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Haven: City of Violence has a free download of the basic rules on rpgnow.com. I went there, took the time to download the whole package, and then picked up The Killing Fields supplement as well.

The game is a stylish, modern day shoot-em up, with a focus on gritty urban crime and violence. And wow, lots of violence. This is a pretty brutal game. But, my players just got Grand Theft Auto Vice City, so they were ready for this. We ran a pretty good session, and I'll recap most of it, and the basic rules as follows.

Character creation is points driving, distributing 100 character points into Strength, Intelligence, Perception, Willpower, Agility, and then derived from those main attributes come the players attributes of Accuracy, Influence, Counter Measures (think picking locks), and Subterfuge (think sneaking around), Speed, and Fighting Value. But beyond that, the characters take on a GURPS-esque quality of getting Benefits, Disadvantages, and Special Abilities. Benefits like Marksmas costs Character points, while Disadvantages like Pursued by Drug Dealers gives you points back. There are quite a few interesting Special Abilities, such as CHI, which lets you pump up an attribute for a few rounds, or Dodge, which lets you hop out of the way of bullets, but you can only choose to use it BEFORE someone rolls to see if they hit.

That being said, the skill list and languages seems tacked on and unrealistic. The skills are many, but being a grand master in Engineering doesnt really help you that much, or give you much of an advantage over everyone else. And while the languages have a good list, the characters just have WAY too many. I doubt a street thug of mine would really be able to speak four different langauges so well. Its also pretty easy to just make the "Biggest, baddest m'fn character around" using the rules.

The players took around a half hour to make the characters (it was our first time, I bet you can do it alot faster the more you know the system). They made a drug dealer on the run from former associates he double crossed, a former cop turned shifty, corruptable security guard, and a general Getaway Driver/gunrunner.

Coming up with motivations here isnt too hard, since the players were all down on their luck, and needed cash, cash, cash to get our of their respective predicaments. I wanted things to be pretty simple and straightforward, so they got a call from Tony Basso, medium level Italian gangster from the Santucci crime family. Basso wanted them to find out wherever federal witness and stoolie Freddie Mederi was hiding out, and kill him. The game does a good job of promoting this really violent, morally vacant world of criminals and casual backstabbing. Each area of the city (from the suburban Freeman Hills to the burnt out factories of Armistad) are pretty much overseen by a different ethnic gang, all at odds with each other and with their own agenda for gaining power and crushing their enemies.

So anyway, the players hit the streets, and started twisting arms to see what people knew about where the guy was being held. When they went into the wrong dive bar, the group hit their first real action. Since initiating a shootout bloodbath was decided against, the players got to use the highlight of the H:CoV system, the hand to hand rules. At first, I wanted to use away with it, since it is a massive chart, but it is all rather intuitive. Every character gets a certain number of actions to spend, depending on their fighting value score. Then, before the fists start flying, everyone picks their moves, such as a fist to the solar plexus, which costs 1 action point, or a high block, anothe 1 point, or maybe they want to attempt a suplex, which is 3 points, I think. So on the first round of combat, whoever has the highest INtelligence (?) goes first, and sees if their opponent picked any defense that will work against the move. Depending on what kind of defense the enemy has, the damage and effect changes considerably. Its a blast to run and play, and kept the players very nervous, since they couldnt rely solely on rolling.

After the barfight, which left the getaway driver limping with a broken nose and a few cracked ribs, they figured out that the federal witness was being holed up in a hotel on the outskirts of town.

After some driving hijinks over old roads, the players approached the old hotel, and planned out their actions. This being the first game, they decided that going in guns blazing would be the best course of action. Shooting in the game is pretty typical, rolling under your Accuracy score, putting in modifiers, and then if you hit, rolling to see where, and how much damage you do, with all different kinds of dice. Its more lengthy and involves more rolling than something like Unknown Armies, so if you like straight to the point gunfights, this probably isnt for you. I enjoyed it since it seemed to keep the action going, but seemd so cinematic, I guess.

Basically, the game ended with the ex-cop shotgunned in the gut at close range, the gunrunner driver getting behind the wheel of a car bleeding from gunshots to both legs, and the backstabbing dealer chasing the witness across an open field and emptying a clip before finally dropping him in the tall grass.

So that is how the game works. If you enjoy Grnd Theft Auto, you'll enjoy the game. The backstory and "world" of Haven are good, maybe a bit contrived and simplistic, but definately atmospheric and dangerous to live in. The rules are really, really well laid out, and the art is really nice, seriously. It was of a much, much better quality than I expected for a PDF download.

All in All, a fine outing, and the most fun I've had in a modern style game in quite some time.

