Aces & Eights: Shattered Frontier vs The Last Book

Compare Aces & Eights: Shattered Frontier and The Last Book side by side. See differences in complexity, dice, genre, and more.

	Aces & Eights: Shattered Frontier	The Last Book
Genre	Historical	Fantasy
Tags	Simulation, Crunchy, Deadly, Gritty, Sandbox, Classless, Career-Based, Tactical, Lore-Heavy, Strong GM Support	Crunchy, Tactical, Simulation, Character Building, Classless, Deadly, Sword & Sorcery
Core Mechanic	Gunfights run on a Count Up measured in tenths of a second instead of turns or rounds. Each character rolls d10 and adds Speed for a Starting Initiative, where lower is better, then adds each action's Count cost to find when it happens. To shoot, place the Shot Clock overlay on the aimed point of a Target Silhouette and roll d20 plus Accuracy modifiers. A 25 or higher hits the exact spot and 14 or less misses. Totals in between draw a poker card whose suit sets the direction the shot drifts from the aim point. Skill checks roll d100 and succeed at or above a mastery number that falls as the skill improves, while ability checks roll d20 at or under the score.	The Last Book uses two resolution systems. Skill and attribute checks roll d100 under a calculated success chance, and how far under the number sets the success margin. Combat is an opposed contest where each side rolls 2d6 and adds a maneuver rating, and the higher total wins the exchange. The margin of victory, called Strike Severity, is added as bonus damage.
Dice	d20, d100	d100, 2d6
Complexity	High	High
Availability	Paid	Free core rules
Runnability	5 of 5 book tools	3 of 5 book tools
License	All Rights Reserved	All Rights Reserved
Third-Party Publishing	No verified route found	Not yet researched
Summary only, not legal advice. Check current terms before publishing.
Publisher	Kenzer & Company	Patrick White
Year	2007	2026
Languages	English	English
Best For	Groups who want a long-running, town-centered Western campaign where characters build careers and reputations, and where gunfights are rare, precise, and often fatal.	Groups who enjoy 1980s-style point-buy character building and granular, location-based tactical combat, and want that level of crunch set in a violent sword and sorcery desert world.
Highlights	Shots target specific locations rather than an abstract opponent, so a near miss can still strike nearby and hit location feeds a detailed wound and healing system. Profession Paths award Building Points for career objectives such as opening a business or winning an election, so a banker or rancher advances as surely as a gunfighter. Cattle drives and jury trials run as complete mini-games with their own daily checks or juror track, so frontier work generates play outside combat.	The margin by which a 2d6 attack contest beats the defense becomes Strike Severity and is added to damage, so cleanly won exchanges hit harder rather than only landing. Attackers can aim for a specific body location such as the head or vitals, trading an accuracy penalty for effects like multiplied damage or a chance to cripple a limb. Esoteric Alchemy builds potions from five reagent types that each carry their own laws and effects, letting an alchemist mix custom concoctions instead of drawing from a fixed list.
Considerations	Running the full game takes the Player's Guidebook plus its separate GM Addendum PDF, along with a poker deck, the Shot Clock overlay, and Target Silhouettes for gunfights. Characters die at 0 hit points with no recovery from death, and slow healing, infection, and incurable disease can sideline a character for weeks of game time. The alternate-history setting presents slavery and period racial attitudes as setting facts with mechanical effects, such as a higher literacy cost for freed-slave characters.	The game runs on two separate resolution engines, a d100 roll-under for skills and a 2d6 opposed contest for combat, so players learn and switch between two different systems. Resolving one attack can involve wound level, strike location, vulnerability and status, encumbrance, and lighting at the same time, which keeps combat deliberate and slow. Character death is largely permanent and crippling injuries can persist well beyond a fight, so losing a heavily built character is a real risk.