In Short
In Prophecy players take on the role of adventurers in a fantasy world where a quality sword is a big deal and magic is rare enough not to impact day to day life. With an emphasis on trying to break away from traditional fantasy while still being traditional fantasy and the moderate use of random generation, Prophecy provides a unique experience that is marred by flaws that could have been avoided.The Good: The fantasy setting isn’t going to amaze you, but it’s definitely playable and, at times, makes use of some of the best presentation aspects from older RPG settings. Characters evolve organically rather than based on the player’s preconception, which could be a lot of fun for some groups.
The Bad: Whether you’re a fan of tables and random character generation or not, these tables are strangely constructed in the frequency extreme results occur. The XP system could make advancing some character concepts and skills difficult depending on the frequency of certain rolls in the game. The renaming of real life concepts is taken to an unpleasant extreme with, for example, ‘hour’ being redefined to mean 3.5 of our hours. Tables are taken to an extreme at times, such as with the inclusion of a frostbite location table. The system and presentation showcase many of the difficulties that older games face in today’s RPG environment.
The Physical Thing
Prophecy has been released in a boxed set format that includes many of the nifty toys and play aids that you might expect. The 72 page Player Manual, 72 page Game Master Manual, and 224 page Continent: Superius Reference Manual are black and white softcovers. Four large fold out full color maps, two percentile dice, and a Game Master Screen are also included.The GM Screen is really a chart reference item, as it’s simply not sturdy enough to survive play. The outside tends to involve random PC generation tables while the inside showcases more GM oriented tables, such as the hit location chart. From a GM screen perspective this isn’t very useful. The outside tables should be something that can benefit players in some way, and the same tables found on a 2 page spread of the Player Manual just don’t do that. The interior of the screen is adequate in that it helps with quick random NPC generation and critical hits, but there are no rules summaries on this screen. The biggest benefit to me as a GM is having a summary on the screen of the rules. The same goes if you want to look at this simply as a reference item.
The Manuals have a major problem right off the bat in that they’re very poorly organized. I’m sure they make sense to the creators, but I had a very difficult time engaging the game. Information is found in a variety of different locations, and sometimes only half of what I was looking for was found in one place. This made understanding the Races of the game and how magic works to be needlessly involved. It also results in the Player Manual not actually covering everything most players need to know, unless the player intends to avoid all magic and detailed (but important) race information.
The artwork is generally of below average quality, with some pieces being the same piece with a different panel added on top of the existing one or a zoom effect on a character’s face from a previous piece. It’s also of a large variety of styles, which is fine for some games but really clashes at times here. The maps are adequately done, but their general lack of landmarks means that they just provide an unspecific sense of where people and nations are.
The index is somewhat useful, but since there is one for each book and the information is scattered it can still make finding what you want a little difficult. The editing is slightly below average given the large amount of text included here, but a proof reading pass by a human should have caught quite a few errors missed by computer.
While the boxed set has a feel that definitely reminds me of the days of the AD&D boxed sets, and those for other games, I don’t believe that the quality of the game or production holds up well to the $55.00 price tag.
Under the Cover
Because it works fairly well and this is a fair bit to review I’m breaking this review up into sections covering each of the books and a general section to discuss mechanics and broad concepts.In General
Prophecy’s setting is the continent of Superius, an enormous landmass with a wide range of environments. The setting makes use of high medieval technology, including plate armor and siege weapons like the trebuchet. Though magic is prevalent in the world, it has not been applied like technology to the setting (though the book often suggests PCs do this). What you’re left with is a fairly classic fantasy world that is low-magic in magical impact but high-magic in the potential capabilities of magic. While the setting strives to avoid fantasy staples like orcs, such attempts don’t greatly distinguish it from other settings.
On a mechanics level Prophecy makes use of a roll under percentile system. Characters have Traits that tend to range from 40 to 60, with a few slightly higher connected Skills, and most rolls simply involve trying to roll under that number on a d100.
One of my core objections to Prophecy is that many of the random tables it relies on are not well crafted. The author simply did not fully consider the implications of some of their results. One example is the character I randomly generated. Through the tables I ended up with a skeletal midget with hip length dishwater blonde hair, a broken nose, and a face no one could love. It’s an interesting character, but some of the more bizarre results feel too common at a 10% chance.
