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I left it a devoted follower bordering on fanboy-dom.
Initial Impression
When I first gazed on the book, I have to admit, it didn't excite me. First of all, I'm not in any way interested in playing in World War 2 for any reason. Second of all, the art does not appeal to me.
In fact, I probably would have passed it by, if someone who worked in the store hadn't suggested it and told me about it.
So, I took a look and skimmed through it.
Thumbing through it, the book looked like it had a lot of meat. In and of itself, that doesn't really matter - I've seen plenty of "loser" games that also had plenty of material.
More to the point, I noticed that much of it was background material, and only a small amount of it was devoted to the game engine. Now, I am one that follows the KISS theory, but in my experiences most games that are simple are also TOO simple. I had my suspicions.
However, between what the game store person had said, and what I saw, began percolating in my brain....
So, when I got home, I went to the godlike web site: godlikerpg.com
There, I read more about it but, more to the point, I found they had a link to a quick tutorial PDF, a more lengthy tutorial which has all the basics of the game engine itself (sans character creation rules), and an example adventure.
I read more, and was amazed. So amazed I ran the introductory adventure, and soon thereafter bought the book.
Delving in Deep
The premise of the game is superhero roleplaying in World War 2. However, this isn't your spandex wearing kind. You are low powered superheroes, and this is a very gritty setting. The potential fatality level is quite high. I am paraphrasing here, but they say "The only thing more godlike than their abilities was their fear."
I went back and read people who played the intro adventure at Gencon, and said "I never had more fun having a character die...." I was amused and intrigued.
The mechanics do not take up very much space. The chapters on game mechanics are slim compared to the rest of the book. For those pleased with rules-light games, you will love this - but the game mechanics presents a surprising amount of depth for such a seemingly simple mechanics, meaning many who despise rules light systems will love it too.
The rest of the book is devoted to World War 2, the geography, and its history, as altered by the Talents of the day and age.
The Looks
Visually, at first I found the book wanting in terms of art. I am not a big fan of the style of art used.
However, I must admit, for the setting, it was perfect. It really does a great job of setting the tone, and capturing the feel of World War 2 and the generation that fought it.
The art and layout are also very effective. The text reads smoothly with little or no interruption in flow. The chapters are put together very well.
You get the rules, read them, and you are done; the rest is "background material," and there are lots of it!!!!
The only problem is their editing. They made two mistakes: one a judgement error IMHO, the other was, well, it was a big one.
The first is that they put character advancement at the end of the chapter that is right BEFORE character generation. While this isnt a big deal, I found the decision... a bit odd.
The other is that, peppered throughout the book, they have rules references saying things like "pg xx". instead of having the page number, they have xx: meaning they forgot to go back and replace them with actual pages.
This is a very big deal in my humble opinion. How they could have missed such a simple and obvious thing before editing is beyond me and, frankly, is rather amatuerish - something I expect better of with these men who know the gaming industry so well.
With that in mind, that's why I gave their style a 4 intead of a 5, and I was tempted to give it an even lower score. However,those two flaws nonwithstanding, this was a very well done book, and getting past these mistakes, it is otherwise exceptional.
The Game Mechanics
The game mechanics are what really sucked me in. These are the most innovative game mechanics I've seen in a very long time. They are simple, and yet capable of doing a lot.
For those of you who have played Vampire or other WoD games, you will already know of what is called a Dice Pool system. For those who aren't a brief education.
A dice pool system is the idea that you roll a number of dice for an action. The dice are read in such a way to give you a variable result. The advantage is it gives you greater gradiations of effect; the disadvantage is that it is dice heavy.
As an example, rolling to hit in D&D requires rolling a single die; generally, its hit or miss. With a dice pool, you find out not only IF you hit, but HOW WELL. Every single potential result can possibly influence the total.
But, you have to roll lots of dice: roll dicepool x to determine initative, Roll dicepool y to determine if you hit etc etc.
Godlike took the premise of a dice pool and reduced it all to a single roll of a single dice pool, creating a mechanical system that at once has the advantage of a dice pool while making the combat and other actions flow fast and dangerous.
The concept all revolves around sets. A set is when you roll a dice pool and have two or more dice with the same value on it. So, if you roll 6d10 and got three 5's, you have a set. Two 5's are also a set, but one 5 is not.
A set has two important attributes: its Width and its Height. Width is the number of dice that make the set - so in the above example of three 5's, it has a Width of 3. The Height is determined by the value read on the pips of one die. So, in the same example, the Height is 5. This would be read as 3x5, or 3 by 5.
Width determines the following: first, success - you fail if you do not get at least a width of 2. The second is the speed at which you do an action, so the Wider the result, the faster it triggers (in combat, this is your iniative); and finally, in combat, it determines your damage (for instance, a pistol might do Width + 1 in killing and stun damage).
Height determines the QUALITY of the action. The Taller your set, the higher quality it is. In combat, this determines hit location, with a 1 being the left leg, and a 10 being the head (yes, this game uses hit locations, and quite elegantly). Height is also a tiebreaker for width in iniative.
The combat system uses hit locations as well; it has a damage silhouette representing the hit locations, and boxes of damage that each location can take. Killing and stun damage are recorded differently. And combat has the potential to be very, very fatal. Use your head in this game, or you WILL lose it!
There are three elements representative on a character sheet. The first are attributes: a regular human's abilities range from 1-5. The second is skills: a regular human's skills may not exceed his stat in value. The final are talents, those superhuman abilities that each character possesses.
A skill is rolled by rolling a # of dice = to his stat plus his skill; powers either modify stats and skills, or else are known as Miracles, things men and women could not normally do, such as fly. These have their own pool of dice.
There are three kinds of dice - regular, hard, and wiggle. Regular dice work as normal; hard dice are counted as always 10s, and wiggle dice can be any value you wish. Hard dice and wiggle dice are granted only from powers and superhuman abilities.
That is really about it. You are given the entire core of that system, including dodges, attacks, gunfire, parrying, cover fire, etc, in a small section of the rules, along with character creation.
The die roll system is seductively simple, and yet has a lot of depth to it.
Final Words
The game has a couple of very minor flaws in it. For instance, Difficulty (not mentioned here) doesn't mesh perfectly with the hit location system, and Miracles are generally most economically purchased with hard dice, when wiggle dice are supposed to be better (although hard dice have some often-missed restrictions; you have an attack with two hard dice, you have to use it at full power, which means you could kill someone even if you just want to capture them; powers like flight HAVE to be at full power, and you cant hover, etc etc; hard dice aren't flexible at all).
Despite this, this game is one of the deepest simple games I've ever seen. I have become ye olde fanboy, am now using some optional rules and other material from their websites etc for running a modern superheroish campaign, and they have more books for alternate settings coming out, as well as having licensed the engine out for a fantasy game via another company.
For that matter, this system can easily be used in any setting with very little effort. As long as you can forgive the couple of very minor faults (and I have yet to see a game without flaw), and if you don't mind a game that is very gritty (and they have optional rules to tone that down), then this game is just incredible.
Buy it. Today. :)
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