|
I'd known of Savage Worlds
(SW) for a while. I never got around to have a closer look and, in
fact, one of its game terms put me off wanting to (“bennies”,
for your information).
So to my surprise, after seeing and
flicking through a small but colourful book, I found myself scurrying
outside with it grasped in my hand and, most likely, a slightly
worried look on my face. Had I just wasted eighteen Australian
dollars? To find out just read on...
sav·age -
lacking the restraints normal to civilized human beings
the book
Savage Worlds
Explorer's Edition (SWEE) is a small soft-covered book of
approximately 150 pages. It is not the “tradition”
role-playing game book size, being of smaller proportions, making it
handy to carry around. Its interior is full-colour, illustrated with
pictures from various genres (taken from other products if I
understand correctly).
the game
SWEE pretty much leaps into character creation straight away. The
system uses dice (d4, d6, d8, d10 and d12) to represent the Traits
(attributes and skills) of a character. This dice is what is rolled
for tests and a target number of 4 is what is sought. The game also
uses a deck of cards, one use of which is to determine initiative in
combat. There are various other items used (bennies, raises, wild
die) to make this game Fast, Furious, and Fun.
Apart from Traits, Edges and Hindrances are two other defining
characteristics of a character. Hindrances being “flaws”
and Edges being everything else – from background advantages to
magical or super powers. Its this simplification that is the strength
of SW enabling almost any genre to be created with the same rules
set.
SWEE dedicates an entire chapter on Gear, ranging from medieval,
modern and futuristic. And to ensure that the game is complete,
another chapter is dedicated to Situational Rules (from Mounted
Combat to Fear, Hunger and Poison).
A list of generic powers is given and advice on how to tailor them to
your character. There are 5 Arcane Background Edges listed (magic,
miracles, psionics, super powers, weird science) to cover the various
genres – some are handled more differently than others but all
use the same list of powers. Tailoring a Power can be as simple as
distinguishing it with a unique Trapping. For example the Bolt Power
can have the Trappings of Fire, Ice, or even Bees. The effect will,
for the most part, be similar with the Trapping giving the power some
special rules (a Trapping of Fire may set alight flammable items or
inflict extra damage to beings with a Weakness to Fire).
The Game Master's section of SWEE has two chapters: Game Mastering
and Villains and Monsters. Game Mastering contains the expected
advice on running a game and creating adventures and also includes
some brief rules on designing races. Villains and Monsters highlights
the use of the SW rules to create opponents to throw at the
characters and provides a range of mostly fantasy monsters (Dragon,
Orc, Zombie, Vampire, etc.) to allow a Game Master to start up a game
almost immediately. A list of monstrous abilities (Construct, Undead
to name a couple) is given that act as templates to help you build
your own creatures.
the good, the bad, and the ugly
The system is
quite easy to muck around with. The books offers advice and options
to allow almost anything you can think of. While reading it I was
think on how I can use it to run other games where the rules might
not be as good as they should.
Despite being
for all genres, fantasy seems to be the easiest to start with despite
the lack of any races.
No setting means
more work. As I said above, I'm a fan of games that include their own
setting. If you cannot find a Plot Point setting produced by Pinnacle
Entertainment Group that offers what you want then you are forced to
create you own. When I was young I had oodles of time to create my
own maps, countries, cities and dungeons – indeed that was
something I loved to do on a wet Sunday afternoon (with the red box
set of OD&D) – but now I don't have the time nor
inclination to do so.
I really like
the size of the book. It makes it easy to carry around just in case a
role playing game suddenly breaks out.
in summary
This was a
surprise to me. I did not expect to like it so much, being a fan of
games that offer the full service model: system and setting.
I think it
deserves a 5 for Style. Its full colour and oozes style. The cover
alone made me want to dress like Indiana Jones while reading it (an
unfortunate lack of hat and whip denied me that particular pleasure).
Unfortunately,
despite liking it so much, I can only give it a 3 for Substance. It
is a light-weight game with the expectation that the game master will
create their own setting (including character archetypes/classes and
new Edges) or buy one of the published settings.
From my reading
of the game I can only recommend it as something every gamer should
own. Its price is not an onerous burden on the pocket (running SW
should mean that everyone has a copy of their own) and its
flexibility should not discourage people tied to one genre.
|
