Psion
Adventurer
Faceman/Snoop Class Guide
The Faceman/Snoop Class Guide is the third and presumably final
book in a series of supplement books for AEG's Spycraft game
providing additional options and details for the games core classes, in this case the Faceman and the Snoop. The book is written by Alexander Flagg and Clayton A. Oliver, with additional material by Scott Gearin and Patrick Kapera.
A First Look
Format: 128-page perfect-bound softcover. $24.95.
Art: As per most books in the line, the cover art is a monochrome
picture, in this case a woman in a nice dress pulling up information on a virtual 3d computer screen. The interior is black-and-white, illustrated by Paul H. Way. The pictures are mostly well-done genre-appropriate line art, though some looks a bit comical.
Layout: Two columns with conservative body font text and moderate leader space and single-spaced paragraphs. Mostly clear and readable, with nicely laid-out tables.
A Deeper Look
The book is organized into four chapters: prestige classes, new rules, investigation, and the intelligence guide.
The Spycraft game makes extensive use of the prestige class mechanic to make more specialized characters within the basic classes, and this book is no exception. The classes are primarily those appropriate to snoops or facemen. Facemen might become members of the heartbreaking cassanova prestige class, take over other people's identity and lives as a doppleganger, a diplomatic negotiator, an in-the-know networker, and a manipulative politico. The snoop on the other hand might find their investigative skills best put to work as a bounty hunter, detective, an examiner (forensics expert), a master of electronic data known as an oracle, a profiler, or the master of surveilance known as a sentry. Either focus core class might find their skills work well as a journalist.
The classes are generally well put together, but players of agents may
find that some of these class concepts are more appropriate for NPCs or that some class abilities are more appealing than others. However, sentries, dopplegangers, cassanovas, networkers, oracles, and profilers may fit many agent concepts and some agents may find them desirable; other concepts might work as well, perhaps as cover or backstory concepts.
The second chapter, new rules is where you will find new elements such as backrounds, departments, bundles, skill uses, feats and gear.
The typical mundane take on the core classes of interest in the various departments of the agency is included; while wearisome, it might provide some GMs with some perspective on the agency views.
GMs with a taste for running games with a real-world flavor will find a gold mine in the new departments. Four new "generic" departments include corporate raider, diplomatic security, "dot commie", and field researcher.
After that, however, the book presents a variety of real world intelligence and law enforment agency under the umbrella of two macro-departments. The intelligence agency training macro department includes some common benefits and includes more specific selection among such selections and NSA and MI6 that provide some further benefits (for those who aren't familiar with this concept from earlier books.) Similarly, the counterintelligence training macro department includes such agencies as US homeland security, MI5, and yes, the Mounties.
This lets us segue right into the new feats. Of course, would a Mountie be a Mountie if they didn't get the new feat Always Gets Your Man (which provides a variety of benefits when in pursuit of a target) as a bonus feat?
Other feats that appear to have good potential are double life (which gives you a second life outside of the agency), bugging feats that boost the ability to use bugs introduced later in this chapter, and a variety of contact feats in a variety of communities (police, criminal, blue collar). Many of these feats seem as if they make good fodder for detailed and interesting PCs. On the other end of the spectrum, there are also a lot of feats that seem like you would only ever see them on specifically themed NPCs, such as the chain of cryptology feats.
The new gear is primarily surveilance and communication gear. The highlight here is the bug section, which provides a variety of inconspicuous remote sensing devices.
The supposed "common ground" between snoops and facemen is investigation. It seems to me that many of the faceman's activities might fall outside of investigation, but in the context of a spycraft game, this seems fair enough. The whole third chapter is devoted to the topic of investigation and provides rules for handling a variety of investigation activities.
The investigation chapter seems very useful for both PCs and GCs. On the GM side of the fence, it provides guidelines for setting up clues for investigations, building clue chains, and provides DCs for a variety of agency task using different skills and techniques. I don't know about other GMs, but when I run an espionage game, investigation is key, so this is a welcome feature.
