Mouse Guard Roleplaying Game [Hardcover]

Luke Crane (Author), David Petersen (Illustrator)

Book Description

Publication Date: January 30, 2009

Join the Mouse Guard and defend the Mouse Territories against predators and dangers, in this roleplaying game based on the acclaimed Mouse Guard comic book series! Players form their own Mouse Guard patrol and attempt to complete missions while the Game Master takes on the roles of the weather, animals, and the wilderness, all trying to thwart the fearless mice. Designed by Origins Award-winning game designer Luke Crane for beginners and veterans alike, the game comes complete with three sample patrols and three sample missions, so you and your friends can get started playing right away. Includes art and extensive background material on the Mouse Territories specially prepared by Mouse Guard creator David Petersen, as well as character sheets and maps.

Product Details

• Reading level: Ages 13 and up
  
• Hardcover: 320 pages
• Publisher: Archaia Entertainment (January 30, 2009)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1932386882
• ISBN-13: 978-1932386882
• Product Dimensions: 8.3 x 8.4 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2.4 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (14 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #189,950 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

45 of 46 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Mouse Guard - Burning Wheel for the Rest of Us!, February 19, 2009

By 

William F. Hostman (Eagle River, AK United States) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Mouse Guard Roleplaying Game (Hardcover)

Mouse Guard is a simplified cousin of the Burning Wheel RPG (and Burning Empires). The game is about semi-anthopomorphized mice in a medieval society; essentially, mouse-sized & shaped people in an apparently human-free world. The players play members of the Mouse Guard, a non-governmental body of troops which protect the main habitation from the worst of the predators.

There is enough information to run the game without reference to the comics. The comics will help to visualize the world, but there are plenty of old and new illos in the book.

Having run the game for several months (thanks to a preorder special), I can say with confidence the game is suitable for children and adults alike. most teens should be able to run the game, and just about any literate child should be able to play. The game is more structured than more traditional RPG's, and is mission focused. My group has had players from age 9 to 50, all enjoying it.

Basic Dice mechanic: (skill)d6, counting successes (the number of dice which rolled 4,5 or 6), versus a difficulty number. It helps if everyone has 10 or so d6's, and it's nice if everyone's dice are distinctive.

There are several reward cycles in the game engine: Fate and persona for playing beliefs, roleplaying well, and having been a moving force in the plot, which allow improved chances on challenges. Skills require both successes and failures to go up, and can only go up if used. Traits have to be used against one's self to earn checks, which allow a variety of actions during the player turn, and allow players to heal during the GM turn.

Narrative structure: The game has a default mission-based play narrative structure. Here's an outline:
(1) Recap prior session
(2) Get mission briefing
(3) Write goals for this session
(4) GM Turn: 2-4 challenges
(5) Player Turn: 1 challenge per trait check earned in play
(6) Rewards: check beliefs, instincts, and goals for whether they earned fate and persona points.

The system works really well. My 9yo can play it comfortably, and understands the rules; my 50yo friend who has been gaming since 1978 also enjoys it quite a bit.

22 of 24 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars an accessable and revolutionary roleplaying game, March 21, 2009

By 

Jacob Waltier (Seattle, WA USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Mouse Guard Roleplaying Game (Hardcover)

Whether you're approaching Mouse Guard Roleplaying Game as a fan of the Mouse Guard comics or a fan of roleplaying games, there is something new and interesting here for you. The game uses a simplified and streamlined version of Luke Crane's Burning Wheel system, but while Burning Wheel has been criticized by some for having too steep a learning curve, Mouse Guard is a breeze to read and understand. The game is clearly presented with lots of examples, including an ingenius example of play that shows the events of the first comic as though they unfolded naturally during a game session. The book contains several character archetypes to be used to immediately create player character, and a few sessions worth of missions for the Guardsmice, so it's great for beginners. Visually, the book is stunningly beautiful. Color and visual texture practically pop off of each page, and the book is filled with art both from the comics and created specifically for this product including the cover, which shows the entire cast of Fall 1152 and Winter 1152. Or, as my female gamer friends have said, "Mousies!!" The only downside to this game is persuading people who are used to playing big, tough heroic types in RPGs to play a game about mice with swords. If you can get past that hurdle, you will be blown away by this game. Luke Crane and David Petersen have really made something special here, and if you are a big fan of the comics or of roleplaying games and are looking for a novel experience, you owe it to yourself to buy this book.

9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars This game thinks outside the box -- and succeeds, August 21, 2009

By 

BK (Cleveland, Ohio USA) - See all my reviews

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This review is from: Mouse Guard Roleplaying Game (Hardcover)

Amongst the numerous fantasy role-playing game systems, why would you choose to buy and play "Mouse Guard Roleplaying Game"? There are plenty of reasons. You could start with the fact that it is based on a fun and beautifully illustrated series written by David Petersen involving anthropomorphic mice. (How cool is that?) You could also buy it because, put simply, the game book -- like Petersen's Mouse Guard series books -- is of the highest production quality: readable text, beautiful illustrations and great production quality. (How many other RPG books come with a dust jacket?) You could also buy it because a number of Internet reviewers on RPG-related sites have already reviewed this game and come away very impressed.

I recommend you buy it for all those reasons, plus at least one more: it is a really creative gaming system. This game is not "D&D for mice," though clearly the game, and the Mouse Guard series, were inspired at some level, even if just in the most basic origins, by Dungeons and Dragons. Perhaps the best way for me to describe the system is that, it seems driven at its most critical and interesting level by qualitative mechanics and not quantitative ones. That alone makes it stand out in a crowd. Part of the fun of this system is in designing a character -- who is, what else?, a member of a mouse patrol -- that has a very specific nature and characteristics. Some of these things can change (indeed, for each adventure, you have to select a specific goal for yourself), and some are a bit more static ... or at least they take longer to change. But unlike most games where a player selects some qualitative material as part of a "character background," and then only references this material as seems best to him or her, the Mouse Guard RPG makes very direct use of these qualitative factors. Suffice to say that the Mouse Guard RPG challenges players in a way that other games don't; it is certainly not a game bent on amassing quantitative factors, whether that is experience points, hit points, gold pieces, etc. (In fairness, no really good RPG should be just a quantitative exercise, but number-driven mechanics are so prevalent in so many RPGs that it is a natural byproduct or double effect, even in a well run game.) Put another way, Mouse Guard incorporates storytelling right into its central mechanic.

In a nutshell, the Mouse Guard RPG thinks outside the box ... to good effect. This game is not designer Luke Crane's first foray into RPG design, but it may be his most polished. When combined with Petersen's charming Mouse Guard storyline and characters -- as well as a beautifully designed and readable book -- you have a real winner.