Tag: Free League Publishing

Ring Side Report: RPG Review of PIRATE BORG Starter Set

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Product–  PIRATE BORG Starter Set

System– PIRATE BORG

Producer– Free League

Price– $19.99 here https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/555993/pirate-borg-starter-set?affiliate_id=658618  

Basics:  Welcome to the Dark Caribbean! This box set has a ton of stuff and enough to help you get playing quickly.  Check out our unboxing video here: https://youtu.be/FgXEPdMvink .  Let’s dig into this game and box set.

Mechanics or Crunch: How much crunch do you need?  This box set has a small rulebook and enough tokens, player sheets, and maps to get you playing in all of 10 minutes.  This ruleset is d20+ a number between -3 and +6 to hit a 12.  That’s most of the actions.  The rules explain that well and get you building characters in about 10 minutes.  I love the Borg mechanics and simplicity.  And this box set teaches that well and quickly.  5/5

Theme or Fluff–  I love all the stuff in the story here, but I the story has a small plot hole.  The basics of the story are: you are hired to find a thing, get marooned, find half the map, learn the rest is in a British anti-pirate port, and then go find the thing.  It’s fun and teaches the basic rules well, but I think the link to the British is a bit light.  That said, I love what’s here.  Sure, its a bit of a knockoff of Pirates of the Caribbean, but I DON’T CARE!  It’s just fun, especially when you mix in the fact that there is magic dead guy drugs that can make you a god running around. 4.9/5

Execution: I do love me some intro boxes, and honestly I think this might be my favorite.  Why?  Sure, this, like any other good intro box, has dice, maps, tokens, a small intro book, character sheets, and an adventure, but it’s also got DRY ERASE MARKERS!  You build a character in about 10 minutes, and they can die fast.  This gives you dry erase markers and laminated character sheets.  That right there in this kind of game is a godsend. 5/5

Summary: You want some crazy Pirate fun in the Caribbean?  Here you go.  The system is fast, fun, and low rules.  The story is good.  And the box itself is my ABSOLUTE favorite.  And the physical box is about 40 bucks.  The PDFs are a solid value at 20 bucks too.  This is something you need to get and have fun with.  99%

Ring Side Report: RPG Review of Chrysalis

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Product– Chrysalis

System– ALIEN RPG Evolved Edition 

Producer– Free League Publishing

Price– Coming soon! 

TL; DR– Good, but pricey 87%

Basics: Time for a fresh start on a new planet.  Wait, what did they just load into the hold?  Chrysalis is a one- to two-hour demo adventure for Alien RPG Evovled edition.  It’s got pregens and maps with some horror-based fun along the way.

Mechanics or Crunch: This adventure has all the pieces for a good intro to the mechanics of Alien.  You have a time crunch that illustrates how long actions take. You also have a little combat and a little skill-based checks and a tad bit of panic in there.  All the basics are covered to learn this system quickly and well.  5/5

Theme or Fluff– I don’t hate the theme here, but I do think the story needs a bit more direct suggestions.  The game has a short intro, but most of the plot takes place aboard a crashed ship.  The ship has horror things in it, but you also have to put them where you feel they fit.  That’s good, but for a new GM, I’d directly say “put this here” and “do this there”.  Also, I like the combat, but I feel it doesn’t belong as much, say, in other events.  Honestly, I want more direct Alien corporate evil than the random evil that happens on this adventure.  Not bad, but not as Alien as I would have hoped. 4/5

Execution: This is well done, but doesn’t belong as a separate thing.  There are maps, pregens, and pieces to help the players really learn this system.  But, this honestly belongs at the back of the base book.  The base book missed an adventure, and this was it.  Also, at GenCon, this was over $ 10.  This is a one- to two-hour intro adventure.  That is WAY too much for this.  It’s good, but that’s too much.  4/5

Summary: This is a great intro adventure.  At GenCon, this was being run in the Free League room every other hour.  And, this adventure did exactly what it’s supposed to do-it entertains and teaches the basics.  I love that.  The theme is a bit off, with the Alien being more of a random problem and less about corporate machinations, but that’s ok. The big issue is price.  It’s pretty expensive for what you get.  It’s good, but it should be a free PDF and given out when you get the main book.  87%

Ring Side Report: RPG Review of ALIEN RPG Evolved Edition Starter Set

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Product– ALIEN RPG Evolved Edition Starter Set

System– ALIEN RPG Evolved Edition 

Producer– Free League Publishing

Price– $19.99 here https://www.drivethrurpg.com//product/521240/alien-rpg-evolved-edition-starter-set?affiliate_id=658618 

TL; DR– Everything I wanted and more! 100%

Basics: What happened here?  This is the starter set for the Alien RPG Evolved Edition, and it includes the “Hope’s Last Day” adventure.  It’s got five pregens with detailed backstories, multiple cards for players to navigate the adventure and see ever-changing motivations, and lots of dice specific to the system.  For those of you who remembered the original book, this adventure is in the back of that version.

