The Starting Dead - a Mephisto review

After being frowned upon as a horror scenario for a long time, the zombie apocalypse has become again a popular theme in the horror genre for many years. One TV series that has both benefited from and fueled this trend is The Walking Dead, which revolves around the survivors of a zombie apocalypse in the USA. After computer games set against the backdrop of The Walking Dead, a role-playing game for this setting has now been released.

As with the zombie genre in general, although the walking dead appear to be the primary threat, it is the interactions with the other survivors that can be much more dangerous, as the fall of civilization does not always bring out the best in people.

With The Walking Dead Universe role-playing game, Fria Ligan has bought another license for a film or series universe and published a corresponding starter set in addition to the core rule book for getting started. The starter set consists of two booklets, a rule book and a scenario booklet, as well as ready-made characters and cards. In terms of rules, The Walking Dead uses the Year Zero game system, in which players roll six-sided dice, and every six rolled is a success. Attributes and skills define the dice pool and suitable tools can increase this dice pool even further. Players also have the option of pushing a roll, which allows them to repeat the roll to increase their chances. This involves re-rolling all dice that were previously unsuccessful. However, the character takes a stress point for this, which also directly adds a stress die to the roll. Stress points can also be accumulated in other ways (e.g. lack of food, attacks by walkers, terrible experiences), and each stress point adds one stress die to the pool. On the one hand, stress dice increase the chance of success, but on the other hand, they carry a risk, as every one rolled on a stress die causes complications and problems.

There are also other special dice that are used by the game master in particular, such as rolls with d66 or d666 for random tables, or the so-called double high or double low dice, where two d6s are rolled and then the higher or lower value is taken.

The Walking Dead role-playing game uses four attributes and twelve skills, with three skills being assigned to each attribute. The skills are adapted to the scenario and include things like combat, but also scouting and survival in the wilderness as well as social interactions. As you would expect for a role-playing game about the zombie apocalypse, combat is an important aspect of the rules. The rules differentiate between three combat situations. The so-called duels are fights between two opponents in which comparative tests are rolled between the two opponents. The winner of the comparative roll causes damage to the opponent. In game terms, this is not to be considered an exchange of individual blows, but as a longer combat sequence per roll. As humans only have three health points in The Walking Dead, they are already eliminated after three normal hits or even fewer heavy hits. In addition to the duels, there are the so-called brawls, which depict the classic combat scenario with several participants. What changes here is that the fight takes place in phases and a character must decide in which phase to act. The phases include searching for cover, ranged combat, close combat, movement, first aid, and other actions. The phasing means that characters with firearms, for example, act before melee fighters. As the characters only have three health points, there is a relatively high risk that they will be broken at the end of a fight, i.e., have no more health points. This means that, on the one hand, they are knocked out for a certain period of time, and, on the other, they have to roll d66 on a table for critical injuries. In addition to injuries such as shortness of breath, which means that they have a penalty for a few hours, the spectrum at the other end includes a heart attack with immediate fatal consequences.

As already mentioned, there are rules for stress, and of course, there is also the possibility of reducing stress. The idea here is that this is done through social interactions, in particular through the so-called Anchor, who is one of the other characters. By spending a little quiet time, the characters can reduce stress. The rule book also includes some rules for other threats, equipment, and, of course the third combat scenario: the fight against the undead. This is not a classic battle at all, as individual walkers play no role here. Instead, the walkers are grouped together in swarms and represented in game terms by the size of the swarm and the threat level. The threat level indicates the extent to which the undead have already noticed the player characters and are hunting them. Accordingly, rules are introduced on how players can avoid walkers or reduce the threat level, and how individual walker attacks that can be triggered by a high threat level are to be handled in terms of rules. Of course, the player characters also have the option of fighting a swarm. However, there is always the risk that the noise will attract more walkers. There is another d66 table for the walker attacks, which also includes harmless but nevertheless drastically described attacks, as well as attacks that mean a fatal and terrible end for the characters. One concept in The Walking Dead is that the game can be played in two modes: the so-called Survival Mode and the Campaign Mode. Survival mode is designed for the player characters to play a single adventure — with pre-made characters if necessary. The level of threat is correspondingly high, as the characters are not part of a campaign, so it is quite possible that they will not survive the scenario in order to keep the horror level high.

