Thinking About: Level Up A5E

Ever since I standardized on Tales of the Valiant, I have had my Level Up A5E books in the garage, in an airtight plastic case, protected, yet waiting there in case I wanted to return to them. I have missed this system because it is one of the best-designed and most well-thought-out revisions of the 2014 5E version on the market.

If you are bought into LUA5E, Tales of the Valiant is nothing to write home about, since it is just a "patched 2014 5E." With Level Up, the game was rebuilt, the SRD rewritten, and the game designed around core pillars of play. I have never seen exploration done so well in a 5E system, and the entire system supports wilderness adventuring beautifully. 

With ToV? It is more of the same as 2014 5E, which is honestly a good thing. But if the exploration pillar of play is not supported, why even choose a ranger? At least ToV keeps the "soft powers" for exploration from D&D 2014, but they have no mechanical benefit since there is no exploration system to support them. Many A5E players never jumped to ToV, preferring the rebuilt classes of A5E, and not seeing enough new to switch. This market fragmentation hurt both games, ultimately helping D&D, but A5E is still out there and doing well.

A5E should be doing better; it is that good.

D&D 2024 is nothing to write home about either. For the ranger, they eliminated all survival powers and focused solely on VTT powers. The design of D&D 2024 is horrible at supporting anything other than VTT play, and it is really the weakest version of 5E out there today in terms of supporting the different pillars of play.

Again, A5E players saw this and said, "Why waste our time?"

In Level Up A5E, we need rangers! All martial classes gain fighting techniques at a stamina cost. Mages can find rare versions of spells. The social pillar of play is supported. There are massive environmental challenges built into the system. Where ToV is content to patch and provide the same thing, A5E rebuilds the entire 5E system in every area, keeping it 80% the same, but that last 20% of the rebuild is what takes an engine from a rough idle to a smooth, powerful purr of power and responsiveness.

This is still 5E, but in every darn way it has been rebuilt and improved. We lose 3rd party subclass compatibility, but when the existing classes are this good, why do I need junky, made-to-fix-2014 subclasses ever again? Many 3rd-party subclasses are either flavor or patch material, and they are nothing I can't simulate by sticking to what is in A5E, rebranding it, and making a few tweaks.

The downsides? It takes a lot of work, by hand, to create a character. The process is slow and painful. But you learn more about the system this way, and if this is the way it is, then I accept it. You want to play 5E, and no VTT will hide the pain for you; play it raw and accept the truth. If you can't, then play an easier system. A5E is a more in-depth system than 5E, and why I would ever want that seems like a recipe for disaster, but somehow, it works.

My low-level character sheets run two double-sided pages per character in A5E.

I do not know how bloated they get at higher levels, which is something I am interested in finding out. Hand-run sheets are generally more compact than a VTT print-out.

A5E is like AD&D for 5E. While I feel 5E character sheets are too long, A5E gives me the extra depth that makes the game actually work well enough to he considered a serious system, rather than "just another 5E." 5E character sheets reprint a lot of rules they don't need to, and some of these "print to PDF" character sheets from VTTs are atrocious and make the game worse for everyone.

What we have in A5E works so well that I feel many 3rd-party subclasses take more away from the rebuilt game than they add. Many 3rd-party subclasses are worthless bloat or are meant to create a style of play that the corebooks should have supported. 

What we have in the core game of A5E, plus the expansion books, is excellent. Multiclassing is not an exploit, but it is celebrated and supported here with multiclass synergy feats and builds. They thought of this stuff! Amazing!

And so many of 2014's issues are fixed, and these continue on into 2024 D&D. Like character death. Fixed. Supplies and survival. Fixed. A weak social game. Fixed. Martial class disparity and boredom. Fixed. Exploration. Fixed. Page after page, if you sit down and read these rules, every one of them fixes a huge problem in 5E, and many of these are still unfixed today, or heavily houseruled in 2024 D&D.

Level Up A5E is the 2024 D&D we should have gotten.

I may revisit this game.

Dungeon Crawl Classics: Built for Fun

There is no "off the shelf" with DCC; it is still firmly "on the shelf" for me. This is a game built for fun; it feels like a heavily modded 3.5E, but does things its own way, drawing on old-school tropes while taking them to crazy places. This game took all my shelf space for D&D 3.5E and Pathfinder 1e, and it proudly sits as the most gonzo and insane game I have, filling that power fantasy need, while still delivering loads of unpredictability.