Mechanics or Crunch: This has all the intro crunch you will need.  The box comes with a 20-page book discussing the mechanics of the system.  I’ve gotten pushback on my glib remarks about how little crunch this game has (in the best possible way), but this book is honestly about 20 solid pages with enough rules to get you and your players playing FAST.  There are item cards that you can hand out to your players so they can see the stats on the different weapons.  And everything is just done well. This is a solid intro for the crunch of the system.   5/5

Theme or Fluff– This box gives you the movie world of Alien fast.  It’s just a short book with a 3-4-hour adventure and multiple character motivations.  Characters don’t like each other and have conflicting motivations, so make sure your players are ok with that, but it’s a simple adventure that explains the world well.  Just well done.   5/5

Execution: I love this boxset.  Check out my unboxing here: https://youtu.be/uDghTPRaujE. Just amazing production values and great writing and layout all around.  I love everything that’s here.  There are a few errors like a location on the map being mislabeled, but aside from that, it’s just everything I wanted in a box. 5/5

Summary: I can’t recommend this enough…. To the right people.  This adventure has five players try to survive the horror of an Alien invasion.  But, the adventurers don’t like each other and might stab one another in the back. If you just want a big damn heroes adventure, maybe don’t get this one.  If you want movie-accurate gaming with a good explanation of the rules, and great production with minis, dice, maps, and cards, then this is a great way to get into the Alien RPG!  100%

Ring Side Report: RPG Review of ALIEN RPG Evolved Edition Core Rulebook

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Product– ALIEN RPG Evolved Edition Core Rulebook

System– ALIEN RPG Evolved Edition 

Producer– Free League Publishing

Price– $20.99 here https://www.drivethrurpg.com//product/520969/alien-rpg-evolved-edition-core-rulebook?affiliate_id=658618 

TL; DR– Good horror missing an example.  97%

Basics: In space, no one can hear you scream, 2nd Ed!  Well, more like 1.5.  Alien Evolved Edition has some minor changes to the original edition.  Honestly, it’s the same system, so I wouldn’t call this a new edition, but really an update.  The biggest changes are stress.  Stress is MUCH more forgiving in this edition.  Bad things happen, but you don’t have cycles where everyone just goes crazy from one roll feeding off others’ craziness along the way.  It’s more forgiving.  The game is much kinder to players, as characters have a better chance of surviving encounters.  There are many other small changes, like armor now being a static number rather than a roll, acid splash being nicer to players, and so on.  But honestly, if you know the original, you can play this new edition with a quick skim of the book.

Mechanics or Crunch: I liked the original, and the updates are just nicer to the players.  I like a gonzo RPG where players die every five minutes, but that also means the story can’t be very deep for that character.  The Alien movies, when they are rock-solid, have deep stories and gut punches that make you love and hate the characters and what happens to them.  By tempering the harder aspects, you get much more survival.  I LOVE that.  I also like that it’s still there; stress and rerolls go hand in hand.  Panic-driven storytelling and having characters freeze at the worst times make the story deeper and more intriguing.  It feeds well into the theme below.  Solid work on the tweaks that make this game more fun for longer campaign play.  5/5

Theme or Fluff– Do you like Aliens?  Do you like the extended Alien universe?  Honestly, this book is about 10 pages of rules, but the rest of the 300 pages is world.  You have all kinds of world-building in this book.  This is a solid book to build the world of Alien.  5/5

Execution:  This is a good book, but it’s missing some big things.  All the big things are here, like hyperlinks, good layout, and even amazing art.  But the big things it’s missing are pregens and an adventure.  Those are completely needed for any RPG.  You need a free adventure to really help get the GM and players into any RPG, but the new edition has new things like one-player rules as the soul survivor.  Good, but not the adventure I wanted. 4.5/5

Summary: I love what’s here, but I need a bit more.  The mechanics are absolutely solid. It’s more forgiving than before in just the right way.  The fluff is amazing.  You can see so much more of the universe is out there than the movies show you.  The execution is good, but missing.  I need an example to build off of.  I think most other GMs need that as well.  But, aside from what’s missing, the book is solid.  If you like horror and d6 dice pool-based RPGs, this is a must-have. 97%

