OSR Commentary On Pitford: Gateway To The Ruins For The Mutant Epoch Rpg By William McAusland

 "Pitford is like a great immobile tank, stuck on the battle scarred, hostile plains in the shadow of the Great Ruins. This scrap metal enclosure is more than a home base for excavators; it is a dynamic adventure site, where opportunity, riches, espionage, crime, and debauchery await. Herein, game sessions are as challenging and deadly as anything found outside of its junk and concrete shell."

" The fortress-town stands as a frontier bastion for a hard pressed humanity, providing a retreat from the harsh sand storms and flesh eating mutated beasts of the wilds. With one road leading in at the south and another at the north, it is stopping place for travelers, outlaws, savages, scavs, runaways and most of all, excavators. For over eighty years this fort has served as a base camp for dig teams who loot the boundless ruinscape beyond, where the lucky make it back alive with artifacts of enormous wealth and power."

 Pitford: Gateway To The Ruins By  William McAusland is a huge sprawling post apocalyptic trading post city complete with tons of NPC's, lots of random tables, factions, and many more pieces of Mutant Epoch rpg  material.  Pitford is such an iconic adventure location & I can't begin to tell you the number of times I've run PC's through this place. Pitford is excellent to get the player's PC's involved in what's happening  in the wasteland around the fortified trade town. This supplement book is fantastic as a place to start forth to adventure into the wasteland. Pitiford is another supplement that dovetails right into the Crossroads Region campaign setting. 

Pitford has multiple opportunities for player's PC's to get everything from equipment to gladiatorial combat encounters. This makes Pitford a prime adventure location for a post apocalpytic rpg's and there's plenty of  shops,businesses, and more for the PC's to stumble upon. According to Thomas Riccardi's 2013 Amazon review;" There are also some unique businesses offering services such as robotics (and a table to generate unique robots), a parcel service (and a glimpse of the world beyond Pitford's walls) and even a guide service (where characters can hire a guide to go on expeditions into the wastes). Each of these shops is depicted in great detail as to what the character is selling, their personality and what they might have in value stashed behind the counter. There is even a fighting pit in Pitford that allows the characters to try their hand at being a gladiator and there are a few combatants they will be engaging. From just normal folks to mutants and beasts there is no shortage of opponents for the arena." 

These businesses tie directly into the history, location, and more as a part of Pitford.This means that there's lots of detail for wasteland & post apocalpytic adventuring. 

Review & Commentary On MT3 Marvel Super Heroes Advanced The Revenge of Kang By Ray Winniger

 "What if the Fantastic Four were never born? How many other heroes would be affected - who would die? Who would not decide to become a hero? Who would switch sides and become a villain? This is what Kang wants to happen. He and his alternate reality duplicates have targeted the early 1960's as the time-space to begin their (his?) domination of the planet Earth. The plan is to eliminate the heroes of the 20th Century to make life easier for Kang. Lots easier. Can your super-group foil this nefarious plot? Can you make it through the myriad of time-streams, finding the right Kang at the right time? Have you ever operated a time machine in any of your lives? Well you will now..."

We pick right up from our commentary on  MT2 The Weird, Weird West By Ray Winninger (Author)

MT3 Marvel Super Heroes Advanced The Revenge of Kang By Ray Winniger was published in 1989 and by 1990 we were deep into the 'Time Quake" campaign. This is a classic Avengers focused adventure. Kang the Conquerer is out for blood and to erase heroes! This adventure brings your heroes back to 1963 and it's a great adventure to bring in both classic and modern heroes into the fray. This is a time travel related adventure that plays a central pivot point to this adventure. "Revenge of Kang"  adventure points up the fact that the players really have to use thier 

brains. 

 According to the Wiki entry on "The Revenge of Kang" the review from Games International magazine hits some high points;"Games International magazine reviewed The Revenge of Kang and stated that "The Revenge of Kang sports the most absurd plot rationale in the history of module design. More time travel silliness provides the excuse for a succession of set pieces in which player characters either make skill rolls, fight villains or (exceptionally) use their noddles. Required for those who have played the first two, if only to rid your game of all this tosh, but not worth a look in otherwise.""
The time quake series of adventures  led our heroes into some very interesting places especially the Silver Age. The Revenge of Kang is a perfect adventure to introduce the MA6 The Silver Age Sourcebook by Keith A. Kilburn. The time traveling elements allow the DM to really play with the PC's. As we got stranded in 1959 by Kang in a recent romp  by our DM through Revenge of Kang. And that's the time period  where we currently are. 