Note, this does not replace 5E for me. 5E and I are complicated. Currently, C&C is replacing 5E for me while 5E and I work it out. My 5E books are in the closet until they can find an answer to the character sheet problem they have.

I wish 5E were better.

But, at this time, I can't support a game that forces me to do more work and flip through pages of a character sheet every round. It is in the closet until I want to fight with it again.

DCC is my 3.5E replacement, and it sings as that.

DCC drives the engines of many games, most of which are built and played out of zines and strange books that clutter my shelves. It is a crazy existence, one moment playing what feels like traditional fantasy, while the other powering a science fiction game. It really is more of a "game engine" driving any type of game you can imagine, with whatever random character classes you find being "tonight's entertainment."

Veer off into mutants and mahem? Fine. Bug hunts? Great! Surviving on strange alien-filled worlds? No problem. Crawling through the esophagus of a sleeping giant to rescue a singing parakeet? Sure! Fighting marshmallow goop creatures from a random gate a mad wizard opened? Works here! Playing "Keep on the Borderlands?" Why not?

DCC is the role-playing game equivalent of a Sharpie pen. A million and one uses, and it leaves a permanent mark on your psyche that makes all other games seem boring.

And the game isn't complete! You can pull in monsters from other editions, steal treasure tables and magic items from other games, pull an equipment list in from over here, use an adventure from over there, and generally mish-mash whatever you have lying around into your DCC game.

This one is sticking around, and it displays amazingly well.

Mail Room: Age of Rebellion Beginner Game

The Age of Rebellion Beginner Game never really took off for us, as we were more into the Jedi and smuggler paths in the Star Wars universe, and those held a higher interest for us. There is a stark good-versus-evil in the Jedi boxed set, and the smuggler boxed set was a classic "space rogue" where your allegiances could shift depending on which way the credits were flowing.

My copy came with the old-style box, and I wanted to see the newer, high-quality box, but I understand if cost concerns were a thing. Still, I would have loved to see the new-style box on my copy.

This set is focused on the rebels, but it never felt like it answered the question, "Who wants to fight in a war?" And while the genre may seem ripe for anti-Imperial sabotage missions and deep strikes, most players of the game will have never fought in a real war, and real wars are brutal, neighbor-against-neighbor, scary, randomly terrifying, horrible things.

Also, unless you are a team of special commandos and have some freedom and agency, like the secret strike team of a diplomat, you may find yourself under a huge command structure, stuck on a planet fighting a war of attrition, and locked in a battle where you have no freedom at all. You play the "troopers in Hoth base" - have fun in the trenches!

The answer is always to play as a small, dynamic, mission-oriented team, not "soldiers in the barracks."

I prefer the dynamic campaign type that covers special operations, elite strike squads, undercover military strike teams, and other high-agency operations, where players have some flexibility in how they accomplish their goals. A smaller team with a direct line of command to an authority figure and clear objectives is a far better setup.

Imagine Princess Leia with a small rebel strike force at her disposal, and her wanting to give them missions she can deny any knowledge or involvement in, but the success of those missions directly helps her fight against the Empire - even with her operating as a senator from within.

You get a small, heroic, and covert team that needs to keep things quiet when the shooting stops, they are not stuck in a military base, and they get to participate in intrigue and social situations frequently, and then they get to "go in" and suit up into battle for those high-stakes missions, and get out before the Imperials swarm in and shut it all down.

The gear they have is likely all disposable and will be destroyed when the mission is complete, and they will all blend back into normal society. The transport and contacts are all paid well to keep quiet. And after the chaos, it is as if none of them were even there, yet the wreckage is still smoldering.

And you all melt back into society, going your separate ways. Then, you are given a location to go to, and no further information. You know this is the next mission, where you will all meet up again at a safe house, say your hellos, have a drink and a laugh, and the next set of plans is made...

While the game exclusively covers rebels, you could 100% play this from the Imperial side as a faction that is against tyranny and the Sith. The Legends universe at the end of the EU timeline has a noble house that is an Imperial remnant, strong in the Force, who end up being more the good guys than the bad, yet they are still Imperials. They even have a princess, their own Imperial Knights, and a very cool faction setup that puts them in the middle of the war.

