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Doctor Who - The Time Traveller's Companion
 
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Doctor Who - The Time Traveller's Companion
Publisher: Cubicle 7 Entertainment Ltd.
by Timothy B. [Featured Reviewer]
Date Added: 05/25/2023 13:51:13

Originally posted here: https://theotherside.timsbrannan.com/2023/05/reviews-doctor-who-rpg-supplements.html

PDF 242 pages.

Again from the Matt Smtih/11th Doctor Era.

Now here is a book we would have LOVED to have had back in the FASA Doctor Who era. Everything we know about Gallifrey to date (well...to the date of this publication).

This product, like other supplements, is a bit freer with its use of material and image from the Classic series. So while the "trade dress" is the 11th Doctor, all the Doctors are featured here.

This book covers Gallifrey. It's history, it's culture, and of course, the Time Lords. This history by the way is great. We get deep cuts like "The Dark Times" and Morbius. Though only brief mentions of the Racnoss, the Great Vampires and the Carrionites in the Time Lord history. Interesting aside. All these early enemies of the Time Lords; spiders, vampires and witches respectively, all feature into the fears and horror tales of humans. Coincidence?

There is even a little bit on the Time War here.

Essentially if there is a Doctor Episode that featured Gallifrey or Time Lords it has representation here.

We get updates/expansions on Time Lord Character creation. This includes character creation based on which of the great academies the Time Lord comes from. Nice touch. There are even expanded regeneration rules here that predict how the War Doctor would be.

A brief overview of Time Travel is next. We get a good (ok better) explanations of the Blinovich Limitation Effect, or, "Why You Can't Cross Your Own Time Stream" and the Time Differential. Though the time differential is a good way to help explain how the Doctor never really knows how old he is.

There is coverage on Vortex Manipulators, Time Corridors, Time Scoops, Time Dams, even "primitive" time travel machines.

Updated information on TARDISes, including how to build your own in the game. Here things like the "Symbiotic Nuclei " of the Two Doctors episode is explained in 11th-Doctor-era terms and ideas.

Several TARDIS templates are given from Ancient (Type 1 to 29) to Decommissioned (Type 30 to 59, The Doctor's TARDIS is Type 40), Modern (Type 60 - 89, used by The Rani and the main TARDISes of the Time War), and Advanced (Type 90+). Like Characters, TARDISes have attributes and traits.

Lastly, there is a Gamemaster section, divided into four chapters.

This covers not only running a game, but things the GM needs to know that the players should not. These are details like what tyrant the Great Rassilon was, how Omega survived, how Morbius escaped Time Lord justice, the War Chief, and the workings of the CIA.

There are the hidden files about the weapons of the Time War (the Moment had not been created in the show just yet) and other monstrosities.

We get some other Time Lord Renegades from the show, Drax, The Monk (separate now), the Rani, Romana, and even the new regeneration cycle of the Master.

More details on travelling in time and how to deal with players being...well, players in this.

There is even a TARDIS controls diagram that reminds me of the 1980s Doctor Who Technical Manual which also works as a TARDIS character sheet.



Rating:
[5 of 5 Stars!]
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Doctor Who - The Time Traveller's Companion
Publisher: Cubicle 7 Entertainment Ltd.
by KEVIN T. [Verified Purchaser]
Date Added: 04/27/2016 07:26:27

The PDF was beautiful. Just like the hard cover book.



Rating:
[5 of 5 Stars!]
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Doctor Who - The Time Traveller's Companion
Publisher: Cubicle 7 Entertainment Ltd.
by Megan R. [Featured Reviewer]
Date Added: 01/12/2016 08:21:02

Fun as it may seem on the surface, when you start thinking about it time travel can make your head hurt. So here's a primer to get all you budding Time Lords sorted before you leap into a TARDIS and make a complete mess of time and space.

Launching straight in to Chapter 1: Into The Vortex, there's an overview of the contents of the book chapter-by-chapter and various comments on things like die-rolling conventions and other rules mechanics. There are plenty of extra rules here, which you - as the GM or in agreement with the group - will need to decide if you want to implement. The ruleset as given in the original box set work fine, these are refinements which you may or may not want to include. There's also a note that a big portion of the book is best left to the GM alone, on the assumption that only one member of the group will GM Doctor Who games. If you don't plan on being the GM, you might want to wait until your GM has had a look at this book before you decide to buy it.

