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Alliances is the second book that RTAS and Hero put out for C:NM, and it's basically a background book. It details five organizations: The Guard, a US Government based agency that consists of normals trying to fight off supervillans; the Arcadian Academy, a 'New Mutant' like school to help teenaged supers deal with their powers; the Scions of Caine, a mutant mutual-benefit organization, containing a number of evil mutants, and some just trying to get along; Odyssey Research Institute, a helpful scientific corporation similar to DC Comic's 'Star Labs'; and PanStar, a mostly evil corporation along the lines of GENOM. At the end, it contains some errata for the rules in C:NM, and a number of new powers and power modifiers that old Champions hands have been missing.

The listings of each organization are pretty complete. It starts off with the history of the group, followed by administrative people (often detailed in Instant Fuzion statistics, allowing the usual 12 or so primary statistics to be folded up into 4) and then any super-powered personnel in detailed write-ups. In the case of Odyssey Research Institute and PanStar, they also include add-ins for the life-path to make origins a little more detailed.

The Good:

For the length of the write-ups, most of the organizations are pretty completely covered. I can't really think of any details that I thought were missing, and even minor characters got some form of statistics. The Scions of Caine seemed particularly interesting: The goal of the group is the mutual support of mutants, and as such they're not so obviously evil as most evil mutant groups can be. They're willing to forgive (to a degree) any mutant who needs to work for good, and aside from taking what they want (which they believe they're entitled to) they don't go out of their way to hurt normals, which they generally feel is the same as going out of your way to kick a puppy.

The Arcadian Academy, although not terribly original, has it's good points as well. The students actually attend high school with normal students, and you can kind of feel the uncertainty some of these proto-heros have. Most interesting was Brother X, a spiritual superhero who's smart enough to be able to keep his origin in the dark, as well as to know that he needs more training before trying to change the world on his own. He cries out to have an adventure crafted around himself, and the writers have left enough in the dark to give the GM free reign with it.

Odyssey Research Institute and PanStar are your typical good corporation and bad corporation. They're not original, but the book gives you background and details on both, so you don't have to come up with the details for your own good and bad corporation. For fun, a short section on each suggests ways of changing what they're really like inside to confound the players.

Several mysteries from the original C:NM book are detailed for the GM. Since (unlike C:NM) this is mostly a GM-only book (except for the new rules, which could easily be photocopied), I'm quite happy to see what really has been going on. But nothing's completely explained, and there's a lot of things the GM can fill in for his own games.

And finally, a brace of new rules. Some minor errata, a number of powers they excluded from the first rulebook, and a handful of new power modifiers, such as limited uses and the ever-popular Focus limitation.

The Bad:

It seemed to me that most of the details on the Guard were repeated from the main rulebook. I'd rather they either came up with newer data, or made that section smaller and included more detail on something else.

All in all, at $14 for the whole book, it's quite a useful book for any C:NM GM who is playing in the C:NM world. If you're an Original Champions fanatic, I've heard that Hero will be reprinting this in the future with both Hero and Fuzion statistics, so keep an eye on it in the future.

Style: 4 (Classy and well done)
Substance: 3 (Average)

Champions: New Millennium, Alliances
Author: Eric Burnham, Steven S. Long, Steve Peterson, Bruce Harlick Category: game Company/Publisher: R. Taslorian Games Cost: 13.95 Page count: 96 ISBN: 0-937279-88-9 Playtest Review by John Fiala on 10/22/98. Genre tags: Science_fiction Modern_day	Alliances is the second book that RTAS and Hero put out for C:NM, and it's basically a background book. It details five organizations: The Guard, a US Government based agency that consists of normals trying to fight off supervillans; the Arcadian Academy, a 'New Mutant' like school to help teenaged supers deal with their powers; the Scions of Caine, a mutant mutual-benefit organization, containing a number of evil mutants, and some just trying to get along; Odyssey Research Institute, a helpful scientific corporation similar to DC Comic's 'Star Labs'; and PanStar, a mostly evil corporation along the lines of GENOM. At the end, it contains some errata for the rules in C:NM, and a number of new powers and power modifiers that old Champions hands have been missing. The listings of each organization are pretty complete. It starts off with the history of the group, followed by administrative people (often detailed in Instant Fuzion statistics, allowing the usual 12 or so primary statistics to be folded up into 4) and then any super-powered personnel in detailed write-ups. In the case of Odyssey Research Institute and PanStar, they also include add-ins for the life-path to make origins a little more detailed. The Good: For the length of the write-ups, most of the organizations are pretty completely covered. I can't really think of any details that I thought were missing, and even minor characters got some form of statistics. The Scions of Caine seemed particularly interesting: The goal of the group is the mutual support of mutants, and as such they're not so obviously evil as most evil mutant groups can be. They're willing to forgive (to a degree) any mutant who needs to work for good, and aside from taking what they want (which they believe they're entitled to) they don't go out of their way to hurt normals, which they generally feel is the same as going out of your way to kick a puppy. The Arcadian Academy, although not terribly original, has it's good points as well. The students actually attend high school with normal students, and you can kind of feel the uncertainty some of these proto-heros have. Most interesting was Brother X, a spiritual superhero who's smart enough to be able to keep his origin in the dark, as well as to know that he needs more training before trying to change the world on his own. He cries out to have an adventure crafted around himself, and the writers have left enough in the dark to give the GM free reign with it. Odyssey Research Institute and PanStar are your typical good corporation and bad corporation. They're not original, but the book gives you background and details on both, so you don't have to come up with the details for your own good and bad corporation. For fun, a short section on each suggests ways of changing what they're really like inside to confound the players. Several mysteries from the original C:NM book are detailed for the GM. Since (unlike C:NM) this is mostly a GM-only book (except for the new rules, which could easily be photocopied), I'm quite happy to see what really has been going on. But nothing's completely explained, and there's a lot of things the GM can fill in for his own games. And finally, a brace of new rules. Some minor errata, a number of powers they excluded from the first rulebook, and a handful of new power modifiers, such as limited uses and the ever-popular Focus limitation. The Bad: It seemed to me that most of the details on the Guard were repeated from the main rulebook. I'd rather they either came up with newer data, or made that section smaller and included more detail on something else. All in all, at $14 for the whole book, it's quite a useful book for any C:NM GM who is playing in the C:NM world. If you're an Original Champions fanatic, I've heard that Hero will be reprinting this in the future with both Hero and Fuzion statistics, so keep an eye on it in the future. Style: 4 (Classy and well done) Substance: 3 (Average)

Champions: New Millennium, Alliances