Remember, many future rebels will come from the borderline and good-aligned Imperial sectors such as this, so there is a lot of gaming to be had with a civil-war-style scenario where it is just stormtrooper-against-stormtrooper, with rival governments and sector Moffs fighting for dominance in the post-Death Star chaos. It does not have to be a declared "rebellion" to fit within this game's framework; it just has to be a small military unit fighting for an objective.

That sector could "flip" to the Rebellion later, and then all the TIE pilots get shiny new X-Wings. Or, the sector could stay Imperial, and you get TIE on TIE bloodbath fights with the PCs hoping to get better ships someday, but making do and being careful in their flying deathtraps.

The old TIE Fighter PC game has a huge campaign focused on TIE pilots and Imperials, and it was widely considered to have an amazing story and to be the best Star Wars video game of all time. Of all the games in the Edge Studio collection, the Age of Rebellion game will be the best one to run a campaign like this that focuses on the Imperial side.

If you focus solely on the Classic lore and universe, you can enjoy all these amazing experiences and games without any modern movies or missteps. I would love to play in a TIE Fighter campaign, and watch the brooding Sith skulk about acting high and mighty, and trying to figure out which commander to trust, and which ones are being paid by the Hutts, and trying to survive in flying tissue-paper boxes.

Sure, you may get chewed out for failing another mission, perhaps this time you failed it on purpose, but at least you are alive. This is good, survival-focused, garbage-equipment, who-do-I-trust, the-Sith-suck, stay-alive-another-day, intrigue-based gameplay.

You won't be "living the high life" as a pilot in Yavin base, with a shiny new X-Wing, and you may never defect, but your adventures will be legendary struggles from within a corrupt system, trying to do good in a limited way, and making a small impact from within that will have ripple effects throughout the galaxy.

Perhaps the senator's shuttle that your fighter wing was asked to "accidentally destroy" you all "missed on purpose," and she got away, and you knew letting her get away would be better for everyone. You all silently agreed, "this is how it would go down," and while your corrupt commander may chew you all out for being incompetent, you know the galaxy will be a better place tomorrow.

Still, if you play Imperials, keep it to the smaller, mission-oriented special missions teams, even on the starfighter side, a small squadron that does special missions together is just fine.

These sorts of stories I love, and Classic Star Wars was built to tell them.

The inclusion of a spy character is a good one, since it nicely sets up the "special missions" flavor I prefer. The spy is the intelligent, plotting, leader type, while the soldier is the heavy. They do tend to pick great character archetypes for these start sets, and these are no exception. The spy is a cool, sneaky guy, while the soldier is the shooty guy.

We have a Jyn Erso-type pilot in here, and a cool mechanic character. I can see the Calamari as my favorite (as a kid), setting all sorts of traps, only to yell "It's a trap!" when I trigger one. Each and every trap. I don't care how old it gets; he is shouting it out every time. 

Since his name is Tendaar, I can see my nickname for him being "Chickee."

That sort of stupid, kid humor is why I still love Star Wars. This is not the infantile Grogu type of goo-goo gaa-gaa humor, but the dumb, adolescent, ha-ha type of bad pun dork humor that keeps me coming back.

"It's a trap!"

We finish with a generous rulebook that covers the basics of the game. I love these starter sets; they are everything you need to play a fun adventure, plus a rulebook to create your own adventures with, before you dive in and get the full game. This is a high-quality, long-lasting, excellent value starter set.

We finish with dice, tokens, and a map. I love these tokens and maps, and they are fun to play with. I am making my own 1"/25mm tokens myself, and it is a fun project with a lot of character.

As the least appealing starter set for us, I am beginning to see where the fun is regarding this set. If you put the troops in a barracks, you won't have any fun. If you make the team a dynamic special-missions force, now we are talking.

A fun starter set, one I never realized the true potential of, but now I see a little more clearly with time and perspective.

Is There Hope for 5E?

No.

The audience is aging, and the format lacks that broad market appeal. The next generation is so addicted to their phones that it is hard to pull them away from a screen to sit down and enjoy a game like we once did.

The only way D&D survives is as a name on a mobile phone game.

5E survives, but not as a live-service game. Wizards will keep putting out new versions of D&D, such as the upcoming 6E, and quite likely 7E, and 5E support will be sunsetted since a live-service model has "end of life" support built into the game as a feature. They will not pay to keep 5E support going once they need you to "move on."

5E will be well supported by third parties and the community, which is why Tales of the Valiant remains relevant. That will continue past the official support of D&D 5E and 5.5E and be "the only 5E" outside of finding books and playing it by hand, or on a VTT that still supports it, but even they will be pressured to move on.

