We Played TSR's Gamma World
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 25 ก.พ. 2023
- That's right - Gamma World! We talk about our recent experience playing the game and how much we loved it. Keep your eyes open, we're definitely going to play it again.
KYSAF!
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Awesome. I have always held the belief that Gamma World was the direct inspiration to the OG Fallout series, setting it's themes and tones. It first came out in 1978 and I bet you a brand new $100 bill that the guys at Interplay played Gamma World all the time. In fact, if that is not the case, I would be very surpised.
Gamma world is cool but I don't think we need to go as far as giving it credit for being the first to imagine a post-nuclear holocaust world
The BoS is pretty much an import of Knights of Genetic Purity, with The Enclave taking part of the same fantastic racism.
Played that game in the 80s about three times,love it
It's been a really long time since I played it back in the day. Had almost forgotten how fun it is.
One thing I notice that most people never talk about when reviewing first edition Gamma World is the Artifact flow charts, that are used when a character is trying to workout what some ancient Artifact is and it's fuction. The Artifact flow charts are a mini game within themselves and like everything in first edition Gamma World the simple act of trying to workout what something is or dose can be lethal and lead to a hilarious character death, for example, arming a fusion grenade and not understanding that the grenade then needs to be thrown. Also it's a good Idea to make two characters, one for now, one for later as the lethality in first edition Gamma World is extremely high. Finally, Starting as a pure strain human has many advantages, most ancient technology will be suited and respond to pure strain human use, including security systems/robots ect, and a pure strain human may not start with mutations but they will most likely obtain them via radiation exposure throughout the adventure, That is, If they don't die from the radiation exposure.
I love those charts. You're right, they can be a story in themselves and can add drama or hilarity to the game.
Fallout 4 has the gameplay of Boot Hill in the Gamma World setting
Played Gamma World years ago. Due to our small group size , as GM, I allowed each player two characters with each player having different character types. This gave us two each of the pure strain humans, mutated humans, and mutated animals with each player running different types. I set up a home brew map and it was one of the best runs we did. Hoping someday to return to the gorilla in the gold lame zoot suit and aardvark in a pink jump suit with ostrich feather skull cap to continue their adventures.
Love it. Send us an update if you play it again.
The closest thing I experienced to alignments were the Cryptic Alliances. Always had problems with The Knights of Purity, as we were four Hoops and a pure strain human. Not having alignments, in my mind made it more enjoyable. Imagine four 8’ rabbits and a PSH running around wrecking stuff and collecting artifacts, good times
I loved Gamma World. My group played a lot of cross-over between D&D and Gamma World back in the day.
It was/is hugely fun. We did the Gamma World and Boot Hill cross-over as well. A lot of hilarity often ensued.
@@theoldwarlockwow boothill was my first rpg.
Metamorphosis Alpha was the kind of companion game to Gamma World, in that in that game folks left the world in an "Ark" to save humanity as the events leading to Gamma World were taking place. I'm hoping to run my first Gamma World game soon.
My boys got me the Metamorphosis Alpha collector’s edition for Christmas. Looking forward to jumping into it.
@@theoldwarlock That sounds awesome.
Hi, @theoldwarlock. Thanks for presenting GW. I also played it in 1980 (to 1982), and haven’t since, but it’s still my favourite (1e & 2e). Look forward to future GW from you.
Hi Mark, we're glad you liked the video! We haven't gotten the chance to play it since then but we're definitely looking forward to playing again! Keep your sword arm free!
@@theoldwarlock I’m now subscribed to your channel and look forward to your future videos. Tnx!
More first edition Gamma World would be great! It's truly an amazing game, a lost treasure. Mutant Crawl Classics, is the closest reincarnation of 1st Edtion Gamma World that I would recommend if anyone is looking for a more modern version that keeps very close to the original 1st ed Gamma World setting, with a few new interesting twists.
