RPG Codex - Monte Cook's Numenera Review

Couchpotato

Part-Time News-bot
Joined
October 1, 2010
Messages
36,178
Location
Spudlandia
RPG Codex member Grunker reviews Monte Cook's pen & paper setting Numenera.

I have tried to review the game as fairly as I could. Still, there are many ways to play RPGs, and while there isn't really a right way to do it, people will still have biases and preferences. In particular, a lot of advice, wording, and rules in Numenera make the game seem pretty clearly geared for "episodic" play, as opposed to "sandbox" play. I won't go into the exact differences here, as there is a whole host of play-styles that can fit under each word, but the basic idea is that sandbox games play more like a wargame campaign, with a greater focus on how things are done, while episodic games play more like a fiction story, with a greater focus on what is done.

Now, I am much more of a sandbox guy myself. Rather than trying to simply ignore my own preferences, however, I have tried to make them clear in my comments. Feel free to ignore these if the mentioned viewpoint doesn't matter for you, though! Furthermore, I am not at all implying that Numenera is awful for sandboxes. In fact, I think it could work great with just a few choice modifications.

For the purpose of this review, I have played this game with a few fellow Codexers (Excidium, Darth Roxor, Jaedar, herostratus, Reject_666_6 and Mystary!). We had only two sessions of play, playing the first introductory adventure that came with the book. I admit this is far from ideal, but I believe even this short play time, coupled with my reading of the book should be enough to make true (if not very deep) criticism of the game.
More information.
 
Joined
Oct 1, 2010
Messages
36,178
Location
Spudlandia
Decent review. Plus it's good to read something from RPGCodex that hasn't been slimed with the vernacular...
 
Joined
Mar 22, 2012
Messages
5,521
Location
Seattle
too long for me but I did read about half of it. Curious setting it seems, and the combat system is hmm... curious too. As a GM I don't think I'd like it, I love throwing dice behind the 'GM screen' and making characters nervous :)
 
Joined
Sep 23, 2008
Messages
5,645
Location
Tardis
Back
Top Bottom