RuneQuest

This latest edition of RuneQuest looks very interesting. They've taken the mechanics of previous editions and melded them with several mechanics from the Pendragon RPG. These new mechanics include family history, passions, and year end family/event/upkeep rolls.

The randomly generated family history serves to introduce new players into the setting, teaching them the major events and politics of the past 60 odd years of the game world as they roll up the history of their most significant parent and grandparent.

The passions are a mechanic that seems to fit the setting very well, allowing the loyalties and loves of the characters have a mechanical effect on the game.

I'm not going to go into full detail on the rest of the system, it's still the same basic BRP system that's been around now since the 70s. Elements show that age, but for the most part it still feels like a solid system.

I'm looking forward to wrapping up our current 13th Age Glorantha campaign and giving this system a try.

Edit: Rolling up a sample character and came across a major oversight in the rules: at some points you are asked to average the values of stats, but it doesn't tell you how to round the result if it isn't a whole number. All the examples average two even numbers, so I couldn't extrapolate from the examples. I googled the problem and couldn't find a FAQ for the rules. I did find a quickstart that said to round in the favor of the player (actually it contradicted itself the way it was worded, but it was clear from context what they meant). Running into such a basic error so early into actually using the rules is not very encouraging, so I'm lowering my rating by a star for now.

Edit: In play, the game mostly works, but the sorcery rules are broken, and the designer is defensive rather than helpful. Lowering my rating to one star since the game is essentially unplayable to me at this point, and I therefore don't like it.