Tales of the Valiant will likely be the last major and supported version of 5E ever written. It is a solid game, I still like it, but I have no room on my shelves for it. I do not play it as much as my other fantasy tentpoles, like BX, C&C, GURPS Fantasy, and DCC. It still has a massive problem with character sheet length, which slows play and hurts the game. I doubt any version of 5E, outside of Nimble, fixes this core flaw in the system.

If it takes me 3-5 minutes to flip through my character sheet to decide what I am going to do on a turn, that is a massive problem with the game. Some people take as long as 30 minutes. Character sheet length and choice paralysis will be what kills 5E, and what 6E will be "marketed" as solving, before, of course, they break it again because they now have "room to expand the game" and "we have returned tactical player choice to 6.5E."

And sort of the weak reaction to ToV and other major 5E variants means D&D will be the gold standard, and that also seals the fate of the game when live service support is eventually dropped. More should get on the ToV train and support this game, as it means the 5E rules will have a life past the D&D 6E launch day, and the loud din of voices tells us to "upgrade or be left behind."

Old School Essentials is the hot game right now, taking the torch of BX support and standardization across the hobby. This is compatible with everything: light, fast, simple, and fun. This, plus games in the Without Number series of books, can last you a lifetime of fun across any genre you can imagine.

GURPS, once you know the system, plays faster than 5E. That one-second turn does not allow much wiggle room. The character sheets are easier, too.

DCC is the more fun game, with each class constructed to provide fun choices during a turn, with all the junk cut off and tossed out.

Shadowdark, I don't consider 5E, as it is more of a tweener game between 5E and OSE. It is closer to OSE and BX in feel, and while it uses 5E mechanics, it is an OSR-variant game.

C&C is the closest thing I have to a 5E replacement, in the modern rules and 3.5E variant play, with broad compatibility with every BX and 1E adventure.

D&D will be the thing that kills 5E when they move on to 6E, and the announcement of that feels really close. The best hope is to support the community games and continue that legacy and Open 5E rules support. The real light here is Open 5E, and the community ultimately supported the game. I do see potential for an OSE-style version of 5E that simplifies the game while staying math-compatible, streamlines character sheets, and provides a simple experience that remains compatible with 5E adventures. Nimble is the first game of its kind in this genre, and there will be others.

There will be a major OSR-style game that is 5E compatible, keeps the 5E math, yet feels and plays like a traditional OSR game. Shadowdark is close, but not entirely there. There is nothing in this niche now, and it will come. This is probably one of the best hopes for 5E going forward: an OSR system that adopts the math but simplifies play.

My money is on ToV, since they have the best support and community model. As for the other alternative, Level Up A5E, I am still a fan, but it is a niche game that needs an update. The character creation support is also lacking, and doing a character by hand takes me 90 minutes, which is unforgivable when I just want to play. A5E is still a solid, well-built system, but it is an older game that not many know about.

Level Up A5E is the type of game that will sit around in a box in my garage for years, and I will end up sticking with it in the end, since this is the one I always liked the best out of all of them. Design matters. Fixing the inherent problems of 5E matters more than compatibility. Making the game lethal and serious gives the game teeth. While ToV has more books and stuff, Level Up is a smaller game (a bonus) and has far better design. They were not afraid to break compatibility to solve the system's problems.

Level Up A5E may win the "who survives 5E" question for me, after all is said and done. While ToV has the best compatibility among all versions of Open 5E, I have to ask: Is compatibility with a system that offers me little more than a patched 2014 version what I want? Or is a redesigned version of the core game built around the core pillars of play a better deal in the long term?

A5E is still the better game than D&D 2014 (which it directly fixes), ToV (which is a patched 2014), and even D&D 2024 (which A5E eliminates the need for). Design-wise, A5E is still far ahead of the others, since it rebuilds the core to fix the system's flaws. Yes, it is the oldest Open 5E game, but 5E's problems were known a decade ago, and this game fixes almost all of them.

So, to answer the question again?

Yes.

5E does have a future.

The answer depends on your perspective, needs, and whether you are bought into the live-service model of play. It also depends on your willingness to try new things.

