First Impressions - Temples & Tombs RPG (Year Zero Engine Pulp)

 

I'm pretty certain you can tell the inspiration for this cover...

Temples & Tombs is Gallant Knight Games's recently released Year Zero Engine roleplaying game that embraces the pulp genre as seen in the Indiana Jones films, The Mummy (1999) and Romancing the Stone. The player characters are all heroes who are employed by an institution to get a job done, in a default 1930s setting. The GM is entitled the Game Director. This game is focused on cinematic pulp and embraces failure. Heroes will get knocked back, knocked down and probably knocked out, but they'll bounce back to try and complete their mission. You don't have hit points, but if you lose out, there's always a catch. You aren't going to die from a poor roll, instead, you're going to end up in a fridge and out of the scene as the Bomb goes off.

 

TL;DR: Temples & Tombs is a nicely focused, rules-light pulp game, which leans into the genre well. By the time I'd read it, I wanted to get it to the table, and that is the real measure of a game for me. I hope to run this. I think it would work really well for a convention as a one-shot, and the adventure structure and prompts should make it easy to create a scenario. Recommended.

The book embraces lines and veils and the X-Card from the start. So you avoid snakes if you absolutely need to. There's also sensitive guidance on how to handle 'bad tropes'; imperialism, historical atrocities, and more. Effectively, you soft focus and remove elements that don't fit with the story that you want to tell, especially around race and gender.

The game is pretty standard from a YZE perspective. You start by choosing your profession from a selection of pulp standards (Ace, Archaeologist, Doctor, Genius, Hunter, Journalist, Outlaw, Professional, Socialite, Soldier, Spy, Thief). You can't have two players with the same profession. Your age will affect the number of skills and attributes you have; younger characters have higher attributes and lower skills and vice versa. One attribute will be key to your profession and you can start with it at five points. Otherwise attributes range from two to four dice. The attributes are Grit, Quick, Wit and Style. Each attribute has three related skills. These are broad brush, in the usual YZE way. We have Fight, Endure, Feat, Drive, Shoot, Stunt, Fix, Savvy, Lore, Scare, Sway and Trick, all pretty self-explanatory. 

Each character starts with one of three talents unique to their career. These give you an edge in the game. They also have an ambition, which serves two purposes. Firstly, it allows the Game Director to help engage your character into the story, and secondly, it provides a small mechanical advantage. Once per session, you can invoke your ambition to gain an automatic success provided there's a reasonable link to your profession.

Once initial character generation is completed, the party chose an institution to work for. It could be a Museum, University, Society, Newspaper, Government, or more. It is a reason for your characters to associate and a way to give missions and some resources. This is a way to steer the flavour of the game.

Characters are also defined by relationships with the other characters; each profession has three prompts, both positive and negative. Gear is handled simply; you can carry as much as double your Grit. Income is defined by profession; you can raise it one level by spending a skill point. You also have a signature item; if you can legitimately use it in the adventure then it adds an extra dice to your pool.

Character development is simple; there are a set of six questions, all very pulp in nature. For each question that you can answer "yes" to, you gain a point of XP. Skills can be gained or increased, and extra talents bought.  You can redefine relationships and ambitions in the downtime between sessions. 

Skill tests are started by using an attribute and an appropriate skill and look for sixes to succeed.

You can get extra dice for appropriate gear and your signature item. So far, all so standard for YZE. However, you can also add Hero Dice to the roll; as a starter, the Director can give you one if they feel your plan is awesome. You can also get them in a similar way to momentum in 2d20; for every success you roll above one, you get a Hero Dice for your next roll. Finally, you can add Hero Dice if you have an appropriate talent. If any of your Hero Dice comes up six, you can choose an additional effect. These can help the party as a whole, or just yourself.

