Author: Matt Forbeck & Chris Snyder
Category: game
Company/Publisher: Pinnacle Entertainment Group, Inc.

Reviewed by James McPherson on 08/12/97. Genre tags: none

Independence Day is one Pinnacle's holiday-themed Dime Novels. A combination of short story and module, it does a very good job at providing ample setting (and potential ways the story could be turn out) for a substantial module.

The short story focuses on the further adventures of Ronan Chantry. Now, I'm going to let you in on something important: Ronan's a Harrowed. This is incredibly vital as Mr. Forbeck feels it necessary to make nearly a dozen not so subtle comments to that effect on the first page. Fortunately, this is the only flaw with the story. Ronan and the other important characters are fully fleshed out, there are no real lulls in the story, and it reads well. I was generally impressed with the writing (barring the first page), and personally expect to see an anthology of short stories by Forbeck on shelves in the next few years.

The module and story are set in Dodge on July 4th, 1876. The basic premise, without giving too much away, is that Dodge is having a big shebang to celebrate the holiday, even though they are smack dab in the middle of the disputed territory. Wyatt Earp, Bat Masterson, and the rest of the Dodge police force are unequipped to deal with the event and are hiring temporary deputies. If you can't figure out that this means the PC's should get hired and some kinda hell breaks loose then you're one sad puppy.

The NPC's are given fully fleshed stats, clues abound, and the bounty points are clearly indicated. Several locations are detailed, but I highly recommend having The Quick and The Dead handy when you run. There is a much better map along with a larger list of places and people that made my game much easier to run. A small, functional map of Dodge is included, but a map of the two or three important buildings would have been highly appreciated.

Gameplay went smoothly, and lasted for about 3 sessions (6-10 hours of play). The module is intended to be run in a linear fashion but it's not so rigid in arrangement that an incredibly lucky player won't throw the module into disarray when they figure out the "big secret" an hour into the game.

My only real gripe is something that many others will enjoy: all the NPC's combat stats are in one neat little package at the back of the supplement. This wouldn't be such a problem, but the rest of their stats and skills are listed at the start of the module. I would have appreciated having all of the information in one section rather than hunting through the book to find somebody's Quickdraw skill, which is oddly left out of the combat section.

All in all, the Dime Novel is a very functional one that manages to packages a well-written module with a decent story that helps set the stage. The layout and arrangment of the module are very well thought out, and the classic problem of the overly-vital clue was avoided. Any half-way competent group should easily make it to the finale, and if not the Marshal has more than enough NPC's that could clue them in.

Style: 4 (Classy and well done)
Substance: 5 (Excellent!)