True20 Adventure Roleplaying is the next evolution in game design from the company that brought you Mutants & Masterminds and Blue Rose. True20 offers a simplified and streamlined game system for all your roleplaying adventures. This core rulebook contains everything you need to get started, from character creation and combat to special abilities, supernatural powers and equipment. True20 also contains several sample campaign settings, including the winners of Green Ronin's Setting Search. Each setting provides something different and shows off the strength and flexibility of the rules. If you want a fast, simple, and fun game system that's still familiar to players of the world's most popular RPGs, if you want a vehicle for creating worlds of adventure, then True20 is for you
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
18 of 18 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
True Adventure, Truly Good,
By Sion Rodriguez y Gibson "MrPunch" (City Of Angels) - See all my reviews
This review is from: True20 Adventure Roleplaying (Hardcover)
True20 is an excellent evolution of the Dungeons and Dragon model into new territory. It uses an adaptation of the base rules system in Mutants and Masterminds (just roll D20 and add numbers) and focuses it down to apply to normal rather than costumed adventurers. It adapts systems from other role playing games (challenges from Iron Heroes, damage saves from Mutant and Masterminds) and blends them into a focused whole.
Overall the system runs like a charm; it is fast, fun and encourages the players to try things. This book includes four settings which, I feel, do not show the power of the system and prevent me from giving this book 5 stars. The settings are: Caliphate Nights. The good one focusing on playing tales from the 1001 Nights. New roles, new rules and the djinni! Kaju vs. Mecha. Giant robots versus bigger monsters. Not my cup of tea but adds new sci-fi rules. Lux Aeternum. An attempt to merge swashbuckling and sci-fi which feels a little like a Star Trek episode. Borrowed Time. A great idea to do The Matrix with time manipulators but which doesn't include a complete setting or fully functional rules. A let down.
13 of 13 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Not just a minor tweaking of the d20 ruleset,
By
This review is from: True20 Adventure Roleplaying Revised Edition (Paperback)
I have known about True20 for some time, but had been operating under some faulty assumptions about it that really prevented me from wanting to take a look at it further (for example, thinking that it used some version of Hit Points). I was most pleased to discover a system that had been adapted from the d20 SRDs into its own very well designed multi-genre game.
The Book Itself True20 Adventure Roleplaying Revised Edition (henceforth just referred to as True20 when addressing the system) is a 264 page paperback printed in black and white. A quick flip through shows much of every page devoted to text explaining how the game works, interspersed with B&W art of varying quality. The print is a shade on the small side, but that allows for that much more information to be presented. The System True20 really boils down to the basics of d20: Attribute + Skill Rating + d20 to beat either a static Difficulty Check or opposed check. Where it differs from more "traditional d20" is that the middleman of the attribute number has been eliminated and the True20 Attribute is what would normally be the bonus from said d20 attribute. While this is pretty easy to grasp, I can say from personal experience that not everyone will take to it so well as one of my gaming friends - who is well familiar with standard D&D 3.5 d20 - can't quite seem to make the disconnect and dislikes the idea of negative attributes rather intensely. Chapter Breakdown I'll be honest; I skip most of these sorts of bits in most books, and this was no exception. I did skim enough of it to find out that the Revised Edition not only has the errata fixes from the previous edition, but also has the better part of the True20 Companion folded in vice the original settings. The Basics As one would imagine, most the majority of the system is touched on in these seven pages, from how Difficulty Checks should scale to the flow of combat. A very good primer for what follows, and the majority of it can be previewed here: http://true20.com/files/grr1704_pre1.pdf. Chapter One: Hero Creation, Chapter Nine: Role Creation True20 still uses levels and Classes, but it has distilled down said Classes to three "all-encompassing" Roles: Adept, Expert and Warrior (http://true20.com/files/grr1704_pre2.pdf). The standard d20 attributes of Strength (Str), Dexterity (Dex), Constitution (Con), Intelligence (Int), Wisdom (Wis) and Charisma (Cha) are used, and six points are allocated to be distributed as the player desires. One of my misconceptions about the system immediately became apparent, which is that True20 doesn't use an escalating Hit Point system - this was somewhat of a surprise to me. Instead, a Toughness Save is used which is a derivative of the Injury system (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/variant/adventuring/injury.htm) from Unearthed Arcana, where the damage determined is a static amount that then a character needs to resist. I like the idea in concept, but I think that if I played using the system I would probably switch to something that allowed for a damage roll instead (with then similar results for injuries). Every class gets a pick of four Feats or Powers at level 1 and then a Feat/Power every level after that, which allows for significant differentiation between characters rather quickly. Additionally, every character has a pool of points called Conviction which can be used for various in-game benefits (re-rolling poor rolls, etc.) with an additional use dependent on the "base" Class (read: level 1) that the character has chosen. I have included Chapter Nine in this as well as it goes and breaks down how each of the three Classes have been configured from a balance perspective so that more specialized Classes can be made for specific character concepts/campaigns; this many points allotted for Feats, Skills, Combat Bonuses, etc. Seeing the "under-the-hood" of the design was quite a refreshing change for me personally, as I haven't personally experienced many games that have stepped through the "whys" of how things were done so that changes can be made that won't unbalance game play. Chapter Two: Skills As mentioned previously, Skills hew to the Attribute + Skill Rank + d20 roll vs. either a fixed DC or opposed check. Generating Skills is somewhat confusing, as the information as to what Skills a character starts with is somewhat buried in the text. I would