Man, has anyone here run Spirit of ’77 yet? I didn’t give it a second look when it was Kickstarting because I didn’t think I would like it, but after buying and browsing the PDFs I ordered hard copies. I like what I’ve read, now I need to see it in action. I’ve been wanting to do something Elmore Leonardy with *World mechanics for a while now, and I think this might be the right fit (minus the sci-fi elements).
http://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/148480/Spirit-of-77-Core-Rulebook?term=spirit+of+77
I’ve played a one-shot, it was good fun and worked better than I expected. I’d gone into it sceptical, but it delivered.
My one reservation is that fights seemed too drawn out – not enough instant kung fu takedowns for my expectation for a martial arts master character.
The MC was Daniel Steadman. Do you have anything to add, Dan?
I got excited about the KS but haven’t been that interested since I got it. If anyone is running a hangouts game I’d definitely give it a go.
The Circle of 77 Facebook Group runs new adventure playtests. So if you want to play with the creators, that’s a good fit.
I’ve run some convention one-shots and we played a three month campaign in my home game. Reading it is fun, but it only really shines when you get it to the table. I encourage the skeptics to give it a shot.
Yeah, I Kickstarted this as well but have never brought it to the table. I don’t think I know the right people who’d ever want to play it, alas.
I know somebody used a Dungeon Starter I wrote for Dungeon Planet as an adventure with this system and liked the results:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B7cav44145d9M1hKNU5SeWE4UWM/view?usp=sharing
The thing I found most important was to actually go to the effort of downloading and playing the recommended playlist while the game was going. I normally am fairly ‘meh’ when atmospheric music is playing for a game but when that soundtrack kicked up suddenly everyone was ‘Oh, now I get it!’
Seriously, the soundtrack is the So’77 equivalent of the Monsterhearts homeroom. Any attempt to skip it because it doesn’t seem important will harm your game.
Something else that I think would be good because it helped me get into the groove of running it was a Google image search for 70’s clothing.
As Mike mentioned the system does seem a little slower on fights than most Apoc hacks as the bad guys can take some damage but, if you don’t like it you can just trim that off for the mooks or when you want some Bruce Lee, Shaft or Bionic Woman badassery.
Yeah, I’ve got the Spotify playlist added to my music library, and if I have time I may try to put together an Atlantic City specific mix. Was just thinking about clothing and car reference today, great suggestion!
My 77 campaign in its 7th session and it has been a blast!
Players are Black & Red, an Ex-Con Tough Guy, the other One Bad Mother Bounty Hunter. They grew up together in Boston, on in the Italian and Irish immigrant communities.
The first sessions kick offs could be summarized as:
“Why did you decide to break Carl Lucas off prison?”
“How did you get in the middle of the Saturday morning shoot out in the Central Park?”
“Where were you when the vampires attacked your family?”
“What were you doing in the sorcerer’s sanctum in Greenwich Village when the assassins attacked?”
“Why did you decide to join the West Coast Death Race?”
Two other sessions were tying up knots and using the elements players created.
Basically, they are thick in action of Marvel’s 70s universe… and were involved in the origin stories of Luke Cage, Punisher, and Ghost Rider, also meeting Blade and Dr. Strange.
Last session, they were recruited by Nick Fury, along with some of these other characters, to form the first line up of the Defenders.
Obviously, they look around dumb struck and ask what two thugs have to do along people who can toss cars and do magic.
“Sometimes you don’t need soldiers that might survive the next battle, but instead those who have survived the war so far”
Kool factor has been high, even with a soundtrack less funkier than the main book suggests, going instead for a heavy diet of Skynyrd Lynerd, Deep Purple and Black Sabbath (all very much 70’s in their own way).
The contrast between the funky times, some dark themes and gritty street action has been flowing smoothly.
I hold 77 as one of the best PbtA iterations so far!
Next episodes will probably have a martial arts tournament (Iron Fist), a bad ass hunt in the redwoods (werewolf by night), a zombie attack in new orleans (Brother Voodoo), an experiment gone wrong (Moebius, the living Vampire), an act as bodyguards in a disco club (Crystal and Caliban, and the Morlocks), and the final solution (The Montesi Formula and Dracula).
An NFL Films playlist will also have some amazing instrumental funk. I know there’s several on YouTube, Spotify should have some as well.
I’ve played in one session and DJed two. It was a blast. I ran Beast Bound and Down. Loved it!
I ran a scenario that included a pelvis-swinging rocker turned government agent on the run from aliens. The group loved it!!!