With The Wolf's Den, the second booklet also contains a short survival scenario in which the player characters are part of a group of survivors, two of whom have deserted. The group sets out to find the missing and recover the stolen resources. The scenario takes place in three locations. First, the player characters have to find some clues and then search two locations. The locations are each provided with a map and short descriptions of the houses, and they offer some starting points to keep the player characters busy. At the second location, the player characters also have to face a threat that fits in well with the Walking Dead setting. Nevertheless, there are no elaborate scenes here, just starting points with which players and gamemasters have to tackle the story, which is described in a compact 20-page booklet.

The Wolf's Den is perfectly suitable for a first foray into the world of The Walking Dead and for trying out the rule mechanisms. In other systems by Fria Ligan, however, the introductory settings were much more exciting, and the really original scenes are missing here.

The set also includes three maps for the scenarios from the adventure, as well as corresponding overview maps of the Atlanta area for the campaign game. Two sets of ready-made characters round off the starter set. On the one hand, there are the ready-made characters for the survival scenario, which are integrated into the plot accordingly and are characterized by interaction between the characters (including the fact that each character brings their own personal secret with them). On the other hand, four characters from the series are included to be used as non-player characters, for example.

The role-playing game The Walking Dead has an exciting setting due to the series and the general zombie apocalypse, and the series can probably be used as a comprehensive treasure trove of ideas. The approach of focusing on the threat posed by the survivors and the interpersonal conflicts and tensions in addition to the fight against the undead is convincing. The rule mechanisms are coherent, and the approach to stress and the extremely deadly combat system also fit the setting perfectly. The introductory scenario is suitable for taking your first steps in the world of The Walking Dead, but it lacks some exciting or surprising elements that the starter sets of Alien or Blade Runner offered. Nevertheless, The Walking Dead Universe RPG Starter Set is a coherent introduction to the game world. Fans of the series or players who are still looking for a zombie apocalypse role-playing game will find a well-made horror role-playing game here.

(Björn Lippold)

Decent information. Like the flowcharts. The big problem is the pdf format is not multi-page, so it is almost unprintable without a large format printer.

As a first solo foray into TOR (using Strider Mode), I absolutely love it. It has very interesting mechanics, and the more I think about them, the more I like it. TOR in particular has a Target Number which is derived from the core Attributes (Strength, Heart, Wits), so what your character is natural makes a task easier or more difficult. Skills allow you to roll a number of d6s equal to your d6 level, so the more skilled you are at something, you’re more likely to succeed. I love how these two work together for the same end result, but are separate from each other. Also only by having a higher skill can you get a higher chance of getting a special success, as the attribute only effects the TN. Furthermore you always roll a Feat Die (a d12 essentially), numbered from 1-10 and having a face with the Eye of Sauron and a face with Gandalf’s Rune, which give a Misfortune or Fortune respectively. So different situations can increase or decrease the number of Skill dice, and they can also make the Feat Die be rolled at advantage or disadvantage, and the great thing about it is, that they will impact different things in the game!

Heading to the next part which is combat. I loved it. A skill roll modified by opponents Parry is made. Each character has an Endurance rating which one could think of as Hit Points, as they can take you out of combat. Each hit you receive will reduce your Endurance. Damage to Endurance is fixed, modified by any special successes rolled, and you only drop unconscious at zero. Only Wounds have the opportunity of killing a character, and that’s where armor has it’s place, as it can prevent this. There are many special successes that can be utilized by the heroes or their adversaries, and the heroes also have four (five in solo) stance to choose when fighting. There is no significant Death Spiral, with the major penalty is the risk of becoming weary if your Endurance drops below your Fatigue and Load rating. I won’t go into any more details, I just found that combat may look complex, but actually is very streamlined, with as few rolls as possible, but at the same time providing a great varied experience.

