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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Flynn" data-source="post: 3890920" data-attributes="member: 1836">Good Morning, All:Here's a quick overview of my first experience last night with Savage Worlds. I ran the game, having had no prior exposure to the SW rules system. The essential scenario involved the rescue of some kidnapped children from a band of goblins before they were used for sacrifice on the eve of Winter Solstice. I had run this scenario under D20 before, and from experience, I knew that it could be handled in about three and a half hours. Essential scenes included some basic investigation, a minor combat sequence and a major combat sequence, a scene dealing with the environment, and a few RP scenes.There were six players at first (and one guy who joined us about half-way through the game, to bring us up to seven players for the final climactic fight). With that many people, I still ran the scenario in three hours, and that included a lot of talking and rules discussion. In addition, in the final combat scene, I increased the number of goblins from four to fourteen, and the party just mowed through them as well as the cultist leader with incredible ease. With that in mind, system definitely runs faster than D20.There were a few rules we missed from time to time, based on our combined lack of knowledge about the Savage Worlds rules system. In many cases, these were minor and would not have dramatically impacted the outcome of the scenario. I think that, with a little more experience, this would not have been an issue. Also, I hadn't gamed with over half the table before, and thus there was a need to develop a rapport over the course of the game that I already had with those whom I'd gamed with previously. In general, though, these impacts were to be expected, and so I am trying to separate them from the rest of my review, to make sure I identify things properly.All in all, here are the things I liked about the system, as clumsy as I felt running my first session last night: First, prep time was a snap. At twenty minutes to write out cards for the encounters, and just two hours to create eight PCs for pre-generated characters, I felt that this was the easiest One Shot I had ever prepped for. Second, I liked the basic simplicity of the system overall, from character creation to combat to the rules in general. It's fast. Third, despite the simplicity, characters are easy to build and reasonably developed and deep enough to provide for a good gaming experience. Fourth, it was very easy to explain the basics of the system and bring a new guy in within five minutes at the middle of the game once we all had a little experience with Savage Worlds. Fifth, I like how the "extra" rules work, as it lets the heroes be heroes. Sixth, I like the initiative system, and I can tell it will work just as easily as my D20 initiative cards work once I get used to scanning the table for the cards still facing up. I could even notice an improvement in my reaction time by the end of the session, so I think it'll work out pretty well, and everyone can see when they get to go.Things I didn't like about the system or am concerned about, once I remove the problems I had with dealing with a new gaming system based on a lack of familiarity: First, there is a definite mental shift that has to occur in how damage is determined. It's not a really bad thing, but it needs to be handled well when transitioning new players to the game. Second, the simplicity of the system could potentially lend itself to a certain amount of arbitrary rulings and possible rules discussions/debates in a manner similar to that of AD&D 1st Edition or Classic Traveller or Simple20 or something equally lightweight in the rules department. That's the nature of a rules light system, though, and not a problem with Savage Worlds itself. Third, with a rules light system, there is a definite paradigm shift away from requiring all characters to be fully detailed to making some basic assumptions about a character's capacities that aren't documented on the character sheet. I've mastered that for Traveller, but I need to pull that over into Savage Worlds. It should be a simple matter to do so, once I have integrated the rules to the point where I have achieved a basic "rules mastery" so I can think about other things, but it is a change of pace from the fully documented nature of a D20 character.Looking at the gaming experience overall, it appears that a majority of my concerns could be lifted simply by getting used to the Savage Worlds rules. I probably should run another session before making up my mind to use this system for my next campaign, just to make sure, but I like what I've seen so far. Also, I still want to play the game as a PC to see if that helps clear things up for me and lets me see how the game runs as from the player's side. I will have an opportunity to play at a Game Day being held locally tomorrow, and there's a chance I can get into another One Shot after the Thanksgiving holiday.Please let me know if you have any specific questions about the review or my experiences, and I'll do what I can to answer them. Also, your comments and feedback would be greatly appreciated.With Regards,Flynn</blockquote>

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