Ghost Ops QS & One Page Solo

This is a sort of double play test as I was using the One Page Solo Engine that I talked about last time, specifically the Fudge version I wrote in Javascript, to play test the adventure provided by Ghost Ops RPG Quick Start.

This was also my first encounter with Fudge and to support my weekend I downloaded the 1995 Fudge rules from http://www.fudgerpg.com.

Part One

So lets start with Ghost Ops specifically. The game works really well! There are a few editorial issues with the quick start rules but the beauty of modern PDF publishing is that these could be fixed and the PDFs updated in no time. I am not worried about those as I am sure they will be fixed.

The Fudge rules I have makes a point of using words rather than numbers for the difficulty factors and player attributes. The actual wording says “It [Fudge] also uses words rather than numbers to describe character traits.” The claim is that “Fudge’s descriptive nature makes ideal it for novice players.” I am not a novice and I detest the adjective based difficulty levels. I am pleased to say that Ghost Ops leans much more towards Target Numbers rather than difficulty descriptions for example to quote the sample mission “There is roof access and it would be easy to rappel down the building from the roof (TN 3).” In pure fudge I guess that would have been an Average challenge or something like that. Ghost Ops does have the descriptions and specifies ten levels from Easy TN1 to Mythic TN10.  For me rolling the dice, adding my skill and trying to beat a target number makes perfect sense and I am comfortable with that.

There are 13 skills in Ghost Ops and they are the way I like them, suitably broad that a single skill is used for all related tasks, one skill covers picking locks, disabling traps and bomb disposal. There are enough skills to need a balanced team to get a good coverage of the skills and the individual skill abilities differentiate characters even further. Over all the combination of pools, skills,  abilities and talents means that characters can be as unique as you could possibly want.

Character creation (in the full quick start book) is really quick and easy and is all choice based, no dice rolling needed. The source material is really cool, describing the SAS, Delta Force and a few other special forces units as your starting point.

Combat is quick and easy. In the play test the first half of the mission I was dealing with mainly innocents and tested the unarmed combat. At the end of the mission it was a lot more Frank Castle (Marvel’s Punisher/Netflix) and the body’s soon mounted up.

I never thought I would play a Fudge (or Fate) game and enjoy it but after this weekend I am a convert. I will be using Ghost Ops as the yard to measure all others against.

I am really looking forward to July when the full game is due to be released.

Part Two

The One Page Solo Engine performed extremely well. I don’t want to give any of the mission details away but at one point I was making my way stealthily up an access stair way when the solo engine prompted guards would be coming down, ducking out a fire exit there was another guard out there. Having avoided them and got to the right floor the solo engine was a bit kinder and the mission progressed. Trying to make my way out after completing the task Not only were there security guards on the roof but they were also fully aware of me coming up the stairs, cue yet another encounter.

Looking for a safe side of the building to rappel down to get away I asked the question “Is there anyone in the street below?” The “Yes and…” result, given that all the security and fire alarms in the building were blaring, suggested that not only was the street occupied but the police and fire services would be screaming into the street.

This is the sort of thing that you just have to go along with when you are using a solo engine. The mission went rather off piste for a while but that allowed the solo engine create a range of threats and challenges. The javascript plus dice roller together in the same window make running the solo game really easy and the solo engine almost became invisible. By comparison the paper version required multiple dice rolls for most questions and table look ups. It is a lot more imposing than my version.

People new to solo engines often ask too many questions, not trusting themselves to improvise. In total I only needed to ask eleven questions of the solo engine. For my eleven questions I got four unscheduled encounters any of which could have ended in combat, two new locations and when faced with the the moral dilemma over collateral damage of civilians I learned a lot about by characters moral position. No innocent NPCs were killed during this adventure although several probably had to call in sick the next day.

Over all the solo engine was a great success and it is now my engine of choice. I have saved it to my phone and as it works entirely locally it even works in flight mode so long plane journeys are now even easier!

Part Three

Fudge… The 1995 Fudge rules are certainly not to my taste. Ghost Ops was described to me as ‘leaning towards Fudge’. While I agree the dice and the skill resolution mechanics are defintely Fudge-like the implementation is much grittier than Fudge and comes across as more empirical. I think Target Numbers do that where as Good or Great sound a bit fluffy or fuzzy.

What this has done though is make me want to look at other Fudge games. I may not get on with the original implementation of the rules but I can no longer tar derived games with the same brush.

This has been a really enjoyable and educational weekend.