Free League announces official Alien RPG

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For those that have the game, is the mythology of Prometheus/Covenent present?
 
Now, if I could only convince my group to play it. For whatever reason, they are pretty much fantasy-only and when I suggest something modern or scifi they steer me back to fantasy. :sad:

I like the looks of this new pre-order, however, and will probably sink some $$ into it. :grin:
 
The starter set is supposed to be out soon, I think. I just got the PDF files for the starter set and they look pretty decent so far.
 
Two sets of PDF's, actually. One folder for "Destroyer of Worlds" and one called "Starter Set." I suppose DoW is the adventure and SS is the starter rules.
 
Starter Set also has Chariot of the Gods. Essentially it’s the Alien themed adventure. Destroyer of Worlds is a sort of sequel that is an Aliens themed adventure.
 
I have just skimmed over Destroyer of Worlds and it looks amazing. A deluxe 3 session adventure with maps and handouts like Chariot of the Gods.

I really like how its not just an Aliens knock-off. The premise of Colonial Marines on a colonial mining town hunting insurgents under the threat of invasion is really cool.
 
I have just skimmed over Destroyer of Worlds and it looks amazing. A deluxe 3 session adventure with maps and handouts like Chariot of the Gods.

I really like how its not just an Aliens knock-off. The premise of Colonial Marines on a colonial mining town hunting insurgents under the threat of invasion is really cool.
Yeah agreed, just finished reading it and every little detail is very good. A mini-sandbox with multiple points of tension ready to blow up and so many locations with just enough details. I can see it playing out so many ways.
 
I've been impressed by the way they've managed to dredge up a lot of material from various "official Alien" sources to make having the license actually mean something, but still add enough to offer something other than just Alien / Aliens movie clone adventures.
 
The Stress mechanic looks like Vampire 5E hunger, which is good. Is that so?
 
Its a cool dynamic and one that I haven't seen elsewhere to the same extent. At the start, most PCs want some Stress to enhance their focus and skill, rather than being caught flatfooted by the events to come. This sees players encouraged to go out and investigate and take on challenges early when the scenario is often quietest. However, there is a tipping point where it goes out of control and even spreads to other PCs. This descent really conveys the feeling of the movies quite a bit and is a blast to play.
 
The Stress mechanic looks like Vampire 5E hunger, which is good. Is that so?

For some reason the person who originally answered Silva’s post deleted their response.

I am not entirely familiar with VtM5’s Hunger Dice so I may not be the best to answer, but I think the difference is that in Alien Stress dice add to the dice pool and not convert dice in it. As a result, they don’t just add an increasing chance of something bad but also an increasing chance of success. This creates The dynamic I mention above of making Stress initially desirable but ultimately a risk.
 
For some reason the person who originally answered Silva’s post deleted their response.

I am not entirely familiar with VtM5’s Hunger Dice so I may not be the best to answer, but I think the difference is that in Alien Stress dice add to the dice pool and not convert dice in it. As a result, they don’t just add an increasing chance of something bad but also an increasing chance of success. This creates The dynamic I mention above of making Stress initially desirable but ultimately a risk.

I have no idea how VtM works, but I agree that the good and bad aspects of stress dice makes it interesting. A little stress is good,the senses heighten, reflexes might get a little faster. Too much and you start losing fine motor control, and do things like drop the magazine out of your gun, or fumble with your keys trying to open a door, completely overlook that Alien creature hunched down next to the weapons rack...
 
The two dice mechanics are similar but differ in ways that directly relate to what they are simulating, Stress vs a Vampire's bestial nature.

Stress as mentioned above increases your chance of success, reflecting the focus one gets when under stress. This comes at the risk of panicking, but until you're very stressed panics aren't likely to result in a failure or other negative consequences. Eventually of course it will build to the point where you might go nuts and risk the whole group.

Hunger however replaces dice which leads to, not an increased risk of failure or a better chance of success, but the contamination of both successes and failures with aggression. So you might roll to see if you intimidate a bouncer at a club. Succeed when you have no Hunger dice and you simply stare him down. Succeed with Hunger dice involved and you break his arm. Fail without hunger dice and you just fail. Fail with hunger dice and you kill him violently for "daring to oppose you".

This has to be considered with the generally rare rolling in V5. Act like a mortal and you don't need to roll. Rolling is pushing yourself in some way which risks (via the Hunger dice) bringing out this violence/waking the Beast.

Even ignoring the excellent subsystems that surround them, e.g. Alien's world generator and elegant non-Xeno hazard mechanics and V5's reworking (or revamping omglul!!eleventy-one!!) of the Vitae pool system, these are the recent games that have impressed me the most with their central mechanic.
 
Amazing comparison, Seadna. Thanks! I already got V5, now I need to get Alien.

Btw, how to pronounce Séadna Séadna ? I don't know why but I always assumed it was smthing like "shah-na". Maybe y brain associates it to Gaelic or something.
 
Amazing comparison, Seadna. Thanks! I already got V5, now I need to get Alien.
I'd recommend picking up one of the two scenarios with it (one is PDF only at the moment): Chariot of the Gods or Destroyer of Worlds. The former is the simpler scenario.