I still have the Gamma World box set. It was the first game I ever played. It is in heavily played condition complete with screen and module. My first character was 33cm tall, had wings, and total healing. i think I got eaten by something vaguely giant wormlike
Nice! Great game to start with. And I think everyone should get eaten by worm things at some point in their gaming. Almost a right of passage!
Love gamma world 1e! would recommend looking at the changes in the legion of gold module. If I remember correctly it added more mutations and gave a buff to purestrain humans that was well needed over mutants.
Thanks! Just picked up Legion of Gold but haven't looked through it. Looking even more forward to it now!
We played this in the mid-80s as loved it. Aftermath and Morrow Project too. Lots of post-apocalypse in middle / high school back then!
It really is a great game. And yes, the post-apocolypse thing was big for us at that time.
When will you guys start recording sessions for us? We need that. We need it ☠️
Thanks for your vote of confidence in what we might produce. We would like to, but our small grasp of the technical problems we would surely encounter needs to be overcome first. Tech savvy we are not, as I’m sure you’ve noticed, and we don’t want to take on more headaches until we sure we can deal with them. But, again, thanks for the encouragement. KYSAF!
To this day Gamma World is my favorite RPG setting over 35 years of playing RPG starting with AD&D to playing D&D 5e today. There are other good post-apoc RPGs out there but I often incorporate those materials into my GW campaign. I hope WOTC will update GW & re-release a new edition
During the 80's we tried running a version of sectaurs for gamma world and had a blast
Thank you for sharing. Not many videos on TH-cam about Gamma World.
Our pleasure - it's a great game. We may have more to come.
We loved Gamma World. I remember going through the first module. I think it was hard for us kids to visualize the world. But I loved the mutations and great artwork!
We love the mutations as well.
I think that the first edition is my favourite rpg ever! Got mine in 1981...I love D&D, but this is my game to be sure.
Agreed, it is way up on my list. Was trying to figure out why and it could be I was preconditioned to like it from all the post apocalyptic sci fi I read in the 70s. Andre Norton’s Daybreak 2250 AD, also published as Star Man’s Son, was my first novel and Gamma World allowed me to adventure in that genre.
Have you read Norton's No Night Without Stars and Stirling Lanier's Hiero novels? Oh yes
1st Edition AD&D had Gamma World conversion tables, it was a great game for the time. I really enjoyed GW/MA.
They also had conversions for Boot Hill which could be a lot of fun in the medieval setting as well.
@@theoldwarlock Yes the good old days when they could do conversions for any system TSR owned.
I never played in Gamma World but I did play D&D with characters that had been to the "Gamma World" and returned to the D&D world. They did have some special weapons that had "powerful magics".
We did the same thing with Boot Hill. A box of "Dynamic Might" found it's way back to D&D with some characters who found inadvertently found themselves in the Old West. Stories are still told of the events that followed.
"It was fun".....That alone I thought was the end of the show, LOL.
One day I was playing fallout: new Vegas and I was like “man why isn’t this a tabletop”, so I googled post-apocalyptic tabletop RPGs
And that’s when I found gamma world, I had no idea this game existed at the time.
Definitely some comparisons to be made there! We're also both big fans of fallout.
Just found your channel subscribed great presentation well done
Thanks and we're glad you like our less-than-professional offerings! Best Regards and KYSAF!
So glad you're doing Gamma World. Had so much fun playing it when it first came out. Even had a quest in our D&D world where we had to dimension hop to Gamma World. A mixed party of magic users and mutants can't be beat. :)
Oh that sounds like a great time! We've been having a ton of fun with it and look forward to continuing to play. Keep your sword arm free!
Legion of gold 🤘
I also bought the box set in approximately 1980 and only played about 3 times but loved it. The one thing that Fallout and other crg's don't offer is the opportunity to play a mutated animal class. 1st edition rules rocks.
I missed out on playing this game, but other games similar to it have been my jam all my life. I think my earliest dive into RPG's was with AD&D when I was 13? In the end, Gamma World inspired me to write a book series later that I am still working on to this day. Awesome game, and some old school people still stream it live on youtube if you guys are interested.