Is the Revenge of Kang any good?! Yes, but it must be tied into the rest of the 'TimeQuake' series of modules. There's a ton of good material here from encounters to puzzles, but again the players are going to have to use thier heads and deal with the time travel issues. 

Review & Commentary on HOSTILE Situation Report 015 - Hallow's Eve By Paul Elliot For The Hostile Rpg or Old School 2d6 Science Fiction Games

 'A horror roleplaying seed. It's back again: the Hallow's Eve, that semi-mythical starship seen on the edge of systems at this time of year, before plunging back into hyperspace. Its sojourn amongst the stars has lasted 18 years. What happened to the crew? What about its cargo of gold and uranium, worth a fortune?"

"The ghost ship is only an hour distant from your position. Could you solve the mystery of its curse, and perhaps salvage its cargo for yourselves? "

HOSTILE Situation Report 015 - Hallow's Eve is a Halloween style adventure written by Paul Elliot. We're going to take a look at the bits and pieces of this adventure. 

So "The Evelyn Star" was the second Harbinger prototype & went missing many years ago. The Evelyn Star is also know as the Hallow's Eve because of the infamy surrounding this vessel. Then this vessel is dropped into your party's hands. The adventure is very well constructed.

The Hallow's Eve adventure is very well constructioned & written. The design here is that the adventure plays on the fear of the unknown. There's a lot of moving parts within HOSTILE Situation Report 015 - Hallow's Eve. This means that this adventure is going to be keeping your party very busy. There's lots of opportunity for salvage within this adventure. There are however lots of complications for extreme danger lurking within this adventure.HOSTILE Situation Report 015 - Hallow's Eve is a very dangerous mission/encounter and this after all the Hostile rpg. Everything including and especially space is trying to kill your party. 

The whole cloth of this adventure rests on the party's choices and decisions. These are going to affect many parts of the outcome or deaths of the PC's. I don't want to give too much away from HOSTILE Situation Report 015 - Hallow's Eve. I do think that this is an adventure that is for an experienced Hostile rpg party. 

HOSTILE Situation Report 015 - Hallow's Eve By Paul Elliot is a very well constructed adventure. It take the usual salvage mission in space trope and turns it on it's ear. This adventure takes the party and makes them really on edge with a ship and circumstances in dire straits. Get this one because it would definitely make for a fun nights adventure or as the stepping stone for a full blown Hostile campaign. 

OSR Commentary On Angry Golem Games Stars Without Number Equipment Database For The Stars Without Number Rpg

 "If you are a fan of sci-fi roleplaying games, you might have heard of Stars Without Number, a game that combines the best elements of classic and modern sci-fi. Stars Without Number is a game that lets you explore a vast and diverse galaxy, where you can encounter alien races, ancient ruins, psychic powers, and pretech wonders. But what makes Stars Without Number even more exciting is its sci-fi equipment system, which allows you to create and use a wide variety of devices, gadgets, weapons, and vehicles that can enhance your abilities, create challenges and conflicts, or simply add flavor and atmosphere to your story."

Angry Golem Games Stars Without Number Equipment Database is a solid guide book for the additional equipment that one needs for the Stars Without Number rpg. This book has a lot of material that a DM and players need for thier own SWN campaigns. 
This book has been updated with more droids, drones, and more. This means that the DM has common sense rules for SWN from this supplement. There's more then enough equipment in here to help to customize your SWN PC's. 
There's some fantastic pieces of equipment, weapons, and more to prove your campaigns with more diverse devices, and more within. 

 Angry Golem Games Stars Without Number Equipment Database is solidly done and pivots the game in  smaller interstellar adventures. There's some great scavenger rules for SWN revised rules. 

SWN Revised is such a great game and the  Stars Without Number Equipment Database enhances an already fantastic game. The cyberware within this supplement is great to enhance the Cities Without Numbers game. The switch from classes to edges is very true to the Cyberpunk genre. 

