RPGPundit Reviews: Alpha Omega; or "Now Shadowrun Has its Own Fantasy Heartbreaker!"

This is a review of Alpha Omega: The Beginning and the End by Earl Fischl and David Carter; the copy I'm reviewing is the print copy, and boy what a print copy!

I guess I should start with the one detail that has already made Alpha Omega pretty famous: this is a beautiful book! I mean seriously, if you're the type of guy who buys books based on looks alone, and you don't really care about the game as long as the book itself is pretty, stop whatever you're doing right NOW and buy this book.
Its possibly the prettiest RPG I've ever seen; its certainly the prettiest I've seen in ages.  Its a magnificent hardcover book but in landscape format (a.k.a., sideways, like a coffee table book), full colour glossy pages, from page 1 to page... well, um.. I don't know really (more on that later!), full colour stunning illustrations throughout the book from incredible artists; in short, its a masterpiece of aesthetics.

Now, that said, right here it has a few impracticalities as a game book.  The "landscape" format thing means it'll look great on a coffee table but its not so easy to put on a shelf; its also not as practical to use in actual play. And, for reasons absolutely baffling to me, the book isn't numbered by pages. Instead, each section uses some kind of decimal system (so like, "The World's New Technology is "3.8"; then the subheader "science wins again" is 3.8.1, followed by another section that's 3.8.2, etc etc.).  There's supposed to be a sidebar thingy that helps you look up your section, each section is supposedly coded and its all made to look like it was some kind of really unusual taskbar or bookmark folder from a webpage; part of the whole "Cyberpunk" style of Alpha Omega, no doubt.  But its basically shit. You can't easily look up anything with this system, its certainly not faster than actually just looking up things by page number. I tried the combination taskbar-thingy/decimal-system for about the first fourth of the book, then said fuck it and started using a bookmark to remember where I was.

But really, that's basically the one and only complaint about the format and layout of this game. As a visual product, its insanely brilliant. And just looking at the pictures, you get a very good idea of the "style" of the game: its cyberpunk, its modern, its got supernatural stuff going on, its gritty, its on the edge, etc etc. So, kudos for that brilliant job in the production.
You can also tell that these guys are insanely dedicated to supporting this game and making it a success.  In my book I got a letter written on their own stationary from Mind Storm labs, thanking me for my purchase (which indicates that this is probably standard with the book and not something especially for me), and informing the reader about their various future projects, the success (mostly accidental, in fact, but they don't mention that) of their viral marketing campaign, and the online presence they're making with their forums (http://www.alphaomegathegame.com/community/). In short, how hard they're trying to be huge.

I can't help but imagine that someone blew tens of thousands of dollars on producing this, if not more.  Someone has invested an entire inheritance, or life savings, or something, and has determined to go all out with an effort to become the next huge RPG.  Historically, this hasn't often turned out well.  Most gaming companies grew organically, started small and became huge; but I suppose there are a few exceptions.
Still, once upon a time it was far more common for a couple of nutty kids to invest a small fortune on a dream RPG, usually a group of guys who had mostly played D&D, and thought to themselves "I can design a better game than this!".  Usually, what they ended up designing was a very very similar game with a couple of minor differences, that didn't really get them anywhere other than broke.
In the 90s, these sorts of games were just as often highly-produced "Heartbreakers" of White Wolf products, Vampire-esque books full of pretention and bad poetry. But by the turn of the new century, these had mostly dried out as Vampire collapsed, less people played RPGs, and most of those who might have created a Heartbreaker a decade earlier were writing crappy "indie" games instead.

But it looks like the Heartbreaker is making a comeback! Only this time, its not inspired by D&D or Vampire, curiously, Alpha Omega's most direct and obvious inspiration in terms of both system and setting is Shadowrun.  Shadowrun must be doing better than I thought, if they've got their own heartbreakers...

To be really clear on what Alpha Omega is like: imagine if Shadowrun had gone and gotten herself drunk one night, met RIFTS at a party, and got herself knocked up. Then her baby was kidnapped by a cult of insane kabbalistic metaphysicians and transhumanists, pumped full of steroids, and raised to kill. That kid would be Alpha Omega.

