Renegade Game Studios is coming out with RPGs for some pretty important titles. Power Rangers, G.I. JOE, and Transformers are all coming soon to your tabletops. And they’ll all use a similar system. It’s called Essence20 and we get a look at in this announcement from Renegade.
From the announcement:
Behind the scenes of Renegade’s upcoming Power Rangers, G.I. JOE, and Transformers Roleplaying Games lies a brand new system, Essence20. Read on to learn a little about this new system, and tune in to RenegadeCon VIrtual Special Edition this weekend to see it in action in the new games, and learn more about it from the creative team! Senior RPG Producer Elisa Teague also sat down with Forbes magazine to talk about Essence20 and the Power Rangers Roleplaying Game, which you can find here.
First off, as you may suspect from the name, Essence20 is a d20 based system. The core mechanic for resolving a roll is for the player to roll a d20 along with their Skill die (ranging from a d2-d20). The result of the d20 and skill die must exceed the difficulty of the test in order to succeed. Characters with a specialization in the skill being tested get to roll their skill die and all dice below it, and pick the highest result to add to their d20 roll, increasing their odds of success! What’s more, a max value roll on ANY die is a critical success, leading to more chances for crits and more opportunities for great roleplaying incorporating them.
Character creation follows a three-pronged approach, based on their Origin (what type of person are they?), Role (what is their place on the team?), and Influence (what experiences have led them to this point?). Character’s abilities and skills are based on the 4 S’s, Strength, Speed, Smarts, and Social. These options give an amazing depth and breadth to the variety of characters that a player can create!
The character backgrounds, character flaw system, and Story Point system (awarded for mission success, special heroics, and spectacular roleplaying) lend themselves to a cinematic and cooperative roleplaying experience that is a great fit for settings like Power Rangers, G.I. JOE, and Transformers.
We are excited to show this system off, so please join us for RenegadeCon Virtual Special Edition this weekend for more information and to see it all put on the table in our premiere of Day of Destiny, a Power Rangers Roleplaying Game Actual Play!
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