FRACTURED HOPES - A Basic Roleplaying Space Fantasy

[Charles Green]

I have just started reading 'Fractured Hopes', Mr. Green, and my initial impressions are very favourable. I'll review it when I have read through it all, but what has stood out to me most of all is how high you have raised the bar in terms of quality of writing. Content aside (not a positive or negative inference, I just want to focus on your writing), your writing style is really nice to read-through, imparting a feel for the world in a very engaging style. Kudos, Mr. Green, kudos.

Thanks. I'm glad you found the writing so clear. I should hope that my writing degree is good for something!

I'd be interested to hear what you think of the contents as you get further into the text.

[Bygoneyrs]

I have not yet purchased Fractured Hopes as of yet. Reading the description of the product, I had to say it sounded kinda of silly. I had visions of Thundar the Barbarian, where in that saturday morning cartoon had one seeing in the nights sky our earths moon "cracked/splintered in half"..LMAO! Sorry or thinking of the Kingdoms of Ming from Flash Gordon<g>! After reading this thread, I might just have to buy it for the heck of it anyway in my next order here shortly<g>! Just have to have it all.

Penn

[Trifletraxor]

Bought, printed it and started to read it yesterday, gotten through 2/3rds of it by now. Well written and interesting ideas for a varied campaign are my impressions so far. ARe there any plans to expand upon this setting?

SGL.

[Charles Green]

ARe there any plans to expand upon this setting?

I have a campaign/player's guide in the works, but it's on the back-burner until my writing schedule clears up somewhat. I've also got some ideas for fiction set in the setting, but that will also have to wait for a bit.

[Trifletraxor]

Fractured Hopes by Charles Green is a pulpy space fantasy setting for BRP which allows for a very varied campaign. The basic premise is that the world has been broken into lots of different fragments as a result of a cataclysmic war between humans, aliens and machines. The players take on the roles of heroes sailing from fragment to fragment on magical voidships. Overall, the writing is very good, making it an easy read. The layout is reasonably nice too. As always, the beetle rating goes as follows: 1=horrible, 2=bad, 3=average, 4=good, 5=great & 6=perfect! Chapter by chapter:

Chap. 1 - Introduction (p3-6): A short overview of the setting, the contents of the monograph and a short, but philosophical "What is a Roleplaying Game?" Okey-dokey. :b1:

Chap. 2 - Characters (p7-14): Contains some typical player-professions for the setting, and the background history of the "Fractured Worlds" universe - which works as a good introduction to the setting. :b1::b1:

Chap. 3 - Skills (p15-17): Changes to some of the existing BRP skills, plus a new one: Own a Voidship(???). Didn't like that skill at all. :b1:

Chap. 4 - Powers (p18-38): Describes the reason for the presence of all the basic power systems in the setting; magic, sorcery, mutations, psychic abilities and super powers - and does the job well. :b1::b1:

Chapter 5 - Spot Rules (p39-46): Several spot rules, including minion rules and fate points. Good if you like it pulpy I guess, but my preference is gritty. :b1:

Chapter 6 - Voidships (p47-62): Describes the basics of the voidships, construction rules, ship combat rules and stats for ships of various size. Some tied up to the aforementioned Own a Voidship skill, but overall pretty good. :b1::b1:

Chapter 7 - The Post-Sundering World (p63-82): Describes the world of the setting as it exists today, listing the familiar and the strange. It descirbes several fragments, and contains some really good rules for generating new ones. The different "zones" of the world is described, and also the void that is found between the fragments. This ideas you find in this chapter is really where this monograph shines. :b1::b1:

Chapter 8 - Gamemastering (p83-98): Lots of tips on how to GM... :b1:

Chapter 9 - Equipment (p99-104): Some descriptions on "old" equipment often found, together with some brand new equpment specific for the setting. :b1::b1:

Chap. 10 - Creatures (p105-109): Some new creatures found in the setting. :b1::b1:

Chap. 11 - Putting the Pieces Together (p110-118): An introductory character-creation scenario. Good idea, but didn't really work for me. :b1:

TRIFF SAYS: Fractured Hopes presents some really great ideas. The fragments works as small micro-settings, and gives the possibility of running a campaing that goes from fantasy to western to modern to sci-fi, without turning to mystical gates or timetravel. I like that a lot. The setting as written is much to pulpy for my style, and there's much in it that rubbed me the wrong way. However, that can be tweak as I like it, and the basic ideas of the setting are really great. Thus, strangely enough I end up with a total impression that is higher than the average for the chapters:

Total impression: :b1::b1:

Recommended!

Edited March 21, 2010 by Trifletraxor

[Trifletraxor]

Beetle Review is up: http://basicroleplaying.com/content.php/36-Fractured-Hopes

SGL.