The underlying metaphysic of the game suggest that the Earth is actually a battleground between heavenly armies (Demons and Angels, called Ophanum and Seraph in the game), who come back to earth every ten thousand years or so to duke it out. These periods of war usually end up utterly destroying all the civilization that the humans might have managed to produce in the meantime. Explaining the story of all this, and providing some metaplot elements to it all, are some writings of a prophetic 19th century occult author named Ethan Haas (who provides the introduction to the setting, and was the subject of their "Ethan Haas Was Right" viral marketing campaign).
The game setting takes place in the year 2280. Between now and then, the world has mostly gone to shit due to environmental devastation which lead to global civil war and civilizational collapse; massive nuclear and biological damage which created huge uninhabitable areas and strange mutations, and the eventual slow rebuilding of society around several mega-city-states. About a hundred years before the setting's present day, it is revealed that several half-human/half-angel(or demon) people known as the Nephilim had been living secretly among us for the last ten millenia, preparing for the return of the Ophanum and Seraph (collectively known as the Elim).There are also apparently one-quarter-angels and one-quarter-demons out there, and some kind of artificial slave race of the Elim called the Grigori.  All of these supernatural beings have been here all along, but had somehow managed to avoid detection until 2099. In 2280, the Elim are returning.

So you've got all these Elim and half-elim and quarter-elim running around, these Grigori homonculus-dudes, and of course humans have by this time taken up cybernetics, bio-genetic augmentation, and mutations. You also have AI intelligences that live on the equivalent of the internet.  All of these races are playable.

The world itself is organized by city-states: some are open cities not all that different from our own; some are walled cities, fortress areas meant to protect against the dangers that lie beyond, and finally some are Arcologies (massive, self-contained supercities). There are also "freezones" outside control of the city states; wild post-apocalyptic communities and roughshod wild-west towns.
The setting material is pretty extensive. Wish I could tell you how many pages it is; but suffice it to say that you get a nice overview of what life is like in the 23rd century, how culture works, food and finances, the Net and "augmented reality", and how people view magic, supernatural beings, and technology. You get some very nice breakdowns (along with STUNNING sci-fi/fantasy art) of the various city-states and areas of importance throughout the world; with each area detailed as far as the type of government they have, technology, what the culture and people are like, its military status, and any notable details. A lot of the arcologies are corporate-run (again, Shadowrun gamers will feel very much at home in this setting). And each area has its own very special style. Vancouver is a large urban centre with a corporate arcology, still the entertainment capital of the world. Greater Mexico City (incorrectly put in the "central and south america" section; note to authors: Mexico is in North America) is the second-largest city on the planet, an important manufacturing and trade open city with strict rules for citizenship and an immigration problem (I found that amusing).  Arcon-C-Hell, an Arcology built over the ruins of Paris, is a dictatorship with a powerful oligarchy where order is maintained by private mercenary armies; a den of swindlers, smugglers and thieves. Hong Kong is the largest city on earth (with 70 million inhabitants), a powerful and independent open city with massive advances in AI and high-tech, and a violent underworld.  The caribbean is collectively known as the "Pirate Islands", a dangerous sea of harsh weather and social instability.
And these are only a few examples of the setting material.

Alongside the setting material, you get a long list of NPC "personalities", individuals and organizations for the PCs to interact with, for good or ill. Pretty much every NPC detailed in this section is a uber-powerful badass that just has "potential GM's-Pet-NPC" written all over it. Most of them look like they came out of a Wachowski Bros. film. Apparently, in the 23rd century, form fitting outfits and leather are very "in". The organizations, which I find more interesting, include an army of radical AI-mercenaries, a group of Nephilim dedicated to trying to resist the oncoming invasion of the Elim, a few different groups of non-human supremacists bent on being the "ultimate evolutionary rulers" of the world, a dubious corporation called Triton Enterprises which bio-engineers dinosaurs, another dubious company that specializes in AI which has been accused of AI "exploitation" or abuse, and a group of AI-supremacists bent on liberating the AIs of human presence.

So now we get to the system.  First, let me say a couple of things about what the system is NOT:
1. Its not a direct copy of Shadowrun.  However, it is extremely "inspired" by Shadowrun, using the same basic structures of rules and character creation. I would bet my best pipe that the guys who designed this system were hardcore SR fans who thought they could do it better. I would leave it up to the SR fans and gamers in general to decide if they succeeded or not.
2. Its also defintely NOT rules-light.  This is one freakingly rules-heavy game.

