MUTAZOIDS3e Player's Guide and Handbook
By Moses "Wolfy" Wildermuth
MT Enterprises LLC product number SF1001
224 pages, $32.95
Mutazoids3e is the third edition of the Mutazoids game and apparently the first version to be based on the SRD under the OGL (although it's not d20). I admit to not only never having played the previous editions of the game, but never having even heard of the game before now. As a result, I cannot comment on how well the author, Moses Wildermuth, did as far as keeping the "feel" of the original game, although I suspect the games are pretty close considering he devoted two and a half years to getting it to this state. I
am familiar with the original version of TSR's
Gamma World game, though, and
Mutazoids3e bears a close resemblance to that game -- oddly enough, I'd even say that
Mutazoids3e does a much better job of bringing the original
Gamma World game into the d20 world than the current version of
Gamma World does!
[I suppose that comment is worth a quick sidetrack: I picked up a copy of the new
Gamma World book in the store and flipped through it, and was very disappointed in what I saw, especially in the area of mutations. There were only something like a half dozen possible mutations, and even those were along the lines of heightened constitution and heightened balance; all of the cool (and weird) stuff was extremely conspicuous in its absence. Now, I'm not trashing the new
Gamma World game by any means - I put the GW Player's Handbook back on the shelf and thus have not read through it - for all I know, it's an excellent post-Apocalyptic RPG. It's not, however (to me at least) an authentic translation of the
Gamma World game -
Gamma World to me includes oddball mutations like dual brains and heat-beam eyes, strange weapons like black energy rifles and micromissiles, and strange creatures like the anthropomorphic-bunny "hoops" and the snake-with-arms "hissers." Not realistic by any means, but then that's half of the fun.]
Mutazoids3e has all of the belovedly-goofy nonsense like photosynthetic skin, telekinetic flight, and shooting energy bolts from the tentacles you were born with. It's got anthropomorphic animals with human intelligence fighting humans (including mutated humans, or "mutazoids") for limited resources, and it's even got Gamma World's Cryptic Alliances (although here they're called Spheres of Influence).
The cover is a painting by Dan Frazier composed of 5 figures overlooking a wasteland: a human female in an improbable outfit (leather bodice, loincloth flap, knee-high boots with netting covering her right leg from the boot to just under her buttock), a mounted human male (in more sensible leather armor) riding a bear with tiger striping, a blue lizard, and a foot-tall "walker" robot. There isn't a whole lot of detail work evident in the picture, and worse yet, it look like the figures and the foreground were "cut out" of their original picture and "plopped onto" a blue background, with their original background tweaked a bit in an attempt to make it look like clouds. (This would have worked a whole lot better had there been a better job "cutting" around the human figures; as it is, it's fairly obvious - and rather fake-looking - that the "clouds" just happen to line up in such a way to outline the humans' upper bodies.) I'm curious as to what prompted this: was there something wrong with the original background?
The interior artwork consists of 46 black-and-white pictures (two of which might actually be photos) by four different artists. Much of it is recycled, in that a section of one piece of artwork is often blown up and used as a standalone piece on a different page. Much of the artwork is sub-par, either by dint of not being very detailed at all (check out the "background" for the winged reptile on page 29), poorly drawn (as the weasel-man (?) on page 19), or just plain wrong (the grasshopper-man on page 11 has a right hand on his
left middle arm/leg - the one holding the pistol). Still, there are some very nice pieces scattered throughout the book as well; I particularly liked the armed rodents with the VW Beetle on page 214, the winged kangaroo with hat and machine gun on page 204, and the pig-man on page 16. Still, taken as a whole, I'd have to put the artwork in the book at no better than "average."
Mutazoids3e Player's Guide and Handbook is laid out as follows:
- Player's Introduction: a brief history of the Mutazoids game's previous editions
- History of the World: how the world of Mutazoids (which takes place in the year 2123) got to be the way it is - 90% of the human population was destroyed by two plagues, which also spread mutations throughout not only humanity but many animal species as well
- Character Design: creating your PC as either a Normal Human, Psykazoid Human (mental powers only), Mutazoid Human (both physical and mental mutations), Humazoid Animal (anthropomorphic animal, possibly with other physical and mental mutations), or Mutazoid Animals (both physical and mental mutations, but not humanoid in build)
- Mutations, Defects and Disadvantages: physical change mutations, physical mutation powers, mental mutation powers, mutational defects, and disadvantages (with rules for both random die roll and pick-and-choose by point-buy for determining your PC's mutations)
- Character Vocations: the "character classes" available to the PCs: Merc (Fighter equivalent), Holy-One (Paladin/Cleric equivalent), Shaman (Druid equivalent), Medico (Cleric equivalent), Lifter (Rogue equivalent), Tech-Mech (Wizard equivalent?), Outlander (Barbarian/Ranger Equivalent)
- Skills and Feats: the standard array of skills and feats, including power feats and metamutation feats
- Spheres of Influence: political, religious, and professional organizations the PCs can belong to or fight against
- Sample Adventures: two bare-bones ideas for adventures that need to be fleshed out, plus a dozen or so other adventure seeds
- Appendix A - Money & Trade: the standard monetary system (based on the "gold dollar")
- Appendix B - Gear & Equipment: the stuff a PC might buy with his gold dollars
- Appendix C - Armor: rules for traditional armor, plus weird stuff like force field belts
- Appendix D - Weapons: standard fantasy melee/ranged weapons, "modern" weapons (guns, grenades, 2-by-4s), and "futuristic" weapons (laser guns, antimatter rifles)
- Appendix E - Masterwork Items: what masterwork armor, weapons, and tools can do for a character
- Appendix F - Vehicles: rules for vehicle use
- Appendix G - Legal: the required OGL stuff
If I haven't made it clear in the opening paragraphs, let me state now and for the record that I think Moses Wildermuth did an excellent job in capturing the original "Gamma World' feel, even though that undoubtedly wasn't his target. Don't go into
Mutazoids3e expecting the science aspects to be realistic; go in with a willing suspension of belief and don't worry about how the Mutazoid virus allows mammals to be born with insect eyes and wings, or tentacles, or chitinous armor.