Thanks for the info! I'll have to look up some of those streams. Really a great game!
Wow crazy to think about Gamma World. Played in the early 80's along side D&D and Boot Hill. It's been 40 yrs but cool to hear about it because i'm remembering now trying to get a decent mutation based on your animal. I may go buy the guide just kickstart some of those memories.
You should. Sometimes just going through a copy of those older guides can take you back decades making it seem like months instead.
Ha, ha, cracking me up about finding the power rifle. Wait till he actually finds one and has to figure out how it works without killing himself! 🤣🤣🤣 Sounds like you're playing the Albuquerque Space Station, a fun module. Love me some Gamma World.
Played Gamma World just after I started playing D&D back in 5th grade c. 1979 or 1980. We loved it!
There has been seven editions of Gamma World released, the seventh edition was the last version released in 2010, it uses a stripped down 4th ed D&D rules set and a collectable card mechanic and changes the setting a lot from the original first edition.
Nice video on a cool old game! 😎
Thanks, RDMR!
I was talking about Gamma World a couple months ago, with a coworker who is interested in running it. This reminded me of our conversation, so I ordered a couple of reprints from DTRPG. One for me of course!
Of course! FYI, they also have some reprints of GW modules on DTRPG. Have fun and let us know how your game goes. Unarmed combat is a real weak point in the system so let us know if you homebrew something for it.
Gamma world is so overlooked by tabletop role-playing game community criminals. Boot Hill also worth checking out.
Agreed. And Boot Hill?! What a great game.
Metamorphosis Alpha was the pre cursor to Gamma world. I played them both back in the day, Great games
We are definitely looking forward to diving into some Metamorphosis Alpha, that's one of the next things on our agenda.
I still have my 4th edition rulebook, held together with duct tape and filled with scribbled notes. I've run Gamma World more than any other game, and every campaign starts with Famine in Far-Go.
Can easily see why you've run so many games. It's a fantastic game.
Hello there, Good video guys. Gamma World is one of my favorites. I picked up my 1e box in 1981. I have every edition in hard copy except for the 7th edition which I have in PDF. Although I think 2e is my favorite edition.
Glad you liked it! It truly is a fun game.
Gamma World and remember the Morrow Project? Could never get into Boot Hill, but we spent many a Saturday lost in the wastes.
yes please more gamma world!
We're going to hopefully get the chance to play soon and we'll be sure to make an update in either a video or a podcast!
I have the boxed set. Was great to play! But same only played a few times.
And I'm not sure why we didn't play it more back in the day. We're changing that now, but I wish it had been a regular thing all these years.
Played in the 80s as an small talking elk with gamma eye. The party had a station wagon running on 5 cylinders and flat tires that we were always looking for parts to fix up. Never had power armor since my ranged and melee weapons were built-in. Another time I was a plant living in a broken articulated mannequin from a department store with prehensile vines sticking out where the hands should have been and water and soil in the legs for my roots. It was nightmare fuel when I illustrated it. My role was basically being the food supply for a rabbit buddy and healer that time. Of course there were plenty of dingleberry jokes and having to pick the berries from weird places. Groot and Rocket were hilarious to me when Guardians of the Galaxy came out.
Loved reading this. Thanks for sending it!
12:00 last edition was 6th during 4e d&d. Great setting. Very thundarr.
Thanks for a great video. Is there much art in the book?
Glad you liked it! There isn't a ton, but there are definitely some fun images in there. Keep your sword arm free!
@@theoldwarlock I've been tempted by Mutant Future, though the trouble is I'm not sure I could scare up a group to play it.
Looking forward to seeing what is beyond the "Rest Eatery"
We'll get more details soon! Thanks!
Loved Gamma world. They did expansion pack Mutants Down Under that had amazing cover art. It had a kangaroo bouncing through a battlefeild with her joey in her pouch firing a mounted belt fed machinegun. Check Star Frontiers. Like basic d&d in space.
I've seen the image you mentioned. And I just received a very good copy of Star Frontiers and few weeks ago. Fun game we didn't play too often back in the day but should have played more of.