TOR has several bookkeeping stats, which all play a major role in the game. You need to keep track of your Fellowship, Endurance, Load, Fatigue, Hope and Shadow. Sounds like a lot, but they all provide a different result. Your character may start going down the shadow path, or lose hope, or become tired and need to rest, etc. These all provide an experience as close as one can get to the Tolkien books. The authors also chose terms whose name rings familiar to the LOTR trope.

The next part I adored was the Journey system. Another smart way to run hex based journeys. An event will always happen, the question is when, and what event. So depending on how good you’re at travelling, you may make the journey with fewer events or as many as 1 per hex, making you earn each hex with hard adventuring. I love how this system could also work with a hex crawl generator (like the hex power flowers), and with any success based RPG ruleset. It’s something I’ll keep on my toolset for the future, as it works great for solo, and is much better than asking the Oracle or rolling on random encounter tables.

As to the presentation, I have the hardcopy book and the art and quality of print is absolutely stunning. Production value is great, and the whole book is very evocative. Love it.

Having used various solo tools, oracles and engines over the past few years, I was really curious as to how Strider mode plays.

The experience of Shawn Tomkin in this is evident. Utilizing the Strider Mode doesn’t feel like you take an Oracle and put it on top of the game. Instead it connects to TOR so seamlessly, it feels like TOR was meant to be solo played. It has a Fortune and an Ill-Fortune table which you can use when you roll something good or bad on the Feat die (during regular ruleset rolls), so you can always get an Intervention of sorts while playing. It has a Telling Table (a Yes/No with Extremes, Oracle), and a Lore Table which has 72 each of Action, Focus, Aspect words. These words fit a lot in the theme without being explicit (for example it has Fell, Gloomy, Fellowship, which all bring out the Tolkien vibe), and then it also has a Revelation table for when the Eye of Sauron is fixed on you (another great mechanic!). Finally it has 7 Journey Event tables (6 entries each) which really create opportunities to adventure, essentially expanding on top of the existing Journey system and making it solo. I think it shines here.

So, it doesn’t work with Scenes or Actors. This may be an issue in the long run, if you want a more arching adventure and meaningful encounters. On the other hand, this brings a more gamey vibe out, where things happen on your way to your quest (the initial mission, but they need not be relevant). This follows up a lot the Hobbit vibe, where the party faced a multitude of dangers that were mostly random, before arriving at their quest at the lonely mountain.

I haven’t finished my first Journey yet, and have only accumulated several disjointed journey events, making my trip look like a book or journal. Having a defined enemy (Sauron), clarifies things a lot in solo. Because as I foresee now, the missions will be relevant mostly to the enemy, and depending on the location and the Eye Awareness, you may get extra enemy events. On the other hand there are ample situations for random events.

Overall I love it, and it can play very fast. Actually it plays a lot faster than most of the other solo adventures I’ve run in the past, and a great advantage is that I rarely had to pause for a long time and think how to interpret a situation. The rolls and results were straightforward, and the process streamlined, I really felt like playing the game, than having to write my story. I can’t tell how it will progress. It’s very deadly, but gives you the opportunity to get out of a bad situation if you need to. Recommended.

Dark secrets in the North - a Mephisto review

The Lost Mountains Saga is another adventure book for the Vaesen role-playing game. The campaign comprises five individual adventures with several connecting elements. At the heart of it all is an ancient secret, traces of which are found in the form of unusual crystals in northern Scandinavia. However, the mine where these crystals were mined has been closed for a long time since an accident. Nevertheless, there are several parties that are following the trail of the crystals and have their own goals for these artifacts.

