[SPYCRAFT 2.0] How does it play?

[GlassJaw]

Because reading the book is pretty intense.

I've recently rediscovered my Spycraft 2.0 book. I've had it for a while but only skimmed it in the past. I'm now going back and reading it more in-depth. I really like what I see but the vast amount of "stuff" is a little overwhelming, and I tend to like crunchy rulesets.

It's not a case of "math is hard" with the rules - just that there's a ton of them. I've never played or run the system but it seems like it would be really difficult to keep track of everything and not forget things.

I'd like to hear some thoughts on those that have experience running or playing the system. Thanks.

 

[Henry]

If you learn to cut out and streamline the parts that bog you down, it's awesome. For me, that was the dozens of special damages and conditions in the combat chapter (like fire damage vs. light damage vs. stress damage vs. electrical damage, and the things like sprawled vs. prone vs. crouched vs. leaning vs. standing, etc.) I found many neat innovations, and loved how they did away with Op-attacks, but replaced it with penalties to attacks and Defense and Dex bonuses - this one thing streamlined everything from firing a gun at a guy you're in melee with, to grappling, to bull rushes, etc.

The Feats are a Strategic player's delight, as the names are innovative, and the feats themselves give you many and varied bonuses, from combat related feats, all the way down to role-play oriented feats. A player could pick 20 levels worth of feats and still not have to step on a combat feat, there's so freaking much.

Combats play about as well as any other d20 game I've seen - faster than D&D, but slower than Mutants and masterminds, if you're looking for a gauge. Action is high-octane by default, with dozens of options in the GM chapter on changing the feel from super-spy to hard sci-fi, to comic book to wild western, to zombie horror.

I created and ran a Convention Demo of Spycraft 2.0 based on the Movie Equilibrium. One character was a turncoat Gun-Kata Cleric, the others of the team were Spec-ops type rebels fighting to destroy the drug-dispensing centers from the Movie. They were the ones who set the charges in the movie, and on the way they discovered the secret to a cache of sense-memory material, which included things from Raggedy-Ann dolls to D&D boxed sets. Because it was Spycraft, the Grammaton Cleric could be cool, AND the other PCs could shine as well both in combat and out. My Thanks to Morganstern for the Grammaton Cleric conversion, because that conversion made him feel perfect. While the others were raking with autofire, slicing networks, and driving with supreme skill (using the game's chase rules), the Cleric was dancing around the battlefield, taking no penalties, putting bullets in the heads of mooks like a lethal ballet-dancer. Awesome, awesome game.

And Awesome, Awesome, rules set. If it weren't so cluttered with the extra fires and conditions, I'd call it one of the top 5 d20 versions of all time, and one of the top 10 role playing games of all time.

 

[Psion]

I've run multiple con and gameday games and am currently running a home campaign. I do think that there are some hurdles to overcome, but it's bark is worse than it's bite. Here are some observations.

Gear, though simplified from 1.0, is still a task that can consume some time if the players aren't familiar, and/or you have limited copies of the book to pass around. I recommend that if you find yourself in the situation of running a con game, you pre-do gear picks.

In my home game, though gear picks still take some time, its often an interesting group activity in which they can plan a bit of strategy.

Some players don't grok the gadget system AT ALL. You might work up some recommended gadgets (or borrow some from the LSpy adventures) to make it easier for those sorts.


I'm currently running with "omnicompetent" quality turned on, as it dispenses with passive and secret skill checks and result caps. Once the players soak up things like threats and errors, I'll probably turn that off. (Result caps don't do much for me, but I like the passive and secret check conventions.)

I'm not currently using fluid initiative and don't use it during con games in which I have mostly newbies, but plan to use it eventually in my home game. Fluid initiative doesn't work well with initiative cards, my classical method of initiative tracking; I have a magnetic initiative board that I use for spycraft instead and should make things easier once we start using fluid initiative.

Those are the biggies I try to work around. There are, of course, lots of options that really don't amount to much if you never use them. I try to throw those in wherever I think it appropriate or interesting. In addition to chases, I've had hacking, interrogation and seduction dramatic conflicts. I have yet to use stress damage in my home game, but next session, I plan to throw in a few stress inducing events, such as a villain with the Glint of Madness feat and a villain that uses the stand off action.

 

[atomn]

I agree about the gear comments. When I played that hurt the game greatly because the session would stop for a long while as each person leafed through the pages of gadgets. If I was running a game I would drop the mechanical aspects that are listed in the book, let the players describe what they want and give it to them if they are high enough level to warrant it. Usually I like rules but gearing up took so much time that the game suffered.

I also very much disliked the Dramatic Conflict system. Perhaps it was the way it was run but instead of being a descriptive, cinematic scene it was just rolling dice and looking at the results. Again it was a big part of the system that bogged down the pace of the game without adding anything interesting.

 

[solkan_uk]

The gear system isn't the bugbear a lot of people seem to think it is. When running off the .pdf gearing up doesn't take too long and if you've not got a book yet I'd recommend hanging fire until the 2nd printing is out (which also has the revised gear tables).

I'd say it's not for everyone - personally I'm a rules person, I have some overbearing players and I like having the rules as a screen to protect me from them, I like having consistent resolutions to things - on the odd occasion when I want to run something fast and loose I use Savage Worlds or Exalted, when I want to run a serious game I use Spycraft.

 

[GlassJaw]

Good info so far. Pretty much what I thought. I'm just going to keep reading and hope to absorb as much as possible.