Another example is the random gem table. Yes, it sounds obscure but it illustrates this problem very well. A random gem table should be there so that when the PCs find a gem I can roll a die and say “It’s a… chunk of topaz!” This is a 1-10 table where 30% of gems are semi-precious (most common gems), 10% are mana pearls (extremely rare repositories of magical energy), and 10% are Storm diamonds (extremely rare gems taken from the jaws of a monster). The book even tells the reader to ignore the Storm diamond result unless it happens to make sense at the time. This sort of random table construction isn’t consistent with presenting a realistic fantasy world, the goal of the product, and it isn’t as useful to the GM as it should be.
Let’s take a look at the individual books.
Player Manual
The author has a strong objection to any form of non-random Trait selection and this can clearly be seen from the beginning. Characters may either take their Race’s default Traits completely unmodified or they can roll 1d10 14 times, the first seven being positive and the second seven being negative, and assign one positive and one negative number from each set to each of the seven Traits. The game has a strong preference for using random tables to resolve events, including character generation.
Players may select (or roll, rolling is always a fine option) one of seven Professions: Warrior, Skulker, Woodsman, Alchemist, Artifact Mage, True Mage, and Vagabond. The choice will determine what (if any) starting Skills the character has, how likely they are to acquire employment, their starting gear, and which Traits they may spend their six bonus Trait points on.
A few things should be noted here. First, starting characters have very little in the way of funds even by the end of character generation. Characters begin with little more than a shirt and a pair of pants, and by the time they’re done they may be able to afford a weapon or piece of armor. While this does add to the realistic feel of the world, to an extent, it doesn’t feel right since the game is stressing the characters’ role as adventurers. The alchemist who begins with no potions may not feel like doing much adventuring. There is, unfortunately, no support for starting play with experienced characters.
The four Races include Comnar (humans), Felinor (cat people), NelVan (elves), and Gelling (Kender or halflings). Each Race provides different baseline Traits, a few unique modifiers, and a percent chance of being a True Mage. Comnar are unable to use magic, Gelling rarely do, NelVan often do, and all Felinor are inherently magical and capable of using powerful magic. The human base average for all Traits is 50, setting an unmodified chance of success at a task at 50%.
Let’s talk briefly about the Felinor. Prophecy has seen some negative attention for including a species of extremely sexual magical catgirls who wander the world looking for mates. The backstory is that most of the males were killed off, leaving only 1% of the population as male, but the females can breed true with other Races. Since they can only become pregnant if they Soul Bond with their mate this has infused them with a procreative wanderlust to try and save their Race.
To tell you the truth, I think it’s ridiculous. I’m sure there are some readers who will enjoy it, but it’s laid on a little thick for most folk to take seriously. They’re all blessed with True Magic, they exude powerful pheromones that enhance their already incredible beauty (and attract monsters), they can only Soul Bond and procreate with virgins, and they “do not comprehend the lusts of men.” As for other races, NelVan women adventurers, as it happens, always get large negative modifiers when interacting with other NelVan because of their protectiveness of their women. This may not be the most enjoyable game to play a female PC in.
Like them or not, the Felinor are only one small part of the game. The NelVan occupy a similar role as elves do in other settings, though they lack pointed ears and have black eyes. They also have a strongly patriarchal culture, something given more emphasis than other cultures in the setting. The Gelling are Halflings, though for those familiar they resemble the chaotic Kender of the Dragonlance setting the most. Minor, bestial races are included as well but the game emphasizes that these are clearly monsters and are treated as such by the people.
With Profession and Race out of the way, let’s talk about Traits and Skills. Prophecy makes use of Lif (Life), Str (Strength), Agi (Agility), Int (Intelligence), End (Endurance), Mov (Movement), and Mor (Morale). Each ranges from 40 to 60 or so after character generation. Not all of these scores necessarily make a lot of sense in the game, nor are they all easily applied. How strong is a Strength 60 character? I don’t know. Above average? How fast is a Mov 50 character? Well, the game does give us that one, at least. Dividing Mov score by 2.8 results in the character’s max speed in MPH. By dividing Mov by 6 we can determine the character’s speed in ‘paces’ per second (combat rounds are 1 second). A ‘pace’ is 3 feet, so an average man moves at 24 feet per second by the rules.