BX vs. Castles & Crusades

If there is one universal rule in the hobby, it is that Castles & Crusades beats every other game. C&C is easier than BX, requires less reference during play, and it is a modern set of rules that is backward compatible with any classic adventure you throw at it. The entire game plays from an index card. The characters have depth and a curated collection of modern abilities. The multi-classing in C&C makes nearly infinite combinations of characters to play.

If you want a modern game that does not feel like "walking away from 5E," then Castles & Crusades will make an excellent home for you. The game is still very old-school in its playstyle, resource management, danger, and feel, but very modern in its gameplay mechanics, with a dice roll for any situation that arises.

I still love Old School Essentials! There is a "toy factor" to these books that can't be denied, and I mean that in the best way. For a game this small, compact, and easy to use, having it be so expansive, infinite, and amazingly playable is a masterstroke. If you ever remember the magic of bringing home an NES game cartridge and having the feeling that "an entire world exists in this tiny object," then you understand the true power of Old School Essentials.

The Latin phrase for that is "microcosmus in parvo," and it fits perfectly when holding a copy of Old School Essentials. The universe is reflected in the smallest thing.

When I hold the OSE books, I am holding the universe in my hands, two tiny books, and infinite worlds and possibilities. With C&C, I am back to the "arcane tome" feeling of AD&D, where the books are big, serious, weighty, and scholarly, and arcane guides on how the world works. While the C&C books are each singularly amazing and a masterclass in game design, the OSE books have a "power in the tiny" that is undeniable.

Using the optional tertiary ability score rules in the CKG makes the game feel more modern and gives your character a lot of customization options. I am a super fan of those rules, and they broke the game wide open for me, so I don't feel my characters are making too drastic a trade-off between primary and secondary scores. Now, I get a smooth progression between my primary (12), secondary (15), and tertiary (18) ability scores.

I used to feel my human "survival cleric" lacked in DEX, having her primaries set to CON, CHR, and WIS. With STR and DEX as secondaries (15), and INT as her tertiary (18), I do not feel she is being punished as hard when she wants to balance along a ledge and force open doors.

Chef's kiss.

Seriously, the optional rules in the CKG turn C&C into about five different-feeling games and fix a few of the game's strange-feeling parts (when coming from the OSR), especially when compared to modern rule sets. You will find the game you want in C&C, and it can be a direct superheroic-fantasy replacement of 5E if you want it to be.

With BX, my survival cleric is just a cleric. I hope she has a high STR or DEX score, and that will do the same thing, but the SIEGE Engine invisibly handles the game's "skill system" without requiring one. In C&C, marking an ability score as "primary" tells us, "If this game had a skill system, I spent a lot of skill points in this ability score area." The SIEGE Engine forever fixes D&D 3.5E's massive, bloated, overdone, and cumbersome skill system by designating a few ability scores as primaries, secondaries, and, optionally, teritiaries.

Like Swords & Wizardry's single save number, the SIEGE Engine as a whole is a genius piece of game design. Rarely do we get game mechanics this good that simplify our lives and solve entire overdesigned systems with a simple, clean, and clear rule.

BX is the simpler game, with a more straightforward gameplay loop. If you have the BX gameplay loop down pat and want a modern set of rules? Want characters with something more to them than a few abilities?  Want that 1E feeling without all the complexity? Play C&C.

If you want the classic, tight, almost board-game-like gameplay loop? Play BX. Easier choices, more iconic selections, a game not overconfused by dozens of races and class choices? The rock-solid, core choices and options that make the game a classic? BX all the way, preferably the classic rules. Once you start adding "stuff" to the game, you water it down, confuse the choices, introduce classes that were never a part of the core experience, and you lose something.

You lose the game under a mass of optional stuff that ends up distracting everyone from what was there. It comes off like adding optional expansion boards to Monopoly or Axis & Allies, and all of a sudden, that core, solid, tight game experience becomes muddled, slow, heavy, distracted, and confused.

The original game is lost.

People who knew the original can see the beauty through the chaff, but any modern player will see a weaker version of what they already have in 5E and similar games. If you want modern classes and roles like those in 5E, but you don't want everyone to feel they're lacking powers or iconic class abilities, C&C will be a better fit.

There is an argument that if you play BX, you should play without all the distractions and enjoy the game as it was played back in the day.

Sure, Advanced Fantasy is the more popular game and has the most "stuff" - but an abundance of choices doesn't make a good game. Some can't play without the bard, druid, or ranger, and I am one of those, too. For me, those classes in C&C feel much better and keep other games out of the equation. I am more than happy with the C&C designs, and they fit my vision of what the modern classes should look, feel, and play like.