Ring Side Report- RPG review of The Electric State

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Product– The Electric State

System– The Electric State

Producer– Free League Publishing

Price- $24.99 here https://www.drivethrurpg.com/en/product/467022/the-electric-state-roleplaying-game?affiliate_id=658618 

TL; DR- Missing some crunch, but full of story 93%

Basics– Ready for a road trip?  The Electric State RPG is a rules light, alternative 90s setting. A decaying America where AI, political intrigue, and the basic fight for real survival all combine to make either the worst or best road trip in history.  Let’s look at the game

Base mechanics– The Electric State follows many of the same principles of Free Leagues’ other games, with players rolling six sided dice and aiming for a 6.  The 6 is a success.  The player typically rolls between 2 and 6 dice.  A character has only four attributes, making up the bulk of a character’s dice.

Pushing/rerolls– Players can push rolls when they fail.  Pushing means rerolling the dice and taking the new result.  However, any ones rolled result in either damage or mental trauma to the character.

Combat-Combat is very simple.  One side, determined by the GM or an opposed dice roll, goes first.  Each character on that side gets an action and a move.  If you want to defend or dodge, you can, but that will remove you next turn.    

Neurocasters– A big part of the setting are neurocasters.  These are helmits you can wear and enter their version of the matrix/internet. You can use this to hack, learn, and pilot drones.  If you push rolls in the internet, you gain bliss.  And when your bliss gets too high, you are too addicted to leave.  Many people die on this internet!

And that’s really it.  It’s VERY rules light.

Mechanics or Crunch– This is the most pure of Free Leagues’ products for mechanics.  It’s very rules light, and maybe even too rules light. What’s here is good, but I would like more.  I think I need a bit more crunch to my RPGs to really get the most out of this game.  Then again, this game focuses much more on the journey and not the destination even for its mechanics, meaning it’s more hand-wavey about how things happen.  If you want the dice to tell a story like a critical success, then this is not for you.  If you play RPGs and just roll dice, then you could speed through most of The Electric State missing its pieces.  But, I still need a bit more crunch to my game.  4/5

Theme or Fluff–  This is where the game shines.  If you want a travel RPG, then this would be it.  The characters are literally called travelers.  You go on an adventure in The Electric State where anything from a cult, to a serial killer, to a robot with hundreds of neurocaster- wearing human zombies on strings follow it around.  There is politics, a world falling apart, drug/internet addiction, human misery, and a whole host of other themes in this game.  The authors have many things to say about the human condition, and this RPG reflects the world well and says volumes at the same time.  5/5

Execution– Free League knows books.  This book has solid production, art, and layout.  It reads easily and fast.  The rules are laid out well enough that I could just pick them up and start reading right away with no confusion.  It’s a good story mixed with solid math, making it an easy read.  It’s also got four pre-gens and several adventures, so if you and your buddies want to play, you don’t have to guess how to run, prep, and plan this adventure or what the designers thought characters should look like. 5/5

Summary– The Electric State is an interesting one for me.  I don’t hate it, but I don’t know how often I’ll travel in it.  I need a bit more crunch in my usual games.  But, the crunch that’s here is pure Free League with pushed rolls and consequences.  The story of the world is interesting and poignant.  I can’t tell how much the designers are luddites against tech or people embracing the tools needed to keep the modern world alive, and maybe that’s a solid trick to pull on me.  The book itself looks good and reads well.  I know I might not visit this world often, but if you offered, I don’t think I would turn down an afternoon in The Electric State.  93%

Ring Side Report- RPG review of Blade Runner RPG: Starter Set

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Product– Blade Runner RPG: Starter Set

System- Year Zero

Producer– Free League Publishing

Price– $35.99 here https://miniature-market.sjv.io/nLo07a 

TL; DR-Solid value for a solid adventure 95%

Basics–  Can you find her in time and why did she run?  The Blade Runner Start Set is a single contained adventure and all the materials you need to play the Blade Runner RPG.  It comes with dice, four characters, turn and combat cards, a basic rule book, a scenario book, and a whole packet of handouts..

