The purpose of the review is to answer the question does the Radiance Players Guide blend D&D editions together and provide a toolkit for world creation? And does it do so with stylish and well written rules?

This review is divided into seven sections:

--what The Radiance Players Guide strove to accomplish based on the author’s stated goals

--my expectations about the game based on how The Radiance Players Guide described itself

--the introduction which sets up many of The Radiance Players Guide goals

--character creation

--the game engine

--GMing Radiance RPG

--my overall conclusions including whether I felt The Radiance Players Guide delivers what it promised.

Radiance Players Guide Design Goals and Promises The back description reads: Radiance RPG blends the best of editions of the world’s most popular role-playing game. It lets you focus on a fantasia of the late 19th century. Yet it is meaty and flexible to support any campaign setting you can imagine.

The credits page lists the principles that guided the design process:

--Familiar (the wizard casts magic missile, dragons, and newer tropes such as steamgear)

--Streamlined (reducing GM prep time and reducing the number of subsystems)

--Flexible (options such as multiclassing and statted NPCs and a modular nature so steampunk, magic items, or electrotech can be pulled out or plugged in)

--Balanced (classes are balanced especially between fighter and wizard)

--Appealing (choice of focusing on tactical challenges with optional battlemaps and minis, narrative and storytelling, verisimilitude with details on an extensive fantasy world, or a blend of all three).

Expectations of the Reviewer For fantasy, I really like D&D, especially AD&D 1E. I enjoy making my own worlds and D&D provides me the tools I like the best to make my own setting and adventures. I ran 1E for my current group but the unique mechanics were hard for some in the group to enjoy. After that attempt, I had just about given up on D&D.

4E is not something I can wrap my head around anymore, 5E is not what I’m looking for, and Pathfinder just requires too much paperwork and math. DCC RPG is great, but the player character options are restricted (and a bit random of course, part of the game’s charm). If I was going to consider a retroclone, I’d just play 1E instead. Then I found Radiance RPG.

Chapter 1: Introduction The first thing in chapter 1 is not words but a great half-page piece of art that pays homage to the AD&D 1E Player’s Handbook cover. Adventurers plunder an alien idol with the piled up bodies of monsters behind them. In this piece of art, the idol is steampunk as are the adventurers and the monsters are slain squid headed aberrations. The art is described thusly: “After dispatching the illithrix clutch, we studied their rude idol: a derelict nucleonic device. Jasper dislodged the psychic crystal in its bowels.”

The Radiance Players Guide starts with an Introduction chapter that defines key terms (the same terms used in other D20 fantasy RPGs), provides an overview of the thirteen chapters, mentions the Radiance Masters Guide for GMs, and discusses heroic stories.

A short paragraph is dedicated to describing each heroic story concept. The stories The Radiance Players Guide supports include the standards of D20 fantasy including have fun, battle terrible monsters, delve ancient ruins, develop unique abilities, and gain magical treasure. Other stories The Radiance Players Guide was written to support include build a kingdom, fulfill your destiny, navigate court intrigue, pursue true love, and win souls to your god. The Radiance Players Guide includes both advice as well as rules to support romance and faith that appear innovative to me. I discuss those rules under character creation below.

A paragraph about anti-heroes follows and the game supports that option with rules. Again, more on that in character creation.

Another great piece of art follows. Portraits of four adventurers surround a map of an area to explore. Villains are depicted in the lower right corner.

A description of campaign settings follow. The Radiance Players Guide supports campaigns ranging from gritty medieval all the way to space fantasia. Rules in later chapters support a variety of campaigns. I’ll touch on rules to support a variety of campaigns in GMing Radiance below. A definition of rule 0 and the author’s suggested rules for interaction at the table between GM and players wraps up this section.

The chapter finishes with twenty-five steps to character creation.

Character Creation Character creation is nearly all mechanical advice and instruction. The only drawback I saw to this list is that the chapters and/or page numbers for each section are not included. They aren’t hard to find, but a direct page reference would have been useful.

I also felt with all the innovations The Radiance Players Guide offers, it fell down a bit on this section, missing a real chance to offer new options to long-time D20 fantasy players. It starts with Imagine Your Character. After all the build-up about campaigns and stories and GM/player interaction in the Introduction this paragraph boils down to you might have a specific image in mind or have some challenges that might define your PC. I would have liked to read advice to tie your image to the shared campaign you are building with the other players and GM for example.

