2 comments about GURPS Autoduel (Steve Jackson Games).

1. The problem with GURPS Autoduel is that it doesn't give you what you need to run an Autoduel campaign. Almost all of the rules for designing cars and for car to car combat are in GURPS Vehicles. Given that Vehicles is a terrifying mass of badly organized systems, this is a pretty serious problem. They really should have gone ahead and reprinted the relevant rules here, hopefully in a more organized form.

   Autoduel spends most of its space giving write-ups of every major city in a degenerate USA. It is essentially a pre-made campaign setting, but without a lot of details.




2. I am just writing to assert that SJ Games' autoduel is not meant to be a re-print of the original game "Car Wars." You can get that at Steve Jackson's web site. Unlike, the original Car Wars game, Autoduel is not complete without vehicles, Vehicles Lite or any number of other expensive supplements. The original CW game was essentially a miniatures game with cardboard counters and a paper road section. I had fun with it it and I think you can, too

No comments about GURPS Castle Falkenstein: The Ottoman Empire.

3 comments about GURPS Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri.

1. GURPS: Alpha Centauri is the best crossover from a computer game to a Role Playing Game available.

   About the source material: "Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri" is a computer game that lets you build entire civilizations. The most original feature of Alpha Centauri is that it takes place after civilization advances to space flight. In Sid Meier's "Civilization" computer game, one way to win was to be the first to have colonists build a spaceship, leave Earth, and travel into space. Alpha Centauri follows that band of colonists from their start on the new world to their end, centuries later. The expansion, Alien Crossfire, adds more factions to the possible colonists, and also adds two alien races wanting to keep the world for themselves. Although based on his Civilization games, Sid Meier created a fresh way to play colonization computer games with this game.

   GURPS: Alpha Centauri provides an adaptation of that source material to a role playing game. Both Alpha Centauri game info and Alien Crossfire expansion info were used to create this worldbook. Most of the pictures were taken directly from the computer game, although the selection of pictures and the placement of graphics is one of the major reasons this book did not get a perfect five stars from me.

   Chapter 1, the Prologue, gives people unfamiliar with the game a starting point. It contains basic info about the world and what happened to the mission.

   Chapter 2, "Planet", gives a capsule look at the new world, and includes some of the native life forms and the things these creatures do. These creatures give players a hint that all is not well on the planet.

   Chapter 3, "Factions", provides an in depth look at the various political and social agendas that exist among the colonist's leaders. This section includes profiles of the faction leaders, along with the stats necessary to use them as non-player characters in campaigns. You'll have to hunt for pictures of some of the leaders, as they frequently do not appear on the pages that they should be on. An example: Zakharov's stats are on page 49, but his picture does not appear until page 86. This book would have been much better with a full page of info about each faction leader and making sure the picture of that leader was on that page. One of the better features of this section are the adventure seeds given for each faction.

   Chapter 4, "The Road to Transcendence", deals with the advances needed to win the computer game translated into gaming terms. This section is further divided into sub-sections dealing with specific periods of time in the mission. This nice feature gives potential GM's the ability to sort out what they need for campaigns quickly and easily. This is the best section to use when deciding when in planet history you want to set your game.

   Chapter 5, "Colonists", contains the info you will need to create characters. Some of these character types are unique to GURPS Alpha Centauri. In this section are some of the Advantages, Disadvantages, and Skills players will want to give their characters.

   Chapter 6, "Hardware", gives stats for weapons, vehicles, and other tools which characters use to fight the dangers of the new world.

   Chapter 7, "Campaigns", gives GM's a way to decide what to include from this game world in their own campaigns.

   Appendix A gives some standard GURPS items and info to convert those items into this setting if possible. Appendix B allows people who own a copy of the computer game a chance to convert what they know from playing the game into GURPS game stats and terms. This second appendix will see a lot of use from me.

   In 128 pages, Steve Jackson Games manages to convert a great deal of the richness and variety of Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri into a hardcover role playing game book. As a GURPS fan and Alpha Centauri player, I was interested in what this union would produce. If anything, I'd say that those who frequently play the computer game will find that this book does not cover all of the various possibilities from the game. Even the book itself admits this in chapter 7, where it says: "The Alpha Centauri setting is almost too rich for role playing, covering centuries of time and a tremendous range of possible themes". Thus this book suffers from being too short. Much more material could have been added, especially in a hardcover. Some GM's may wish to purchase the computer game and try it before attempting a campaign set in this worldbook. This book does a very admirable job at attempting to give people a chance for role playing in the world of Alpha Centauri. I know I'll use this book.




