. So will exploration-based characters. Skill characters will have things to do. It’s not bad, but you can’t do everything in 3 hours. 4.5/5
Theme or Fluff– Bad stuff happens, and you stop it. That’s the theme, and it does that well. It’s a solid year intro adventure. The story is light, but you are rushing between different issues to try to save as many people as possible. That’s a fun ton of problems to solve. 5/5
Execution: There are new monsters and enough pictures in this one. The monsters have pictures for you to include in the adventure, along with stats for them. There is enough new here that you don’t have to consult too many outside sources to play this one. It also reads quickly and requires only two maps to run. Good old Paizo polish. 5/5
Summary: I like what’s here. It can’t be everything to everyone, but it’s fun. You kill bad things, save people, and stop the problems. All in a day’s work for the Starfinders. It’s also well written and well laid out, so you can read this fast and easily. A good start to a new season. 97%
Price– free here https://www.drivethrurpg.com/en/product/511285/oath-hammer-quickstart?affiliate_id=658618
TL; DR-Want Shadowrun rules in The Hobbit? 87%
Basics– Time to take back our home! In Oathhammer, players take the roles of dwarves, elves, humans, and many other fantasy races as they attempt to take back the dwarf home island long ago seized by the orcs. Let’s get into the basics.
Base mechanics- Oathhammer is d6 pool based system. For any action, a player takes an attribute and a skill, adds them together, adds penalties, and then rolls that many six sided dice. The novel part of this system is the dice colors. Different dice colors are assigned based on skills and abilities, with the least skilled dice only succeeding on a 4 or better and the best dice succeeding on a 2 or better. These are small dice pools where a single success is needed for really simple actions and five successes are needed for really difficult actions.
Combat– Combat is teams based. When combat happens, one character on each side makes a leadership check. Going from high to low, that side decides if they will go before or after any group. Combat is much like other dice pool games. A character rolls an attack and a defender rolls a defence pool. If the attacker wins, the net difference is carried over as damage. The attacker then rolls weapon damage dice with any successes being carried over into more damage. Lastly, the defender will roll armor dice, with the weapon reducing the number of dice the defender rolls. The defender’s successes reduce the damage, and any remaining damage reduces grit or the hit points of the character. When a character is reduced to 0 grit, two six-sided dice are rolled and a chart determines if it’s just a flesh wound, or if the character dies.
Magic– Magic is cast till you can’t. Magic is a basic roll as above, and contested effects are determined by spell. When you roll a 1, you build up stress. Too much stress, and you can’t cast any more.
Character building– Characters are built by choosing a race, class, and oath. The race gives you some bonuses and penalties to your attributes. The class gives you some basic abilities and skills as well as what dice you roll for each action. Finally, your oaths give you roleplaying opportunities and if you follow them, you gain experience points.
Character advancement– When you complete adventures and follow your oaths, you gain experience. Those points are spent to increase your attributes, skills, and even buy new skill features.
Ok, thats the basics, let’s get into my thoughts.
Mechanics or Crunch- This is an interesting system, if a bit fiddly. I love d6 dice pool systems. It’s satisfying to throw a bunch of dice at a problem. That said, the different dice colors are a tad fiddly. Nothing too crazy, but you need to keep the different dice separate, and that’s not as much fun. But it works, and it’s still fun to do. 4.5/5
Theme or Fluff- Honestly this world feels like The Hobbit, in all the right ways. You have dwarves who are fighting to get their homeland back. You start as just random dudes, and can end up wielding huge armies who conquer the orcs to reclaim your homeland. It’s a solid world to explore. 5/5
Execution– The book works, but it’s got some major flaws. It’s beautiful and easy to read. The sections are well laid out and enjoyable. The big things I hate are for a quickstart are it’s not realy a quick start. There are no pregens nor is there an adventure. It’s an advertisement for the system-which is good, but it’s not a thing I could give my friends and jump in in 20 minutes. We have to build characters and an adventure. I couldn’t even find pregens on the website. I’d prefer almost no rules if you give me a game in 20 minutes. 3.5/5
Summary-I like The Hobbit and Shadowrun, and this is the mix of them. The base mechanics work here, if they are a little bit fiddly at times. The setting is pretty and well defined. The only thing I don’t like is the lack of a real quickstart. What’s here will draw you in, so it does its job. But, you won’t be able to play this game without more products and more work. Aside from this, I love what I see. 87%
You’ve learned how to really cut into tendons and joints. When you succeed on an attack on a target with the off-guard condition, it is gains Painful 1 (DC 15 flat check to end). If a target has the Painful condition, it does not increase.
You rip the target apart. Their body is cut for deals 1d6 slashing damage, with a basic Fortitude save. If the target critically fails the save, it is gains Painful 1 (DC 15 flat check to end).
Double the dose! If you succeed on an attack where you cause a target to ingest or are injected with a consumable, you can make a second attack roll without applying the multiple attack penalty. If the second attack hit, the target is affected by a second injected or consumable alchemical item.
I’m coming back to make more DCC RPG content! Here is something for my undead character book!
Undead Strength
Level: 1
Range Self
Duration: perminent
Casting time: action
Save: none
General
Your body grows
Manifestation
roll 1d4: (1) You swell with power (2) Your pure wiry strength (3)Your skin is taught with muscles (4) you grow bigger and bader
1
failure; gain a drawback
2-11
failure
12-13
Your strength score increases by +1
14-17
Your strength score increases by +2
18-19
Your strength score increases by +3
20-23
Your strength score increases by +4 and you deal an additional point of damage on all melee attacks
24-27
Your strength score increases by +5 and you deal an additional 2 points of damage on all melee attacks
28-29
Your strength score increases by +6 and you deal an additional 3 points of damage on all melee attacks
30-31
Your strength score increases by +7 and you deal an additional 4 points of damage on all melee attacks
32+
Your strength score increases by +8 and you deal an additional 5 points of damage on all melee attacks and any hit by you must make a Fortitude save equal to damage dealt or be knocked prone
These Pauldrons are reinforced to provide additional armor against directed attacks. When you move, as a free action you can choose an enemy or group of enemies that are all adjacent to each other to face. You gain a +1 item bonus to AC against attacks from any of them. If the group of enemies separates, you can choose which group you face for the bonus. This item bonus stacks with any other item bonus to AC.
Ballistic Pauldrons Item 4
Price 750 credits Bulk L
Ballistic Pauldrons Item 8
Price 2250 credits Bulk L The rage is of a item bonus becomes +2.
Ballistic Pauldrons Item 12
Price 16200 credits Bulk L The rage is of a item bonus becomes +3.
Champion Cleric Exemplar Oracle Thaumaturge Prerequisite: Worship Abadar Frequency: Once per day
All money flows from you and to you. Before you cast a divine spell, you can sacrifice a number of gold pieces equal to twice the rank of the next spell you cast. If you do so, you can a +1 circumstance bonus to attack and damage rolls as well as to the save DC of the spell.
Throat Punch Games 