1986: Delta Force

1974 is an important year for the gaming hobby. It is the year that Dungeons & Dragons was introduced, the original RPG from which all other RPGs would ultimately be derived and the original RPG from which so many computer games would draw for their inspiration. It is fitting that the current owner of the game, Wizards of the Coast, released the new version, Dungeons & Dragons, Fifth Edition, in the year of the game’s fortieth anniversary. To celebrate this, Reviews from R’lyeh will be running a series of reviews from the hobby’s anniversary years, thus there will be reviews from 1974, from 1984, from 1994, and from 2004—the thirtieth, twentieth, and tenth anniversaries of the titles. These will be retrospectives, in each case an opportunity to re-appraise interesting titles and true classics decades on from the year of their original release.

—oOo—

The year is 1986. The Cold War continues unabated, the political, military, and economic forces of the Soviet Bloc and the Warsaw pact continuing to stand off against Western Bloc and NATO. Yet there is hope that the relationship between the United States and the USSSR can change, even thaw, with the appointment of Mikhail Gorbachev as general secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union the year before. In comparison to the present incumbents, he is seen as progressive and has already sought to improve Soviet–US relations, including participating in the Geneva Summit in 1985. Yet the USA—and many of the countries it is allied with—face another threat. International terrorism. Numerous organisations, often radically Left Wing, anti-American, anti-bourgeois, and anti-Israel groups seek to strike terror in western countries. In Germany, the Baader-Meinhof Gang robs banks, bombs US military bases, and supports Palestinian radicals. In Italy, Brigade Rosse also attacks US military bases, commits robberies and kidnaps, and murders judges, members of the police, and journalists. Numerous groups linked, but not necessarily directly affiliated to the Palestinian Liberation Organisation, such as Black September, the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, and the Palestine Liberation Front, conduct attacks on NATO bases and Israel and civilian targets across Europe and rival factions, as well as hijacking cruise liners and passenger aeroplanes. These are not the only terrorist groups operating in 1986, but they are perhaps the most notorious. Worse, many of these organisations are state-funded—by the USSR, Libya, Iraq, and Iran—and hovering between is the infamous Carlos the Jackal. In response, governments across the West turn to their militaries and from their existing special forces units, establish and train anti-terror forces. In the United Kingdom, this is the famed SAS, in West Germany, this is GSG-9, and in the USA, this is 1st Special Forces Operational Detachment–Delta (1st SFOD-D), better known as Delta Force.

Operations against the international terrorist organisations of the late nineteen seventies and early nineteen eighties are the subject of Delta Force: America Strikes Back! Designed (and illustrated) by William H. Keith, Jr., best known for his deep contributions to the background and setting of Game Designers’ Workshop’s seminal Science Fiction roleplaying game, Traveller, it was the first roleplaying game to be published by Task Force Games, better known for the Star Fleet Battles and Starfire Science Fiction wargames. It is interesting to note that The Delta Force, a film starring Chuck Norris and Lee Marvin, was also released in 1986. Of course, there is no connection between the two, but the release of the film cannot have failed to elevate the prominence of the roleplaying game. At least within the hobby. Although two other military-themed roleplaying games were published in 1986—Freedom Fighters from Fantasy Games Unlimited (designed by J. Andrew Keith, William’s brother, but also illustrated by William H. Keith, Jr. with surprisingly similar covers) and the in some ways subtler The Price of Freedom, designed by Greg Costikyan and published by West End Games, and that in addition to the Phoenix Command fire combat rules from Leading Edge Games, the year marks the end of the strand of mundane military-themed roleplaying games. As the Cold War ebbed and relations between the West and East improved, so too did interest in strictly military roleplaying games slip away. Only fifteen years later with the anniversary of the attack on Pearl Harbour and the USA’s entry into World War 2 did interest in military roleplay games revive and that was with the military of past not the present. Arguably, the military roleplaying games of the early twenty-first century were not beset by the moral complexities of those nineteen-eighties.

Delta Force: America Strikes Back! is a boxed set containing three booklets, a three-panel Game Master Screen, and two six-sided dice. The three booklets, coverless and done in black and white with greyscale artwork also done by the author, consist of the forty-eight-page ‘Rules of Play’ book, the forty-page ‘Warbook’ book, and the thirty-two ‘Scenarios’ book. Although the internal artwork depicts the members of Delta Force in action as you would expect, there are a couple of illustrations depicting the blood-spattered and bullet-ridden bodies of terrorists and a special forces operative just having killed a sentry with a knife. It is surprisingly blunt in its depiction of the consequences of the Player Characters’ actions. The Game Master Screen has all of the tables that he needs to run Delta Force: America Strikes Back! on the one side with illustrations of members of Delta Force in action the front.

A Player Character in Delta Force: America Strikes Back! is defined by Strength, Agility, Dexterity, and Intelligence, which range in value between five and fifteen. From these are derived five secondary statistics—Training, Endurance, Experience, Reactions, and Stamina. Of these, Agility is physical co-ordination; Dexterity is fine manipulation; and Reactions are how quickly a Player Character responds to danger and threats. Training represents a Player Character’s military and specialist training, whilst Experience indicates his time in service and actual combat experience. Both Training and Experience are used as points that are spent to purchase levels in individual skills.

The Player Character creation process involves rolling dice for the four core attributes and then some arithmetic to determine the secondary attributes and other factors. Skills are categorised into Native, Basic Military, and Specialist Skills. The primary means of gaining skills during character creation is by selecting templates according to the nationality of the character. Skills such as languages, Culture, Negotiation, Interrogation, and so on, do point towards Delta Force: America Strikes Back! being a roleplaying game, but it very much a gun-first roleplaying game. Templates are provided for Delta Force and Seal teams of the USA, the Dutch Royal Marines of the Netherlands, West Germany’s GSG-9, the SAS of Great Britain, Italy’s Squadron Anti-Commando, Sayeret Matkal of Israel, and Egypt’s Unit 777. There is some bias here in that the more attention is devoted to the eponymous 1st Special Forces Operational Detachment–Delta (1st SFOD-D) than the special forces units of other countries in that members receive more training beyond basic military training. Another oddity is that that none of the templates for or details of the special forces units are in the ‘Rules of Play’ booklet which is where character generation begins, but in the ‘Warbook’. The creation process is not complex, but it is fiddly. Oddly, there is no means of determining rank and no difference is made between enlisted soldiers and officers, important given that officers in most militaries have to attend military college and receive different training.

Name: Lowell Larson

Unit: Delta Force

Training: Basic Military Training, Airborne Special Training, Rangers Special Training, Special Forces

CHARACTER STATS

Strength 14 Agility 11 Dexterity 10 Intelligence 07

Training 09 Endurance 15 Experience 12 Reactions 09 Stamina 12

Weight: 94 kg Age: 29 Handedness: Righthanded

Load Carried (Unburdened): 28 kg

Load Carried (Burdened): 42 kg

Load Carried (Heavily Burdened): 84 kg

Load Lifted: 112 kg

Load Dragged: 140 kg

MILITARY SKILLS

Area Survival (Desert) 1, Area Survival (Forest) 2, Area Survival (Jungle) 3, Area Survival (Mountain) 1, Boat Handling 3, Camouflage 2, Chemical Warfare 1, Climbing 2, Commo Operator 2, Commo Repair 2, Culture (Shi’ite Moslem) 1, Driving 2, Demolitions 3, Driving (Heavy Equipment) 3, Driving (Motorcycle) 2, Driving (Tracked) 1, First Aid 1, Free Fall 1, HALO 2, Hand-to-Hand Combat 5, Language (Arabic) 2, Leadership 2, Mechanic 3, Negotiation 1, Night Operations 3, Orienteering 3, Parachute 3, Stealth 3, Swimming 2, Tactics 2

WEAPON SKILLS

Hand Guns 1, Foreign Weapons 1, Knife Fighting 1, Light Automatic Weapons 3, Machine Guns 4, Mortars 1, Rifles 1, Sniper 1, Special Weapons (Grenade Launchers) 1

Mechanically, Delta Force: America Strikes Back! manages to both underwhelm and threaten to overwhelm. It uses two six-sided dice, much like Traveller which William H. Keith, Jr. had also worked on, but where in Traveller, a player needs to roll high to succeed, in Delta Force: America Strikes Back! a player must roll under to succeed. All rolls in the roleplaying game are counted as ‘Critical Rolls’. To make a ‘Critical Roll’, a Relative Difficulty Factor (RDF), which can range from between one and ten, is deducted from the statistic a player is rolling against. A skill adds a modifier to the stat being tested. The problem here is that between the sections on ‘Relative Difficulty’ and ‘Applying Skills’ it is not explicitly explained that a successful roll is one of equal to or under, rather than over. However, it does state that, “Since complicating factors in a task might be almost anything, there are no clear-cut rules for establishing an RDF.” In other words, there are no set difficulty factors and the play of Delta Force: America Strikes Back! is very much down to Referee judgement, and thus at odds with much of its design.