@@theoldwarlock they added some great tech in later expansions. i did port the Yazarians directly into d&d as a player race. Race evolved in the dark of the lower canopy of a jungle made of massive trees with carnivorous plants, giant insects, and sauroids depending on the elevation witnin the jungle you lived. They had true night vision not infravision so they saw better than the other races in the dark. I ran old school gnomes who are the masters of crystal work so the character could get lenses made so they could operate in the day. The gliding added a unique elament without the headache of a flying character. their battle rage from Frontiers just became beserker rage. Added that they took increased damage from blunt weapons due to light bone structure to balance the character. Minus 1 on STR, INT, WIS. Plus 2 on DEX and plus 1 CON(jungle is nasty so you'd heal or die thus the plus). Their weapons were a wood/resin almost as strong as steel. sorry babbled
If you want to get some inspiration for this game read Hiero’s Journey. That book is basically Gamma World and I think the designers got a lot of inspiration from it.
Thanks! We'll take a look!
In my opinion, I don't really think Fallout 4 stole the idea from Gamma World, but I do believe that they were heavily influenced by Gamma World. Part of my opinion is that the Fallout series is heavily retro future and I never really thought of Gamma World as retro future. But I fully understand where your opinion comes from and support your ability to have and express that opinion.
By the way, I still have my original boxed set, that was bought back when it came out. It's still in fairly good shape. Also I've run it over and over, most recently about 15 years ago.
Thanks for the comment, John! And if it's been 15 years, I think it's time for you to fire up Gamma World again!
I'd love to see a more in-depth rundown of the system and your house rules/observations.
It’s in the plan for the channel. We want to get really comfortable with the game then revisit it with our inevitable changes. Unarmed combat is not well addressed but I’ve found some old articles from RPG magazines that give alternate systems that I like. We’ll pass those along then. KYSAF!
Played this a few times back in the day, and my experience was similar to yours: The unusual setting makes for some great scenarios and roleplay, but the mutations can get really lopsided. It's easy to end up with a character that's either ultra-powerful, or completely helpless. I don't know if later editions managed to fix that or not. But with a little GM intervention and some judicious nerfing and buffing, you should be able to get a nice campaign going. And yes, getting a gun is awesome, but then you have to worry about ammo. Those "hydrogen cells" (batteries) are more precious than gold...
Agreed! It’s a great setting, but it will take a fair bit of tweaking, as well as some hammering, to get it where we want it. A fun part of the game, by extension, is digging through old issues of RPG magazines to find changes made back in the day to make the game more playable. We might list some of those changes in a future video.
Never played Gamma World, but we did our own horror apocalyptic campaign using RECON system.
My two novels and third one coming is based on Gamma World.
Nice! Have they been published, or are you working on getting them published?
I remember that the rules seemed incomprehensible at the time
I remember rolling a 99 and killing a guy with a dagger lol
Haven’t played Gammaworld. As kids, we looked on in anticipation at the adds seen in comics and the product lists in the boxes. In the current era I can only point to Mutant Crawl Classics for game mechanics. Play on!
Hey JR. Yeah, those old product lists were great to go over - and then when you waited for something to show up in the mail that you'd ordered - I miss it. Someone else mentioned MCC. Now I'm curious.
Have you tried Mutant Crawl Classics? It reminds me of Gamma World.
We've had a number of people ask us about MCC. Enough to where I'm going to have to buy a copy just to see what it's like. I guess short answer - no we haven't seen it but we're going to have to take a look. (oh darn)
Never played Gamma World. Always wanted to though.
Have you guys played any old-school games like OSRIC or C&C?
Jim has played both. C&C would have been his game of choice if not for have a few decades of his homebrew in play before discovering C&C.
Never had the chance to play that game. I did know of it. I wonder what boot hill(?) Was like.
Boot Hill was/is great! We play it as is, and it's also the basis for a homebrew creation of mine called Cowboys vs. The Undead - undead groups trying to take over the old west.
