Review of Frontier Horizon

Frontier Horizon Complete Character Rules
Review
by Larry Bullock

Requested Review

I received an email from the game creator (Rick Heney) asking that I review his system. I guess you could say this is a comp copy (although anyone can currently download it from the website - http://www.geocities.com/omegab1ade/). The website calls the game:

"A revolutionary new role playing game! Frontier Horizons is a science fiction roleplaying game featuring ideas never seen in any other RPG!"

I don't know if I'd quite agree with that.

A Matter of Style

The download at the website is a zipped PDF file. It is a very large download (around 4MB, which doesn't shave a lot of size from the PDF file (around 4.5 MB), so it'll take a while to download on a dial up connection). The document itself is 334 pages (with a comprehensive table of contents and index (both of which you'll need to use the game)). Each page has a background image associated with it. While the background image adds a nice border to each page, it also includes computer circuit style lines that run behind the text. I found these lines very distracting.

There is a lack of art in the game. However, this is not by the creator's choice. He is currently looking for artists interested in working on the project. There are place holders in the file, though, where art is supposed to go (with a description of what is supposed to be there). I can forgive that as it is a game in development.

So, What Is It?

The closest game to this is TSR's Alternity (with bits of Cyberpunk and Traveller thrown in). Frontier Horizon tries to provide a rule system to be used for any science fiction game (from modern spies forward). Similar to Alternity, it provides sample aliens, character creation rules, combat rules, psionics, etc. However, the system itself has little resemblance to Alternity.

Frontier Horizons is a very rules intensive system. I mean that. Character creation can take quite some time. The game has 16 basic attributes and 9 derived ones. The basic attributes are determined by a combination of die rolling and a point system (depending upon your race), which in and of itself is OK. However the randomness continues as you roll for age, handedness, salary, savings, and spirals out of control as you roll for such mundane things as eye color, history, etc. Some of this can be good for someone who has trouble defining a character, especially the series of questions for personality. However, most roleplayers will probably opt out of using these rules.

The game uses a class system (called occupations) to give your character starting skills (and your choice of occupation will affect your character's age as well). There are quite a selection to choose from. However, I feel as if the choices for occupation are designed for a specific setting in mind (same as the aliens) that isn't really fleshed out. There don't seem to be any rules for designing other occupations either.

The basic mechanic for a skill check is to roll a d10, add the skill level, and add the result to the ability related to the skill. If your total is higher than the difficulty rating, you succeed. If only combat stayed this easy.

The combat system requires you to calculate a new derived score (to add to your initiative roll (d12)). You then need to calculate your percentage chance to hit using this formula: (Agility X 6) (Weapon Skill X 6). You want to roll low. Of course, there are literally pages (66 (pages 95-161)) of modifiers to your roll. Basically, the rules try to cover all of the situations that may arise in combat. Some people may find this level of detail "realistic." Personally, I thought it was too much.

The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly

A great deal of thought seemed to go into this game. However, it should not have tried to present itself as a generic system. The whole thing comes across as being very much tied to a setting. However, the setting in question is never really detailed (at least Alternitiy presented ways to use the aliens in all the various technology levels). Perhaps if the game tied itself to a setting, it would work better. I mean, there aren't any rule provided to create a setting, varying the technology level, etc. If the rules aren't going to provide anything for creating a setting, they might as well provide the one that was in mind as the game was created. Again, though, there do seem to be rules available for a setting that includes psionics, robots, cybernetics, etc., I just wish that there were details on it.

I gave this game an average rating for style. I like the PDF format for distribution, but the background image and missing images hurt the presentation (and the sheer size of the document doesn't help either). While there is a large page count in the game, I still gave the game an average rating for content. While I'm sure part of that rating is my bias against rules heavy systems, I don't even know if rules heavy fans will like this. It seemed to be too much. Also, the lack of either a detailed setting or rules for creating one didn't help. Perhaps there will be a GM book to go with this one. I don't know.

What do you think?

What do you think of Frontier Horizons or my review? Please use the forums to let me know.

Larry