If Delta Force: America Strikes Back! is vague about its core mechanic, it is detailed about everything else! This is where it begins to overwhelm, starting with the time and travel rules. ‘Strategic Periods’ can last minutes, hours, or days, and cover periods of travel or relative inactivity, or rather non-combat. This includes mission briefings, planning, and intelligence gathering. The travel rules encompass movement by foot, tracked and wheeled vehicles, and by air. For ground travel, there are modifiers for terrain and weather, whilst for air there are modifiers for weather and other hazards which can lead to malfunctions or crashes. For extended activities, including combat, Endurance checks are required and will result in a temporary loss of Endurance if failed.

Prior to combat, the Player Characters need to spot the enemy. Intelligence, whether provided during a briefing prior to a mission or by an update during a mission, may already indicate where the terrorist enemies are, but not always and there is possibility of a chance encounter or a different pattern of activity by the terrorists. In such situations, a ‘Sighting’ check is required. The ‘Base Sighting Number’ is based on range, from thirty for under five meters to one for five thousand meters and more. This modified by light, weather, terrain, target type, target character, and the sighting character to give a ‘Modified Sighting Number’. Roll under this and the Player Characters will have spotted the enemy (or the enemy spotted the Player Characters).

Once done, there is a chance that the Player Characters can surprise the enemy, based on their Stealth skill and the enemies’ Alertness Factor, which ranges from five and fully alert and ready to one or “Drunk, dazed, or thoroughly engaged in doing something else.” Actual combat is played out in five-second ‘Tactical Rounds’ and initiative is determined by the Referee based on the logical and obvious course of events. A Player Character or other combatant can take as many actions as he wants in Tactical Round, the limiting factor being time. If an action takes longer than five seconds, that is longer than a single Tactical Round, it will spill over into the next round. However, bar movement distances and the reload time for weapons in the ‘Warbook’, there is no set list of actions and the time they take. Again, this is down to Referee judgement.

Direct fire is determined by the range and the weapon used—each weapon listed in the ‘Warbook’ having its own range table—to give a ‘Base To-Hit Number’ which is modified by movement, cover and visibility, vehicle type and size, how the weapon is used (including Weapon skill), aiming, and firing mode. The rules cover semi-automatic, burst, automatic, and suppressive fire as well as aimed and opportunity fire. Oddly single shots are handled by the Rifles skill, not the Light Automatic skill, so the Player Characters and the NPCs are encouraged to use burst fire. The ‘Penetration Number’ of a weapon determines whether a round overcomes the Armour Value of any cover, which includes wood, sheet metal, concrete, bricks, and stone by thickness. Also included are ratings for furniture, human bodies, and of course, Kevlar armour. Hand-to-hand combat handles most melee situations, whilst the advanced rules add more detail, including martial arts (using the Martial Arts skill) and various manoeuvres. With that detail comes greater complexity and longer playing time, so they probably best saved for showdowns with more important NPCs or to silence a prominent . The rules also cover grenades and attacks against vehicles, mostly civilian and utility vehicles, rather armour. The rules for grenades also cover what happens if a Player Character wants to throw a grenade back or even himself onto a grenade if he wants to protect his buddies and/or win the Medal of Honour.

Damage to Player Characters and NPCs is handled as wounds rather than Hit Points. These are suffered per hit location and can be light, moderate, or severe. A light wound will reduce a Player Character’s stats, a moderate wound will typically disable a limb as well as reducing stats, and a severe wound will incapacitate a Player Character and may even leave him with a severed or mangled limb. A Player Character or NPC can also be killed outright and severe wounds can bleed. Wounds and blood loss can also lead to a loss of Stamina and when that falls to zero, a Player Character is dead. However, a player never knows what his Stamina currently is, only the effects of its loss. This is an interesting narrative wrinkle in a simulationist roleplaying game, but it does mean that the Referee has to track the Stamina values for all of the Player Characters and the NPCs. Wound location is determined by the degree of cover protecting the target and then a random role modified by half of the weapon skill used and the Sniper skill. Although a Player Character will probably have the benefit of cover and wearing body armour, getting shot at is a nasty, brutal experience. First Aid will stablise a wounded or injured Player Character or NPC, but in keeping with the simulationist nature of Delta Force: America Strikes Back!, it takes time, rest, and recuperation for a Player Character to recover from anything more than a scratch.

Other rules cover parachute drops, communications, morale and panic for NPCs, and oddly, victory conditions for scenarios. Thus, ten points for achieving the primary mission goal, two each hostage rescued, two for each terrorist captured or killed, and so on, with points deducted for hostages being wounded or killed, each Delta Force team member killed or captured, and more. This sort of makes every scenario repayable to see if the players and their characters can do better each time, but it also makes the play of a mission less like a roleplaying game scenario, and more like a video game mission or miniatures wargame scenario. However, what it is supposed to reflect is the American public’s reaction to the execution of a mission, successful or otherwise, with it being noted that a poorly handled mission can lead to war with the nation where a mission is being staged or the loss of an ally. Essentially, “It should always be remembered that elite military units assault teams such as Delta Force are extensions of American foreign policy — the President’s final resort when American lives and property are in danger. To be effective, such military units must strike hard, fast, and with surgical precision.”

Rounding out the ‘Rules of Play’ booklet is a set of three appendices. The third details various martial arts, but the first two give ‘The Delta Force Referee’ and ‘Surviving in Delta Force’, advice for the Referee and the player respectively. Both are a page in length and advise that both player and Referee start small with simple situations and training exercises. The author recognises that whilst the Referee has less of world to create because Delta Force: America Strikes Back! is set in the here and now, he has a lot to keep track of in terms of information to keep the world feeling real. The Referee is also advised to not always apply every combat modifier and to not be concerned about precise ranges or movement values, usually to ease play, but at other times to heighten the tension. Arguably, this is contradictory advice since it means that the author is telling the Referee that this simulationist roleplaying game is too much of simulationist roleplaying game, though only when it matters. Lastly, the advice points out that few if any Delta Force players are likely to have had any actual combat experience, so it is okay for the Referee to take the player whose character is leader aside and warn him of things that a real team leader know. This is further supported in the advice for players which focuses on roleplaying members of Delta Force rather than The A-Team and suggests numerous tactics and good practices.

The second book, the ‘Warbook’ is one part gear and equipment guide, one part setting guide, and one part the other half of the character creation rules. The first half lists stats and details of all of the hand guns, assault rifles, submachine guns, rifles, shotguns, special weapons, and grenade launchers that the Player Characters might arm themselves with and the referee might arm the enemy with. Most of them make sense. The inclusion of the Auto-Mag .44 seems more like a nod to cinematic recreation rather than reality and the inclusion of the Heckler & Koch G11 seems more like contractual obligation for a nineteen eighties military roleplaying game. A handful of vehicles are given stats, the M-113 APC being the only military vehicle, whilst more detail is paid to a range of civilian and military transport aeroplanes and helicopters. These are all included to be used to get the Player Characters close to the mission target and then away again, rather than provide onsite support. There are also sections on communications and surveillance gear as well as general items. Overall, the equipment content of the ‘Warbook’ is a job well done.

The penultimate section in the ‘Warbook’ consists of the ‘Delta Force Warbook Dossiers’. These detail twenty-one terrorist organisations across European, Middle Eastern, and both North and American theatres of operation. Each write-up describes each organisation’s origin, ideology, international ties, history, and present activities. The bulk of these are Palestinian, whilst there are some less prominent groups such as the Ejercito Revolucionario del Pueblo in Argentina and the Republik Malaku Selatan in the Netherlands. The Provisional Irish Republican Army is written for use in the United Kingdom and the USA, but the write-ups for domestic US terrorist organisations—the Symbionese Liberation Army, the Black Panthers, the Black Liberation Army, and the Weatherman—are very broad in comparison. There is no denying that these groups committed acts of terror, but how much of a threat these groups posed to United States security is open to debate and by the time of that Delta Force: America Strikes Back! was published in 1986, they were all defunct anyway. Of course, Delta Force itself, as part of the US military, has limited capacity to operate on American soil. What the sole inclusion of these groups does indicate is a strong anti-Left Wing bias present in Delta Force: America Strikes Back!, since it ignores any Right Wing terror groups or movements—on home soil or abroad.

