The Strange

by Bruce R. Cordell

The Strange. It is an RPG set on Earth, in the modern day. But a few people a very few people have discovered how to travel to other places. They call them recursions, and they are like limited pocket dimensions with their own laws of reality, connected to Earth via a dark energy network beneath the normal matter of the universe. A dangerous, chaotic network they call the Strange.

Genres: Role Playing Games, Gaming, Science Fiction, Fantasy, Reference, Fiction, Games

416 pages, Hardcover

Published August 2, 2014

About the author

Bruce R. Cordell authored books for Dungeons & Dragons over the course of 4 editions (2nd Edition through 5th Edition D&D). These days, he’s a senior designer for Monte Cook Games, LLC designing Numenera , Gods of the Fall, and The Strange. Also a novel author, his credits include several titles set in the Forgotten Realms. Bruce’s tenth novel, Myth of the Maker, is just out from Angry Robot Books:
http://brucecordell.blogspot.com/2017...

Reviews

[ScottIsANerd (GrilledCheeseSamurai) · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Strange is the latest and newest setting for Monte Cook's Cypher System and holy balls...it's pretty f'ng cool!

As I have said in previous reviews I am a big Numenera fan. When I fell in love with that world, MCG gave us the next book, the Cypher System Rulebook, and expanded everything. Now comes along The Strange and I just don't know what to think. My brain is exploding. The possibilities are staggering.

How do I explain The Strange? Think of it like this - there's earth. And then, there's the Strange. The Strange is like another space. It surrounds earth - is connected to earth - and wants to eat earth. Within the strange are pocket dimensions or worlds. These are called Recursions. A recursion can be anything. An entire planet - just a city, or even just a room or a castle, or a tavern. There are people on Earth that can travel to these recursions. That would be us...the players.

So now...we have a modern time setting for us as players. Earth. But alongside that, we have all these separate recursions or possibilities of gameplay in whatever genre we want and the Cypher System ties it all together nice and neat like.

So instead of having to start up a whole new adventure anytime we want to switch campaigns or games or genres...we can just tie it all together in The Strange.

One character...infinite possibilities...over...and over...and over again.

I just...I cant...there are no words. Literally, with The Strange, you never have to buy another game or start a new adventure over. You can do whatever you want and it's so exciting that it kinda makes me pee a little bit.

The Strange is everything that I want. All in one. Frankly, it's near damn perfect.

[Ed · Rating 5 out of 5]

Originally posted at www.throatpunchgames.com, a new idea everyday!

RPG-The Strange
Producer-Monte Cook Games
Price-$41 here
System- Cypher
TL;FR-It's the next RPG from Monte Cook Games, so It's going to be good. 100%

Basics- Ready for some Strange? The Strange is a semi-sequel RPG to the previous hit Numenera. In this RPG, the concept of the Strange is first and foremost. The Strange itself is a chaotic mix of ideas where different versions of reality can be generated. In these different pocket "dimensions", steampunk, video game, popular fiction, fantasy, literature worlds/universes can be created and existed in . However, monsters that eat whole worlds prowl out in the chaos. In this game, your job is to keep that from happening.

Mechanics or Crunch-There is a lot here, so let's go topic by topic.

Mechanics Basics- Remember Numenera? This is pretty much the same. GM never rolls the dice. Players say a task or activity, the GM sets a level, multiply that level by three, and player rolls a d20. Hit the number-succeed. Don't-fail. Your different powers and skills may make the number on the d20 lower. The system is quick, easy, and keeps the focus on the story.

I'm a blanking blank who blanks- Character generation is select one of descriptor that give you a general power, a class from one of three options, and an additional power that grows as you gain "levels" or tiers. Character generation is again quick, easy, and keeps the focus on the story instead of min/maxing.

