It seems a good time for the Homeworld 2D20 game that is due to arrive out of hyperspace when the book is fully validated by Gearbox, with current indications being August, just over a month away. I wasn’t too much of a computer gamer back in 1999 when the title first landed, and not in 2015 when the game was delightfully remastered. The RTS title, highly rated back in the day, and still pulling a great experience out of your screen today, is now available at a significant discount. A Father’s Day gift from Cameron brought it to my screen, with the age of the game ensuring that my rig could run it smoothly. I’m one mission in and we’ll see how I fare…
For me, this is all way of background for the Modiphius 2D20 TTRPG, which I seem to be looking forward to immensely. It’s very much on the light end of the 2D20 family of games, with six attributes and six skills that can be mixed and matched depending on the task. These are tweaked by Focus areas and Talents that bend the rules in your character’s favour through exception based design. It looks as though it will play out very well, and with a lot less heavy lifting than Infinity. Much as I love the big early Infinity, it is fiddly and really does go on for ever. You may loose some of the fine grain, but for some broad high octane action I think that’ll be OK. I haven’t gone tot he light end of 2D20 before, having bizarrely missed out on Star Trek Adventures, which I hear nothing but good things about, John Carter but a mssed opportunity, and Dune a hand wrinigng ommission. I have since been gifted a Dune core book PDF, so I will be able to erratically read across the dunes.
I have pre-ordered the Gamesmaster Bundle, delivering a core book, some 2D20 and D6 dice with a screen. The Quickstart is already consumed, though I missed out on a physical copy on Free RPG Day as, ironically, I was running North Star Convention!
Keen anticipation then until the game drops into the real and I can pour over it. It’s a tingle game, one that I am impatient to get to the table. I think the theme of a desperate quest for home, when your world is destroyed and inimicable forces surround you, captures my current dispair at the state of the UK and the government running us. A yearning for better, and possibly against the odds. Plus of course, some highly accessible 2D20 space opera sounds just perfect for me. Without realising, I seem to be on a bit of a 2D20 kick at the moment, with Conan and Infinity both getting played and delivering good games at the table. Homeworld will round this off rather well.
Sometimes The Fates are kind and through a breezy verisimilitude everything falls into place. No sooner had I started to wibble on about how much I was looking forward to this game when Play Role, one of my core VTTs, and Modiphius announce a partnership, with the full Quickstart being prepared as a free ready to play game on the platform. The platform is also free to use.
