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Feng Shui 2 is a roleplaying game by Robin D. Laws (Feng Shui, HeroQuest, GUMSHOE, Hillfolk) which is primarily concerned with doing 90s Asian action cinema genre emulation; in other words, it's a game where a Shaolin monk from the 7th century, a Triad assassin, a lovesick ghost, a down-on-his-luck cop who knows ancient Chinese magic, and John McClane team up to punch evil eunuch sorcerers and fascist cyber-gorillas in the face. The game had a very successful Kickstarter in September 2014, and is available to purchase on DriveThruRPG.  How does it work? The system is fairly simple: players choose from a variety of archetypes - essentially pre-made characters; there are no archetype creation rules, although there's a pretty huge number of archetypes in the book (36) covering everything from venerable kung-fu masters, to be-mulleted truck drivers, to post-apocalyptic road warriors, to loose-cannon detectives, to daoist exorcists, to the aforementioned Shaolin monks, Triad assassins, magic cops, ghosts and John McClane. Each archetype has a handful of stats (Attack, Defence, Toughness, Speed and a power stat that depends on the archetype's power source) and a number of fairly simple powers (schticks), and that's it - to do anything, you roll two d6 of different colours (one positive, one negative), subtract the one from the other, add the relevant stat and compare it to the DC; if you beat it, you succeed at whatever you set out to do. There's no detailed list of skills or big d% tables or anything complicated, because those would just detract from the fun of beating up Chinese vampires with a hospital gurney while someone else goes diving through the air, guns akimbo.  What's the setting like, other than a heaping pile of 90s action movie clichés? Imagine, if you will, that every large-scale success that anyone ever had in the history of the world wasn't due to plain hard work, divine intervention or dumb luck, but to feng shui. It turns out, the world is full of places that have naturally-powerful geomantic energies. It also turns out that whoever controls these feng shui sites ends up having a plain better time of things: everyone's a little nicer to them, everything seems to go their way, their hard work is recognised, their belief system is the one that's vindicated, etc. Control enough of these, and enough things go right enough for you that you end up ruling the world. It also turns out that reality is connected to the Netherworld - a dimension underlying our own that's mostly bedrock and soil, but can be shaped through willpower - through a series of portals. Oh, and the Netherworld is actually connected to our world at multiple (fixed) points in time (these are called junctures). What happens if you go back in time and take enough feng shui sites that you control the world in the past? Well, you change all of history, and the present and future too. There are four junctures connected to the Netherworld: the China of 690 AD, just after Wu Zetian took power (the Ancient juncture); the China of 1850, besieged by the villainous Western powers seeking to destroy it from within (the Past juncture); Hong-Kong, present day, present time (the Contemporary juncture); and the post-apocalyptic ruins of the future where desperate survivors struggle to not get eaten by mutants and fascist cyborg apes (the Future juncture). Each of these is home base to a different faction: The nefarious eunuch sorcerers of the Lotus don’t actually rule the Ancient juncture, although they’re trying. Up until very recently, the Ancient juncture wasn’t in 690 AD but in 69 AD, a juncture that the nefarious eunuch sorcerers very definitely controlled. Some unpleasant things happened in the Future juncture, and now the portal to the Ancient juncture opens in a China that’s been bereft of nefarious eunuch guidance for over 700 years. They’re slowly getting back a measure of the influence they used to have, but their backwards-looking position on the role of woman in politics mean Emperor Wu Zetian (a woman) does not look too kindly on them. This is, annoyingly, putting a crimp in their plans to rule the world throughout all time and space. The fanatical and ascetic Guiding Hand, meanwhile, are desperately struggling against the despicable forces of Western corruption in the Past juncture. It’s only been a few short years since the Anglo-Chinese war and the Treaty of Nanking forced the Chinese government to let the British do as they please. Now, Western goods (including opium, which is creating hundreds of new addicts daily) and philosophies are flowing into China unopposed, and ruining everything. Only the Guiding Hand, a secret society of staunch Confucians, can possibly hope to unite China to kick the Western devils out, and beat some respect for their elders into the corrupted Chinese youth. The world of 2015 is pretty much as you know it: it’s the juncture with Starbucks and Twitter. The key difference is that the Illuminati are real… and they’re a bunch of animals. Literally, in this case - the Contemporary juncture is ruled from the shadows by the Ascended, a secret society of intelligent animals (rabbits, crabs, oxen, dragons, etc.) who took control several centuries ago and eradicated magic in order to maintain human form. They control most of the world’s finance and top corporations, and have extensive influence over the world’s leaders. Apart from that, everyone pretty much lives the same as they do in our world (if our world were an action movie). As for the Future juncture, it’s a blasted wasteland. It used to be a dystopian dictatorship controlled by the fascist Buro, who