@@theoldwarlock nice. Like your channel. Keep it up.
Gamma World is a really fun setting, did you guys every get back into it in the half year since this vid?
Only once. With fall starting, we'll be playing again soon. We'll talk about it in a video or on the podcast when we do.
@@theoldwarlock that sounds good, I look forward to it!
As much as i know, its more of an inspiration
Because they didnt made fallout out of gamma world
They made "Wasteland" first, a DOS game that is heavily inspired from gamma world, then they made fallout.
Hello Luis. I did not know this! Thanks for passing it on - the game progression make more sense now.
@@theoldwarlock last thing i remember from that wiki dwelling was that they changed the backstory in almost each edition
First it was a war, then it was a meteor strike turned into war, then it was aliens, and by the last it was just open to interpretation what had happened before the shadow era i think
More videos and details on GW!
We'll be making some early next year.
@@theoldwarlock Thanks! Please do!
There was also Aftermath, which came out in 1981 (Fantasy Games Unlimited). Far too complicated, but you an see where Fallout got some ideas from.
That's interesting, we may have to check it out! Thank you!
@@theoldwarlock Aftermath! Sydney: The Wilderness Campaign was a lot of fun for us over here, as it was the first time I'd played an rpg set locally, and I had a friend who helped playtest it (I think?)
Trivia - original developers of fallout wanted to use the d&d system for their game but they were not able to come to a deal with TSR. So they made up their own gurps like system instead.
That's really interesting! I've never played the original Fallout games, just the more recent (starting with three). It's cool to hear there's a definite crossover though! Keep your sword arm free!
@@theoldwarlock you should give them a go. 1 and 2 are the superior games imo and still hold up well.
Honealty sounds a lot like Mutant Crawl Classics, not in setting, but in its character creation. Does this book do anything that MCC fails to do, im trying to put together a Post-Apocalyptic game and febating systems.
To be honest, I haven't played or much looked at MCC. I might imagine MCC would be a smoother play since its a newer game, but I might be wrong. Overall, Gamma World is pretty simple if that's more what you're after.
Hi! I have a large Gamma World first edition collection, that includes all three box set printing versions of the fisrt edition and most of the miniatures released for Gamma World first edition by Grenadier models, the genius of the first edition of Gamma World, Is that it's very bare bones, but gives you just enough information to let your imagination go wild and create something truly unique, Even the world map is basically a canvas to paint out your unique version of the world of Gamma World. Unfortunately later editions of Gamma World lost a lot of what made the first edtion so unique, partly due to being heavily influenced by MadMax vision of the post apocalypse that isn't what Gamma World is meant to be, personally the first edition of Gamma World is the only edtion of Gamma World in its purest form with its original unique vision of the post apocalypse every other edition is Gamma World only in name.
Agreed for those exact reasons. I also really like the, "here are a few cools things to get you started - no go out and make something with it" approach to many of those early games. It almost forced expanded, imaginative thinking.
If you're planning on homebrewing stuff in it, you might also look into the Mutant Future game. Believe it is a free retro clone of Gamma World 2e (could be wrong, but one of the TSR versions) and is a pretty popular revamp of the system amongst the community. May fix some of the issues you have or give you some stuff to steal.
Personally I am more into GW 7e (yes the one with cards) than the older ones as I tend to find them a bit too messy in their layout & design for my tastes. Also because the usage of cards for finding ancient Tech that can easily be used up or destroyed from feels like an excellent fit, being able to literally pull from a deck and toss them into discard once they explo- I mean, malfunction... helps sell the feeling of being scavengers. Also great for tracking information.
Thanks for letting us know. I’ll check into it. Now, of course, I need to track down an edition with the cards.
@@theoldwarlock No problem! And the card version is out of print, though I think there are some for sale on Noble Knight Games which have been opened but contents basically untouched. You can also get the cards printed via Drivethru, but the rest of it is pdf/digital format.
@@TheNerdySimulation Thanks TNS!
