Freelancer's Guide

"We're tired of being taken advantage of in this soul-crushing galaxy. The mega corps get relief funds. We get to work the relief shifts. They report record profits. We report record hours.

Now we are free.  Now we will report our own record profits. Right from the coffers of the corps."  -Anonymous Contributor

Freelancer's Guide to a profit-focused living is a deckbuilding tabletop roleplaying game about making a living in a megacorp ruled galaxy. You and your crew will create great plans like characters in the movies Ocean's Eleven and Now You See Me, and then execute those plans like characters from shows like Cowboy Bebop or Firefly. 

I love games that inspire my creativity, focus on character growth, and have meaningful choice.  I keep that mentality throughout the design of the game from the high level mission structure to the core playing card based mechanic.

You and your crew will go on missions to meet new contacts, earn new equipment, and upgrade your ships and bases.  Each mission is divided into key stages that highlight the important moments in that mission. Each stage has a planning phase where you create your plan, and an execution phase where you play out said plan.  The planning phase inspires creativity by taking what you discuss and using it to set up the perfect scene for the execution phase.  The choices you make during planning directly effect what you play in the execution phase. The checks you make will create opportunities later on.

Once the mission is over, there is always downtime, where you and the entire table will create your next mission by performing a Recon.  You Recon your next mission by asking the questions to best set up your next heist. The details of the next mission is then built from these questions.  Your creativity actually shapes the next mission.

What is being a Freelancer without tools, weapons, and space ships.  The core game progression is earning money to buy better equipment, expand your contact list, and establish hideouts all throughout the galaxy.

A Skill Check is required whenever an outcome is in question. This is done outside of an encounter by drawing one number card. The value of the check is equal to the value of the card number, plus the suit modifier, plus the Skill modifier. 

Card Number + Suit Modifier + Skill Modifier = Check Value

You can use face cards to change the suit of the card you drew for the Skill Check. Each General Skill has an associated suit where it will gain additional benefits when that suit is present. 

The Red Joker is a critical success, a value of 14 with whatever suit you want, while the Black Joker is a critical failure, a value of 0 with no suit. Both reset your deck of cards by causing you to shuffle, but the Black Joker allows you to perform a card upgrade before you shuffle. These are the basics of how the cards add more to the game but there are systems throughout the book that utilize cards in ways that only cards can be used.

An encounter is a scene with stakes.  This can be a chase, combat, exploration but at the start of the encounter everyone draws a card to determine initiative.  the suit of the card drawn determines which character goes first with Spades > Clubs > Diamonds > Hearts > Black Joker. Each round, you draw two cards at the start, and then determine how you want to use your two main actions and two movement actions. Each card can be committed to one Skill Check, be used to perform maneuvers with your weapons, or even cast Altered and Tech Powers.

Altered and Tech Powers are the "magic" in the system.  You use the two cards drawn to spend the value of the card, the energy, to add effects and make your power unique. The powers end up being more about the creativity of deciding what you want your powers to do and how it looks, than picking the correct spell from a list.

An encounter is more than just damage to hinder players, the Effects and Resistance system is easy to apply and use for any length of encounter. Each effect lasts 1 round by default and a character's resistance to the effect reduces the tier of that effect. So a character might be pushed Prone instead of Downed or if they are more resistant, just Pushed back slightly instead. To use another example, maybe instead of being Feared, they are only Intimidated.

The deckbuilding system used in this game is inspired off of Gloomhaven and allows for a new way to represent your character's growth.  The system works best with medium to long term campaigns with a mission lasting one to two sessions and the campaigns spread over a long time for you to really master how your deck and skills interact.  The tech and altered power system focuses on your creativity where you use the cards you draw to craft your perfect "magic".  The playing cards act as a fantastic tool to really inspire your creativity and let you represent your character.

At the core of the system is the playing card mechanic. Every player starts with a deck of 22 playing cards that represent your character.  As your character grows stronger, so does the deck, allowing you to trade lower cards for higher cards, or add face cards for additional flexibility and control.

When you build your character, selecting your Skills and upgrading your cards, you can shift your character's priorities from one suit to another.  Because some Skills perform better with some suits, your choices shape your character's growth.  Furthermore, the face cards give you more control over the suits in your deck, allowing you to change the suit of your currently drawn card so you can be ready when you need to be.

This book contains the complete rules to play the game prior to the Kickstarter. The Kickstarter is to add additional abilities, items, bases, ships, and corporations while paying for the art and layout upgrades for the book. Any money you pay here will be used to work towards that Kickstarter goal.

Please consider supporting my efforts by signing up for the mailing list found on c22system.com to be notified of the Kickstarter when it goes live. You will also get access to a version of the game with 2 more Altered/Tech Powers, 2 more corporations, and their unique items.

You'll need https://playingcards.io/ to play the game online.