Mechanics or Crunch– Any starter set that comes with a rulebook and a whole adventure is built well. You get all the rules you basically need and you can honestly start playing after about 30 minutes of reading. There is one issue I have and that’s chase mechanics in this box. You get chase cards and scenarios if you drive, but the mechanics for just running are not covered as well. It’s small, but you’re playing cops pursuing escaping robots; running will happen!  Aside from that, this will get you playing Blade Runner fast and with a surprising amount of depth for a starter set.  4.75/5

Theme or Fluff– While this starter set can’t build as much of the world as the core book, this set does give enough background and comes with an awesome story with lots of handouts to draw the players in. It’s a mystery where a replicant goes missing and your job is to track her down.  Along the way, there are twists and turns as well as corporate meddling, so it’s a standard cyberpunk story but a well done one.  My one issue is that a character does something that the players might not understand, and I feel it’s not led up to enough.  That said, it has enough of a hook and solid writing to make it a fun intro to the world. 4.5/5

Execution– Execution is the stand out section of the product.  The box is well done, the books are well written, and the handouts, cards, and dice are all top notch.  I absolutely loved all the pieces in this box, and it really helped draw my players in too.  5/5

Summary-I do love me some cyberpunk noir.  The Blade Runner movies did it well, and this starter set is a solid addition to those stories.  There are minor issues like food, chase cards and mechanics and some minor story issues that I felt were not emphasized enough, but overall if you want to start playing Blade Runner, this might be a better start than the core book.  The starter set adventure ends with teasing the next adventure, and I plan to buy and run that one when it’s out.  95%

Ring Side Report- RPG review of Blade Runner RPG Core Rulebook

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Product– Blade Runner RPG Core Rulebook

System- Year Zero

Producer– Free League Publishing

Price– $24.99 here https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/399929/Blade-Runner-RPG-Core-Rulebook?affiliate_id=658618  

TL; DR-Another surprisingly well done year zero system.  99%

Basics–  The tortoise lays on its back, its belly baking in the hot sun, beating its legs…. Time to track down those replicants or be one!  Let’s look at how to play.

Mechanics- Ah Year Zero… the system that Free League uses for everything, but is never quite the same.  This one uses attributes and skill dice for each roll.  Each thing you want to do be it hack a computer or shoot a guy is grab the attribute and the skill die for the activity and roll.  Dice range from d6 to d12, but you do not use the basic number!  What you do is check if you roll a 6 to 9 or 10 to 12.  A 6 to 9 is one success, and a 10 to 12 is two successes.  Doing a thing requires one success.  Criticals have two successes.  Slick and simple!

Rerolls-  Rerolls and player control are the parts of the Year Zero system that mostly stay the same between all the different games they produce.  If you want to reroll a physical thing, you reroll and if you roll a 1 on any die you take a point of physical damage.  Do a mental thing, and you take stress damage on a 1.  Humans can only reroll once, but replicants can reroll twice.  However, replicants ALWAYS take stress on their 1s.  This is bad – if you hit enough stress you basically need a reboot and your max stress can PERMANENTLY be reduced!  But, the choice is always yours to make!

Combat- Another thing that is the same across Year Zero systems is combat and rounds.  At the start of combat, players and the GM draw cards from 1 to 10.  Players then take their turns doing simple things like moving and more complex things like attacking.  Actions like attacking are handled just like any other roll described above.  The more interesting thing is that weapons do a set amount of damage, and any two or more successes is a critical. Each weapon has a set critical die with rolls on that die above 10 resulting in instant death!  Guns are VERY deadly!

Ok, Let’s discuss.

Mechanics or Crunch– I love the Year Zero system.  I don’t know if I’ve ever honestly seen it entirely, as every Year Zero system uses a COMPLETELY different set of dice and die mechanics, but be it a pile of d6s, a single d20, or different skill dice, I LOVE it.  It’s complex enough to build fun characters and simple enough to play fast with enough depth to keep even my Shadowrun loving self engaged.  I also like player choice. This system always gives the players the option to do something, even on failure, and the story keeps rolling.  The total package builds toward a fun system to dive into quickly, but you’ll find a lot to play with when you are there.  5/5

Theme or Fluff– Free League does their homework.  Blade Runner is a dark, fun cyberpunk romp, but if you JUST saw the two movies you would miss large amounts of material.  Free League did not do that.  They dug deep into some crazy pieces, and there is a whole world that is out there now.  Most adventures are gonna be against the corporation and world of the movies because that’s what your players know.  But if you want more, there is a whole world to see there and Free League wrote that for you to find.  5/5

