The three origins in the game are Belter, Earther, and Martian. Intro to Israeli Theory – Your Character Does Not... For the Lesbians of the Lake; Reviewing Thirsty Sword L... Information Gaps – When The Information Runs Dry, Sentinel Comics: The Roleplaying Game Core Rulebook Review, Bride of Gamenstein: Three More Systems to Graft onto Your Game, Testimonials: Smart, Sexy, Famous People Love Gnome Stew. The GM's section opens with a bunch of additional rules including combat modifiers such as high ground, obscured target et cetera. It lays out a method for providing the characters with leads and clues some (most) require a test, a dice roll to get past the lead and find the clue. The last section of the book is a nice touch, an introductory adventure that borrows its name from a Shakespeare quote: To Sleep Perchance to Dream. The next step is to determine a Drive. There are actually several pages in this section dedicated to actual science and the scientific speculations that make the space travel in The Expanse possible.  This review is based on the PDF of the RPG, which is 260 pages in length. Roll a successful double and check the Drama Die and spend your Stunt points. This game has a lot of stunts. In this section, we don’t get much of a preview of talents or specializations, but an Ability Focus is essentially a skill, and some of the Focuses indicate that you can’t make an Ability Test to do work related to that Focus without the Focus. The next section is Game Play, which fleshes out some of the rules touched upon earlier. Yes, they also use Stunts. The steps presented include finding a theme for the game, determining where and when the series is set, then finding what the actual series will be. Very comprehensive review! The Expanse Roleplaying Game brings James S.A. Corey’s award-winning series of science fiction novels to the tabletop. The book is full color and features a copious amount of artwork. The Expanse RPG is based on the exciting new Modern AGE rules-set, and includes many of its features, such as customized character building using Backgrounds and Professions, Drives for character engagement, and an abstract resources system. Substance: 2 (Sparse) If you decide you are taken out of the fight early, you can “roll over,” and assign yourself a condition that would be appropriate, and you are no longer part of the encounter. If I was a brand new player I would only be required to read the Player's Section and would be left with the impression that roleplaying is an exercise in dice rolling and, frankly, pretty dull. The protomolecule is the driving force behind much of the source material; it's alien, it mutates things and creates mind-blowing alien objects, it is partly responsible for the death of 1.5 million belters and almost crashes the asteroid into earth. If you took the 40 pages of the Guide as the only setting information you're looking at 15% story to 85% rules. The chapter is rounded out with a list of goodies your character earns when a new level is gained. When it comes to The Expanse RPG, however, you also get a system that blends plausible sci-fi with a smooth-playing ruleset that doesn’t need an astrophysics degree to pilot. collective, many of the Gnomes are affiliated with creating products through Encoded Designs. In a nutshell, roll three six-siders add a couple of modifiers then beat the target number to succeed. There are things I don't like of course but they are not deal breakers: Stunts, there are just too many but you don't need to use them or maybe you could introduce a few at a time so the players and GM can digest them in small bites. This is a very extensive chapter, and its good material, but I really wish the Churn was less a set of “mile markers” for introducing things, and more of an active pool that a GM could spend at various times for defined effects. This is where we read about Green Ronin's idea of a campaign and it's a pretty good way of setting out a sequence of events. Based on their AGE System, the same underlying rules that are used for the Dragon Age Roleplaying Game, this one is tackling a completely different genre. Honest review based on our early sessions of the Expanse Roleplaying game - Duration: 51:59. Examples include Freelancers, Military, Political, and Rebellion, and also discusses how much you may want to include canon information in the game. I got to play the introductory adventure at a con recently and really enjoyed it. 27. Technology and Equipment come next. Using the Adventure Game Engine (AGE) rules that power Green Ronin’s Fantasy AGE, Blue Rose, and Modern AGE RPGs, The Expanse takes players to afar-future solar system where humanity is divided: Martians, Belters, and the people of old Earth struggle for … Required fields are marked *, Subscribe to this comment thread via email (we'll send you updates). In the character generation chapter. The book feels like a rush job that has suffered from too much cutting and pasting from other Green Ronin AGE games. These usually provide special situational bonuses, re-rolls, or exemptions from other existing rules. This one missed the sanity check on its trip through proofing. Hot New Top. Leviathan Wakes, the first book of The Expanse series, is now one of my favorite novels. Obviously these should feel appropriate for the setting, but in this case, I am really impressed with how much this feels like something I would expect from The Expanse, without touching too much on the main storyline from the books. That is a relief. The next chapters detail the history of the setting, laying out how Earth unified under the UN, colonized