Spycraft Game Control Screen and Agent Record Sheets
The Spycraft Game Control Screen and Agent Record Sheets come packaged for $19.95. The screen is a three panel screen that is somewhat lightweight compared to the D&D 3e Dungeon Master's screen. The included record sheets are in a 32 page booklet.
The outside of the screen has a pattern on it resembling a printed circuit board diagram, with the word Spycaft emblazoned upon the outside of the center panel. The side panels feature the same man and woman depicted on the cover of the Spycraft book and the Shadowforce Archer book respectively.
GM screens are something I rarely review. In fact, this will be the first. As such, I have little to go on other than existing screens. The D&D 3e DM's screen is both heavier and has one additional panel. Further, the text on the Spycraft screen is somewhat less compact.
Now there is the perfect possibility that there may have been less things that a GM needs in a Spycraft game. So let's take a look at what is on the Spycraft screen:
- Combat sequence (I consider this so simple and superfluous as to be unnecessary.)
- A table of combat actions (including type of action: free, full, or half.)
- Attack modifiers
- Cover and concealment
- Sample critical miss effects
- Face and reach for different size opponents
- Base breakng DCs
- Sample object hardness, wound points, and break DCs
- Example DCs for various skills (listed in one short table)
- Substance hardness and wound points
- Chase maneuvers listing
- Spotting difficulty. This table is somewhat wasteful in that it takes the whole width of the panel, but the text is only takes up half the width of the panel; half of the table is empty space.
- Spotting difficulty, with verbose explanatory notes
- Disposition modifiers to interpersonal skill checks
- Influencing disposition table
Now, the first question to ask is if the screen could have benefitted by using smaller text or an additional panel as the D&D 3e DM screen did. I definitely think so. This are other things I would have like to have seen on the screen:
- More skill tables. Spycraft seems like if anything, it would be more skill-reliant than D&D. However, it lacks the many skill result/sample DC tables that pepper the D&D screen.
- Chase sequence, which is a bit more involved than the included combat sequence.
- There is a chase/distance chart in the record sheets that might have been convenient to glance at during the game.
- Vehicle critical hit table
- Crash check modifiers
- Favor check DCs
- Hampered movement and terrain tables
- In the Shadowforce Archer campaign setting book, the psion bonus table is of such central utility, I think including it here would be warranted.
Now perhaps you might not be able to fit all of those, but I do think that many of those would be worth including, sufficiently so to call the size and layout of the screen into question.
Turning our attention from the screen to the sheet booklet, the booklet contains a variety of record sheets. The booklet is primarily comprised of sheets for player characters. Each sheet is unique and the booklet is not perforated, so the book is obviously intended for photocopying.
All of the PC "agent" record sheets are double sided, with a matched front and back. The first sheet in the booklet is generic, intended for general use by Spycraft PCs. The following sheets are specific to one of the Spycraft classes, with the class name box filled in and the class skill check boxes on the front and some special ability blanks on the back already filled out.
There are also sheets intended for use with characters in the Shadowforce Archer campaign setting, bearing the Shadowforce Archer logo instead of the Spycraft logo. The first sheet is essentially identical to the generic Spycraft character sheet, except one of the blanks is renamed from "nationality" to "chamber".
Three sheets are dedicated to the psion classes from Shadowforce Archer. As with the earlier class-specific sheets, these sheets have class skill check-boxes and special ability blanks already filled in. There is also a second skill list on the back of the sheet listing psionic skills that are available to a character of that class.
Finally, there is a "mystic" sheet. The word "mystic" entered in the first "class" blank, which is technically incorrect (not to mention inconvenient) since there is no mystic class; the mystic rules in Shadowforce Archer is feat-and-skill centered. The back of the sheet has some of the mystic feats available to such characters, as well as a spot for rites and rituals that the character knows.
There is also a mastermind and minion record sheets. The mastermind sheet is similar to the generic spycraft sheet, but has space for criminal and organization profiles. The minion sheet fits two minions on a single page and contains basic information.
Finally, there are some other sheets in addition to the character sheets. There is a chase record sheet, with spots for vehicle details as well as convenient tables and charts for use during a chase. There is also a season design sheet, for use by the GM when using the Spycraft mastermind design system to create villainous organizations.
Conclusion
While I think this package provides some useful tools for Spycraft GMs and players, there is room for improvement in terms of both price and utility. As stated above, I think that the GM screen could have afforded an extra panel and smaller print to accommodate more information. Further, I find character sheet packets less useful in the internet age, where character sheets are usually obtained free from a publisher (or fan) website and printed on a computer. Perhaps something like a sample adventure or threat could have been included to round out the offerings.
Further, the screen itself isn't much thicker than the cover of most modern softcover RPG books, and 32 page adventures typically market for much less than 20 dollars. Considering that much less writing development and artwork was required for the Spycraft Game Control Screen and Agent Record Sheets than a typical d20 system adventure, I find the price of the a bit unjustifiable.
-Alan D. Kohler