The last part of the ‘Warbook’ gives the templates for the special forces and anti-terror units featured in Delta Force: America Strikes Back!. It is followed by the templates for European, Middle-Eastern, and western hemisphere terrorists. These are again, fairly broad in their treatment.

The play of Delta Force: America Strikes Back! is mission-based and fairly formulaic in its structure. The Player Characters receive a briefing, plan the operation, select equipment, move to the area of operation, conduct the mission, and then exfiltrate, returning to base for a debriefing. Plus, of course, the valuation according to the Victory conditions for the mission. This makes missions easier to set up by the Referee, but barring the page of advice in the appendices of the ‘Rules of Play’ booklet, Delta Force: America Strikes Back! is decidedly lacking when it comes help in designing missions, whilst the possibility of long term play is mentioned, but really only as an aside rather than be supported.

The three missions in the third booklet, ‘Scenarios’ all have their own mission objectives, location, and background as well as the mission for the Referee and the Victory table for determining how well the Player Characters did. They start out simple with ‘Operation Red Thunder’ in which the Player Characters must rescue hostages held at a PX (a retail store found on US Army installations that sells food, clothing, and goods to military personnel and their families) on a US Army base in Germany as well as capture one of the terrorists. The complexity rises with ‘Operation Lightning’. The Player Characters must rescue American and Israeli hostages held aboard WTA Flight 874 on the ground at Beirut Airport as well as capture a hostage and prevent the local Shi’ite Amal militia from reinforcing the hijackers. It is nicely detailed and is accompanied by detailed NPCs and advice on running the mission for the Referee. Lastly, ‘Operation Swiftsure’ returns the Player Characters to Beirut where they have to penetrate an Islamic Jihad planning centre and headquarters, kidnap its leader, acquire intelligence data, and destroy the planning centre and make it look like a rocket attack. Again, it is nicely detailed and as with the other two scenarios are accompanied by decent location maps.

Physically, Delta Force: America Strikes Back! is decently presented for the time. The illustrations are not bad, but not really great either, but they are in keeping with the world that the roleplaying game is portraying. That said, the depiction of Middle Eastern is far from positive. The cartography is simple, clear, and easy to understand.

—oOo—

Phil Frances reviewed Delta Force: America Strikes Back! in Open Box in White Dwarf #84 (December, 1986). After describing the basics of the roleplaying game, he said, “Actually the game itself isn’t too bad – the rules are comprehensive, and don’t waste space getting their point across.” However, he concluded by saying, “In all, not a bad game, I suppose, but it’s very unethical and awfully tasteless. Is it Ok to talk about ethics and taste in a review? No? Give me a place to hide them…”

Thomas A. Grant reviewed Delta Force: America Strikes Back! in Game Reviews in Different Worlds Issue 47 (Fall, 1987). Interestingly, he evaluated the roleplaying game on the basis of its rules, its capacity to simulate modern small-unit tactics, and its treatment of its subject matter. Of the rules, he said, “All in all, Delta Force provides a competent though unexceptional role-playing system.” whilst of its capacity to simulate modern small-unit tactics, he stated that, “As a game of modern small-unit tactics, equipment, and training, Delta Force is very good. The game includes an exhaustive listing of weapons, equipment, and vehicles, including every type of military-issue firearm of which I’m aware.” Of its subject matter—terrorism and counterterrorism—he was more critical, pointing out that its illustrations depict its terrorists as stereotypes, that is, “…[T]he unkempt Middle Eastern terrorist with a large black mustache and five-o’clock shadow” and thus as barbarians. He concluded, “Admittedly, Delta Force shows only part of the entire counterterrorism picture, though it gives no acknowledgement to the existence of anything else. Handling a controversial subject such as this is bound to displease someone, and Delta Force will probably sell mostly to people whose minds are made up about terrorism. However, just as politicians and bureaucrats often are led into blunders by looking at too narrow a piece of a problem, so too can the citizens at large. Delta Force, for the important subject it tries to cover, is just too narrow. Still, for the student of modern “unconventional” warfare, Delta Force can provide some important lessons.”

—oOo—

Delta Force: America Strikes Back! draws comparisons with Phoenix Command, published by Leading Edge Games in the same year. Both offer detailed combat simulations and both could be played as modern skirmish wargames. In fact, given its lack of non-combat skills, Phoenix Command works better as a modern skirmish wargame. Whilst both are comprehensive, Phoenix Command has the advantage of being a more coherent and definitely a more coherently explained set of rules. Delta Force: America Strikes Back! suffers from a lack of explanation in places, but gives a player a more rounded—though not too rounded—character to play, as well as setting in which to play. One that would have been familiar to roleplayers in the nineteen eighties. Of the two, Delta Force: America Strikes Back! is the more engaging of the two, since it has an actual premise and appears to have been written by humans.

In terms of design it is debatable as to whether or not Delta Force: America Strikes Back! is a roleplaying game. Its emphasis upon military action, including planning, stealth, and combat together with its primary method of interacting with NPCs being to shoot them shifts it away from being roleplaying game and towards being a special forces skirmish wargame. Which it very easy could be run as. However, its protagonists are defined and designed as Player Characters rather than simply characters and the rules do allow for them to interact with NPCs with skills such as Negotiation and Interrogation. So, the possibility is there. However, with play focussing on missions rather than who the Player Characters are from one mission to the next, pulls Delta Force: America Strikes Back! back to being a wargame. At best, Delta Force: America Strikes Back! is very tactical roleplaying game focused on executing missions that support a political agenda.

Unfortunately, that political agenda is where Delta Force: America Strikes Back! is at most problematic. Of course, the roleplaying game is set in 1986 at the height of the Cold War and it reflects the political outlook of governments in the USA, the United Kingdom, and elsewhere, but the USA in particular. Which means that whilst it would have been undeniably patriotic for some players at the time, for others it would have looked jingoistic and that is the main impression it gives today. The Player Characters are specialist members of the military trained to strike at terrorists and terrorist organisations and kill them. That was the reality then and in many ways, still is. Further, there is no denying that terrorists commit atrocious acts of brutality and murder, often targeting the innocent. That was the reality then and still is today. As a result, the outlook in Delta Force: America Strikes Back! is black and white, good versus evil, and the NPCs, the terrorists are stereotypes, even clichés. Especially when it comes to the depiction of Middle Eastern characters in the artwork. There is no advice on creating NPCs other than the numbers so it is difficult to do anything more than create what are effectively cardboard cut-out villains. Another issue with the game is its masculinity—just look at the cover, let alone the internal artwork—but given its subject matter it is difficult to get away from that. Arguably worse though, is its strong anti-Left Wing bias which ignores the possibility of Right Wing terror groups. Overall, Delta Force: America Strikes Back! is not a subtle game in its depiction of the world in the middle of the nineteen eighties or its political stance.

Delta Force: America Strikes Back! reflects a moment a history, especially American history, and models it as a roleplaying game—if only just about, but more as tactical skirmish wargame with the potential for some roleplaying. That seems appropriate given that it is the first roleplaying game from Task Force Games, a publisher much better known for its wargames. The consequences of that are its complexity of rules, attention to situational detail and action, and often poor presentation when it comes to teaching the rules all serve to give the Referee a lot of extra work to do to prepare it for play. Ultimately, Delta Force: America Strikes Back! is a roleplaying game from the nineteen eighties that captures perfectly its time, genre, and the political landscape just at the moment before they all changed.

Water Works

Twilight 2000: Roleplaying in the World War III That Never Was opens with the Player Characters on the run, attempting to escape the last hurrah of the US 5th Mechanized Infantry Division near the city of Kalisz in central Poland or the 2nd Marine Division near the central city of Örebro in Sweden. Where do they go? Where do they find shelter? Where do they find food and water? Spare parts for their vehicles? Extra ammunition for their weapons? Published by Free League Publishing, Twilight 2000 presents an expansive sandbox setting that the Player Characters can explore, forage, loot, protect, and even settle. A sandbox setting consisting of a broken world, torn apart and poisoned by war and weapons of mass destruction, followed by disease and starvation. In the immediacy of the aftermath of the war, it is a grim setting where every day is a struggle to survive at best, a fight at worst. Urban Operations, the first supplement for Twilight 2000: Roleplaying in the World War III That Never Was, examined the status of cities and other settlements in the broken world of 2000, in particular, updating the supplement, The Free City of Krakow, for the first edition of Twilight 2000 from 1984. This was followed by The Black Madonna, a scenario that updated the original The Black Madonna from 1985 and detailed the Silesia region of southern Poland. This journey and that of the Player Characters continues with Hostile Waters.

