So yeah. I’ve been playing a lot of 5E lately and have been having a blast. So figured what the heck, let’s pick up Ultramodern5 and see what this edition could do outside the normal fantasy realm. Overall, I’d say it’s pretty darned cool. There isn’t a whole lot of additional rules and there’s some pretty neat stuff that I’d like to use in my normal fantasy 5E games.
So let’s get the bits that I wasn’t that crazy about first. The classes seemed kind “meh” and designed for a particular style campaign. The RPGnow blurb does that it’s suitable for many genres but for some there’s no key underlying stuff. Space Opera sure but no aliens or starships. Cyberpunk yeah sort of but no cyberwear. Urban fantasy, yeah maybe if you do D&D in modern or near future times nothing like World of Darkness or Dresden Files. I’m not really too upset about this since I view this as core book that will or spawn various setting/genre supplements.
Now the really good parts in my humble opinion. Just like regular 5E rules, you have your class and background but Ultramodern adds a couple of more neat things. Archetypes. Yes, these are in the core rules but I like they way they’re done here better. You see Archetypes have nothing to do with your class. You just choose one. This creates a lot more options for character customization. Then’s there’s the Ladder. This is something that’s chosen at 1st level and adds another layer of customization. Think of it of picking a string feats right way. The character gains bonuses based on their Ladder as they level. These don’t replace Feats. Heck you can use those too. But my gut tells that might lead to pretty powerful characters.
So what would I use this for? Well, that all depends on players and what they want to play but my imagination is going with this one and seeing potential to do a crazy space opera or even a simpler sword & sorcery type game with it. In both cases, I’d redo and customized some classes. Replace the normal Feats with having the players choose a Ladder (which I’d also probably make some just for the setting) and probably do some custom archetypes.
So yeah. It was worth it. So go check it out at RPGNow. And. oh I’ve heard a rumor, but the PDF and you’ll be able to get the hardcopy at cost when it comes out.