Фэн-шуй: Ролевая игра о боевых искусствах и контроле над миром

Tabletop role playing game by Robin Laws

Feng Shui is a martial arts themed role playing game, designed by Robin Laws, published first by Daedalus Entertainment and now by Atlas Games. The game shares its setting with the collectible card game Shadowfist. The system is simple, with most detail being in the game's combat system. Combat is made to flow quickly, moving from one action scene to another very quickly. It was inspired and based on Hong Kong style action movies. The characters begin at a high level of skill, as appropriate for protagonists in the source films. After a successful Kickstarter, Atlas Games released a Second Edition of Feng Shui in late 2015, on the eve of the game's 20th anniversary of publication.

The name Feng Shui refers to one of the central themes of the game: those who control places with powerful Feng Shui control the world. These people find that events go in their favour more often than would be explained by chance. The outcomes of all major historical events, such as wars, elections and natural disasters are dictated by who has the most powerful Feng Shui. Numerous groups vie for control of these sites, and thus control of the world. Feng Shui crosses genre boundaries and includes martial arts, firearms, magic and advanced technology. One of the main features of the game is that the physical settings for scenes are meant to be vague, allowing the Game Master and the players room for creative improvisation and description of exciting stunts during combat.

The rules are intended to be simple and easy to learn. There is one central mechanism for making skill checks. Non combat checks are generally resolved with a single roll of the dice, whereas a scene involving combat can last half an hour or more.

For each skill a character has, they have an associated Action Value that states how good they are at that skill. When a skill is used, two six sided dice are rolled. One, the positive die, is added to the Action Value. The other, the negative die, is subtracted from that sum. The final value is the Action Result which is then compared to the difficulty of the task being performed. If the Action Result is greater than or equal to the difficulty, that action succeeds. Because the average Action Result is equal to the Action Value, the difficulty can simply be the Action Value of an opponent.

A means to travel in time inevitably means that people will try to change the past or future. When this happens without a Feng Shui site changing ownership, this results in a superficial shift. Details change, but everything important remains the same. People may find themselves laterally reincarnated into a different name and job, but their memories will change to match their new identity. Whoever was in charge before is still in charge. However, when there is a significant change in the flow of Chi as a result of Feng Shui sites changing hands, there might be a critical shift. Such a shift may make major changes to history and the balance of power. World War II may have ended with the Axis powers victorious, a large part of the world might have become a peaceful Confucian state, or the entire world might be recreated according to some terrible pattern. As with superficial shifts, people will be laterally reincarnated to fit the new world. Anyone who has been to the Netherworld, however, does not get laterally reincarnated and will be acutely aware of the changes. Butcher comments that "Simply put, Feng Shui is brilliant." In 1999 Pyramid magazine named Feng Shui on its list of "The Millennium's Best Role playing Games". Editor Scott Haring said that "Feng Shui found the way to do over the top cinematic roleplaying without turning it into an exercise in dice rolling and power trips".