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It is a common misconception that 7th Sea is a Pirate roleplaying game - nothing of the sort, it is a Swashbuckling roleplaying game that, to put it simply, gets everything right!
Now I have always been partial to cinematic style roleplaying games - Hong Kong Action Theatre, Big Eyes Small Mouth, Feng Shui, Adventure! (See my review for more on this game) to name a few. But if I were allowed to play only one game, I would have to choose 7th Sea.
Why?
Firstly, shrewd policy on the part of Alderac in regards to handling it's metaplot and secrets. 7th Sea is big on secrets, and the players' guide acts as nothing more than a primer to the setting and rules. The GM's guide contains a great deal of the secrets and rules that are necessary for play - with further information revealed through the various supplements.
But most of all, it is because this is a game that truly understands its genre and plays with the idea.
The book starts with a nice, easy to follow primer that tells the player everything s/he needs to know to get into their first game - rules, basic setting details and a sufficiently written fiction. (If there is one complaint I have it would be that the book does contain some dire fiction in places. But the game more than makes up for this.)
After the primer, the next section covers the world in more detail - while still managing to keep from giving anything away. The Wicks' choice of combining historical Europe with their own setting is far from lazy - it is truly intelligent. By using a familiar base, players find it easy to become immersed within the setting. In our first couple of games we managed to hook several players who had never roleplayed before in their lives. Within one session one of them was swearing like a norse viking while another was simpering like a typical French noble - it was amazing. Even D&D never had this effect on newbies.
Hero - the character creation section - provides the meat of the book. Before players even begin to look at numbers the game gets them to create a character by answering 20 questions about personality, attitudes and family, by the time you are ready to spend points you tend to have pretty good idea of what character you are going to play.
The rules section - aptly named Drama - gives only the basic rules that players need to know. The majority of the specific rules are in the GMs' guide. For those who don't know AEG's house rules, they consist of Trait Skill = number of d10s rolled. Then you simply keep a number of dice equal to your trait score. (Highest being best.) It is interesting to note that Lo5R 2nd ed uses a different iteration of these rules - but personally I like the original method for 7th Sea.
The key to the system being accurate to swashbuckling is based on three factors:
a) Drama Dice - each player gets a number of special dice that they can spend to reroll actions or otherwise alter game events to help their heroes come out on top.
b)Exploding Dice - if your character has a skill with the appropriate knack (these are abilities that the character has due to their skills) then any 10s rolled can be re-rolled - this can happen indefinitely, which is generally how characters manage to do many of their impressive stunts. I am constantly amazed by how many times we have rolled 10s in a single game.
c)Villains, Henchmen and Brutes - all opponents are divided up into one of these three categories. Villains are essentially like PCs - but evil. Henchmen are weaker villains and easier to defeat. Brutes are the fodder - players will tend to knock these guys down en masse. However, if there are enough brutes they can still overwhelm the PCs.
But not to worry about that - players cannot die. Just like a swashbuckling film, they can be hurt, maimed and knocked out - but they will always spring back for more in the next scene. This isn't carte blanche for players to run amok in a game however - the rules DO state that if a player can die in certain circumstances, but it is never through a bum-roll. Death is meant to be dramatic in 7th Sea, and so the game keeps faithful to that.
Magic in 7th Sea is unusual due to there being different rules for each of the different styles of magic - which is great in my opinion, it makes each nation that little bit more unique. If only the rules had been a little clearer though - for example, Sorte - the Vodacce (Italian) fate magic - is very confusing as to how it is supposed to be used.
After the rules is a Player section - this gives novice and experienced roleplayers various tips as to how to get the most enjoyment out of 7th sea as well as how to roleplay, create characters and generally enjoy the game. If only more companies would have to forethought to publish such essays in the main rules - it is great to see the writers communicating to the reader and answering their questions - so to speak.
For a book that is only the primer to the game, this is full of great stuff that is useful to any roleplayign game. Alderac's focus on players is fantastic and should be commended. They have sought to make a roleplaying game that IS a game and not simply an interactive novel on rails. Théah is huge and full of intrigue and mystery - the scope for adventures is just massive. As our GM put it - 'I just let the players create characters and then put them in a situation, the game pretty much runs itself after that.' I would have to agree - with a book that leads players step-by-step through the generation process and then gives advice as to how to play that character, as well as the great player support in later publications (Nearly all supplements can be read by both Players and GMs, barring certain GM only section) this game is obviously by players for players.
Take some time to look at this book next time you are in the gaming shop. Trust me, you won't regret it.
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