If you fail on a roll, you take a catch; they represent an impact on your character and change the number of dice in your pool. They can increase them (for example, you could become emotional which gives you 2 extra dice), or decrease them (you're caught off-guard and lose a dice). The modifiers remain until the catch is cleared. If you take all six catches, you drop out of the scene, taken out of action. If you really don't want to take a catch (you don't want to take the final result, you can opt to lose all your Hero Dice for the next roll instead). If you don't get enough successes, you can push your luck; you get to mark Luck, and add Luck dice equal to your current Luck score to the pool. You then re-roll whichever dice you want. The catch is if any of the Luck Dice comes up 1, you clear the Luck tracker, and take a catch. There's also a mechanic to test your luck, using the current tracker score.

Helping adds a single Hero dice for each player up to three into the pool; this can be used for Group rolls as well. Opposed tests look to see who has the most successes and only the attacker can push their luck.

Combat and action resolution is at the lighter end of YZE; if you've seen Vaesen or other games you'll know exactly which you're letting yourself in for.

The Game Director's section defines the following agenda:

1. Never a Dull Moment
2. Make it Awesome
3. Make it Wonderous

It's a simple agenda, but effective. There is a list of best actions to take if the players are looking stumped; these are very much like Narrator moves in Powered by the Apocalypse games. Suggestions include 'Block their Way', 'Drive a Hard Choice', 'Escalate the Situation', 'Make it Visual', 'Ask Questions' and 'Action, Action, Action'. All sound ways to drive the story. There's guidance on running a one-shot ('single story'), an episodic series and cinematic game.

Beats are described for the game session; all games start with a Cold Open. This is a set of questions about the previous adventure. Think the start of Raiders of the Lost Ark. The players have narrative control responding to questions. This serves to introduce the characters and can create ongoing situations. There's good guidance for this process, and no dice are used. Single Stories and Episodes will usually use a short 5-10 section for single stories and episodic series. Cinematic mode will have this dominating the first session, but not being used again.

The second beat is the Call to Adventure, often held at the institution's base. A trusted person presents the mission, and the characters prepare for their journey to adventure. A recommended structure for an adventure is given; starting with the MacGuffin which is the reason for the adventure. There's a Dungeon (a difficult to access location where the MacGuffin is) and a Threat. Something will be Unknown and necessary to discover before the MacGuffin is found. There will be something at Stake; if the MacGuffin isn't found, something bad will happen. Finally, there's the Journey to consider, usually to at least two different and interesting locations.

The Journey is the third beat; when it is concluded, the characters will have everything they need to go to the Dungeon and recover the MacGuffin! So the fourth beat is the Dungeon itself. Assuming the characters are successful, they'll finish with the final beat, the Wrap. This is done with questions rather than dice rolls, mirroring the Cold Open. There's a d66 table of MacGuffin ideas, and further tables for Set Piece, Dungeons, Cold Opens, and Threats. They're a useful inspiration.

The section on threats includes groups that can be a problem for your characters; ideas are given for use in play along with sample NPCs. There's a bestiary that includes the obligatory dinosaurs (but no giant ape).

The book rounds out with three sample adventures; the first - the Temple of the Feather of Ma'at - spans the eastern Mediterranean and Egypt, and looks pretty fun. It's classic pulp. The second - Sky Zeppelin and the Valley of Yesteryear - involves a zeppelin ride into the Andes in search of parts of the world that have hitherto been inaccessible. There's a lost expedition, a lost city, treasure and exactly what you'd expect in an isolated and lost valley, dinosaurs. I think we've all seen the film! The final adventure 'The Lost Works of William Shakespeare and the Oak Island Mystery' didn't work for me. It felt too complicated and just didn't draw me in. There are some clever elements, but it doesn't feel like it meshes well. I could understand how I'd run the first two scenarios by the time I'd read through them, but not the last one. I read it several times, but it didn't work for me. That said, there are some great elements in it that could easily be lifted. 

This review is of the PDF; although it's the final version, there are still a few annoying typos. It's nicely laid out and illustrated.

The key thing for me is that that this game is a nicely focused, rules-light pulp game, which leans into the genre well. By the time I'd read it, I wanted to get Temples & Tombs to the table, and that is the real measure of a game for me. I hope to run this. I think it would work really well for a convention as a one-shot, and the adventure structure and prompts should make it easy to create a scenario. Recommended.

13 May 2021