Hostile Waters is the marine and riverine supplement for Twilight 2000. It explores one of the few remaining and most reliable means of travel in the post-apocalyptic world of Twilight 2000—rivers, canals, lakes, and even the sea; presents specific rules for travel and combat on the water—whether up and down rivers and canals, or along the coast; details new equipment and vehicles; and describes factions that can be encountered and plots that can play out as the Player Characters try and find a safer way to cross Poland or Sweden. It maps out and offers two routes for that. One is the River Vistula, which runs all the way across Poland from Kraków, Warsaw, and Toruń, before emptying into the sea at Gdańsk, whilst the other is Göta Canal, Sweden’s ‘Blue Ribbon’, which runs from Gothenburg to Söderköping, connecting western and eastern Sweden via series of lakes and rivers as well as the canal. 

In doing so, Hostile Waters is an update and expansion of the scenario, Pirates of the Vistula, published in 1985 for the first edition of Twilight 2000. This pushes on the rough campaign outline begun with ‘OPERATION Reset’ in Twilight 2000 and continued with The Black Madonna and Urban Operations. It will conclude with Operation Reset, based on The Ruins of Warsaw, also published in 1985. These are not the only links other to scenarios in Hostile Waters. During the course of their travels, the Player Characters may learn about an operation to repatriate surviving Americans more fully explored in Going Home from 1986 and even discover the existence of a surviving Ohio-class nuclear submarine, foreshadowing perhaps, the events of The Last Submarine Trilogy.

Hostile Waters is a boxed set as is standard for Free League Publishing’s supplements for Twilight 2000. It contains the one-hundred-and-four-page ‘Hostile Waters’ source and scenario book; twenty-six new Encounter Cards; sixteen modular battle maps; six scenario specific battle maps; tokens for the battle maps; and a large, double-sided map, with northern Poland on one side and southern Sweden on the other. Both maps on the double-sided map abut the one included in Twilight 2000 which depicts southern Poland on one side and northern Sweden on the other. Together they cover the whole of Poland and Sweden respectively and depict the main riverine environments along which the Player Characters are likely to be travelling in Hostile Waters. The tokens depict the various vessels detailed in the ‘Hostile Waters’ book as either fully operational or as a wreck. The scenario specific battle maps in turn depict a castle, a submarine—inside and out, an island, and a floating village. There is a set of floorplans for the River Queen, a tugboat that appears in one of the scenarios. The depict stretches of river with docks, bridges, islands, banks (and or shores), harbours, and even a canal lock! The Encounter Cards can be mixed and matched with those released with Twilight 2000 and its supplements, but are in the main designed provide random encounters when travelling along a river, whether that is on the water or on the bank. They include storms, discovering bodies floating in the water, mines, a ship cemetery, Russian fishermen, pirates in speedboats, a shootout on a nearby bank, and more. All of these are of a solid quality, full, and look great on the table. The only thing missing is perhaps a map with a river section with a more pronounced curve to it. As per usual, all of the modular and will work with the maps previously published for Twilight 2000.

Hostile Waters is a boxed set as is standard for Free League Publishing’s supplements for Twilight 2000. It contains the one-hundred-and-four-page ‘Hostile Waters’ source and scenario book; twenty-six new Encounter Cards; sixteen modular battle maps; six scenario specific battle maps; tokens for the battle maps; and a large, double-sided map, with northern Poland on one side and southern Sweden on the other. Both maps on the double-sided map abut the one included in Twilight 2000 which depicts southern Poland on one side and northern Sweden on the other. Together they cover the whole of Poland and Sweden respectively and depict the main riverine environments along which the Player Characters are likely to be travelling in Hostile Waters. The tokens depict the various vessels detailed in the ‘Hostile Waters’ book as either fully operational or as a wreck. The scenario specific battle maps in turn depict a castle, a submarine—inside and out, an island, and a floating village. There is a set of floorplans for the River Queen, a tugboat that appears in one of the scenarios. The depict stretches of river with docks, bridges, islands, banks (and or shores), harbours, and even a canal lock! The Encounter Cards can be mixed and matched with those released with Twilight 2000 and its supplements, but are in the main designed provide random encounters when travelling along a river, whether that is on the water or on the bank. They include storms, discovering bodies floating in the water, mines, a ship cemetery, Russian fishermen, pirates in speedboats, a shootout on a nearby bank, and more. All of these are of a solid quality, full, and look great on the table. The only thing missing is perhaps a map with a river section with a more pronounced curve to it. As per usual, all of the modular and will work with the maps previously published for Twilight 2000.

The ‘Hostile Waters’ source and scenario book begins by making the point that since the Twilight War has smashed much of the infrastructure—sources of food, sources of water, transport networks, and more—that made modern life possibly, the post-war world has been turned back centuries to a time when waterways—rivers, lakes, and canals were vital society. Not only did they provide the fastest and most reliable form of transport, but they were sources of water, whether that was to drink, to irrigate crops, to supply livestock, or even use in various manufacturing tasks. As survivors abandon towns and cities without ready access to water, those that do have access or stand on navigable waterways become important trade hubs and places to protect. Or target, because in the post-war world, pirates have reappeared, preying on the traffic up and down the river and the towns along the river. Some pirates have ambitions beyond merely raiding as well. And since the war is not officially over, militaries on both sides of the war often patrol these waters too, clashing with other and pirates. Armed boats are not the only hazard on the waterways of Europe. Some routes are mined to stop traffic or barricaded by brigands looking to collect a toll, wrecks—submerged or not are a shipping hazard, and the war has prevented maintenance of all and any waterways, which can lead to rivers and lakes silting up and broken canal locks. That is in addition to any water having been poisoned by chemical or biological contaminants, let alone radiation.

Mechanically, riverine and nautical combat is treated like an extension of the vehicle rules in Twilight 2000. A boat can be anywhere from a rowboat or sailboat all the way up to patrol boats and missile boats. The larger the boat, the bigger its crew and the less manoeuvrable it is, but the more likely it to have fixed weapon points. Otherwise, crews will use portable weapons. The rules cover boat size, movement, water depth and running aground, sinking, and damage to both the hull and components, as well as travel and combat. In general, unless on the open sea, boats of all sizes will be limited in their manoeuvrability on rivers, lakes, and canals, and the players to take both this and the depth of the water into account. There is a good example of naval combat to show the Game Master how the rules work along with descriptions of various types of mine sown in the waterways of Europe and different naval weapons like anti-ship missiles, surface-air missiles, and torpedoes. This is backed up by the descriptions, illustrations, and stats for twenty-two water vessels of various kinds, including civilian boats and those operated by the USA, the Soviet Union, Poland, Sweden, and NATO. The rules also cover swimming, fighting in water, and drowning.

The four new factions added to Twilight 2000 in Hostile Waters can all be encountered along the waterways of either Poland or Sweden. They include the Pirates of the Vistula (or Sea Wolves in Sweden), which can be independent of or under the command of Baron Czarny (King Vasa), the warlord of Warsaw (or Stockholm), but which is attempting to take control of the river and its various towns, and has been quite ruthless in doing so. Led by an ex-popstar turned crime boss, the Pirates of the Vistula are the default antagonists in Hostile Waters, having been adapted from the earlier Pirates of the Vistula scenario. The other factions include the remnants of the U.S. 6th Fleet, assigned to blockade any Soviet naval operations, but currently planning a repatriation effort back to the USA, whilst a Russian Naval Spetsnaz group, reporting to the KGB rather than the GRU, currently monitors activity in a broken Europe, looking for loyal Soviet units, but prepared to target smaller threats like the Player Characters if necessary. The last of the factions, the Troupe, is perhaps the most fun, a travelling group of actors, performing classic Shakespearian plays as well as Star Wars and classic episodes of original Star Trek. All four factions are fully detailed, complete with important NPCs written up and goals for the group as well as the NPCs.

The five new plots provide frameworks for stories that can play out as the Player Characters travel up and down Europe’s waterways. The first, ‘Operation Reset’, first introduced in Urban Operations, brings a slight Science Fiction element into play with a secret Soviet technology programme that CIA and DIA are trying to track down. The Player Characters will not find it here, but instead locate it in the ruins of Warsaw in Operation Reset. Nor do the details actually explain what it is, but that does not matter here because the Player Characters are really only looking for clues and people who know more at this stage. The other plots include locating a decorated Russian general being held by pirates; looking for a missing US submarine that might still be armed with nuclear missiles; finding a way to get home to the USA via the US 6th Fleet; and supporting one town or another over access to a supply of water. The four plots are nicely detailed and come with a detailed, often lengthy countdown of events suggesting how they might play out once the Player Characters get involved.

