Fallout: Wasteland Warfare RPG returns to Fallout's tabletop roots
Roll a 1 and Ian shoots you in the back
Way back in the forgotten times of glossy paper games magazines, I remember my first exposure to what would become Fallout: A Post Nuclear Role Playing Game. Early previews said Fallout was going to be a PC showcase of the GURPS pen-and-paper RPG system, but it grew into its own thing. Now, tabletop studio Modiphius have announced the Fallout: Wasteland Warfare Roleplaying Game, a freeform RPG expansion for their tabletop miniature tactics game. Curiously, there's yet another, more traditionally pen-and-paper version based on Modiphus's 2d20 RPG rule-set due next year.
Modiphius's Fallout: Wasteland Warfare has been kicking around the tabletop scene for a few months now. It's a vaguely Warhammer 40k-ish tactical combat game for two players, but also offers the option to play solo against rules-driven 'AI'. The new role-playing expansion is a bit more traditional, with one game-master and up to six players, character creation and a trio of starter adventures to get the party rolling or GM's imagination going. There's even rules for settlement building, and the cynic in me is hoping for a painfully simple Preston Garvey quest-generation table.
The original Wasteland Warfare game, launched last year - required for the RPG expansion.
For those after a more traditional pen-and-paper RPG, less reliant on custom dice and fancy miniatures, the 2d20 version (the rule-set used in Mutant Chronicles, Star Trek Adventures and others) is due out next year. Sam Webb - brain behind Star Trek Adventures - is lead developer of the 2d2o edition, and I think it'll be interesting to see how the two versions compare. Feels odd that there'll be two official Fallout tabletop RPGs launching within a year of each other, both from the same studio, but better late than never. War may never change, but the hop from GURPS to 2d20 seems significant.
Fallout: Wasteland Warfare is out now, with the RPG expansion due this summer, and a combined box-set launching by Christmas. The 2d20 role-playing system should surface sometime next year. You can find more on the Modiphius's Fallout Roleplaying page here.