However, what it lacks in roleplaying advice, it more than makes up for in being concise, thorough, and usable (despite the missing page number references). Steps 2 to 7 are standard for D20 fantasy: assign six attributes, race, level, class, class abilities, and skills (overviews below).

Steps 8 and 9 calculate hit points and defenses which I talk about in the game engine section. Step 10 is calculating attack roll (d20 ½ your level prime attribute modifier other modifiers). Steps 11 to 15 cover starting equipment. Steps 16 to 20 cover theme, deity, alignment, culture, and faction all of which I talk about more below.

The remaining steps give an overview of combat and adventuring, NPCs, and wrap up with naming your character. A list of suggested names is included on page 13 but not referenced here, which is an oversight in my opinion. --Races and Racial Abilities Key terms for classes are described first. Comeliness is an attribute based on race that rates physical attractiveness for roleplaying purposes. Adjustments based on age are also an option. A racial ability can be spent to gain a noble title as well.

Races include human, asimar, atlan, drack, dromite, drow, dwarf, elf, gnome, goblin, goliath, grippli, half-elf, half-orc, halfling, hobgoblin, kobold, lizardfolk, pygmy, rakasha, slith, tengu, tiefling, and warmech. Each race has a one page write-up. Additional racial traits are chosen at different levels for a total of six at 18th level.

Every race has unique and in some cases frightening twists. Some descriptions veer into adult territory. For example, the pygmy is a feral tribesman and headhunter. The pygmy can take a racial ability to eat the fingers of enemies in combat to heal vitality. Another ability allows the pygmy to eat other parts of a slain enemy after combat to regain vitality. My group was not bothered by a feral tribe of small headshrinkers and we have a pygmy PC.

For a more classic example, all dwarves start with: Darkvision: You see in conditions of total darkness as easily as full daylight. Darkvision is black and white only, but it is otherwise like normal sight.

A player might also chose as one of the two racial ability options at 1st level: Duergar Form (Magical): Eons ago, dwarves could enlarge their size. Once daily, you grow to size Large for 5 minutes. A larger size doubles your height, applies a -2 penalty to Reflex, a 2 bonus to damage rolls, a 5 bonus on Athletics checks, 5 wound points, 10 ft speed, a 5 bonus to resist Bull Rush, Grapple, and Trip attacks, a -5 penalty on Stealth checks, and a 8x weight increase. Costs 1 vitality.

I discuss vitality in the game engine section.

--Classes A discussion of advancement starts the chapter off. A sidebar includes Behind the Math, which explains how every class is structured mathematically.

Key terms follow. Included in key terms are range bands for using class abilities without minis and a battle map. Levels range from 0 (optional) to 20. Classes include: Artificer, Barbarian, Bard, Blackguard, Cleric, Dhampir, Druid, Elementalist, Fighter, Gallant, Gunslinger, Inquisitor, Invoker, Mageblade, Medicant, Monk, Necromancer, Paladin, Pathfinder, Psion, Ranger, Rogue, Sage, Shadowcaster, Shaman, Shifter, Sorcerer, Warlock, Witch, and Wizard.

I did not like the idea that 0 level characters start with only 1 vitality. I changed it to 3 vitality (half of 1st level rounded up).

Each class gets a two-page write-up. Each class has one prime attribute which is used to make all attacks.

Each class starts with three core abilities. Additional abilities can be chosen at the Basic Tier (1-3), Intermediate Tier (4-8), Advanced Tier (9-13), and Paragon Tier (14-20).

Two classes require a character to be evil: the blackguard and the warlock. The vileness of each class and the trafficking with fiends is reinforced by the requirement that both classes sacrifice a sentient good creature to advance in level. While the blackguard has traditionally been an evil class in D&D the warlock has not. This change made sense to me because the warlock abilities in Radiance require evil intent and evil actions.

I will likely only use both classes for NPCs. For groups that want characters that have truly crossed a line, however, the blackguard and warlock are viable options especially if combined with following an evil deity.

The name radiance comes from the magic of the setting. An optional rule requires that radiance, the stuff of magic, is needed to cast spells. It has a small cost associated with using it. Otherwise, it can be used simply for roleplaying purposes with no mechanical effect.

Here are examples comparing the fighter and wizard.

A fighter has access to all weapons, armor, and shields. Core abilities include combat focus (use move action to gain 2 to hit), rapid attack (2 attacks at -2 to hit each), and weapon focus ( 1 to hit and 2 to damage with one melee weapon). A paragon tier ability is:

Weapon Mastery: This improves Weapon Specialization, such that you apply a 5 bonus on attack rolls and 15 damage when using the weapon.