The BX versions of these classes are weaker and are slow to "come online" with signature powers. In lower-level play, the feeling between playing a fighter and a paladin will not feel like much in BX, where in C&C, those two will feel and play vastly different.

Your class identities are much better represented and feel in C&C than in BX, especially for expansion classes, which in the original game took quite a while to begin to feel and play differently. C&C also lets you houserule in "class skills": if a ranger should know how to do something, you make a SIEGE Engine check on the closest ability score, and do "the thing" on a success.

C&C makes adjudicating "class skills" a part of the system by default. In BX, you will rely on the referee "pass or fail" allowing it, and most of the time, if a ranger knows how to do something, they will just be able to do it (or make an ability score roll for it), and that will be it. C&C starts with the modern notion of the "skill check" and lets the SIEGE Engine drive it all simply and in a unified manner.

But do you prefer a more modern set of rules with ways to handle any situation that comes up? Rules mods that fill up an entire book? Characters with new abilities that unlock as you level? Then, C&C will be better for you. C&C does everything BX does, but with a modern rules framework that stays out of the way and handles much of the heavy lifting for you.

For me?

Castles & Crusades easily replaces 5E for me, as a game that "does anything and everything." This is my 16-bit Genesis console that "brings home the arcade."

OSE is my "game on the go" and daily driver for everything else, being cross-compatible with so many things (and even C&C) that the investment is great for every game I buy. This is my 8-bit NES or Gameboy, the tiny thing I hold in my hand that does so much.

Microcosmus in parvo.

Off the Shelf: Genesys

If you play the Edge Studio Star Wars game, you typically play Genesys. Star Wars is the entry point for this game and provides setting-neutral support for its unique dicing system. For Star Wars, you play Star Wars. For everything else, you play Genesys. This system transplants the cinematic system used in the Star Wars game to other genres, allowing you to use it for anything you can imagine.

These two are sister games, same rules, different dice, and less Star Wars.

This is "Movie: The RPG," the game. Any Hollywood movie from 1920 to about 2019 can be recreated with this system, and it works better than many of today's narrative and storytelling games since the dice leave "what happens" up to you, instead of "telling you what happens" through the rules. I put an end dat of about 2010 on this simulation system since Hollywood has changed so much in the 2020-2026 era that filmmaking is practically unrecognizable and alien compared to earlier times, due to streaming and the collapse of the theater model.

Genesys feels like a forgotten system at this point, with Cypher System feeling like it replaced it (and Cypher System fading), and these days, Daggerheart is the RPG darling of the narrative crowd. This was always in the same sort of narrative simulation systems, such as Cypher System, FATE, Savage Worlds, and other generic systems.

I bounced off Cypher System many times before I finally learned it. It is a good system, but a part of me preferred Genesys, since the dice in Genesys are more solo-friendly than Cypher's GM-driven narrative model, which is honestly better with other people. Daggerheart, I have, but never got into, partially because I have Nimble, which does everything I need for superheroic fantasy.

What I like about Genesys is that you are playing with oracle dice, there is no narrative control system, and you do not need to drop out of character to reference narrative rules and determine outcomes. There are no "hope and fear mechanics." I am not dropping out of character to accept a GM Intrusion (or trigger a Player Intrusion), tripping bennies, nor am I dropping out of character to create a situational aspect.

There is a pair of "story pools" for the GM and players, with each player getting one point and the GM getting one point. When a point is used by either side, it flips to the other. These are mainly used to upgrade dice (positive for players, negative for enemies), to activate talents, or to affect luck and slightly change the narrative (we find a crashed cache of survival gear).

The dice roll tells me "what happens in the world," and I can stay in character to make it happen, or suffer the consequences. It is simple, straightforward, and keeps the action in the "mind space" of the game and in-character" situation.

This is a classic, fun, and elegant system that relies on special dice, and it is the best "special dice" system out there. The pool mechanics are limited, and enforce a currency that flips between the players and the GM.

Weaknesses? Some people get tired of constantly interpreting the special dice symbols. The game does have a fatigue to it if you are constantly rolling the dice for every little thing, and having to look at charts, cancel symbols, and interpret the remaining pool with every single roll. I recommend that dice rolls in this game be used for the macro-level actions: one roll to sneak across the town, avoid guards, and stay out of trouble. Do not roll for every city block, and every action without consequence!

