I was fortunate to be able to pick up Twilight: 2000 – Urban Operations (Free League Publishing, 2023) in the Free League Summer Sale.
As I’ve written about before, Twilight: 2000 (T2K) is what I call an “Adventure Wargame.“ An Adventure Wargame is interchangeably a wargame with strong roleplaying game (RPG) elements or a RPG with strong wargame elements. In the case of Urban Operations, this product is an adventure supplement for T2K. Depending on your viewpoint, T2K can be seen as either a roleplaying game with a robust (as in DEADLY) combat system or a skirmish-scale wargame tightly integrated with a RPG.
Old town
For those of you who might be old enough to remember Twilight: 2000 1st Edition (GDW, 1984) you will likely see the similarities between the module The Free City of Krakow (GDW, 1985). Urban Operations is for the 4th Edition of Twilight: 2000: Roleplaying in the World War II That Never Was and includes two feature cities—Krakow and Karlsborg.
SOP
From a rules perspective, Urban Operations introduces new combat and travel rules for use in urban environments. Out of the 96 pages in the rulebook, the “City Rules” chapter is a mere 12 pages. In those 12 pages you get:
- Two new Archetype characters (The Cop and The Criminal).
- Five new Specialties (Authority, Close Quarters Combat, Cryptographer, Liar, and Thief).
- Combat rules for city warfare including a special subset of rules for Close Quarters Combat.
- Travel rules for use in cities and on the City Maps to include new Tasks
Going downtown
Twilight: 2000 is the what I call an “adventure by encounter” style of game. The 16 new encounters can be found both in the book and on Encounter Cards in the boxed set. The book also has several Stationary Encounters tables that are used for when the group stays in one place within a city for more than a day. The encounters make for excellent plot hooks.
Urban life
Almost two-thirds of the rulebook for Urban Operations is given over to adventure seeds in cities. There are four City Factions presented that both populate and operate in either of the two cities presented (Krakow and Karlsborg). These factions are closely tied a new gaming concept introduced in Urban Operations—Plots.
While retaining the player freedom to navigate the open world, a plot offers a backdrop that can tie encounters and factions together into longer narrative arcs.
A plot is not a detailed story the PCs [Player Characters] must follow. Instead, it offers you a context to draw inspiration from and a way to give PCs’ travels a long-term purpose. You should not force your players to follow the plot, but rather feed them plot elements throughout the campaign at a pace of your choosing. A plot can be as long as you like, and you can have several plots in play at the same time.
Urban Plots, p. 42
Urban Operations offers seven different Urban Plots for potential use. It is possible to have one, some, all, or even none in your game. That said, a study of how an Urban Plot is created is a good lesson for the Referee to use as a springboard to their own plots.
Urban planning
Urban Operations included four scenarios complete with valuable non-player characters (NPCs), locations and events. The scenarios are tied to Plots, but each can be used exclusive of those rules if desired. Each scenario has a battle map provided in the boxed set.
The big city
Urban Operations ends with two appendixes, one each for the cities of Krakow and Karlsborg. Each city is described with its history, current situation, inhabitants, neighborhoods, key locations, and NPCs given. A city travel map and battle map are provided for each city in the boxed set.
Grid coordinates
A comment on the maps in Urban Operations. Wargamers should find themselves at home using these maps as they use hexes to regulate movement and assist in determining range. Although there are many maps included in the boxed set (and electronically in the pdf) it would likely be just as easy to use almost any map in a tactical-scale wargame for battles, and operational-scale wargames for travel. Anybody feel like visiting the Fulda Gap?
Urban sandbox
Urban Operations does an excellent job delivering sandbox adventure for Twilight: 2000 play. The new city rules for combat, travel, and general adventuring are easy to add to the core game. While there are scenarios (one-shots?) and plots (campaigns?) they can be used in part or in whole as the Referee sees fit.
Urban to Suburban
On a more personal note, I found Urban Operations a refreshing change in my roleplaying experience this summer. Going into the Fourth of July, I have played Pirate Borg (Free League Publishing, 2023) which I like but can’t talk more about until the formal release in September (review embargo). My second game played this summer, Cowboy Bebop: The Roleplaying Game (Mana Project Studio, 2023), I ended up not jazzed about. Thus, when I got the pdf for Urban Operations (the box is enroute) I eagerly jumped in…and really enjoyed what I found. Yeah, I’m a Grognard wargamer, but Adventure Wargaming is just as fun!
Feature image courtesy Free League Publishing
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Rocky Mountain Navy Gamer 
One aspect I love about Free League’s RPGs is the tabletop play support. Certainly you could play T2k4e on VTT – and many do – but the cornucopia of maps and encounter cards in Urban Ops really lend themselves to in-person games.
Agree!