A wizard has to hold an implement or take a -2 penalty to magical attack rolls. No armor and can use light blades and staff. Core abilities include magic missile, a bonus to skills, and a spellbook allowing access to any one accessible tier ability after study. A paragon tier ability is:

Disintegrate (Magic): You target a single 10-ft-cube volume or 1 creature within 120 ft. If you target a volume, unattended mundane material and force effects (such as Wall of Force) vanish. If you target a foe and beat its Fortitude, it suffers 4d6 wound damage and vanishes if it dies. Miracle or Wish restores disintegrated items and creatures. Costs 10 vitality.

Multi-classing is optional, can be done once to gain access to two classes maximum (dilettante theme allows more options), swaps abilities on a one for one basis, and only takes three paragraphs to detail.

--Skills The Radiance Players Guide has twenty-nine skills with most broken down into three or more described uses. Any character can use a skill and add an attribute modifier and any other applicable modifiers.

Skills by attribute modifier:

Strength: Athletics, Intimidate

Constitution: Endurance

Dexterity: Acrobatics, Mechanics, Stealth, Pilot, Trick

Intelligence: Appraise, Arcana, Craft, Dungeoneering, History, Literacy, Nature, Technics, Warcraft

Wisdom: Handle Animal, Heal, Insight, Perception, Religion, Survival

Charisma: Bluff, Diplomacy, Disguise, Music, Nobility, Streetwise.

Rules include aiding others, multiple skills checks, skill challenges, opposed skill checks, and earning a living using 3 skills of the character’s choice.

An example of a skill is Mechanics. Mechanics can be used for: Craft Device, Craft Firearms/Explosives, Craft Trap, Disable Device, Open Lock, and Repair Construct.

--Theme A theme provides an archetypal focus or meaning. Covered extensively in Chapter 6, themes include: Arcanist, Believer, Commando, Dilettante, Explorer, Guildsman, Heretic, Hunter, Martialist, Noble, Protector, Rider, Romantic, Scientist, Specialist, and Traitor. Each has a one page write-up and eleven minor and major awards are chosen over 20 levels.

Themes can be generic in nature or tightly themed. For example, the arcanist helps with using arcane magic of any type. On the other hand, the commando theme concentrates on owning and using an electrotech battle suit.

I was challenged trying to figure out how to make the Commando theme work. Does mundane armor proficiency count for battle suits for example.

--Deity Twenty-two deities each receive a one page description. PCs gain 1 faith point for every two levels when gaining a new level or at the start of a new game year (left overs are lost). Faith points can be used to access four levels of boons for each deity.

I like faith points and deities. They are like action points from Unearned Arcane 3E but tie directly to the faith and the deity a character follows. Great idea and easy to use during a game. I give out glass beads equal to faith points and have each player put them on a printout of their character’s deity.

--Alignment The traditional nine alignment scale is used and covers one and a half pages. It is looser in Radiance. For example, the paladin can be lawful good, neutral good, or lawful neutral. Alignment must be within one step of whatever deity the PC follows.

--Culture Four cultures include primal tribal, medieval feudal, enterprising colonial, and decadent imperial. Each culture can be used for roleplaying purposes only or a cultural ability may be chosen in place of a racial ability.

--Faction Fourteen factions are included and can be joined after the game begins. Factions range from demon hunters to titan following heroes to assassins to mercs to druids. Undead and shapeshifters also get factions.

I like factions. They are flavorful, directly part of any world, and have a variety of tangible benefits to entice PCs to join.

The Game Engine Most rolls in The Radiance Players Guide are d20 plus attribute modifier plus other modifiers. Some also use half level as a modifier. Damage uses smaller dice just as in other versions of D&D. Armor, however, uses damage resistance which I really like (I like simulation most of all).

Attacks specify which of three defenses resist (roll over to hit): Fortitude (physical resistance), Reflex (dodging and looking way), and Will (mental resistance). Each uses 10 ½ level class bonus (if any) attribute modifier (pick between two). I like that armor class is not a defense.

There are 2 kinds of hit points: wounds and vitality. Wounds is based on race. It represents actual physical punishment you can take. Vitality is based 5 per level with Constitution modifier added only once. It represents energy, luck, skill, etc.

Mostly, damage applies to vitality first, then wounds when vitality falls to 0. Some special attacks like poison deal wound damage directly. A PC can go to negative wound points equal to Constitution score before dying.

