Free RPGs

Welcome to the RPG section of 1KM1KT. Here you’ll find member submissions of tabletop pen and paper role-playing games. All of the RPGs available in this section are free for download and are generally in .pdf format. If you’re interested in submitting your own RPG for publication, please visit our submissions page for details or send it to us using our contact form.

A 24 hour RPG by Cliff Billing
Yorkshire, UK
(From 10:00 26th March to 05:44 27th March, 2008)

Immortalis’ is a game set in the current day, but it is a world very different from our own. Colonies and space stations dot the Solar System and the first steps to other stars are about to be taken. You play an Immortal, either part of the public face of the Council of Immortals or hidden amongst the masses. Either way, you work to guide humanity and stop the insidious influence of the Dark Summoners. Dark Summoners are people who can summon entities from the Rift and use them to control mortals like puppets.

Immortals have been around since the dawn of man. In ancient times they were the heroes of myth. However, during Roman times a Council was formed and Immortals decided to let normal mortals define the shape of the world to come. Immortals retreated from sight.

The plan worked well for 2000 years. In secret Immortals worked to limit the damage done by the Dark Summoners. However, the numbers of Dark Summoners grew until the conflict engulfed the world in war in the late 19th century. Secrecy was no longer possible and after the victory of the Immortals and their mortal allies, the Council of Immortals decided to take on a guiding role in the world. It was a Golden Time of art and science and it took humanity into space.

The game uses a fairly simple set of rules and you’ll need up to 5d6 for each player and the GM.

INTRODUCTION
In case you had already guessed ‘Immortalis’ is the latin word for immortal and that is what the player characters are.

First of all you should probably be an experienced GM or player. I will not be explaining about what roleplaying is, define many common roleplaying terms or include a lot of the other things you find written at the start of many rpgs. Consequently, you should probably already know that stuff and have done it all before.

These rules may be copied or printed freely, so long as I’m given credit. However, they may not be sold or used for profit by anyone but me.

WHAT DO YOU NEED?
You’ll need up to 5d6 for the GM and each player. I’ve also included a character sheet at the end.

THE SETTING
This game is set in an alternate version of the current day. There are colonies on several moons and planets in the Solar System and fusion-powered ships ply the space lanes between. Some believe that the first step between the stars has been taken. We first ventured into space in the 1905, ten years after the Great War.

KRASNOARMEETS is a submission for the November Ronnies. It’s an RPG/minis hybrid centering on the unglamorous southern flank of the Battle of Stalingrad in the autumn of 1943.

It is the autumn of 1942. In the Hero City of Stalingrad, heroic Red Army defenders are battling for their lives against the fascist hordes who have invaded Mother Russia. Street to street and house to house, the hard-bitten Soviet soldiers fight with the desperate ferocity of madmen.

You are not one of them. You are a new arrival on the scene, one of a huge number of Red Army troops moved into position along the banks of the Don river, northwest of Stalingrad, in recent weeks. Everybody knows that you’re here for the big push. When winter stars to set in and the ground freezes hard, Marshal Zhukov will order you and your mates forward to smash the thinly-defended German lines and trap the Hitlerites in the city. For right now, though, the rains continue to pour down, turning the yellow earth into mud. This horrible mud. And because idleness in soldiers is a recipe for trouble, and because Comrade Stalin wants to keep the fascists on their toes, you have to go out on patrol in it.

A 24 Hour RPG done on April 20/April 21, 2008 (7 pm to 6 pm), in which the PCs play ordinary people who must investigate and face down creatures of darkness. The DIP-Styx system was designed to encourage Develop in Play character creation style and to be friendly to beginning gamers.

DIP-Styx

An introductory RPG for the 24 Hour RPG Project
Written by Timothy Dedeaux
Begun Sunday night, April 20, 2008 around 7:00 pm
Ended Monday, April 21, 2008 around ??
Premise/idea: one non-roleplayer who’d tried roleplaying and hadn’t fallen in love with it told me the hardest part was character creation. Cross-referencing this in my mind with what I’d read years ago on the old Rec.Games.frp.Advocacy group about Design at Start vs. Develop in Play styles, I decided to write an RPG to emphasize the DIP side of things, and perhaps help new roleplayers get over the “character creation” hurdle. Develop in Play is abbreviated “DIP,” and thus the “DIP” part of the name. The “Styx” part comes from the setting. For the record, this is designed for an at least somewhat experienced GM to use to introduce new players, not to be easy-access for a group of total newbies.

For thousands of years, Charon guarded the entrance to the underworld, protecting us from the things that go bump in the night. But now, he’s gone missing, and creatures are slowly breaking free, and it falls to ordinary people to stop them. Ghosts, vampires, werewolves, and strange spirits must be put to rest, and only you can do it: are you up to the task?.
The game begins with a group of relatively ordinary people (the player characters, perhaps with a few NPCs around for flavoring) finding themselves in a strange situation. They have to figure out what’s going on and how to stop the creature. Ultimately, the game is a game of investigative horror, though the horror can be run anywhere from G-rated, funny cartoon monsters to Unrated disturbing things. The characters may find themselves chasing ghosts through old, haunted mansions, seeking lost children in the dream world, chasing a vampire through the slums where he preys on prostitutes, Jack the Ripper style, or hunting (and being hunted by) a werewolf on a country estate.

Crime Fighter RPG is a roleplaying game that requires this rulebook, some copies of the Crime Fighter RPG character sheet, some pencils, two six-sided dice, and at least two players in order to play. One player takes the role of CM (Crime Master) while all other players will take the role of PCF (Player Crime Fighter). The CM will oversee all gameplay, put forth adventures for the PCFs to interact in, and play the role of each NPCF (Non-Player Crime Fighter) and NPC (Non-Player Criminal). The PCFs will create superheroic detectives which they will then play the role of.