Next, Chapter 2: The Shining World of the Seven Systems takes a look at Time Lords and their homeworld of Gallifrey. Any player who wants to be the Doctor (or another Time Lord) really ought to read this, it's background information any Time Lord would have. It's fascinating stuff... but likely only known to Time Lords so if you're playing a companion, stay out or at least forget it - unless your Doctor likes giving history lessons. We have the history of the Time Lords from way back in the mists of time until now, the 'Laws' relating to time travel and so much more. Time Lords are a political bunch, and there'd be scope for creating a unique game with several Time Lords engaging in the sorts of power games that they enjoy if you want a game something out of the ordinary. Or you may want to get involved in the Time War. It's all here. You also find out about life on Gallifrey and the Academy programme that forges new Time Lords - there's enough detail that you could even run an Academy game if you wanted to! It ends with notes on how to create a Gallifreyan character - not all are Time Lords, only those who graduate from the Academy, you see.

Then comes Chapter 3: I Walk in Eternity. This discusses the creation of original Time Lord characters, rather than resorting to playing the Doctor. There's a more advanced process for generating the character, and even more ideas about what sort of adventures he could have. Did the Doctor actually exist in this reality, or does your Time Lord have the opportunity to do the things the Doctor did? There are new traits and all manner of other goodies too, like detailed rules for regeneration.

Now we have a Time Lord, it's time to travel in time so on to Chapter 4: Temporal Mechanics 101. This talks about the things that can go wrong time travelling, and how to avoid them. It's complex and scary and is almost enough to persuade you to trade in your TARDIS... almost. Fear not, after scaring the would-be time traveller half to death, the chapter settles down to explain the game mechanics to travel safely through time and space, and maybe even end up where and when you intended to go!

Of course, to travel in time you need a TARDIS, and Chapter 5 provides a detailed run-down of what a TARDIS is and what it is capable of doing. There's loads of detail about different systems and modes of operation, and you can even have a go at designing your own TARDIS. Like the rest of the book, this chapter is copiously illustrated with shots from the show... alas, all uncaptioned so if you don't have photographic recall of the entire history of the TV show you can be left wondering just what a particular person, place or item might happen to be.

Next, Chapter 6: Master of Time and Space heralds the 'GM only' section - which occupies the second half of the book in terms of number of pages. The main elements are Chapter 7: Dark Secrets of the Time Lords, Chapter 8: Last of the Time Lords? and finally Chapter 9: Advanced Temporal Mechanics. The Dark Secrets takes Chapter 2 and lifts the lid on the true history of the Time Lords, and makes fascinating reading. Quite a few useful NPCs are included. Plenty of ideas for adventures and even entire campaign arcs are scattered throughout as well. Last of the Time Lords looks at the belief held by the Doctor - at least during the initial years of the 2005 'reboot' of the TV series - that he is the last surviving Time Lord. There are ideas for using this, and others for things to do if this is indeed not the case and there are plenty of other Time Lords scampering around. Advanced Temporal Mechanics is an opportunity to mess with everybody's head...

Essential reading for Gamemasters, and probably for any aspiring Time Lord, but of limited use to other players. A thoroughly good read, though!



Rating:
[5 of 5 Stars!]
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Doctor Who - The Time Traveller's Companion
Publisher: Cubicle 7 Entertainment Ltd.
by Alexander O. [Featured Reviewer]
Date Added: 12/15/2013 19:07:08

For people who want actual time travel mechanics in their DWAITAS games, or who want a comprehensive look at Gallifrey and its impact on the time stream, or some pretty neat looks at TARDISes and alternate TARDISes and other time travel devices -- this is it. All with fantastic images from the long run of the TV show!

Well worth the price. If discounted, then an auto-buy!



Rating:
[5 of 5 Stars!]
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Doctor Who - The Time Traveller's Companion
Publisher: Cubicle 7 Entertainment Ltd.
by Micheal F. [Verified Purchaser]
Date Added: 12/13/2013 16:26:49

Entertaining and informative. This will give my players headaches for weeks...



