 Goto [ Index ] |
The book itself is deliberately intended to look like a contemporary Pulp story compendium, with yellow paper, a fake 10c price tag and fringe on the cover art to suggest wear. However, the back cover picture of a gun moll is actually too good to look like a real Pulp-era illustration, which is a nitpick problem with the art in general- it's either too slick (Derwyn Talon) or too crude (Guy Davis). The first section of the book- 104 pages- alternates between Pulp-style "Tales of the Aeon Society" and typical White Wolf in-game presentations of the game setting. The first story is written by none other than Warren Ellis, and is of his usual high standard, though somewhat unrecognizable without the LSD-fueled political rants and virtuoso displays of profanity. The background material, in the form of news clippings, notes and Aeon Society correspondence, details the fictional world as of 1922-24: After Professor Hammersmith's experiment in "telluric radiation" the professor and his lab were destroyed, and two of the survivors - the wunderkind millionaire Max Mercer and the mysterious Dr. Primoris- agreed to start a new gentleman's society in order to explore their new gifts and enlighten the world. As the Aeon Society developed, it discovered that telluric radiation from the experiment had somehow given strange powers to various people around the world, and in their discoveries Aeon also found hidden lands, legends and sinister conspiracies that actually pre-dated the Hammersmith Experiment. (The 'telluric' rays are pretty obviously related to the superpowers of the Aberrant/Trinity eras, but this book doesn't clarify whether telluric radiation is the source of aberrants, psions, both or neither. Nor is such a connection really necessary to use or enjoy the book.)
Chapter One: Rules (beginning on page 110) is a self-contained rules system, like other White Wolf games of this period. Adventure, like the other Trinity games and Exalted, is based in a 'transition phase' of White Wolf rules from Storyteller to Storytelling (new World of Darkness). Basically, you pair your character's Attribute with a relevant skill (Ability), if possessed (like Dexterity + Martial Arts for combat) with each trait having a scale of 1 to 5. The total rating is one's dice pool rolled on d10s, and looking for 7 or higher as a success. More than one success usually means a higher degree of performance; the GM/Storyteller can adjust difficulty by raising the number of required successes (so a +2 difficulty means the dice pool needs to hit 3 successes). If all dice fail to earn successes AND at least one comes up 1, the action attempt botches and causes a mishap of some sort.
Within this system there are certain options. Extended actions allow a player to accumulate successes over time when a certain task (like research) requires an out-of-combat time length. A botch on such an action may cause a setback on accumulating successes or make the action impossible, at GM's discretion. It is possible for a player to reduce a dice pool to get multiple actions, losing 1 die for each action beyond the first. If these penalties cause a given dice pool to go below zero, that action can't be attempted (e.g. if a character has 3 dice for 1 action and 2 dice for another, multiple actions would reduce the pools to 2 and 1 respectively; if he were acting on a wound penalty that reduced his dice pools by 1, he couldn't try the second action at all). There are of course further permutations to the dice system, dealt with more extensively in Chapter Six.
Chapter Two: Character details how characters are created in this game. The period allows a pretty broad range of character types, further defined by the rules and the assumptions of this particular Pulp setting. Of course as the book points out, if the Storyteller wants a group of globetrotting explorers, you have to avoid concepts like Dark Urban Avenger, so the players and GM need to be on the same page. In Adventure, you start with Phase One ('Genesis') of basic character building. In Step One the player comes up with the basic character conception, including the character's Nature in White Wolf terms. At this point a PC can also choose an Allegiance (say to the government, or the Aeon Society) which in game terms gives a free point of Backing (see below). In Step Two the character chooses Attributes on the familiar White Wolf tier of three priorities (Physical, Mental and Social) which have three Attributes each, with first, second and third priorities adding 6, 4 and 3 dots respectively to a base of 1 in each Attribute. In Step Three you buy Abilities, with 23 points to spend, to a max of 3 dots in a given Ability (unlike most WW games, these are not grouped into three classes, but are defined in terms of the main Attribute each is paired with, Strength for Might and Intelligence for Investigation, for instance). In Step Four, you get six points for Backgrounds, e.g. Backing represents one's status within the ranks of an organization and ability to call on its resources. In Step Five, one gets Willpower at 3 dots, Initiative rating (Dexterity + Wits), and 15 bonus points that can be used to raise any of the prior traits (using separate ratios on the Character Creation table at page 116).
