 Goto [ Index ] |
A few words about Runequest. For me RQ was always the arch-simulationist game - the goal was basically to produce something as realistic as possible (in a fantasy world) as succinctly as possible. But, like most games of the era, it really focused on simulating the physical world, not anything about personality or motivations.
Before I dive in... a few comments on perspective. I'm writing as an old-school Runequest grognard (specifically RQ3 was my poison); I've also played around a bit with HQ and HW, but RQ was my first love, and I was thrilled to have a new RQ version. Strangely I somehow missed RQ 4 and 5 - I never played Mongoose RQ at all - so I'm comparing to RQ3 (and a bit to RQ AiG for those that got ahold of that). Related to this, I'm writing primarily for other people who know RQ deeply and are interested in the latest update, as opposed to comparing RQ to other games. Finally, I should note that I've only read the game (in PDF form only) and never played this latest version - so apologies in advance for any mistakes!
So with that background - on to the review.
Style
The book is definitely elegant and professionally produced. The format is clean, the art is over all quite good. The layout includes example stories along the page edges which helps clarify some of the rules.
The downside is that this book is BIG - 456 pages - and I definitely feel that it could have been edited down. Just to highlight one example: * The term 'sprint' is introduced in the 'Athletics' skill (p 58) * The term is defined (as 5x walking) in 'Movement' in Game Mechanics (p 106) * The impact of encumbrance is defined later on page 116 t* Not until Appendix 1 (p 438) does it clarify why you'd want to run instead of sprint (it's because sprinting doesn't allow any combat actions)
There are similar examples through the book... net result is that I'll rate the 'Style' a 4 based on this.
Content
As said in the introduction, overall I really like the updates. (To be fair, I'm not sure what's new with this update vs. what was changed in RQ4 or 5.) i think they focused on the right areas and the changes made sense. That said, it definitely preserves the simulationist approach of base RQ, for good and ill. Overall I'd give it a 5 out of 5 - it's a little generous (this isn't perfect), but I respect that this is a successful update of a beloved system.
One thing I should highlight is that this book makes NO reference to Glorantha whatsoever. I'm not sure about the plans there - I really hope a supplement will be forthcoming soon.
Focusing on the key areas...
Character creation and growth
This will all feel very familiar to the grognards. Most of the changes are small - separation of CHA from POW; concept of 'experience rolls' being awarded on a regular basis.
The biggest change is the addition of 'passions', which is mechanically very similar to the Pendragon concept. Unfortunately this really only serves to highlight how little RQ deals with personality and motivation, especially in comparison to Pendragon. Personally I would have left this out - it feels orphaned.
Another critique is that the character creation system is still very 'variable'. They've taken some steps - notably awarding the same skill points to everyone, with one exception - but the focus is still very much on randomized statistics, and then there's a number of areas (social class, reputation, connections, age) where some results are clearly 'better' for min-maxers. It would have been better to have balanced impacts (e.g., some negative impacts of higher class).
Combat
This was always the best part of RQ and it's preserved the best parts - HP by location, 'reflective' armor - while adding some interesting new elements.
The biggest change from my perspective is the replacement of RQ3's Strike Rank with 'Strike Rank' (essentially initiative - defines first-action sequence') and 'Action Points' (number of actions per turn). The entire Action Point economy seems quite elegant from my perspective - essentially you have to spend AP to take any action, including active defense such as parrying, which does a nice job of having outnumbered combatants get overwhelmed. That said, I think it goes a bit too far - the 'passive defense' is quite weak as I read it, which doesn't seem quite right - I'm not exactly a master warrior personally, but it seems like a strong fighter should be able to have some basic dodging skill usable against multiple opponents, vs one parry/evade at a time. (To be fair, the 'Outmaneuvering' action seems to be addressing this, but the narrative description seems more specialized than the 'mass dodge' I'm thinking of).
Another significant change in combat is the concept of 'Special Effects' in combat. Essentially this replaces the old 'impale/critical' rules from RQ3; in essence, a combatant gets one 'special effect' per difference in degree of success vs. his opponent, and can then choose the exact effect - example include Choose Location, Bypass Armor, Disarm Opponent, etc. Overall I quite like the idea on paper - and it ties nicely with the AP economy described above.
The final relatively major idea is Combat Styles. In essence this means that you have a skill for a group of weapons - e.g., 'Medieval Knight' would give you Sword, Lance, Shield. While I appreciate the attempt to have a 'generic combat skill', it raises lots of simulationist questions. It doesn't seem write that all are at the same skill - e.g., a knight should be able to specialize in sword vs. lance. In addition, what if you get the same weapon from two Styles? Overall this doesn't seem quite right. I'd rather figure out some sort of stacked skill approach - e.g., combat style + weapon specialization = weapon skill.
Magic
In this space they also preserved the good parts and enhanced it in good ways. The biggest change is that the 3 old RQ3 schools have divided into 5: * Folk magic - basically the old spirit magic (hello, Bladesharp!) * Animism - a nice system for spirit combat * Mysticism - to use Meditation to gain augments and special abilities * Sorcery - very similar to the old RQ sorcery (sadly not like the Sandy Petersen sorcery rules) * Theism - like the old Divine magic spells, but instead of sacrificing POW for skills, you use the Exhort skill to 'coerce' miracles from the gods
For those of you who have played HW, the names are probably familiar... But in any case: Each of these seem to work better than the RQ3 version, at least on paper.
The one thing this DOESN'T cover in any way is any sort of heroquesting rules. Given how much of a gap this was in RQ, this is a bit sad... hopefully this is something that will be covered in a Glorantha supplement (along with - if I can dream - rules for Draconic magic).
Overall
As noted in some sections above, this isn't perfect. The product could have used more editing and organization, and some of the changes didn't really go far enough for my taste. That said, my view is basically it's an improvement over RQ3, while not spoiling the basic elegance of the system; so I'm really pleased. I'm definitely looking forward to trying it out at some point; and I'm also really looking forward to the Glorantha supplements.
-- Hyperlexic
Help support RPGnet by purchasing this item through DriveThruRPG.