Several scenario sites are detailed that tie in with the plots and the factions. The River Queen is a moving location, a mobile base, or river tugboat, that will travel up and down the River Vistula. In the original Pirates of the Vistula, the tugboat’s captain was travelling down the Vistula to Warsaw to rescue his family and this can still drive the plot forward. The other scenario sites include a floating village of boats which is being targeted by river pirates; the castle base of the river pirates where they are also holding an important prisoner—but are not aware of how important; the USS Maine, an Ohio-class nuclear submarine; and an island where some hoped to escape to form a utopian society, but which is now on the verge of collapse and hides a very deadly secret!

Obviously, some of the factions, plots, and scenario sites do tie together. The Pirates of the Vistula are the major threat during the scenario and the Player Characters can run into them as a result of an Encounter Card or because of the plot involving the prisoner they hold or the floating village scenario they are targeting. The U.S.S. Maine has its own plot and scenario location, whilst the other factions and scenario sites have their own internal plots as well. Some of these can be used on their own, but travelling aboard the River Queen journeys to Warsaw (Stockholm) is intended as a spine around which the other plots will revolve. Together, the various factions, plots, and scenario sites form a toolkit or set of options, some of which can be used on their own, but are really intended as a means for the Game Master to create a set of interlocking hooks and events for a lengthy journey and multiple stories.

To that end, the ‘Hostile Waters’ book comes to close with a pair of appendices that detail in turn the Vistula and the Göta Canal. Complete with history, rumours, a guide to travelling their lengths, and inhabitants that the Player Characters might encounter, these provide a geographical guide to the terrain through which they will be travelling in Hostile Waters.

Physically, Hostile Waters is very well presented. Everything is in full colour, the artwork is excellent, and the maps are clear and easy to use.

Much like Urban Operations and The Black Madonna before it, Hostile Waters is a toolkit rather than a traditional scenario. It can be pulled apart and its individual parts run as the Game Master wants in her campaign, but she can also use those parts to construct a darkly picaresque voyage into the unknown, whether down the Vistula in Poland or along the Göta Canal across Sweden, setting up some great stories in the process. All backed up with surprisingly straightforward nautical rules and ably supported with some great maps.

1986: Phoenix Command

1974 is an important year for the gaming hobby. It is the year that Dungeons & Dragons was introduced, the original RPG from which all other RPGs would ultimately be derived and the original RPG from which so many computer games would draw for their inspiration. It is fitting that the current owner of the game, Wizards of the Coast, released the new version, Dungeons & Dragons, Fifth Edition, in the year of the game’s fortieth anniversary. To celebrate this, Reviews from R’lyeh will be running a series of reviews from the hobby’s anniversary years, thus there will be reviews from 1974, from 1984, from 1994, and from 2004—the thirtieth, twentieth, and tenth anniversaries of the titles. These will be retrospectives, in each case an opportunity to re-appraise interesting titles and true classics decades on from the year of their original release.

—oOo—

If the apogee of the military roleplaying game was Twilight 2000 in 1984, there was yet life in the genre still. Not in 1985, but in 1986, there were four military roleplaying games published. Delta Force: America Strikes Back! from Task Force Games, Eternal Soldier from Tai-Gear Simulations, Freedom Fighters from Fantasy Games Unlimited, and The Price of Freedom from West End Games were all published in 1986 and that is ignoring the paramilitary elements of the setting for 2300 AD from Game Designers’ Workshop. But in the four decades since, the straight military roleplaying game has been a rarity, and barring the return of Twilight: 2000 with Twilight 2000: Roleplaying in the World War III That Never Was from Free League Publishing, most, such as War Stories: A World War 2 RPG from Firelock Games and Alien: The Roleplaying Game from Free League Publishing, have been set in the theatres of World War 2 and Science Fiction. Of the four from 1986, perhaps the most famous—or should that be infamous?—was Phoenix Command.

Phoenix Command was published by Leading Edge Games, which had already released its first roleplaying game Rhand: Morningstar Missions, in 1984. It was designed as an accurate simulation of gunshot wounds with detailed aiming and firing rules, and authentic modern weapon data to create a simple, fast-paced game with an incredibly realistic feel. It came as a boxed set which included a forty-eight page, spiral-bound ‘Combat System Rule Book’; a twenty-six page, fully illustrated ‘Phoenix Command Modern Military Small Arms Supplement’; four double-sided Reference Cards; character sheets; and a single ten-sided die. Like many roleplaying books from Leading Edge games there was a streak of sly humour that ran through the quotations given in the extra-wide margins of the ‘Combat System Rule Book’. For example, ‘Blam. Blam. “Stop.” Blam. “Police.” Blam. Officer Axly.’ and ‘If you can’t dazzle them with style, riddle them with bullets.” Corley Norris’. The tone of that humour is set by the blurb on the back cover of the box:

“Are you tired of your current small arms combat system? Tired of inconsistencies and rules that simply don't work? If so, we invite you to conduct a short test:

Using your current small arms combat system, place the muzzle of a large caliber pistol between your character's eyes. Squeeze the trigger. Continue squeezing the trigger until he falls unconscious. Then have a friend put a band-aid over that nasty .45 caliber dent in his skull, and try not to get him shot too often in the week or two it takes to heal.

Now, using Phoenix Command, place the same pistol in the same place. Squeeze the trigger. You now have a choice: you can either roll up a new character or rush the body to a very sophisticated medical facility and discover the joys of role-playing a vegetable.

If you are nodding your head and smiling, and thinking that it would be nice to have a combat system that really works, welcome to Phoenix Command!”

This then sets out the stall for Phoenix Command. It was a highly detailed, highly accurate simulation of small arms combat designed to be used on its own, but more obvious as a replacement for the smalls combat rules that the Game Master and his players were dissatisfied with from whatever modern or military roleplaying game they were playing. There was fertile ground for this in 1986, whether it was The Morrow Project or Merc, Delta Force or The Price of Freedom, or more obviously, Twilight 2000. Essentially, just like the constituent parts of Rolemaster—Arms Law, Spell Law, Claw Law, Character Law, and Campaign Law—before it became a roleplaying game all on its own, were designed to replace the parts of the fantasy roleplaying game that a group was dissatisfied with, Phoenix Command was designed to bolt onto the modern or military roleplaying game of a group’s choice. However, unlike the various parts of Rolemaster which coalesced into a roleplaying game all of its own, Phoenix Command and its various supplements never would. Instead, stripped down versions of the rules would appear in Living Steel and the Aliens Adventure Game.

The spiral-bound ‘Combat System Rule Book’ is surprisingly short. However, do not in any way think that this means that Phoenix Command is not as complex as its reputation suggests it is. Phoenix Command is complex and that starts with Player Character. First, a player rolls three six-sided each for Strength, Will, Health, and Agility. Then the Game Master or player decides on the Player Character’s Gun Combat Skill Level. This ranges from one to twenty, with an average solider having a 2nd Skill Level, a veteran a 3rd or 4th Skill Level, an elite soldier a 5th Skill Level, 6th Skill Level, or 7th Skill Level, and a marksman a 9th Skill Level at the very least. What determines the actual Gun Combat Skill Level will depend upon the role that the Player Character has in whatever game or encounter that the Game Master is about to run or by the rough skill level in the roleplaying game that Phoenix Command is being used to replace. It should be noted that beyond noting that it represents the Player Character’s competence with small arms, there is no real explanation of what it is beyond that, and it is also the only skill in Phoenix Command.

What the player is instructed to do next is determine Encumbrance. This is the total weight of armour, clothing weapons, and equipment carried into combat. There is a surprisingly short equipment list and no real explanation of what each item is in comparison to the explanations of what each gun is in the ‘Combat System Rule Book’ and the ‘Phoenix Command Modern Military Small Arms Supplement’. After that, it gets complex with a lot of cross-referencing on tables. Base Speed is determined by cross-referencing Strength and Encumbrance on Table 2A and Base Speed and Agility on table 2B to find out the Player Character’s Maximum Speed. (This means that should a Player Character drop or shed a lot of weight, such as dropping a Squad Assault Weapon and switching to a pistol, all of this will need to be recalculated…) The Gun Combat Skill Level is checked on Table 2C for the Player Character’s Skill Accuracy Level, which measures his actual skill with weapons and knowledge of small arms tactics. Typically, a Player Character’s Skill Accuracy Level is six points higher than his Gun Combat Skill Level. Skill Factor is the Player Character’s Agility plus Gun Combat Skill Level, but there is no explanation as what it is. The number of his Combat Actions is determined by cross-referencing Maximum Speed with Skill Factor. Knockout Value is derived from Will and Gun Combat Skill Level. This is percentage chance of a combatant withstanding the pain of wounds and not falling unconscious.