But then you get "Phase Two: Transformation." Adventure makes two assumptions in building heroic characters: That the Hammersmith event somehow "Inspired" various people to become exceptional, and that these Inspired people fall into three categories: daredevils ('normal' people who are just highly lucky or good at what they do), mesmerists (who gained powers of the mind) and stalwarts (those who were changed physically or gained low-level superpowers). In Step One the PC gets an Inspiration trait base of 1 dot that can be increased later. He also has to which of the three categories he belongs to, and define his origin, or "Instance of Inspiration" - which could be anything from a radiation accident to "Personal Stupidity." Then in Step Two the character must "Define the Inspiration": the first Inspiration point must be placed in one of three categories, or "facets" - Intuitive, Reflective, and Destructive. In Step Three the character gets 13 extra 'transformation points' that can be used to improve the character like bonus points but can also be used to buy more Inspiration points or 'Knacks' (see below). In addition to having the player go over the 'last touches' on his character, this chapter includes the rules for character advancement and experience point gain, as well as story guidelines for how some traits can be gained (or sometimes lost).
Chapter Three: Traits reviews the traits that the PC buys with those points in Chapter Two. It starts with some general "Origins" for characters with suggested Background options (ex. the Tinkerer's suggested options are Gadgets or Sanctum). There are also example Natures which as in Aberrant can be either a Virtue (character earns one Willpower point by upholding the Virtue in difficult circumstances) or a Vice (character must roleplay his Vice or sacrifice 1 Willpower point to resist the urge). What's interesting is that a Nature can be either a Virtue or a Vice, but having the same Nature for both can cancel out (or in some cases the Vice will lead the character into difficult situations that grant opportunities for the Virtue to regain Willpower... which is pretty Pulp). There are also sample Allegiances listed for a few of the organizations in the game, along with suggested or required Background traits to go with it (the international intelligence group Branch 9 requires members to have Mentor and Resources).
Then the book goes into the familiar White Wolf traits for Attributes, Abilities, and Backgrounds. The neat thing is that like a couple of other WW books, the traits are prefaced with example paragraphs from the viewpoint of characters in the setting, which add up to mini-stories in themselves. Again, traits normally range from 1 to 5 dots. However an Attribute above 4 is assigned a quality specialization that allows the character to re-roll any 10 and add any successes. A character can add a specialty to any Ability (+1 die in a given circumstance, like Brawl with Low Blow specialty). An Ability of 5 dots allows the character to buy an Ability mastery with transformation points (from Chapter Two) or twelve XP (maximum three masteries per character); this simply adds a sixth die (meaning a mastery with specialty can add 7 dice in that case before Attribute). There is a similar concept for Backgrounds called Background Enhancements that allows characters to attain the truly legendary traits of some Pulp heroes: Resources 5 with enhancement becomes Wealth Beyond Avarice and Sanctum 5 (like an uncharted island) becomes Sanctum Sanctorum (like a Martian base accessible only via teleporters).
This chapter briefly reviews Willpower (one spends a point to add a free success, or resist controls like one's Vice, or mesmerist powers; losing all Willpower means that the character can no longer resist his Vice). Then the book goes into detail on the Inspiration trait. Like Willpower, it ranges from 1 to 10 permanent dots, but unlike Willpower it is cut into three 'facets' that the character allocates, so a PC with Inspiration 4 dots could get Intuitive 3 and Destructive 1, for example. Each of these has certain benefits (e.g. a Reflective character can add his character's Reflective facet trait to any extended-effort roll by spending an Inspiration point). Inspiration points are also used to power Knacks (see below). One can also spend Inspiration on the special "Dramatic Editing" feature described in Chapter Six. Inspiration is regained in a manner similar to Willpower (the character can also regain 1 Inspiration point if he could gain a Willpower but the temporary score is filled out), but includes performing in an exceptionally heroic or stylish manner. This can be anything from scoring an exceptional roll (5+ successes) on a skill to truly heroic deeds (similar to how Star Wars characters regain Force Points) - obviously this is a standard that is up to Storyteller interpretation.