Execution– This book is well done with one small thing that drives me up a wall.  First the good.  It’s hyperlinked, laid out well, reads easily, and the art fits the aesthetic.  This is a solid, well done book.  What drives me crazy is the way the die system is discussed.  You have a d6, d8, d10, and d12.  The books refers to them as rank, D, C, B, and A. So, the GM screen needs to have a table on it so you can change back and forth from letters to dice.  Just use the dice and leave it out.  This drives me up a wall, but honestly, this complaint feels like being mad that they changed the color of the toilet paper in your favorite restaurant.  If you get past my one crazy hangup, you will enjoy this book’s production.  4.9/5

Summary– I love this book.  It’s got a simple, yet interesting system with a solid world and story put together in an excellently made product.  I have my own idiosyncrasies, but if you want a dark, gritty detective story in a cyberpunk world with no magic, I would easily suggest this to anyone.  Keep in mind, though, that this is not a big damn heroes game.  Like the movies, this is a world without happy endings.  If that’s not your preference in a game, then I would pass this by.  I enjoy a good sad story, so this is one that I will bring to the table. 99%

Ring Side Report- RPG review of Alien RPG

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Product– Alien RPG

System- Year Zero Engine

Producer– Free League Publishing

Price– $24 here https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/293976/ALIEN-RPG-Core-Rulebook?affiliate_id=658618 

TL; DR– No one can hear you scream how good this is!  98%

Basics– In space, no one can hear you scream!  Alien RPG is a new take on the classic Alien franchise.  Let’s dive into the basics of the game.

Mechanics- This system uses the Year Zero Engine.  Here, you take a specific skill you want to do and the associated trait and roll that many d6’s.  The GM may add or remove dice as the difficulty warrants, but if you roll one 6, you succeed.  Additional 6s add more levels of success.  You do this for everything from fixing a cargo door to shooting a xenomorph.

Stress- The Alien movies are nothing if not stressful!  When you do something, you might fail, and if you do, you can reroll but you gain a different colored d6.  If you roll a 1 on these d6’s you panic and roll a d6 and add your current stress level to that roll.  Roll too high and you can go catatonic to violent to anything in between.  You also gain stress dice when violence happens to you, to seeing androids, to fire full auto into a monster among the stars.

Combat-  This game uses cards to track initiative.  You draw cards at the start of a fight.  There is no rolling for turns.  Each turn on your card time, you can do a slow action and a fast action.  Slow is shooting a gun or fixing a cargo door, while fast is yelling, running, or even pushing the button to open the airlock.  Damage is determined by the weapon you are using minus any armor the creature or person has.  Monsters are interesting in this system as well.  Instead of the GM planning what happens, you roll a d6 when a monster attacks and that die determines what they do.  

Ok, let’s go my thoughts on the system.

Mechanics or Crunch– This is a pretty low crunch system, but that doesn’t make it bad!  What I just told you above gives you enough to jump in and start playing.  You just need a character and two colors of D6s.  It’s fast and lets you focus on the world that is here.  I will admit getting only one talent or a feat for your character is kind of a bit light to me.  I like having lots of fun toys for my character to use to get through the world.  But that is what you get from Year Zero.  I’m glad I get the talents/feats I do, but I would like just a bit more.  In terms of how it fits the world, I love it.  Stress is key in the movies and key here too.  A near perfect fit of mechanics and world.  4.75/5

Theme or Fluff– I love the Alien movies (yes even the bad ones!).  The people who made this did too.  They even reference old books that I thought most people forgot about long ago!  The world is built out a TON in this book.  To the uninitiated, it is WAY more than just Weyland-Yutani and chestbursters, and this book shows that.  Solid world building in this one.   5/5

Execution– PDF? Yep.  Hyperlinked?  Yes! Solid Art?  Yep.  Good layout? Yes. This is the first full book by Free League Publishing, and I have to say I am impressed.  Good layout, good art, good flow, good everything EXCEPT respect for my printer when I try to make pregens from the book.  The Alien world is dark.  That’s ok, but the background of the book is dark as well.  So if you print off characters for your friends, you WILL kill a printer cartridge!  Give me some pregens on nice white paper please!  4.9/5

Summary– I love me some sci-fi, and I don’t think enough is done with it in RPG spaces.  This book brings back the atmosphere of the 80’s Alien to a new decade and with a system that fits well with it.  It also doesn’t fall into any of the 80’s pitfalls of RPG book design and is a solid expression of modern book layout.  My issues are small.  I want more stuff for my characters, and I would like pregens on better, less black intensive sheets.  But, if thats the worst I can say about this, then an empty print carriage is a small price to pay for this awesome book. 98%