Officer John Smith
Strength 11 Will 9 Health 11 Agility 12
Gun Combat Skill Level: 3rd Skill Level
Encumbrance 13.2 lb.
Base Speed: 2.5
Maximum Speed: 5
Skill Accuracy Level: 9
Skill Factor: 12
Combat Actions: 4
Knockout Value: 13

EQUIPMENT
Clothing (5 lb.)
Medium Flexible Armour (2.6 lb.)
Fighting Harness (0.6 lb.)
Holster (0.4 lb.)
Magazine Pouch (two magazines) (2.2 lb.)
Beretta M92F (2.4 lb.)

There is an example character, but not example of the creation process. There is also the basics of pre-generated troops intended to be used as quick NPCs.

Mechanically, there is no skill roll in Phoenix Command and no rules for handling actions that are not directly related to combat. So, the ‘Combat System Rule Book’ quickly moves on to weapons, movement, actions, and shooting. Each weapon has data for length, wait, reload time, rate of fire, ammunition capacity, and ammunition weight and feed device, which you would expect as per any roleplaying game with firearms. Added to this are Sustained Automatic Burst, a weapon’s accuracy during burst fire; Aim Time Accuracy Level Modifier, a measure of a weapon’s accuracy when time is spent aiming; Relative Impact Damage and Damage Class, which measures bullet penetration and bullet damage capability respectively; and Minimum Arc, the minimum number of hexes over which a burst of automatic fire is spread. Then each weapon has Ballistic Data and this is not for the weapon itself, but for different types of ammunition—Full Metal Jacket, Hollow Point, Armour, Jacketed Hollow Point, and Jacketed Soft Point—the Relative Impact Damage and Damage Class varying according to range.

Phoenix Command is intended to be played on a grid of two-yard hexes in a continuous stream of two-second phases. In each phase, the player will expend his Combat Actions on movement and actions that have an Action Cost. Movement takes into account direction of movement—forward, backward, oblique, and sideways; stance, including crouching, hands and knees, and belly crawl; elevation and terrain and depth of water; injury; and more. Actions include assuming a firing stance, ducking, changing facing, getting up and down, breaking and clearing glass from a window, drawing a pistol from multiple different types of holsters, tossing a grenade, and so on. The list is extensive, but advice is included on how to work out what the Action Cost is for any action not listed.

Each phase is broken down into three periods. First, in the Allocation period, players and Game Master allocate their Combat Actions. A player does not have to allocate all of them, but can save some of them for the Response period. In the Movement Period all combatants expend their Combat Actions assigned to movement, whilst any remaining Combat Actions are spent in the Response period. This can be on type of action, except movement. Primarily, it is spent is on combat actions. Fire resolution takes place at the end of the phase.

Fire resolution assumes that combatants take time to aim. The rules allow for hip fire and snapshots, both of which are done at a penalty, but otherwise to gain the full accuracy of a weapon, a player needs to assume a firing stance, which takes Combat Actions, and then spend one or more Combat Actions aiming. The Odds of Hitting is determined by aim time, firing stance, range, visibility, movement, and size of target. Each of these provides an Accuracy Level Modifier (ALM), which are in turn the Aim Time ALM, Target Range ALM, Firing Stance/Situation ALM, Visibility ALM, Movement ALM, Target Size ALM, and Effective Accuracy Level ALM. The Aim Time ALM will vary according to weapon and every weapon has a table for the number of Combat Actions spent aiming and the resulting modifiers. Visibility ALM accounts for smoke, darkness, optical scope, and so on. The Target Size ALM not only includes the stance and position of the target, but modifiers for the head, body, arms, and legs, which can be applied if an attacker wants to shoot at a specific body location. The total number of Accuracy Level Modifiers are called the Effective Accuracy Level and the higher this is, the greater the Odds of Hitting. This is cross-referenced on the Single Shot Odds Table to get a percentile chance and this is rolled equal to, or under, for a single to hit a target.

In addition, Phoenix Command also takes into account visibility of a target if the target moves. So, a target might be visible at the start and in the middle of the Movement Period, but not at the end, it allows a shooter to potentially fire at a target before he moves behind cover. It simply applies an Action Count penalty, the longer the target is out of line of sight the higher the Action Count penalty.

So far, this is the only time that anyone has made a dice roll. And what is important here is that it is not a skill roll of any kind—at least not in the traditional sense of a roleplaying game. Rather it is determined by the choices made by the player as to what stance his character will take, how many Combat Actions will be spent aiming, what weapon he is using, and so on. The character that a player has created and is controlling has no immediate effect on how good, or how accurate, a shot he is. Ultimately what the factors created during character generation influence is how many Combat Actions he has in a single phase. The more he has, the more can move, take cover, and so on, but ultimately, the more time he can spend aiming.

This though, is only for single shots. The process for fully automatic fire is slightly different. It is done in half second bursts into an Arc of Fire that indicates how many bullets are fired into each hex and thus at each target. Target visibility, which already accounted for the amount of time that the target was visible over the course of a single phase also indicates how many bursts can be fired at a target. In addition to aim time, firing stance, range, visibility, movement, and size of target all being factors in finding out the Odds of Hitting, automatic fire adds elevation as well as Arc of Fire. Automatic Elevation target size modifier replaces Target Size ALM and is taken from the Burst Elevation Odds Table. It is rolled first and if successful, the burst is at the correct elevation and a roll to hit using the Automatic Weapon Hit Chance Table. The chance of hitting depends on the Arc of Fire and Rate of Fire and is rolled per target, with the result also indicating how many bullets hit. An attacker can continue to first bursts or fully automatic fire from one phase to the next, but there is a Sustained Automatic Burst penalty for each weapon which is applied to the Effective Accuracy Level on each subsequent rounds of firing.

The next dice roll is to find out where a target is hit. This is a simple roll on the ‘Hit Location and Damage Table’ which gives different results based upon the target was looking around or over cover, if he was firing around or over cover, and if he is in the open. The amount of Physical Damage inflicted is determined by the weapon’s Damage Class and Effective Impact Damage. However, first you need to know what the Effective Impact damage is and that is worked out by subtracting the Protection Factors of any armour worn from the Relative Impact Damage. Relative Impact Damage is a measure of a bullet’s penetrating power and both that and the Damage Class depend upon the range of the attack and the type of ammunition fired. Armour is by location and its Protection Factors will vary from four for Light Flexible to thirty for Heavy Rigid. If the Effective Impact Damage is reduced to zero by the Protection Factors, the shot does not penetrate and no damage is inflicted. If the Effective Impact Damage is more than zero, but less than the Protection Factors, the shot penetrates, but its damage is reduced. To learn how much, the roll for the hit location is cross referenced with the correct Effective Impact Damage for the Damage Class of the weapon. If the Effective Impact Damage is greater than the Protection Factors, the shot penetrates and inflicts the full amount of Effective Impact Damage listed under the Damage Class. (The term used here is “full Damage Class (DC) column”, but there is no Damage Column marked ‘Full’, so presumably, the authors meant the maximum value.) Depending upon the Effective Impact Damage, the Damage Class, and the hit location, the Physical Damage inflicted can range from one to millions of points. Hit locations run from forehead to ankle-foot and also include glancing blows to general locations. In general, hits to the head—forehead, eye/nose, and mouth—will inflict anywhere from hundreds of points of Physical Damage to hundreds of thousands of Physical Damage.

The rules also allow for disabling blows if the shot hits an arm or leg and a target being knocked out by damage suffered. Any damage suffered greater than a target’s Knockout Value and there is a 25% chance that he will be rendered unconscious. This rises to 75% if the damage suffered is more than twice the target’s Knockout Value and 98% if is more than three times the target’s Knockout Value. And to remind ourselves, Knockout Value is not determined by Health, but by Will and Gun Combat Skill Level, so effectively, the better you are at firing guns, the less likelihood you have of falling unconscious due to pain.