[Skyman]

Review of Fractured Hopes

BRP setting by Charles Green

The monograph is a very bold work. I say bold because the setting promises a lot of accommodation for whatever players or GM’s desire to have in a game with minimal amount of exclusions to be considered. Such as if you want ninja’s with light sabers or nazi zombie pirates raiding the local tavern in a pimped out Winnebago…well…you can do that. Not to sound like I am lampooning the setting I am just illustrating how much you can bring in. How serious you want to make this is up to you. The monograph makes reference to the concept as being able to throw everything in, including the kitchen sink. Much of the historical background in the setting comes across as a massive excuse to pretty much do what you want. I personally have no problem with the historical background and somewhat think that it might be pretty fun to play out certain parts of that history. For even more freedom you can even ‘tabla rasa’ the whole historical back plot and just say this is where you are and so much time has passed that you’re not even sure what happened.

I get the impression that this setting was developed to utilize the BRP core rules to the max as a universal setting. I think in so doing that the setting suffers in that it may appear to being doing too much without any sense of direction or actual feel for a particular genre or scope of play. This is not a setting where people will be saying hey lets play ‘Fractured Hopes.’ Instead this is a setting where you might have players that want to have various elements in whatever they play next like one person wanting to play high fantasy with angsty shape shifting gnomes, another wanting something like the TV show Firefly and another player that just wants to go against mutant Cannibalistic Clowns with high tech gadgetry. Your answer as a GM is ‘let’s play Fractured Hopes’ and do all that…because you can. Unlike other BRP settings where you have pre-existing themes like Call of Cthulhu, and Stormbringer, you actually have to form a theme for playing. With this freedom comes a lot of responsibility to create…you know...to be creative and use your imagination a bit more than usual which is always fun.

One fun way is to pass a 3x5 card, or a sheet of paper, around to players in a clockwise fashion and have them write a word or one sentence of what they would like to see in Fractured Hopes. Instead of writing something down a player can veto another person’s idea by crossing out the entry. This keeps going around till 5 to 10 ideas are down. The amount will depend upon the amount of players you have. Once you’re done the GM just builds around the player input.

So how does the setting create the opportunity for these things to happen? Well the author of this monograph created a situation where the Earth has ‘Fractured’ creating floating islands of rock in a self sustaining atmosphere that the games referred to as the ‘Void.’ These floating pieces of rocks are like self contained sandboxes where you can have whatever you want. There are examples in the book of notable fragments of interest such as one that has nothing but Ninjas (pg 75, Stronghold of the Pop-Culture Ninja).

This whole concept reminds me of the fragments of rocks that held various kingdoms of destroyed worlds in the 1970’s movie Flash Gordon…you know the one with the killer sound track from Queen. (I just dated myself didn’t I?)

To get around from one fragment to another fragment the players need to have a Voidship, which is a magic run vehicle. It can be a surfboard to something as big as a WWII battleship like the Japanese anime Yamato. I would have liked to have other means of crossing from one fragment to another like man made bridges or something.

I think the monograph really shines in using optional rules or spot rules to create a pulp feel. Some people might like the gritty aspects of BRP but I really don’t think Fractured Hopes is made for the grit. I think optional rules on minions and Fate points bring in elements of what I find in more contemporary independent RPGs. It really bridges the traditional system with more modern ways of looking at RPG’s. IMHO.

I did not have a hard time reading the monograph and the author writes in a casual voice. Sure there are some spelling mistakes but it does not take away from my flow of reading. Such as on page 53 the gray box heading says ‘Trnsport Vessels’ but I pretty much know it means Transport Vessels without blowing an extra brain cell. Heck I think his grammar is better than mine.

The introductory (character gen) scenario is alright but nothing I would probably rely on or consider a stand out. This monograph might draw comparisons to another RPG game called RIFTS by Palladium because of the multiple realms/fragments and the ‘kitchen sink’ aspect. While the ambitions of both are bold I think they are different enough from each other that you’re not getting a copy of a setting dressed to look differently for a different system and the game engine is nothing like each other. Plus I just need the monograph and the core book. Not a library of supplemental worlds.

The art by Alberto Bontempi and David Frampton is very good for what I expect in a monograph. Mr. Frampton really brings out the fun in the possibilities that can be found in monograph with his ink work (I think its ink over pencil). Mr. Bontempi’s art looks like color painting that had to be made into black and white gray scale. He captures the epic aspects of the monograph with dark undertones.

I think more scenarios and a table of contents would have made the monograph better for me. I hope this review helps with your decision making for purchasing or not making a purchase of this monograph. For those of you who do decide to take the plunge I hope my suggestions help you make the monograph more accessible for your players and you.