Btw, how to pronounce Séadna Séadna ? I don't know why but I always assumed it was smthing like "shah-na". Maybe y brain associates it to Gaelic or something.
It is Gaelic, it's the Gaelic word for Jack-of-the-Lantern/Stingy Jack/Jack the Smith.

It's pronounced She-ah-nah. With "She" as in "She said" and "Nah" as in the casual form of "No".
 
Just finished reading Destroyer of Worlds to run in a couple of weeks time. It’s a pretty amazing scenario. They talk about it being run in three scenarios like Chariot of the Gods, but it seems like it would be longer, especially Acts 1 and 3.

It has the feel of Aliens but the set up is so much better, with some excellent military drama with dealing with local insurgents. It has a Black Hawk Down vibe. There is a sense of isolation but that’s because everyone is hostile to you.

The setting is huge, both in terms of the city and the military base. I am really impressed by the scale and scope they have added with this adventure.
 
Just finished reading Destroyer of Worlds to run in a couple of weeks time. It’s a pretty amazing scenario. They talk about it being run in three scenarios like Chariot of the Gods, but it seems like it would be longer, especially Acts 1 and 3.

It has the feel of Aliens but the set up is so much better, with some excellent military drama with dealing with local insurgents. It has a Black Hawk Down vibe. There is a sense of isolation but that’s because everyone is hostile to you.

The setting is huge, both in terms of the city and the military base. I am really impressed by the scale and scope they have added with this adventure.
Nice. That's pretty exciting!
 
If your pre-order is through Free Legion Publishing you should e-mail customer service and ask about it. I got my starter set a few weeks ago.

If your pre-order is through a game store, I have no idea. :sad:
 
If your pre-order is through a game store, I have no idea. :sad:
401 Games in Toronto. Usually they're pretty good, although they started posting a warning that Canada Post is super duper slow and awful right now.
 
I've had the starter set and Destroyer of Worlds about a month now. It seems readily available here in the UK.
 
Reading this and noticed that, just like AW, the suggested names for archetypes are Easter eggs for media characters. Anyone noticed that?

for the 'Kid' character:

Chip Harrington
Hugo Turner
Jakey Myers
Meggie Wu
Maisie Kelly
Becca David

Chip Harrington, Maisie Kelly, and Hugo Turner seem to be based on Kit Harrington (Jon), Maisie Williams (Arya) and Sophie Turner (Sansa) from Games of Thrones. And Becca David is obviously here for those who want to play as Rebecca 'Newt' Jorden. :heart:

tumblr_mq1h3hjS051sah41po1_r1_400.gif
 
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Officially as of last night, when I finish up the current arc on our MSH game , we're playing Alien, and *I* get to play! WEE!!

So some thoughts on the game after giving it a single readthrough: UNEXPECTEDLY INTERESTING.

- The system is easy and none of the mechanics throw red-flags at me.
- Setting narratives are *rich*. Far far far more than I expected despite the fact I've seen all the movies, read most (if not all of the comics). They did a stellar job of curating the material into a massive playable sandbox with tons of possibility.
- Aliens are optional! No kidding, there is enough conflict in this setting between factions, basic survival, etc you never need to even fight an Alien. I could run this game exactly as it is - a bleak but hopeful post-cyberpunk dark sci-fi survival game of people trying to get by, and never even get into Aliens. This also allows a GM to use them as intended - a horrible rumor on the edges of the public consciousness. They nailed it.
- Blue Collar Sci-Fi - Caveat: I'm not known as a sci-fi super-nerd. I've done my due-diligence, I've read all the classics, Dune is my favorite series, read a lot of the modern stuff (Alistair Reynolds is a standout, Stross, Verner venge, etc.) But outside of say... Corey with his Expanse books, I can't think of anything that grabbed me as so distinctly about "blue-collar sci-fi" as it's core conceits, and I'm sure it exists (and I'm sure someone will point out such exceptions - feel free!) but I like that the hard kernel of this game is about people regular people living DIY in many cases in the depths of space without beating the fuck out of me with mechanics. The game does a very good no-nonsense job of establishing the core vide of the game with the idea that its 80's sci-fi tech+ and things are wearing down.
- Panic system! Love the mechanics for it. It captures the fit and feel of the movies contextually to the character roles wonderfully.

Now I haven't run or played the game but it's next up on bat. So whether we do some episodic stuff, or a full blown campaign (no idea what our GM is planning) I'm hoping he runs one of the adventures which I purposely avoided. So yeah this baby looks cool. If it plays as good as it reads I'm looking forward to running it myself.

More once it hits the tarmac and we launch.
 
Officially as of last night, when I finish up the current arc on our MSH game , we're playing Alien, and *I* get to play! WEE!!

So some thoughts on the game after giving it a single readthrough: UNEXPECTEDLY INTERESTING.

