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Message: <blockquote data-quote="(un)reason" data-source="post: 9189124" data-attributes="member: 27780">Dungeon/Polyhedron Issue 90/149: Jan/Feb 2002part 12/12Johnny's Combat Aces - Chasing the Sky's Wrath: They aren’t going to reprint the full combat rules, just do a quick list of how they differ from regular D&D. HP are replaced with Vitality and Wound points, which means a lot more potential for sudden reversals of fortune. People are more likely to engage in fisticuffs instead of going straight to lethal weapons, so unarmed characters threaten attacks of opportunity normally. However, shooting pistols at close range does not automatically trigger AoO, unlike bulkier ranged weapons. You can ready actions even outside of combat. Plus a couple of pages on chase scenes and vehicles in combat, which once again use ideas that they’ll develop further in D20 Modern. So even more than the previous sections this feels pretty incomplete and doesn’t work standalone. Any nongamers who picked it up on the merits of the cover would be starting to get a bit perplexed about how to fill the gaps at this point. The Discoveries and Powers of Prof. Prometheus: Even more than the combat section, this is very incomplete, as lists of powers can be as long as a piece of string. Scientists get to build items using any of the spell lists in the PHB, which at least makes up somewhat for the slow way they access them. Mystics choose powers from the Psionics Handbook, because Gotta Collect ‘Em All! Without that, you’re limited to a choice of 10 1st level powers, which will last you the first three levels before you really need those outside sources. Which does of course beg the question of how many people actually tried to play these minigames, if they did, how many sessions it lasted and when they stopped was it due to running into issues with incompleteness of the rules, lack of suitable adventures or just the usual scheduling malaise that is a challenge for every group? Not one I can answer, save by playtesting and reporting back about my findings. An issue in which the most interesting things about it are the new features, as the adventures are competently done but very samey indeed. The rest is full of intriguing possibilities, even if it doesn’t feel like a continuation of the old Polyhedron at all and needs a bit of kitbashing due to the editing issues. Then again, after the 3e corebooks being mathematically fine-tuned in a way that discourages house-ruling, it’s refreshing to see them release stuff that pretty much requires it again. So I’ve got mixed feelings about these changes, but at least they’re fresh and it’ll take a few more issues before they get into a routine again. Will the minigames improve with practice, or grow stale like so many experiments before them before gradually petering out? Time to see if this April will deliver any reasons to laugh or cry.</blockquote>

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