RPGPundit Reviews: Two-Fisted Tales


This has been a surprising review to write; surprising because its difficult to express just how much I liked this book, and to do justice to how favourably I look upon this game.  Of all the games I've reviewed, only In Harm's Way and Coyote Trail come close to equaling my favourable impression of Two-Fisted Tales, a game that I think deserves (and should come to get) more attention than it has, and might be making a few people nervous.

The publisher of Two-fisted Tales, Brett Bernstein, expressed to me that he felt like he had to "swerve" the "debris" that was Spirit of the Century (that OTHER Pulp Game).  My advice to him would be this: don't swerve, use it. Go on every goddamn Spirit of the Century forum and thread on the internet and to every thread about pulp that gets co-opted by Swine SoTC fanboys, and plug Two Fisted Tales! In direct competition, Two Fisted Tales should have an enormous advantage: unlike SoTC, "2FT" is actually about pulp.

Shocking, I know. Also, those who've tried to smear 2FT by suggesting its only good for "gritty" pulp are so unbelievably full of it I wouldn't know where to start. The 2FT ruleset actually supports a number of different levels of play (much moreso than that other game),  but its default would be the "superheroic" level of action.  The author has said as much, and the game makes it quite clear in its examples, its mechanics, and even its artwork.

If you want to play The Phantom, Flash Gordon, Doc Savage, Mandrake the Magician, Buck Rogers, or Tarzan, this is the system to use. Hell, it'd even be good for a pulpier Call of Cthulhu (check out the Spell Schticks, later on!).

Even the cover is anything but gritty film-noir. The cover is pure action; bright red from its image of a costumed hero (reminiscent of the Shadow) swinging off on a rope with a half-naked blonde clinging to him as groups of goons and what looks like some ogrish monster are consumed in explosive flames behind him.  Now, THAT is the spirit of this game.

The book is up to the usual quality of products from Precis Intermedia; good binding, black and white images that are mostly very good artwork, good smooth layout.

The book begins with an extensive and useful introduction to both the Pulp genre (and explaining the different power levels found therein) and Roleplaying Games. After that, it gets right to business, detailing the system. It starts with the attributes (called "abilities" here), of which there are eight.
I struggled through out the reading of this game to find issues with the game, and here is one of very few: the abilities are listed in alphabetical order, but in fact the very last of them, Weird (the others are Brains, Luck, Mind, Muscle, Reflexes, Savvy and Status), is actually an attribute that all the others are regulated by.  Your Weird stat determines the maximum possible level of any other attribute, which might be enough to warrant it being shown FIRST in the chapter.
In any case, its a minor quibble, and each of the Abilities are fairly standard in that they regulate different features of the game (Brains determines how many languages you have, Muscle is how much damage you do, Reflexes how fast you are, Savvy your social contacts, and Status determines your wealth and reputation). Curiously, its Mind that comes closest to mimicking your "hit points" in the game.  Finally, Luck determines how many playing cards you get (more on that later).

Each ability features a number of specialties. A specialty gives you a +4 bonus to any check with an ability when you are using it related to that special skill. So normally if you were going to intimidate someone, you'd roll your Savvy; but if you have an "intimidate" specialty, you roll your savvy+4.

Masteries are an even further specialty, granting another +4 to an even more specific focus.  So while Mind (alertness) would be a specialty giving +4 to your Mind roll when you are trying to be perceptive, Mind (alertness) (shadowing) is a Mastery that would give you a total of Mind+8 for using your perception to follow someone discreetly without losing them.

The game uses Defects, which I figured would finally be an area I'd have a problem with (notorious non-fan of any Defects that give you extra points that I am).  However, the way they made it, even this doesn't bother much: essentially, players can choose to take a single defect.  That's unlikely to cause too much disruption to the game, and can certainly help give a character some personality.

And how exactly do we build a character? The method used is, to me, quite brilliant for a Pulp game: you have a set of 20 archetypes from the Pulp genre that are already statted out. You choose one of these archetypes, and then you will get a number of "hero points" based on the overall power level of the game ("Gritty"; "Escapist", "Fantastic", or "Amazing").  You can use these Hero points to add to the default level of the attributes, to buy new specialties or masteries, and to purchase Schticks (the special powers or items that Pulp Heros have). You can choose to reduce attributes to gain more hero points, or to take a defect as mentioned above, which also gives you more hero points.

This means that the character, while chosen from a list of archetypes, will come out very individualized.  The system reminds me somewhat of the Feng Shui RPG, but it leaves things more open to customization than that game did.
Furthermore, the personality of your character gets further personalized in choosing his Background elements.  The Player choose the character's History, Style, Code (as in, code of honour), and Motivations (what makes him an adventurer); each from a list of possible options.The combination of these, once selected, will go a long way to telling you a great deal about your character's story and personality. No need to "write a small novel" here.
Finally, if you've read all this and STILL don't like the idea of Archetypes, don't worry. There's a 21st Archetype, the Everyman, that is basically every starting off completely average so that you can build him up with hero points any way you want.

