In my experience as a game-master over my many years, I have picked up a lot of roleplaying books, mainly the core book systems. My most recent grab was the Song of Ice and Fire Roleplaying Game, A Game of Thrones Edition. This edition of SIFRPG is fresh of the printing press, and I bought one of the first copies to arrive at my local gaming store. The reason I bought it is because a friend of mine, the man who plays the Caitian Captain Ozozah, is narrating a SIF game using the system.
At first glance, there were some things in this book that kinda blew my mind. For one thing, I don't remember looking at a system previous to this that didn't have Attributes and Skills, but instead just a combination called Abilities. I'm sure this isn't a first, but it was for me. This system used a d6 additive dice-pool system, where you have a pool of d6s and add the result together. Another incredible aspect was the House Creation system, which was just plain neat. Another mind-blowing rule was the Intrigue system, which was a sort of combat for conversational, well, intrigues. At first, this system seemed extraordinary.
But, after our first session, I started to see things I didn't like. For starts, the standard skill cap of Rank 7 seemed way too high. The ratio between the defense values and the amount you normally roll in an attack was totally unbalanced, making it so that the only way to have a defense that actually stopped enemies from hitting you was to build a specific character.
For the roleplaying side of things, having your own house in the world of Song of Ice and Fire isn't all that fun. Our narrator led us towards a very Intrigue/warfare heavy setting. Warfare is another system designed to handle large-scale combat, which I always thought was stellar when we first started playing. The female players of our group literally had nothing to do. My wife was playing my character's wife (I know, original), and she spent most of the time pregnant (which was my fault).
Whenever I pick up a new system, my primary goal is to learn from it. I like to create my own system more often than not, and I'm not ashamed to take the best of one system and add it to my own. For my latest system, the one we are presently using for our Start Trek: Invincible game, I decided the only thing that was worth taking out of this was the dropping of Attributes and the Intrigue system, which is a must for all systems to come. I modified (heavily) the Warfare system for space combat, in the sense that the captain of a ship gives orders back and forth with the opposing captain, and the crew reacts to those orders.
Oh, and another worthy mention is the idea of taking Injuries and Wounds during combat. I had been struggling with something along these lines across several of my systems. And old 80's system (my first experience with an rpg system) called DragonQuest had this awesome Grievous Injury system, that could had devastating effects. The Wound and Injury system allows the receiver of the attack to decide his fate, which actually works out really well.
As for the system itself, I'm not sure if I would recommend it. It has a very niche style of play. I'm not sure what type of group would use this system to its fullest potential, though I'd love to see one in action. The combat is subpar, apart from the Wound and Injury idea. Warfare is worthless once one side gets there hands of well-trained archers and just spends each action just shooting at each other, making it impossible to move a melee unit in to attacking range without getting pelted first. The Intrigue system is extraordinary, perhaps because it is the first of its kind I have ever seen. The House creation was cool until we had to take an hour out of each session to manage all the little statistics and options, which only one player really had a say in. If you have an entire group of roleplayers that are really, really in to Song of Ice and Fire, than you should give it a shot. That is, if you're willing to shell out $50 for the book.
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