have preferred to have the Skills be either one or the other as opposed to both, with my personal preference being a given number of Ranks per level for a trained Skill. Characters begin with a number of Skills determined by Role plus Int at 4 Ranks; raising Skills is done with Skill points (again determined by Role plus Int). Most of the Skills are taken right from the d20 SRD with a few from the Modern SRD (Computers, Drive, Medicine and Pilot), so some of the skills would have little use in a modern/future setting. These can be seen here: http://true20.com/files/grr1704_pre3.pdf. Each Skill is further defined by "Challenges" that may be used in conjunction with said Skill, which increase the DC of the Skill use to provide added benefit - thus making individuals who are highly skilled all the more likely to be capable of accomplishing great tasks. Chapter Three: Feats Feats are specialized game mechanics that allow characters to become specialized in whatever manner you'd like, and there is a fair variety for more-than-just-fantasy use. Mind you, many of the Feats are only useful for a fantasy-esque campaign ("Shield Training" immediately comes to mind) and I would have preferred that more modern Feats have been included. A full listing of the Feats available can be found here: http://true20.com/files/grr1704_pre4.pdf. Chapter Four: Supernatural Powers Powers in True20 work much the same way that Skills do, with the Power Rank (determined by Adept level) being added to Attribute + d20. The concept of having certain capabilities Fatigue the user is introduced, where each time a Power is used the caster/user makes a Fatigue saving throw or is weakened; this replaces the fire-and-forget style of magic that is otherwise largely prevalent in standard d20. The Powers are of a decent selection, allowing for more modern sorts of adventures more readily than the Feat selections. Chapter Five: Equipment The equipment section begins with an explanation of a Wealth mechanic, which replaces the need to track specific expenditures - and thus reduce bookkeeping. I tend to gloss over for most laundry lists of equipment, and past the Wealth mechanics I gave this section a cursory glance, making note that various sorts of weapons/armor/vehicles/etc. might be available, and there's a fair selection with varying degrees of explanation. More on this a little later. Chapter Six: Playing the Game The mechanics of the game are more explicitly gone over, starting with the differentiation of Physical and Social Actions. Combat makes up the majority of this section, and much like the rest of True20 there are slight differences between it and regular d20. For example, all attack rolls are made with a Dex modifier to one's Combat bonus, while Ranged attacks are opposed by a Dex modifier while Melee is opposed by a Str modifier. Damage works in a "death spiral" where failed Toughness saves result in either penalties to further Toughness saves or penalties to all actions, depending on the difference in Toughness save roll vs. damage dealt. This allows for a mechanical expression of one being wounded which I personally like. Chapter Seven: Narrating the Game Brief advice is given as to how to cover situations that aren't otherwise covered by the rules already presented, how to dole out Conviction points as well as how to advance characters. Chapter Eight: Adversaries The better part of the adversaries presented is largely geared toward fantasy gaming; I'll get that out of the way right now. Descriptions of various creature types are given for custom-making one's own beasties, along with a handful of premade critters. Chapter Ten: Fantasy Adventures The specifics of building a fantasy geared campaign are gone through rather thoroughly in this chapter, with both options for both players and GMs alike. Fantasy specific roles, particular styles of fantasy settings and more specific equipment is gone into in quite a bit more detail than previously examined early in the book. Chapter Eleven: Space Adventures Further delineation of what the system can be geared for regarding particular sorts of sci-fi/future settings are presented, giving many options for Skills, Feats and Equipment. Vehicular design is covered as well as possible adventure ideas, universe building and environments that would otherwise not be taken into account (i.e., vacuum). Chapter Twelve: Horror Adventures Different styles of horror campaigns are discussed as well as new Roles presented for horror-specific styles of games. Sanity mechanics, as well as possible insanities that can be developed, are also gone into in some detail. Chapter Thirteen: Modern Adventures What I was really hoping to get out of this chapter - modern specific Feats - are not present; instead there is a fair amount of the chapter dedicated to how to obtain "hard to get" items via the Black Market. There is also a slight update of equipment, but on the whole this chapter seemed to have the least amount of usable information in it out of all the Adventure... Read more ›
13 of 14 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Truly what D&D should be!,
By Anthrorob (United States) - See all my reviews
Amazon Verified Purchase(What's this?)
This review is from: True20 Adventure Roleplaying (Hardcover)
Pros: The system is quick, streamlined, and open to limitless possibilities. Magic now requires a dice roll to cast a spell. The Caliphate Nights setting example in the back of the book is intriguing, although I don't like that is set in a quasi-historical world. The combat system is based on Mutant & Mastermind's system which is streamlined but some will miss their "hit points"...I for one won't.
Neutral: They use the D20 Modern Wealth score system (with Wealth checks to buy something.) I would have liked if they included the quick conversion rules to keep it currency based If one chose to do so. Negative: Aside from the Caliphate Nights, the other three settings that are included (as examples of True20's versatility) are...um...goofy. Really, I cannot say anything good about the other three. Thankfully they don't take up too much space but I wish they had published the settings separately. Also, the artwork is really hit and miss. They should hire the artist who works with I.C.E.'s HARP line, whose pen and pencil drawings are excellent. The poor art can make this feel amateur-ish. All in All...I highly recommend this game! Just stop reading once you finish the Caliphate Nights section. The other settings are sad really. There seems to be an active community on their forum boards which is always a good sign. Not sure? Green Ronin (publishers) offer a free Quick Start guide on their True20.com website. Check it out!
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