You start first by choosing a species.  Humans are still the most common species on the planet, they have low attributes (compared to most of the other stuff) but have good options for skills and magic.
The Necrosi are gothy, pain-loving mutants who think they're playing Vampire or something.  They have relatively low attributes too, but have some bonus powers and are good with magic.
The "remnants" are diverse mutant humans who are the descendants of those who weathered the chaotic destruction of civilization outside the city states, and were exposed to radiation and other stuff which left them deformed. They're basically like humans with some bonus mutant powers.
The Bio-engineered are artificial humans originally mostly created as warriors, workers, spies, or pleasure-slaves. They have high skills and bonus abilities, but can't use magic.
The Nephilim are half-humans/half-Elim.  They have high attributes, special powers, are wicked good with magic, but can't get their skills as high as humans can.
The "Lesser Nephilims" are the offspring of Nephilim with humans (or any other non-nephlim, non-elim race).  They have relatively low attributes, but have the most diverse range of access to abilities of all kinds.
The Grigori were the homonculi created by the Elim as their warriors and servants, left behind on Earth after the last Elim visit here.  They have some magic, and a special power called "state-shifting"; but have very limited skill options.
"Lesser Grigori" are, you guessed it, half-grigori, half-something else. Apparently everything can breed with everything else around here.

And as if to prove that point, Anunnaki are half-Seraph(angel), half-ophanum(demon).  They have high attributes and tons of magic, and some powers. They're obviously outcast types and all have "dark eyes", they're clearly meant to be the loner-badasses of the game.

AIs are artificial intelligence androids, capable of having huge attributes depending on construction, and all the benefits of being artificial lifeforms. No magic, though, obviously.

Once you pick your race, you have 500 points to build your character with. That's right, its point-buy.  You first need to buy your "Core qualities", your primary attributes. At this point I was thinking to myself "ok, its complicated, shadowrun-esque, but not TOO bad".  How high you can make your Core Qualities depends mostly on your race. Once you have those Core Qualities, you have to derive from them a set of Secondary Qualities.  "Shit," I thought to myself, "not only do you have seven attributes in this game, you also have a bunch of secondary attributes?".

But wait, that's not all! After that, there are a bunch of TERTIARY qualities! That's right, the seven attributes weren't enough, neither were the secondary attributes, you have to have attributes after that which derive from core AND secondary qualities! Jesus fuck.

Then you have to buy a bunch of Abilities and Drawbacks, advantages and disadvantages. Fucking point buy.  Many of these abilities or drawbacks are limited by the race you have chosen.
Like most point-buy games that allow disadvantages, I can certainly see lots of opportunity for a well-read player to "maximize" (or abuse, depending who you ask) the system in order to create uber-characters whose disadvantages aren't really all that disadvantageous for him. But then, seeing as how the overall feeling of the game is that of creating uber-cool hyper-powered characters anyways, I guess it matters less than it would if this was a gritty-level game where you all played weakling mortals.

The Grigori (and half-grigori) can choose to invest in special powers called state-shifting; this basically allows them to alter "states" like size, speed, density or emotional states of themselves or their allies or opponents.

Mutant characters and Elim characters can then buy genetic deviations giving them special abilities. Lots of cool stuff like retractable claws, and some genetic disadvantages offering more opportunities to milk extra points.

Next, you buy skills. And finally, magic, if you can and want to. Magicians (called "wielders") are divided into arcane wielders, spiritual wielders and innate wielders. Different races might only be able to choose to be one or two of the three types, and some races (AIs and the bioengineered) can't choose magic at all. Magic in the system is tied into the universal metaphysics of the heavenly and demonic plus elemental planes, the ultimate positive plane being called "Alpha", and the ultimate negative plane "Omega"; from this the game derives its name. Each source of magic will allow different kinds of spells to be cast, and different types of magic-users have limits as to which types of sources they can access. Arcane wielders can buy power from any source except Alpha or Omega, spiritual wielders can only access Alpha or Omega as sources, and innate wielders can only access a single source of their choice.

Finally, you build your character details and gear up with some starting cash, called Trust in the game.

The mechanics of the game are based on "dice pools", where you roll a number of dice based on the attribute that governs the skill or power you are using, add the bonuses from how many levels you have in the skill, plus miscellaneous modifiers, and compare the total to a difficulty, usually. The dice pool you get is derived from a table. At the "Human" levels of attributes, the dice you are rolling for your pool are mostly D4s; for example, if you have a 10 in an attribute, you'd roll 5D4 in your dice pool. Someone with a 20 in an attribute would roll 4D6+2D4. The highest attribute level, 100, would roll 6D20.