In many cases, just do not roll; let the character's skills and abilities grant automatic success, and only roll when it means something, when there are consequences for failure, or when the path forward is uncertain and potentially dangerous.

Landing your starship at a starport in normal circumstances? No roll needed; that is a routine action and should be covered by your normal training and ability as a pilot. If there were a situation that made it difficult, such as enemy fire or severe weather, roll. But - only if you need to! If the bad weather can't force anything to meaningfully change, then why roll?

"Just to see" is not really a good enough reason.

If there are others being chased by stormtroopers, and you need to stick the landing on the first attempt, or else that group will be stuck down there, playing a desperate defensive last stand, then, yes, roll. If the bad weather just means a sloppy landing, or landing in a far-off, clear spot where no roll is needed, then don't roll. Why? Does it matter?

Before you roll, think of the dice as the director of the scene "on the set" wanting to film "the best movie possible." Does the scene have conflict? Is there an uncertain outcome? Does failure have consequences? Is the scene interesting enough to even film?

If the scene is a nothingburger, assume success and move on to the next scene that the audience does want to see. Why waste film on filler? Why waste a die roll on the same?

Being frugal on your shot selection makes for a great movie.

Being selective in rolling the narrative dice will avoid burnout.

Part of why I fell out with Genesys was GURPS, and GURPS is its own amazing thing that can do anything, too. GURPS tends to enforce a gritty reality on everything it touches, which is amazing to see superimposed over Star Wars or any other "false reality" game (including D&D). However, gritty realism does not always work across genres, and it can dramatically change things.

If I am playing "D&D with GURPS," I can get those moments where a goblin is hit in the leg by an arrow, hobbling around, and bleeding to death. That is a dark, gritty, and hardcore level of reality that is cool to experience in a hyper-realistic system, and it gives a wonderful feeling to "see D&D through realistic glasses."

If I want to play a movie game, GURPS can do that with a few tweaks, but there are times I want to play a narrative, curated experience where the rules have a lot to help me. The dicing system in Genesys is fun and produces unexpected outcomes. This is good stuff, and things that GURPS does not give me without adding oracle dice or other tools.

The system is more weighty than Savage Worlds, FATE, or even Cypher. The dicing is simple, but there is a lot going on behind the scenes, special rules, and sections of the rules to master. Once you get the hang of it, everything runs smoothly, and you can mostly play with just a GM screen reference and be fine. There are fewer "toys" (cards, bennies, tokens) than Savage Worlds, and no XP and per-character pool economy like in Cypher.

Cypher is still a lot easier to convert into, requiring only one challenge number and a few special abilities for monsters (or any challenge). This requires source data and conversion, so it is par for the course for games like GURPS or Savage Worlds.

The real advantage here is that the dice are all oracle dice, and you are not taken out of character to figure out what happens next in the narrative. The flip-flop story pool between the players and GM is an acceptable extra pool to track, and accounts for momentum shifts and narrative control flips.

The characters are also top-notch, with the talent trees being an excellent part of the design, solving the character depth issue in a single page of the character sheet. The characters here are far more fun to build than Cypher or Savage Worlds, with only GURPS beating them in design flexibility.

Dated? Compared to the game-of-the-week that comes out on Kickstarter? Yes, a touch. Clunky? Not really, the narrative dice are the reason to play. VTT support? I haven't seen too much, so that is a minus, but I play solo, so not for me.

The community content on DriveThruRPG is excellent.

If you are playing Star Wars and want to stay in the Star Wars groove while playing in other settings, Genesys will work perfectly. The same types of dice are used here; the mechanics are identical, and there is not much more to learn to play.

This is still a solid generic system; it still holds up, and the solo-play factor is high due to the assistance from the oracle-like dice. A strong recommendation.

Classic Star Wars as the OSR

There is a parallel between Classic Star Wars and the OSR. We have a game, the Edge Studio 2012 Star Wars RPG, still licensed and in print, that feels like it comes from a time before the sequel trilogy. It does, and even though the books have Disney on the covers, the game predates the era, and to be honest, Disney did make a few good Star Wars movies and shows. I would put Rogue One up at the top, and something worthy of being considered canon.

I have to be fair and honest.