Skills are increased with a random 1d10 roll at character generation, resulting in characters having a small to large bonus when using that Skill. On the downside this isn’t always a lot of fun. The example character I built only ended up with a +1 bonus for the only weapon he was skilled with. Another downside involves how heavily many Skills rely on certain Traits. Untrained attempts suffer a penalty based on the difficulty of the attempt, between -5 and -20, but there’s still a heck of a benefit from having high Agi and Int in this game. Here’s why:
Prophecy features 89 distinct Skills, including some that are probably not very appealing to many players. Grapnel allows a character to make use of a grappling hook. Mining assists a character in locating ore and engineering an excavation. It’s a useful skill for miners, to be sure, but less so for adventurers. Of these 89 Skills 2 of them are based on Str, 4 are based on Mor, 22 are based on Agi, and the other 61 are based on Int. This is a big deal since some of the untrained penalties aren’t that harsh.
Traits and Skills are increased through ‘tics’. Whenever a character uses a Skill or Trait a little mark is placed next to it. When the number of marks exceeds the rating of the Skill or Trait it improves to the next level. Marks can also be gained by practicing the Skill or Trait during downtime. While systems that emphasize characters growing through Skill use are interesting and tend to result in more organic character growth, this one may be a little much to keep up with given the very large number of Traits and Skills. Keeping up to about 50 marks for 7 Traits and a half dozen or more Skills may be more in-game book keeping then some folk would prefer. That said, I suspect it isn’t a problem for most groups making use of the character sheet and remembering to make a mark at the appropriate times. The biggest downside to the system may be that character defining but infrequently used Skills will rarely or never be improved.
One of the major problems with the Player Manual is organization. Want to know how fast the character can swim? It’s not in the index. It’s not with Mov or Str. It’s in another section. The same is true of many rules throughout the boxed set. Magic is briefly discussed in the Player Manual, but it’s confusing since all spell entries appear in the Reference Manual.
One of the common problems I’ve found with the game is that scattered fluff text appears here and there in the product. The Player Manual has sections on Travel and Weather, for example, that say nothing more than “the GM sometimes rolls for weather.” This is a common problem found throughout the product that increases its disorganization.
Before we move on, let me tell you a little bit about magic. True Mages begin play with a set group of spells they know. These spells each have a Mana cost that is deducted from the mage’s Power Level, a special pool calculated from End. Once this pool is exhausted the character can still draw from End and Lif to fuel magic, providing many spellcasters with the ability to make use of spells pretty often. Artifact Mages begin with an artifact that can use certain spells, but generally are much more limited than True Mages. They can’t push the artifacts as True Mages can their bodies, the artifacts can be lost, and it’s completely unclear what the artifacts are able to do. There simply are no solid rules for artifact creation and use. Starting characters can, supposedly, have any spells in the game located in their artifact. Unfortunately, most of the rules surrounding artifacts are left up to the individual GM.
Alchemists brew potions according to set formula. I find the alchemy system to be fairly well done, actually, though it’s surprising that some common and extremely useful potions haven’t altered the default setting. The main downside to alchemy is that it’s expensive and time consuming, and that starting characters are giving up their skills for the opportunity to brew potions for later use. Encumbrance rules can also limit the power of an alchemist, as only so many potions can be safely carried.
Game Master Manual
The GM advice appears front and center here, and while I’m sure it works fine for some folk I can’t say I’m a fan. It takes the form of a very authoritative GM, so much so that the players are not allowed to determine who their character’s parents are. I quote from page 80: “Remember back in the Player Manual about a PC not knowing if he had access to money, had magical abilities or a player not being able to choose his PC’s parents? This is where you get to do that! This is called embellishing a PC, and we’ve provided some more charts for you to roll on, too!”
Additional advice is fairly standard. Cheat when you need to, but don’t let the players know about it. Killing characters sucks but it makes the characters be more careful from then on. I have to say that the system is often so poorly defined that cheating isn’t a difficult thing to do in many cases. Prophecy anticipates a very active GM.