On the players side of the fence, in each of the areas with described mechanics for the GM, there are a 5 (realistic) questions for the player to consider during that type of investigative task. In addition to simply being good advice for an investigation, it helps bridge the roleplaying gap, letting the player actually play a character who would ask the sorts of questions a real investigator would.
Prior Spycraft class guides have introduced new techanical techniques; this one is no exception. The investigation chapter introduces a deduction system that can be used to handle investigations mechanically. Much as the mastermind system involves different sites, the deduction system builds a mystery of investigation sites. As characters move from location to location uncovering clues, they earn abstract investigation points. These investigation points are "spent" by the agent to receive benefits in terms of knowledge.
I find the deduction system interesting, but at the same time, I am a little wary of the power it accords directly to players. Personally, I think GM determination of the sorts of clues that the PCs receive is important, and granting players the ability to pick their own clue results could result in some unexpected results for the worse.
On the positive side, I could see how in the hands of a skilled GM willing to improvise, it could provide for some interesting freeform gaming in which the approach the characters take could vary widely.
The fourth chapter is the so-called intelligence guide, and is sort of a continuation of some of the resolution systems we have seen in earlier books (like manhunts and harassment ). It uses Spycraft and general d20 System mechanics to resolve a number of common intelligence activities, including pursuits (seems a bit redundant with the manhunt rules, but is handled a bit more convincingly), package handoffs, persuading assets, identity theft, cryptography, isolating sensitive personnel, and so forth. These sorts of rules are often the sorts of things that would be above the heads of low level agents, but might come into play with agents with a little pull or rank in the agency.
Conclusion
It seems like with every Spycraft supplement, I find a "gem". The gem on this ring is the investigation chapter. It seems to me to be a boon to investigative games from both a mechanics and a roleplaying standpoint, and for both Game Controls and Agents.
The remainder of the material seemed decent to me. The intelligence guide seems like it would be referred to only occasionally unless you have a real penchant for doing rigorous resolution of off-screen activities. The new character options seemed usable, but I saw less reason to deviate from the Spycraft rulebook in favor of options presented here than I did in previous books. All told, though, this book rounds out the class book series nicely.
Overall Grade: B-
-Alan D. Kohler
The Faceman/Snoop Class Guide is the third and presumably final
book in a series of supplement books for AEG's Spycraft game
providing additional options and details for the games core classes, in this case the Faceman and the Snoop. The book is written by Alexander Flagg and Clayton A. Oliver, with additional material by Scott Gearin and Patrick Kapera.
A First Look
Format: 128-page perfect-bound softcover. $24.95.
Art: As per most books in the line, the cover art is a monochrome
picture, in this case a woman in a nice dress pulling up information on a virtual 3d computer screen. The interior is black-and-white, illustrated by Paul H. Way. The pictures are mostly well-done genre-appropriate line art, though some looks a bit comical.
Layout: Two columns with conservative body font text and moderate leader space and single-spaced paragraphs. Mostly clear and readable, with nicely laid-out tables.
A Deeper Look
The book is organized into four chapters: prestige classes, new rules, investigation, and the intelligence guide.
The Spycraft game makes extensive use of the prestige class mechanic to make more specialized characters within the basic classes, and this book is no exception. The classes are primarily those appropriate to snoops or facemen. Facemen might become members of the heartbreaking cassanova prestige class, take over other people's identity and lives as a doppleganger, a diplomatic negotiator, an in-the-know networker, and a manipulative politico. The snoop on the other hand might find their investigative skills best put to work as a bounty hunter, detective, an examiner (forensics expert), a master of electronic data known as an oracle, a profiler, or the master of surveilance known as a sentry. Either focus core class might find their skills work well as a journalist.
The classes are generally well put together, but players of agents may
find that some of these class concepts are more appropriate for NPCs or that some class abilities are more appealing than others. However, sentries, dopplegangers, cassanovas, networkers, oracles, and profilers may fit many agent concepts and some agents may find them desirable; other concepts might work as well, perhaps as cover or backstory concepts.
The second chapter, new rules is where you will find new elements such as backrounds, departments, bundles, skill uses, feats and gear.
The typical mundane take on the core classes of interest in the various departments of the agency is included; while wearisome, it might provide some GMs with some perspective on the agency views.
