The Inside Scoop on Gaming

"For ten measly cents, a kid (or an adult, for that matter) could escape the mundane world and step into a world of action and adventure that only the comics could provide."

MetalMan's Review of "Four Colors" by Cynthia Celeste Miller

The Premise:
Four Colors is a roleplaying game that draws its inspiration from the Golden Age of the comic book in America... a time when heroes were heroic and villains were dastardly. Action was over-the-top and fresh adventure was only a cheap pulp comic away.

What Ya Get:
The game itself is divided into two booklets: the Player's Guide and the Gamemaster's Guide. Both are available as HTML and PDF documents. As I prefer the Adobe Acrobat format, this review will be based on it. The Player's Guide clocks in at sixteen pages and the GM's Guide at thirteen. Your page count from the hypertext format may vary.

Cost:
Nothing. Zip. Zilch. Zero. Gratis. Free.

Appearance:
Unlike the genre its based on, Four Colors is extremely simple in appearance. Text is arranged in two columns on the page with the occassional table tossed in. On the plus side, the text size is large and easily read for those of us who have irradiated our eyes to near blindness. Still, this is a free rpg so the true measure of the game will be its contents rather than any graphical or layout element.

The Game:
Four Colors is a point-based system with a certain level of abstraction built into it for handling superpowers that reminds me a little bit of the old Mayfair DC Heroes game. This is especially appropriate to the 1940s superheroics as everything was new and limited only by the minds of the comic creators. Another plus is that, since its point-based, scaling the power level of your game is easily accomplished. Running street-level heroes such as The Spirit or The Green Hornet is as simple as limiting the number of points available to the character.

The Four Colors Player's Guide:
The Player's Guide jumps right into character creation. At its default game, Four Colors recommends awarding sixty points for character creation. It also doesn't use any attributes per se and uses Traits instead. Traits are various mental, physical and social aspects of the character such as Wealth or Detective. Traits range from -2 to 4 for normal humans and from 2 to 5 for superhumans. Superhuman traits add to the already existing human traits as human characters can never have a trait higher than four.

There is no list of superpowers in Four Colors. It is a pure "roll your own" mechanic in the guidelines are given for creating powers to keep them balanced in relation to the game but everything else is wide open for players to get creative with. Powers are defined in point cost by their impact on the story aka Power Level and Power Rating or the magnitude of the power.

Character creation wraps with options for purchasing Oomph and Stunts. Oomph comes into play during initiative and when you roll a 12 on a action check. It basically allows you to add your oomph rating to the die result. Stunt points function in the same capacity in that they improve the result of your action check by adding your Oomph score but can be used at any time. Stunt points are expended but replensh between adventures.

Action checks are a simple roll of a single d12 plus Trait versus a Difficulty Number. These rolls can be modified by any superhuman ratings. Opposed actions are handled by each side rolling d12 Trait with the highest roll being the victor. Combat is merely action checks with a few modifiers to the difficulty number to handle things such as range. Damage is fixed for most ranged attacks (except for thrown items) and variable for most melee attacks based on the Body trait.

The Player's Guide concludes with a section of distance benchmarks for ranged powers based on their ratings, travel speed based on the Athletics Trait, a brief description of various types of damage (mainly geared towards non-defendable attacks such as mental ones) and the creation of items and/or vehicles.

The Four Colors Gamemaster's Guide:
The GM's Guide really should have been called "How to Roleplay During the Golden Age of Comics" as its main value is in tips and guidelines for how to emulate the genre. Some rules are included at the beginning and they are mainly the "squiggly bits" of games that players generally dont think about but always come up in games. Rules are given for awarding experience points and how to advance characters, guidelines for chase scenes, the role of money and wealth, item creation and inventions, and the ever popular falling/drowning/burning rules.

The biggest advantage of the GM Guide is the "setting" information. Even if you are completely unfamiliar with the Golden Age of comics, you should be easily able to get a game up and running with the correct flavor after reading the guide. It covers such important information as morality and patriotism, theme villains, outlandish costumes, the use of coincidence, recurring villains and the sidekick. This is followed by valuable advice to the gamemaster on how to structure and run a Series (a campaign) that will be fun for everyone without becoming unbalanced or boring. Tips on structuring Issues (single adventures) are also given including pacing information and sources of ideas that you can draw upon. The GM Guide concludes with the most important part of any superhero game - how to create the master villain.

Overall Impression:
Four Colors is an interesting experiment in creating a superhero game without a massive list of powers that attempts to cover everything. I think its refreshing to place the control back into the hands of the players who, if they are playing superheroes, generally tend to be on the creative side anyway and like being able to make their heroes and heroines as they envision them instead of having to endlessly bend it to fit a rigid rules system. I'm a big fan of the old Justice Society comics so I'm very partial to Golden Age heroics as the setting allows more than just fighting crime. Four Colors is definately worth a look if you're looking for straightforward superhero action without the emotional baggage that most modern heroes seem to carry.

MetalMan signing off.