- The system is easy and none of the mechanics throw red-flags at me.
- Setting narratives are *rich*. Far far far more than I expected despite the fact I've seen all the movies, read most (if not all of the comics). They did a stellar job of curating the material into a massive playable sandbox with tons of possibility.
- Aliens are optional! No kidding, there is enough conflict in this setting between factions, basic survival, etc you never need to even fight an Alien. I could run this game exactly as it is - a bleak but hopeful post-cyberpunk dark sci-fi survival game of people trying to get by, and never even get into Aliens. This also allows a GM to use them as intended - a horrible rumor on the edges of the public consciousness. They nailed it.
- Blue Collar Sci-Fi - Caveat: I'm not known as a sci-fi super-nerd. I've done my due-diligence, I've read all the classics, Dune is my favorite series, read a lot of the modern stuff (Alistair Reynolds is a standout, Stross, Verner venge, etc.) But outside of say... Corey with his Expanse books, I can't think of anything that grabbed me as so distinctly about "blue-collar sci-fi" as it's core conceits, and I'm sure it exists (and I'm sure someone will point out such exceptions - feel free!) but I like that the hard kernel of this game is about people regular people living DIY in many cases in the depths of space without beating the fuck out of me with mechanics. The game does a very good no-nonsense job of establishing the core vide of the game with the idea that its 80's sci-fi tech+ and things are wearing down.
- Panic system! Love the mechanics for it. It captures the fit and feel of the movies contextually to the character roles wonderfully.

Now I haven't run or played the game but it's next up on bat. So whether we do some episodic stuff, or a full blown campaign (no idea what our GM is planning) I'm hoping he runs one of the adventures which I purposely avoided. So yeah this baby looks cool. If it plays as good as it reads I'm looking forward to running it myself.

More once it hits the tarmac and we launch.
I had a blast running it. I hope you keep us posted on how it goes!
 
Officially as of last night, when I finish up the current arc on our MSH game , we're playing Alien, and *I* get to play! WEE!!

So some thoughts on the game after giving it a single readthrough: UNEXPECTEDLY INTERESTING.

- The system is easy and none of the mechanics throw red-flags at me.
- Setting narratives are *rich*. Far far far more than I expected despite the fact I've seen all the movies, read most (if not all of the comics). They did a stellar job of curating the material into a massive playable sandbox with tons of possibility.
- Aliens are optional! No kidding, there is enough conflict in this setting between factions, basic survival, etc you never need to even fight an Alien. I could run this game exactly as it is - a bleak but hopeful post-cyberpunk dark sci-fi survival game of people trying to get by, and never even get into Aliens. This also allows a GM to use them as intended - a horrible rumor on the edges of the public consciousness. They nailed it.
- Blue Collar Sci-Fi - Caveat: I'm not known as a sci-fi super-nerd. I've done my due-diligence, I've read all the classics, Dune is my favorite series, read a lot of the modern stuff (Alistair Reynolds is a standout, Stross, Verner venge, etc.) But outside of say... Corey with his Expanse books, I can't think of anything that grabbed me as so distinctly about "blue-collar sci-fi" as it's core conceits, and I'm sure it exists (and I'm sure someone will point out such exceptions - feel free!) but I like that the hard kernel of this game is about people regular people living DIY in many cases in the depths of space without beating the fuck out of me with mechanics. The game does a very good no-nonsense job of establishing the core vide of the game with the idea that its 80's sci-fi tech+ and things are wearing down.
- Panic system! Love the mechanics for it. It captures the fit and feel of the movies contextually to the character roles wonderfully.

Now I haven't run or played the game but it's next up on bat. So whether we do some episodic stuff, or a full blown campaign (no idea what our GM is planning) I'm hoping he runs one of the adventures which I purposely avoided. So yeah this baby looks cool. If it plays as good as it reads I'm looking forward to running it myself.

More once it hits the tarmac and we launch.
Please give us updates after each play session. I'm very curious to see how it plays in a campaign and information coming from someone like you would be invaluable. Your opinion on how it would work as a bleak post cyberpunk sort of rpg could be really interesting.
 
Will do!

I need to get a copy of the Colonial Marines book. When does that drop? Anyone know?
 
Will do!

I need to get a copy of the Colonial Marines book. When does that drop? Anyone know?
If I recall the pdf's out and the print version will be released third quarter. This is from memory and I could be wrong. lol
 
I can't pre-order it on the Free League site!! They don't WANT MY GOLD!!!!!
 
I know right? I tried putting any of their products into the basket and I get bupkus.

WEAK.

Maybe the pre-order period is over? I got mine about a month ago.


I agree with your assessment of the game. I've seen a lot of comments that you could just use Traveller and that is a fair comment, you could. What I think Alien brings (besides being the official Alien game) is a nice system for running something a little darker than Traveller. It works well for a game where space is a dangerous place, just the environment itself before you add in anything intentionally trying to cause you harm.
Blue collar sci-fi is a good term for what it does, I could very easily see it used for running a game in a space version of Deadliest Catch, Ice Road Truckers, or similar. It would also work well for a space western like Outland. Space colonies seem very likely to attract the same kinds of activity seen on frontiers everywhere.

Funny thing is the system would not normally appeal to me, but it fits the game well. When life is cheap, quick chargen is a plus and the stress system is brilliant, I love the way it actually adds to the characters abilities right up until they snap.
 
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