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.

Between ‘what could be’ and ‘what is’ lies a hungry darkness. The dreamers that dare this darkness and not prepared for the horrors it offers, but there is hope. A cadre of wild and impassioned devils lie in wait, for their chance to guard those that dream against the teeth of darkness…

About Guardian Devils

Throughout history, from the earliest of times, they have been with us just like the darkness. History has given them many names and titles. Just a few of which are: witches, wizards, shaman, sorcerer, enchanters, warlocks, and such. All of these names refer to the same beings. These are powerful people who are no longer whole, that operate just outside of what is, always eclipsed by the darkness. These protectors stop the darkness from corrupting the hearts of those that date to dream.

In the Victorian era of this game, they are known as devils. This rather dirty name comes from the powers of such being clearly clashing with the doctrines of the church. All devils are cast as inherently evil, though they are not demons after any fashion. In fact, the devils are guardians of the heart. They seek to protect those that dream from the despair of the darkness.

In the world of procedural crime dramas, there are two separate yet equally important groups: the writers who dream up the episodes and the actors that bring them to life. This is their RPG. Time Constraint: 1 session of 2 hours Ingredients: Law, Team, Actor (+”Steele”)

About the Game:

“Here’s to wearing a badge, carrying a highpowered sidearm, and hopefully being right more often than we’re wrong.”
~Lennie Briscoe, Law & Order, ?For God & Country?

In Crime & Punishment players take on the roles of writers and actors in a procedural drama. In the first half of the game, players create story elements that will entice each other?s investment. In so doing, they earn resources for the second half of the game when they will need them to purchase time and glory in the spotlight of the drama they have created.

Man Called Tribe is a lovely game set on the glass shores of chaotic green seas, where you play the group consciousness of the Joyful neolithic tribes that fight the Wurms in a barbaric postpostmodern world.

SETTING:

All the tribes live on the melted glass plains that surround the ancient Dead Places. Your plains are surrounded by the green Seas. If your tribe enters the twisted metal and concrete of the Dead Places, you die. This brings you sorrow. If your tribe enters the green Seas, you die. This also brings you sorrow.

Thus your tribe lives in the Middle Lands, the glass plains that are your home. The middle lands are a joyful place. Even your dreamers, those who sleep for the tribe, feel the joy.

Wurms form from the green Seas and visit your glass plains. Your hunters kill them and your tribe eats them. This gives you sustenance and brings you joy. Sometimes, they kill your hunters. This brings you sorrow.

When you meet other tribes, that is a time of celebration. You can procreate. You can war with them. You can trade. These are joyous things.

Sometimes your scouts find relics from the Ancient Times. This is handy and also brings you joy. And sometimes a scout will find an Outcasta person who is not of any tribe. Giving the Outcast a tribe brings joy to all.

When the silver notmoon covers the sun, the green seas recede and your dreamers stir. This is called the Awakening, when all tribes go to the notDead Place under the sea. Things change then. Joy is expressed. Outcasts appear. A small silver notStar rises. The whole tribe sleeps. The ancient term for this is Death. It is a joyous thing, for a new tribe will awaken.

What Mr. Big Wants, Mr. Big Gets! A Short, Competitive Heist Game for 2-4 Players.

Introduction

Welcome to The Right Hand of Mr. Big! In this game, Mr. Big wants an object, and he’s sent his best pair of agents to get it. However, Mr. Big’s chief rival, Mr. Small, does not want to give up this object, and has sent his own pair of agents to guard it. The players will take on the role of these two teams, acting in the stead of their masters, attempting to achieve their goals. For the sake of clarity, any reference to ‘Mr. Big’ is meant as a reference to the person the teams are working for.

This game draws from inspirations like the Soderbergh Oceans 11, Sneakers, Mission Impossible, the James Bond franchise, games like Splinter Cell, and the comic book series The Losers. So think modern setting, with technology standing in for magic as a means for otherwise human characters to get impossible or improbable things accomplished. The game aims to be fast and competitive, with each team creating new complications to confuse, block, and delight their opponents.

The year is 2116 AD. The world is divided by two super powers; the corporation known as IBS (Itty Bitty Software), and the country of New Hampshire. The head of IBS is the Mega Trillionaire William Doors inventor and sole owner of Pre Comp-nition, the most powerful Computer System in the Solar System. Using time travel William Doors placed his super silicon neutron computers in the 2th and 21st centuries.

The way Pre Comp-nition works is if a customer has a question of any kind the question is sent into the past where the super silicon neutron computers have more than one hundred years of ?COMP TIME? to work on the problem. The answer is given to the client immediately after the question is made. The company also has a ?D?j? vu Contract?. For an extra fee the answer is supplied before the question is asked.

The Pre Comp-nition facilities embedded in the past where huge due to the time portal equipment and cyber bowling alleys required by union regulations. This is why they had to be disguised as shopping malls.