Four Colors
Four Colors Capsule Review by MetalMan on 03/07/01 Style: 4 (Classy and well done) Substance: 4 (Meaty) POW! Take that, Axis Scum! 1940s Superhero Action! Product: Four Colors Author: Cynthia Celeste Miller Category: RPG Company/Publisher: Spectrum Studios Line: Cost: FREE Page count: n/a Year published: 2001 ISBN: SKU: Comp copy?: no Capsule Review by MetalMan on 03/07/01 Genre tags: Superhero	"For ten measly cents, a kid (or an adult, for that matter) could escape the mundane world and step into a world of action and adventure that only the comics could provide." MetalMan's Review of "Four Colors" by Cynthia Celeste Miller The Premise: Four Colors is a roleplaying game that draws its inspiration from the Golden Age of the comic book in America... a time when heroes were heroic and villains were dastardly. Action was over-the-top and fresh adventure was only a cheap pulp comic away. What Ya Get: The game itself is divided into two booklets: the Player's Guide and the Gamemaster's Guide. Both are available as HTML and PDF documents. As I prefer the Adobe Acrobat format, this review will be based on it. The Player's Guide clocks in at sixteen pages and the GM's Guide at thirteen. Your page count from the hypertext format may vary. Cost: Nothing. Zip. Zilch. Zero. Gratis. Free. Appearance: Unlike the genre its based on, Four Colors is extremely simple in appearance. Text is arranged in two columns on the page with the occassional table tossed in. On the plus side, the text size is large and easily read for those of us who have irradiated our eyes to near blindness. Still, this is a free rpg so the true measure of the game will be its contents rather than any graphical or layout element. The Game: Four Colors is a point-based system with a certain level of abstraction built into it for handling superpowers that reminds me a little bit of the old Mayfair DC Heroes game. This is especially appropriate to the 1940s superheroics as everything was new and limited only by the minds of the comic creators. Another plus is that, since its point-based, scaling the power level of your game is easily accomplished. Running street-level heroes such as The Spirit or The Green Hornet is as simple as limiting the number of points available to the character. The Four Colors Player's Guide: The Player's Guide jumps right into character creation. At its default game, Four Colors recommends awarding sixty points for character creation. It also doesn't use any attributes per se and uses Traits instead. Traits are various mental, physical and social aspects of the character such as Wealth or Detective. Traits range from -2 to 4 for normal humans and from 2 to 5 for superhumans. Superhuman traits add to the already existing human traits as human characters can never have a trait higher than four. There is no list of superpowers in Four Colors. It is a pure "roll your own" mechanic in the guidelines are given for creating powers to keep them balanced in relation to the game but everything else is wide open for players to get creative with. Powers are defined in point cost by their impact on the story aka Power Level and Power Rating or the magnitude of the power. Character creation wraps with options for purchasing Oomph and Stunts. Oomph comes into play during initiative and when you roll a 12 on a action check. It basically allows you to add your oomph rating to the die result. Stunt points function in the same capacity in that they improve the result of your action check by adding your Oomph score but can be used at any time. Stunt points are expended but replensh between adventures. Action checks are a simple roll of a single d12 plus Trait versus a Difficulty Number. These rolls can be modified by any superhuman ratings. Opposed actions are handled by each side rolling d12 Trait with the highest roll being the victor. Combat is merely action checks with a few modifiers to the difficulty number to handle things such as range. Damage is fixed for most ranged attacks (except for thrown items) and variable for most melee attacks based on the Body trait. The Player's Guide concludes with a section of distance benchmarks for ranged powers based on their ratings, travel speed based on the Athletics Trait, a brief description of various types of damage (mainly geared towards non-defendable attacks such as mental ones) and the creation of items and/or vehicles. The Four Colors Gamemaster's Guide: The GM's Guide really should have been called "How to Roleplay During the Golden Age of Comics" as its main value is in tips and guidelines for how to emulate the genre. Some rules are included at the beginning and they are mainly the "squiggly bits" of games that players generally dont think about but always come up in games. Rules are given for awarding experience points and how to advance characters, guidelines for chase scenes, the role of money and wealth, item creation and inventions, and the ever popular falling/drowning/burning rules. The biggest advantage of the GM Guide is the "setting" information. Even if you are completely unfamiliar with the Golden Age of comics, you should be easily able to get a game up and running with the correct flavor after reading the guide. It covers such important information as morality and patriotism, theme villains, outlandish costumes, the use of coincidence, recurring villains and the sidekick. This is followed by valuable advice to the gamemaster on how to structure and run a Series (a campaign) that will be fun for everyone without becoming unbalanced or boring. Tips on structuring Issues (single adventures) are also given including pacing information and sources of ideas that you can draw upon. The GM Guide concludes with the most important part of any superhero game - how to create the master villain. Overall Impression: Four Colors is an interesting experiment in creating a superhero game without a massive list of powers that attempts to cover everything. I think its refreshing to place the control back into the hands of the players who, if they are playing superheroes, generally tend to be on the creative side anyway and like being able to make their heroes and heroines as they envision them instead of having to endlessly bend it to fit a rigid rules system. I'm a big fan of the old Justice Society comics so I'm very partial to Golden Age heroics as the setting allows more than just fighting crime. Four Colors is definately worth a look if you're looking for straightforward superhero action without the emotional baggage that most modern heroes seem to carry. MetalMan signing off.