Psion
Adventurer
European Commonwealth
European Commonwealth is a "chamber book" supplement describing one of the chambers of the Archer Conspiracy for the Shadowforce Archer setting for AEG's Spycraft game. The European Commonwealth is a synthesis of old-school European power brokers and younger criminal elements that is nominally in league with the multi-national watchdog group that is the Archer Conspiracy.
A First Look
European Commonwealth is a 128 page perfect-bound softcover book priced at $24.95. This is a reasonable price for a d20 System product of this size and format.
The cover of the book has the black background common to all Shadowforce Archer series books. The cover has a depiction of a woman in a tight-fitting outfit illustrated by Veronica V. Jones.
The interior is black-and-white and is illustrated by Ilya Astrakhan and Richard Polland, who are fairly new to the Spycraft scene. The style of the art in the book is more realistic and detailed than many Spycraft books that went before, and I generally prefer the crisper style.
The book has fairly compact leader space and body text and has single spaced paragraphs, delivering a decent amount of content for the money.
A Deeper Look
European Commonwealth has an arrangement similar to prior chamber books. There is an introductory fiction section followed by four game content chapters: Campaign, Agent, New Rules, and Chamber.
The Campaign chapter provides some "current events" type material (including a mock headlines page) detailing some developments in the Shadowforce Archer world (in particular, in Europe), such as major flooding in Paris. The chapter then provides a number of missions associated with these events, including a multiple variations or complications that the GM can provide for each. More details and game statistics for the associated threats are provided later in the Chamber chapter. (Though this is common between the chamber book, it always seemed odd to me that they didn't put the missions and associated threat statistics in the same place.)
The second chapter, Agent, describes the European Commonwealth subsetting of the Shadowforce Archer setting. The EC setting is supposed to approximate classical European espionage, rife with political power plays, criminal enterprises, and paranoid thrillers. Resouces in the chapter include GM advice on running games in Europe, resources available to agents of the EC, and prominent enemies of the commonwealth.
The third chapter provides new rules, including new departments, classes, skill uses, feats, and gear.
The new departments are celebrity and recruitment, appropriate to the nature of the high profile high stakes political games of the EC.
The book provides a new 20 level base class (as I am told all chamber books are intended to), the Spin Doctor. The Spin Doctor are masters at manipulating information and opinions. The Spin Doctor's core ability is doublespeak, which allows the character to spend an action dice to shift the target's disposition towards the character by one rank. Other class abilities allow the spin doctor to manipulate opinions in other ways.
I am a bit unconvinced that the spin doctor deserved a base class. On the plus side, the class abilities rules are extensive (more extensive than is typical for a Spycraft NPC class), allowing the GM to model such public manipulation in the game more readily than a less thorough treatment might allow. However, it seems to me that few players would desire such a role and most NPCs that fall into this role might only warrant an NPC class.
There are four prestige classes described in European Commonwealth:
-Accuser: This is a role specific to the European Commonwealth. Accusers are essentially "internal affairs" investigators of the Archer Conspiracy, a charge given to the Commonwealth. The Accuser is a 5-level class; similar to some other 5 level classes, the class retains some class skills of its former classes in addition to its class abilities.
-Assassin: This class actually represents members of an ancient cult of Assassins that has been a foe of the Guardians of the Whispering Knife (another Archer chamber); the class has many mystical underpinnings and abilities
-Illuminati: Illuminati are, as you might guess, descendants of an ancient cabal that wields political power from behind the scenes. The illuminati's class abilities help them plant moles, manipulate people, and deflect suspicion. Fnord!
-Intruder: Intruders are infiltration and combat experts specially trained by Fade and given the physical adept serum to heighten their abilities.
Perhaps befitting the power-brokering nature of the setting, several skills receive a number of new uses in the rules chapter: bureaucracy, diplomacy, innuendo, and perform. Bureaucracy receives the most attention, adding DCs and modifiers for a number of tasks such as bribery and obstruction through official channels.
The chapter provides new fringe and style feats. Fringe feats include Momentary Lapse of Reason (Pink Floyd fan, anyone?), which allows the user to use Fringescript to interfere with the target's memory (uh, fnord?)
Many of the style feats are especially appropriate for celebrities and other public figures, such as Action Hero (allows you to spend an action point to add half of your perform ranks to a number of physical skills), Famous, Gorgeous, Groupies, Hollywood Star, and Political Clout. This selection of feats is especially attractive to some faceman characters.
