Short and pretty sweet - the simple production keep the cost down I guess and it is really all about ideas anywy, not the look of the product. For what it cost, exceelnt VFM

I had the opportunity to run 3-4 games with Ivan system and let me tell you: it is in my opinion one of the best Sci Fi skirmish ever. First, it is simple to learn, but it is far from being ordinary. Second: game is actually fun and fast! there is a lot of action, tactical thinking and reactions... and all in a smooth, cinematic and fun way. This third edition is very polished and can be used for very different game scenarios (modern, sci fi, horror, pulp...). It has a nice campaign system, rules for vehicles and even random events and options for pick-up games. I strongly suggest to try it.

Published by Nordic Weasel Games, Not Just a Brush War. Brush war campaigns for any war game system is apparently a departure from their usual product range, in that it is system agnostic and not designed to work specifically with one or more of its other products. It is clearly aimed at wargamers, specifically those wargamers focusing on the brush wars of the last century, this century and the near future. The pdf has twos ections. The first section consists of tables for generating "imagi-Nations" for wargaming, these tables cover about 10 pages and are designed to be modularm, so that a player need not use all of the tables if desired. The last section is about 28 pages long and covers campaign rules, designed to overlay your wargames rules, again, they are modular and you need not use them all.

While not aimed at Sci-fi (my favourite genre) I can definitely find a use for this pdf in both my wargaming and roleplaying games. There are even rules for figuring the relative tech level of the imagi-Nation and a table for generating the name of military operations, I rather like this table and will definitely use it a lot.

I'd definitely recommend it.

I deducted one rating point, only because it is not broadly useful across all game genres. Having said that it would still be fairly easy to adapt it to your favourite genre.

Trench Storm is a nice interpretation of company/battion level WW I, subsequent civil wars and disorders. The rules can apply to both trench and open warfare without becoming too detailed or excessively abstract. The author understands the period and provides easy rules for extending the game to playing a campaign.

This provides the wargamer with a quite innovative way of producing a whole variety of battles across a range of scenery areas, yet it is balanced toward the games ending up with a historical feel. Poland lost and so the scenarios lean toward that, sometimes with an unerring certainty. I would recommend this to wargamers who use almost any rule types, as a means of producing some excellent games.

Mal Wright

I got these rules with the intention to run small, fast skirmish games. They are, however, so much more than just that. I find now that I am preparing an entire RPG-lite campaign for myself in order to take my miniatures for a ride. I am coming up with stories, back stories, governments, systems all so that I can play little battles between a few of my figures and with that tell a story. These rules are fun.

I don't really know where to begin. You roll a handful of D6s to see if you hit, and if you kill. Your opponent might roll a couple of defence D6s to negate some of your hits. You roll a few D6s to see how far you can move. If you take 1 hit from an attack, you are pinned. 2 hits and you are out of the game. 3 hits and you are killed so horribly that your team will suffer extra negative points to their morale check. That is essentially the rules. How many D6 do I roll? There are 4 class of character ranging from cannon fodder to hero (main player character). Cannon fodder roll fewer D6s BUT you can change that if you want. The beauty of these rules are that you can do what you want with them. As well as having more D6 available to them, heroes and aces have character traits, which can basically, again, be what you want them to be: an extra D6 on attacks, free movement, talk your way past guards, stealthy. They can also have weapons that have abilities: extra D6 on attacks, limited ranges, long ranges, explosive radius, push targets back, only fired once per game, etc.

There is an entire system in place to standardize and create traits and weapons, but you can also just make stuff up. None of my character notes are officially labeled as per the rules. I have a shotgun that grants +1D6 under 8 inches and -1D6 over 12 inches. According to the rules this could have all kinds of "tags" on it, but I feel just writing exactly what the ability does is easier. This is the same with traits, although I should keep better track of combat/non-combat traits.

Where the game gets really interesting, in my opinion, is in the RPG/campaign parts. I hadn't even considered these, but they are so cool. My battles now are not just my heroes fighting gang members over a village and if they win then they save the damsel. There will be people to talk to, things to repair, terminals to hack, messages to broadcast, buildings to search. My skirmish will not just be a skirmish. There will be more to it. Then, after the battle, I can earn money or loot (which I can take from tables provided or just MAKE UP MYSELF!!!).

There are a few pages of just random stuff generators: people, motives, back stories, corporation names, news headlines (WHAT?!?!). There is a section devoted to the outside world moving on while we have out little fight on this planet in the middle of nowhere. There are sample missions to help you get started and randomly create encounters.