THE WORLD OF CRIME FIGHTER RPG

In the superheroic world of Crime Fighter RPG, there are no super powers. Instead, all crime fighters and criminals are highly skilled human beings armed with advanced technological gadgetry. Technology and science are at modern day levels, with some breakthroughs being made by a few. Despite the lack of super powers, many individuals exist that are quite formidable due to great physical prowess, genius level IQ, and advanced weaponry. Because of this, many ‘super’ criminals exist which the normal authorities cannot handle, so the law has been taken into the hands of a select group of ‘super’ heroes known as crime fighters.

Letter of Patent, Tim Morgan – 1 page RPG, 2007

In Letter of Patent, players take on the roles of knights at a late medieval tournament. Knights participate in jousts and melee competitions, while trying to meet ladies and better themselves socially.

Characters are made by creating their letter of patent, a list of the knight’s ancestors. Depending on the stock of their forebears, their own stats and abilities are formed. Combat is simple, yet includes rules for damage to self, horse, equipment and even reputation.

LoP uses six stats: Melee (used to attack while on foot), Joust (used to attack while on horseback), Shield (used to defend, either on foot or on horse), Romance (used for influencing women), Honor (used for interactions with men), and Wealth (a measure of the character’s fortunes). Each are abbreviated with their first letter.

Bring Out Your Gods is an RPG set in the ancient world, spanning from China to Greece to Rome to Egypt. It’s a world where the gods have started to appear, as men and women with animal heads. These people are the new gods, entering a new world. Each has godly powers and must decide between being a devil or a saint, a beggar or a king.

Bring Out Your Gods uses a dice system that’s quite simple: roll d6s equal to your appropriate stat and count successes (any rolls that are four or above) and then compare those to the difficulty rating.

So what will it be? A holy god, saving the weak, or a devil in disguise, crushing all who oppose them? Will you be king, and lead armadas to your whim, or will you be a loner, simply wandering and committing your godly will whenever you see fit?

Gods

The players are gods. New gods, gods who on day simply awoke with a new head, the head of a beast. These gods are superhuman in everyway, but they are not true gods. They do not come born with the great godly powers that the old gods have. They are only better than a human in every way, shape, and form.

Governments quickly accepted the existence of these gods, but there is still a mystery about them. Kings and Pharaohs fear them for their powers, for their ability to uproot them. The people see them as either enemies, especially to the gods who simply ravage the country side for the hell of it, or they see them as saviors, for those who heal the wounded and feed the hungry.

You can be any of these things: a savior or a devil, a king or a beggar. But you are surely at least a god.

This game is Free! Really! Give copies to your friends! (Written: Apr-17-1998)
Printing Instructions: This is an PDF document. Just load and print.
Needed materials: 6-sided dice, paper, writing tools, and 2 or more players.

In a war-torn future, an elite unit of soldiers roams the depths of space exploring Palaces, huge warships frozen in space and time. They use their training and sense-enhancing drugs developed by the military to defeat unknown enemies and to learn straight from the Palace’s Memory Flow. But beware, for without teamwork they could easily fall into the mouth of madness.

What is Silent Archaea?

Silent Archaea is a role-playing game. The characters will be elite troopers exploring huge abandoned spaceships in a distant future. They will use weapons, teamwork and sense-enhancing drugs to complete their mission. Some may go mad. Some will never return.

In kalma, you will take the role of old, old people who have stolen the breath of others. Now on their last breath, they have one more thing to achieve. kalma was submitted for the 27 Sight & Sound game design challenge.

Characters in this game are old people who have lived past their rightful age.

Some time ago, perhaps as a child or perhaps last week, they stole the breath from another person. In doing so, they took the remainder of that person’s life as their own. The act may have been deliberate, malicious, accidental or for another reason entirely, but the breath-taker was forever changed. Since stealing breath, the character has lived on the edge of life, able to see or sniff out elements of the underworld.

Perhaps they can occasionally glimpse the gloomy fate that awaits others, can smell impending accidents or can touch and weave the wisps of life connecting everyone. But most importantly, they have lived beyond their allotted span.

FLASHBACK is a game about identity and the power of choice. The Players assume the roles of characters (PCs) that awaken in a strange place, with no memory of their former lives. As the game progresses, Players receive Flashbacks which represent the slow trickle of memory returning to the character. Although the cards indicate the content of the memories, it’s up to the individual Player to decide its specifics. Does the memory of committing a crime make one a criminal or is it the choices made from here that matter most? The game is designed to function as a one-shot RPG, however, there is no reason the game could not be continued to extend the story of any characters created during the session. You could even use this game as the prequel of another RPG altogether! Though the game could be played with two people, it really shines with a GM (guiding action, mediating conflicts, and controlling pace through Triggers) and four or more players. If you really want to play with only two people, both should be Players and simply share GM duties between them.

The game is heavily inspired by the film Unknown which utilizes all of the desired themes perfectly and will be used as the Example Game, but there is no reason why the game can’t be played in an alternate setting or using entirely new Triggers or Flashbacks.

Your head pounds as your senses grudgingly float back from the depths of unconsciousness. A shrill noise pierces the silence. Your heavy lids lift to reveal strange and unfamiliar surroundings, hard walls of thick concrete, tiny windows barred with heavy iron, and one ominous steel door, with no handle. The noise assaults your eardrums again, resonating painfully inside your aching head. Around you lay the motionless bodies of unfamiliar foes… or are they friends? You can’t remember anything, how you got here, where ‘here’ even is, the identities of those around you, or even your own name! The high pitch ring echoes once more and you realize a phone is somewhere nearby. Maybe you should answer it. Maybe you should find out what the hell is going on, before someone else does…