Free League's Alien RPG - My Experience

[Retreater]

If you're dealing with the preview version... the core rules are very much not that at all, and I'm wondering if you read the actual corebook, or just the rules section of the preview version.

I didn't read any of the rules. What you quoted above from my previous post was meant as an exaggeration and attempt at humor. I'm sorry if that didn't come through.
Concerning the GM not running it correctly, I can excuse that for him trying to throw a game together without a lot of time to prep - real life getting in the way. It's good to know what wasn't correct about our experience, so thanks for sharing that.

 

[aramis erak]

I didn't read any of the rules. What you quoted above from my previous post was meant as an exaggeration and attempt at humor. I'm sorry if that didn't come through.
Concerning the GM not running it correctly, I can excuse that for him trying to throw a game together without a lot of time to prep - real life getting in the way. It's good to know what wasn't correct about our experience, so thanks for sharing that.

It's far too easy to get an RPG wrong as a GM doing a pick-up run.
If players are warned of the PVP rule, they're far less likely to engage in significant PVP...
And it's very easy for me to miss humor in text.

 

[MGibster]

I didn't read any of the rules. What you quoted above from my previous post was meant as an exaggeration and attempt at humor. I'm sorry if that didn't come through.
Concerning the GM not running it correctly, I can excuse that for him trying to throw a game together without a lot of time to prep - real life getting in the way. It's good to know what wasn't correct about our experience, so thanks for sharing that.

It might have been the first time he ran the game as Mother. I made a few errors in judgment myself when I ran the game. Unless he's an android, pardon me, a synthetic lifeform, we all make mistakes. And just as an example, I completely missed/forgot about the "traitor" becoming an NPC.

 

[Retreater]

It might have been the first time he ran the game as Mother. I made a few errors in judgment myself when I ran the game. Unless he's an android, pardon me, a synthetic lifeform, we all make mistakes. And just as an example, I completely missed/forgot about the "traitor" becoming an NPC.

It was definitely the first time he ran it, and I know he had to prep it quickly. He totally gets a pass from me.

With the way we played it, between character deaths and agendas turning characters into NPCs, we would've likely run out of pre-gens probably at early in Act 3 had we played by the rules.

 

[Grendel_Khan]

With the way we played it, between character deaths and agendas turning characters into NPCs, we would've likely run out of pre-gens probably at early in Act 3 had we played by the rules.

iirc, when you have to surrender your character for traitorous reasons the GM can also hand you an NPC to play.

But also I think we've established that, for whatever reason, you guys were going unreasonably hard with the direct PvP slaughter that early in the adventure. Hard to really account for that with anything mechanical. Best I can imagine a GM doing is leaning into the grindhousey chaos and dark humor. Again, though, this is more an operator error situation than a system one.

 

[aramis erak]

It was definitely the first time he ran it, and I know he had to prep it quickly. He totally gets a pass from me.

With the way we played it, between character deaths and agendas turning characters into NPCs, we would've likely run out of pre-gens probably at early in Act 3 had we played by the rules.

Had people been warned about PVP , as they should have been, you probably wouldn't have had the issues with PVP at all. The PVP rule is in the player section of the core. And of the preview rules, too.

Looking at the preview rules.. because I'm too lazy to get the corebook out, and because it highlights what FL felt was absolutely needed. Note that the layout is nearly identical to the player section of the core rulebook. I'm leaving out chapter heading pages, as they're just quote, label, and art, and full page thematic art.
7-15 - high level overview of the setting
16-27 descriptive of how play is intended - themes, tools of play, differences of cinematic and campaign modes, and the PVP rule.
28-29 high level look at key elements of gear rules, including the vital consumables rules and encumbrance
32-43 Atts & Skills, and how to roll tasks.
48-49 basic combat
51-52 Stealth Mode (aka exploration mode)
52-56 Actions and Initiative in combat and stealth modes
57-59 melee combat
60-63 Ranged Combat
64-65, 67 Damage and healing
67-69 Stress and Panic
70-74 Conditions, hazards
75 player rules for synthetics
76 player description of Xenomorphs
80-90 combat gear
92-99, 101 non-combat gear

26 pages of actual mechanical rules in player section

11 mechanics pages in the GM's preview:
150, 151, 153-159: GM xenomorph rules
160 Crits
161 permanent traumas

the adventure is about 40 pages. the missing includes GM copies of the ship maps,,, and a couple images.

See, i wanted to point this out, as the "20 pages of rules" frustration-gripe isn't too far off... the corebook's added rules include random encounters, random mission generators, ship combat, travel and maintenance, advice on campaign mode, another cinematic adventure (which is also a direct prequel to the movie ALIENS).

I'll also note: the worst character breakdown in my PPTS Brave Survival campaign had nothing to do with combat, xenomorphs, nor injury... one of the players pushed her character hard... over 10 stress... and didn't have the character take downtime, drink a beer, nor even rant at the MU/TH/UR unit... until she finally snapped, and went totally catatonic. Worked herself into a nervous breakdown.

The stress and panic rules are great for just plain gritty space opera... Just remember, tho'- characters need to take downtime, or they will blow up, not unlike the issues 'twixt Ripley and the other crewmember at the start of the movie...