All the Action—Everywhere

Inspired by the classic action films of the past sixty years—Die Hard, Goldfinger, Kingsman, Ocean’s Eleven, Hot Fuzz, Lethal Weapon, and John Wick, the cinematic action roleplaying game Outgunned is designed to do three things. One is to handle a variety of different action films, from chases and heists to Spy-Fi and hostage situations. The second is to help deliver short action-packed sessions, tending towards one-shots or ‘Shots’, and in keeping with the genre, sequels. The third is to play fast and easy, and definitely encourage the action. Originally published by Two Little Mice following a successful Kickstarter campaign, but now published by Free League Publishing, the award-winning Outgunned fills what would appear to cover a relatively limited niche in roleplaying. Which is not a bad thing. However, Action Flicks begs to differ, shucking off its leather jacket, peering over the top of its sunglasses, and giving a million dollar grin in a hundred thousand dollar direct-to-video movie before taking you round the universe—or is that multiverse? This is a supplement which takes you to ten different genres which you knew that Outgunned should and could do, lets you play in them for a bit, or at least for a long as the film lasts, leaving you waiting for the sequel.

Action Flicks is a book of mini-settings for Outgunned. Or rather sub-genres, because it does Space Opera, martial arts or Wuxia, swashbuckling, superpowers, kids in danger (bicycles optional), magical kids, hunting aliens, hunting ghosts New York-style, hunting vampires and/or werewolves, and cyberpunk. Which is a lot for a small, two-hundred page book. Each sub-genre is given a similar treatment. This includes an introduction to the specific sub-genre, a list of what it contains; ‘Action Homework’—a lengthy list of the touchstone films and television series which inspires the particular sub-genre treatment in Action Flicks that both the Director and her players should watch; an examination of its core themes and some hooks for the Director to develop into full missions; new rules and roles; new enemies and enemy feats; new genre-specific mechanics; and both a Hero ready for action and a dedicated Hero Sheet.

Or rather sub-genres, because it does Space Opera, martial arts or Wuxia, swashbuckling, superpowers, kids in danger (bicycles optional), magical kids, hunting aliens, hunting ghosts New York-style, hunting vampires and/or werewolves, and cyberpunk. Which is a lot for a small, two-hundred page book. Each sub-genre is given a similar treatment. This includes an introduction to the specific sub-genre, a list of what it contains; ‘Action Homework’—a lengthy list of the touchstone films and television series which inspires the particular sub-genre treatment in Action Flicks that both the Director and her players should watch; an examination of its core themes and some hooks for the Director to develop into full missions; new rules and roles; new enemies and enemy feats; new genre-specific mechanics; and both a Hero ready for action and a dedicated Hero Sheet.

The selection of sub-genres opens with ‘Star Raiders’ whose ‘Action Homework’ lists Firefly, The Fifth Element, The Mandalorian, Star Trek, and John Carter, but the touchstone for this first treatment is very obviously Star Wars. Which is no bad thing, since every treatment in Action Flicks is intended to be obvious in its inspiration just as with much the action films which inspire the core rules of Outgunned and thus its visual look and story beats are meant to be easy to grasp and run with. The core themes of ‘Star Raiders’ is ‘Know the Other’, that everyone in the galaxy is alien is each other and that a Hero should learn to navigate the differences in physiology and culture and work with others, whilst ‘For Freedom’ states that a Hero will always yearn to look to the sky and fly free despite what the authorities or the alien invaders or robot revolutionaries want.

In terms of new rules and gear, ‘Star Raiders’ replaces bullets with lasers, which are always loaded, so instead of running out of rounds, overheat. The weapons also include the Laster Crossbow as well as the Laser Blade. Star Pilots get to replace the Proven Driver Feat with the Star Pilot Feat, whilst the ‘Alien Diplomacy’ feat grants free rerolls on interactions with alien species and negates the standard penalty when doing so, ‘Hyperlight Evasion’ lets a starship crew jump to hyperlight to avoid a chase, and ‘Shoot First’ does exactly what you think it should. New roles include ‘Logical Thinker’, ‘Lonely Stranger’, and ‘Lovable Scoundrel’, whilst the ready-to-play Hero is the eponymous ‘Star Raider’, who could be Han Solo, Malcolm ‘Mal’ Reynolds, or Korben Dallas. Alien Feats ‘Amphibian’, ‘Big Guy’, ‘Little Guy’, ‘Brainiac’, and more enable player and Director alike to create alien Heroes and NPCs, whilst the rules for Starships adapt the vehicle rules to outer space by adding the need for a ‘Copilot’ and giving special actions such as ‘Raised Shields’ and ‘Asteroid Field’, the latter turning every action into a Gamble when passing through them.