The book begins with a brief introduction that provides background information for the game master and presents the various people and power groups involved. The adventure Duty and Despair then gets straight down to business. In the first adventure, the player characters are asked by another member of society to help him investigate incidents in a mining town. When the player characters arrive there, they witness how the conflict between the miners and the town's reverend intensifies in the town. As usual for the Vaesen role-playing game, this is just one of the conflicts in the adventure. At its core, of course, it is once again about a vaesen that must be found to stop it and prevent a major catastrophe.

After this intro, the players have the opportunity in the second adventure, The Beginning of the Fall, to start some investigations on location in Uppsala. In the process, they discover that an influential industrialist and his young wife want to reopen an old mine in the north of the country that promises technical wonders. This allows the characters to immerse themselves in the larger story and find out more about their partner from the first adventure.

In the third adventure, Where the Sun Dies, the player characters are sent out to search for an island where contact with the local community has been lost during the winter, and an icy and deadly threat awaits them.

The fourth adventure, The Prince and the Witch, is again set near Uppsala. Here, the player characters have to help free some people from the clutches of the so-called Prince, who lives deep in the forest.

At the end, the eponymous adventure The Lost Mountain Saga leads to the heart of the story and the grand finale, where the various storylines are brought together, and the final confrontation takes place.

Without revealing more about the content of the adventures in detail, it can be said that the stories are woven together in such a way that, although they are part of a larger campaign, the connecting threads are often not clearly visible to the player characters at first. The players will probably only recognize the connections at the end, which in my view, is more of an advantage than a disadvantage. In fact, this campaign could also be combined with other adventures, thus building up the themes very subtly.

The individual adventures are designed quite differently. They range from the introductory adventure, which classically follows the basic Vaesen pattern, to the city adventure in Uppsala with its many investigative approaches and social interactions, to the survival adventure and the grand finale, the course of which also depends on the players' decisions.

In my opinion, The Lost Mountains Saga is an excellent campaign for Vaesen with five varied adventures in which the players will probably not recognize the common story elements at first, increasing the tension. Even though the core of the campaign revolves around larger secrets, it is only at the end that it becomes clear what is at stake. The well-written and coherently illustrated book thus offers Vaesen gaming groups adventure material for several evenings and can therefore be recommended.

(Björn Lippold)

It's just a question of time - a Mephisto review

It is hardly surprising that the topic of time anomalies is used in a supplement for Tales from the Loop. However, Out of Time is “out of time” in two aspects. On the one hand, time anomalies are addressed here and used as a hook for a small campaign; on the other hand, this volume is set between at the change of the decade from Tales from the Loop with children in the 1980s and Things from the Flood with teenagers in the 1990s.

The central element of the book is the Out of Time mini-campaign, which consists of three adventures: The Animal Ark, Summer Camp, and The Storm in the Hourglass. This three-part adventure campaign begins with the children investigating the disappearance of some animals and thus discovering strange events. In the second adventure, they spend time at a summer camp, which soon leads to even more confusion and danger rather than relaxation.

Finally, at the end of the campaign, a catastrophe must be prevented, which also links to the remaining adventures and clarifies the previous events.

Out of Time offers a varied, but also challenging campaign for the player characters, which increases the challenges from adventure to adventure. Even the game master needs a certain amount of imagination and mental flexibility to fully understand the complex sequence of events in the adventures, which use the usual tropes and concepts of the genre to create a tricky puzzle. In addition, the three adventures form a transition between Tales from the Loop and Things from the Flood: while the first episode still appears to be an exciting mystery episode, the finale has much darker tendencies and threatens more than just the existence of the player characters. Although all stories can be played as Tales from the Loop adventures, a transition between the systems is offered as an alternative.

While the small campaign constitutes the majority of the book, Secret Places is a so-called Mystery Landscape for Tales from the Loop. Ten locations are described as mini-scenarios that can serve as a starting point for adventures and can be played as part of the Mystery Landscape according to the players’ interests and priorities. Each of these ten scenarios entices the player characters with mysterious events and thus leads to a short story. However, it is up to the player characters to decide which of these secrets they would like to explore and how they go about it.