After a battle, all wounded characters must check to see if they will live. Physical Damage Total is how much damage a character has suffered, whilst the Damage Total is a measure of the severity of the injuries suffered. To get the Damage Total, the Physical Damage is multiplied by ten and then divided by the character’s Health. The Medical Aid And Recovery Table is consulted to discover the Critical Time Period during which time the character must receive aid and the Recovery Roll to be made at the end of this period. This will vary according to whether the character receives no aid, first aid, goes to an aid station or field hospital, or is sent to a modern trauma centre. There are suggested adjustments for trauma centres, or hospitals, from 1831 to 2345—even though the weapons listed in the ‘Phoenix Command Modern Military Small Arms Supplement’ cover the period from 1910 to roughly 1990. The Recovery Roll is a percentile value and if the roll is made, the target will survive, the Critical Time Period also indicating how long it takes for the target to recover. Results of “00” on the Medical Aid And Recovery Table mean that the character cannot survive. The rules also account for the lingering effects of old injuries.

In general, if a target suffers a Damage Total of one hundred or more, he is in trouble without dedicated medical aid. At a Damage Total of a thousand and more and the Recovery Roll values plummet. However, there is no chance of a character dying in actual combat. There is a chance of being knocked out—a good chance—and only after a combat is it discovered whether a character has lived or died. For all that Phoenix Command claims to be accurate simulation of gunshot wounds, there is no means of working out if a character is dead in the midst of a shootout and no rules for rendering first aim whilst in combat. Experienced players of Phoenix Command can estimate the likelihood of a target not recovering from the amount of damage suffered, but both omissions make no sense.

Now all of this takes up sixteen pages of the ‘Combat System Rule Book’! Which begs the question, “What the hell is in the rest of the book?” There is some advice for running Phoenix Command, which includes delegating some of the tasks, using a ranging stick, and using markers to indicate each character’s status. There are two sample scenarios. Scenario one is ‘The Bridge of Oppenheim’, a beginning scenario for five to eight players and involves German and NATO forces facing a Russian invasion just outside Mainz and Wiesbaden. Each player controls a single figure, so all together equal to two squads who must hold off forty-eight Russians! It is designed to teach the rules for Odds of Hitting and damage. The second scenario is ‘The Defence of the Apollo Rey’. It places for four SAS (Special Action Squad) commandos aboard a vessel that has been taken over by nine terrorists. It is not as static as ‘The Bridge of Oppenheim’, with the terrorists searching for passengers and the commandos trying to incapacitate the terrorists without alerting them. Both scenarios come with maps and pre-generated characters.

The remaining ten pages of provide optional rules. These differentiate between non-blocking cover—that is, cover that blocks sight, not penetration and blocking cover that does both; field of view which can be increased by expending Combat Actions to look around; shotguns which involve Base Pellet Hit Chance and a Pattern Radius in working out the resulting Effective Accuracy Level; explosives and grenades, which includes the possibility of damage from both shrapnel and concussion; improved accuracy for all weapons; spotting and sound detection; defensive skills, initiative, and morale; Master Phasing Count; and second shot accuracy, pinned targets, and semiauto bursts. Of these, the Master Phasing Count is a means of determining when detailed timing of fire occurs, such as who fires first. This is discovered by cross-referencing a character’s number of Combat Actions with the Action Count and is measured in tenths of seconds. The defensive skills are the only rule to use a character’s Intelligence and the first mention that a character should have an Intelligence characteristic, but the inference is that it comes from the roleplaying game whose combat rules Phoenix Command is replacing rather be rolled for as in a standard roleplaying game.

The ‘Combat System Rule Book’ packs a lot of rules and a lot of detail in its forty-eight pages. There are moments where it is possible to see what the designers intended and grasp the rules as written, helped by numerous examples. However, turn the page and there is another set of rules for another specific situation and they have their own complexity. And then again. The advice for the Game Master suggests delegating tasks to her fellow players, but that assumes they understand the rules. The complexity of the game means that it is challenging to teach and none of it is necessarily intuitive or easy to grasp, whilst the constant need to consult the tables at the back of the ‘Combat System Rule Book’ can only serve to slow down the play of the game. At the very least, what Phoenix Command needs is a set of flow charts per player, one flow chart per action, and even as much as that would ease play, there is no denying that it would still be intimidating.

In comparison to the ‘Combat System Rule Book’, the ‘Phoenix Command Modern Military Small Arms Supplement’ is straight forward. It lists almost one-hundred-and-twenty handguns, submachine guns, assault rifles, squad automatic weapons, general purpose machine guns, light machine guns, heavy machine guns, shotguns, grenade launchers, anti-tank rockets, and rocket propelled grenades, and twenty-four grenades. The earliest weapon given is the Browning M1911A1, whilst the then most recent are the Italian Benelli CB-M2 submachine gun, German Heckler & Koch G11 assault rifle, and British XLE85E1 assault rifle, all of which were underdevelopment at the time of Phoenix Command’s publication. The only thing missing perhaps is a standard .38 caliber revolver instead of just the Smith & Wesson M36 2” Barrel, Chief’s Special.

Physically, Phoenix Command is well-presented and the production values are high. With its spiral bound format, the ‘Combat System Rule Book’ definitely looks like the technical manual it is supposed to be. There is a glossary of terms, and even though it is only forty-eight pages long, the ‘Combat System Rule Book’ could have done with an index. Arguably, ‘Phoenix Command Modern Military Small Arms Supplement’ could have done with one too. Otherwise, the illustrations—nearly all of them guns—are fine and the maps serviceable.

—oOo—

Roman J. Andron reviewed Phoenix Command in ‘Game Reviews’ in Different Worlds. No. 47 (Fall 1987). He opened with, “IMPRESSIVE. THAT is the first word that comes to mind when Phoenix Command is implemented in a game. Never before have such high degrees of realism and playability been achieved simultaneously in the gaming world. Compared to this, all other combat systems are nothing.” His only issues were with the use of English (or Imperial) measurements rather than Metric and that the high number of abbreviations slowed down the process of learning the rules. Other than that, the review was very positive and Andron awarded it four stars before concluding with “I heartily recommend this system to weapons buffs or anyone wanting to put realism into their role-playing or wargaming. Phoenix Command provides for a simple yet highly-realistic simulation of modern firearms combat. However, my recommendations cannot do justice to the system. It has to be used to be fully appreciated.”

—oOo—

Although Phoenix Command can be praised for its degree of detail and accuracy, in terms of game design it is a developmental dead end. It represents the simulationist drive for accuracy and detail pushed to the nth degree, to the point of not necessarily unplayability, but at the cost of playability and engagement. More skirmish wargame than roleplaying game, Phoenix Command is a love letter to statistics, the nadir of the trend of military roleplaying games in the nineteen eighties, and today, a dinosaur.

Convict Conscript Combat

It should be no surprise that the future is a corporate future despite our aspirations. So, governments and agencies might do all the scouting and exploration, but the corporations have the money to invest and they expect a return on that investment. In the Corealis System, the conglomerate known as the Corporate Echelon is attempting to squeeze as much profit from the system and that includes protecting their facilities, let alone the colonies. There are reports of bug infestations and scab pirates attacking ships and outposts. In response the Corporate Echelon has instructed its Military Foundation to find a cheap solution to the problem. The result is the Rehabilitation Incentive Program (R.I.P.), a programme of enforced conscription from the Corporate Echelon’s private prisons. Convicts are given basic training and sent off on relentless tours of duty. They will eradicate bug infestations, assault pirate bases and spaceships, conduct salvage missions, run supply missions, and more, but no matter the type and nature of the mission, the Convicts, known as ‘Dirtbags’, are expendable. However, if a Dirtbag survives long enough, there is the promise of freedom and reintegration.

This is the set-up for Dirtbags! A Sci-Fi Shooter RPG, published by The Dungeon’s Key following a successful Kickstarter campaign. Inspired by films such as Starship Troopers, Tank Girl, and Aliens, plus The Dirty Dozen and an unhealthy dose of the Borderlands video game franchise, it is a satire on corporate greed and capitalism and deals with a lot of mature themes. The dystopian satire starts with the look of the rulebook, which is heavily graffitied in a running commentary upon service in the Rehabilitation Incentive Program, the Convict Conscripts sticking two fingers up in punk attitude at the corporate commanders and masters.

