Customer Reviews

Beyond the Supernatural

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This book could be the beginning of a lot nights staying up late fighting evil extra dimensional beings planing to bring hell on Earth and for me Beyond the Supernatural is a flash from the past. This was the first RPG game that I cut my teeth on. Anywho, When most people think of a D20 rpg game they think of D&D 3.5. There was a game before its time. Beyond the Supernatural is one of many books under the umbrella of Palladium's RPG gaming system, and yes it is an older system but it has stood the test of time. Beyond the Supernatural has a setting, in my option, of a modern day Cthulhu mythos meets HellBoy with a small amount of X files thrown into the pot. You are a Supernatural detective trying to save the world from vampires, gangs of monsters from other dimensions, and demons from hell. They are transported to Earth with a little help from "Rifts", or gateways that link our world to theirs, and these Rifts just so happen to be linked to real world locations. Some of these places are the great pyramids of Egypt and the serpent mound of Ohio. These are just two of many other ancient supernatural hot spots. That was a brief description of BtS now lets move on to the system.
Beyond the Supernatural is an older D20 system. The rules for combat are pretty straight forward. If you are proficient with the weapon i.e. if you choose a weapon proficiency skill, for example sword w.p., when you attack with your character you have a plus to your D20 roll. They also takes into consideration your attributes. Meaning, if you have a high P.S."Physical Strength" then you will have a plus to your damage roll, like D&D. Also if you wear armor the attacker meeds to roll higher then the A.R. "Armor Rating" to punch through it, which means the character take all of the damage. If the attacker does not roll high enough then the armor takes all of the damage. A players health point and taking damage is also different then D&D. You have two sets of damage locations one for SDC "Structural Damage Capacity" and the Other for Hit points. SDC is the amount of Damage you can take before your vital organs start taking damage. Taking Damage in Beyond the Supernatural could turn some players away, because, one bad grenade throw means you wipe out your whole team. Skills are a bit different from D&D's. Palladium systems uses percentile dice. The highest percentile a character's skill can reach is 98%. This leaves room for a failure on a skill check. One of many examples where Palladium applies real world reasoning into a RPG system. The chance of a failure makes the system more believable. Then there is the negative points of the Palladium system.
The reason I did not give it a five star rating applies to if a character wants to learn a new skill they need to go back to college and take a class or classes allowing them to learn a new skill. If the character has 200 bucks per class then they can learn a new skill, if I remember the option for learning new skills is right. So the GM takes some time with those wanting to learn a new skill and either role play out the time it takes to get the new skills, or the GM down time the 17 weeks it takes to learn the skill for the characters and wam bam thank you ma'am new skill. This seems like a great system of gaining knowledge for the game, but Palladium forgot their own rule percentile. What about the chance of failure? People take tests and turn in homework when they are in college leaving the door open for a chance of failing. What about the monsters that you have to hunt down and take out of commotion or the bad guys wanting to take you out of business? Their not going to sit back wait for you to finish. It doesn't some practical nor plausible. They need to put a point system into play handing out points when a character levels. They get so many points per level to spend on new skills or increasing an attribute, even if its self taught or from a school. They also need to create a set of rules to learning new skills, weapon proficiency, and/or raise an attribute. They also need to add a failure chance. For example, When kids head off to college does every student pass. No. So if the players wanted to learn then a table for how much time it takes to learn, the cost of the instructor's time, were they go to get the training, and if they pass or fail. Most people keep learning new skills throughout their lives, maybe they pick up weight lifting, or get an itching to learn how to fire a hand gun. The other reason I give BtS four stars goes to writing up a character. A first time Palladium player needs a few hours to set down and write up their character. I can remember my first fleshing out a Palladium character took me all of 3 hours and that's with a friend who knows the rules for writing up a character.
All in all if you are looking for a fun system to play and are new to Palladium systems then pick up Beyond the Supernatural, or for that matter any of the Palladium books. I for one remember having a great time staying up late with my friends, drinking Mountain Dew, and facing off with a tomb full of mummies under the sphinx's right paw. What a story!

Now in an expanded second edition, Beyond The Supernatural is a role playing game by Kevin Siembieda that is set in the modern world where the heroes include ordinary people as well as those with the gift of paranormal abilities. This is also a world of shadowy horror, strange creatures and dark magic. This 256-page role gaming compendium features extensive backgrounding and a lush setting; 14 psychic character classes including Fire Walker, Ghost Hunter, Medium, Psi-Mechanic, and Psychic Sensitive; 42 occupations (including Professional Psychic and Psychic Investigator); more than one hundred psychic abilities; The Lazlo Society and Lazlo Agency; as well as entities, fiends, and creatures of darkness. Beyond The Supernatural is a strongly recommended addition to any dedicated role gamer collection, this fantasy role-playing game offers easy to learn rules to get even the most novice player up and running quickly.

The 2nd ed book is cool, it has alot of "upgrades" to the 1st ed book. but it is incomplete. it lacks an equipment section, along with Monsters and magic are missing. it is workable though if you have some of the other games made by palladium.