Chapter Four: Knacks details the special traits of Pulp heroes in Adventure. Daredevils can buy "Heroic" Knacks for 2 transformation points or 10 experience points during play. Mesmerists can get "Psychic" Knacks tiered in three ranks and stalwarts can get "Dynamic" Knacks at the same rate, 1 transformation point per rank of the Knack during creation or 8, 12 or 16 XP for a rank 1, 2 or 3 Knack respectively. It's made pretty clear that player characters can only buy Knacks from their own "class." The Knacks presented are appropriate to the character types; heroic Knacks are usually just extensions of natural ability and do not require Inspiration points to use but usually require certain Attribute or Ability minimums (e.g. the Universally Deadly Knack requires 4 dots in both Melee and Firearms but adds 1 to dice pools with weapons and is never penalized for unfamiliar weapons; the character is a natural master of all weapons, even ones he's never actually seen). Psychic Knacks range from minor talents at level 1 to full blown telekinesis or flame creation at level 2 to "Cloud the Mind" or teleportation of small objects at level 3. Likewise the dynamic Knacks range from level 1 abilities that might be explained as natural talent (Mad Scientist is counted as a stalwart Knack because of the changes it creates in the brain structure) to inexplicable superpowers at level 3 (like Reptilian Regeneration, which does indeed allow a stalwart to regrow limbs). The mesmerist and stalwart Knacks usually require spending a point of Inspiration, especially at the higher levels.
Chapter Five: Super-Science explains how to build the exotic gadgets of Pulp fiction. In Adventure, the setting assumes that there are two tiers of invention: Advancement (something that can be extrapolated from contemporary science) and Innovation (science-fiction stuff). It also assumes that while daredevils can make Advancements, only stalwarts and mesmerists can make Innovations. This setting, like TORG's Nile Empire and a few other "science fiction" games presumes that the more advanced machines channel the metaphysical energy that powers heroic characters (here described as 'telluric', 'pseudoaetheric' or 'Z-rays') which also means that Inspired characters can power them or develop special batteries of Inspiration points. In game terms, Innovations duplicate the effects of character Knacks. The game establishes a limit of Resources rating on the number of Advanced inventions a character can have and Inspired characters can additionally have a number of Advanced and/or Innovative inventions equal to his Inspiration score (a daredevil can still use Innovations even if he can't invent them). These limits do not apply to inventions bought with the Gadget Background, which represent "trademark" gadgets that are personal to the character.
In mechanical terms, a character needs to have Ability mastery in Engineering, Medicine or Science Ability (depending on whether the invention is a device, an altered organism or a chemical compound) to make an invention in the first place, along with whatever skills are needed to build or modify it (like Firearms for advanced gunsmithing). R&D rolls are made with the Ability mastery dice pool, and the total time required for research is totaled depending on what options are desired (e.g. 3 days to add +1 accuracy to a melee weapon, 7 days to add +1 damage, 10 days total for both). Modifying an existing device allows a maximum number of enhancements, while other experiments have set R&D times. Additional successes on the R&D roll allow base research time to be reduced by one day per extra success. Making further tinkerings (like increasing a die bonus or miniaturizing the device) adds +1 to difficulty. Having qualified lab assistants gives bonuses to the R&D roll, increasing chance of success and potentially reducing time to research. Even then the invention still needs to be actually built and field-tested, requiring further collaboration and possibly outside sponsorship. There are various tables for all this; as the game admits, making these inventions involves a lot of (in-game) math. It also provides lots of opportunities for industrial sabotage and drama as the character tries to get his research and/or construction funded.