To create a Convict Conscript, a player divides five points across three abilities—Bones, Cunning, and Nerves, rolls for his Convict Conscript’s Pardonable Offence and the Fallout, and then selects a role assignment, loadout, and trait. The Convict Conscript’s upbringing, personality trait, and appearance can all be rolled for. Each Convict Conscript also receives a fifty-credit signing bonus. The roles are Ape (Infantryman), Pill (Combat Medic), Tech (Combat Engineer), Hen (Reconnaissance), and Muscle Head (Support Gunner). Each provides three options in terms of Loadouts and Traits. Both the Pardonable Offence and the Fallout provide an extra bonus. In addition to his loadout, a Convict Conscript wears a Prisoner Identification Collar, which of course, is fitted with a small amount of explosives which can be detonated remotely, as a deterrent against escape attempts.

Name: Louise Kincy (MD)
Bones 1 Cunning 2 Nerves 2
Pardonable Offence: Medical Malpractice (75 years)
Fallout: High-Strung (No breathers in combat)
Role Assignment: Pill
Traits: Field Surgeon
Upbringing: Water Carrier in the circuit city sweatshops
Personality Trait: Petty
Appearance: Old World Prosthetic Hand
Loadout: 350-SI Service Pistol (three magazines), Surgery Kit, Juice Box Energisers (two), Tourniquet (one)

Mechanically, Dirtbags! uses a dice pool system. In fact, it uses three dice pools. These are Action, Ammunition, and Reserve. The Action pool is based on the Convict Conscript’s abilities. It is the number of dice that a player can assign to any one action. Using six-sided dice, any result of a four, five, or six is a success, although this range will increase or decrease depending upon if the Convict Conscript has Advantage, Disadvantage, or Severe Disadvantage. Any failed results go into the Convict Conscript’s Reserve where they cannot be used. Various traits will restore dice from the Reserve to the Action pool, but the primary means is to ‘Take a Breather’. Out of combat, this takes fifteen minutes, but in combat, it takes a whole turn in which the Convict Conscript can nothing else. A critical success, a roll of two sixes on an action will also restore a single die from the Reserve to the Action pool.

The number of actions that a Convict Conscript can undertake in a round is determined by his Ability values. For example, a Convict Conscript with a Bones of two has two physical actions in a round. So, his player might describe his actions in cleaning out a bug nest as first throwing a grenade at the hole out of which a bug swarm has erupted and then charging to its lip. Whilst a Convict Conscript with Cunning of two operating a drone might send it to hover over the hole and then scan for movement. In either case, the Convict Conscript’s player needs to roll a success for each action. Notably, none of the actions involve shooting or attacking. This is a free action. Nor does a player roll to hit. Instead, he rolls the Ammunition pool for his Convict Conscript’s weapon. The Convict Conscript can fire as many times as he wants. The only limits are the ammunition capacity of the weapon and its firing mode. Firing at targets beyond a weapon’s range reduces the number of Ammunition dice the player rolls. Every success is a hit, but if two ones are rolled, it means that the weapon has jammed. All dice rolled from Ammunition pool go into the Reserve pool and can only be refreshed when the Convict Conscript takes a turn to reload.

When hit, a Convict Conscript can defend using his Action pool or his Ammunition pool and every success negates a hit. Armour negates hits and can be destroyed. Damage is inflicted per location and if a hit location suffers two more points of damage, it is bleeding and will suffer more damage loss. Limbs can be ruined and amputated; if the torso is reduced to zero Hit Points, the Convict Conscript cannot ‘Take a Breather’, but can talk and still take free actions like shooting; and if a Convict Conscript’s Hit Points in his head are reduced to zero, he is dead. In addition to possible access to a Pill or Combat Medic, every Convict Conscript carries at least one ‘Muscular Intravenous Liquid Koka’ (M.I.L.K.) Energiser in his Prisoner Identification Collar. This can be automatically injected to negate hits of damage, ignore Ability limits, gain advantage on the Convict Conscript’s next roll, reroll any number of dice with disadvantage, and spend a success to gain an extra action. However, consume too many Energisers and a Convict Conscript can suffer an emotional outburst, such as hyperventilating, suffering a nervous breakdown, fleeing, and so on. Similarly, witnessing another Convict Conscript’s death, suffering an amputated limb, and other dire situation may also result in an emotional outburst. An emotional outburst is resisted with a Nerves roll.

Mechanically, Dirtbags! is simple and it does give a player plenty of freedom in terms of how and what his Convict Conscript does. Primarily this is because it removes the need to declare an attack as action and have it happen automatically if the player declares it. All the player has to do is roll for the effect. It means that the player can focus on his Convict Conscript moving and taking other actions. The limits are his Ability values and the size of his Action pool and the flow of the play is going to be from action to rest and back again from running and gunning and hiding and ducking to needing to ‘Take a Breather’ and back again. The Action pool and the Ammunition pool are both resources that need relatively careful handling.

Dirtbags! A Sci-Fi Shooter RPG is played out as a series of tours of duty, each of which consists of several operations, the number randomly determined reflecting the difficulty of a campaign. Effectively, length of play determines the campaign difficulty. A completed operation reduces a Convict Conscript’s sentence by five years and for every twenty years his sentence is reduced, he can improve an ability, take a Retinal Curriculum Projector course which grants a trait, or take a trait from his role. Between tours of duty, a Convict Conscript can take Shore Leave, which may be a relaxing time or it may leave the Convict Conscript without an internal organ, which reduces his torso’s Hit Points. The Convict Conscripts also have access to a wide range of military surplus that they can purchase and in return they can sell their military surplus and salvage. A sample mission, ‘Occam’s Razor’, a training mission that goes to hell with a bug invasion!

Dirtbags! A Sci-Fi Shooter RPG does not feel quite complete. There is background to the setting, but no advice for the Game Marshal and it could have done with a random mission generator at the very least. There is content sufficient to inspire the Game Marshal, but such a table would have been useful. It also does not address what happens if a Convict Conscript manages to reduce his sentence to zero, which is possible, but difficult after ten to fifteen operations. Whomever has amended the training manual that is Dirtbags! A Sci-Fi Shooter RPG calls it a return to slavery. The Corporate Echelon states that the Rehabilitation Incentive Program has an eighty percent success rate. One option here might be to look at Gangs of Titan City, a roleplaying game of criminal gangs and life in a spire city, as to what happens next, but otherwise, the Game Marshal is left to decide what happens next.

Physically, Dirtbags! A Sci-Fi Shooter RPG is a scrawling mess of a book and intentionally so. It is all punk attitude verses corporate bullshit and sometimes that does get in the way of what is relatively simple, straightforward roleplaying game. The example of play is actually the easiest and quickest means of learning the roleplaying game’s rules. The artwork is decent though.

Dirtbags! A Sci-Fi Shooter RPG has the potential to be manically chaotic fun, throwing it as it does a disparate, desperate group of poorly trained conscripts into one dangerous mission after another, whilst the Game Marshal throws every military movie cliché into the mix. It would be interesting to see what happens if the Convict Conscripts are actually rehabilitated, but that will have to wait for a supplement or another roleplaying game. In the meantime, the Dirtbags have one last chance to prove they are not scum in a light, but surprisingly detailed military Science Fiction shooter.

Miskatonic Monday #435: Terror on Texas 4

Much like the Jonstown Compendium for RuneQuest: Roleplaying in Glorantha and The Companions of Arthur for material set in Greg Stafford’s masterpiece of Arthurian legend and romance, Pendragon, the Miskatonic Repository for Call of Cthulhu, Seventh Edition is a curated platform for user-made content. It is thus, “...a new way for creators to publish and distribute their own original Call of Cthulhu content including scenarios, settings, spells and more…” To support the endeavours of their creators, Chaosium has provided templates and art packs, both free to use, so that the resulting releases can look and feel as professional as possible. To support the efforts of these contributors, Miskatonic Monday is an occasional series of reviews which will in turn examine an item drawn from the depths of the Miskatonic Repository.

—oOo—

Name: Terror on Texas 4

Publisher: Chaosium, Inc.
Author: Autumn Unwin

Setting: Atlantic, 1961

Product: One-shot

What You Get: Thirteen page, 2.05 MB Full Colour PDF
Elevator Pitch: Grace Under Pressure because Grace under Pressure is out of print.

Plot Hook: An engineering survey reveals the reason why the deep sea tower went done...
Plot Support: Staging advice, no pre-generated Investigators, two NPCs, one handouts, one deck plan, and three Mythos monsters.

Production Values: Serviceable

Pros

# Interesting real world location

# Set on the eve of a real world disaster
# Strong sense of isolation

# Man versus the elements shifts to man versus the deep

# Thalassophobia

# Batrachophobia

# Teraphobia

Cons

# Needs a slight edit

# No pre-generated Investigators

Conclusion

# Not entirely original, but the location and the staging is

# Engaging period piece let down by lack of pre-generated Investigators