The whole character creation system is very well written, with plenty of examples, making it quite easy to figure out how to make a character.

The next chapter details the Schticks, the various gimmicks and gadgets and stuff that you see in pulp adventures. Schticks are also bought with Hero Points, and each Schtick has a prerequisite of some kind plus a cost in hero points. If your score in whatever the prerequisite is vastly surpasses the required amount, it reduces the Hero point cost, up to a minimum of 0, meaning that its even possible for a character to get Schticks for free.

The first group of Schticks are "Gadget Schticks".  These are things like the aircar, The Earthquake machine, Invisibility Potion, Night-vision goggles, or Water Breathing Pills; the mad scientist/Weird Science stuff that was common to pseudo-scifi heroes of the age.  There are 38 different gadgets listed in all.  These gadgets all have Brains(science) and some mastery as their prerequisite.

Next there are Martial Arts maneuvers, perfect for the ethnic sidekick or the hero who trained in the mysterious east.  These have Mind as their prerequisite, reflecting willpower needed to master these techniques. You get stuff like "Attack at a distance"; "Danger sense"; "Deathstrike"; "Judo Throw"; "Immortality"; or "super jumping".  There's 24 martial arts maneuvers in all.

Next up there are the Hypnotic Disciplines; the power over the mind that certain occultists or master magicians (like Mandrake) have been known to use, mesmerism. Its not actual magic, but has very powerful effects.  Obviously, these gadgets have as their prerequisite the Brains(hypnotism) specialty. Sample hypnotic disciplines include "control bleeding", "hypnotic suggestion", "Mental illusion" or "Sleep".  There are 14 in all.

Next there's actual Magic Spells. Spell Schticks can be learned as "memorized spells" which are magic that you know by heart and will be able to cast automatically, or "Library Spells", that you have from ancient grimoires or copied into your own books, but cannot cast just so.  These spells, when cast, have a risk of failure; but they cost only half as many hero points to gain.   Spell schticks are based on the Brains (occult) specialty, and you have examples like Animal Form, Animate Undead, Bind Minor Supernatural Being, Invisibility Dust, Scrying, or Ward (against being).  There's 29 spells in all, and each is listed with the consequence of fumbled spells if you read that Library spell wrong! Animal form, for example, will leave you with an animal-like body part if you fumble it when reading from a grimoire.

Speaking of animals, next up are the Animal Schticks, of which there are just two: Animal Speech, and Animal Companion.  One lets you speak with wild creatures, with a hero cost point varying on just how many varieties of creatures you can speak with.  Animal Companion is the classic "Cheeta" to your "Tarzan", with the prerequisite and cost depending on how intelligent and trainable you want the animal to be.  Animal Speech has the Weird ability as a prerequisite, and Animal Companion has Mind(Husbandry) as its prerequisite.

Finally, there's the "Other" schticks, the odd powers that show up in the pulps but aren't definable in some other category; these are based on the Weird ability for a prerequisite and the 19 listed are all very different, ranging from shapeshifting ("Appearance change") to being Double Jointed, to Eidetic Memory to periodic or permanent invisibility, to a high-pitched screaming Screech, to X-ray Vision.

As you've seen, with the Schticks you can run anything from Dick Tracy right up to the early Golden Age superheros as a 2FT campaign.

Chapter 4 details Money and Equipment, with the Wealth score working in a way very similar to that of D20 modern or True20 (that is, you don't have to keep track of every penny, instead your Wealth measures more or less how much you're worth, and costs for items are listed in Wealth value; you can buy anything less than your wealth score without any problem, purchasing anything equal to your Wealth will reduce it by one point, and you can't buy anything above your wealth score: a simple and elegant mechanic). There's a whole range of equipment, from typical 1930-50s weapons and vehicles.  To be fair, one of the few criticisms you could make of the book is that there could have been a larger selection in this section of miscellaneous items and their typical costs.

Chapter 5 gets down to the action, detailing the task resolution and combat mechanics. In 2FT you automatically succeed at any task where your ability (plus specialty or mastery) are higher than the Difficulty number. If not, you roll two ten-sided dice; with one of them being the "positive" number, the other the "Negative" number. the positive is added to your value, the negative is subtracted. In this game, a "0" (10) roll on the die counts as zero, not ten.  if you roll a nine on either die, you roll again and keep adding to that die, continuing to roll if you continue to roll nines; so spectacular failures or successes are possible.  If you get a very low result because of this (just how low depends on your luck score) you have fumbled. If you make your target number by 10 or more, you have scored a great success, a critical. If you end up with a result exactly equal to your target number, it is a "Close Call", a very near shave which can be interpreted by the GM to mean a partial success or a success with complications. Once again, this system is reminiscent of the Feng Shui RPG.  Optionally, rolling doubles on a check will result in an automatic Close Call. Also optionally, if your PC has a very low Luck score and rolls a close call, it is treated as a fumble instead.  This latter rule can be useful to make sure your players don't choose to reduce their Luck ability and hope to compensate it with other stuff.