Basically, if like me you have no friends and a pregnant wife who goes to bed early at the moment, then I recommend this game. I can play out a little story one evening, spend the next thinking up my next part and then fight that out the following day. However, this game also works if you have friends. You could easily turn it into a proper RPG campaign. If you want small fights in cantinas, or scavenging jobs, or to tell a story then these are rules to get.

Last era is a solid game. The mechanics are straight-forward, and may seem overly simple at first glance. However, there are 20 special rules which can add a lot of nice character to the game’s simple stat line. And the combat results and morale rules subtlety reward using appropriate ancient/medieval tactics. Indeed, I’m planning to try the rules out for some historical battles as well as fantasy.

As an added bonus, the background/world-building given, while brief, is pretty interesting, and I think it can be great inspiration for scenario building.

The army list included contains a mix of troops from several different factions and aren’t really complete by themselves. But many new troop types have already been published in the expansions with the promise of more. So, this is less of an issue.

Overall, I feel I received a lot of value for the money, and I’m looking forward to the continued support for the game.

Starport Scum is a great game if you are looking for some space adventures. The rules are very open-ended, giving you lots or freedom when it comes to designing the characters, traits and equipment for them. Using a set of traits that either give you a bonus to a roll or allow you to do something that you normally couldn't, your imagination is the only limit to the characters and creatures you can feature in your games.

The system uses only D6s for all task and combat resolution and a handfull of them will be enough. There isn't a point-system of any sort in this game, it's definitely geared towards narrative play, with or without a game master. If you are looking for a competetive tournament-type game, this isn't it.

It's worth noting that the game is still in beta, and some functions, like mission generation and character growth rules are not in the beta as of yet, however the basic game if fully playable as it stands right now.

This game is for epic adventures of the fantastical kind, and I can't say I've played one that better fits the bill.

From a personal standpoint, for my style of gaming, the rules themselves might be slightly much to handle alone. However, objectively, they're well written and pretty concise as far as miniatures rules go. The core rules aren't the reason I gave it a 4; the main reason is the lack of a bookmark sidebar, which would be extremely helpful in referencing certain nuances mid-game.

From a more biased standpoint, I'd like to note that once again, Nordic Weasel Games has delivered a rather useful tool within a game that, even though I may not end up getting much use out of the core book, will be extremely helpful to me in other endeavors. In this case I refer to the solo play rules and the tables occupying the last third or so of the PDF.

There are comprehensive rollable tables for campaign attributes such as random forces (WW2, Modern, Irregular, Gang and SWAT), fireteam generation, vehicle presence, a war generator for both earth and spacefaring settings, and even some goodies in character creation that help you define the background and personality of a character you don't already have down in your head.

Perhaps most intriguingly, the campaign rules give you rules and rollable tables for such things as the nature of injuries that befall those taken out in combat (from light wounds and dramatic scars to permanent injuries and death), replacements and recruits, campaign events (reassignment of soldiers, arrival of a new recruit, and so on), and of course, full-on mission generation.

For me, the strength of Nordic Weasel titles has always been the robust random generation, and these are things I feel like I could transplant into any game. In fact... I was going to give it a 4 for the lack of a bookmark index, but the more I look over these bonuses at the end of the book, the better I feel about this purchase. Five stars, for depth of utility alone!

Short Version: (And mind, this is from a very individualized standpoint.) If you've been searching for a game that lets you take control of a squad or platoon and follow them throughout a procedural military campaign, as I so long have, this is your train. Get on and ride this baby to glory. (Or... horrific defeat, as circumstances may dictate. May the dice treat your boys well!)

A simple, clean set of mass skirmish rules with some subtle tweaks on the conventional mechanics. It fulfills its stated goal, which is to be an easy, minimal-prep game, with room for future expansion. There is enough going on to make it a viable and worthwhile (and cheaper?) alternative to the many other rulesets out there. A solid 4.

For me personally, the core section of the book - which is roughly five pages of actual mechanics - is alone worthy of $9.99. I like to use tabletop roleplaying systems to run stories that force me to react to circumstances and think on my feet, and this is understandably difficult. But Usurper gives me enough "randomness" for my taste without bogging me down in number crunching mechanics.

The character creation, another part of the core, is also excellent. Games that can mesh the perfect amount of meat with the perfect amount of simplicity in the way the Usurper character creation rules do are rare gems indeed, and I enjoy them like a fluffy oven pastry on a cold day.

The quick option, for those who already know what they want to play, is a single page (plus one extra for how to handle specific questions players might have). The story option, which sings to me in particular, is a lifepath sort of system with roll tables.

