Faery’s Tale Deluxe By Green Ronin Review
-== What is it? ==-
Faery’s Tale Deluxe from Green Ronin Publishing is a role-playing game where players take on the role of pixies, brownies, sprites, and pooka. Everything that is needed to play is contained in the book.
The book has a color cover and an entirely black and white interior. The book is 6? x 9? and is 96 pages in length. I have not played the game I have only read the book.
-== What I Like ==-
I love the way that the book tackles the fae genre. The list of abilities is concise and uncluttered. You won’t see entries that people don’t want to play. Also each entry is explained with an example if there are multiple levels of effect.
The mechanics are very simply and I think they need to be for a game geared at younger players. On neat thing with the mechanics is the fact that they are additive only. You don’t have to worry about subtractions, multiplication, etc. Great touch. The only mechanic I’m hesitant on is the way the dice are totaled. The mechanic is to count the evens and odds. I guess that works but I almost wanted something simpler. I think custom dice with fairies and goblins or similar would be really great. There are dice on the Green Ronin site but they still have pips and rely on even and odd. I would have liked to see them go even farther.
The artwork is fantastic. It conveys a real sense of the fairy world and in playing a fae. Often pictures are angled from the view of the fairy and contain a great sense of wonder. The amount of artwork is just about right. There is not so much artwork that it impacts the text or layout in a poor manner. Very nice.
-== What I Don’t Like ==-
The adventures are a bit too open ended for introductory younger players in my mind. In some ways I was hoping that at least one of them was a bit more railroading. I know that sounds strange but when first starting with young kids I find that it helps?especially the first session where folks are learning the rules.
I also would have liked to see more sample character and possibly ones provided with the adventures. Maybe each having their own page with a picture and a summary of their abilities. It would be really nice to have details on each ability with the character sheet.
-== Summary ==-
I really like this product and I think it fills a great hole for younger gamers. My complaints are not serious and can be corrected with some minor work by the GM. The price point is fine at $20 for the print copy. I think $10 is a deal for the PDF. 🙂
I give it 8 out of 10 paws.
