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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Crothian" data-source="post: 2210073" data-attributes="member: 232">High Adventure Role PlayingI like fantasy.  I always have preferred it to any other genre when role playing.  Not a very uncommon statement, but there it is.  My love of fantasy though takes me to other games out side of D&D.  There’s the statement that will separate me from the masses.  D20 is not the end all of games as I know it and looking to se show other games and companies are handling the fantasy is always good for me and my game.  All game systems have assumptions built in and sometimes it takes looking a completely different game to recognize that.  Some games never consider doing things a different way and again playing and reading other systems can broaden one’s mind when it comes to gaming.  Some of the ideas actually can work very well in other games.  I might always find my way back to D&D but I do enjoy leaving it at times to see what else is out there.      High Adventure Role Playing (HARP) is a game by Iron Crown Enterprises (ICE).  This review specifically covers the PDF version but the print book has the same content and the review can be used to as a good judge of that as well.  The book is One hundred and ninety four pages long and is in black and white.  The art and lay out are nicely done and the book has a good table of contents and index.  It though does not have any book marks.  Book marks would be very useful for this book as it is the core rules for the system and flipping around in it to look things up can be a bit of a pain.      HARP is not d20 but it is fantasy.  Many of the game concepts are very familiar so trying the game out is not like switching to Nobilis for instance.  The game is not what I would call rules light but does not seem rules heavy either.  I am not sure what sort of learning curve will be needed to understand the game but it does look like a few sessions at least to get familiar and comfortable with the system.  The system is percentage based.  There can be quite a bit of modifiers for different action as well.  In a small play test I did we had to refer to the book for a lot of things.  However, a simple cheat sheet of things can easily remedy that.  If I were to start a campaign of HARP that is one of the first things I would create or find on the net for myself and players.      The game has nine professions for character to pick from.  They are the Cleric, Fighter, Harper, Mage, Monk, Ranger, Thief, Rogue, and Warrior Mage.  It is nice to see some separation along the lines of the Rogue and the Thief.  One can have multiple professions. There are plenty of fantasy races here like the human, elf, dwarf, gnome, halfling, and gryx.  The gryx is like the more traditional half orc of other games.  One great things that they did is have different types of cultures be separate from the races.  So, instead of creating all sorts of different sub races, all one has to do is mix and max the cultures and races to get the desired effect.  That is a fantastic and simple idea that works very well.      The magic system is another big plus in my book.  Magic works like skills and off the same percentage system.  Five of the classes have magic potential.  There is a universal spell list but also a good number of spells that are unique to one of those five classes.  There are not that many spells here either, least compared to the hundred and hundreds of other systems.  The spells have some versatility to them in that they are scalable allowing them to have increased or decreased effects with a simpler or harder penalty on the roll.      There are monsters and encounters in the book but no actually fantasy world.  I would have preferred to see some sort of setting in here at least to some degree.  The magic items, monsters, and non adventuring professions are all nice but linked to a setting I think would have strengthened these sections of the book.       The game does have some nice GMing advice and tips in it.  This is a section that could easily be made generic and expanded into a great GM resource.  It is always good to see ways and ideas to improve ones game.  The industry needs a bit more of that in it these days.    HARP is a nice fantasy system.  It is a little lower on magic and relies a little more on the skills and abilities of the characters.  The game so far has some nice support to it and I look forward to reading through and reviewing a lot of them in the coming weeks.</blockquote>

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