The cool side of all this is that you get to roll a lot of dice, and that you add them all together rather than counting successes; thank God for that. The downside is that you often have to roll a shitload of D4s, which are frankly the crappiest dice to have to roll a lot of.

Combat is done by rolling an initiative roll called a Reaction check.  They will get to act in a certain number of segments.  Characters get a maximum of six total die rolls during a single "combat cycle", and when all die rolls are depleted, the round ends. Combat rules are very complete, just as rules-heavy as any other part of the game system, with rules for everything typical under the sun (cover, rates of fire, movement, called shots, special attacks, etc). Armor provides damage resistance, and players have a health pool.  Rules for damage include things like bleeding, and being reduced to 50% or less of your health pool causes an increase to the difficulty of all checks.
I have to give the combat system credit in that it is extremely complete. Again, its about at Shadowrun-levels of completeness, not as complex, say, as GURPS or the Hero System when you use everything in it, but certainly far above the average levels of RPG complexity. On a personal note, the entire system is too complex for my liking, but I know that Shadowrun or GURPs fans would have little trouble with this.

The magic, or "Weilding" system is very clever, allowing casters to essentially craft their own spells, and each source has very different kinds of broad categories of spells they can cast. These categories are called "intentions", and the game does a good job of making each source unique in its style and strengths.
Thankfully, lots of sample effects (spells) are provided, which make things easier for those who don't want to be too creative with their magic.
Spellcasting is handled like any other skill check, with serious failures causing damage to the caster's endurance.

Advancement is essentially handled by giving the PC more character points with which he can buy new stuff. But one interesting addition is the issue of "ascension".  Ascension represents the overall "spiritual" development of a character in this apocalyptic time, and if a character manages to increase his ascension level he gains access to special "Ascension" powers.  This is the true route to becoming a total Neo-like badass in the game.

The section on gear is quite extensive, with lots of cool items and gadgets, with lots of interesting illustrations. A lot of the equipment looks and sounds like it could have come out of a Shadowrun tech manual. Of course, the most detailed section of the Gear chapter is the section on weapons, with tons of cool blades, ninja weapons, freaking huge guns, and a few truly ridiculous items which leads me to think the authors have really not considered the practicality of these things. Or, put another way, they've never even been near a real fight in their lives. Particularly amusing is the "Raust Model 2620 with Undergrip Serrated Blade": Imagine, if you will, a standard revolver with a huge curved knife sticking out of the butt of the pistol. Hint to the game designers: there's a reason this thing doesn't exist in real life: it would be totally impractical and useless. And it looks more goofy than cool.
Thankfully, most of the guns look much sleeker and cooler than the Raust. Though I could say a thing or two about the "Misca Thunder, with Retractable Stock-Flail", too.  Yes, it looks just like what it sounds like, a kind of shotgun with a chain and bigass flail attached to it.

There are lots of cool physical augmentations you can also purchase, and quite a few vehicles with some truly awesome illustrations; badass cars, cycles, and even power armor.

Finally, there's a guide to playing the game with some very mundane and mostly useless rules on "creating stories and story arcs", and some sample NPCs of generic contacts and encounters like "gang boss", medic, or security officer. No hideous monsters are included in the main book, but I understand that there's a monster guide which will have a ton of these.

To conclude, I think in certain ways this game's massive production and promotion effort have almost worked against it in some ways; the opinions I've seen in many forums would suggest that people have assumed that because this game is so beautfully produced and so hyped, it will probably be an ultimately crappy "fantasy heartbreaker".  I don't think that's true. As a sci-fi/fantasy game, it hardly breaks new ground, and it is trying to fall into a very similar niche to Shadowrun.  But it doesn't end up being a Shadowrun-clone either; its got its own very interesting world, and its rule system, while being more rules-heavy than the average gamer might like, is apparently quite functional. In quite a few respects, I think the system does succeed at being smoother and more interesting than Shadowrun's.

This game certainly won't be for everyone; but if you really like the concept of the setting (and particularly if you're the kind of guy who's always like the concepts behind Shadowrun or even RIFTS without actually liking those games) you should try to check it out. Likewise, if you just love really beautiful books, you must get this game for your collection.