ruled through omnipresent surveillance and a mastery of the blending of magic and science into nightmarish creatures. The Jammers, a slightly bomb-happy resistance group largely made up of cyborg apes, demons formerly enslaved by the Buro, and their human allies, succeeded in building a bomb that could blow up every feng shui site in the future, thereby allowing the Buro to be overthrown. Unfortunately, the plan went too well, and the resulting chi backlash killed 95% of the world’s human population, mutated most of the rest, and reduced the planet to something out of a Mad Max movie. Distraught at the extent of the slaughter, a small number of Jammers (including their leader, Battlechimp Potemkin) decided to try to correct this mistake by setting out to capture feng shui sites in the past, thereby hopefully averting the formation of the Buro and subsequent destruction of the Earth entirely. Disgusted by this (the Jammers being previously ideologically opposed to manipulating people via feng shui), his former second in command Furious George formed the New Simian Army and now rules the wastelands with an iron fist in a fascist dictatorship of his own. There are also a variety of pop-up junctures, eras of history that are only sometimes connected to the Netherworld, like 1937’s Japanese-occupied Shanghai, the end of the Sengoku jidai, or far-future Mars. Each of these factions must control feng shui sites in multiple junctures if they hope to accomplish their goal of world domination. Collectively, their struggles to conquer time and space make up what’s referred to as the Chi War. Enter you: brave, determined or just bumbling heroes, thrown into this chaos and left to heroically oppose Bad Guys on your own.  Where can I buy this? What else is out? You can buy the core rulebook in PDF form from on DriveThruRPG, or buy it in hardback from your FLGS, assuming they’ve ordered it in. This contains absolutely everything you need to play (except for dice), and has a starter adventure to start you off. There’s also a GM screen, if you want one of those, and:
Can we talk about Feng Shui 1 in here too? Sure, but Feng Shui 2 is such a massive improvement over the first edition that most people are playing this instead. 
Lemon-Lime fucked around with this message at 19:28 on Dec 13, 2015 |
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Dec 1, 2015 16:06
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FYI if you do not at least recreate the "babies in trouble" scene in Hard Boiled at least once while playing this, you are doing it wrong
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Dec 1, 2015 21:05
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Latest Feng Shui Adventure idea: A courier job for IKTV to the modern juncture to pick up a parcel of Chinese subtitled bootlegs of the latest, hottest western movies/TV shows for rebroadcast in the Netherworld. A simple job, right? Not like any of those Blu-Rays have secret info hidden in them, real or imagined.
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Dec 1, 2015 21:24
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Required Viewing: Modern Juncture: Big Trouble in Little China Hard Boiled The Killer Heroic Trio Ancient Juncture: Detective Dee and the Mystery of the Phantom Flame Five Deadly Venoms Red Cliff (2 disc non-theatrical version) Past Juncture: Ip Man (Jackie Chan's) The Legend of Drunken Master Future Juncture: Mad Max: Fury Road Megaman's Jockstrap fucked around with this message at 00:29 on Dec 2, 2015 |
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Dec 1, 2015 23:44
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Very nice.
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Dec 2, 2015 00:16
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Also for Past Juncture: Once Upon A Time In China Iron Monkey
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Dec 2, 2015 01:16
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Also for Future Juncture: The Heroic Trio Returns/The Executioners since it's got a whole post-apocalyptic thing going on.
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Dec 2, 2015 01:31
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On top of the Chi War, FS2 is also good for action themed one-shots! I ran a Hotline Miami game which I may try to backdoor into a pop-up juncture for a Chi War campaign.
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Dec 2, 2015 01:50
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Megaman's Jockstrap posted:Required Viewing: I should've reserved a post for a film list. Oh, well! I'll edit the list into the OP tomorrow. Zephirum posted:On top of the Chi War, FS2 is also good for action themed one-shots! I ran a Hotline Miami game which I may try to backdoor into a pop-up juncture for a Chi War campaign. Yeah, I can confirm that it's a good pick if you just want to run a straight up wuxia game, too. Just use only the Ancient juncture stuff/kung-fu and sorcery schticks.
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Dec 2, 2015 02:15
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Is Secrets of the Chi War worth getting? I do love secrets, and Chi Wars.
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Dec 2, 2015 21:35
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mr.capps posted:Is Secrets of the Chi War worth getting? I do love secrets, and Chi Wars. Yeah, it's pretty good. There's expanded information about each juncture, and they give you a big location or two for each one. There's also six pop-up junctures and an adventure. And every juncture gets a ton of movie recommendations for every juncture and pop-up.