Worlds of "who blanks"-In my day job (thing that keeps me in the RPG books), I am a research scientist. That's great in a place where "science" works, but what about a place with magic? Well, since a major part of this game is about changing worlds, the last part of each characters blanking blank who blanks changes depending on the world! So, when Ed the crazy paradox who researches leave Earth and moves to a world of magic, I get a chance to choose what kind of character I change into based on the new world. Now Ed is a crazy paradox who practices soul sorcery and looks like Anubis as I enter the magic world of Ardeyn. This is the BIGGEST change in The Strange. Your character is a near infinite number of characters as you can go to a near infinite number of worlds. And that is awesome! The book comes with a bunch of different descriptors that give all kinds of different options based on the different types of worlds presented.

Infinite Worlds-The Strange is infinite (as far as we know...). The base book comes with some basic worlds to play in, but the game comes with rules to make any type of world you want. The book even gives rules for the players to create their own worlds. You can tell the Bruce Cordell was a major writer as the Lovecraft world is presented, and that makes me happy. Want to play some Oz? Done. Wonderland? Done. Again, awesome!

Translation-the newest mechanic that is presented is translation. This is the process of moving from one world/universe/reality to another. It's fairly simple, but the rules give a good introduction on how to do it as well as different way to move between worlds/universes/realities (portals, cyphers etc).

Mechanics Summary-This game is basically a bigger version of Numenera. Heck, since The Strange is all inclusive, Numenera CAN exist within this game! That's not a bad thing! This game feels like Monte Cook Games learned from Numenera, and Numenera was an excellent system to start with! Small new additions make this an even better systems in terms of mechanics. This game isn't for the min/maxers out there, as it's set up to be a super easy to use system that focuses on the story. The mechanics of this one really do focus on the story first, giving just enough math to make things happen, but enough options to keep anyone happy. 5/5

Theme or Fluff- The theme is strange (pun intended) and fun. You play a combination of MIB/RIPD/Delta Green/Stargate/Warehouse 13 Agents. It's a fun theme with an infinite number of places to play. Heck, the book introduces fiction leakage-ideas leaking from one place to another and creating worlds/universes in the Strange. So, you if you want to start a game where every single work of fiction comes from a different place in the Strange and cultists from Lovecraft are summoning Kaiju/Transformer monsters from beyond reality and the ritual must take place in a world based on 50 Shades of Gray with the end goal of destroying Earth, the game give you the tools to make that happen. The theme covers all the themes you could want while adding its own touch to everything. And again, that is awesome. 5/5

Execution-This book has a lot of ground to cover. From introducing the cypher system to the multiple different descriptors needed to play this game in different realities to describing the setting, this book does a good job explaining how the game works. Things are as close to perfect as you can with this size book. The book does have the occasional sections where things get a bit textbook dense, but the number of pictures keeps that to a minimum. The font, layout, pictures, and breaks make this fun to read and will keep you digging deeper and reading. And this book is over 400 pages! That number of pages for the price when considering the quality of the RPG is insane! 5/5

Summary-Monte Cook Games knows how to make an RPG for their target audience. You CAN'T min/max in this system. If you want to power game, look elsewhere! This game is designed to tell a story, move it along quickly, and draw you in as quickly as possible. The mechanics are amazing. If you like the cypher system, you will like this. Heck, the best part of this game is EVERYTHING from Numenera has a place in The Strange. Each power, descriptor, and idea can be SOMEWHERE in the strange. I suspect that within a few weeks a handy list giving which types of worlds/universes the Numenera powers/descriptors would work in will be out there (or I will make one!). The idea that you change, but don't, as you enter different worlds is a phenomenal addition to the system and RPGs as a whole. I love what I see, and if you get a chance, you will too. However, here is a word to the wise. Since your characters change settings and powers fairly quickly, the player's handbook is a good addition as it will really help you know how your powers work in each world, and the game won't stall as the players have to pass the book around to understand each world they enter and how their characters fit in. Give this one a look as soon as you can! 100%

[Marcus Ilgner · Rating 5 out of 5]

A great setting and refreshingly straightforward ruleset. If you like story- and character-centric roleplaying, you should check out The Strange.