Mars, stagnated, and how the Belt and the outer planets were reached. Rather than tracking individual currencies, characters have a wealth score. The specific Interlude Activities are also defined in this section. Next we have Threats. The thing that made me smile about Income is this: the party can share income values, as follows: Take the highest Income value and reduce it by one, that is now the new income value for all party members. I hope they bring out some adventure modules for it. I’m also considering trying to convert Dungeon World to SF too however, so many games so little time! Next up we have the two other types of key encounters: Exploration and Social. Space battles are deadly and this is definitely a part of The Expanse. Honourifics are a facet of reputation and are earned, lost and maintained during Interludes; the GM has a lot of control around reputation but the entry in the Interludes section does raise the spectre of a dice roll being necessary. As you may surmise, these abilities are similar to abilities in other games, but rather than having a score that provides a bonus, the score and the bonus are the same. This isn't strictly fair, there are slivers of setting to be found scattered across the book but more is needed. Um? That's an awful lot of rules, no wonder the brilliant source material is so thin on the ground, there's no room. Talents have a Novice, Expert, and Master tier. There are also full-page images introducing some of the larger sections, as well as a two-page spread of the solar system. Challenge Tests are similar to Advanced Tests, except each time a character fails an Ability Test, a complication happens in the narrative. They actually work quite well outside of the action environment. Roll 3d6, add a modifier, see if you match the difficulty number. They can be spent to increase the value of a single die on a two-to-one basis and... Well, an interview with the games author on the Kickstarter page featured his answer to the question: "What are you most happy with about the game?" Also included here is some good advice and suggestions for actually running a game. I've read the first five books of The Expanse series and loved them. We are treated to A Guide to The Expanse. Finally, as usual, this review is my opinion only; if I say something is great of poor it doesn't mean that it actually is. This is a very flexible mechanic with several uses including: deciding ties, fuelling stunts, determining when ammo runs dry, contributing to Churn and more. Yes, you read that right. There are guides to structuring adventures and combat, and how to determine proper opposition. Come on, please. Beyond that, the characters get hired to investigate something that leads them to corporate impropriety and a dangerously overindulgent personal goal, and its probably one of the better starting adventures I can remember in a core rulebook. I also like that the chase rules give you a reason to know why one character is slightly faster than another, but I’m a little sad that the game uses standard movement instead of range bands (especially since the next chapter expressly does use range bands for starships). This chapter also has a good deal of information on running investigations in the system. I also like the idea that Fortune does serve a similar function to hit points, but allowing it to be spent for something else reinforces that it’s not equivalent to health or stamina. Like many of you, as soon as I got the email I downloaded my copy and immediately began devouring it. This section is comprised of the following chapters: The Game Mastering section has solid advice on how to run the game, as well as some specific tips on how to use this particular system. That said, never, ever make Bobbie Draper mad. Gnomes on Podcasts, even a Gnome Only Podcast! The worst aspect of this is reading through the entries to see what all of them do. However, this one is a good story with a good investigation sequence and some notable characters. The writing is relentlessly boring and for the most part sidesteps the licensed material, It's too conversational and verbose coupled with a bucket of rules-bloat. The way Fortune works, and the interaction with the combat system conditions, feels like a great trade-off between the grittier feel of the setting and the needs of the game’s ongoing shared narrative. Review of The Expanse Board Game. I have no problem with this approach but it veers sharply from the "hard" approach of the books. This section also has what is called The Churn, a mechanic for tracking ongoing unforeseen complications. Secondly this review is not based on game-play; I've studied the Book extensively but that's all so far. Get a temporary bonus on a job, and you get a bonus that you can apply to a single roll. Built around the Adventure Game Engine rules used by Green Ronin's other tabletop games, the RPG tasks players with putting themselves into the simmering conflict between Earth, Mars, and the Belt, taking on a variety of roles, from combat operatives to diplomats an… Hot New Top Rising. I liked the idea; as I read on I begin to struggle with he concept. If you like the setting, and you don’t mind your narrative elements having some mechanical impact, you should enjoy this game. His answer, "Getting rid of hit points". I’m a big fan of bonuses and focuses coming from Backgrounds and Professions, and I like that the Drive has a little bit of mechanical reinforcement in addition to the roleplaying guides. First: He chides the authors of the book ... Mike Hill's Summary: The new AGE roleplaying game from Green Ronin. The adventure