Alternate Realities Primary ...

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Alternate Realities: Primary Reality Guide, v1.0
Page 1
Alternate Realities: Primary Reality Guide
A Role-Playing System by Carter Butts, Karim Nassar, and Brian Rayburn
ã
Copyright 1996 Carter Butts, Karim Nassar, and Brian Rayburn
Alternate Realities: Primary Reality Guide, v1.0
Page 2
Table of Contents
Introduction __________________________________________________________________ 5
Basic Ideas ___________________________________________________________________ 6
Critical Mechanics ____________________________________________________________ 10
The Character _______________________________________________________________ 12
Supplemental Mechanics _______________________________________________________ 31
The Game Environment________________________________________________________ 44
GMing Alternate Realities ______________________________________________________ 50
Alternate Realities 'How To' Guide ______________________________________________ 54
Generic Lists: Items, Materials, and Equipment ____________________________________ 62
Generic Lists: Modifiers _______________________________________________________ 68
Generic Lists: Skills ___________________________________________________________ 69
Writing for
AR
_______________________________________________________________ 84
Index _______________________________________________________________________ 86
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Copyright 1996 Carter Butts, Karim Nassar, and Brian Rayburn
 Alternate Realities: Primary Reality Guide, v1.0
Page 3
Statement of Copyright
Alternate Realities
, the
Alternate Realities Primary Reality Guide
, the
Alternate Realities
Generic Lists
and all related rules, images, and software here included are Copyright (c) 1996 by
Carter Butts, Karim Nassar, and Brian Rayburn.
Permission is granted to make and distribute verbatim copies of this document provided the
copyright notice and this permission notice are preserved on all copies.
Permission is granted to copy and distribute modified versions of this document under the
conditions for verbatim copies above, provided a notice clearly stating that the document is a
modified version is also included in the modified document.
Permission is granted to copy and distribute translations of this document into another
language, under the conditions specified above for modified versions.
Permission is granted to convert this document into another media under the conditions
specified above for modified versions provided the requirement to acknowledge the source
document is fulfilled by inclusion of an obvious reference to the source document in the new media.
Where there is any doubt as to what constitutes 'obvious' or ‘clearly stating,’ the copyright owners
reserve the right to decide. All other rights reserved.
Acknowledgments
Thanks to Terry Dawson, and the Linux Documentation Project, for their support of the
free distribution of information, and for the above permission notice (which is a modified version of
that contained in Dawson’s IPX HOW-TO). Support Linux, the operating system of champions!
Thanks to all those who have had to put up with the authors’
AR
obsession.
And, naturally, thanks to Gary Gygax, Steve Jackson, Kevin Seimbeda, and all the other
game designers whose work has provided us with such inspiration and enjoyment over the years.
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Copyright 1996 Carter Butts, Karim Nassar, and Brian Rayburn
Alternate Realities: Primary Reality Guide, v1.0
Page 4
Forward to Version 1.0
Believe it or not, this project has been six years in the making. It all started with a series
of conversations between Karim and myself regarding an automated world creation system
(something which, amusingly, we still have not developed). Around this time, Karim had gotten an
earlier system of his own called
Guardian Dome: 2020
(soon to be an
AR
Reality Guide
) to the
point of playability, and we began to talk about possible improvements. Eventually, our discussion
turned to the subject of creating the Perfect Role-Playing Game (TM), and before long we had
resolved to create a new, generic system incorporating some of the lessons learned both from
GD
and from other systems. After much wrangling, we decided to call this system
Alternate Realities
,
and the project was born.
A lot has happened since then. Countless “visions, and revisions, which a minute will
reverse” ensued...since these often took the form of my coming in and babbling to Karim about
how we needed to scrap everything we had (painstakingly put together by Karim) in favor of the
Idea of the Day, I’m somewhat surprised that I survived. Often,
AR
got put on the back burner,
and I think that neither of us really believed that it would one day be completed. Renewed interest
in the past few months, and a new sense of urgency due to our various pending relocations,
however, provided the spur to drive us to action:
AR
had to be finished, and soon.
At this point in the narrative, however, I need to back up and mention Brian, who got
involved somewhere along the line vis a vis Karim’s play tests. Brian took to
AR
at once, and
began to help with play testing, design, and (especially) content. When things began to get really
hectic, Brian took on an increasingly important role; when Karim departed for Japan, it was Brian
who put together the lists of skills and equipment without which the project never could have come
to completion, and who is hence no less of an author for having come into the project half-way.
So, where does that leave us? The end of the beginning, I should think...which is as good a
place to be as any. Having cobbled together version 1.0, I may be able to once again sleep nights
without worrying about when this thing will be finished. On the other hand, if we’ve done our
work well,
Alternate Realities
will
never
be finished - which is fine by me. I’ve seen too many
closed systems in my time, too many designers who sue players over copyrights, and too many
Megacorps where the Elite dole out gaming wisdom to the masses. It’s time for gamers to have
something which belongs to them...and that’s what
AR
is all about.
Enjoy!
-Carter Butts
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Copyright 1996 Carter Butts, Karim Nassar, and Brian Rayburn
Alternate Realities: Primary Reality Guide, v1.0
Page 5
Alternate Realities
A Role-Playing System by Carter Butts, Karim Nassar, and Brian Rayburn
Introduction
Alternate Realities
is a generic, copylefted role-playing system with scaleable, modular
rules which allow for a wide variety of gaming styles. Whether you are into fantasy or sci-fi,
detailed simulation or free-form story telling,
AR
can provide the basis for your campaign.
This alone is somewhat unusual, though not totally unique. Unlike most systems,
however,
Alternate Realities
is built around a few, general principles which form the basis for all
other game mechanics. This is a boon to new players, who can get by without learning a vast array
of disparate rules, and to designers, who can easily extend the
AR
framework to produce new game
environments.
There is, also, an aesthetic method to our madness. In producing
Alternate Realities
, the
authors have striven for
elegant
solutions to design issues; while we may not always have been
successful, we feel that
AR
is generally more compact and intuitive than other systems of
comparable sophistication. Even when it is not, however, we have tried to make it clearer to
players and GMs by providing detailed explanations of how we arrived at the present rule system.
By deriving the more obscure aspects of
AR
(such as the Diminishing Returns Function) in the rule
book itself, we hope to encourage others to build on our work...and to correct its shortcomings.
To further aid players in adding to
Alternate Realities
, we have included a section on
writing for
AR
, with tips on how to organize your work so that other players can derive maximum
utility from it. If you do decide to produce work for
AR
, please let us know; we’d love to hear
about it, and will be happy to help you distribute your creations to other gamers. Our ultimate
intention is for this work, the
Primary Reality Guide
, to be the start of a much larger collaborative
project, much as the work of Linus Torvalds began what is today known as the “Linux
Movement.” We’re not holding our breaths, however.
In any case, we certainly hope that you enjoy
Alternate Realities
, and that you copy and
distribute it freely to anyone and everyone you know. It’s not a perfect system, but we think you’ll
find it to be most effective.
-The Authors
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Copyright 1996 Carter Butts, Karim Nassar, and Brian Rayburn
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