Anybody have experience with Hunter: The Reckoning?

[Rel]

In the near future I'm going to crank up a solo campaign of Hunter: The Reckoning for my wife who like to game but never gets a chance (she's home with the little one while I go to Game Night). I've run White Wolf games before (mostly Mage) but I figured I'd ask if anybody had any experiences to share regarding Hunter.

I'm shooting for a feel somewhere along the lines of the show Medium mixed with the Anita Blake books by Laurel K. Hamilton in case any of you are familiar with those settings. My wife's character is going to be a psychic who occasionally helps out the police when they do investigations, particularly when they involve the supernatural. This will of course lead to her getting involved in Things That Man Was Not Meant To Know (tm) and ultimately various sorts of mayhem. Also possibly hijinks.

One variance with the base Hunter setting (in case it matters) is that there will be much less of a "veil" between the supernatural critters and the "mortals". Most people don't know or associate with Vampires, Werewolves, Ghosts and Goblins but they know they exist and there are certain places in the city where you're likely to see one. I plan to play up the often violent power politics inherent in these groups of supernatural folks and the alliances and associations necessary for survival in such an environment (also lots of sex).

So anyway, if you've got any insights to the ups and downs of this system I'd be interested in hearing them.

 

[JoeGKushner]

I never got too deep into it, but did have several of the books like Avenger, Defender, and some of the 'off' caste.

Your idea sounds like it may require some additional work on the various breeds of Hunter. Is she going to be standard power or ?

Which books do you have access to?

 

[Mercule]

I ran a one-shot last Halloween (2003). It was fun. It puts a significantly different spin on a lot of the existing WoD tropes, so you can catch old players a bit by surprise (double plus good).

Otherwise, about the only thing I can say is that the power level is slightly lower. Most PCs seem to have one or two things they do well, but they aren't gods.

 

[Rel]

I never got too deep into it, but did have several of the books like Avenger, Defender, and some of the 'off' caste.

Your idea sounds like it may require some additional work on the various breeds of Hunter. Is she going to be standard power or ?

Which books do you have access to?

I've got the main book and a couple of the "Creed Books" including Avenger and Visionary and I think one other. Her character is going to be a Visionary and have some of the psychic/psycokinetic powers to see the future and get impressions off of objects. She's made her to be a fairly good balance between smart/aware of the supernatural and decent at combat. I'm not going to throw her right up against a Vampire or Werewolf out of the gate in terms of combat.

I plan for the campaign to focus on her involvement with various mysteries that brush up against the domain of the supernatural critters and let her tangle with their minions/thralls/ghouls and such. Her interactions with the "big boys" will be mostly non-violent and if she makes the right alliances they'll probably steer away from attacking her outright in most cases.

 

[Berandor]

I used Hunter to replay "Sleepy Hollow" for my little brother. Worked really well (set in a Amish city in contemporary times), and afterwards we went to see the film.

 

[Umbran]

I found that Hunter worked very well for people who were unfamiliar with the other WoD games, but that Hunter lost a great deal when the players had soem ideas of what was going on in the WW universe (even when I wasn't playing the rest of WW by the book). Hunter really depends upon player ignorance to create a sense of mystery.

I think much of the power of the setting is lost when everybody already knows that supernatural creatures exist, and you may have some problems justifying the existance of Hunters at all in such a setting. YMMV.

 

[Tinner]

For the kind of game you're talking about, IMO you'd be better served picking up a copy of the old WW book "Hunter's Hunted" which dealt with normal mortals & psychics vs. the superatural. "Hunter's Hunted" has more of an Anita Blake feel than H:tR IMO.
H:tR is very different in scope, dealing with normal people suddenly gifted with the powers to purge monsters from the world. The Visionaries especialy are very mch "guided by voices". The archetypal characters for the Visionary creed all wind up going mad, and being consumed with their new powers!
The Reckoning is great if you want to explore themes of alienation, inhmanity, etc. But if you're after more of a detective type story, I hink you'd do better with HH, or even d20 Modern.
YMMV.

 

[Rel]

For the kind of game you're talking about, IMO you'd be better served picking up a copy of the old WW book "Hunter's Hunted" which dealt with normal mortals & psychics vs. the superatural. "Hunter's Hunted" has more of an Anita Blake feel than H:tR IMO.

Well I just googled it and the good news is that I could get a copy off of Amazon for as little as $1.89. The bad news is that the reviews for this book were all "mediocre at best" and went downhill from there.

I considered using d20 Modern for this campaign but after reading through Hunter I felt like it was tailor made for the type of campaign and story I was looking to run. I'll have to give this some further thought.

I do think that the sort of character she is going to play is a mitigating factor in the whole "PC's as near gods" issue that I've seen with many of the WoD games (Mage in particular). She's not going to have a lot of supernatural abilities to kick total butt and will largely rely upon her skills and savvy for prevailing against the bad guys. She will of course have her Conviction to help her when the chips are down and that's what will separate her from the "mere mortals".

I appreciate the replys so far. They've been thought provoking. I'd love to hear more.

 

[Tinner]

Yeah, I should have said that HH was a mixed bag. It's a WoD 1st edition product too ...
Sorry, that's what I get for posting while getting ready for work!
If you like the H:tR system for the game, by all means, use it.
You might want to look at some of the supplemental books though for more help. The Player's Guide (which are usually useless in WW games) actually has quite a bit of useful info for running a more low powered game.
The enemy books are excellent as well, despite being mostly fiction and little crunch. Walking Dead was excellent, Nocturnal was good, the others are a mixed bag.
You might also want to look at the Mind's Eye Theater books, Laws of the Reckoning, and Laws of the Hunt (both the two blue covers, and the newer red cover). The rules aren't likely to be useful for a tabletop game, but there are a lot of interesting tidbits throughout those books as well. I do have to say that a Hunters setting does work VERY well for a LARPtoo. I ran a Reckoning LARP for two years using house rules before they actually published the MET system book.

 

[Rel]

You might also want to look at the Mind's Eye Theater books, Laws of the Reckoning, and Laws of the Hunt (both the two blue covers, and the newer red cover). The rules aren't likely to be useful for a tabletop game, but there are a lot of interesting tidbits throughout those books as well. I do have to say that a Hunters setting does work VERY well for a LARPtoo. I ran a Reckoning LARP for two years using house rules before they actually published the MET system book.

Good call. I did mention something to her about LARPing the sex parts.