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Fast forward to 2002. Chaosium reprints the 16-page pamphlet for a new generation. While there were some subtle rules changes, including the nerfing of impale, very little actually changed. Many people out there criticized the reprinting, believing that the pamphlet was not worth the price tag. It still served as an introduction, but this version of the pamphlet made the mistake of labeling the game as "complete". There's only so much that can be put into 16 pages, and only one creature in the book, it's not going to happen.
In 2004, the 16-page pamphlet was pulled from Chaosium's lineup and replaced with a series of print-on-demand monographs, consisting of a Player's Book, a Magic Book, a Creature Book, and a Gamemaster Book. These monographs are advertised as pre-production material, and have not been extensively edited. Therefore, this review does not focus on the presentation of the material, and does not extensively deal with the presence or absence of game world or flavor text.
The 16-page Basic Roleplaying booklet provided extremely basic rules for the creation of characters and conduction combat. As an introduction to roleplaying, this was a deliberate design decision on the part of Chaosium. The Player's Book monograph outstrips the introductory pamphlet in virtually every respect, providing more of everything that existed within the 16 pages of the Basic Roleplaying booklet. Instead of the introductory character in the booklet, starting off as a young boy, players now have the option to select an occupation from an extensive list. To select a character type, the player first determines the character's background: primative, nomad, barbarian, and civilized. The player then randomly determines the occupation of the character's parents. This also in effect determines what occupation and skills the character will carry. The Player's Book does provide an alternative method that avoids the dice rolling, allowing the player to choose his occupation. The authors state that the gamemaster must be careful to prevent abuse if he uses this system, but in spite of that caution, I myself would recommend that option as it provides the player with the freedom to develop his character as he chooses, without being straitjacketed by die rolls.
After determining the character's occupation with whatever method the gamemaster is most comfortable with, the player then determines all the stats. Unlike the Basic Roleplaying booklet, the hit point system is completely different. Instead of a single hit point tally that covers the entire character, the hit points are broken up by body part. Following this, fatigue points and strike ranks are determined. At this point, everyone should have a sneaking suspicion that some of this stuff has been seen before. You'd be right.
The rest of the Player's Book explains the combat system and how characters gain experience. Unlike the Basic Roleplaying pamphlet, combat is extremely detailed, utilizing those fatigue points and strike ranks and combining the whole into a very realistic combat system. If it wasn't suspected before, now you really should have a suspicion that this stuff has been seen before. Again, you'd be right. Without even going into the other books one can figure out this is RuneQuest 3rd Edition with the serial numbers filed off! While this isn't a bad thing because the system still has a loyal following to this day, the fact that this stuff has been seen before does make it difficult to recommend buying these for roleplaying purposes. However, at the time of this writing, there is a dearth of 3rd Edition RuneQuest material on ebay, and they are an available option.
That this material is essentially reprints of older material is the biggest drawback to the monographs. Everything in them has been seen before. In fact, the text is taken verbatim from RuneQuest third edition, even down to using the same character in the examples provided. The fact that the information has been seen before is not a big issue. This system after all is the core rules for practically every Chaosium product. What is of more concern is that the text is just the RuneQuest rules recycled. Although these are pre-production monographs, and not available in stores, these monographs could have been the perfect springboard to begin to incorporate some of the updates found in the aborted RuneQuest 4th edition playtest rules (freely available on the web). Perhaps, if and when Chaosium decides to commence actual work on this product, the updates will work their way in. I've been told that the actual product is being retooled, and that the actual product will not just be RuneQuest reprinted.
For the sake of completeness, I will provide capsule reviews of the other three books that make up the Basic Roleplaying system monographs. Keep in mind though that as this is RuneQuest, there isn't much that I can really say about these books that hasn't been discussed before in other reviews on RuneQuest.
The Magic Book builds on the Player's Book and provides spells for the Basic Roleplaying character in four different categories: spirit magic, divine magic, sorcery, and ceremony. Spells in Basic Roleplaying are point based, rather than the Vancian system of D&D and its brethren. Rules are provided for learning spells, which differ depending on the category of magic being learned. Most of the book is nothing more than spell lists with effects. The 16-page Basic Roleplaying pamphlet did not cover spells at all, preferring to leave that to the games in which the Basic Roleplaying system was used. But, just like the Player's Book, there's nothing new here.