Mutazoids3e is much more science fantasy than science fiction, and it doesn't try to take itself too seriously. Nor, really, should it.
I was very pleased with the selection of mutations; just about everything I remember from the earlier editions of
Gamma World is in here, with plenty of others thrown into the mix. (One of my favorite new ones is the possibility of having extra kidneys, which not only makes you immune to ingested poisons but makes your urine a not-quite-as-toxic poison - the DC is two points lower - if you
do ingest any poison!) I really appreciate the fact that you have the choice to go random roll (which I always found to be the most fun: most of the anticipation was seeing what you'd end up with) or point buy to get the exact mutant you're looking for, with rules for balancing out the positive mutations with defects and disadvantages. The only thing I thought was a little "off" in this section was the way the charts were laid out for the physical changes: each body part in question has entries for a roll of 1-5, 6-7, 8, 9, and 10, but it doesn't look like a whole lot of thought was put into which physical mutations went where on the chart. For example, under "Marking," why should 50% of mutated humans with marking happen to have stripes, as opposed to spots, mottling, tippedness (lighter at the extremities), or random? In real life, the only natural one is mottling. (Whereas with "Feet," the choices are webbed, hooves, paws, talons, and thumbs on the feet, and the "1-5" slot is "webbed," something that can actually occur in real life.) I was glad to see that they came up with 5 different outcomes in each case, but I think they kind of painted themselves into a corner in some cases by forcing the 1-5/6-7/8/9/10 breakdown. Also, I was a bit surprised in that many of the physical changes are identical to some of the physical mutations - while I agree that not all physical mutations are best defined as "powers" (suppose you have a fin on your head - so what? what does that get you?), I wonder if maybe the "physical changes" might have been left out and only the actual game-affecting powers detailed. After all, what's to stop a player from deciding his PC has a fin on top of his head if he wants one? Still, even the physical changes that don't have any game effects (like, say, having buck teeth) are assigned Benefit or Defect points, so I suppose it serves a purpose if you choose to go the point-buy route. (Although there's an argument to be made against getting credit for a Defect Point for having buck teeth if there's no real game effect other than not having straight teeth.)
As far as proofreading and editing go, I was pleased to see very few instances of typos. (Those that made it past the proofreader include "nicttiating" instead of "nictitating," "friendlily" instead of "friendly," "potwers" instead of "powers," and "shecan" instead of "she can.") There are, however, quite a few instances of words that were apparently hyphenated to fit across two lines, and then something changed to put the whole word on the same line, hyphen and all. (Examples include "inform-ation," "attempt-ing," "struc-ture," "entang-led," and "ef-fective.") Several sentences lacked a period at the end; several others had two. Finally, there seems to be
quite a bit of confusion about the proper use of the apostrophe - so much so, in fact, that I think I'll post a link to an online cartoon and let Bob the Angry Flower gripe in my place. (Check out
http://www.angryflower.com/bobsqu.gif)
On the editing end of things, while much of
Mutazoids3e is taken from OGL sources, a bit more care might have been taken in the conversion process as there are occasional references to such D&Disms as "DM," "carrion crawler brain juice," and "ogres." Also, apparently the "Holy-One" vocation was originally called the "Holyman," because virtually everywhere else but the Holy-One vocation description he's referred to as a "Holyman." Finally, several of the charts are accidentally in more than one place, instead of the intended chart. As an example, the Analyze Object Chart shows up in both the "Analyze Object" and "Analyze Powers" sections; the real Analyze Powers Chart is missing. Likewise, instead of the Safecracking Chart in the "Safecracking" section, we get a reprint of the Search Chart from the "Search" section.
Since I'm used to having my previous
Gamma World games come fully packaged in a boxed set with everything needed for play, I should point out that
Mutazoids3e Player's Guide and Handbook is to the
Mutazoids3e game only what the
Player's Handbook is to
Dungeons and Dragons. I was a bit disappointed not to see a "monsters" section with the
Mutazoids3e equivalents to GW's hoops, hissers, orlens, and centisteeds, but then they're not needed from a player's standpoint, and certainly everything a player would need is right here in this book. I look forward to future books in the Mutazoids series, especially those detailing the "standard mutant animals" from the game setting.
All in all, despite some unimpressive artwork, a few editing glitches, and a great deal of apostrophe confusion,
Mutazoids3e does a great initial job of setting up a mutant-laden, post-Apocalyptic world ripe for all sorts of science fantasy gaming. I give it a rating of "4 (Good)" and can't wait until the rest of the books come out so I can have the "whole package" and try out a campaign. In the meantime, I'm sure to have a load of fun rolling up some mutant PCs and seeing what the dice bring me.
[As a final word, I should point out that while I'm aware of the existence of the
Darwin's World RPG - another post-Apocalyptic campaign world - I haven't seen it either, so I really can't give a comparison between the current versions of
Gamma World,
Darwin's World, and
Mutazoids3e. Perhaps somebody who's read through all three can give a comparative review, but sadly, I'm really not qualified for the job.]
