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d20 Past
New rules for running a d20 Modern campaign set in the past.
This new rules supplement provides everything players and gamemasters need to participate in adventures in the time period between the Renaissance and World War II, including new character options and rules for early modern firearms. It begins with an exploration of the historical period between 1450 and 1950, then provides rules for creating characters and campaigns that blend realism and fantasy. d20 Past also presents alternative campaign models, along with all the rules needed to play swashbuckling pirate adventures, Victorian horror investigations, thrilling Pulp Era escapades, and more, including three ready-to-play campaign modules.
AUTHOR BIO: James Wyatt won an Origins award for Oriental Adventures™. He has also co-authored numerous roleplaying game products, including the Eberron™ Campaign Setting, Sharn: City of Towers™, Draconomicon: The Book of Dragons™, and Book of Exalted Deeds™.
AUTHRO BIO: Gwendolyn F.M. Kestrel is a managing editor for Wizards of the Coast, Inc. In addition to editing several D&D® books, she co-authored Underdark™ and Planar Handbook™ for Wizards of the Coast, Inc.
This new rules supplement provides everything players and gamemasters need to participate in adventures in the time period between the Renaissance and World War II, including new character options and rules for early modern firearms. It begins with an exploration of the historical period between 1450 and 1950, then provides rules for creating characters and campaigns that blend realism and fantasy. d20 Past also presents alternative campaign models, along with all the rules needed to play swashbuckling pirate adventures, Victorian horror investigations, thrilling Pulp Era escapades, and more, including three ready-to-play campaign modules.
AUTHOR BIO: James Wyatt won an Origins award for Oriental Adventures™. He has also co-authored numerous roleplaying game products, including the Eberron™ Campaign Setting, Sharn: City of Towers™, Draconomicon: The Book of Dragons™, and Book of Exalted Deeds™.
AUTHRO BIO: Gwendolyn F.M. Kestrel is a managing editor for Wizards of the Coast, Inc. In addition to editing several D&D® books, she co-authored Underdark™ and Planar Handbook™ for Wizards of the Coast, Inc.
96 pages, Paperback
First published March 1, 2005
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35 people want to read
About the author
James Wyatt
102 books146 followersJames Wyatt is an award-winning game designer at Wizards of the Coast, and now holds the position of Design Manager for Dungeons & Dragons. He was one of the lead designers for D&D 4th Edition and one of the original designers of the Eberron Campaign Setting, and has written and co-authored dozens of game supplements. He grew up in Ithaca, New York, and now lives in Washington State with his wife and son.
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July 13, 2022I got a chance to look at the D20 Modern Dark Matter book and I was so disappointed -- it was almost just a reprinting of the Alternity Dark Matter book with a slightly different system. I was so disappointed, that I had to just check out all the other books in the product line to see what I could learn, so:
Menace Manual -- a book of monsters, npcs, and groups/factions. Which really raises the question: what point is there in a generic monster and rogues gallery? Like, if your game can span everything from "horror in the modern day" to "pew-pew space battles," why would you put them all in one book? The thing I really want to take away from this is to put people/monsters in the wrong contexts. Do you have a space opera? Well, here's a vampire stalking this space station (or better: space elevator). Do you have a horror game? Well, here's some straight up space aliens. (OK, that's basically Delta Green, one of the best games ever.)
Weapons Locker -- the least interesting book you could make for me, just list of real-world guns.
Future — D20 Future is an expansion of D20 Modern (woof, these names), which extends the generic modern rules into generic future rules: so there's a chapter on space travel, a big chapter on starships, and other chapters on mecha, cybernetics, mutations, etc. So, basically, this is a toolbox for you to build your future campaign, and they include some mini-campaigns here to show how you can adapt these rules for, say, Bughunters or Genetech (which were two Amazing Engine worlds); or Star*Drive (an Alternity world); or Star Law (a Star Frontiers property, I think). Now, there's a few campaign ideas that aren't rehashes of their old IP (space opera against void monsters, a dimensional hopping and collapse game, something with mecha, and a post-apocalyptic world). I guess if you wanted to keep playing one of the older IPs, this could be useful, but otherwise I am left scratching my head: who is this for? What is the one-line sales pitch to the kid who comes into the store?
Past — the historical version of D20 Modern (double woof), and this book is only like 100 pages, and most of that is long descriptions of different campaign worlds, complete with sample adventures. And you know what, these ideas aren't revolutionary -- pirates & magic, Victorian monster hunters, pulp heroes vs. Nazi superscience -- but I like these longer versions of the campaigns. I am really left wondering if maybe they would've had better luck putting out, say, specific campaigns using more-or-less the same engine. Basically, I am arguing that they should've done Amazing Engine again: a single system that was generic enough to be used for a bunch of different games with slight modifications, and you make your selling point the game, not the engine. Because, after all, a kid comes into a shop--do you think they'll be more excited by "you play a hero fighting Nazi mad scientists!" or "well, the game is a very similar rules engine to D&D, but there are drop-and-play modules about cybernetics you can add"? I mean, the Amazing Engine model failed once, it can fail again without hurting too many people.