The  Stars Without Number Equipment Database is perfect for both a Space Opera & a Cyberpunk rpg. For OSR games SWN is still the gold standard for Science Fiction rpg's. Campaigns set within the SWN timeline are easily able to plug into these two genres. The equipment is almost another NPC's in these games. This means that the player's PC's are enhanced by the devices, relics, artifacts, ships, etc. 

Entering The Fray - Session Report- Forever War By Paul Elliot For The Hostile Rpg

 We see opportunity in crisis and the September Group has it's mercs heading into Leviticus's conflicts  an irresistible lure. This game session report picks right up from the Forever War review here.   Most of our players were running a scouting party that was to establish a forward base for our merc unit. 

Serveral years ago we sent scouts to access the horrid conditions on the conflicts with the colonies of Leviticus. These were followed up with our main  party's ships heading toward's Leviticus. While there's plenty of opportunity for bodyguards, security, work, etc. the whole place is crawling with competition. Our scouts have found serveral fire fights and came into conflict with two unknown merc units with a few days of boots on the ground. 
Our scout's team cleared the way for our merc unit's Harbinger to land on Levitcus & complete preparation for a forward fire bases. But we experianced heavy fire from  rival mercenary company. The conflict was a pain in the ass but to about twenty minutes with good dice rolls. 

We got our base set up and after three months in  hyperspace arrived on Leviticis. Our party landed and used our Harbringer as the main base feature. This allows us to set up command very quickly. We've got  a parameter set up & we're ready to access the planet. 

We're ready to send out sniper teams around the base tonight. And set up parameter guards. The whole base is on alert and we've got an  internal source of water for the moment. 

OSR Commentary On The Mutant Epoch rpg By William McAusland For Your Old School Post Apocalpytic

 Alright let's pick it up right from here on the blog from the expansion rules blog post. So I went back to the basic Mutant Epoch rpg rules.  And I began reading through the expansive Mutant Epoch rule book. And there's a couple of obersvations that I'd share with you dear reader. 

William  McAusland brings to the table a very interesting PC generation system that takes full advantage of the random tables of the rules. The TME rules take full advantage of the vision of the author and designer. There are an incredible range of mutations & cybernetic within this book. The lore has lots of solid options and career options available. What set's TME apart is it's approach to the post apocalpytic genre as a whole. 

There are a huge variety of tables and more for loot, random encounters, weather, etc. that make a campaign work. The Mutant Epoch can be thought of as a whole cloth post apocalpytic tool kit from the ground up allowing the DM to create thier own setting from simple random rolls. 

What takes the TME rules into the realm of solid game play is the fact that the game is designed too take advantage of the player as the engine for thier own PC design. That is the gamer has total control of the PC generation process and it's perfect for solo gaming. This means that the DM can with a few flicks of the dice can bring PC and campaign to life. 

This means that the TME rules book plugs directly into the TME Rules Expansion almost seemlessly. 

This places the TME Rules Expansion directly into the second most useful book position for TME itself as a system.  Why? Because the expansion rules place new PC types directly into the gamer's hands. TME is a game that's meant to be played completely and could be overwhelming to a DM. As the sheer scope of the campaign setting could overwhelm a new DM. 
Not to worry the cure is simple pick your part of the TME world and then expand from there. 
There's a ton of options as the TME world setting leaks through the rules like toxic waste. 
The TME rules are full of mutant and madmen goodness when it comes to bringing the campaign setting into focus. The TME rule  book is extensive as it completely builds out the foundation of the Mutant Epoch itself. 

Is the game actually worth it?! In a word, yes. This is a post apocalytic game that takes the gamer's PC into it's world of survival and horror of the post apcocalytic. TME is a solid investment for the post apocalytic gamer on many levels. 

Review & Commentary On Damocles By Joseph Mohr For The Cepheus Engine & Old School 2d6 Science Fiction Rpg's

 "This is an adventure for Cepheus Engine.

Damocles Station, also known as Star Base S-132C, is known to be one of the most lawless places in the Sonora sector. The station is built into the side of an asteroid at the very heart of the Glusrerosia system. This system has one of the most dense asteroid belts in the sector and is heavily mined by most of the major mining companies."

