The Big Damn Heroes Handbook is a sourcebook for the previously reviewed Serenity Role Playing Game, and using the Cortex system. It's got new Traits, new combat rules, expanded ship rules, information on Chinese culture in the 'Verse including more vocabulary and a bit on Tongs, and a wealth of statted-out NPCs including my personal favorite incidental character, Badger.
All of this is good stuff, but with the exception of the new Traits it's more useful to gamemasters than players. This confused me a bit, because I kind of expected a book titled Big Damn Heroes Handbook to be character-focused. It's not really set up as a gamemaster's guide either, though. It feels more like material that was cut from the core rulebook for length. Which means it's interesting, but not absolutely essential to running a Serenity game. If you've read my review of the core rulebook, you already know that I don't even consider the Serenity RPG necessary for running a Serenity RPG.
If you're a completist, buy this book. In all fairness, all of the material is solid, useful, and the book is oh so pretty just as the core rulebook is. If you're running a regular Serenity game that features a lot of ship-to-ship fights and the Chinese side of Alliance culture, you will find this useful. If you're anyone else, you can probably skip right over this and not miss anything. I'll give it a Good Touch, with the caveat that it's pretty niche.
Buy the Big Damn Heroes Handbook (softcover) at Amazon
Buy the Big Damn Heroes Handbook PDF at RPGNow
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