There are notes too on how to add the ‘Power’ to ‘Star Raiders’. This combines the ‘Samurai’ Role from World of Killers with the Mental Powers of ‘Great Powers’, the superhero treatment later in the book. It is a pity that the Director needs to refer to another supplement, because this neatly distils the essence the archetype with just about enough a nod to the source, yet leaving room for Director and player to develop it as they want. Lastly, the ready-to-play Hero sheet is for very cute ‘Young Alien Nobody’.

‘Star Raiders’ packs a lot into its sixteen pages, enabling the Director to pick it up and start developing a galaxy her own and missions to fit, or taking the obvious inspiration from the ‘Action Homework’ and then running missions in their galaxies using Outgunned (rather than any licensed roleplaying games). Which is the point of Action Flicks. Yet ‘Star Raiders’ also does not quite pack enough, which an issue with a lot of the sub-genre treatments in Action Flicks. In the case of ‘Star Raiders’, there could have been more options for Alien Feats and the rules for robots are underwhelming, simply treating them as aliens and letting them take more Feats later on. As a sub-genre, ‘Star Raiders’ leans very much into space opera which does not feel right for one of its inspirations, Star Trek, which in most of its incarnations, is not as cinematic as Outgunned. Similarly, John Carter is a great choice for Outgunned, but deserves its own ‘Swords & Planet’ Action Flick entry rather than being lumped in with everything else here.

‘Rising Dragon’ is inspired by Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon and House of Flying Daggers and brings Wuxia to Outgunned giving the option of Heroes learning Ancient Martial Arts such as Dragon Style, Drunken Style, or Monkey Style as they and everyone already knows martial arts, replacing with Plan B: Bullet with Plan B: Blade (again from World of Killers), and swapping Adrenaline with Qi. Daring Noble and Vengeful Ghost are fitting new roles and along with a range of new Feats, this is a solid little genre set that does not just have to remain fixed in some mythical past. It is easily mixed with sub-genres if the Director wants to run more Hong Kong-style films. The Pirates of the Caribbean, The Three Musketeers, and The Princess Bride are the inspiration for ‘Cloak & Dagger’, which does swashbuckling action. There are rules for horses, carriages, and flintlock weapons, and Plan B: Bullet is again replaced with Plan B: Blade, whilst the new Friendly Brute and Witty Casanova roles fit both the sub-genre and the humour that often runs through it. Depending upon the type of film, the Director and her players may need to engage with the humour more than in others.

Fundamental to the sub-genre is duelling and for this ‘Cloak & Dagger’ adapts the duelling rules from Household, also from Two Little Mice. With admonition not to repeat an action twice because it is boring, it suggests mixing skills to make duels exciting and dynamic, and optionally, adding Challenge Feats so the Director can customise a challenger to make him a capable duellist. It notes that the rules could apply to Heroes too should their ardours and tempers fly enough for them to want to settle matters of honour with each other. These Duelling rules enable a Director to set up some great scenes and confrontations and they could be used with ‘Rising Dragon’ too for confrontations with weapons rather than martial arts.

‘Great Powers’ is the superhero treatment for Outgunned in Action Flicks. It draws from Kick-Ass, Watchmen, and Daredevil amongst others. It gives rules for what happens to vigilantes whose identities are exposed, Plan B: Blast to go alongside Plan B: Bullet and Plan B: Blade, and ‘Powerless’, a new condition when a Superhero suffers the effects of his weakness. There are numerous new roles, like Billionaire Philanthropist and Chatty Mercenary, and specific to the genre, Super Feats rather than Feats. Every Superhero gets one at character creation and can swap a standard Feat for another one. Super Feats include ‘Flight’, ‘Gadget’ (which can cover retractable claws, spiderwebs, returning weapons, and so on), ‘Mind Powers’, ‘Regeneration’, ‘Super-Speed’, and more. The silliest is ‘Ruler of the Sea’, which lets the Superhero talk to fish! ‘Great Powers’ manages to cover a lot, but it has three problems. One, obviously, is that it has been superseded by Outgunned Superheroes. Two, the superhero genre encompasses a lot of subgenres itself and sixteen pages cannot cover everything. Three, ‘Great Powers’ has to work hard to get up to the Four Colour sub-genre and being for Outgunned is a better fit for the street level style.

As its title suggests, ‘Weirder Things’ covers inspirations such as The Goonies, Karate Kid, and most obviously, Stranger Things. Which again is quite a lot. First, it makes everyone young and removes the ‘Too Young to Die’ Feat and very much inspired by Stranger Things replaces a young Hero’s catchphrase with his favourite song and then backs it up with Plan B: Beat which comes into play when a Hero listens to that favourite song. The Director and her players need to decide quite how dangerous and deadly a ‘Weirder Things’ should be. Several Feats get replaced like ‘Better Than Walking’ for ‘Proven Driver’ and ‘Popular’ for ‘Heartbreaker’. The Hero ready for action is ‘The Loser’, very much inspired by Kevin McCallister from Home Alone along with many others.