Next up is the Creature Book. These characters you've created need something to fight, and in these 50 pages, you find stats and descriptions for over 70 monsters, including a few entries with multiple variations. The first part of the book starts off with what a monster is, and then delves into issues such as what an incomplete monster is and how incomplete stats can make things difficult for the characters. The next section then explains the format the monster statistics are in as well as explaining how to read skills. Then come the monsters, and in a nice touch, sidebars in the book detail several potential character races, including the standards (elf, dwarf, halfling), and some less standard options (broo, ducks, centaurs). Since this book is all monsters, there is little in the way of game mechanics in this book, but that is not a drawback, as the mechanics are covered in the Player's Book.
The Gamemaster Book is different from the other three monographs in that it has a small table of contents. A table of contents could have been useful in the Player's Book, but again, this is technically pre-production material, and some allowances should be made. The Gamemaster Book is broken down into several main sections detailing various things that can assist a gamemaster in running a Basic Roleplaying campaign. The first section, Gamemastering, delves into the areas of how to run a campaign, as well as designing a campaign. There is nothing earth-shattering here, and nothing that any other role playing game hasn't already gone over, but it's nice to see.
The next section, Scenario Aids, deals with various aids in fleshing out scenarios or campaigns. While a section on languages is of varying usefulness, the encounter tables and treasure generation rules here are rather important. After all, sometimes it is necessary to reward the characters for their activities. The last part of this section details danger classes, which is noted as an optional component. This "optional" component though is a lot like the D&D treasure tables, and I recommend it be used.
The third section, Civilization, goes into detail regarding the sizes of cities and towns and things within those cities and towns. Rather generic information, and usable in any campaign, this part explains the differences between single homes, villages, towns, and cities. After this, the various standards of living are described in terms of income, from the lowliest peasant to the highest lord. The last part of this section provides a listing of various items that can be found in the cities and towns of the game world.
The next section, Ships & Sailing, details rules for nautical travel and combat. It starts off by defining the attributes of a ship, then proceeds to explain the different ship types in the game world as well as note their crew sizes. Movement rates are discussed next, and unexpectedly, focus on four different wind types in relation to the ship instead of focusing on game speeds, although game speeds are noted in a small sidebar. The next portion of this section details the various things that can damage ship, such as storms and monsters (both of which are illustrated on the front cover), as well as the more mundane things, like failing to bail out your ship, since all ships in the game take on water as a normal function. Of course, if your ship gets damaged, you have to be able to repair it, so the last part of this section tells the gamemaster how to repair ships that have been damaged by the aforementioned storms, monsters, or crew laziness.
The final section is an introductory adventure, The Money Tree. Taking place in the town of Greenbrass, 4-6 characters are sent on a mission to retrieve a holy object. The adventure is standard fare, but on the first day out that accursed bear that made such a nuisance of himself in the Basic Roleplaying pamphlet makes yet another appearance. It's almost as if the adventure from the pamphlet was incorporated into The Money Tree.
A character generation summary, a character sheet, ship sheets, and an adventure record make up the rest of the book. The very last page is a listing of the other monographs in this series.
The only way the Basic Roleplaying system can stand on its own is if the buyer purchases all four of the monographs. Chaosium has marketed these books as a way to gauge consumer interest in the rules. I wholeheartedly recommend that Chaosium proceed post-haste with producing an updated version of this system. They have a hole in their lineup that I feel does need to be filled. After all, they have dark fantasy in Stormbringer, horror in Call of Cthulhu, they had science-fiction in Ringworld, and superheroes in Superworld. Basic Roleplaying can be high fantasy, which is D&D territory, but at the same time can be set up as a generic system, allowing gaming in any genre. After all, Superworld and Ringworld are both out of print, and both of those can have their actual rules, if not setting, set up to work with Basic Roleplaying. Though only speculation, it's entirely possible that the next editions of Chaosium product will be released in a core rulebook/setting book model, like what White Wolf is now doing with the World of Darkness.
The monographs do succeed in their role as a tool for prospective authors. If you want Chaosium to publish Basic Roleplaying, then head on over to their site and purchase the monographs. However, if all you wish to do is play this game, I suggest searching on Ebay for a copy of third edition RuneQuest. You get the same rules, plus a world setting, for much less than the approximately $60 the monographs together cost. I'd personally like to see material from the aborted 4th edition RuneQuest playtest document incorporated into the main rules, and if that were to happen, then I'd be telling everyone to buy the game, especially the RuneQuest players.
Note: given their nature as print-on-demand books, the style rating of 2 is accurate. There is no art, though the text is easy to read. However, this review does not focus on style, but substance, so I ask that you not take the style into account when replying to the review.
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