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Dec 2, 2015 21:43
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It's not bad. It focuses a lot on places and times that aren't Hong Kong 2015, which is something the core book skimped on a little bit. The chapter about the Contemporary juncture is kinda weak, especially the Japan section, but the Ancient Juncture info more than makes up for it. Also, simultaneous pop-up junctures for 70s Harlem and Hong Kong is kinda rad.
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Dec 2, 2015 21:45
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Also the Warring States era.
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Dec 2, 2015 21:53
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Evil Mastermind posted:Also the Warring States era. !!!!!! OK yeah I am picking this up. e: Also if you ever need some musical inspiration for your games I recommend this Snooze Cruise fucked around with this message at 22:12 on Dec 2, 2015 |
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Dec 2, 2015 21:54
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Oh awesome, I just got the corebook. So how easy is it to convert stuff from FS1? Aside from the Conversion Codex, are any of the sourcebooks from it worth checking out?
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Dec 3, 2015 18:44
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My FLGS finally got the core book in!  I grabbed the screen too just because.Lightning Lord posted:So how easy is it to convert stuff from FS1? Aside from the Conversion Codex, are any of the sourcebooks from it worth checking out?
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Dec 3, 2015 18:51
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Evil Mastermind posted:My FLGS finally got the core book in! I meant are any of the FS1 books worth checking out? I played it a bit but never really dug into the game.
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Dec 3, 2015 19:24
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Oh, in that case yeah. The faction/juncture books are useful, although the Lotus and Architects ones less so for obvious reasons. Blood Of The Valiant, Seal Of The Wheel, and Elevator To The Netherworld give a bunch of info on their factions, the juncture they operate out of, and bunch of locations and NPCs. I'd say at the very least get the Netherworld book since that's not a location you can research via Google and Netflix.
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Dec 3, 2015 19:29
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Definitely Elevator to the Netherworld. Its got all sorts of awesome places in it like The Forest of the Fallen Banners (a huge forest where the trees are history's wars, the branches battles, and the leaves the individual dead), IKTV, a few awesome nightclubs/party places (including the Jammer's Genocide Lounge, though Battlechimp closed it for some reason), and PINBALLHALLA! The Netherworld's first and best arcade with genuine Viking bouncers and includes a basement that is one massive pinball machine with your PCs getting bashed around it inside a ball. I love Pinballhalla.
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Dec 3, 2015 19:34
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I mean, once you commit omnicide genocide loses its allure a bit.
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Dec 3, 2015 21:13
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To be fair the Genocide Lounge was less "Celebration of Genocide" and more "Vain attempt by actual old school Russian anarchist to educate the Jammers on historical atrocities" which probably now comes off like one big "I told you so"
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Dec 4, 2015 13:26
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So how many years do you think this thread will be December Game of the Month? 
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Dec 4, 2015 20:17
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Oh man I forgot about this, which is almost the perfect Feng Shui trailer. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UMH29mekU14 If someone could splice in footage from Mad Max and a Jet Li period movie it'd be perfect.
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Dec 4, 2015 21:16
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Oh hey, it also predicted drone warfare.
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Dec 4, 2015 22:16
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Galaga Galaxian posted:So how many years do you think this thread will be December Game of the Month? Only one, because that's all I needed for the joke to be complete.
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Dec 5, 2015 02:16
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I may run this for some people who've never heard of it... and, uh, is there like a rulebook and class list and stuff that doesn't scream "Hey there's time travel involved!" because I'd like that to remain a surprise.
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Dec 6, 2015 01:38
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Gharbad the Weak posted:I may run this for some people who've never heard of it... and, uh, is there like a rulebook and class list and stuff that doesn't scream "Hey there's time travel involved!" because I'd like that to remain a surprise. Not a full rulebook, but most of the cheat sheet stuff doesn't scream Time Travel. I'd say just ignore the non-contemporary archetypes and print out all the Contemporary juncture ones. You unfortunately couldn't use the front pages with the archetype description due to the juncture symbols on them hinting at the thing you're trying to hide. How long are you expecting to hide it? If it's just for a few sessions and/or a one-shot, that first page isn't really necessary. If you're gonna go for a long time, which I personally wouldn't recommend, you're gonna need to get a copy of the Awesoming Up stuff on a separate page.
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Dec 6, 2015 02:00
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It wouldn't be for too long. Just long enough for them to get used to the idea of "I'm in the modern time period for this game." Is the cheat sheet stuff in the book? I got the books, I just haven't finished reading them yet.