Chapter Six: Drama is the "dramatic systems" chapter familiar to most White Wolf games, including the fundamentals of combat and task resolution. Most of these, of course, follow from the mechanics from Chapter One. The book reviews "automatic" feats that require no die roll (like drawing a weapon or activating a Knack) as well as Physical, Mental and Social feats; these are basically examples of which Ability is used for what action, with some Abilities having more than one application (Engineering could be used for inventions as well as engineering research), and some feats can be attempted with more than one Ability depending on circumstances (Seduction could be rolled with Etiquette in cultured circumstances or Savvy in a seedy bar).
After this the book goes into a very innovative mechanic for simulating Pulp reality: Dramatic Editing. Basically, dramatic editing allows the player to spend Inspiration points to alter the narrative "as long as the Storyteller approves of it and it does not contradict anything that's already been established." This is on a scale where spending 1 Inspiration would allow the PC to find a spare parachute in the falling plane and 3 Inspiration would allow him to find parachutes for the whole team. It costs 1 extra point to create a useful "Plot Ramification" that helps later (like 'discovering' a new clue) or 1 less point for a plot "Complication" that penalizes the character (he finds a parachute but loses his satchel of bills while escaping the plane). There is also a variant of this for the cliffhanger ending, where the players are stuck in a dangerous situation at the end of a game session that they will probably need dramatic editing to survive at the beginning of next game. Given that this is intended as an opportunity to spur player creativity, only PCs can spend their Inspiration during a cliffhanger. (One aspect of the game system that isn't explicitly pointed out: Since daredevils don't need to spend Inspiration on Knacks, they're in better position to take advantage of dramatic editing than the other two types of Inspired.)
Then Chapter Six discusses "Combat Systems," organizing combat into "close" (melee), ranged and vehicle combat. Combat turns are three seconds each, in the order of setup (the GM recaps events in the combat to update players as to their options, and is advised to 'make her descriptions interesting and exciting, leaving all sorts of possibilities for the characters' actions'), initiative (players have an Initiative rating of Dex + Wits, and roll 1 die and add Initiative rating to get initiative for the turn. High rolls go first but declare last, so quicker characters can pre-empt someone else's action), attack (the character rolls for his action using the appropriate dice pool) and resolution (the effects of the attack are determined after all attacks are made). In that regard, extra successes to hit add up to five dice to the damage roll. As with Exalted, there is a 'soak' rule where a character's natural Stamina can absorb its rating in "bashing" damage, and armor can add to this. However a successful attack still gets to roll at least one die of bashing damage even if the character's soak exceeds the attack's damage dice and even if the attack was otherwise lethal (an armored vest that stops a bullet might still cause bruising).
There are general rules for modifiers in combat including the multiple attacks rule (described in Chapter One), aimed shots (higher difficulty but higher base damage if the attack hits) ans so on. The close-combat maneuvers are a general variety of effects that could describe martial arts or weapon attacks, while the ranged maneuvers include burst fire, strafing and the like. Vehicle combat is generally similar to regular combat except that the pilot is directing a vehicle (with certain maneuvers getting +1 or +2 difficulty, especially in air combat) and using its weapons. Also in a mixed melee (like soldiers attacking a tank) the individuals get to go before the vehicle. Because of vehicle scale, however, some vehicle weapons have "vehicle adds" against characters (the machine gun of a fighter plane does 6 [4] lethal damage, or six damage dice PLUS four automatic damage before dice are rolled) and vehicles have "armor adds" that apply against "personal" (character-scale) weapons like guns and swords (4 [5] armor on a vehicle means a personal weapon needs to score over ten damage to have any effect, while a vehicle-scale weapon only needs to roll against 4 soak). A vehicle collision (against a character or another vehicle) inflicts one lethal damage die per 10 kph of speed.
