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The game is presented in a very attractive book with a blood red cover, printed on heavy, glossy paper with full color artwork and monochrome inkings. Flipping through the layout is plain but very functional though the artwork seems a little sparse. The production values on this book were obviously very high from the quality paper stock and sewn binding. The most glaring offense is the lack of an index in the back of the book. Gaming books already have a reputation for bad indices but Qin seems to have dispensed with them altogether. The table of contents is very well laid out though and for the most part comprehensive.
By far the weakest point of this game is organization. We see stats for sample characters, templates, skill lists and the like before we know what they are or how they fit into character creation. There isn't an index. Let me emphasize that to make sure I get the point across: there is no index. Despite how light the game is on mechanics it really hurts not having a quick lookup for mechanics or setting concepts when you're in a game.
Much of the book concerns itself with setting material: Chinese folklore, Taoist traditions and the history of the Warring States period. As a scholar of Chinese history I can say that the overview of the period that Qin provides is an excellent overview of the period.
Qin: The Mechanics
The system that Qin uses is based off of Taoist and Chinese folkloric traditions concerning the five elements, Wood, Metal, Fire, Water and Earth that represent physical, spiritual and mental characteristics. They correspond roughly to intelligence, strength, charisma, constitution and wisdom/spirituality. These five aspects, as the game calls them, are assigned on a 1:1 basis with fourteen points. Later in character creation secondary stats such as life force, chi and passive defense will be calculated based off of the five elements and their relations to one another. For example players planning on a character with a high chi for spellcasting would be best off balancing their metal and water total against their fire and wood total. In this case, the smaller the difference between the two, i.e. the more "in balance" they are, the higher the character's chi. It's a good bit simpler in practice.
After reading through the character generation section of Qin and downloading a copy of the official character sheet it took me about thirty minutes. The character generation system is point based so it's very formulaic and would lend itself very well to a character generator should anyone decide to make one. Players have fourteen points to spend on a 1:1 basis for their base attributes, 15 points for skills spent on a sliding scale (level 2 skills cost more, and the cost is cumulative), and another fifteen points on a similar sliding scale for use on Taos, Techniques and Magic. Qin also has provisions for an advantage/disadvantage system but unlike many other games such as Shadowrun players do not gain extra build points for taking disadvantages. In Qin players simply have to choose one advantage or one disadvantage. Most of the advantages involve the option for re-rolling certain skill tests while the disadvantages mean that the GM can ask a player to re-roll a skill test. The flaws in the official character sheet become glaringly obvious as one tries to fill it out - there simply isn't enough room in many cases. Many of the Taos, spells and techniques are described like martial arts techniques from a Shaw Brothers film. Character sheets will be full of "Jianshu" for fencing or "Breath of the Dragon". Maybe I write in big chunky letters but I had trouble with the small spaces allotted. The sheets are very pretty but there is a lot of empty space.
To help speed character creation up Qin provides a number of character archetypes, much like Shadowrun does. These archetypes represent a number of different professions, from soldier to courtesan, found in the Warring States that players can use for the basis of their characters. They aren't a requirement but they do help quite a bit in speeding things up by helping players find skillsets to match their concepts. Equipment and the like is left up to the discretion of the players. There simply isn't any starting gold, just what you and your gamemaster agree on what makes sense for your character at the start of the game.
The task resolution and combat system in Qin is conducted using two ten sided dice, one white and one black, that represent the yin and yang aspects of the universe. Unlike many other games the "0" on a ten sider is quite literally a zero instead of a 10. When called to make a test players will roll the two dice and subtract the lower result from the higher result. Qin refers to this two die construct as the yin-yang die and the results it generates will be added to the value of the skill being tested and the associated stat. For example, to make a survival test to start a fire a character will roll the yin-yang die. Say the yin die reads 8 and the yang die reads 2. The yin-yang die result is then 6. 6 is added to the value of the survival skill and the value of the aspect associated with survival, in this case water. This total is then compared to a target number that is defined by the difficulty of the task. The result and the target number can also be used to determine the margin of failure or success. Certain rolls of the yin-yang die have special effects in game, such as a double zero meaning a catastrophic failure or doubles of any other number representing varying degrees of stunning success. Overall Qin's system is very light and surprisingly robust; it is readily converted to allow for the resolution of extended tasks and for opposed tests.
Combat in Qin uses much of the same opposed task resolution found in the regular rules. Combat rounds are broken up into a number of "exchanges" - sub-actions that characters gain access to by virtue of the skill at arms. Very skilled characters can get more actions in a round while unskilled characters are relegated to a single action. Distances are handled by dividing characters up into two zones, the melee or close combat zone and the distance or missile combat zone. Qin dispenses with the concept of squares or complex range requirements by using only rough approximations of short, medium long or extreme. Attacks are made against a secondary, calculated stat called passive defense if they are not opposed by a defensive action such as a dodge or block. Damage is resolved by simply adding the damage value of the weapon being used to the Water aspect of the attacking character. Special results of the yin-yang die roll from making the initial attack can add to the damage allowing for particularly devastating blows. Instead of hitpoints damage is applied to a condition monitor, once again much like Shadowrun. As characters take damage they will progress through varying levels of hurting until they can hurt no more. Qin has five such levels ranging from normal to fatally injured. As characters become more damage and are forced down the condition monitor they will receive greater penalties to their actions. Armor in Qin provides damage reduction instead of altering a character's odds of suffering a hit, subtracting from the amount of damage felt by the character. Overall combat is very lethal. Anyone with martial training will slaughter those who lack it by the simple fact that they can act more, stab stab stab versus a single defense. This also has the side effect of allowing epic martial arts confrontations between trained characters much like a kung-fu film.
