Valor Knights – The Electrocube War by Eric Bloat is a role playing game published by Bloat Games. The supplement is covered by the Open Game License and some parts are considered to be Open Game Content as a result.
The supplement is available as a 36-page PDF from DriveThruRPG for $4.99 but was received for free thanks to a special discount. Two pages are the front and rear covers, one the Table of Contents, one the Open Game License and two are blank. Additional files are PNG and PDF versions of the character sheet and docx and PDF versions of Hack the RPG, which is a third-party license allowing others to create RPGs based on the system.
Our World Now explains that a civil war was raging on a dying planet between the Valor Knights and the Chaos Lords, both being members of a race of sentient, morphing robot vehicles called Shifters – it rapidly becomes obvious these are Autobots, Decepticons and Transformers. Both Valor Knights and Chaos Lords have ended up on Earth and their war continues.
It starts off by explaining that this is a role playing game, how such work, what players and the GM do and that the standard range of dice is used. The core mechanic involves rolling a d6 and a d20, with a 1 or a 6 on the d6 indicating a hindrance or a benefit. Rolling with advantage has 2d20 and 2d6 rolled with the highest results taken; with disadvantage is the same but the lowest results.
The game has the six standard attributes; Strength, Intelligence, Wisdom, Dexterity, Constitution and Charisma. Attributes are determined by rolling 6d6, with the result of each dice being the score for that attribute, though the numbers are converted to range from -2 to +3, instead of 1-6. Luck Points allow rolls to be rerolled, hit points are health, 8 hours of rest heal all damage and death occurs at 0HP or below, though using a Luck Point to roll d20 results in coming back with 1HP on a natural 20; this can be redone until brought back or Luck Points run out.
Evade is the ability to evade attacks, Armor Points are defence, Damage Points are damage done, saving throws and skills are instead done using the core mechanic and adding the appropriate attribute score and any modifiers against a target difficulty check. 1d10 is rolled at the end of each session; it this is higher than the current level, characters level up and gain an attribute point, a luck point, +1 to Evade and +1 hit die.
The game is turn based and initiative is rolled to see who goes first. It looks at what actions can be done on a turn and relative time in narrative play, with an example.
The game uses abstract distances, of Close, Nearby, Faraway and Distant, intended to support theatre of the mind play, though tokens can be useful to track positions. There are also details on how to translate these into measurements for more miniature-based play. It explains hit dice and hit points, and how the robots shift shape.
Gamemaster Advice provides some tips on using the mechanics, modifiers and attributes.
Character Creation covers this, which involves the previously mentioned stats and choosing a class. The classes are covered, with their hit point bonuses, hit dice, armor points, attack damage, attribute bonus, size in robot form and suggested vehicle form, as well as special abilities. The classes are Leader, Warrior, Support and Mini-Bot.
Weapons & Equipment explains this is left to the imagination of players, and they will have access to what they need. Damage is determined by class, not weapon.
Chaos Lords vs Valor Knights explain that Chaos Lords use the same creation rules but prefer airplanes and other flying machines. There are some simple rules for determining damage.
Finally, there are some sample Chaos Lords and a d12 for determining background.
Valor Knights – The Electrocube War in Review
The PDF lacks bookmarks and is long enough with enough different sections that these would have been useful. The Table of Contents covers the major sections. Navigation could be better. The text maintains a two-column format and appeared to be mostly free of errors. There are a number of custom black and white illustrations, up to full page in size. Presentation is good.
As mentioned, this is clearly a Transformers-inspired game, which may prove to be useful, as, once past the short piece of fluff at the beginning, the game only has details on the mechanics, with nothing on creating adventures; mining the franchise for adventure and campaign ideas could be useful. Though this is technically a complete game, it’s one that will require quite a bit of work from the GM. Despite it being a relatively rules-lite game, and having some simple “What is a role playing game?” material at the beginning, it’s not really designed for novice GMs. Valor Knights – The Electrocube War can be found by clicking here.
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