As in traditional White Wolf games, characters only get seven Health Levels, with "bashing" damage healing over a factor of hours. "Lethal" damage (swords, explosions, etc.) is traumatic damage that heals over a factor of days or weeks. It also cannot be soaked, except with worn armor or certain Knacks like the stalwart Body of Bronze. If enough bashing damage is inflicted to go over six, the character is incapacitated, and further damage, even bashing, "carries over" to lethal, and likewise a mixture of lethal and bashing damage combines (a character who took two bashing and one lethal box of damage has effectively taken three levels). Going past Incapacitated on lethal will kill the character, and "carry over" damage means it's quite possible to beat someone to death with bashing attacks. With mixed damage, bashing always heals first.
Speaking of damage, this chapter goes over the many other ways a character can suffer damage levels besides direct combat, such as electrocution and fire. More exotic effects like disease are given vague guidelines. There is also a one-page review of mental disorders a character can suffer. White Wolf sure seems to like mental disorders. Not like this is Candyland the RPG, but it's not Vampire: The Masquerade, either. We can't ALL be psychotic or depressed.
Chapter Seven: Roleplaying is a Storyteller advice chapter for running Adventure. It starts with a discussion of the team dynamics between PCs, with the useful suggestion that characters with a similar focus define their traits so as not to overlap roles (e.g. two investigator characters can be on a team, but one would be the street detective and one the high-society reporter). That leads into a review of the genre's typical roles, although some noteworthy characters (like Doc Savage or Max Mercer) qualify for several roles at the same time, being scientists, action heroes, and investigators at once. It's also suggested that the game use an "ensemble" cast of rotating characters to account for some players not being present at all games, although this does present problems with the cliffhanger ending, although the GM can always make it look like the absent PC suffered certain death. One idea is for some characters to be used as semi-NPCs/support characters in cases where the player isn't always available. The flip side of this being that some PCs or "GM PCs" will get too much attention, which the book accurately describes as "The Doc Savage Problem." Given that RPGs are a group activity, the story has to give all players a moment, even if some characters are obviously more powerful than others. The suggested solution is to tailor plots so that each PC has a certain plot element bringing him into the action.
As with other Pulp games, there's some attention paid to period authenticity, even though the fictional history is somewhat different than the real world; most of the weird events are not common knowledge because global communication is not as ubiquitous as it is today (the Aberrant history clearly diverges from the real world in 1998 because the 'eruption' of superhumans is a well-known and worldwide event). On one hand, historical accuracy gets the GM and players in the proper mindset, on the other hand, "It's possible the Storyteller and the players don't give a fig about real history." In that regard it's emphasized that Adventure "is not a time travel game" - the GM does not have to say the aberrants erupted in 1998 or that Hitler became leader of Germany in 1933.
The book then tries to define what Pulp is first by going over what it isn't- not Noir (not dark enough), not camp (not silly enough) and not four-color superheroics (it operates on a more human scale). Its common elements include an emphasis on action and themes of scientific progress. It also touches on contemporary discrimination (the first third of the 20th Century was probably the height of the KKK's power). Of course, dealing with the real racism of the period may make the game too grim for most players. One solution given is to shift perspective by having characters outside the Western world suffer xenophobia in exotic lands, which for one thing means the discrimination will be suffered by all the characters equally, not just the female/non-white PCs.
The rest of the chapter gives the Storyteller advice on how to build and run a plotline. The two plotting methods described are 'story oriented' (traditional, linear) plotting and backstory plotting, which assumes how events will go in the absence of the PC's interference and allows them to change things by reacting. Because each approach has its weaknesses, the book also proposes combining the two so that the Storyteller starts with a basic plan and then asks what would happen if the PCs interfered. This book quite wisely accounts for the fact that roleplayers will hardly ever do what the GM expects.