Rating:
[4 of 5 Stars!]
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Doctor Who - The Time Traveller's Companion
Publisher: Cubicle 7 Entertainment Ltd.
by Michael R. J. [Verified Purchaser]
Date Added: 07/02/2013 23:23:28

Read my full review on my blog: http://ofdiceandpenblog.blogspot.com/2013/07/the-time-travellers-companion.html

The Time Traveller’s Companion is a massive 240-page tome full of information about time travel, Time Lords, TARDISes, and more. Pretty much everything to do with time and its potential use in-game gets discussed in quite a lot of detail. Most of the book is descriptive detail, from a complete history of Gallifrey to temporal mechanics and space-time phenomena. Adventures in Time and Space is a rules-light game and this book maintains that, but that doesn’t mean there aren’t any new rules elements here. These are mostly in the form of new traits (particularly Time Lord and gadget traits) and new gadgets, but there are also detailed rules for piloting TARDISes, regeneration, and more. I’m actually extremely impressed by just how much detail there is in the book. It has definitely made the long wait worth it.



Rating:
[5 of 5 Stars!]
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Doctor Who - The Time Traveller's Companion
Publisher: Cubicle 7 Entertainment Ltd.
by Jeremy M. [Verified Purchaser]
Date Added: 01/21/2013 17:34:30

A thoroughly impressive piece of work, this supplement will be useful to anyone interested in playing - or using as NPCs - Time Lords from any era of the show's history. Although, in fairness, it's far, far more useful for classic era games where the Time Lords are still around, that canonical new series era games where the Doctor is the last of the Time Lords.

There's an extensive history section that does an excellent job of showing how Time Lord society evolved through its various TV appearances, a "Life on Gallifrey" chapter that gives Time Lord players all they need to create a background for their characters, a comprehensive guide to creating and using your own TARDIS, accompanied by supplementary rules on time travel and temporal phenomena (including Vortex Manipulators and Zygma beams), write-ups on the renegade Time Lords we've met over the years - the Monk, the War Chief, the Master, Drax, the Rani, and Romana - and a "GM's section" that reveals the secrets that aspiring Time Lord's don't get to learn during their time at the Academy. This section is slightly misnamed; the kind of dedicated Whovians who are the game's target audience know perfectly well that Chancellor Goth was secretly working for the Master, et cetera. As a means of keeping sensitive information out of the hands of players, it's of questionable value. What it does do, very usefully, is provide a clear dividing line between what the players know and what their characters do. This is a book that feels bigger on the inside than it is on the outside; it has a huge amount of useful material crammed into it, but it's all laid out in a very coherent manner and presented in a clear, readable style, with some very nice little flourishes (finally, we learn why the Doctor doesn't seem to use the same controls for the same functions all the time, for example).

Cubicle 7 has pretty high standards for its Dr Who game anyway, but this is the best product they've created for it to date, by a comfortable margin.



Rating:
[5 of 5 Stars!]
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Doctor Who - The Time Traveller's Companion
Publisher: Cubicle 7 Entertainment Ltd.
by Matthew T. [Featured Reviewer]
Date Added: 12/30/2012 11:30:20

This is a great book that adds lots and lots of new information and options for a Doctor Who game. Like all of the line, this book is pretty and easy to read. As a fan of classic Who, I was very happy to see that the book covered all the Doctor Who timeline both in the text and the illustrations.

The book includes cultural and historical information about Gallifrey and the Time Lords, answering a lot of questions and offering tons of plot ideas. It's worth reading even if you don't play the game. Not only do we have the big historic events (like the Dark Times and the Time War) but we have information on daily life on Gallifrey.

Next is a whole chapter on creating Time Lord characters, starting with tips for getting around the "last of the Time Lords" bit. This fixes the only real problem I had with DW:ATS, namely everybody (naturally) wants to play a Time Lord. This chapter includes a step-by-step process for creating Time Lords with background information (like the Academy and naming conventions) and good and bad traits. Most of this information is drawn from the TV show. There is also a lot of information on regeneration. Regeneration is handled randomly with rolls and tables increasing or decreased stats and changing physical appearance and personality. I'm not convinced this is the best way to handle regeneration but it does reflect the sometimes extreme nature of regeneration.

