D20 Gamma World or Darwin's World

[C. Baize]

The mutations in D20 Future are interesting... Perhaps not the best I've seen... perhaps not the worst... They might be worth converting over to your favorite PA game (DW2).

 

[Kanegrundar]

My whole veiwpoint on GW is that there is no way that future revisions will make everyone happy. This new version is fine by me, I'm just not a fan of the representation. The PHB didn't do it for me, I thought the follow-through was poorly done. (Mutants and Machines was much MUCH better.) However, my favorite part of past editions was my first GW character, a sentient mutant cactus. Great fun, but the last two editions didn't give me what I wanted in the way of creating mutant plant characters. I've seen numerous arguements about this or that being left out against GW. It's simply one of those games that there is so much history with it that whenever a new edition comes out the publishers are fighting an uphill battle against the pre-conceived notions of the players.

Kane

 

[zero skill LPB]

I'm a dual-owner of GW and DW and I find useful and enjoyable bits in both product lines. If I had to make a choice between the two I'd go with DW for a few reasons.

• GW seemed to hit End of Life simultaneous with its release. DW, on the other hand, is ALIVE with regular doses of errata, free enhancements, and new material.

• GW content feels uneven. I understand the need and especially the desire to take submissions from many talented sources, but there are many crunchy-bit areas that appear to have escaped the editor's smoothing-out influence. DW feels internally consist and competently edited.

• GW has (at best) a lackluster web presence. The Sword & Sorcery web site is clunky and their forums, well, their forums suck. Bad. Whatsmore, the GW-specific pages were orphaned even before the second book in the product line was released. In contrast, the RPG Objects site friggin rules! I purchased the DW PDFs through rpgnow, created an account on the RPG Objects site after some gentle prodding, and am now informed when updates (a.k.a. FREEBIES) are made available.

So, yeah. Good stuff from both camps, but DW wins the cage match.

 

[Krieg]

You've GOT to be kidding me.... That attitude, in and of itself is enough to prevent me from purchasing any GW D20 products.

I can attest that at least some of Nisarq's comments have truth to them. Bruce did state that he wanted to follow a different path with this version of GW. There were also comments made that WoTC had at least some influence on that decision in that they specifically wanted a version that was not rehash of what has gone before.

Add to that some of the most virulent flame wars I have seen between consumers and some of the individuals involved with the game and you have a pretty ugly picture. For the record although Bruce is not entirely without blame he did not participate in most of the ugliness as he was in absentia due to health problems (which thankfully he seems to ahve gotten the better of now).

Add me to the list of folks who feel that the GW PHB was an unqualified mess. It ranks right up there with Mongoose's Conan as having the worst editing of any D20 product I have purchased to date. It was a book in which different authors were tasked with seperate parts of the book and it shows, it reads as a cobbled together mishmash rather than a cohesive whole.

The follow on books are of much higher quality. Unfortunately the problems with the first book coupled with the vitriol displayed by some of the authors (to be fair some of it was in response to severely unjustified personal attacks made against them in reaction to the GW PHB) and the feel of a money grab by WW/SS in how the series was handled turned me off to the whole mess.

Darwin's World is by no means perfect, but it does a far better job of providing the necessary tools for those interested in creating their own "6th Ed" Gamma World campaign.


BTW has anyone taken a look at the 3rd edition of Mutazoids for D20?
...and if so how does it compare?