In this regard the book quotes the oft-quoted Raymond Chandler story where Chandler said he usually got over a writer's block in his plot by having a couple of guys enter the room and start shooting. Adventure has similar advice with regard to players sidetracking the game with their actions: "There are plenty of roleplaying games out there well suited to subtle roleplay and extended in-character debate and conversation. This is not one of them! As suggested elsewhere, if the characters insist on roleplaying trips to the grocery store, have the Pharaoh's men blow the place up." (Never mind how Pharaoh's men got to 20th Century America, or how they got explosives.)
Finally story design includes a description of "the Opposition" - the main villains of the story, and the tropes associated with them like the vast secret headquarters, their armies of thugs, and their use of world-threatening weapons. The book admits this is all cliche, but that's largely the point: "That doesn't mean you shouldn't apply the gimmick, of course- the polite term for cliche is 'classic schtick'- but try not to overdo it."
Chapter Eight: Heroes & Villains reviews- in broad terms- the founders of the Aeon Society and their principal adversaries in the 1920s. It's explained that the character stats are only partly defined so that the GM can give them whatever traits are appropriate. Even so, what traits are explained tend to break the game's own rules for characters. For instance, Dr. Primoris is described as a stalwart who also has mesmerist Knacks, Safari Jack is a daredevil who invented a compound with the stalwart Knack for Optimized Metabolism (when the rules state a daredevil can't develop Innovations that simulate Knacks), one of the villains has a Knack that works even when he's armed, when the Knack description states the character has to be unarmed to use it, etc. Now in some respect this is understandable (especially when Primoris himself is described as a unique case, and Mercer has a Knack that no one else in the setting has due to his origin) but when less pivotal characters are given exceptions to the rules, to me that indicates the rules need to be broken (since obviously they can't simulate the characters the authors are trying to create). This also means that there really aren't concrete examples of how to build a master villain, except on the purely conceptual level, although that may also be the intent.
After descriptions of the villains and a few other prominent NPCs, there are stat blocks for mooks (who of course are subject to a 'mook rule' so PCs don't get too worn out beating them up), cops, other stock NPCs and animals. Then there's an Appendix for "everything else" that didn't fit in the other sections- like weapons and vehicles. The Appendix also has brief reviews of fashions and personal gear, fairly detailed rules for recreational drugs (I suppose these can be combined with the mental illness rules to simulate Reefer Madness), and an Aeon Continuum timeline from 1900 to the 1950s.
SUMMARY
Because Adventure! was something of an afterthought in the Aeon 'trinity' of games, it didn't have any associated sourcebooks. In a way that actually makes it a stronger game: It can't rely on later material to make it good, and while it touches on the machinations of typically godly White Wolf movers and shakers in the later books, it's not dependent on them. Like Pulp HERO, it can be used with or without the 'company' history. It suffers from the inconsistencies I mentioned in Chapter Eight, and on the need to shoehorn Pulp conventions and mysterious powers into the sci-fi origin and game constructs the authors developed, but these are hardly killer drawbacks. Indeed, given how unique Adventure! is compared to Aberrant and Trinity, it's again remarkable how well the book stands on its own. That in itself is a great selling point, given that it also uses the Exalted iteration of White Wolf rules, which I find generally superior to both the original Storyteller system and the current Storytelling one. Thus, Adventure! has both the flexibility of those rules and a very effective interpretation of Pulp heroism, which can be very easily adapted to use as much or as little White Wolf 'metaplot' as desired. In its own right, the game did a lot to advance the Pulp spirit in RPGs, with the "dramatic editing" mechanic by itself being a pretty obvious inspiration (so to speak) for the rules in the aforementioned Pulp HERO and even Spirit of the Century.
Style: 4
Of all the Pulp RPGs out there, Adventure! looks the most like an actual Pulp work, which helps a lot in bringing the reader in.
Substance: 4
Adventure! scores because it uses the familiar White Wolf rules and adapts them to Pulp in the right style, creating a setting that fits in the Trinity Universe while still working as the basis of a stand-alone game.
Help support RPGnet by purchasing this item through DriveThruRPG.