Remember how I mentioned Cards? Yes, this game uses a special mechanic, slightly gimmicky but kind of appropriate for the Pulp feel of things, that requires a deck of regular playing cards (without Jokers).  Depending on your Luck score, each PC starts out each game with a certain number of randomly selected cards.  He can choose to play these cards in order to do a number of things: he can play the card to give him a bonus to his ability check, or to reduce damage taken, or to get some kind of "lucky break" (a hint or clue that he'd otherwise not get), or to add to damage, or aid or hinder another PC or NPC's roll.

Combat is smooth and elegant, with basic and advanced rules (though frankly the "basic" rules are probably a little too basic for long-term use). Characters roll initiative (based on Mind), and will then have a choice of actions. Usually a character will have two actions, but gets a bonus "positive" die if they only do one action that turn, or can choose to take three actions but suffer a penalty of an additional "negative" die to their checks if they do so. A few other circumstances can grant such bonus or penalty dice; for example, if your character has taken a number of wounds equal or more than one-half his Mind score, all his actions have a penalty die of one extra "negative" die roll.
Attacking, Defending, Moving, using a hypnotic power, casting a spell, reloading a weapon, driving a vehicle or re-rolling initiative are all actions (some activities, like spells, require more than one action to use).
Attacks are usually opposed rolls (of the attacker's combat specialty versus the defender's defense specialty); unless the character being attacked is not defending or is unaware of the attack; in which case the roll is a simple roll with a target number of 0.
Damage is based either on your basic damage rating (derived from the Muscle ability) modified by your weapon of choice, in the case of melee attack, or fixed damage in the case of ranged weapons. This is reduced by your resistance rating (based on the Muscle ability), and other values.  If you take more than a certain number of wounds at a time, you might end up unconscious or dead; otherwise, if you end up with more accumulated wounds than half your Mind ability, it means you get penalty dice to your actions. If your number of wounds surpasses your Mind rating, you are incapacitated. And if you take more than 20 wounds total, you are dead.

This chapter also details a number of non-combat hazards, the standard stuff you might face in a Pulp game (acid, poison, etc), plus some that are very particular to Pulp Genre, like rules for surviving in the harsh wilderness environment, or horror effects for a more Cthulhuesque game.

Some very good rules are also included for mystery-style investigations, scientific research, understanding weird science devices, sneaking about, and dealing with law enforcement.

The next chapter details advancement in the game, which is resolved through a very interesting mechanic; wherein you get a set of scores for things you accomplish in the game: cool ideas, experience, roleplaying, and virtue.  At the end of each session, the GM can award "checks" in each of these areas.  The higher the rating an area already has, the harder it is to succeed in the check; success gives you a hero point you can use to get new schticks, specialties, masteries, or to raise attributes, but it also raises your value in that advancement area by one.

Its possible to advance by training in the game, and some schticks (like gadgets or new spells) require research to gain. This section includes rules on that research, including lab accidents when researching gadgets, and rules for determining the location and form of magical grimoires.

Chapter 7 details GM advice for the Pulp genre. This chapter has a lot of good advice about setting tone, and running adventures. The best part of the chapter is the random adventure generation system, where you can create Pulp adventures with a series of random tables. I tried out this system a couple of times and it works really well. The chapter also includes templates for various NPCs, including typical Pulp villains like Cult Leaders, Femme Fatales, Nazi Generals, or Pirates. Random tables are included to detail NPC motivations and personalities. The chapter also has a section on animals and a few spectacular creatures, like dinosaurs or vampires.
There's also an awesome set of tables for determining random locations for adventures or encounters in your pulp setting.

Continuing the cavalcade of totally awesome random tables, you get a section on "macguffins" (weird items that are the focal point of an adventure's plot), complete with random tables to generate the macguffin of that adventure, be it an ancient mystical weapon, the maltese falcon, an ancient Incan death mask, or a lost map to the treasure of Roi-Rama.

The guidelines on running adventures are quite complete, perhaps something that someone very experienced with the pulp genre won't particularly find too novel, but for someone who's heard more about pulp than experienced it directly, there's a lot of good advice, complete with things like guidelines on secret codes and deathtraps.

The book ends with a useful appendix outlining the most important tables and rules for quick reference.

