“Try Before You Buy” is an occasional segment of Astral Projections. It spotlights free (or nearly free) supplements, quick-start rules, and modules for various RPGs.
SPOILER FREE REVIEW!
A Call for Heroes is a free follow-up to the module in The Force Awakens Beginner Box and is intended as a “sequel” for PCs who played through that module, although that is not required. Like Discovery on Jakku, the previous module, Call can be easily altered for the default Rebellion era and upcoming Dawn of Rebellion settings. Our Skype group played it a while ago and had a good time. Now that we’ve finished the module, I downloaded it to read myself.
Call has the same format as previous FFGSW modules, with three Episodes (these are playable in any order), a short episode outline, and a “mission briefing” with a Q&A format for the PCs. There’s also plenty of helpful sidebars, and action and adventure. In other words, another solid Fantasy Flight product.
One thing that impressed me in the first couple of pages is that the writers put some effort into providing alternate ways to get into the adventure proper. The default is that the PCs are in contact with the Resistance, through the Discovery on Jakku events. There are also large sidebars for two other likely endings to Discovery–the PCs haven’t yet been made contact with the Resistance or they were taken prisoner by the First Order. These would work well for groups that didn’t play the earlier module, as well.
Speaking of capture, additional sidebars have suggestions for GMs if their players get captured in the first episode. There’s more advice, in sidebars and main text, much of it directed towards the less experienced GM. “Beginning a New Session” is the earliest of these and is useful for first time GMs. “A Free Agent” sidebar, between Episodes 1 and 2, has tips for using an allied NPC. Continuing this, the encounters cover how various adversaries will operate, including the whys. All of these are great resources to someone who has some GMing experience but not a lot. Experienced GMs can skip all of this if they want.
The thing I liked least about Call is that the Episodes seemed much less connected than I have come to expect in FFGSW modules. The first two are loosely connected, being missions resulting from analysis of the data brought from Jakku in Discovery. The final one, “Return to Jakku,” has no connection to the others, which the writers freely admit, alongside tips for using it, such as separately.
How was our (very experienced) group’s game experience? Pretty good, as I said earlier. Since the GM only wanted 1 -2 sessions, he not only omitted “Return to Jakku” but more or less combined the other episodes. As we are very familiar with the system, and using pregens that had some additional experience, he also didn’t use the included NPC ally. Even so, Call took us two sessions, partly because we usually only play 3 – 3.5 hours and our first session was ended early. If your sessions run longer, each episode will probably only take one per mission/episode.
Overall, I recommend A Call for Heroes for groups of any experience level, who are looking for Star Wars adventures. I suggest using them separately, such as between longer arcs in an ongoing campaign, or as one-shots or con games.
Linda Whitson
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