The Inside Scoop on Gaming

The Hell on Earth Radiation Screen is the gamemaster screen for, well, Hell on Earth the post-apocalypse RPG from Pinnacle. The Radiation Screen comes in two parts. The first is a 3-fold double sided and laminated screen. The side facing the players is in color and has tables for weapons, armor, combat modifiers, damage, and a few other basic charts. The middle section is filled with cover art. On the inside you lose the ranged weapons and armor, but gain the tables for fear, harrowed, movement and a few others. It's in black and white with no artwork.

The adventure is 48 pages in a 8.5x11 inch booklet. It is in black and white, contains a fair selection of artwork and maps, and has an easier to read and photocopy HoE character sheet in the back

_Major Strengths_

I thought the strongest part of the whole thing was the thought and detail that went into the adventure. It had almost everything that I as a gamemaster look for in a canned adventure: Detailed maps, appropriate artwork that relates to the scenes, NPC motivations, intelligent NPCs, good background and story elements, sections on what to do if the PCs derail the plot at key points, and excellent detail all around.

One thing that particularly impressed me was the tactics used by the bad guys in the first part of the adventure. They are ruthless and intelligent, but not overwhelmingly so. The feel I got was that they had set themselves up as strongly as possible given the limited time they had. A group of PCs will have a tough time with them if they elect for a straight up approach.

_Major Weaknesses_

The screen itself has one major failing. It's hard to read. PEG used a texture to simulate the look of a weathered piece of sheet metal, and the black ink tends to disappear into the "tarnish" marks. Combine that with a fairly small font size and certain words and numbers just tend to vanish into the background on the player's side. The visibility is worse on the black and white GMs side, where you don't have the contrast of color to help. I'll be printing out my own charts and paper clipping them to the inside of the screen.

Pinnacle had a similar problem with its Deadlands GM screen, and I was disappointed that they didn't prevent the same problems with this one.

_Strengths_

That's not to say that the screen is worthless. It fulfills the other two functions of a screen, which is to protect the information and die rolls of the GM, and it adds a good element of atmosphere to the gaming table. It is a quality screen and happens to look cool.

It is made out of a heavy cardstock and is laminated on the player's side, which will be useful in keeping it alive in the face of the inevitable soda deluge. It is heavy enough to not knock over under the impact of several dice being rolled. I used a handful - around 15 - of dice and rolled them several times behind the screen where they would hit the bottom of the screen in an "average" roll situation, the screen stood tall each time.

Another strength is the $15 price tag. Normally, Pinnacle products are on the expensive side, balanced by a high quality standard that usually makes compensates for the extra $5 or so bucks. This time they kept the best of both worlds, high quality and a decent price. (I was honestly expecting this to cost closer to $18).

_Weaknesses_

As for the adventure, I had only one real problem with it - it suffers from a friendly NPC who directs the storyline more then the PCs do. The start of the adventure is when the PCs are introduced to this NPC when he is in need of help, and the rest of the adventure is the PCs following the NPC around as the NPC lives up to his heroic nature.

There is some room for PC importance, but all to often the plot is forwarded by an action or "suggestion" of this guy.

I think that this is a great product - for the price. Break it down into it's two parts, and consider that your are paying $10 for a well thought out adventure and $5 for a good looking screen to protect the GMs notes and die rolls and the Radiation Screen comes out to be a "Very Good Buy.", despite the lack of legibility of the screen.

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

Hell On Earth Radiation Screen/Apocalypse Now! adventure (gm screen)
Author: John Hopler Category: game Company/Publisher: Pinnacle Entertainment Group Cost: $15.00 Page count: 46 screen ISBN: 1-889546-29-1 Playtest Review by Allan Seyberth on 11/20/98. Genre tags: Science_fiction Horror Post-apocalypse	The Hell on Earth Radiation Screen is the gamemaster screen for, well, Hell on Earth the post-apocalypse RPG from Pinnacle. The Radiation Screen comes in two parts. The first is a 3-fold double sided and laminated screen. The side facing the players is in color and has tables for weapons, armor, combat modifiers, damage, and a few other basic charts. The middle section is filled with cover art. On the inside you lose the ranged weapons and armor, but gain the tables for fear, harrowed, movement and a few others. It's in black and white with no artwork. The adventure is 48 pages in a 8.5x11 inch booklet. It is in black and white, contains a fair selection of artwork and maps, and has an easier to read and photocopy HoE character sheet in the back _Major Strengths_ I thought the strongest part of the whole thing was the thought and detail that went into the adventure. It had almost everything that I as a gamemaster look for in a canned adventure: Detailed maps, appropriate artwork that relates to the scenes, NPC motivations, intelligent NPCs, good background and story elements, sections on what to do if the PCs derail the plot at key points, and excellent detail all around. One thing that particularly impressed me was the tactics used by the bad guys in the first part of the adventure. They are ruthless and intelligent, but not overwhelmingly so. The feel I got was that they had set themselves up as strongly as possible given the limited time they had. A group of PCs will have a tough time with them if they elect for a straight up approach. _Major Weaknesses_ The screen itself has one major failing. It's hard to read. PEG used a texture to simulate the look of a weathered piece of sheet metal, and the black ink tends to disappear into the "tarnish" marks. Combine that with a fairly small font size and certain words and numbers just tend to vanish into the background on the player's side. The visibility is worse on the black and white GMs side, where you don't have the contrast of color to help. I'll be printing out my own charts and paper clipping them to the inside of the screen. Pinnacle had a similar problem with its Deadlands GM screen, and I was disappointed that they didn't prevent the same problems with this one. _Strengths_ That's not to say that the screen is worthless. It fulfills the other two functions of a screen, which is to protect the information and die rolls of the GM, and it adds a good element of atmosphere to the gaming table. It is a quality screen and happens to look cool. It is made out of a heavy cardstock and is laminated on the player's side, which will be useful in keeping it alive in the face of the inevitable soda deluge. It is heavy enough to not knock over under the impact of several dice being rolled. I used a handful - around 15 - of dice and rolled them several times behind the screen where they would hit the bottom of the screen in an "average" roll situation, the screen stood tall each time. Another strength is the $15 price tag. Normally, Pinnacle products are on the expensive side, balanced by a high quality standard that usually makes compensates for the extra $5 or so bucks. This time they kept the best of both worlds, high quality and a decent price. (I was honestly expecting this to cost closer to $18). _Weaknesses_ As for the adventure, I had only one real problem with it - it suffers from a friendly NPC who directs the storyline more then the PCs do. The start of the adventure is when the PCs are introduced to this NPC when he is in need of help, and the rest of the adventure is the PCs following the NPC around as the NPC lives up to his heroic nature. There is some room for PC importance, but all to often the plot is forwarded by an action or "suggestion" of this guy. I think that this is a great product - for the price. Break it down into it's two parts, and consider that your are paying $10 for a well thought out adventure and $5 for a good looking screen to protect the GMs notes and die rolls and the Radiation Screen comes out to be a "Very Good Buy.", despite the lack of legibility of the screen. Style: 4 (Classy and well done) Substance: 3 (Average)

Hell On Earth Radiation Screen/Apocalypse Now! adventure (gm screen)