[Benjamin]

The Strange is another Bundle of Holding/Humble Bundle two-fer, and another (and I think my last) Cypher System game. That’s the game engine underlying Numenera, which involves creating a character as a sentence — “I am a ___ ___ who ___”, with all those blanks filled in from lists depending on the game/world.

And I use “world” advisedly here, since The Strange is from Bruce Cordell, the author of my favorite Alternity book, Tangents, which is just what this game is about: the Earth is connected through a network of portals to other worlds, some organic and some concreted around some fictional work (or the source of that fiction).

That is a trope that RPGs seem to like, and it makes sense: why build a game dedicated to John Carter of Mars when your players might want to just visit it. It is a trope that I also have mixed feelings about, partly because… I don’t know, this sort of genre-hopping and genre-mixing would seem perfect for me, and in some moments I really enjoy it. (The “Arthurian world except the sickness on the land is a nano-virus turning everyone into a machine” is a great reconfiguring.) But otherwise it kinda feels like adventures on the Holodeck -- exciting, but ultimately airy and matter-less.

That said, this game also provides a solid core activity: whereas Numenera is full of monsters and evils, The Strange is the same PLUS provides a campaign frame where the PCs are part of the agency Estate that tries to protect the earth from bad alternate realities (or bad actors in find alternate realities) and also from world-eating menaces. Of course, there’s also bad actors on Earth, either people who understand what’s going on (like a rogue government agency) and those who don’t and are just accidentally going to destroy the world (like people summoning monsters from a Lovecraft reality).

This feels like a powerful story engine for a game AND also hits on a trope that I enjoy (alternate dimensions, how things could’ve turned out, genre mashing), SO why don’t I feel compelled to play this? Maybe it’s the very openness of the worlds, which also asks the question: why are we defending the Earth? Maybe there’s a better world out there.

Bundles include:
Core:
* Core rule book
* Player’s guide (which is a small section of the core)
* In translation: The Strange Character Options
* When Worlds Collide: Converting Numenera and the Strange

Accessories
* The Strange Bestiary (why have a bestiary this big when so much of it could just be “use any monster from any other book”?)
* Worlds Numberless and Strange
* Estate Dossiers (mostly in-world handouts and forms)
* Encyclopedia of Impossible Things (magic and science stuff, but again, why not just say “use anything from any other game, here’s how to translate?”)
* Impossible Vehicles
* Alternate Origins

Adventures
* Dark Spiral
* Eschatology Code
* Swordbreakers
* Strange Revelations (instant adventures)
* The Hum
* Mastodon

[Daniel · Rating 5 out of 5]

Been pouring through this delightful game. The fluff material is just as intriguing as the rules. It, as Numenera does, uses the Cypher System. This is a fun and easy to grasp role playing system using a D20, and maybe the rare percentile dice. The GM, who runs the game, or actually narrates the events of the game, never rolls dice. This is a new concept to many Gamers. Rolling dice is what it's all about, right? No, not so much. This is a true cooperative story telling game and man does it hit on all cylinders. Anything you want to do, you can build it within The Strange. It is such a well produced and solid book also. Over 400 pages of delicious and crunchy goodness. Fuel for the heart, energy for the soul and boundless explosions of imagination. Wow, what a great read!

Danny

[David Stoneking · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is the next game I'm going to be playing (starting thursday) It's really a great idea, to be able to take any world/rpg and create a "recursion" to play inside it. But some of the recursions included in the book aren't really my thing. Specifically the mad science world of Ruk, where humans have bioengineered so many modifications as to look very alien. It was a little bit too hardcore for my taste. Lacking any real humor. Either way. still a beautiful book and a great idea. I can't wait to play.

[Garth · Rating 5 out of 5]

endlessly fascinating, endlessly fun. like any great RPG rules book there are sections i've read over and over again, and other sections i really should read, and some areas i may never get around to. despite that it's one of my favorite books of the last ten years, and i can easily imagine reading it for another ten.

[Michael Parker · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great setting. I love what The Strange had to offer as a game.