The Red Star Campaign Setting is a d20 Modern campaign setting based on The Red Star comic by Archangel Studios. The book is written by T.S. Luikart and Ian Sturrock, edited by Michelle Lyons, and developed by Robert J. Schwalb, and published by Green Ronin.
A First Look[imager]http://www.greenronin.com/images/product/grr1406_200.jpg[/imager]
The Red Star Campaign Setting is a 192 page full color hardbound book priced at $34.95.
The cover of the book is by Christian Gosset, Snakebite, and Paul Schrier, depicting three figures in Russian garb, one woman wielding an odd translucent weapon.
Interior art (full color) is by Christian Gosset, Snakebite, Paul Schrier, James Ryman, Allen Coulter, Jon Moberly, Junki Saita, Chris Glenn, Edwin Fong, Nolan Nelson, and Aaron Skillman, including both 2D art and 3D computer generated art. Overall, the art is of fantastic quality. The pages have a nice color watermark backdrop, and the pages are printed on "glossy" paper. The Red Star Campaign Setting is easily the most attractive d20 product I have seen this year, outstripping even books for Green Ronin’s own well regarded Mutants & Masterminds line.
There were a few noticeable editorial errors, such as spelling errors and an inexplicable shift in fonts in mid-paragraph.
A Deeper Look
For those not familiar with comic, The Red Star is set in what might be thought of as an alternate Earth. Major players and elements of 19th and 20th century history exist, though many names and specifics are changed. But the biggest difference between the world of Red Star and our own is, perhaps, that the world is one rife with magic, and this magic is integrated with society, with military units wielding telekinetic weapons and with sorceresses as part of military ranks.
Much as many earlier comics drew from American political imagery, The Red Star draws from Russian political imagery.
The book is divided into three sections and further subdivided in nine chapters, plus appendices. The three sections cover character creation, military and magic rules, and the setting, respectively.
The Red Star uses D20 Modern as a baseline, but hews less closely to the core assumptions of the D20 Modern book than some D20 Modern products. The generic ability-score-keyed base classes are not used. Instead, the book introduces a number of profession/archetype style 20 level core classes, based primarily on military archetypes seen in the comic:
-Hailer: Elite Red Fleet soldiers that carry telekinetic machine guns, also called hailers. As they advance, they gain greater abilities with their weapons.
-Nistaani Shaman: Shamans of the nomadic Nistaani people. Shamans wield magic in the form invocations and rituals.
-Nistaani Warrior: Rugged warriors of the Nistaani, proficient in wilderness survival and guerilla warfare. Abilities vary slightly depending up specific area of origin.
-Nokgorkan Resistance Fighter: Members of a rebellion started in the republic of Nokgorka. The capabilities of the Restitance Fighter strongly resemble those of the class D20 System rogue, with additional capabilities representing the network of the resistance movement.
-Red Fleet Officer: Officers in charge of detachments or vehicles of the Red Fleet of the United Republics of the Red Star.
-Red Trooper: The basic infantry trooper of the URRS. The Red Trooper uses a multipurpose telekinetic weapon called a hook; as they advance, they learn additional maneuvers with the hook, among other tactical abilities and bonus feats.
-Sorceress: Magic is a part of the Red Star setting and sorceresses are the practitioners of the URRS, who cast (or rather, kast) spells called "protocols". There are a variety of specializations that must be chosen (like warkaster or Nokgorkan priestess) that influence their abilities. See below for a brief description of how magic works in The Red Star.
-Zek: Zeks are current or former prison-workers. Like sorceresses, they choose specializations (like engineer or criminal) which influence their class abilities as they advance.
There are a variety of tweaks and options in the Red Star’s take on the system. Two options in character creation allow for a character to choose three ability to advance each time they are eligible for ability score advancement, instead of the normal one, reasoning that The Red Star’s heroes are larger than life. Also, there is an option to balance characters according to where the campaign is run. If a campaign is run largely exclusively in a region friendly to a given character class, members of other character classes receive bonus feats to make them more appealing.
The equipment section presents items of gear unique to the setting, such as telekinetic weapons and special armor such as STRIFE armor (which protects against regular weapons as well as against protocols) and autoshields (protocol force field generators). Weapons can be enhanced through protocols as well, providing bonuses similar to D&D magic weapons.
The second section is primarily about the URRS military, detailing rules changes, vehicles, and rules for sorcery. A brief chapter provides a few additions and modifications to the D20 Modern system. One of the most notable is that they revert to using D&D style nonlethal damage (as I share the widespread view that the D20 Modern take on nonlethal damage is conceptually problematic, I consider this to be a good thing). The combat rules also tweak the scale to operate in metric, using 2 meter squares instead of 5 foot squares. Finally, a simple system is laid out for indirect fire, allowing a gunner to "zero in" on a target with successive shots.
Magic in the Red Star setting is not an automatic affair. Sorcereress and Shamans gain spells called Protocols or Invocations, respectively. Spellcasting characters gain knowledge of protocols/incantations as they gain levels, though much more slowly than in the core magic system. Spells (protocols and incatations) are not cast with spell slots. Instead, spells use a skill called kasting. Skill checks determine whether or not the characters succeeds at the spell. Spells normally cost a listed number of nonlethal damage, though a good kasting skill check can reduce the cost.
Section three included 4 chapters, describing the history and current state of affairs in the world (with a focus on the URRS and later Commonwealth and other major nations and regions that figure prominently in the setting), the spirit world (which figures in the Red Star setting), and a chapter on GMing.
The history and geography chapters cover history dating back to the tribal times in the Red Lands, through the revolutions, and up to the modern day. There is relatively little rules material in this chapter but several figures, regions, and attitudes that are important in the setting are covered.
The spirit realm chapter is more rules oriented. The spirit realm played a major role in the Great Patriotic War (the Red Star analog of WWII), with the spirits of the dead taking roles in the wars, and the power of the greatest leaders history and modern times stems from tapping what would be called Post Human Energy.
Some characters with powerful spirits in life go on to become immortals in the afterlife; a template is provided to define such characters. Immortals have a number of new options available, such as two advanced classes (free spirit and soul thief) and several feats such as read destiny. The chapter also covers the Nistani invocations described earlier.
The last (brief) chapter provides GM advice, in the form of defining a number of potential campaign models that they GM may wish to run in the setting, most of them military in nature, but there are some that are not.
Appendices provide game statistics for major characters from the comic as well as generic NPCs and important tables (such as equipment and vehicle tables and metric game scales.) There is an index as well, which has most important terms, but I found a few that were missing (like Imbohl.)
Conclusions
Graphically, The Red Star is one of the most eye-pleasing offerings I have seen this year. Sometimes collaborations between game companies and designers in other mediums don’t work out too well, but this one worked out beautiful.
There are no glaring holes in the rules, and most of character options seem well assembled and interesting. A few concepts came as a bit of a shock, such as the concept of providing bonuses for characters in a potentially disadvantaged campaign situation.
The use of 20 level core classes is a bit of a contrast with traditional D20 Modern rules, which could compromise compatibility for those who wish to mine the book for material or integrate other material. Also, the core classes seem much more narrowly defined than traditional D20 Modern classes, which could limit the variety in the campaign and characters a bit. That said, I was pleased to see yet another publisher happy to do away with the (to employ a common internet term) craptastic default d20 Modern nonlethal damage system.
Finally, coming to the book as someone who is not well read in the comic, I felt that a clear cut summary (as appear in some other licensed products) would have gone a long way in getting the feel of the setting.
Overall Grade: B+
-Alan D. Kohler