‘A Kind of Magic’ is mostly obviously inspired by the Harry Potter books and films, but again it wants to cover a whole lot more like Doctor Strange, Big Trouble in Little China, and The Dresden Files. With rules for incantations and wands, magical culture, flying cars and broomsticks, and roles such as ‘Charming Bookworm’ and ‘Chosen One’ it really wants to stick to modelling the Harry Potter books and films rather than trying cover everything under its ‘Action Homework’. It does not help those aims by needing the Director and players to adapt the ‘Dog Trainer’ role from World of Killers and switch out the dog for an owl (or another suitable creature) to have a magical familiar. There is a short list of spells, each of which is effectively treated as a piece of Gear. The more obvious companion to ‘A Kind of Magic’ is ‘Weirder Things’, but ultimately, it would be a stretch for ‘A Kind of Magic’ to cover all of the inspirations it lists and perhaps there should be an Urban Fantasy treatment for Outgunned?

‘Killing Aliens’ is again more obvious in its inspirations—Aliens, Predator, Starship Troopers, and so on—but switches the role of the Heroes around to be the hunted in ‘You Are The Prey’. ‘Whatever It Takes’ gives the Hero an edge, but typically at a cost as the situation gets ever more desperate. Despite switching the Hero from hunter to hunted, this is a straightforward adaptation backed up with lots of alien enemies for the Director to build and several that come on-demand ready to play. ‘Ghost Hunters’ does the same with its ghosts and ghoulies on-demand or waiting to be built in a sub-genre adaptation that might include Caspar and Beetlejuice amongst its inspirations, but really is Ghostbusters writ large, especially with the new conditions of ‘Possessed’ and ‘Smeared’ (in sticky green ectoplasmic discharge!?).

Hunting takes place at night in the penultimate sub-genre treatment with ‘Midnight Wars’. Underworld and Blade are the primary inspirations, but Buffy the Vampire Slayer is another touchstone. It introduces three modes—‘Humans versus Monsters’, ‘Monsters versus Humans’, and ‘Monsters versus Monsters’—as the wars between vampires, werewolves, and humans continue. Plan B: Bullet and Plan B: Blade are joined by Plan B: Blood & Beast and Monstrous Feats such as ‘Lycanthrope’ and ‘Nosferatu’ enable a Hero to be a Monster Hero! The new gear is designed for anti-vampire and anti-vampire action and the new Role is the Slayer, looking exactly like Blade. This works well with the earlier ‘A Kind of Magic’ too.

The last sub-genre treatment is ‘Neon Noir’ which does cyberpunk for Outgunned. If the Director wants to add androids to this future, then the Synth Alien Feat option from ‘Star Raiders’ is the suggested option, whilst psychic powers can come from the ‘Great Powers’ sub-genre. The primary is that of cyberware, which is treated as gear. Every Hero in ‘Neon Noir’ has one piece, whilst the given Role of Solo can have another item. A Hero can also give up Feats to have more. Some of the items could easily added to the ‘Great Powers’ sub-genre to give an extra source of powers.

What is apparent with all ten of the sub-genres explored in Action Flicks for Outgunned is that how many will work with each other. For example, ‘Midnight Wars’, ‘A Kind of Magic’, and ‘Weirder Things’ to really do Buffy the Vampire Slayer, but Action Flicks runs with the mix and match options and throws them all into the mixing bowl with ‘Everything at Once’. This allows Heroes to jump from one universe to another and even learn the Feats of one universe to take it to another and presents a new Role, ‘The Master of the Multiverse’, who can jump from universe to universe and channel the power of the Multiverse. It is a special Role, combining Role, Trope, and Job in one that uses a Multiverse Roulette instead of a Death Roulette. When ‘The Master of the Multiverse’ uses his Plan B: Break to create a crack in reality to the advantage of his allies, is Left for Dead, or taps into power of the Multiverse to Go to another universe, Grab an object from another universe, Send a target to another universe, or Pass to someone else in this universe, there is a chance that an Anomaly is created and that can really miss with the universe! ‘The Master of the Multiverse’ has a lot of power, but there is a price.

Physically, Action Flicks is a good looking book. The artwork is excellent and the layout clean and tidy, and easy to read.

Action Flicks is fantastically, genre-encompassing ambitious covering ten genres and over one hundred films and television series. However, Action Flicks cannot encompass everything about all of its genres. It just does not have the space. It also means that that none of the genres it explores are quite ready to play and in all too many cases, like ‘Great Powers’ and Outgunned Superheroes, the Director is going to wish that there was more, especially where genre descriptions really have to work hard to handle some of the given inspirational suggestions. However, the core essentials of its cinematic settings and sub-genres, ably supported with rule changes and additions, are all here in Action Flicks to help get the Director with every movie and mission the Director wants to write for Outgunned. The good news is that there are now sequels too—Action Flicks Vol. 2 and Action Flicks Vol. 3.