GMs with a taste for running games with a real-world flavor will find a gold mine in the new departments. Four new "generic" departments include corporate raider, diplomatic security, "dot commie", and field researcher.
After that, however, the book presents a variety of real world intelligence and law enforment agency under the umbrella of two macro-departments. The intelligence agency training macro department includes some common benefits and includes more specific selection among such selections and NSA and MI6 that provide some further benefits (for those who aren't familiar with this concept from earlier books.) Similarly, the counterintelligence training macro department includes such agencies as US homeland security, MI5, and yes, the Mounties.
This lets us segue right into the new feats. Of course, would a Mountie be a Mountie if they didn't get the new feat Always Gets Your Man (which provides a variety of benefits when in pursuit of a target) as a bonus feat?
Other feats that appear to have good potential are double life (which gives you a second life outside of the agency), bugging feats that boost the ability to use bugs introduced later in this chapter, and a variety of contact feats in a variety of communities (police, criminal, blue collar). Many of these feats seem as if they make good fodder for detailed and interesting PCs. On the other end of the spectrum, there are also a lot of feats that seem like you would only ever see them on specifically themed NPCs, such as the chain of cryptology feats.
The new gear is primarily surveilance and communication gear. The highlight here is the bug section, which provides a variety of inconspicuous remote sensing devices.
The supposed "common ground" between snoops and facemen is investigation. It seems to me that many of the faceman's activities might fall outside of investigation, but in the context of a spycraft game, this seems fair enough. The whole third chapter is devoted to the topic of investigation and provides rules for handling a variety of investigation activities.
The investigation chapter seems very useful for both PCs and GCs. On the GM side of the fence, it provides guidelines for setting up clues for investigations, building clue chains, and provides DCs for a variety of agency task using different skills and techniques. I don't know about other GMs, but when I run an espionage game, investigation is key, so this is a welcome feature.
On the players side of the fence, in each of the areas with described mechanics for the GM, there are a 5 (realistic) questions for the player to consider during that type of investigative task. In addition to simply being good advice for an investigation, it helps bridge the roleplaying gap, letting the player actually play a character who would ask the sorts of questions a real investigator would.
Prior Spycraft class guides have introduced new techanical techniques; this one is no exception. The investigation chapter introduces a deduction system that can be used to handle investigations mechanically. Much as the mastermind system involves different sites, the deduction system builds a mystery of investigation sites. As characters move from location to location uncovering clues, they earn abstract investigation points. These investigation points are "spent" by the agent to receive benefits in terms of knowledge.
I find the deduction system interesting, but at the same time, I am a little wary of the power it accords directly to players. Personally, I think GM determination of the sorts of clues that the PCs receive is important, and granting players the ability to pick their own clue results could result in some unexpected results for the worse.
On the positive side, I could see how in the hands of a skilled GM willing to improvise, it could provide for some interesting freeform gaming in which the approach the characters take could vary widely.
The fourth chapter is the so-called intelligence guide, and is sort of a continuation of some of the resolution systems we have seen in earlier books (like manhunts and harassment ). It uses Spycraft and general d20 System mechanics to resolve a number of common intelligence activities, including pursuits (seems a bit redundant with the manhunt rules, but is handled a bit more convincingly), package handoffs, persuading assets, identity theft, cryptography, isolating sensitive personnel, and so forth. These sorts of rules are often the sorts of things that would be above the heads of low level agents, but might come into play with agents with a little pull or rank in the agency.
Conclusion
It seems like with every Spycraft supplement, I find a "gem". The gem on this ring is the investigation chapter. It seems to me to be a boon to investigative games from both a mechanics and a roleplaying standpoint, and for both Game Controls and Agents.
The remainder of the material seemed decent to me. The intelligence guide seems like it would be referred to only occasionally unless you have a real penchant for doing rigorous resolution of off-screen activities. The new character options seemed usable, but I saw less reason to deviate from the Spycraft rulebook in favor of options presented here than I did in previous books. All told, though, this book rounds out the class book series nicely.
Overall Grade: B-
-Alan D. Kohler