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Dec 6, 2015 02:56
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Gharbad the Weak posted:It wouldn't be for too long. Just long enough for them to get used to the idea of "I'm in the modern time period for this game." Is the cheat sheet stuff in the book? I got the books, I just haven't finished reading them yet. Yeah, it's in the back of the book, in the appendices. It's 3-4 pages of stuff on the basics of task checks, combat and initiative/how to use the shot counter. Unfortunately, not one for car chases, which is sad because it's really the only major part of the game that needs one for more than a few sessions. Especially since it works sort of like combat but not really like combat.
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Dec 6, 2015 03:08
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The summaries in the back are kinda bad for a first session and I've been thinking of making better ones. I'd probably include stuff like car chases, using Fortune on rolls, reload checks, stuff from the type-specific chapters on their own page, etc.
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Dec 6, 2015 05:15
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New Kickstarter update just went out:quote:
Sample archetypes are sort of a weird spread: all three cop archetypes plus the PI, but no Cyborg or Transformed Animal/Supernatural Creature/Ghost/Exorcist Monk or Archer/Bandit or Sifu/Redeemed Pirate, so basically no representation for any non-Contemporary juncture except for the Gene Freak and Sorcerer.  I think a better list would have been Bandit, Cyborg, Everyday Hero, Full-Metal Nutball, Gene Freak, Killer, Magic Cop, Martial Artist, Scrappy Kid, Sifu, Sorcerer, Transformed Crab/Dragon. Lemon-Lime fucked around with this message at 18:18 on Dec 9, 2015 |
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Dec 9, 2015 18:04
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Lemon Curdistan posted:Sample archetypes are sort of a weird spread: all three cop archetypes plus the PI, but no Cyborg or Transformed Animal/Supernatural Creature/Ghost/Exorcist Monk or Archer/Bandit or Sifu/Redeemed Pirate, so basically no representation for any non-Contemporary juncture except for the Gene Freak and Sorcerer.
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Dec 9, 2015 18:28
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Evil Mastermind posted:It's the list of archetypes they say to use for the Red Packet Rumble demo, which looks like is set up to be "it's a normal modern setting but SUDDENLY YOU ARE IN THE NETHERWORLD" over the two fights. Yeah, that's fair enough, but I feel that misrepresents FS2 a little. In other news, I just got the Burning Shaolin Redux email from DTRPG, and have edited the OP with a (currently non-functional, will work Friday) link to the product page.
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Dec 9, 2015 20:13
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I do like that they finally got a sticker sheet to fix the Archetype sheets from the Kickstarter I was real pissed about those being worthless . Guess I'll have to get those printed on a Sticker sheet and relaminate the sheets. Thankfully a friend has a laminator I'll be able to use
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Dec 9, 2015 23:01
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Burning Shaolin is reaffirming my desire to just run FS2 as straight up wuxia, without the Netherworld or other junctures. 
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Dec 10, 2015 00:13
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Lemon Curdistan posted:Burning Shaolin is reaffirming my desire to just run FS2 as straight up wuxia, without the Netherworld or other junctures. This is a great idea. I wish my players didn't love guns so much.
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Dec 10, 2015 01:15
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ThNextGreenLantern posted:This is a great idea. I wish my players didn't love guns so much. I'm actually in Lynx Winters' playgroup, and the fights have been great without any gun-users. (We have a pew-pew ghost type, but that's about it.) We did notice that it kind of hosed over the Archer in our original group when no one chose guns, though. So, keep that in mind.
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Dec 10, 2015 14:54
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Feng Shui 2 has damaged reality, we are now living inside the game setting: http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-e...t-a6767546.html The contract posted:‘The buying party also agrees that,’ it states, ‘at any time during the stipulated 88 year period, the seller may legally plan and attempt to execute one (1) heist or caper to steal back Once Upon A Time In Shaolin, which, if successful, would return all ownership rights to the seller.’
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Dec 10, 2015 16:13
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I backed this Kickstarter and I'm liking what I read of the final product. Can't decide whether I want to run time traveling Like a Dragon/Yakuza or supernatural Sleeping Dogs first. One question: my favorite d20 game, 13th Age, allows you to mow down multiple mooks with one attack if you do more damage than one mook has hp. Is there anything like that here?
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Dec 10, 2015 16:26
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One of the default options for attacks is 'take a penalty, attack more than one mook at once'. There's also schticks that let you make more attacks as long as you're attacking unnamed characters.
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Dec 10, 2015 16:28
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