In conclusion, 2FT has just about everything that you could possibly want in a Pulp game. Its real, direct pulp action. No fawning about "story" here; this game isn't an "investigation of the genre"; its a Roleplaying Game of living out the great pulp adventures, everything from Mandrake the magician to Johnny Quest, from Buck Rogers to the Venture Brothers. The book specifically lists things like Raiders of the Lost Ark, the Mummy, Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow, and the more classic books and strips of the pulp era as its influences.

Whether you want to explore lost worlds, solve gritty crime drama-mysteries, confront cults of weird gods man was not meant to know, or fight villains with masked adventurers; or just plain smash some Nazis, this is the game for you.

RPGPundit

Thanks for the review. It really is a fun game.

Agreed entirely, Pundit! 2FT is an awesome pulp game!

-clash

I've never read Two-Fisted Tales, but the favourable review comes as no surprise. P.I.G. consistently creates good, tight, and (most importantly) playable games.

People who say it's for gritty stuff aren't necessarily lying bastards you know, that was my clear impression originally until Flyingmice queried it and I went back and saw I was wrong.

It's not obvious to me now where I got that impression, but I wasn't alone in it and it was honest, so I would suggest occasionally considering that people might just be wrong rather than part of a malefic conspiracy.

Balbinus, you should know better by now not to take him so seriously

Quote from: brettmbBalbinus, you should know better by now not to take him so seriously

Pundit's rants are far more enjoyable if you take them completely at face value.  Besides, what point is there in him ranting if none of us object?

An artist needs his audience Brett, and for better or worse and occasionally against my better judgement I find myself on occasion amongst his.

Except in this case John Kim specifically tried to claim that 2FT was not as usable for various power levels as SoTC; something that's a blatant lie (2FT actually supports a WIDER range of power levels), and that 2FT was specifically crafted for "film noir" style gritty pulp and not for "superheroic adventure"; all of which are blatant LIES. 2FT is SPECIFICALLY crafted for super-heroic adventuring.

RPGPundit

Quote from: RPGPunditExcept in this case John Kim specifically tried to claim that 2FT was not as usable for various power levels as SoTC; something that's a blatant lie (2FT actually supports a WIDER range of power levels), and that 2FT was specifically crafted for "film noir" style gritty pulp and not for "superheroic adventure"; all of which are blatant LIES. 2FT is SPECIFICALLY crafted for super-heroic adventuring.

RPGPundit

Well, either that or he was simply wrong.  That does happen to folk on occasion.

I wouldn't say by the way that 2fT is specifically crafted for super heroic stuff, rather it covers that as part of its natural spectrum.  Specifically crafted makes it sound like it doesn't do gritty, but I think it would do gritty better than SoTC (ie that it may have a wider range).

I'm not so familiar with SoTC though, as its more modern than traditional pulp and as such less aimed at me as a target audience.

It's just not good practice to start out a positive review about a product with a negative attack against a competing product.  It makes the reader distrust the rest of your review. I'm quite interested in checking out TFT, but your review makes me suspicious that you only like it because it supports your bizarre anti-SOTC position.  JHKim's argument that TFT supports grittier style play was done in passing and you turned it into this huge argument like he went on some rampage about TFT being designed to only fit gritty play and thus inferior to SotC.  Actually, he was quite complimentary of the product.

SotC is a great game. TFT looks pretty sweet, too. When I have some calmness and time I'll check it out, despite your review, Pundit.

I just got Two Fisted Tales. I've breezed through it and my first impression is, WOW. It's very well done.

That's the first review that actually might have convinced me to buy a game solely based on one review.  The only thing holding me back is wondering why I'd buy 2FT and not just stick with Feng Shui.

I'm not familiar with Feng Shui, but I can say I'm really impressed with Two Fisted Tales.

Quote from: JohnnyWannabeI'm not familiar with Feng Shui, but I can say I'm really impressed with Two Fisted Tales.

Well - really Feng Shui is rather similar.

Characters - serious of archetypes, that have a set starting point but then give you a points to tweak and personalize them out (though admittedly not as much as some people would like to)

Schticks, for - Fighting, Weapons, Magic, Mutant Powers etc...

Dice mechanic role 2d6 1 is a positive die one is negative subtract one from the other add your skill and that give you your success.

The big difference based on knowing Feng Shui and reading the review really seem to come from the combat system.  From the initial impressions 2FT does seem to be a little lighter in that regard, but it's hard to say until you play it if it's actually lighter (read easier) or just different.

Quote from: kryystThat's the first review that actually might have convinced me to buy a game solely based on one review.  The only thing holding me back is wondering why I'd buy 2FT and not just stick with Feng Shui.

Well, one is for martial arts/gun fu action and the other one is for pulp/noir action.