I took a few months off from Danger Close and started writing a dozen other games. Everytime I had this feeling like I was leaving Danger Close unfinished. It wasn’t until a friend expressed interest in playing Danger Close at an upcoming convention that I decided to take another look at Version 3. I wanted to brush up on the rules and I barely started reading when I noticed typos, grammatical errors, and a few rules I wasn’t happy with.

I still don’t think Danger Close is finished. I need to find time for more playtesting but until then I’ve compiled a new edition. Version 3.5 clears up a few rules, makes some slight adjustments, and brings the game one step closer to completion.

You can download Danger Close here and the Character Sheet here. If you play it, let me know how it works.

This is the long-awaited (ok, not really) Version 3 of Danger Close. There is even a little preview of Version 4 in there, or maybe it was just a chapter I’ve yet to find the motivation to finish writing. The First Mission is all highlighted in yellow and should stand out like a sore thumb. I left it in to give you an idea of what I was aiming for but you can safely assume it’s not part of the final Version 3 product.

We’re at 86 downloads for Version 2 of Danger Close. That is about eighty more downloads than I ever expected. This has been a great process and I’m so glad that people are enjoying it so far. I’ve made some decisions as to what the final product will look like and I talk a bit about it in Version 3. Still, I’ll make the formal announcement here.

Danger Close will always be a free game. I will never charge a dime for it.

Hopefully after seeing and playing Danger Close you’ll become more interested in my game design and be more inclined to purchase future products. That’s right, Danger Close is only the beginning of my serious game design work. I really want to go re-visit my ideas for Eidolon and some day tackle my Lovecraft System seriously. I have a few other thoughts brewing too but I’ll keep my fat mouth shut for now.

All that said, I’d love to hear what you think of Danger Close now. It looks pretty different then the original version I started posting on this site and I think it still has a long way to go. If any of you actually play the game I’d love to hear how it turned out.

Don’t forget about the Character Sheet too!

As some of you know I’m currently hard at work (cough) on Version 3 of Danger Close. In an effort to keep transparency while I work on the next PDF release I figured I would highlight some of the changes coming to Danger Close.  One of the biggest overall changes comes to Areas. While Areas are functioning the same the way they are decided and what they cover has changes quite a bit. Overall, I think this is a better metric and will lead to the style of game play that the system requires.

There is a lot of talk in this section that extrapolates out to other changes. It might be confusing in spots but when V3 is released it should (it better) all make sense.

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I just hit 50 (unique) downloads on Danger Close. That is about 45 more then I expected! The results of the current poll have also been fairly positive. Only one person saying they are Not Interested but they are out of Amsterdam apparently so they are high and stupid. The majority of the voters are Interested and even a couple people are Very Interested!

We also sat down for a second round of character creation, no playtesting, but just crunching some numbers and doing some of the mental homework. In light of that there have been some significant changes to how Areas work. I also sat down and started watching Season 2 of Leverage and it got me thinking about the Areas and what they do. I wrote some expansion pieces and fleshed out what’s what. Capricorn is now the thinker, planner, and not just the leader. Capricorn is the team’s brain, Aries is the teams brawn, Gemini is the teams face, Virgo is the teams technician, and Scorpio is the teams grace. Just to give you and idea of what we’re looking at.

Anyway, I have some more writing to do before I’m ready to release the Version 3 PDF. I just figured I’d let you all know that what you have is out of date and, in many ways, unplayable. Sorry about that.

I know, I know. A DAY later I remembered a sidebar I forgot. Add this into the Intelligence Gathering section.

With the vast and sweeping changes that have been made since Danger Close started releasing on this site, I’ve instead opted to stop the daily release and just put out the compiled PDF of the Danger Close v2 guide. The PDF is freely available by clicking on the icon to the right. Feel free to download it and let me know what you think!

Thus ends the daily releases of Danger Close.

Continuing coverage of Danger Close, today we present the rules for how your character changes. Advancement isn’t Experience. Remember that and Enjoy.

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Continuing coverage of Danger Close, today we present the last part of Character Creation. MICE are how other player Agents get you do go along with their plan. Enjoy.

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Continuing coverage of Danger Close, today we present the next part of Character Creation. Advantages are mechanic changing\breaking aspects of your character. Enjoy.

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Hey Danger Close fans. Got some good news \ bad news for you. We did the first playtest of the system last Friday and a good majority of it has been revised and rewritten. I’ve been working on a local copy and once all the details are finalized I’ll do an update here. Unfortunately a lot that has already been released (and some stuff coming up) has been changed so what you get off the site here is pretty far from what the final game will look like… it’s also a bit unplayable. A brief synopsis of a few of the more radical changes:

• Moved away from a Roll\Keep system to a straight dice pool system.
• You no longer spend a single Agent Point to roll extra dice, now you spend an Agent Point for every additional source you wish to roll in.
• Assets no longer degrade with every use, now you can choose to “Push” and Asset which would make them degrade but you don’t have to spend an Agent Point.
• There are now two types of Equipment and some new rules for how Equipment is used.
• Lowered the amount of points you get for starting MICE to bring the TNs closer to the average Agent TN.
• Advancement details have changed (not released yet)
• The Intelligence Gathering phase (not released yet) has been almost entirely re-written.
• Added a new Investigation phase to buff out the Intelligence Gathering phase.
• Added new Survival rules for when Agents get trapped behind enemy lines.
• Narrative Control rules have changed (not released yet)
• Added a couple of side bars to discuss a couple of issues that came up during playtesting, including dealing with Shared Assets.