Chapter 4 covers temporal tricks in a lot of detail (possible too much detail). There's paradoxes, and vortex manoeuvres, and nexus points, plus a plethora of temporal gadgets. This chapter tries to catalog and understand 30 years of Whovian craziness, and it does a really good job (particularly since I strongly suspect the Who-verse doesn't make complete sense). But it also adds lot of complexity to a game.

Chapter 5 is dedicated to TARDISes, their history, systems, and uses. There are details on almost every aspect imaginable from the "desk top theme" to "spatial overlap" and the Cloister Bell. There are notes on ancient to advanced TARDISes as well -- most exciting of all -- rules for creating a TARDIS complete with good and bad traits (an insatiably curious TARDIS may nip off to have adventures on its own!).

The rest of the book is given to "GM-only" information: dark secrets of the Time Lords, hidden technologies, and famous and infamous Time Lords (like the Master and Romana!). While there's lots of great information here, it won't be "GM-only" to anyone familiar with classic Who. There are chapters of adventure seeds, ideas for setting games during different periods of Time Lord history, general GM advice, and even more advances temporal phenomena.

Finally, there is an extensive and helpful index, as well as Time Lord and TARDIS character sheets and helpful reference cards.

As I said, there's a lot of information here, not just setting but rules: new rules, modifiers, stats, and charts. Enough so that incorporating all these rules could alter the feel of a DW:ATS game. While the system is still simple, this supplement adds lots of fiddly bits. Without a light touch, all these new details could bog down a game (something the book addresses). These is a great book to dip into, cherry-pick, or even obsesses over, just like Doctor Who itself.



Rating:
[5 of 5 Stars!]
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Doctor Who - The Time Traveller's Companion
Publisher: Cubicle 7 Entertainment Ltd.
by Ian F. [Verified Purchaser]
Date Added: 12/23/2012 17:06:57

In my opinion, this is the best supporting supplement for any games system I’ve seen this year. The production qualities on this book are outstanding, from the writing, to the new game mechanics and the content. There is nothing in this book that is expendable or useless. It’s a feast.

It has all the material you could ever want from the new and classic series about Time Travel, Temporal Physics, Gallifrey and Time Lords. It’s packed with detailed rules, new traits and info for dealing with regeneration, Time Travel and creating Timelords, TARDISes and more. The new rules will greatly please those who wanted more crunch and while they expand the usual lighter rules, they don’t add any unnecessary complexity.

With this book you can: -Create Time Lords (Pre and Post Time War) from any of the chapters (Prydonians, Arcalians, Patrexes, etc.). Any Time Lords seen on the series (new and classic) can be created as well as other classes like the Shobogans or plebeians.

-Create a TARDIS. New traits and all sorts of TARDIS goodies are covered along with very detailed sheets for TARDIS operation. These will satisfy the most fervent of TARDIS fans who want to pilot one in the game. All TARDIS systems are covered with game mechanics for operation and damage.

Some really nice touches: It includes stats for Renegade Timelords such as The War Chief (The War Games), Morbius, Omega and two versions of the Master (dying 13th incarnation and the insane John Simm version). Even if you won’t be using these characters, they give excellent examples and benchmarks as a starting point for your own villains and supporting characters.

The Time War and the whole of Gallifreyan history is covered and there’s a section for creating Time War weapons of cosmic-levels of nastiness. These are suitably huge enough to provide seeds for epic adventures or campaigns.

The parts on Time Travel and Temporal physics also provide tons of campaign or plot seeds in themselves. Most (if not all) of the stuff and devices from the classic and new series are covered in great detail with game mechanics for Time Loops, Chronic Hysteresis and lots more. ‘Expert Cards’ are also provided for a GM to give to Time Lord players with all the pertinent info on them. If you want to put someone or some thing in a Time Loop on the fly, this will tell you how to do it, the difficulty, how many Story Points it will cost and so on. In short, this section will let you do Time Lord magic.

This book is going to greatly expand your creative powers as a GM, as a player of a Time Lord and really enhance your game and inspire you with tons of plot ideas.

An essential buy.



Rating:
[5 of 5 Stars!]
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