The chapter The Mystery Machine, on the other hand, provides tables for randomly rolling certain framework conditions and ideas for your own mysteries and thus getting a corresponding starting aid. These tables can either be used as a source of inspiration or to fill in gaps, such as determining the personalities of corresponding non-player characters or similar.

The book concludes with the chapter Mixed CD of Mysteries, in which eight additional scenario ideas are presented. These adventure outlines are somewhat more detailed than the Mystery Landscape, but do not reach the length of the three campaign adventures. As these adventures are set in the 90s, they are better suited to the follow-up role-playing game Things from the Flood, not only for this reason but also thematically. Some mysteries here are somewhat darker and more dangerous, and they address themes that are better suited to teenagers in Things from the Flood. I really liked the idea that each adventure is named after a song from the 90s to do justice to the title of the mixed CD, which also contributes to the basic atmosphere.

From my point of view, Out of Time is an excellent adventure book that offers a lot of exciting game material for both Tales from the Loop and Things from the Flood with its three-part campaign, the Mystery Landscape and the adventure mix CD. Placing the supplement on the border between both systems fits the thematic focus and can be used to draw the transition between the optimistic 1980s and the darker 1990s. Out of Time is a highly recommended addition to both Tales from the Loop and Things from the Flood games.

(Björn Lippold)

One of the best material for Tales from the loop!

The One RIng is the best TTRPG that I've found for invoking the spirit of Tolkien's Middle-earth.

Production values are through the roof. Art and layout are graphically superior to other RPG core books.

I like this supplement. There is a lot of good stuff in here to work with. For my game, I'm taking the powers/mutations, Deadzone points/anomalies/encounter, and adding them to my existing game. My only criticism is that I wished there was more horrors.

My fav published introductory scenario for Coriolis. Great, nearly airtight storyline. Introduces the PC's to the basic elements of the factions and Coriolis universe. Download the maps of the station for this one. Great art and NPC's are included. Not really a gunslinging scenario but the option exists. Great for 1st time RPG players and veterans alike that might be interested in a whodunnnit with a plenty of intrigue.

The main story is based on escorting a very annoying character with a worn out movie trope. There are couple of interesting things, like location description and its placement, but overall its pretty boring and has no new ideas. Some of the stuff does not make sense at all. I guess it can be used as basis for your own adventure, but I would not recommend to play it as is.

This is a great supplement. The design is cute. Perhaps if the designer tried being a little less cute they would have realized the pages are numbered in some places, in other places not at all. Include page numbers or don’t. Numbering half the pages is as helpful as a half-completed table of contents, an index with missing entries, and a table of contents that only lists odd numbered chapters.

Cute designs are good, but not when elementary decisions and designs are overlooked.

With the adition of the three new cultures, I can use my AiME sourcebooks to play Wilderland Adventures. As cultures in LotR 5E and AiME 5E are not fully compactible, a little work is needed in order to get the old 6 pregen characters - Lifstan, Beli, Beran, Trotter, Caranthiel and The Bride - for new adventurers.

Time to take back players to Mirkwood.

This is a fast, furious and fun rpg that really captures the dark, dystopian mood of a cyberpunk universe. The mechanics are simple and clean. They really steer the game towards having the characters stir up some shit and cause trouble. For example, the player in my game that was running a "burned hacker" had a great time using his "Boom Boom" app to blow up appliances and vending machines to terrible effect for those nearby.

I ran the two the adventures it comes with- Lucky Flight Takedown and Reaper Repo. Both were a really fun and easy to run. I like how they organize their adventures. They were both short (we got trough each one in a single session), but they were both lot of fun to run and play.

I'm looking forward to playing more Cy_Borg in the coming months/years.