"The station is a great place to find cheap goods to bring to market elsewhere. Sometimes these goods are not exactly legal at other places in the sector. It is also a good place to find information or to find someone evading the law. Bounty hunters visit this place regularly seeking their prey. It is also a good place to get killed. People are found floating outside the station without a vacc suit from time to time."

"The station is populated by all sorts of people. Belters, pirates, gamblers, merchants, aliens, spies, criminals and bounty hunters visit the station daily. It can be a dangerous place to visit but it is a great place to find adventure."

Damocles By Joseph Mohr is a nice place to visit but not a great place to die! This is a station on the edge of legal and illegal activities. And it can easily be added into your own Cepheus Engine rpg. Damocles is a station that has plenty of NPC's, encounters, &  opportunities for crews and adventurers to get into deep trouble. There's a list of complications and hoards of NPC's working thoughout this adventure location. 
Damocles is the type of shady place where bounty hunters and pirates rub elbows while high end cargoes of a highly illegal nature leave the station. There's cut throats a plenty here and even the staff is on the take to a certain extent. All of this is rounded into the forty four pages of information on Damocles. Bare in mind that the station is a haven for scum and villainy all across the universe and yet there's plenty of opportunity here for profit and trade! 

This is the type of location that's perfect for adding right into your own frontier out on the Black. Damocles is the perfect location to add in as a quisi legal or completely black location off the books. Yet, the station exists and flourishes out on the frontier. For 2d6 old school Science Fiction rpg's Damocles station is a boon in that it's a highly functional and yet incredibly dangerous place out in the blackness of space. 

What's perfect about the station is the fact that it's both a respite for your party of adventurers and a place of opportunity for adventures. There's lots of risk and reward here in Damocles station. 

But is it worth the down load as a pay what you want title on Drivethrurpg?! In a word, yes and here's why! The fact that Joseph Mohr crammed a Hell of a lot into his station in adventure opportunities, NPC's, complications, etc. means that Domacles station is a happening place in a Cepheus Engine campaign. This is a perfect station to plug into your Clement Sector campaign  easily as a hangout for the scum of the Clement or Earth sector.

For the Hostile rpg the Damocles station might take a bit of work but it could be done! The pirate career would have to come into it's own though. And opportunities would have to expand against the corporations of Hostile. 

Stars Without Number could easily host a Damocles station with scum from across the face of creation having to deal with pirates, gamblers, colonists and more. This station would fit right in. The DM might have to work to fit in the station and do some leg work on stats but it could easily be done.  

The Campaign World of CROM THE BARBARIAN By Jothanathan Nolan For The FASERIPopedia! Rpg

 "Taking as its inspiration Saturday morning science fantasy cartoons and the Golden Age comics era character CROM THE BARBARIAN, this sourcebook brings the full fantasy roleplaying experience to FASERIPopedia!"

"CROM features some of the most startling art and monsters, most exciting characters and settings of any FASERIPopedia game!

A full sandbox chart set is provided to generate detailed "hexes" to explore or fight over as well as a generator for the scattered city-states of CROM's world!

The Bestiary lists cosmic horrors and exotic threats quite unlike the normal and a real challenge even for hyper league superheroes!"

So I'm taking this time with the CROM THE BARBARIAN By Jothanathan Nolan  For The  FASERIPopedia supplement to augment and expand our Ascendant campaign. And today's blog entry is going to pick right up from here on the blog. CROM's realm is unique because of the fact that in our game it functions as a whole cloth Sword & Sorcery dimension. 

Crom's realm offers a whole campaign's worth of adventure because of the fact that there's a ton of wizards and warlords who have custom cyborg organisms left over from the ages before everything went post apocalpytic. The fantasy wastelands of CROM are not nice places. There are a ton of left over mutant and horrors from outside to challenge player's PC's. The realm of Crom was last accessed during the Seventies when portals from  Subterraea into Bloodville caused a major rift. This Rift was used by raiders from Crom's world for years in our Ascendant rpg campaign.

These incursions into our campaign world have shaped certain cults & occult groups which have crossed over from Crom's realm. Some of these cult members have gone on to be powerful wizards and shamans who thrive in Subterraea. While others are in our campaign world biding thier time and gathering followers. 

