The Monsters Are Our Heroes

It’s almost the Holiday Season!!! No, not THAT holiday season, the spooky one. Time to bust out my classic Universal Monsters Collection box sets and my less classic Mad Monster Party by Rankin-Bass. It’s also a good time to look at a great option for your roleplaying game nights anytime, but especially right now.

The Monsters Are Our Heroes (TMAOH) is an extraordinarily straightforward roleplaying game, that is built from The Black Hack streamlined interpretation of original D&D rules (under Wizards of the Coast’s Open Gaming Licence). The streamlined rules make getting started (as a player) incredibly quick and simple, and as long as you are organized GMing for the game is similarly user-friendly.

Taking place in a contemporary world that still feels as much like a 1920s film as it does the 2020s, this is a world where “monsters” are real. Players take on the role of their favourite public domain monstrosities, made famous (in part) by Universal Studios. The Creature [From the Black Lagoon], the Invisible Person, [Frankenstein’s] Monster, the Mummy, a Vampire, and a Werewolf are the default Squad of Monsters that players can pick from and customize. The short bestiary section includes a whole host of adversaries from literature, mythology, and folklore. Well, maybe not a WHOLE host, but at least half a host. Plus the Old School styled rules make bringing in things from other games and sources fairly easy. One of my favourite things in a game is when I encounter a cryptid I don’t know. In this case, it was an Ahool. A quick internet search later, and an Ahoy is a giant bat-like creature from the jungles of Indonesia.

This is the point of the review I would grab a book or five from my bookshelf looking for examples, but I’m on the road writing this so that’s not an easy option. BUT one of the reasons I’m writing this specific review from the road is its size. It’s higher quality than I would normally associate with a “Zine’ but it’s the same format. Only 50 pages in a saddle-stitched booklet. It uses better paper and a decent amount of colour artwork, plus the cover is heavy cardstock. The Character sheet is conveniently on the back cover making it easy to photocopy if you are old school, or just scan with your phone if you aren’t An Old™. I wasn’t, however able to find a printable version of the character sheet online without buying a full PDF of the book. (Not expensive, but not what I was looking for.)

The Core Mechanic of the game is to roll a single d20 and a single d6, add the appropriate attribute score (usually +/- 0-3) plus any modifiers to the d20 and compare the total to the target Difficulty Check number for whatever they wanted to do. If the d6 comes up 1 or 6 the roll gains a Hindrance or Benefit respectively, which adds an additional challenge or convenience to the situation. Let’s say you rolled to pick a lock, and found a whole set of keys on the ground making it unnecessary (and potentially helpful later), OR you failed the roll, and still found the keys for later. If you rolled a success with a Hinderance, maybe you open the door but set off the silent alarm. If you ever roll with Advantage or Disadvantage you’d roll 2d20 and 2d6, taking the higher or lower results as appropriate.

There are no traditional Skill Checks or Saving Throws in TMAOH. Everything uses the same Core Mechanic above. Damage is based on your STRength on a Melee attack or DEXterity for a ranged attack. If a character has any Armour Points they absorb some of the damage, and a creature’s natural Evade score replaces traditional Armour Class to be hit. At the end of each gaming session, players each roll 1d10 and if the number is higher than their current level they Level Up by adding +1 Attribute Point, +1 Luck Point, +1 to their Evade Score, and +1 Hit Die (which determines your Hit Points, according to your chosen character type)

There isn’t much for written rules in TMAOH, which is very specifically mentioned. A GM should use ”Rulings vs Rules” in the “Spirit of DIY TTRPGs” (both actual section headings). This is a game that values the freedom to bend and mould the rules to whatever works for your table, which is something that too many RPGs have forgotten. This point is extra poignant for me as the last RPG review I wrote (well before this review will see publication) was incredibly rules heavy. Basically, if you like classic monsters and you like playing RPGs, you will almost certainly have a blast playing The Monsters Are Our Heroes.

You can find Bloat Games online at bloatgames.com or on Facebook at facebook.com/bloatgames.