Spy-genre Poll

[Gundark]

Bull-hockey.
.

Bovine hockey? I think I'll stick to human hockey if it's all the same.

 

[trancejeremy]

Too bad you can't license the James Bond System. While not a perfect game, that was far ahead of its time and still quite good by today's standards. (And IMHO, I think the chase/dramatic conflict system in Spycraft was inspired by the JB RPG)

 

[Falkus]

d20 Modern and Spycraft 2.0 are both superb systems. I say both.

 

[jaerdaph]

Sure, you could use Skill Groups

Never saw that before - good stuff! Thanks for the link.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

Were I to start a spy campaign today, I would try to run the game in the RPG system of (in order):

1) HERO.

HERO is an old, old friend to me, and its extreme flexibility allows me to create any gizmo I can imagine.

2) Mutants & Masterminds.

M&M has much the same flexibility, and its a little lighter in the rules department. Plus, its D20 heritage would be familiar to more of my players.

3) Spycraft 2.0.

While not as flexible as the above, it IS set up as a D20 spy game, so it would be relatively familiar to my players, and much of what I would use is already in the game.

4) Godlike.

A WW2 Supers games is ripe for a spy game...especially since its designers did a good job with the campaign details.

5) Other.

I can envision a good spy game in something like Shadowrun, Cyberpunk, or even For Faerie Queen & Country...or D&D. Or a host of other game systems.

That said OP, if your game is good, I'd at least give it a look-see.

 

[MoogleEmpMog]

Based on d20 Modern would be my first choice, based on True20 my second. SpyCraft is a nice game with some neat ideas, but there's more room for such a project in the other options, IMO.

 

[ValhallaGH]

Never saw that before - good stuff! Thanks for the link.

No problem. And thank you for the compliment.

 

[Committed Hero]

No problem. And thank you for the compliment.

Can I ask you a question about the skill groups idea - do you still use the same number of skill ranks when making a character and/or level up? Is it unbalancing that some skill groups offer access to twice as many skills as others? It's not that I dislike the idea, on the contrary, but those are my misgivings about it.

 

[ValhallaGH]

Can I ask you a question about the skill groups idea - do you still use the same number of skill ranks when making a character and/or level up?

Yes.

Is it unbalancing that some skill groups offer access to twice as many skills as others? It's not that I dislike the idea, on the contrary, but those are my misgivings about it.

I went with the design philosophy of a group being balanced if it had three good skills, and that two Craft, Knowledge or Perform skills were equal to one good skill.

Not all the groups follow this idea. For example, Educated gives all but one knowledge skill. This was due to a desire to make it possible for a character to invest into all knowledge areas without having to choose eight different groups that completely overlap except in knowledge skills. A few groups, such as Perception, are also more powerful due to thematic reasons (all four of those skills are directly involved with perceiving things) but on the whole they stick to the 'three good skills' philosophy.
Honestly, the only group I have had any issues with is Educated. I haven't seen any abuse yet but it's possible. Then again, Knowledge skills are generally sub-par (hence the two for one equation above).


With regards to actual game play, I've been using these with my Modern game for several months now, and though characters are generally more powerful (they come up with cool ideas for their skills and I usually approve them), it's not an increase that has unbalanced the game nor made it less fun; quite the opposite, it's allowed the team to split up successfully during investigation phases, as they have the skills to do the legwork. Even though the martial artist can now act as a face, the negotiator is still head and shoulders better at it. Both players are happy, the Martial Artist with his ability to interact successfully and the Negotiator with her ability to socially dominate when she desires.

Finally, it's made it so that all advanced classes are accessible to all characters by level 6, and most are accessible by level 3 or 4. It always bugged me that a level 4 Fast hero could be a Soldier or Martial Artist but that a Strong hero had to be level 9 before he could be a Gunslinger or Bodyguard.

 

[Turanil]

Depends on the licensing requirements. I'm not sure if True20 <...> allow "shared" products.

Where True20 PDFs by third party publishers are concerned, you must buy a 100$ license to Green Ronin (more about this on their website).

Personnally I would be interested in it, if it were for True20. True20 is new with few stuff available, so I am interested in what is released for it, while there is already so much stuff available for d20 out there...

Otherwise, I also second the Savage Worlds suggestion.