Solitaire: Notorious

In the midst of the galactic war, the authorities are stretched thin. They cannot prosecute crime in the way that they before hostilities began. This role has been supplanted by the Nomad’s Guild, an independent, neutral organisation which licenses individuals to locate persons who have had a bounty placed on their head(s), to bring those persons to justice, dead or alive—no disintegrations, and collect the bounty. Such individuals are called Nomads and as long as a Nomad adheres to the Guild Code—Finish the Job, Only Kill When Necessary, Nomads Don’t Fight Nomads, Your Employer’s Business is their Own, and Don’t Get Attached—he can continue to collect bounties. Break the code and he is in danger of having a bounty put on his own head and becoming a target. In the course of prosecuting a contract, a Nomad will track down his target, scour the underworld and backwaters of the planet where he is hiding, and take him in. Resistance by the target of the bounty will not be the only difficulty faced by the Nomad. There may be suspicious locals and rival Nomads to be faced or avoided in getting to the target. Worse, there are six factions who regularly post bounties, and sometimes rival faction may take exception to the bounty you are about to collect! The question is, should a Nomad finish the job, collect the bounty, and so enhance what may be an infamous reputation? Or may be there is a reason not to collect at all, which means putting a price on a Nomad’s head?

This sounds like a situation in the Star Wars universe with bounty hunters going after criminals and rebels, and whilst it is not that, it is one inspired by the likes of The Empire Strikes Back and The Mandalorian. This is the set-up for Notorious: Hardscrabble bounty hunting aid intergalactic war, a solo journalling game published by AlwaysCheckers Publishing, published following a successful Kickstarter campaign. A Nomad falls into one of six types—the Armour, the Assassin, the Bot, the Brute, the Scoundrel, and the Uncanny. Each provides a Loadout—Ranged and Melee weapons, and Outfit, as well as Origin, Scar, and Trigger. The latter three add colour to the Nomad and the player is encouraged to think about others might react to his appearance and how his Nomad acts. The illustrations for these heavily suggest the influence of Star Wars. For example, the Armour looks not unlike Bobba Fett, the Bot like IG-88, and the Uncanny like Forom. He also has three attributes—Favour, Notoriety, and Motivation—representing a Nomad’s reputation on planet, adherence to the Nomad Code, and drive to succeed. Lastly, he has a Species, a Name, and a Personality. To create a Nomad, a player rolls for everything bar the attributes which always start out the same, or picks the options he wants.

Name: Mako Suds

Type: The Brute
Species: Kimano (Amphibious)
Personality: Assured
Weakness: Expectant father with eggs in his pouch
Origin: Your whole life has been dedicated to pursuing victories in worship of a fickle god
Scar: You proudly wear a belt flaunting teeth, pelts, and other morbid hunting trophies
Trigger: A New Uprising member thwarted your most glorious and lucrative bounty capture

Favour 2
Notoriety 0
Motivation 2
Loadout: rapid-fire Laser Rifle, Power Hammer, no helmet, chest bandolier, ill-fitting jumpsuit

Key to play are the Nomad’s ‘Reactions’ used to interact with Locals, Assets, Hostiles, Leads, and Target on a planet. These are ‘Speak’, ‘Threaten’, ‘Attack’, and ‘Recruit’, and not all of them can be sued against the various persons a Nomad will run into. For example, a Nomad can ‘Speak’ to anyone, but a Hostile; can only ‘Threaten’ a Hostile’; and cannot ‘Attack’ a Local or an Asset. Reactions are generally resolved by rolling two six-sided dice, one for the Nomad and one for the opponent. Whichever one rolls the highest wins the challenge and indicates the outcome. The roll for the Nomad is modified by half the value of his Favour, except for ‘Threaten’, when half of his Notoriety is used. A player can expend a point of his Nomad’s Motivation to reroll. Some Reactions automatically work. For example, a ‘Speak’ Reaction always works against a Lead or a Target. The ‘Speak’, ‘Threaten’, and ‘Recruit’ Reactions have random tables that provide a prompt for the player if successful.

The ‘Attack’ Reaction works differently in that it can be repeated and the roll is modified by Assets and Equipment for the Nomad and by Equipment for the opponent. Assets and Equipment that provide defence simply block a single attack per point. The Outcome of the ‘Attack’ Reaction is more complex and more varied than other Reactions and depends on the opponent. A Nomad will gain Favour for sparing a Hostile or Lead, but lose it for sparing a Target. He will gain Notoriety for killing a Hostile or Lead, and Favour for killing or capturing a Target. Failure can result in the Nomad being badly beaten up or injured, attracting the attention of local law enforcement and lose Notoriety, and so on.

Play of Notorious can be as a one-shot telling the story of one bounty or a series of stories each telling the story of a bounty. There are tables to create planets along with their predominant species and destinations, as well as giving the competing factions on that world. The factions consist of the Old Empire, the New Uprising, the Targ Cartel, the Red Moon syndicate, the Trade Alliance, and the Mystic Order. Each is given a short description and several reasons why it might issue a contract. They are all used to create the details of the contract. The fulfilment of the Contract is told through a loop which consists of two parts, ‘Exploration’ and ‘Destinations’, during which the player rolls on tables for each. These can generate events and Leads that will take the Nomad closer and closer to his Target. Every entry includes two options to add variety and allow for the Nomad to revisit an entry. Some Destinations also enable the Nomad to search the area.

The easiest way to generate a Lead is for the Nomad to increase his Notoriety. Effectively, as the Nomad’s reputation grows, the more likely they are to talk to him, but what this means is killing Leads and Hostiles. There is a table for creating a Lead, but the third Lead becomes the Target of the bounty, whom the players gets to detail based on the prompts on the Targets table. There are also ‘Showdowns’ tables to determine where the Nomad faces the Target down. Lastly, the ‘Epilogue’ table determines the response to how the Nomad completed the Contract.

Physically, Notorious is a short, spiral-bound book, a format which eases the player’s need to flip back and forth between tables. The writing is clear and easy to understand, and the artwork is excellent, cartoonishly invoking the feel of Star Wars without copying from it directly. One oddity is the number of reference numbers, but without any footnotes or endnotes.

Notorious is easy to pick up and play, and at two hours at most, has a pleasingly concise playing time. It can be played with the player taking just a few notes as he goes along, but he also can take the time to write the Contract up as a story in journalling fashion. The latter enables the player to build the planet where the hunt takes place up around the Nomad as he progresses. Much of the setting of Notorious is described with the barest of bones, but this leaves plenty of room for the player to flesh out the world based on the prompts provided in the tables. As the factions come into play, their motivations will also begin to influence the bigger story, especially over the course of multiple Contracts and whilst the Nomad Code says that ‘Your Employer’s Business is their Own’ and ‘Don’t Get Attached’, how long that will last up to the player and his Nomad. There is also another way in which Notorious can be used and that is to generate contracts, bounties, and thus adventures for other Science Fiction roleplaying games. Effectively, a player could play Notorious for himself, but use its content as a Game Master to run it for other players.

Notorious: Hardscrabble bounty hunting aid intergalactic war successfully combines a thrilling Science Fiction journalling game of investigation and action all of its own with a systems neutral sourcebook for other Science Fiction roleplaying games. It is a winning little combination.