Peace

[Skyman]

Review of Fractured Hopes

BRP setting by Charles Green

The monograph is a very bold work. I say bold because the setting promises a lot of accommodation for whatever players or GM’s desire to have in a game with minimal amount of exclusions to be considered. Such as if you want ninja’s with light sabers or nazi zombie pirates raiding the local tavern in a pimped out Winnebago…well…you can do that. The monograph makes reference to the concept as being able to throw everything in, including the kitchen sink. Much of the historical background in the setting comes across as a massive excuse to pretty much do what you want. I personally have no problem with the historical background and somewhat think that it might be pretty fun to play out certain parts of that history. For even more freedom you can even ‘tabla rasa’ the whole historical back plot and just say this is where you are and so much time has passed that you’re not even sure what happened.

I get the impression that this setting was developed to utilize the BRP core rules to the max as a universal setting. I think in so doing that the setting suffers in that it may appear to being doing too much without any sense of direction or actual feel for a particular genre or scope of play. This is not a setting where people will be saying hey lets play ‘Fractured Hopes.’ Instead this is a setting where you might have players that want to have various elements in whatever they play next like one person wanting to play high fantasy with angsty shape shifting gnomes, another wanting something like the TV show Firefly and another player that just wants to go against mutant Cannibalistic Clowns with high tech gadgetry. Your answer as a GM is ‘let’s play Fractured Hopes’ and do all that…because you can. Unlike other BRP settings where you have pre-existing themes like Call of Cthulhu, and Stormbringer, you actually have to form a theme for playing. With this freedom comes a lot of responsibility to create…you know...to be creative and use your imagination a bit more than usual which is always fun.

One fun way is to pass a 3x5 card, or a sheet of paper, around to players in a clockwise fashion and have them write a word or one sentence of what they would like to see in Fractured Hopes. Instead of writing something down a player can veto another person’s idea by crossing out the entry. This keeps going around till 5 to 10 ideas are down. The amount will depend upon the amount of players you have. Once you’re done the GM just builds around the player input.

So how does the setting create the opportunity for these things to happen? Well the author of this monograph created a situation where the Earth has ‘Fractured’ creating floating islands of rock in a self sustaining atmosphere that the games referred to as the ‘Void.’ These floating pieces of rocks are like self contained sandboxes where you can have whatever you want. There are examples in the book of notable fragments of interest such as one that has nothing but Ninjas (pg 75, Stronghold of the Pop-Culture Ninja).

This whole concept reminds me of the fragments of rocks that held various kingdoms of destroyed worlds in the 1970’s movie Flash Gordon…you know the one with the killer sound track from Queen. (I just dated myself didn’t I?)

To get around from one fragment to another fragment the players need to have a Voidship, which is a magic run vehicle. It can be a surfboard to something as big as a WWII battleship like the Japanese anime Yamato. I would have liked to have other means of crossing from one fragment to another like man made bridges or something.

I think the monograph really shines in using optional rules or spot rules to create a pulp feel. Some people might like the gritty aspects of BRP but I really don’t think Fractured Hopes is made for the grit. I think optional rules on minions and Fate points bring in elements of what I find in more contemporary independent RPGs. It really bridges the traditional system with more modern ways of looking at RPG’s. IMHO.

I did not have a hard time reading the monograph and the author writes in a casual voice. Sure there are some spelling mistakes but it does not take away from my flow of reading. Such as on page 53 the gray box heading says ‘Trnsport Vessels’ but I pretty much know it means Transport Vessels without blowing an extra brain cell. Heck I think his grammar is better than mine.

The introductory (character gen) scenario is alright but nothing I would probably rely on or consider a stand out. This monograph might draw comparisons to another RPG game called RIFTS by Palladium because of the multiple realms/fragments and the ‘kitchen sink’ aspect. While the ambitions of both are bold I think they are different enough from each other that you’re not getting a copy of a setting dressed to look differently for a different system and the game engine is nothing like each other. Plus I just need the monograph and the core book. Not a library of supplemental worlds.

The art by Alberto Bontempi and David Frampton is very good for what I expect in a monograph. Mr. Frampton really brings out the fun in the possibilities that can be found in monograph with his ink work (I think its ink over pencil). Mr. Bontempi’s art looks like color painting that had to be made into black and white gray scale. He captures the epic aspects of the monograph with dark undertones.

I think more scenarios and a table of contents would have made the monograph better for me. I hope this review helps with your decision making for purchasing or not making a purchase of this monograph. For those of you who do decide to take the plunge I hope my suggestions help you make the monograph more accessible for your players and you.

Peace

[Charles Green]

Thanks for posting this.

Fractured Hopes had a long and difficult journey coming into existence, and I'm really glad someone has taken the time to read it deeply enough to comment on it at this sort of scale.

Edited September 8, 2010 by Charles Green

[Skyman]

You are welcome

It seemed to be a gutsy under taking on your part and I hope it does well.

you do write very well