Meanwhile back in Crom's realm these cults have expanded to become major threats. The suppplement CROM has a ton of random tables, monsters, and tools to create your own threats. Be warned that many of these threats are far stronger then would at first seem to be scaled for a FASERIP & Marvel Super Heroes advanced rpg game. 

This gets back into some of the logicistics of scaling and creating a CROM campaign as the hexes of Crom's world are huge. There are literally thousands of ruins, dungeons, and more that have been left by the Ancients. And this offers a unique spin on an Ascendant rpg with me dovetailing some of the origins of Ascendant's Rogues Gallery to Crom's world for our campaign.

Crom's world also offers a nice 'Thundarr The Barbarian' & DC's New Gods style setting with the serial numbers filed off. This makes it easy to bring a brand new perspective to a campaign without stealing Marvel or DC properties. However some of Crom's monsters and NPC's can be very powerful so some caution is advised! 

Review & Commentary On Marvel Supers Heroes rpg Advanced MT2 The Weird, Weird West By Ray Winninger (Author)

 "It was all supposed to be so easy. But after the heroes go through a tour of duty in WWII (not bad for heroes born ing the 1950's!), things once again get complicated."

"It seems that time travel is once again called for, but this time things are kind of strange. In fact, history itself has begun to disappear! All kinds of people are showing up where they shouldn't be - or not showing up where they should!"

"The key seems to fall somewhere in the 1870's, around Dodge City, Kansas. All you've got to do is go there and fix the problems."

"But Dodge is a city under siege - a siege that only Superheroes can break. Ready to attack are the armies of Napoleon, Genghis Khan, and Alexander the Great!"

The Weird, Weird, West is the second in the three-part TIME WARP series of adventures. It is designed for the WEST COAST AVENGERS - but any character can play.

Today's blog post picks right up from the other day on the blog here.   MT2 The Weird, Weird West  By Ray Winninger (Author) is a weird little adventure for The Marvel Super Heroes Advanced rpg. "After travelling to the 1940's, the players must next journey to 1870's Dodge City, Kansas; where the town is under siege by military leaders of different eras (Napoleon, Genghis Khan and Alexander the Great)" according to the MT2 wiki entry. This is a slightly weirdly regarded Marvel Super Heroes advanced rpg adventure. Because the elements here are dependant upon the Dodge City, Kansas being under seige as time breaks down around them! This is another Kang heavy adventure where PC's are at the center of whole cloth weirdness and time travel hijinks. MT2 isn't highly regarded among critics & Mike Jarvis savaged it a bit;" In the September–October 1989 edition of Games International (Issue #9), Mike Jarvis admitted that "I'm not greatly enamoured with this product. It's not that it is a bad scenario as such; merely that it isn't particularly original." Jarvis also found the adventure lacked a "superhero atmosphere", and the pre-generated characters provided were not a good fit for the adventure. Jarvis concluded by giving the adventure a poor rating of 2 out of 5, saying, "This is a lacklustre product [...] As a superhero adventure it didn't inspire me, and probably won't thrill your players either."" 

We used our own heroes for this adventure and subbed in the provided ones such as the original Ghost Rider & others. We also included Hitler's forces among the armies of history to shore up and lengthen this adventure. This might have been a mistake on our part as our PC's almosted died. The time warp was getting bigger in our campaign and included two other minor encounters to pad this adventure into a full on campaign stepping stone. 
We loosely tied in MT2 into the triliogy for Marvel Super Heroes Advanced as we had the other adventures follow in it's way. We added a few minor side quests to add in the World War II flare to this. 

OSR Commentary On The Warriors of the Red Planet Rpg - The Martian Underworld

 So I haven't been writing this blog due to a serious family emergency. It's times like this when I've had to really lean back into OSR games that I find comforting. For myself I find Warriors of the Red Planet rpg very comforting. In the back of the Warriors of the Red Planet rpg it discusses the Martian underworld of Edgar Rice Burroughs, VD Vance, Leigh Brackett and other classic Pulp writers. 