(That said, between D20 Past-Modern-Future, I I am now wondering about a game that spanned generations and genres, telling one epic story about… something.)
Apocalypse — another toolbox model, which covers ends of the world from nuclear to biological to judgment day; the art and rules are mostly action-oriented, as are the sample worlds.
Cyberscape — cybernetics and cyberspace rules, with cyberpunk campaign world that I can only yawn at these days.
Future Tech — what it says on the tin, from guns to starships to mecha to robots. Again, I'd be much more interested in a D20 Mecha game that, oh, by the way, had modular rules, than this attempt to be everything.
Critical Locations — maps of generic and ordinary locations (bowling alley, cineplex, high school)
That's the whole line from WotC, though some 3rd party publishers made some stuff, but I'm too demoralized by this to look. That said, I am even more interested in reading some of the recent books about TSR (and hoping for some coverage of WotC too). Because I am always mystified by their decision making process.
Like: when I was in grad school, I once thought "well, I'm sure the business world isn't so dysfunctional." And if I still believed that, this product line would quickly disabuse me of that notion.
Menace Manual -- a book of monsters, npcs, and groups/factions. Which really raises the question: what point is there in a generic monster and rogues gallery? Like, if your game can span everything from "horror in the modern day" to "pew-pew space battles," why would you put them all in one book? The thing I really want to take away from this is to put people/monsters in the wrong contexts. Do you have a space opera? Well, here's a vampire stalking this space station (or better: space elevator). Do you have a horror game? Well, here's some straight up space aliens. (OK, that's basically Delta Green, one of the best games ever.)
Weapons Locker -- the least interesting book you could make for me, just list of real-world guns.
Future — D20 Future is an expansion of D20 Modern (woof, these names), which extends the generic modern rules into generic future rules: so there's a chapter on space travel, a big chapter on starships, and other chapters on mecha, cybernetics, mutations, etc. So, basically, this is a toolbox for you to build your future campaign, and they include some mini-campaigns here to show how you can adapt these rules for, say, Bughunters or Genetech (which were two Amazing Engine worlds); or Star*Drive (an Alternity world); or Star Law (a Star Frontiers property, I think). Now, there's a few campaign ideas that aren't rehashes of their old IP (space opera against void monsters, a dimensional hopping and collapse game, something with mecha, and a post-apocalyptic world). I guess if you wanted to keep playing one of the older IPs, this could be useful, but otherwise I am left scratching my head: who is this for? What is the one-line sales pitch to the kid who comes into the store?
Past — the historical version of D20 Modern (double woof), and this book is only like 100 pages, and most of that is long descriptions of different campaign worlds, complete with sample adventures. And you know what, these ideas aren't revolutionary -- pirates & magic, Victorian monster hunters, pulp heroes vs. Nazi superscience -- but I like these longer versions of the campaigns. I am really left wondering if maybe they would've had better luck putting out, say, specific campaigns using more-or-less the same engine. Basically, I am arguing that they should've done Amazing Engine again: a single system that was generic enough to be used for a bunch of different games with slight modifications, and you make your selling point the game, not the engine. Because, after all, a kid comes into a shop--do you think they'll be more excited by "you play a hero fighting Nazi mad scientists!" or "well, the game is a very similar rules engine to D&D, but there are drop-and-play modules about cybernetics you can add"? I mean, the Amazing Engine model failed once, it can fail again without hurting too many people.
(That said, between D20 Past-Modern-Future, I I am now wondering about a game that spanned generations and genres, telling one epic story about… something.)
Apocalypse — another toolbox model, which covers ends of the world from nuclear to biological to judgment day; the art and rules are mostly action-oriented, as are the sample worlds.
Cyberscape — cybernetics and cyberspace rules, with cyberpunk campaign world that I can only yawn at these days.
Future Tech — what it says on the tin, from guns to starships to mecha to robots. Again, I'd be much more interested in a D20 Mecha game that, oh, by the way, had modular rules, than this attempt to be everything.
Critical Locations — maps of generic and ordinary locations (bowling alley, cineplex, high school)
That's the whole line from WotC, though some 3rd party publishers made some stuff, but I'm too demoralized by this to look. That said, I am even more interested in reading some of the recent books about TSR (and hoping for some coverage of WotC too). Because I am always mystified by their decision making process.
Like: when I was in grad school, I once thought "well, I'm sure the business world isn't so dysfunctional." And if I still believed that, this product line would quickly disabuse me of that notion.
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