The feeling I get when I play the Edge Studio Star Wars game is the same as when I play an OSR game. The memories come back, the feeling is there, and that magic happens. Tooling around the universe as my smuggler, letting the dice fall where they may, and getting myself into all sorts of story trouble feels great, and it comes from a time before modern "story gaming," which has gone so far down the road of an artificial, curated experience that today's narrative games feel manipulative and far too controlling.

Sure, the Star Wars game uses special narrative dice, but they have a charm and mystery that add to the experience without detracting from the narrative flow. I am still interpreting results here, which can get tedious, but the results are up to me, and the game isn't getting in the way and telling me "what happens." There are suggestions, but the decisions on narrative flow are still up to me, and the game has not taken them out of my hands, unlike some narrative games today.

Nor is there a pool mechanic tracking different types of narrative currency. Cypher System has its XP, and Daggerheart has hope and fear. The dice stay a creative tool, up to interpretation, and the results are up to you to determine. Every roll is like an oracle helping you determine the next cinematic result.

Also, this is not a D&D-like game where monsters and NPCs throw their lives away. Like a movie, there is always something else to a fight, and the narrative flow and push-and-pull of the active situation are the real fun here, not killing everything in a room and looting the bodies. Playing a D&D-type dungeon crawl with this game would be less than ideal, while playing a D&D fantasy movie based on characters, a module, or a setting would be a lot more fun.

There is a generic version of this system called Genesys, ideal for other settings with the same rules but slightly different dice. This one is also still in print and great fun for simulating that classic "Hollywood" movie experience from the 1920s to about 2010. There is an innocence to this game that many other generic narrative-driven games lack. The dice are intended to be "tools of imagination" like a set of oracle dice, and most everything from that point is left up to you.

You are not pushing and pulling narrative-currency pools against a referee. The game isn't telling you exactly what happens. You are not triggering boss abilities by rolling badly. You are not asking the players to "take an intrusion" in exchange for narrative currency.

You roll the dice.

They produce a result.

Your imagination takes it from there.

The rules stop here, and the narrative outcome remains in-game, feeding into the next situation. You are not tracking pools or stepping out of the game, into player or GM-mode, and making narrative flow choices based on an artificial rules framework. Oh, something cool happens: my blaster hits a nearby stack of clay pots, and they collapse onto the group of stormtroopers, allowing us a chance to make a break for it. Nothing in the pools has changed. No rule is activated. No special encounter ability has been triggered. Nothing on my character sheet is activated by my good-guy narrative pool. No player intrusion needed to be triggered by spending an XP.

Genesys uses the same dice, but with slightly different symbols. The Star Wars game comes with loads of "Star Wars toys," so it is a better experience for playing in that universe and for having classic, OSR-style throwback stories and adventures based on movie-like experiences.

I don't have to drop out of my character's head a moment and figure out what rule or ability was triggered. This is key. This is what keeps Genesys and Star Wars a cut above many other modern narrative games. You play the game with oracle dice, and you are not dropping out of character to reference the narrative flow rules.

The dice give me direction on what happens in the world.

And it happens.

I stay in character.

We move on to the next scene.

Playing classic Star Wars stories with the special dice feels like an old-school game to me. I am firing blasters, evading enemies,  shooting the controls to a blast door to try to get it to close, and doing all sorts of other "space hero" stuff that I can't get in a traditional OSR game. The OSR has this spreadsheet math going on when combat happens, and combat is typically a failure condition, so combat is punishing and to be avoided whenever possible. The moral and reaction roll rules in the OSR mitigate the "to the death" combat math.

In Star Wars? Combat is dangerous, but also a part of the film. In many ways, combat is fun and cinematic, as my character runs across a street with blaster bolts flying by, trading shots with stormtroopers, and figuring out "how to get out of this mess."

This is clearly in the realm of "combat is fun" narrative action games. If I want realism, I have GURPS. To live in this "movie reality," then Star Wars and Genesys work very well and provide that curated, action-oriented, popcorn-gaming experience.

And I can keep Classic Star Wars apart in my mind from the modern era, and in fact, treating the Classic era as an OSR-type experience helps me return to the fun, and put the not-always-so-good present in perspective. I still need to be fair and give new things a chance, since this is a licensed game and it will never replace new stuff that happens to be good.

But for classic throwback Star Wars romps and tales of two-fisted and blaster-firing adventure that bring me back to my childhood? This is good stuff. It makes me happy the way the OSR and BX do.

Gaming should transport us to a different world, a feeling, or a moment in time when times were good and the world looked infinite and full of possibilities.

This does that for me.