Blake's 7 RPG

[Guest Vile Traveller]

Now, I don't know if this is the right place to post this - there doesn't seem to be a place for general D100 gaming posts, so this seems the closest. Anyway, I just wanted to say that I've just tried out the Blake's 7 RPG, and I like it. Full action report in Gringle's Pawnshop, but suffice to say that the players did whatever they wanted with no concern for their referee's carefully-laid plans. Well, maybe not so careful. But I like refereeing with few plans but big possibilities.

 

[Trifletraxor]

"The chief Basic Roleplaying forum for the Great Family of D100 RPGs " is the description for this forum, so the post fits right in! 

Could you tell us a bit more about the stress and skill system? 

 

 

[Guest Vile Traveller]

The basic system is a roll-under D100, as we know it and love it. A 01 always succeeds, a 00 always fails. There are no 'specials', although the referee is advised to implement them in extraordinary circumstances.

There is no way to get beyond 100% in a skill, except through modifiers. Modifiers come in two flavours, specific (i.e. +10% per phase of aiming), or generic (+25% for easy rolls, -25% for difficult, -50% very difficult, -75% impossible) - the latter remind me of Rolemaster.

There are no characteristic bonuses (or attribute bonuses, in this game). Instead, your starting skill points are directly based on your attributes, times 5. Skills are keyed to one or more attributes, if you use skill points from those attributes they are worth an equivalent percentage in the skill. Using points from non-related attributes costs double. E.g., you have Reasoning 14, giving you 70 skill REA points. Buying 30% in Gambling (related to REA and Perception/PER) costs 30 REA points. If you used Strength points instead, 30 STR points only get you Gambling 15%.

This is neat. No characteristic bonuses that change, and you can choose where to put your skills, but they are still based on your attributes (rolled on 4d6-4, by the way).

The experience system is straightforward, ticks for successful use and roll over your current skill to gain 1d6%, up to 100% maximum.

I'll do Stress in a bit.

[colinabrett]

I would love to see a BRP conversion of Blake's 7. I remember the TV series as a kid. The Liberator was awesome.

 

[Guest Vile Traveller]

9 hours ago, ColinBrett said:

The Liberator was awesome.

 

Best spaceship on film, ever. The Blake's 7 Technical Manual which accompanies the RPG does a great job of rendering ships, although the interior layouts are not great to my mind.

[K Peterson]

How did you track down a copy of this obscure Rpg?

[Guest Vile Traveller]

By being a bit obsessed by Blake's 7? 

It's a fan-produced book, you can still buy copies from the Blake's 7 Horizon people: http://www.blakes7online.com/news.php It looks pretty amateurish (it dates from the 90s), but the rules are actually pretty solid.

[Guest Vile Traveller]

Stress is interesting, and a bit similar to CoC Sanity from what I remember (haven't played since 1st edition). Basically, you have Stress points based on your Willpower attribute (WIL). You lose Stress points through things like fighting, losing, failing, etc., and regain them through rest. You can lose up to your WIL with no effect, thereafter you start to get penalties to everything. Once you lose more than WIL x 5 in Stress points, you suffer a mental breakdown.

This is a good rule for Blake's 7, because the TV characters were seen to be suffering from stress, and some clearly went a bit nuts towards the end.

[Vorax Transtellaris]

Simon Washbourne's Beyond Belief Games have a rough version of what was once going to be the official Blake's 7 RPG freely downloadable from their site. Not d100 but it may still be of interest.

link: http://beyondbeliefgames.webs.com/freestuff.htm

[Atgxtg]

Vile.

Forgive me, I'm sleep deprived. Just where on that website can you purchase the RPG?

[Guest Vile Traveller]

Oh, you can't. You have to email them and ask - try horizonb7 AT dsl.pipex.com. It's not advertised or anything, possibly because the Terry Nation estate is notorious for clamping down on such things (my recent posting of a photo of mine on G+ probably led to their biggest surge in sales this decade). It's not cheap, I paid £14.99 plus postage for each book (actually the technical manual is just a folder), and it's not terribly pretty, but the more I get into it, the more I like it. Some of it may even affect the AEON:engine.

[Mankcam]

From your description Vile this sounds pretty close to a streamlined BRP with different Characteristics. This was a great dystopian sci-fi series, a top show in its day and a setting that could really be good for a rpg. Pity this never made it bigger. Great find!

Edited May 14, 2016 by Mankcam

[Atgxtg]

One concern I have is that if skills = STATx5%, max out at 100%, and STATS are rolled on 4D6-4, does that mean that somebody with a 20 in a STAT will start off at 100% in all the skills based on that stat? 

[Guest Vile Traveller]

10 hours ago, Atgxtg said:

One concern I have is that if skills = STATx5%, max out at 100%, and STATS are rolled on 4D6-4, does that mean that somebody with a 20 in a STAT will start off at 100% in all the skills based on that stat? 

No, it's 100 skill points to spread over all skills based on that Attribute. If you want to start out reasonably good in anything you have to specialise. REA (Reasoning), for example, is related to 34 skills - that's the most-used Attribute, so it wouldn't go far if you spread it around. Luckily, many skills are related to more than one Attribute so you can be strategic about how you spread those points around. And then there are Attributes like SIZ, which don't relate to any skills - those points can be used for any skill, but only at the rate of 2 points = 1%.

[Atgxtg]

Aha! That makes more sense than what I was thinking. Reminds me somewhat of Phoenix Command.