Player’s Guide
Player’s Guide is a core rulebook for the post-apocalyptic sci-fi role-playing game Dreams and Machines, written by Chris Birch, Dave Semark, Natalie Whipple, Mari Tokuda, Logan Boese, Jennifer Kretchmer, Bryce Johnston, Daniel Lade, and Nathan Dowdell and published by Modiphius Entertainment.
By Aaron T. Huss
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Player’s Guide is half of the core rulebook set for Dreams and Machines, a post-apocalyptic sci-fi RPG from Modiphius that takes place in a post-fall society where the advanced technology that led to a tremendous war, and almost-oblivion of the humans, is a mixture of wanted and unwanted. The wanted is what helps people to survive and thrive while the unwanted is what fills them with terror. It is powered by a very rules-light version of the 2d20 system that focuses heavily on the interaction with the environment and story without concern for creating overpowered characters that can destroy escalating threats. This is a lot to take in so I’ll step through it bit by bit.
Picture Earth centuries in the future where technology has advanced at a rather normal pace and suddenly we gain the ability to traverse the stars through special gateways allowing movement between. At some point Earth gets cutoff from this planet, called Evera Prime, leaving them to fend for themselves. This isn’t really an issue as Evera Prime has been colonized starting with advanced technology in such a way that life is close to utopia. The citizens then realize they are on their own and continue their development of technology and advanced life for the better. They create this powerful A.I. with a giant network to connect the A.I. with a bajillion mechs designed to do all the heavy lifting. Then at some point the A.I. turns on the people, the people resist, and a giant war breaks out. The A.I. is intent on killing everyone and everyone is intent on stopping the A.I. In the end the humans win and are able to shutdown the network that powers the A.I. and links it to all those mechs. Although millions of people likely perished, the survivors are left to restart life on this planet, completely disconnected from Earth, and littered with mechs that are mostly shutdown. Different factions form to keep life moving and unfortunately sometimes the mechs wake up and the people have to defend themselves. The result is a planet that is a mixture of trustworthy, non-intelligent technology, “sleeping” metal giants (they’re not all giants as the mechs range in size from tiny to giant), and of course all the flora and fauna a planet can throw at you.
I’m not going to lie but man Modiphius really likes to take genres and weird them up… but in a 100% good way! They take the norms and break them, rebuild them, and present them in a way that is familiar yet different. There’s no vanilla in Modiphius Entertainment’s gamebook! The threats in Dreams and Machines are an interesting batch as you have these sleeping mechs, a land littered with uncertain technology (that could wake the mechs), and the general stuff you have to worry about. But it’s not hardcore survival; it’s more like encountering an abandoned planet that is ready for you to explore, research, and discover!
Empowering our incredible characters is a set of rules that focuses way less on the mechanical side of these characters and way more on how they do what they do with what they have available to them. Technology is still king and there is even nanotechnology that seems awfully close to magic, but isn’t. At the same time, there is this constant threat that the technology you encounter and fiddle with could have detrimental side effects, such as calling a woken mech to you where all it wants to do is get rid of you. Tread cautiously!! As a fan of storytelling and rules-light games, this is an approach to 2d20 that I can really get behind. It’s the opposite of Conan.
There’s a huge problem though. The setting information in the Player’s Guide is lacking and there isn’t really a deep delve into what makes these different people who they are. By the last page, I didn’t know if I like Dreams and Machines or not. I really wanted to, but there was just something missing…
And then I peeked into the Gamemaster’s Guide and everything clicked.
You know that saying “You can’t see the forest for the trees”? Player’s Guide is the trees; Gamemaster’s Guide is the forest. Once I understood that, I realized the design of Dreams and Machines was brilliant!
If you’re going to GM this game, you’ll have to read the Gamemaster’s Guide review when it posts. If you’re going to be a player for this game, let me say this simply. The Player’s Guide focuses on your Player Character and what it means to be that type of Player Character (considering that PC’s background). It’s like heroic fantasy where the focus is on the character and how that character interacts with the environment around him or her.
Unlike many RPGs or core setting guides, you don’t get your cake and eat it to. The book doesn’t tell you the bigger picture because that’s not what a PC will know. The setting is all about surviving life after this tremendous fallout event. You are no longer connected to the larger world. You still have advanced technology, but your focus is tighter, centered on where you live, because that’s the world you know. You’ve heard the stories, likely passed down from one generation to the next, but you are no longer part of the zenith of this society where everyone probably knew everything. You are a fish swimming in an ocean with your school. Your adventures and campaigns will broaden your understanding as you learn more and more about the world around you, delving into its secrets. It’s not really about survival, it’s more like putting together a puzzle one piece at a time.
