I ran across this gem a few months ago while searching for a generic ruleset that isn‘t too crunchy, too squishy, bland or simply not fun. Tried and tested a lot of them and finally found the Adventure System by chance.

The designer states in the preface that he started homegrowing his rules a long time ago in the 1980s and it shows. This is not an armchair designed system but instead gives the feel of being tried and tested for a long time.

There are a few things I like im every system I encounter (mostly the omission of class and levels) and it hits the sweet spot between just enough crunch and handwaving a bit too. Adventure System seems to be heavily influenced by Savage Worlds (or at least bears a very strong similarity to that system). Having played Savage Worlds for a long time and liked it, this is not a bad thing at all.

So, why bother and not just use Savage Worlds? Adventure System IMO does some things better: First, it does away with modifiers - as in: at all. To quote the designer: „ all conflicts are resolved using dice mechanics without any modifiers. You roll a die and take the result at face value without adding or subtracting any modifiers from that value. Advantage and Disadvantage replace circumstantial modifiers. This simple yet critical concept removes almost all calculations from game play.“

And it does. The system flies. Circumstantial modifiers give you an extra die to roll and you take the highest or lowest result. You just roll the specified dier against a Difficulty Number of 4, 8 or 12, depending on what you try to accomplish. In the case where the rules specify something like a modifier, the system means a die step. Just increase or decrease the specified die type by the number of steps noted. For example, if the character has d6 Strength and wears a Ring of Mighty Brawn +1, he now has d8 Strength.

What‘s more? There is the so called Compass, an alignment system of sorts, based on Honor, Morality and Sanity. Each starts at 0 and can go from +8 to -8, depending on the actions of the character during a campaign. This has mechanical implications, as - for example - a character’s Morality equals or exceeds +4, they are Trustworthy and gain Advantage on Persuasion checks, whereas if their Sanity equals or drops below -4, they are Disturbed and gain Advantage on Intimidate checks, but must make a Spirit check or gain a disorder.

The rulebook is very complete, it covers templates for the usual EDO suspects, Futuristic Characters, Vehicles and much more. In sharp contrast to Savage Worlds, powers largely come pre-built in the form of - well - powers, several types of magic and elementalism.

All in all, coming from Savage Worlds you will find yourself right at home but notice that some things handle smoother and/or faster and that the rules have an interesting spin of their own. If anything, die rolls in and out of combat are resolved really fast and the system does a wide range of genres well, from Classic Fantasy, to Cyberpunk, to Space Opera, to Weird War II and much more.

Artwork and layout is nice and functional, the sepia-toned background makes it easy to read and it has an index. The only minor quibble is that there isn‘t a character sheet in the rulebook, so don‘t forget to download one as well. Adventure System clocks in at 220 pages and is available as pdf or hardcover. I own both, the hardback is of high quality, but my first one got roughed up in the customs, so DriveThru send me an replacement.

Certainly can't tell fellow gamemasters how to do their job. But ... I always suggest to new GM's, or GM's looking to improve, "Never let the rules get in the way of a good story." An even better caveat is to drop the word 'rules' altogether. 'Mechanics' is much more elegant. Mechanics are guidelines to assist in addressing any of the myriad scenarios a GM wishes to tailor. And the Adventure System effectively provides a universal set of those guidelines. The authors go out of their way to directly address almost ANY action/scenario/event/challenge in ANY campaign/world/play setting that you can think of. In the event that a GM or his/her players do come up with something that isn't specifically accounted for, once again, the fundamental mechanics for resolution remain unchanged, and can be applied.

Can only speak for myself, but I got into adventure role playing, to adventure role play and either tell, or experience a story ... not to be an accountant, or min/max, debate or argue every attribute or obscure circumstantial modifier to assist in determining outcomes. However, for the number crunchers amongst our community, Adventure System allows for either a very basic application of determining difficulty, or one can go as far down the situational rabbit hole as one chooses. For all intents and purposes, the fundamental mechanic for Adventure System is allows the GM to assign as provided in detail, or determine difficulty numbers which the players attempt to match or overcome as determined by their stats and/or skills. The fact that players can see improvement with virtually every session tends to keep their interest and engagement high. I appreciate that the authors here, actually specify assigning experience based on good play, interaction via role playing, etc. rather than experience being determined by how 'hot' a players dice are.

I recognize that the same can be said for virtually all gaming systems, target number, plus mods, or minus penalties, but Adventure System streamlines this so that there is more mayhem, and less math. With my play group, within 2 sessions, they settled into character and story, rather than being concerned with the statistics side of their character sheets.

Good Hunting,

Wolly

I really love this system.

As a game master, I like to build my own worlds, and many game systems limit that. Adventure System doesn't use classes, so you can make whatever type of character you want. Becasue there are no classes, a GM is not restricted in his world building like he is in many other games. The Core rule book even comes with primers for the old west, supers and WW II.

One mechanic that I get a lot of use out is the compass. The Compass helps a character grow and evolve based on the actions he or she takes.

Although, on it's surface, Adventure System looks a lot like other dice type driven games, I find it to be less crunchy with math and flows very smoothly. I also like to make house rules and tweak games, and if thats your thing too, you will find Adventure System easy to do that with too. It is a great tool set to make your own world with.

The only criticism I have is the name. 'Adventure System' is almost impossible to find in search engines. I can only find it on Drivethru by looking up the publisher's name, and that's sad, becasue this is a great game, and I think it would do much better if it was more easily found in searches.