New psionic skills are all telepathic and emphasize subtlety and infiltration. Aegis, for example, allows the psion to conceal psionic abilities and resist brainwashing and torture. Dark Corners allows the user to scan a target for strong emotions that can be exploited to manipulate the victim.
Supporting the subgenre's emphasis on charismatic public figures, two new rules sections are provided. Presence rules allows a character with the Jet Setter feat to use their reputation and charisma (and action points) to influence others in special ways, such as dazzling them, awing them, rallying them with a stirring speech, seducing them, or soliciting special privileges.
In addition, the normal disposition grades are expanded here to represent new levels of disposition beyond those described in the d20 System rules. Above ally are now fanatic and worshipper, while below adversary are hateful and obsessive.
In addition to these rules items are a number of new gadgets, vehicles, and bundles, NPC classes, some notes on Room 39's "shadownet", and a sidebar detailing a major figure in the EC and revealing something that Shadowforce Archer fans might have been curious about...
The final chapter, Chamber, provides some more concrete information on the history structure of the European Commonwealth chamber. The EC is actually composed of two loosely tied chambers. The mysterious Fade heads up a tribal union of criminal elements, while the Gemeinschaft Consortium is an secret political alliance with its roots deep in Europe's past.
The chamber chapter also includes NPC statistics for chamber figures, threats for the earlier missions, a "hook sheet" with adventure ideas surrounding a sunken u-boat, and chase maps for Prague and Monaco.
Conclusion
While I don't find the European Commonwealth to be one of the more fascinating chamber books to date (that would be Pan Asian Collective), I do find it to be one of the more convincing elements of the Archer Conspiracy.
The rules elements are generally well executed. As stated, I am not sure that the Spin Doctor deserved core class treatment. However, I found the feat selection would support faceman type characters and interaction and political driven games rather well and are some of the more convincing candidates for inclusion in a generic Spycraft espionage game.
Though the new rules elements and skill use elements aren't perhaps as useful as those in the Pointman/Fixer Class Guide, they also have a lot to offer to a game based on personal influence, and along with the new feats are compelling for faceman characters.
Overall Grade: B
-Alan D. Kohler
European Commonwealth is a "chamber book" supplement describing one of the chambers of the Archer Conspiracy for the Shadowforce Archer setting for AEG's Spycraft game. The European Commonwealth is a synthesis of old-school European power brokers and younger criminal elements that is nominally in league with the multi-national watchdog group that is the Archer Conspiracy.
A First Look
European Commonwealth is a 128 page perfect-bound softcover book priced at $24.95. This is a reasonable price for a d20 System product of this size and format.
The cover of the book has the black background common to all Shadowforce Archer series books. The cover has a depiction of a woman in a tight-fitting outfit illustrated by Veronica V. Jones.
The interior is black-and-white and is illustrated by Ilya Astrakhan and Richard Polland, who are fairly new to the Spycraft scene. The style of the art in the book is more realistic and detailed than many Spycraft books that went before, and I generally prefer the crisper style.
The book has fairly compact leader space and body text and has single spaced paragraphs, delivering a decent amount of content for the money.
A Deeper Look
European Commonwealth has an arrangement similar to prior chamber books. There is an introductory fiction section followed by four game content chapters: Campaign, Agent, New Rules, and Chamber.
The Campaign chapter provides some "current events" type material (including a mock headlines page) detailing some developments in the Shadowforce Archer world (in particular, in Europe), such as major flooding in Paris. The chapter then provides a number of missions associated with these events, including a multiple variations or complications that the GM can provide for each. More details and game statistics for the associated threats are provided later in the Chamber chapter. (Though this is common between the chamber book, it always seemed odd to me that they didn't put the missions and associated threat statistics in the same place.)
The second chapter, Agent, describes the European Commonwealth subsetting of the Shadowforce Archer setting. The EC setting is supposed to approximate classical European espionage, rife with political power plays, criminal enterprises, and paranoid thrillers. Resouces in the chapter include GM advice on running games in Europe, resources available to agents of the EC, and prominent enemies of the commonwealth.
The third chapter provides new rules, including new departments, classes, skill uses, feats, and gear.
The new departments are celebrity and recruitment, appropriate to the nature of the high profile high stakes political games of the EC.