A critical hit is scored on a natural 20 (rarely 19-20) if the attack would normally hit (otherwise it hits but isn’t a critical). A critical bypasses damage reduction and does maximum damage.

Use of many abilities requires spending vitality. In addition to rest, many abilities provide romantic or relaxing activities (such as counting gold for the guildsman theme) that can recover vitality.

I like the splitting of hit points into vitality and wounds. I also like that vitality is spent to power powerful abilities.

Healing classes include the cleric, druid, medicant, and paladin. The witch can heal as well.

Characters earn experience points for anything that advances the game: killing monsters and overcoming dangers, achieving personal goals, and playing in character. Characters start at 1st level (or optionally 0 level at -2 XP) and advance through twenty levels and four tiers. An optional one page rules of sentiments for roleplaying can also provide bonus XP.

Equipment uses slots for encumbrance. Gear includes armor, weapons, property & business, war machines, and steamgear (gear, novelty travel, and weapons).

Electrotech is not needed to balance characters and can be pulled. Included are power sources, battlements (armor and weapons), communicators, conveniences (ranging from a calculator to a reanimation lab), mind machines (influences the mind), and transports (electric carriage, flying saucers, moon rocket and more).

As mentioned in themes above, I struggled a bit with battle suits. I couldn’t figure out how they worked (do they have to be powered all the time or not, do you need the Technics skill to use, does mundane armor proficiency count?).

Magic items are not needed to balance characters and can be pulled (though keeping potions is recommended). Magic items include weapons, armor, potions, scrolls, spellships, symbionts, and wonders. Magic items are listed in four tiers and each item in each tier has the same gold piece cost.

GMing Radiance RPG The Radiance Masters Guide has many traps, maps, and monsters. A free PDF of monsters can found at the same link for the free Radiance Players Guide.

An important note on the monsters. As previewed in this book, all the monsters follow the 4E tradition of having all needed rules listed in the description. No looking up spells or feats or monster powers somewhere else. Everything needed for each monster is with the monster description.

The Radiance Players Guide includes many GM tools as well. Chapter 7 devotes one page to the origins and layout of the Multiverse. Chapter 12 covers exploring including rules on everything from disease to space travel. It includes a list of alternate realms and their conditions for each deity. A sample creature is provided as are rules for making creatures of levels 1 to 20.

Chapter 13 has details on culture, factions, settlements, 102 NPCs, and a list of common items PCs might want to purchase. The introduction, described above, also has useful advice for GMs.

A pure fantasy campaign can be run by pulling out electrotech from Chapter 9 (and gunpowder and steamgear for an even earlier era). A more sci-fi game can be run by pulling out magic items from Chapter 10 except for potions.

Conclusions of the Reviewer The rules for Radiance appear sound. Playing the game at low levels has gone well. I anticipate higher levels will also run smoothly.

The 4E idea of gaining bonuses every other level balances out twenty levels of adventuring. More powerful spells like fly and teleport are pushed to higher levels. And every class has two pages of mechanics. Casters don’t have a hundred pages of spells. Themes are also used.

Concepts from 3E and Pathfinder include easy multi-classing and many familiar classes like the gunslinger, mageblade, and witch. Long-time D&D favorites prior to 4E include the lance, the grippli (well, the race is one of my favorites), and nine alignments but with looser restrictions. For example, the paladin can be lawful good, lawful neutral, or neutral good.

Radiance also has many new ideas: steamgear, electrotech, and deities whose influence can be felt in every session by every character. A hundred townies are statted out for the GM’s use as NPCs. And sentiments are included as a guide for roleplaying.

I can easily see players creating characters that range from courtly duelists to lords growing a kingdom to space-faring explorers. What the game promises, the game delivers.

Personally, I really like the warmechs, a warforged/ironborn race. The grippli are another favorite. In Radiance, some grippli have formed blood cults and drain enemies of blood to regain Vitality. I also really appreciate the sheer number of races and classes included, all with equal amounts of page count in regards to each other. I also hope the PCs in my group buy a moon rocket someday.

The Radiance Players Guide blends classic fantasy with steampunk, sci-fi, and horror in a modular design. What could be a horrible mash-up instead blends together, for me, into a pleasing mélange that is greater than the sum of its parts.

I like the game well enough that I started a Radiance based campaign. I also ordered physical copies of both the player book and the GM book based on the strength of the free PDFs and our experience playing Radiance.

Charlie

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