Haven: City of Violence Demo Rules
Haven: City of Violence Demo Rules Playtest Review by Derek Woods on 02/02/03 Style: 4 (Classy and well done) Substance: 4 (Meaty) Ready for your Grand Theft Auto RPG? Here it is! Product: Haven: City of Violence Demo Rules Author: Louis Porter jr. Category: RPG Company/Publisher: LPJ Design Line: Haven: City of Violence Cost: zero! Page count: 40 Year published: ISBN: SKU: Comp copy?: no Playtest Review by Derek Woods on 02/02/03 Genre tags: Modern day Conspiracy	Haven: City of Violence has a free download of the basic rules on rpgnow.com. I went there, took the time to download the whole package, and then picked up The Killing Fields supplement as well. The game is a stylish, modern day shoot-em up, with a focus on gritty urban crime and violence. And wow, lots of violence. This is a pretty brutal game. But, my players just got Grand Theft Auto Vice City, so they were ready for this. We ran a pretty good session, and I'll recap most of it, and the basic rules as follows. Character creation is points driving, distributing 100 character points into Strength, Intelligence, Perception, Willpower, Agility, and then derived from those main attributes come the players attributes of Accuracy, Influence, Counter Measures (think picking locks), and Subterfuge (think sneaking around), Speed, and Fighting Value. But beyond that, the characters take on a GURPS-esque quality of getting Benefits, Disadvantages, and Special Abilities. Benefits like Marksmas costs Character points, while Disadvantages like Pursued by Drug Dealers gives you points back. There are quite a few interesting Special Abilities, such as CHI, which lets you pump up an attribute for a few rounds, or Dodge, which lets you hop out of the way of bullets, but you can only choose to use it BEFORE someone rolls to see if they hit. That being said, the skill list and languages seems tacked on and unrealistic. The skills are many, but being a grand master in Engineering doesnt really help you that much, or give you much of an advantage over everyone else. And while the languages have a good list, the characters just have WAY too many. I doubt a street thug of mine would really be able to speak four different langauges so well. Its also pretty easy to just make the "Biggest, baddest m'fn character around" using the rules. The players took around a half hour to make the characters (it was our first time, I bet you can do it alot faster the more you know the system). They made a drug dealer on the run from former associates he double crossed, a former cop turned shifty, corruptable security guard, and a general Getaway Driver/gunrunner. Coming up with motivations here isnt too hard, since the players were all down on their luck, and needed cash, cash, cash to get our of their respective predicaments. I wanted things to be pretty simple and straightforward, so they got a call from Tony Basso, medium level Italian gangster from the Santucci crime family. Basso wanted them to find out wherever federal witness and stoolie Freddie Mederi was hiding out, and kill him. The game does a good job of promoting this really violent, morally vacant world of criminals and casual backstabbing. Each area of the city (from the suburban Freeman Hills to the burnt out factories of Armistad) are pretty much overseen by a different ethnic gang, all at odds with each other and with their own agenda for gaining power and crushing their enemies. So anyway, the players hit the streets, and started twisting arms to see what people knew about where the guy was being held. When they went into the wrong dive bar, the group hit their first real action. Since initiating a shootout bloodbath was decided against, the players got to use the highlight of the H:CoV system, the hand to hand rules. At first, I wanted to use away with it, since it is a massive chart, but it is all rather intuitive. Every character gets a certain number of actions to spend, depending on their fighting value score. Then, before the fists start flying, everyone picks their moves, such as a fist to the solar plexus, which costs 1 action point, or a high block, anothe 1 point, or maybe they want to attempt a suplex, which is 3 points, I think. So on the first round of combat, whoever has the highest INtelligence (?) goes first, and sees if their opponent picked any defense that will work against the move. Depending on what kind of defense the enemy has, the damage and effect changes considerably. Its a blast to run and play, and kept the players very nervous, since they couldnt rely solely on rolling. After the barfight, which left the getaway driver limping with a broken nose and a few cracked ribs, they figured out that the federal witness was being holed up in a hotel on the outskirts of town. After some driving hijinks over old roads, the players approached the old hotel, and planned out their actions. This being the first game, they decided that going in guns blazing would be the best course of action. Shooting in the game is pretty typical, rolling under your Accuracy score, putting in modifiers, and then if you hit, rolling to see where, and how much damage you do, with all different kinds of dice. Its more lengthy and involves more rolling than something like Unknown Armies, so if you like straight to the point gunfights, this probably isnt for you. I enjoyed it since it seemed to keep the action going, but seemd so cinematic, I guess. Basically, the game ended with the ex-cop shotgunned in the gut at close range, the gunrunner driver getting behind the wheel of a car bleeding from gunshots to both legs, and the backstabbing dealer chasing the witness across an open field and emptying a clip before finally dropping him in the tall grass. So that is how the game works. If you enjoy Grnd Theft Auto, you'll enjoy the game. The backstory and "world" of Haven are good, maybe a bit contrived and simplistic, but definately atmospheric and dangerous to live in. The rules are really, really well laid out, and the art is really nice, seriously. It was of a much, much better quality than I expected for a PDF download. All in All, a fine outing, and the most fun I've had in a modern style game in quite some time.

Haven: City of Violence Demo Rules