The Martian underworld is an extensive series of tunnels, passages, dungeons, ruins, etc that crisscross into one another. These underworld enviroments are forgotten ancient Martian bunkers, ruins,dungeons,that hold many of the secrets of Mars. These places are also pregnant with ancient artifacts, forgotten cities, and much more. They are highly extensive places where anything might be found. These forgotten tunnels and passages even crisscross under Martian cities, forgotten temples, and more. 

The Mutant Future Wiki has a great overview of the Warriors of the Red Planet rpg rules here. And it brings to mind how the Martian underworld might be shaped by a post apocalpytic theme. According to the Mutant Future wiki entry:"Due to the similar nature between old-school pulp sci-fi and post-apocalypses science-fantasy, Warriors of the Red Planet can be used wholesale to run a Gamma World-styled setting, or maybe picked piecemeal for one's Gamma World or Mutant Future game."

How might this effect the landscape of a Martian underworld?! The alien nature of Mars suggests that a post apocalyptic Mars might well influence the underworld in a very Pulpy direction with the underworld holding the last remaining secrets of Martian culture and civilazation. 

This does not preclude the fact that such an underworld would be extensive and seriously crowded with competing factions going for resources, food, artifacts, and more. This makes such an underworld have extremely colourful Martian races, monsters, mutants, and more. 

This begets the vision of how one incorporates these ideas into a whole cloth vision of the underworld. There could even be possible aliens living in these underworld locations such as cities. The possibilities of such a world bringing adventurers as fresh blood isn't that far fetched. The underworld itself might be alive and very hungrey.

So which side of the narrow tunnel will your PC's be? Fodder for such  ruin or dungeon could be at the heart of such a con or occurance. The living dungeon is a good representive of some of the core concepts of an extensive living and breathing part of such an underworld especially on Mars. 

Review & Commentary On Marvel Supers Heroes rpg Advanced MT1 All this And World II By Ray Winninger (Author), & Chris Mortika (Author)

 "It starts out as a simple enough assignment: Help old friend NICK FURY test out a new military weapon in the New Mexico desert. Then the Nazis attack.

"Nazis !?"

"After that, it gets weird. Do the Nazis have a diabolical plan to change the outcome of World War II by changing history? There's only one way to find out-go back in time, team up with CAPTAIN AMERICA, UNION JACK, and the rest of the INVADERS, and strike a blow for the Allies!"

Right so do to a family emergency I've had to shelve this week's  games. MT1 All this And World II By Ray Winninger (Author), & Chris Mortika (Author) is a Kang heavy module now according to Dr. Kevin M. Derby from his December 2016 Amazon review of MT1;"lmost 30 years after it was first released, "All This and World War II" holds up well enough even if it is not the most memorable of modules for TSR's classic "Marvel Super-Heroes" RPG. There simply isn't that much that makes this module stand out even as it offers a time travel plot bringing in the Invaders and the usual Marvel Nazi villains from the Red Skull, Baron Zemo, Baron Blood and others. There is something a little off about seeing Hitler written up as a RPG NPC. The recommended canon characters for this adventure are the West Coast Avengers of the period (though, admittedly, they did have a few memorable time travel adventures). Not a bad story by any means but "All This and World War II" simply isn't one of the better modules for this RPG." After a read through I've got to concer with this reviewer. This module first appeared in '89. 

There's something slightly off about MT1 & yes this is a time travel Marvel Super Heroes Advanced Rpg. The Wiki entry on MT1 All This and World War II is the first of a triology;" All This and World War II is a scenario for the Advanced rules, first in a trilogy. An alien spaceship crash-lands in Nazi Germany, enabling Hitler and the Red Skull to use its advanced technology to send storm troopers up and down the time stream in search of secret weapons. The heroes discover one of these groups of foraging Nazis" All right so we ran this module with a few twists and turns. Twist one is the fact that we had the Nazis making contact with the modern Hydra agents of 2000. And the second was to follow this up with an extended number of encounters in the Forties. The third twist we did was to use our own Homebrew heroes who were roaster and franchise Avengers. 

MT1 All this And World II By Ray Winninger (Author), & Chris Mortika (Author) works very well if run almost separately from it's triliogy and then having the other modules follow in it's wake. This means that a few small minor sidequest adventures help to break things up. And it pads out MT1 a bit.