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This depiction of a Communist alien stellar power draws on many real-world examples (particularly Chinese and early Soviet) to describe their ever-so-slightly comic society with great depth and interest. Their history is a good read also, giving further insight into their Blarad and Klackon neighbours. The PDF is not bookmarked.
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What can I say? This is a classic. The game system will be familiar to anyone who has played aftermath! or Daredevils.
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This one is a classic. Old school style super heroes with randomly generated powers rule!
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This one is a classic. Old school style super heroes with randomly generated powers rule!
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It looks like a very meaty ruleset for its slim 50 or so pages, chock full of nautical crunch to satisfy the barnacle-clad old salt in you. In terms of complexity it may rank alongside Birnie's "Action Under Sail". If you're looking for a simple beer-n-pretzels kinda game, this may not be it. However if detailed ship-to-ship combat and realistic manoeuvres are what you crave, then "Heart of Oak" is the naval wargame for you! The scan is mediocre at best with some pages' text looking a bit pale and hard-to-read, and a labelled diagram of a full-rigged ship is poorly reproduced and may not be helpful unless you're already familiar with the maritime jargon. The period illos are too dark in the scan and it is hard to discern the subject-matter of the pictures, making them nothing more than a waste of printer ink. As I printed the PDF, some of the last few pages refused to print at all save for the watermark. Perhaps the maker of this PDF file can post a new, improved version that does not have problems in the printing process.
4/5 stars.
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Villains and Vigilantes is an oldie of course but once upon a time it was one of the big superhero systems. It does some interestingly unfashionable things that modern systems don't. The semi-random character generation is something a lot of gamers would reject out of hand but it was my experience as a GM that the random roll system really opened my mind to character possibilities I would never have otherwise thought of. It made great inspiration for my villain making. Apart from that, the combat system, while once again an old fashioned one relying on the full polyhedral range of dice is straightforward, unambiguous, and well designed to accomodate the varying power levels produced by the dice driven character generation process.
However, V&V's mechanics are very combat oriented and neglect things like detective work. Still, for me, the character generation alone was worth the five bucks and the basics are covered.
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Still a classic d20 hero game, although it could use a diceless revision
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Fun take on the obligatory alternate Earth adventure. Worth a look, if you can forgive the publishers only giving you a glimpse of Vine' rather than an overview (which I'm not sure I can or not).
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Considered a classic, I understand, when it was printed (and it is still highly regarded to this day) I find CACC fun and enjoyable. Isn't that what everyone looks for in a game? Whether it is or not, this is a slice of an era in superheroes where they actually put some thought into the variety of characters they were presenting & working hard not to duplicate others with their abilities & eccentricities. Does it work its magic for today? Yeah, if you're into this sort of thing. It has an innocent fun aspect I found refreshing that might actually put others off a bit when they'd rather do something grittier and darker.
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More chaos & mayhem makers for V&V. That sums up this product, which presents a variety of characters worthy of anyone's supers campaign. While a couple of the characters might be laughable today (okay, they might have even been laughable when this was originally printed, too), it still offers something vibrant and new if played right.
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You gotta love the 1980s! The superhero concepts and ideas would have been fun to read in a comic book, especially those presented in BATE. Something is missing, though, when you read the adventure that an actual comic would have filled in. That's when you realize it's a product designed for the gaming to fill in the details and bring it to life. Brilliant? Maybe not. But with the fun stuff in this adventure, from a space station to the sterotypical battle above the earth (it's even in the title!), it certainly takes you back to a time when that might have been all you needed for a game system to work on a sunny, breezy afternoon / evening.
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I'm never disappointed with my purchases of V&V products. They each offer something interesting and new to one's campaign and ideas. SC&C comes up with some interesting villains/criminals/thugs from a variety of angles. This is how such products need to be written...graphics for each character and all the information you could ever want in just a few "text-bites". If I had a complaint with this product, it would only be that it suffers from its era as these days gamers go ga-ga over all-color books more than they do over B&W ones that think of your wallet.
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I loved the comic as a teenager & I love this interpretation of the characters for a game system worthy enough to present it! The spirit of the comic is preserved and offers gamers to experience one of the more interesting comics from the 1980s that had some of the most potential with where it could have gone. It's also fun to see certain elements of the comic come to life, sometimes comically, like the idea of MEGA-MAN (which somehow seemed cooler when you're younger but doesn't age very well, in my opinion)!!!
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Take a walk down memory lane! This game reminds me of everything that drew me into gaming (old school style) in the first place. While it's not perfect in the way it presents its materials and rules and makes you have to go searching without a handy summary page available, it does make up for this in its imaginative way in presenting a supers setting. It was the 1980s, and its fun to see how the games today still need to give kudos for the ones who first blazed the trails...like V&V. Even with its flaws, this game system is still much better for me than some of the ones sold today. Somehow the innocence of the comics I read as a kid remains in V&V. Not to say that other games can't capture that, but it's nice to find a game where the innocence is part of the allure of the system!
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Simply
The best SHRPG ever
Trully balnced despite all its 80's math
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