Same here, played it just a few times when it first came out, ultimately D&D won out. Recently i've been reading up on Dungeon Crawl Classics which is taken from D&D Basic but with some extra fun stuff. Wondering if you guys have tried that yet?
A friend ran it for awhile. It was actually very good but for my game it's still my very rules light D&D basic plus some AD&D 1E.
actually only ever heard of this when looking into a far smaller game, caves of qud
Caves of Qud has been mentioned a few times. I need to check it out.
Holy cow - Dad is CUTE!!!
You have no idea how many times I'm going to bring up this comment at the next Old Warlock planning meeting. Thanks!
@@theoldwarlock HA HA! 😆
His 2' man needs to find some big pistol that every time he shoots it it knocks him back a few feet and he needs to roll some sort of strength check to see if he can hold onto it. 🤣🤣🤣
You know, that just might have to happen!
@@theoldwarlock Just keeping it "real". Our DM's favorite line is, "Be careful what you ask for...I just may make that happen."
If you ever want a unique monster for any game, roll up a few mutants in gamma world.
As far as the fallout 4 soundtrack search no more friend! th-cam.com/video/vY8UUmIeoPQ/w-d-xo.html
Also if you love this you have to try Mutant Crawl Classics. its kind of like this but much more content written by the folks over at Goodman games!
That must be a reprint, the original came in a box. [...] Then you say the same thing right after I posted my comment. 😂
I read that S3 (Barrier Peaks) may have been in anticipation of Gamma World -- if that's the case I wonder if anyone tried playing S3 in Gamma World.
This made me laugh. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve commented like that. I see something I’d like to comment about, do it immediately because I don’t want to forget it, make the comment, then the comment is rendered inert as the video continues. Oh well… At least we’re trying to contribute, right? KYSAF!
I agree Fallout is a wholesale copyright theft from Gamma World
Did you actually say 2 arms was a mutation?
Hey JR! Can't remember but you know us. It's quite possible we did.
I’ve never played Gamma World but I have heard of it. Tons of nuclear apocalyptic stuff out there so not sure I’d claim that Fallout (which I too am a fan of) ripped this off. There is a Fallout ttrpg also, and our group plays it. Its alot of fun, and I’ve actually played it more than the video game series lol. Good luck Alex, hope your character finds a gun lol
Alex here, thank you I also hope I find a gun. I think I've heard of the rpg of fallout before, we may have to give it a try at some point. Thanks for the comment and keep your sword arm free!
Inon Zur (the composer who scores Fallout 4) has an album titled ‘Doomsday.’ Might be worth checking out for bgm thats fitting for your game. We use music alot for mood and such in our games too.
Check out Mutant Future by Goblinoid Games, it's a Gamma World clone and i like it better than the original. The "no art" version is even free.
I played the classic Famine in Far-go, lots of fun.
We'll be checking it out. Thanks!
Gamma World and Fallout are only similar in that they are post apocalyptic settings. Literature is full of these settings,
Gamma World is more based on literature such as Heiros Journey with anamorphic creatures. There are none of those in Fallout.
Fallout is set in a 1950's style future setting. With Cold War sensibilities. The creatures are more limited than intelligent anamorphic creatures.
Gamma World is a far future from our own with an unknown calamity,
You guys were playing 1st edition which is good but you need to play 2nd edition which is way better
they did not steal Gamma World. Gamma World assumes a super future of wonder and amazing things while Fallout is steeped in retro-futurism. They likely both pull from the rich tradition of classic future apocalypse stories.
Gamma World has too much of the OTT silly stuff that cheapens Fallout for me. I find fantasy games, tabletop games in general, tend to be SO fantastical they border on stupid. Like, for example, zombie apocalypse games. The zombies are always stupid. They're always so overpowered, or there's mutant varieties with super powers, or something silly. The thing that's scary about zombies is there'd be so damned many of them, that's the menace, that and surviving a collapsing world is hard. So I find myself longing for games where you're not some super mutant, or super hero, and the enemy aren't ninja super zombies or something dumb.