The book provides a new 20 level base class (as I am told all chamber books are intended to), the Spin Doctor. The Spin Doctor are masters at manipulating information and opinions. The Spin Doctor's core ability is doublespeak, which allows the character to spend an action dice to shift the target's disposition towards the character by one rank. Other class abilities allow the spin doctor to manipulate opinions in other ways.
I am a bit unconvinced that the spin doctor deserved a base class. On the plus side, the class abilities rules are extensive (more extensive than is typical for a Spycraft NPC class), allowing the GM to model such public manipulation in the game more readily than a less thorough treatment might allow. However, it seems to me that few players would desire such a role and most NPCs that fall into this role might only warrant an NPC class.
There are four prestige classes described in European Commonwealth:
-Accuser: This is a role specific to the European Commonwealth. Accusers are essentially "internal affairs" investigators of the Archer Conspiracy, a charge given to the Commonwealth. The Accuser is a 5-level class; similar to some other 5 level classes, the class retains some class skills of its former classes in addition to its class abilities.
-Assassin: This class actually represents members of an ancient cult of Assassins that has been a foe of the Guardians of the Whispering Knife (another Archer chamber); the class has many mystical underpinnings and abilities
-Illuminati: Illuminati are, as you might guess, descendants of an ancient cabal that wields political power from behind the scenes. The illuminati's class abilities help them plant moles, manipulate people, and deflect suspicion. Fnord!
-Intruder: Intruders are infiltration and combat experts specially trained by Fade and given the physical adept serum to heighten their abilities.
Perhaps befitting the power-brokering nature of the setting, several skills receive a number of new uses in the rules chapter: bureaucracy, diplomacy, innuendo, and perform. Bureaucracy receives the most attention, adding DCs and modifiers for a number of tasks such as bribery and obstruction through official channels.
The chapter provides new fringe and style feats. Fringe feats include Momentary Lapse of Reason (Pink Floyd fan, anyone?), which allows the user to use Fringescript to interfere with the target's memory (uh, fnord?)
Many of the style feats are especially appropriate for celebrities and other public figures, such as Action Hero (allows you to spend an action point to add half of your perform ranks to a number of physical skills), Famous, Gorgeous, Groupies, Hollywood Star, and Political Clout. This selection of feats is especially attractive to some faceman characters.
New psionic skills are all telepathic and emphasize subtlety and infiltration. Aegis, for example, allows the psion to conceal psionic abilities and resist brainwashing and torture. Dark Corners allows the user to scan a target for strong emotions that can be exploited to manipulate the victim.
Supporting the subgenre's emphasis on charismatic public figures, two new rules sections are provided. Presence rules allows a character with the Jet Setter feat to use their reputation and charisma (and action points) to influence others in special ways, such as dazzling them, awing them, rallying them with a stirring speech, seducing them, or soliciting special privileges.
In addition, the normal disposition grades are expanded here to represent new levels of disposition beyond those described in the d20 System rules. Above ally are now fanatic and worshipper, while below adversary are hateful and obsessive.
In addition to these rules items are a number of new gadgets, vehicles, and bundles, NPC classes, some notes on Room 39's "shadownet", and a sidebar detailing a major figure in the EC and revealing something that Shadowforce Archer fans might have been curious about...
The final chapter, Chamber, provides some more concrete information on the history structure of the European Commonwealth chamber. The EC is actually composed of two loosely tied chambers. The mysterious Fade heads up a tribal union of criminal elements, while the Gemeinschaft Consortium is an secret political alliance with its roots deep in Europe's past.
The chamber chapter also includes NPC statistics for chamber figures, threats for the earlier missions, a "hook sheet" with adventure ideas surrounding a sunken u-boat, and chase maps for Prague and Monaco.
Conclusion
While I don't find the European Commonwealth to be one of the more fascinating chamber books to date (that would be Pan Asian Collective), I do find it to be one of the more convincing elements of the Archer Conspiracy.
The rules elements are generally well executed. As stated, I am not sure that the Spin Doctor deserved core class treatment. However, I found the feat selection would support faceman type characters and interaction and political driven games rather well and are some of the more convincing candidates for inclusion in a generic Spycraft espionage game.
Though the new rules elements and skill use elements aren't perhaps as useful as those in the Pointman/Fixer Class Guide, they also have a lot to offer to a game based on personal influence, and along with the new feats are compelling for faceman characters.
Overall Grade: B
-Alan D. Kohler
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