2. As a huge fan of both GURPS and Alpha Centari I was really looking forward to this book. I was hoping it would flesh out the world a bit and set up some nice political intrigue. Unfortunately I found the book lacking on all counts. If you've played Alpha Centauri and have the expansion set then you already have all the information you need to set up a great GURPS Alpha Centauri game. If you have the hint book, then you have everything provided in the GURPS book and more. NOTHING is elaborated on and therefore in my opinion nothing is gained in buying this book. Perhaps SJG was bound by contract not to elaborate on anything, and we have Firaxis to blame for this debacle. It's too bad, because this book could have been great, instead of the plagiarized garbage it turned out to be. Don't waste your money.



3. Great pictures, lots of info, stats, equipment, possible plots, if you love Alpha take a look at this

No comments about Autoduel Quarterly Vol. 3 No. 4.

1 comments about GURPS Celtic Myth.

1. The standard of roleplaying products based in a Celtic background has been poor at best. The majority have been either sloppily written and/or have missed the point entirely, opting for half-baked New Age speculation. However, Ken and Jo Walton have come through with GURPS Celtic Myth. The setting mainly concerns its self with the British Isles, and floats in that wondeful Celtic Dreamtime belonging to Lugh, Fionn and Arthur. That said, the material remains true to its sources and can be used for historical gaming too. It is a refreshing change from previous attempts, which tended to hammer the Celtic round peg into a Game System square hole. A sign of this is the magic system, which harkens back to Druidic Tree Magic. The book itself shouldn't be taken as set in stone, rather, it is a springboard for those who always wanted to play Celts, but were daunted by the challange of codifying such an amorphous and oral culture. The sourcebook is easily converted to other systems, and should be in the Library of any serious gamer- particularly those interested in European Culture and History. Another product worth checking out is Fasa's Tir Na Og, for Shadowrun, for something of similar tone, but in a Cyberpunk setting.

No comments about Best of Pyramid: Volume 1.

2 comments about GURPS Creatures of the Night *OP (GURPS: Generic Universal Role Playing System).

1. I read this book at night and was so scared that I didn't want to get out of bed to pee. It brought back some wonderful memories of my childhood but cleaning it up was a pain. Also, my wife was pretty upset. I was almost successful blaming it on her but the center of the stain gave me away.

   I have used a lot of these creatures in my space/fantasy/old west campaign. The creatures are very creative and the outstanding artwork alone is reason enough to buy this book.

   I didn't really wet my bed. But I thought about it. Maybe tonight...




2. Many people have complained that GURPS is too generic. That the GM and players have to work to breath life into a campaign. This wonderful little book addresses that issue quite nicely. The author has created 67 detailed nasty critters; their characteristics, their goals, their methods, and their environments. Then he provides 2-3 "adventure seeds" for each monster that the GM can flesh out quickly and easily to create adventures of varying degrees of complexity and challenge. These "adventure seeds" are extremely well done and GMs might want to buy the book just for all the adventuring ideas put forth there.
   
   The creatures span all manner of time and space and could be used in a science fiction, fantasy, historical, or even a super-hero campaign with little effort.
   
   My only complaint is that there's no way to index the creatures power against the strength of the party. It might well take some experience and possibly some GM intervention to avoid accidentally killing the party. There is an index in the back that provides a thumbnail sketch of all the critters but some sort of power rating would have made the book perfect instead of extremely good.
   
   The descriptions are wonderfully macabre and the artwork does a great job of further setting the tone. There's no question that the author really enjoyed creating this book. There's still some lingering questions about the type of personality that would come up with some of these monsters, but that's not your problem. Just go out and buy the book and enjoy how it pumps up your campaign without any extra effort on your part.

No comments about GURPS Traveller: Humaniti.

1 comments about GURPS WWII: Frozen Hell.

1. World War II is often depicted as a black and white struggle of good against evil. This book is an excellent introduction to one of its most interesting gray areas: Finland, co-belligerent with the evil Nazis against our Soviet allies.

   Setting the stage with a short history of Finland, beginning with its independence from Russia during World War I and continuing through the events leading to its involvement in World War II, the book explains and describes the Winter War, when the Finns resisted Soviet invasion of their territory, the Continuation War, when the Finns fought alongside the Nazis to reclaim the territory they'd lost during the Winter War, and the Lapland War, when the Finns expelled the Nazis from Finland.

   Later chapters explain and describe the Finnish military, the Finnish people, and the gear, weapons and vehicles that the Finns used to fight. Sidebars throughout the book cover related subjects, such as Finnish pronunciation, place names, especially influential people, peripheral issues and events, and important Finnish cultural concepts. The last chapter discusses ways to use the information in the book for roleplaying games. And the book also includes a bibliography to facilitate further research.

   My only critique is that the book doesn't even mention one of the greatest combat heroes of the Winter War -- and, with over 500 enemy kills, one of the deadliest soldiers of all time -- Simo Hayha.

No comments about Roleplayer. The GURPS magazine (Number 28 April 1992).