d20 System Games

Dungeons & Dragons

Luke Butcher:

 Widely acclaimed and pretty much the standard roleplaying game, the third edition offers a veritable cornucopia of tools to build whatever fantasy epic you wish. Tales of mighty sorcery, epic crusades or simply the adventures of a little goblin called Clive, anything is possible. There is no prescribed setting for D&D, though there are several core settings currently published.

  Want to adventure in a world where darkness has fallen, where nobles and peasants alike fight in a Renaissance of blood and misery against vampires, werewolves and undead abominations? Give Ravenloft a try.

  Perhaps you would prefer a world where the gods once walked the earth, a land of epic struggles and grand battles, take a look at Forgotten Realms. For those who've played them, it’s the same setting as used in the Baldur’s Gate and Neverwinter Nights computer games.

  Finally, if you want something a little different, a world where metal and mysticism meets; have a look at Eberron.

Eberron (Dungeons & Dragons setting)

Joel:

   Okay, you know fantasy, right? Orcs are bad, elves are good, and magic is only found in ancient tomes. And I guess you know Dungeons & Dragons, right? Drow live underground and worship spiders, gods walk the world, and dragons sit on treasure waiting for the PCs to come and kill them.

   This is not fantasy or D&D as you know it. In Eberron, take the basic premises of D&D and twists each and everyone of them: Drow are scorpion-worshipping jungle savages; Elves worship their ancestors and preserve them in a deathless state; Dragons rule their own civilisation and manipulate events to fit the mysterious Draconic Prophecy; Halflings are dinosaur-riding barbarians or dangerous gangsters; A vampire king rules his nation with an iron fist and tries to preserve the uneasy peace.

   The twists are joined by many new ideas unique to Eberron: The Warforged, construct soldiers trying to find a place in the world now the Last War is over; Changelings shape shifting conmen and spies; Shifters are the diluted descendents of lycanthropes, and Kalashtar are psionic beings locked in a secret war against the sinister Dreaming Dark. Then there are the Dragonmarks, the Prophecy manifest on flesh, the families that bear these marks are the economic powerhouses who control the economy of the world. Add to this mix orcs as the worlds saviours, goblinoid characters, flying ships, a hefty dose of Indiana Jones and Pirates of the Caribbean and then a large dash of Noir and there you have Eberron.

Like D&D but completely different.

Mutants & Masterminds

Tom Lynch: 

   From the title, it’s pretty obvious that this is a supers game. Anything from Superman’s bright cape to the Punisher’s simple shirt-and-trenchcoat combo will work nicely within these rules; a variant on the d20 System designed to cater for comic book skills, powers and gadgets from mass mind control to Batman’s utility belt.

   A simple point-buy system allows players to build any comic book concept easily and effectively, and even to reflect the feats superheroes pull off only through great exertion of their powers.

   M&M comes with two core settings – Freedom City and Meta-4 – which pit you against anything from the enigmatic Chinese crimelord Dr Sin to the radioactive genius known as the Atomic Brain.

   Fairly new to LURPS, M&M is gaining a following and it’s not difficult to see why.