Ape Future (A Braunstein! Variant)

In the early 1970s, America had ape fever, thanks to the wildly successful Planet of the Apes film and subsequent franchise, including more successful movies, toys, games, comic books, and no less than two television shows...

The Braunstein! game is also inspired by the 1970s, and can be easily tailored for chronicles in the ape universe with just a few additional rules that follow here:

(1) If you aren't familiar with the movies, or have forgotten them, you should get them now; call it research...

(2) Characters can be apes or humans:

APE	LITERACY	SOCIAL CLASS*	NOTES
Chimpanzee	yes	clergy	scholars and scientists
Gorilla	no	commoner	military personnel
Orangutan	yes	nobility	lawgivers and judges, etc.
*Approximate status/position within ape culture

Note here that apes are quite strong and add +1 to all dice rolled for actions pertaining to this.

These films are great game fodder...

(3) Humans are astronauts or mutants as follows:

HUMAN	LITERACY	SOCIAL CLASS	NOTES
Astronaut	yes*	commoner#	space/time travelers
Mutant	no*	commoner#	mutated human remnants
*Apes read, write, and speak 20th century English
#Humans are displaced and outside of ape culture and society

Clever and resourceful, astronauts add +1 to experience points earned in true chronicles (+1 to stealth in one-off adventures) to guarantee basic game balance.

Mutants communicate telepathically within 30' and use any of the following by spending LUCK as follows:

POWER	COST	DURATION	RANGE
Read minds	2	1 round	10'
Psychic attack	3	combat/instant	30'

Psychic attacks deal 2 automatic hits per 3 LUCK spent.  All other native humans are feral and mute.

(4) Players should always reference the character's race in their written description as per the basic rules.

(5) All ape armor is a padded leather, although there is no precedent for the use of shields in the movies (judges can always add them is they wish, however).

(6) Available equipment includes firearms treated as bows for purposes of range and damage, and not as the early guns offered in the original rulebook.  These are equivalent to mid-20th century weapons, typically used for hunting man.

(7) Everything else will conform to the basic rulebook, adding that ammunition cost 2 SP per 50 rounds. 

Ape armor and rifles on display...

(8) The game is set in the remnants of New York:

APE CITY lies within a fertile area, ruled by orangutans and protected by gorillas, with chimpanzees working mainly as doctors and the like.  Their culture is mostly pre-industrial, but with simple cameras and firearms, among other things (follow the movies here, and you'll get a few surprises).  

The FORBIDDEN ZONE is a desert region off-limits to apes, for it contains the remnants of a lost human civilization.  Here the mutants linger, and indeed, most adventures will very likely occur here, being filled with subterranean places alive with who knows what in the debris of a once-flourishing race.

Planet of the Apes is pure 70s whimsy, so convert your Braunstein! and go ape in the remarkable world these films present...