Has anyone tried the Back to Basics system? I generally like the basic class mechanic and I really like how BtB is similar to Grim Tales. At the same time, the Spycraft base classes are really cool. I usually don't like archetype class systems but this is the first system I can remember in a long time that I do. Just wondering what the pros and cons of each class system are.

Also, has anyone experimented with using the Grim Tales magic system? I bought the Channeler pdf but I'm not sure if it's what I'm looking for. It's actually too much magic for the concept I have in mind.

 

[Victim]

Our group found the gear system slow too. Trying to come up with a plan and the gear to support it can be a big hassle which requires flipping back and forth from the gear to charts to the detailed descriptions. I would definitely go for pretty much all preassigned mission gear.

Dramatic Conflicts seemed like a mixed blessing. They probably can make things too much an exercise in die rolling without good descriptions - and some of the mechanics don't seem to match all that well with descriptions, so a more fluid style seems good. Also, sometimes the modifier/result mix tends to favor certain actions strongly, so the conflict can sometimes result in both sides spamming their ideal strategy. Also, the conflict rules don't really seem to involve the whole group, which is part, I think, of what generally makes combat centric games successful: it's easy for everyone to participate, especially if the system spreads around combat ability. If there's Dramatic Conflict X going on, each side can generally pick only 1 strategy. So most of the players aren't really invovled in the conflict.

Some conflicts, such as chases, can also easily be seconded to combat. A chase can just be a firefight in a moving box (and with 1 PC needing to drive): destroy the other vehicles or kill their personel and you win. Sometimes it will actually be better to lose or forfeit the chase and just fight conventionally.

 

[Henry]

Good info so far. Pretty much what I thought. I'm just going to keep reading and hope to absorb as much as possible.

That's about it - just keep plugging away until the stuff starts gelling. As always, making sample characters at different levels also lets some of the neater concepts come together, I've found.

Has anyone tried the Back to Basics system? I generally like the basic class mechanic and I really like how BtB is similar to Grim Tales. At the same time, the Spycraft base classes are really cool. I usually don't like archetype class systems but this is the first system I can remember in a long time that I do. Just wondering what the pros and cons of each class system are.

I have it, and like it, but I think I'd stick with the Spycraft classes as-is. If nothing else, I'd probably rob Back to Basics to stick into Modern or Grim Tales!

Also, has anyone experimented with using the Grim Tales magic system? I bought the Channeler pdf but I'm not sure if it's what I'm looking for. It's actually too much magic for the concept I have in mind.

Yes, quite a bit. It's a very "magic-dangerous system"; on average, casters will only be casting 4 or 5 1st and 2nd level spells every few days. It uses ability damage to gauge your spell exhaustion (CON if untrained, STR and then CON if trained). Some have suggested using it as nonlethal damage instead of ability damage; if so, the casters will be casting several spells per day, but the end effect is the same (they don't cast any more, but they collapse from exhaustion, instead of out of fear that they'll drain themselves to death!)

 

[Insight]

Spycraft isn't for every player or every GM. In order to play or run Spycraft, you need to be able to escape from the standard d20 tropes, especially where concerns the flow of an adventure. Modern/spy games are not fantasy games, and those who seek to get the most out of Spycraft would do well to remember that.

I agree with much of the above. You should definitely ease your players into some of the more esoteric or rules-heavy aspects of the system. Especially gear, which can be a bear, certainly if you don't have enough books to go around.

What I did with a group of new players was to start their characters at 6th level. It gave them a sense of what the game could be like without overwhelming the players with options. I probably should have chosen their gear ahead of time, but I wanted the players to get a sense of what Spycraft is like, and part of the game is picking your gear. Given my experience, I highly recommend choosing gear before the session.

The nice thing about Spycraft is its modularity. Add stuff, remove stuff, change stuff. It's unlikely you're going to break anything with the changes you make. In fact, the game designers encourage you to tinker with the system to create the game you want. Spycraft doesn't have to be used in conjunction with a straight espionage game either; the GC section has options and ideas for using the Spycraft system in Horror, Action, Fantasy, Post-Apocalyptic, and Future games.

 

[Psion]

Dramatic Conflicts seemed like a mixed blessing. They probably can make things too much an exercise in die rolling without good descriptions - and some of the mechanics don't seem to match all that well with descriptions, so a more fluid style seems good. Also, sometimes the modifier/result mix tends to favor certain actions strongly, so the conflict can sometimes result in both sides spamming their ideal strategy. Also, the conflict rules don't really seem to involve the whole group, which is part, I think, of what generally makes combat centric games successful: it's easy for everyone to participate, especially if the system spreads around combat ability.

While that's true, I find Dramatic Conflicts to be the solution to the problem instead of the problem.

I recall old systems like Cyberpunk where everyone else in the game just sat around while the netrunner did his thing. And really, there's not much you can do about that... that's a sort of conflict that tends to only involve one player (with possible helpers).

But I found that using the hacking cards gave the player and GM some guidance when resolving the hack, and streamlined it compared to ad hoccing it or, conversely, using one of those old baroque map-style systems. The only way you can improve it is really in the GMs court -- create situations in which the hack and the combat are ongoing at the same time.

The same applies to infiltrations. If you have a situation where one player infiltrates and area, you can use the Dramatic Conflict system, but if the whole team enters, you can play it out on a map and with roleplaying.

Of course the book recommends that you can streamline some dramatic conflicts into skill rolls. That's what you should be doing if you really find they are getting in the way.