New SWADE Blues

Savage Worlds.  I remember taking the first edition of the game for a spin years ago and loving it.  I've kept up with the line since then, enjoying one-offs here and there of the Fast! Furious! Fun! game in multiple genres.  So if I love the game so much, why title this blog post New SWADE Blues?  Well, one, the Elvis pun.  But two, and more importantly- the blues part comes from not having enough time to run about six campaigns using this game system. 

Savage Worlds is a system I've become increasingly fond of over the years because it fills that multi-genre system niche without being GURPSd or BRP or D20.  It handily runs just about any game, but without some of the things that hold other games back from running quickly or cleanly.  GURPS' 1-second turns, Palladium's three mile long skill list, things like that.  Savage Worlds has a short set of attributes and skills backed up by Edges that act as Feats do in D20-based games.  The system uses ratings beginning at d4 and running to d6, d8, d10, d12, d12+1 and so forth.  A d6 is average ability.  Dice "Ace"- sometimes referred to as "exploding" in other games. This means if the die rolls its maximum value, the die is re-rolled and the total added.  This continues as long as the maximum value continues to be rolled.  So a roll of a d8 might result in a 22 if the die comes up 8, 8 and 6.  Rolling 4 or more better than the target number is a "Raise" and represents great success.  And that's sort of it- the basics of the rules. 

Now, add Edges to do anything you might want to add.  Magic, weapon expertise, social skill, linguistic talent, you name it.  The Edges bolt on to the basic die conventions to create an extremely flexible, yet simple, construct.  There's no Hit Points, but would levels determined by rolling damage vs. Toughness, which is a function of an attribute modified by Edges or armor. 

Throw in Bennies, poker chips (or other counters) that allow a player to do a number of fun things to manipulate the game, and the concept of Wild Cards and Extras, and you're ready to rock.  Wild Cards are the important characters of the game- the players and non-players alike.  Extras are orcs, stormtroopers, cops and other background or run-of-the-mill characters.  Extras drop like flies, while Wild Cards are tough and more likely to excel. 

When I introduced SWADE to the Royal Dragoons at our gaming meeting, I asked what genre the players wanted to play.  I got "Fantasy", "Cyberpunk" and "Sci-Fi."  OK, then.  We jumped in and created characters- lo and behold, there was zero issue constructing characters to fit this Shadowrun-esque melting pot of genre.  Even the caster/cyberdeck jocky was a simple build.  We jumped into the game and had no problems with all the moving parts interacting in the game because the system was simple and consistent.  We had to reference things like spells once or twice (and had the help of the Power Cards included in the SWADE Essentials Box) but the game moved swiftly and without much delay.

I remember a halfling assassing parkour-ing off a fire escape to land on an Orc in a dark, wet alley between tenements while spells and guns flashed and fists and feet flew.  It was great to have the battle run so easily with so many separate elements freely mixed.  And it didn't take a truckload of dice to do it- I'm looking at YOU, Shadowrun 6e.

This test run was ruled an unmitigated success by the players, and I've had several requests to run SWADE again, as a one-off or ongoing campaign.  For a group that swears by its 5e and Star Wars D6, it's a pretty fun thing to find a new system people enjoy.  Bonus if it's a system that handles many disparate genres.  I can't wait to run it again- and I have about 20 ideas for campaigns I'd love to run.

SWADE is supported by several campaign settings, notably Savage RIFTS, the new Robotech Macross game, and Savage Worlds standards like The Last Parsec, East Texas University, Weird Wars and more.  Want Weird West?  Try Deadlands.  Space: 1889 for that steampunk itch.  Mix them, match them, SWADE makes it all possible and all good.

Yup, I've got the New SWADE Blues in that I don't have tons of free time to run about a half dozen SWADE games in the near future.