That's OK, but worth considering before jumping on some of the other Cypher offerings he's got.Ĭlick to expand.That is sort of the impression I got - someone who prefers a more traditional outlook on system and mechanics (the roll is how well you do something, rather than narrative based (like fate)), sort of traditional GM / Player roles and that sort of thing - but pushes that structure as far up against a narrative system as you can get without it actually being a "narrative" game. The Cypher System is not as uni-system as he'd like it to be. Cypher based super heroes might be fun for an odd one off, but it doesn't work in a campaign for instance. Sometimes the ideas pan out, sometimes they need some (to a lot) more work, and sometimes they just don't work at all. Monte Cook has long been a man/company of great ideas. But the other genres he tries to ram the system onto break rather easily. The former worked really well, the latter worked less well but I could make it fun doing more of the heavy lifting myself. I've got half a bookshelf dedicated to the Numenera & The Strange Kickstarter rewards.
![unmasked cypher system pdf unmasked cypher system pdf](https://zerosangelhome.files.wordpress.com/2020/09/mortal-fantasy.png)
That said, it's reliance on cyphers does wreck it's applicability outside that premise. The premise, lore, and design for that purpose all mesh beautifully (if perhaps break a bit at higher character levels). I rather love how well it works for that setting and campaign. The Cypher System was designed to run Numenera the way Monte Cook envisioned it - with random 'power gadgets' coming & going as players explore a fantasy world playing off of Clarke's Third Law. Godforsaken has some good chapters as well, as do all of the books.īut if you loved MCG's innovate takes, I can understand how the white books, which focus on delivering the standard genre tropes, seem serviceable but meh. Oddly enough, if I was to rank the white book supplements, I'd put Stay Alive (especially Stay Alive) and Claim the Sky as my two favorites.
#Unmasked cypher system pdf Pc
But beyond a great vampire PC creation system, the rest of book is more about ordinary people vs horror (but the book does even address the horror fatigue in long-term horror games.) If your supers/zombies mash up is about vampires beating up zombies, I'd say Stay Alive is worth it. But it would give your player's new power shifts and options (and finally gives Cypher supers much easier access to flight than the core book)
#Unmasked cypher system pdf pdf
Great fun for a one-shot.įor zombies, I'd grab a pdf of the Strange's Worlds Numberless and Strange for it's Zed America, which offers more zombie variety, first, then Claim the Sky if you want more comic book-style supers.Ĭlaim the Sky has new stuff for your supers game including 50 super NPCs, but there's not much of a horror focus, if your plan is to have Super PCs fight zombies. The PCs shut down the ritual magics to win the day. In essence, instead of casting spells like wizards, supers used the trappings of the comic book fantasy to focus their esoteric powers. Hence they defined science because both were magic-based.
![unmasked cypher system pdf unmasked cypher system pdf](https://d1vzi28wh99zvq.cloudfront.net/images/4952/174647-thumb140.jpg)
They discovered the castle was ground zero of a mystic ritual that introduced not only zombie but also supers.
![unmasked cypher system pdf unmasked cypher system pdf](https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-scrglYK3pSI/WTFXv7zmKgI/AAAAAAAAZM4/mq7Xg_KLS1cN2b98D3p-2aPfehExkhqCwCLcB/s1600/charsheet%2Brevised.png)
A few years ago, I ran a great one-shot where the Supers PCs were storming an abandoned castle to get intel because while the supers had turned the tide against the zombies, the zombies could now infect supers (though that was highly classified.) The biggest mystery was how zombies worked, they defied science as we know it, just as with the supers that defended humanity.