is short and has much in common with the other two adventures I've read. The Guide to the Expanse is too short but very engaging. Schematics This review is based on the PDF of the RPG, which is 260 pages in length. Nice. Here's what the rulesmeister tells us, "...be sure to communicate openly when (NPC) social Stunts seem to take away the players' agency..." Not only is this another terrible example of the rule system promoting dice-play before role-play but I'm pretty sure the nature of roleplaying gets bent if not completely snapped in two. In essence, the point is to create a number of clues that lead to a final location. Characters in the setting have a resource called Fortune. But in some cases, like building something new, you make a check for each instance you can take the time in your Interlude to work on that item. There is some good work here but two areas stand out and not in a good way. The Expanse is getting a tabletop roleplaying game By Jonathan Bolding 23 July 2018 Green Ronin will bring the sci-fi series back to its roots on the tabletop. The GM tracks Churn as a numerical value that increases as the game progresses, when Churn reaches certain thresholds something bad happens for the party to deal with. Wait a minute, what happened here? I thought about this for a moment; if the protomolecule never happened, why am I playing this game? Bonkers. Sadly these characters don't seem imbedded in the universe of the source material; yes, Martians, Earthers and Belters get a paragraph each but that's it.  The next section of the book is dubbed the Player’s Section, and this is subdivided into the following chapters: In this section, we get more information on why the Stunt Die from previous AGE games gets a new name this time around. I think I know about the story, characters and backdrop. There is a chapter on "rewards" but levels or experience points are not given the time of day. Roll three dice if the result includes a double look at the differently coloured Drama Die. To maintain the pace of play championed elsewhere in the rules players (and GM) need to be very familiar with these options or choose one on the fly. The first is entitled Dealing with Canon; there are three options and each gets between seven and four lines. Levels are gained whenever the GM deems that it makes sense to do so. I find it very evocative of the books - and let's not forget that this game is based the books - the character images don't look like their TV counterparts and nor should they, the TV show is an entirely different beast. Capsule Review July 15, 2019 by: Mike Hill Style: 2 (Needs Work) Substance: 2 (Sparse) The new AGE roleplaying game from Green Ronin. Another example of how the wonderfully rich source material is squandered. So I went from having ten bucks to eighteen. Don't waste your time doing that until the end of the process if you're going down the path of the random character, your concept will almost certainly be wrong. One of those is to take the place of the main characters from the books. Methinks a bit of cut and paste is to blame. These origins have different charts to use when deriving social class, but the main difference between them depends on whether the characters are operating at higher gravity (which is normal for Earthers) or very low gravity (where Belters excel). share. This is a very attractive book. Fighting makes it easier to hit in melee, but strength adds to damage. It require a lot of work from the GM and contains little in the way of atmosphere (no pun intended). Back to the Guide. In combat, if you take any damage that you can’t mitigate, your character is taken out of the scene, and given a condition dictated by the character that took them out. All is not lost however, the book points out that, "...it's not often characters make use of ground or air vehicles", no surprise either. The character sheet for this game includes an entry labeled "Experience". That might just be us though. Some good, some not so good. I can’t wait to try it, but I’m pressed for time, so I’m waiting on the Abzu’s Bounty campaign to arrive at a PDF near me. Odd. Anyone familiar with other AGE System games may pick up on the fact that the third die used to roll checks in the game is called the Drama Die in this iteration, although there is more on that later. One interesting aspect of combat is that the game simulates how weapons work in the setting. Primarily a ship is a way to get from A to B; there are rules for starship battles and these read well but in the three published adventures I've read, starships and space battles are not a factor. For me this is a good thing but the default path is to establish a relationship bond during character generation, it's a game statistic and my players wouldn't take kindly to such an imposition on the character and player dynamic. Available in print and PDF. The versatility of Ability Tests gives the game the mechanical impact to make action scenes other than combat meaningful, and the investigation rules do a great job of giving purpose to Ability Tests without letting the PCs hit a dead end. Accuracy is used to shoot, but perception adds to ranged damage. This review has been read 11932 times. save. In addition to what players may be familiar with regarding terms like narrative time and action time (being out or in initiative order), there are also Interludes. There are snippets of The Expanse here but a lot of it feels like another cut and paste job. There is a two-page index, two pages for a character sheet, and the Churn Tracker, in addition to the regular material. It feels a little odd that