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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Iosue" data-source="post: 9548490" data-attributes="member: 6680772">I'm resurrecting this thread because I want to talk about Group SNE's Sword World 2.5 RPG Building Box, yet another box set released in 2021.The first two "Start Sets," detailed in the first post, are essentially of the same kind as D&D's Starter Sets/Essentials Kit products. They provide more visual and tactile accessories, but the core concept is the same: you have a slimmed down rulebook, players are given pre-generated characters, and the GM is provided with a mini-campaign to last several sessions.The Adventurer's Guild Box Set, detailed in my second post, is in the same vein, but on a larger scale. More scenarios, more monsters, more locations. There's the added mini-game of furnishing the Guild House, so that a group can put their own personal stamp on the campaign, but other than that there is not much in the way of innovation. The goal here is to get a group up and playing the game as soon as possible, with the hope that by playing this pre-generated adventure with pre-generated characters, the gameplay will draw them in, leading them to buy the core rulebooks where they can learn how to make their own characters, and GMs can start designing their own scenarios.Now, there's another "beginner box" model, the exemplar of which was Basic D&D. You provide a streamlined version of the rules, including character generation, provide GM advice on making new adventures, provide a sample adventure, and go. The best modern example of this is probably the Pathfinder 2e Beginner Box.The issue with the modern D&D/SW2.5 model is that in order to get the group up and playing as soon as possible, you sacrifice character generation and the resources/advice for further gaming. You hope that the experience gets people onboard with purchasing the core rulebooks for this. The old D&D/PF2E model mitigates this a bit, but still requires someone to take on the onerous job of the GM, who will learn the rules and run the sample adventure and design new ones.Sword World 2.5's RPG Building Box is an attempt to provide a new model. One that allows for new players to create original characters that they can advance in level as they progress through the adventure. But also to provide a broad variety of pre-created content that allows for highly varied and repeated play, without putting the onus on one player to take on the job of being the GM. Indeed, the RPG Building Box doesn't require a GM at all...We'll explore that provocative idea in a later post. First, let's look at what comes in the box.Three rulebooks: 1. Characters (covering creating and advancing characters), 2. Scenarios (covering how to run scenarios), and 3. Reference (a general rulebook covering combat, magic, and anything else not in books 1 and 2).For characters:48 skill template cards28 race/species cards20 ability score array cards(As will be explained later, the above are combined to build characters)5 sample character cards46 special combat ability cards106 item cards, split into 35 weapon cards, 28 armor cards, and 43 accoutrements/consumables cards28 magic cards (4 enhancer cards with 6 techniques), and then two sets each of priest, sorcerer, conjurer, and druid spells cards)42 role-playing (character personality) cardsFor gameplay:68 monster cards (2 each of 34 monsters)6 NPC cards134 scenario cards (combined to form distinct scenarios)Two sheets of punch out cards that include dungeon maps, PC and monster tokens, XP chits, and other various chits used in gameplay1 battle map sheet for SW2.5 basic combat (three zones)1 A3 size color poster map of the Burlight region5 A4 sheets to guide character creation6 A5 clear files5 dry-erase markers10 six-sided dice (five sets of two in different colors)12 token standsThese contents are all very comparable to the previous Adventurers Guild box set. Retail price is 6,000 yen, currently about $38 in these days of a super weak yen, but was more like $57 on February 10, 2021, the day it was released. (And now I wish I hadn't done the calculations and been faced with just how much my money has lost value!)In the next installment, we’ll look at the Character rulebook, and see how all those character cards get combined to easily create varied characters.</blockquote>

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