RPGPundit

I have this beast and I've had some choice comments about it, but I do have to say I found elements of their dice pool system innovative and fairly cool. Not entirely unique (reminded me of Cadwallon, though given the shit translation job of THAT book i could be wrong about that... I trust nothing about Cadwallon, since I half think I must have made it all up.  I think I would have better grasped the French! And I don't speak frenchy...)

And yeah, I had the same issue with the NPC's, compounded by their lack of stats (if it has stats, you can kill it!), and yeah, the weapons. Though if you take out all the goofy ass 'close combat accessories' the base weapons are tolerable enough.

Oddly, I didn't like the art for some reason.  At least the 'people' art, seemed sort of hammy low rent given the effort... but then I've gotten really really judgemental on art for some reason the last few years.

QuoteTo be really clear on what Alpha Omega is like: imagine if Shadowrun had gone and gotten herself drunk one night, met RIFTS at a party, and got herself knocked up. Then her baby was kidnapped by a cult of insane kabbalistic metaphysicians and transhumanists, pumped full of steroids, and raised to kill. That kid would be Alpha Omega.

Well said--I feel that's pretty accurate. The book is gorgeous but the organization makes me hurt deep in my brain.

I happen to like insane kabbalistic metaphysicians and transhumanists... particularly the drug abusing variety.... working on my games. See also, Kult...

I have three problems with the system.



The errata.

And the current errata sheet that doesn't even correct the most obvious ones. Considering how much effort the team put into everything else and the fact they have at least some people with programming experience at their disposal, it implies they really didn't give a crap about the system.



It's to complex/unclear for me to bother running.

And not just for me. This is what will hurt the game the most, as I know plenty of people who want to play, but nobody who wants to run it.

In addition, it's just ambiguous enough to cause arguments at the table and require arbitrary rulings from the GM, and I've had enough experience with systems like this to know I'm no longer willing to deal with that kind of crap at the table. And I'm more likely to encounter it here because...



It's extremely open to outlandish character optimizations.

Seriously, wielding Energy to effectively stop time? Raising attribute maximums for just 5pt a shot? There are just too many little combination to create unbalance, and the suggested way to resolve these is to just tell the players 'no'. Yeah right, I've seen how well that works.



It's rather frustrating that the system is so bad, because everything else is pretty good. The book looks fantastic, the landscape format stays open at the table, and the tabs and sections index information better that arbitrary page numbers, not to mention that layout can change without screwing up indexing. Really, I find people's attachment to page numbers baffling.

Quote from: chaosvoyager;287089I have three problems with the system.



The errata.

And the current errata sheet that doesn't even correct the most obvious ones. Considering how much effort the team put into everything else and the fact they have at least some people with programming experience at their disposal, it implies they really didn't give a crap about the system.

If you think you've identified some errata we should fix feel free to contact us and let us know.  We'd be happy to look at your suggestions.

Quote from: Spike;284682(reminded me of Cadwallon, though given the shit translation job of THAT book i could be wrong about that... I trust nothing about Cadwallon, since I half think I must have made it all up.  I think I would have better grasped the French! And I don't speak frenchy...)

Cadwallon's text is extremely confusing in French as well. I think that the translation certainly might have suffered from a very convoluted, pompous, and pointless really, writing style to begin with.

Quote from: chaosvoyager;287089It's to complex/unclear for me to bother running.

And not just for me. This is what will hurt the game the most, as I know plenty of people who want to play, but nobody who wants to run it.

In addition, it's just ambiguous enough to cause arguments at the table and require arbitrary rulings from the GM, and I've had enough experience with systems like this to know I'm no longer willing to deal with that kind of crap at the table.

If people want to play the game but not run it, then they are obviously too lazy to read the rules. If they don't read the rules, then they can't argue about them.

I don't understand why gaming groups tolerate lazy, argumentative fat beards. If someone is too lazy to run a damn game, then they should shut up when they are playing it and be grateful for the free ride.

While I agree with Johnny here, I must offer the counterpoint: I'm a gamer who tries to learn as much about the game, and often the more obscure rules in it (as compared to the gross rules such as 'roll d20 high' or 'roll lots of d10s'....) so that I can do interesting things without having to ask lots of questions.

Apparently many GM's hate that, including the one I play with now to a minor degree, and from threads on this very forum at least a good half of the poster's here, including the Pundit....

Just sayin'... sometimes players not wanting to learn the rules is viewed as a good thing by GM's....