All Pre Comp-nition facilities known as ?Malls? were issued ?Temporal Beacons? with a panic button. If the panic button is pushed a message is sent to IBS HQ signaling the need for emergency help. Before the recovery team (ingredient one) is sent a ?First In? team is injected to gather a pre-recovery report and to make sure a ?Time Tare? hasn?t developed. If atomic cleansing is not required a hardened Para military team known as The Mall Rats are sent to track down the Temporal Beacon, reestablish communications with the personnel and restore the Computers to full operation. That?s your job.

As the 193s begin, the Committee for the Exploration of Mysteries and the Enlightenment of Mankind is the foremost institution of learning and research in the world. You are esteemed members of the Committee, each a pulp hero of the first order, and you are all newly returned from an expedition to discover an ancient city and the lost secrets hidden there. Now you sit before the assembled Committee to give a full report of your expedition. Each of you harbors the same desire in your heart–to be recognized as the first among equals and to garner the most acclaim for your incomparable contributions to the expedition’s success.

This is a game of roles.

Taking on the roles of investigators into the strange and unusual in all genres and settings

In this game the players take the role of adventurers, thrill seekers, secret agents, whatever all on the path to finding the truths in the world.

It is much like a first person shooter style video game in that the adventures are supposed to be linear, damage heals in between games and death is not at all permanent.

During a Session:
The characters fight and overcome various monsters, villains, defeat traps and potential solve puzzles. The person running that session using the Backstory and Genre as inspiration orchestrates all this. While during a Session the characters can find better weapons, armor, gear, special devices to give them special attributes, abilities, Temporary or Permanent Adds to their scores or heal or negate a previous Restart potentially allowing for an add to their Persistence for finding such a powerful item.

It sucks that I finished writing that kick@$$ song but it looks like ?Ancient Committee? isn?t going to get off the ground. It?s just so tragic, but fitting.

On the other hand, I didn?t have much to do tonight and I ended up writing this game thing. It?s actually pretty sweet, becase it?s like what Ancient Committee would have been if Mikey hasn?t been such a flake, y?know? It?s SO unfair but at least this is like, what could have been.

What is this?

This is a game about the evolution of a mid-9s emo band that was more or less called ?Ancient Committee?. It had this neat gimmick, where the band had all these obscure, metaphorical songs about some kind of ancient committee of angels in a glass city or something, and there were songs about relating to man kind through sorrow. (Or am I getting confused with Coheed and Cambria? Whatever.)

And anyway, it wasn?t a great band, but it wasn?t the worst emo band ever, y?know? Besides, you all play one-time members of the band, so if sucked it?s kinda your fault. You all had some role in the band ? maybe vocals, maybe guitar, maybe vibrophone ? and you all contributed some lyrics at some point.

And because this is emo, those lyrics are based on your Real Sincere Pain.

The Opposite of People is a game of illegal art. The participants will create stories of theatre and debauchery (because there’s always debauchery where theatre is involved) in settings where such works are frowned upon or outright banned.

Introduction

?We’re actors! We’re the opposite of people!?
– The Player, Rosencrantz & Guildernstern Are Dead.

In The Opposite of People, the players take up the roles of a travelling troupe of actors. Though they start almost penniless and down on their luck, they hope their travels through the villages and towns of the world will bring them fame and fortune. Particularly fortune.

The game can be set anytime and anywhere, though three settings are provided. These settings are sketched broadly in order to allow plenty of space for the players to detail their own towns, countries, cultures and people.

The game is designed for four people, and is played in ten one-hour sessions. Each session represents one town on a tour. The first shows are performed in small communities, but the final performance takes place in the capital city itself.

The group will need about 3 tokens and a deck of ordinary playing cards.

For tokens, I use plastic gold nuggets. You could use coins, beads or jellybeans, but make sure they?re shiny and tempting.

Someone to Love is a five player dating RPG, where each session takes two characters and puts them into a date. After ten sessions, each character will have dated each other character. What mixes things up in Someone to Love is that the characters are all in the underworld, as lonely ghosts, monsters, gods, and the like. It is also the first main course in the Full Course of Love and Death.
This RPG is the second in the Full Course of Love and Death, occurring between Escape from Prince Charming and the Marriage of Persephone. Someone to Love is the first of the three main courses, and presents a unique perspective on both love and death. In this case, by telling the tales of dating in the afterlife. To link with it?s predecessor, Escape from Prince Charming, ensure that the archetypes selected for the characters include several of the characters who died in that game. This game links into the Marriage of Persephone because the goddess takes notice of the most successful date in this game and decides to take it upon herself to throw a huge wedding for it. This naturally leads to the trials and troubles explored in the next game.

As a game designed for Iron Game Chef 26, it is necessary to discuss the allotments made for that contest. Indeed, for the theme of time, Someone to Love fulfills the ten sessions of 1 hours each requirement. And it uses the following contest terms: Committee, Ancient, and Emotion.