there isn’t a big level by level table summarizing what characters get at each level, just a description of what your choices are when you level up. The "rules first and roleplaying second" approach is totally unwanted in a roleplaying game but easy to ignore. Ships have qualities just like the equipment in other sections. The complete series was nominated for the Hugo Award for Best Series in 2017. These include requirements and resolutions. Some good, some not so good. It probably helps that the novels have a main crew as well as ancillary characters to weave criminal investigations, politics, diplomacy, and military action in around the main plot. The technology and equipment section does take a sip from the cup of the source material but, for example, as a new player I wouldn't have a clue whether my newly minted kick-butt Martian marine is firing a blaster or bullets; most items are described sparingly. It’s written in an interesting and engaging manner, but strictly speaking, the chapter doesn’t really start in with any game rules until about five pages in. [RPG]: The Expanse Roleplaying Game, reviewed by Mike Hill (2/2) Thread starter RPGnet Reviews; Start date Jul 15, 2019; R. RPGnet Reviews Registered User. There is action, political maneuvering, mercenary adventures, and noir detective action going on, and that’s before you get to the really weird stuff. Something has happened in the solar system. The Drama Die is used to determine several ancillary story elements whenever a check is made. Jul 15, 2019 Spaceships are a big deal in science fiction gaming and an important part of the source material; the characters in both book and TV live on their ship; it's an integral part of their story and almost a character in its own right. Chapter 15: The Expanse Series. The Expanse also includes Advanced Tests and Challenge Tests. A Review of The Expanse RPG Posted by giantmothman February 4, 2021 February 4, 2021 Posted in Review Tags: AGE System , Alt Shift X , Belters , green ronin , green ronin publishing , James S.A. Corey , Review , The Expanse , ttrp , ttrpg To call The Expanse hard science fiction misses out on a lot of nuance, but it’s hard to put a finger on exactly what The Expanse is. I can't see a reason why this information doesn't live in the Action Encounter section. The Churn is revealed for the first time and it's something new for me. If you've made it this far, you deserve a medal and I'm sure you've concluded that I don't like this game. The most important part of this game's story is hidden, buried in the descriptions of the various locations of the solar system. Review: Catching Up to ‘The Expanse,’ the Space Opera You Love. The conversational tone pads out the rules; if I could remove every superfluous "Generally speaking", "In general", "Generally" and "As a rule" from the book I'd have a much shorter and easier to read book. The game was launched as part of a Kickstarter by Green Ronin Publishing. You can choose Action Stunts from the following categories: Chase; General Combat; Gun; Grappling; Melee and Vehicle. I was looking forward to the Spaceships chapter. In addition to the foreword, the authors also wrote a short story that is included at the beginning of the book, detailing a day in the life of a freighter crew. I think this is my favorite iteration of the AGE System rules. A Review of The Expanse RPG. Why not play Traveller instead? For those who don’t know, the story of The Expanse is set in our solar system some two hundred years in the future. Without true player agency you're not playing a roleplaying game in the sense that I understand it, what you have is a tactical game of moves and dice throws. I’m not sure that the time spent on the various GM and Player types was the most practical for newer GMs. Tightbeam Ranges. Impressive. The Rules. There is a difficulty to dodge or shoot down the incoming attack that is rolled by the defender. a pistol style weapon does X damage, etc.). I came very close to liking this small slice or rules. 40 pages of background, 210 pages of clunky rules. Jared Rascher has been gaming since 1985, when he stole his sister’s D&D Basic Set to rescue it from disuse. Call me crazy, but I might be the perfect person to review The Expanse board game from WizKids and designer Geoff Engelstein. He has been a moderator for several online gaming communities, and these days, he likes to write RPG reviews to justify all of those games he can’t keep himself from buying. This book will last. Alien: The Roleplaying Game is available to purchase on the website now, where you can also purchase the Chariot of the Gods module and accessories like dice and deck. You talk, sometimes in character, as your character, the GM plays the roles of everyone else. Like this article? Vehicle combat is included, again, short and sweet which is just as well because you can't buy or hire a vehicle and there are no statistics provided for these non-existent modes of transport. This is where a new player will get a feel for the game world. The hull size of a ship allows it to roll dice to reduce incoming damage, and if any damage gets through, there are conditions that the ship can suffer. Following on from non-combat encounters we have Interludes. Relationship bonds are also ranked, and provide bonus stunt points any time the object of the Relationship Bond is affected by a check. The Guide covers forty pages of a 256 page book, that's 216 pages of rules. The character traits section goes into what Focuses fall under what Ability. This is overkill, a cheap way to sneak in every sweet move from your favourite action flick.