Combat is meant to be pretty nasty in Prophecy. At its core it involves rolling for intiative, making an opposed roll to hit, determining hit location, calculating damage, taking armor into consideration, applying damage, calculating bleed effect, and rolling vs. shock. Many small rules come into play based on hit location, amount of damage, and weapon type to result in a fairly involved combat tracking system. 1 second rounds are used, some of which will be used to ready weapons before they can be used to attack again.
The hit location system receives a lot of attention, with each location having a set number of Lif points based on a character’s Lif score. Right toes, brain, left shoulder joint, and similarly detailed locations are included to provide precision to the description. On the downside, this may be too much detail for some players. Being able to target the brain as a hit location doesn’t make the most sense, either.
Combat strikes me as interesting in its level of detail, but I remain concerned that it could be slow in play. Take this with a grain of salt, of course, since I haven’t had the opportunity to run a Prophecy combat. However, weapon readying, weapon and armor type tracking, special rules, multi-step resolution, and specific hit locations could result in combats that are slower than some readers would prefer. Rules for naval and siege combat are also included, with a focus on realism and detail.
The Game Master Manual moves on to a setting overview. A creation story reminiscent of Genesis, with a single God seeding the world, is included followed by a brief timeline and general setting information. The core idea is to familiarize the GM with the world for fast play if the GM doesn’t care to read through the much lengthier Reference Manual. Game pacing, NPCs, and general GM information are also covered. There’s little to cause feelings of praise or offense here. The NPC generation system involves the GM just making up whatever sounds good while the dungeon creation rules nicely emphasize that dungeons should make at least some degree of sense. A short example scenario involving fighting through a crypt is included to round out the Game Master Manual.
Continent: Superius Reference Manual
A combination setting, magic book, and bestiary, the Reference Manual in many ways showcases the game Prophecy could be but isn’t. While I wouldn’t describe the setting as fresh, I do think it’s well presented and that many of the states feel distinct and interesting. Every state receives attention to common knowledge, a timeline, laws, politics, border issues, and other information that really helps it come alive as an entity. The material is consistent and as you read more the world begins to feel like a living place. As much as it surprises me, I think the best thing Prophecy has going for it is its setting presentation.
That said, the setting is a little odd because it’s difficult to place the role of magic. The book often suggests that PCs do obvious things with spells, like set up a teleportation business, but then there are no such businesses in the setting. In fact, the setting is crying out for spellcasters who want to make a few bucks or alchemists who want to revolutionize armor crafting. Those who come to the game for its realism, which is heavily stressed, may find themselves turned off from a setting that doesn’t embrace its own magical properties.
The setting portion weighs in at about 100 pages of states and guilds, which actually makes it a pretty detailed setting by today’s standards. Unfortunately, major cities and the like don’t receive attention. The setting seems to striving for an enormous landmass with tiny, isolated villages existing inside large kingdoms. It’s also worth noting that if you don’t enjoy classic fantasy settings then you probably won’t be gripped by anything here.
Spells are split into seven Paths: Awareness, Senses, Body, Travel, Elements, Manipulation, and Forces. Some spells for each Path have prerequisites, and their cost to cast, duration, and other values tend to be unique such that the magic has a more distinct feel than the completely freeform systems found in many games today. The spell lists are fairly inclusive and no classic fantasy spell is missing, with everything from illusions to chain lightning found here. Be aware that the higher end spells tend to be very deadly, with many effects that can kill most creatures instantaneously.
Alchemy lacks the punch of magic, but I find it to be more appropriate to the setting and much more descriptive in presentation. The alchemical creations feel special, and the attention to the unique things needed to prepare them is fun. Bombs, flash powder, hallucinatory dust, salves that harden to steel, and similarly useful mixtures are all included. A clever player would probably have a good time using the alchemists limited resources to concoct unusual plans for solving problems in the setting.
The bestiary is large and showcases well written monsters that stoke the imagination. The major initial downside is that they’re not all illustrated, and many that are illustrated are poorly drawn. Much like the rest of the product, the entries are strongly reminiscent of older fantasy products. In this case fond memories of the AD&D Monster Manual came to mind as I read over everything. The author strives to try and have unique monsters, not borrowing familiar and existing creatures, and I think he generally succeeds though many of the creatures occupy the same role as other fantasy monsters. At 88 pages of monsters and Races, there’s a lot to chew on here.