To make things more fun players with enough ranks in martial skills can choose to take any number of martial techniques. These techniques represent the sort of thing that a dedicated martial artist would pick up. Things like learning how to find a chink in your opponent’s armor to being able to trap their blade and other fancy feats of martial prowess befitting a kung-fu flick.
That's about the long and the short of the mechanics section of Qin. Most of the task resolution and damage is summed up in the rolls of the yin-yang die and the character's aspects. If you are looking for a system with heavy, hardcore rules that make attempts to represent reality then Qin does not have the system you are looking for. The system is very abstract and the writers went to great pains to keep the dice rolling as simple as possible. Combats that we played through moved very quickly, resolving in under an hour for the most part and did little to bog down the game. Combat tended towards the epic, run and fight cinematic style from a martial arts movie.
Qin: The Magic
Magic in Qin is based off the expenditure of Chi by characters. Chi can be channeled into Taos, the application of the laws of the universe into everyday life to help enhance actions beyond the realms of normal possibility. Magic, on the other hand, is the use of Chi to manipulate those laws to their own ends. The best comparison between the two is that the gliding and flying of wire-kung fu in movies like Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon is the application of a Tao, while the exorcisms and ghost fighting in A Chinese Ghost Story fall more under magic. In game terms Taos are action enhancers that allow you to run across water or shatter thousands of incoming arrows while magic will heal, divine, and perform feats far outside the scope of normal actions. Like so many concepts in Qin the difference is subtle.
Normally any character can have access to Taos, they are purchased on a point scale along with martial techniques and magic. Depending on the type of game that your group wants to run it is entirely possible to remove them from the game if you want to run a historical campaign. The same applies to both the martial techniques and the magic rituals made available.
To get an idea of the kind of magic portrayed in Qin you should look to movies like A Chinese Ghost Story or any of the myriad primers on Chinese mythology and alchemy. Much of the magic is not of the spectacular "Fireball!" type seen in Dungeons and Dragons but much more introspective. Pyrotechnics come into play with exorcism and the alchemists can come up with some stuff that is pretty damn useful in a fight but until higher levels are reached there really isn't much in the way of offensive magic. Players will still have to rely on their wits and their skills with their blades in a pinch.
Qin: The Setting
I've already mentioned that Qin is set in the Warring States period of Chinese history. The upshot of that is that it's set in a time before there was a China - the area was divided into seven different kingdoms. Over his lifetime the leader of the state of Qin led a campaign to conquer and unify the seven kingdoms and form a united China. Qin the roleplaying is set early in the career of this emperor, who later too the name of Qin Shi Huangdi, while the seven states are fully independent and at odds with each other. Qin: The Warring States gives players a vast number of options in this time period from playing the politics of the seven kingdoms to acting as Taoist ghostbusters fighting the spirit world. The setting really is the meat and potatoes of the game.
Qin as a nod to its historical setting provides dozens of pages detailing life in the Warring States ranging from clothing to politics, philosophy, education, technology and everyday life. Detailed characteristics and descriptions are given about each of the seven states including important people and places. It's great reading for anyone interested in the history of China and helps players and gamemasters put themselves more properly in the place of characters from a very foreign land.
The supernatural aspects of Qin's setting are laid out in a separate chapters from the real history of the Warring States. Magic, religion and superstition were ubiquitous in this period of China's history so integrating characters with supernatural abilities is almost granted. The mythology surrounding this period of Chinese history, both the actual mythology and the mythology of Hollywood, Hong Kong and the Chinese cinema and pop culture, makes wire kung-fu or Taoist spirit warriors readily playable. The writers of Qin: The Warring States have taken this mishmash of mythologies to form an overarching metaplot for the game. I don't want to give out too many details on this plot since much of it is gamemaster only information but suffice to say it has to deal with the powers behind the each of the thrones of the seven kingdoms, their motivations and the fall of China into the Warring States from the near legendary Yin or Shang dynasty.
Qin: The Summary
Overall Qin: Warring States is a fantastic new entry into the American RPG scene. The book itself is very well done, strikingly gorgeous and well printed. The only thing that makes me hesitate at all about the game is the lack of an index and some of the organizational troubles detailed in the review. The setting is simple and unabashedly cinematic. Qin has one of the best system to setting matchups I've seen, and the game is readily adaptable to any kind of martial arts or kung-fu driven game. The designers clearly wanted to steer clear of rules lawyering and system bog down. Everything about the game plays like the legends, stories and films that it was inspired by. We haven't seen a game like this since Feng Shui. Qin: The Warring States might not be the best choice for inexperienced groups or gamemasters, it relies very heavily on discretion and judgement calls on both sides of the screen - simply put Qin is rules lawyer hell.
Any roleplayer who is a fan of Chinese cinema should check out Qin for the game; anyone interested in China should check it out for the setting it uses. Qin is also so rules light as to allow much of the details and background for the setting to be readily portable into other games. The system that's included is modular allowing for a range of gameplay. With all of this in mind I foresee Qin as one of the best new products to come out at Gencon this year.
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