Systems for an Espionage Campign

jkruse05

Right now I'm running a D&D 3.5 campaign that is nearing closure. Our group has been discussing what we want to do next and decided we want to move out of the fantasy setting for a while. So, we looked around at a number of systems; D20 Modern, Eclipse Phase, World of Darkness, SpyCraft, Shadowrun, and a few others. Eventually we turned to choosing a specific setting rather than a system. We decided on a Cold War era espionage theme, which I will probably run with plenty of glances to Metal Gear Solid 3.

For now SpyCraft is looking like our best candidate, but I'm wondering if this community has any suggestions for systems that would be easily adaptable to that setting and easy to play with MapTools.

vertroue

Spycraft was a shit ton of fun to play in.

Hensler

I'm a big fan of D20 Modern, as it can adapted to work with almost any setting, but Spycraft is great for what you're looking for, too. The Cold War is kind of in a funny place with D20 Modern - the D20 Modern: Past book goes up to the 1950s, and the Modern Book starts around the Millenium, so there is nothing to specifically apply to the time in between. GURPS had a Cold War book out at some point too - that might be good to track down, just to use as a reference, no matter what system you go with.

The Cannon

There are systems entirely for spy stuff? That's amazing. I'd really like to do a campaign centered around an assassination plot or helping to orchestrate a rebellion from within an authoritarian cyberpunk city. Though my next project will probably be single encounter DnD games so I can just get practice doing whatever I can fart out.

dilettantegamer

I've played in a few short campaigns in Hero System (as well as one really long one that's still ongoing), and it seems to work well in just about any genre, or in campaigns that combine genres. I think there are espionage sourcebooks for it too.

jkruse05

Hmmm, the only Cold War book I can find for GURPS is the Atomic Horror one. While I could take a mission or two in an interesting direction with that, it's not really what I was looking for. Still, GURPS may be a viable option, I've only used it once before, will have to re-familiarize myself.

Hensler

jkruse05 wrote: »

Hmmm, the only Cold War book I can find for GURPS is the Atomic Horror one. While I could take a mission or two in an interesting direction with that, it's not really what I was looking for. Still, GURPS may be a viable option, I've only used it once before, will have to re-familiarize myself.

Well, in that case, maybe I'm mistaken - I know their is a GURPS Cold War reference, but it cold have a different title or been sub-section in one of the other books (Espionage, maybe?). I know because I used it for my D20 campaign when I needed to send my telekinetic CIA operatives to kill Vampire Lord Fidel Castro and his brood and their poor rolling led to the Bay of Pigs.

jkruse05

Hensler wrote: »

Well, in that case, maybe I'm mistaken - I know their is a GURPS Cold War reference, but it cold have a different title or been sub-section in one of the other books (Espionage, maybe?). I know because I used it for my D20 campaign when I needed to send my telekinetic CIA operatives to kill Vampire Lord Fidel Castro and his brood and their poor rolling led to the Bay of Pigs.

That sounds like one amazing alternate history.

Hensler

Who said it was an alternate history ?

stever777

He knows too much!