The great thing about it is that the rolls are random, but not absolute. If I roll that my character was born with Reflexes, I could arguably apply this as several different traits: Maybe he's got "Keen Senses", maybe he's a "Social Chameleon" who can adapt to any setting and blend in perfectly, or maybe he has "Unassailable Wit", shooting down arguments contrary to his own like a master archer. Or maybe he's just "Quick on the Draw".

One special point I'd like to commend the author for is the "First Time Readers" notes. At the end of each section, a paragraph or so is written out for first time readers. It's a bit like a school assignment where you quickly apply some of the points covered in the previous section to practice, getting a hands-on feel for how they work as you go. This is particularly good for someone like me, who learns better by doing than by reading.

In summary: Usurper offers a lot of meat, but most of it is selective and supplementary. At its core, Usurper is a game that operates very smoothly. You roll d100. You have your result. The game then manages to work in per-character nuance and how it applies to actions, as well as attrition, all without convoluted numbers-tracking.

If you're looking for a game that walks the fine line between game and storytelling, one that determines outcomes systematically without becoming a slog... I suggest giving Usurper a try. As someone who's spent the past ten years sniffing out such games wherever I can find them, I can attest that this is one does a very good job of it.

Alright, most of what needs to be said has already been said by Glen. Utterly random, unbalanced and full of itself. Additionally, the book is so poorly laid out it should be criminal. Weapons rules are scattered about the book, movement and base rules are seperated, Initative comes after the bulk of combat rules, Mounted movement is off after weapons and armor, combat and reaction rules come before warband creation, etc. Shameful. The rules are full of vague statements, and several terms are left undefined, leaving it up to player interpretation. Playing this is like pulling teeth. The most painful thing I ran into is the combination of the Stay Alert order and Guard fire. Guard fire allows infinite reaction fire, and Stay Alerts allows a Guard fire to roll Kill Dice. With this combination, a ranged weapon can shoot and likely kill any figure that moves within their firing range, anywhere from 8 to 24 inches, an infinite amount of times, turning a musket into a fucking maxim gun. Rule holes like this make me question how much actual playtesting went into this. The fact that you think this is finished enough to be sold for anything more than a passing glance is disgusting.

But hey, at least no assumptions have been made about the gender or orientation of the players.

This is a great little Skirmish game. The Rules are clearly written as with all of Ivan's products. The thing I like most about this game is that you don't need a boatload of miniatures and a huge table to play on to have an amazing game. This is a terrific introduction to the hobby game for you to help a friend or child get started with.

Don't let the 67 page length scare you. All of the rules you need to get started playing are in the first 20 pages. The type is large and examples plentiful. The next section deals with characteristics of the various nations you can play. There are 7 USA, UK, German, Polish, USSR, Free French, Finland.

The last section of the rules deals with Campaigns. This is where the rules go from really good to FANTASTIC. You can play a solo campaign or a campaign against another player in a kind of what we call today warband style. Ivan has outdone himself here in making the campaign rules simple to understand and execute but worthwhile so that you keep coming back for more battles.

Many campaign Systems Stagnate and people drop the campaign after a couple of weeks or a month. Not so here. My Group has been playing a 5 men campaign for over a year now. We have used different theaters of course but we stick with the system as once side eventually wins.

Next to Fast and Dirty this is Mr. Sorensons Best Game ever.

My friend Chuck ran this set of rules for our regular Monday night Wargame get together at the local game store. It was a Civil War engagement with the Yankees trying to push the Rebs off some high ground. The rules work great! I really like the concept of the command points being a limited resource and the officers as an abstract the you use to rally, provde shock orders ect.. but at the danger of losing that officer to enemy fire. It was a slick set of rules that I would gladly play again. The only reason I don't give it a 5 right off is that I'm reserving that rating for te finished product!!

No Stars in Sight is a pretty much perfect gritty, small-unit sci-fi game.

You get tons of choice in unit design, optional rules to fine tune how you play, and make lots of decisions every phase of the game. Where do I put this plasma rifleman? Do I fire my last buzzbomb at that infantry concentration or save it for that power armor dude who I know is lurking around the corner? Should I push 1st Squad as hard as I can and risk exhausting them for the rest of the game?

It handles bug vs human and low tech humans vs high tech humans very well. Numerous games I've played have felt very much like the ambush scene in Aliens or in the final battle in District 9---intense, fast moving, and violent.

What the game does best is what the historical version, NEIS, does best as well: it keeps weapon lethality under control. Most of the damage you'll inflict is morale: pinning, stress, push backs, etc. Except in bug games, when you'll kill SO MANY bugs (unless they get in close, when they'll kill you).

Good stuff indeed.