DIE: A ROLE-PLAYING GAME KIERON GILLEN ©2019 ART BY STEPHANIE HANS COVER DESIGN BY RIAN HUGHES Copyright © 2019 Kieron Gillen Ltd & Stéphanie Hans. All rights reserved. DIE, the Die logos, and the likenesses of all characters herein or hereon are trademarks of Kieron Gillen Ltd & Stéphanie Hans. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means (except for short excerpts for journalistic or review purposes) without the express written permission of Kieron Gillen Ltd or Stéphanie Hans. All names, characters, events, and places herein are entirely fictional. Any resemblance to actual persons (living or dead), events, or places is coincidental. Representation: Law Offices of Harris M. Miller II, P.C. ([email protected]) CONTENTS 1) INTRODUCTION 2) THE WORLD OF DIE 3) PREPARATION 4) THE FIRST SESSION 5) PREPARING THE SECOND SESSION 6) THE SECOND SESSION 7) THE RULES 8) RUNNING THE ARCHETYPES 9) ADVICE FOR GAMESMASTERS 10) OTHER RESOURCES WELCOME I have a habit of being a little extra around my comics. I fear this is the most extra thing I’ve ever done. Alongside creating the comic DIE with Stephanie Hans, I developed the role-playing game you hold in your hands. Er… figure of speech. “PDF on your hard drive” doesn’t quite have the same ring. This RPG creates, in a miniaturized form, your own version of the first arc of DIE. As such, there’s some possible structural spoilers for the comic. I say “possible” because it really is your own version of the comic. The comic is available in a handsome trade edition from all good book and comic shops, whether physical or online. It’s $10, so even reasonable. I’ve justified this whole ludicrous endeavour to myself as “marketing” so popping to your retailer of choice and reading it to get the vibe would be an excellent thing. It looks like this… I suggest that if you’re not planning on running the game, you stop reading now. Going to the Handouts PDF to have a nose is safe, though I’d only read the player character sheets. They’re the first ones. Reading the Rules section is also safe. There is a third PDF that will be released in the future called Arcana. This is basically supplementary weird material. There are many references to it in the following. The most prominent one is (no, really, this is a thing) the “Box of Crap”. For now, consider them teases. I’ve never quite done anything like this. I’ve VOLUME 1 had amazing support from friends, but it’s FANTASY HEARTBREAKER still a huge thing. This is a Beta, a public playtest, so do excuse roughness. I hope you’ll find it interesting. There are at least three funny jokes. If you’ve any thoughts, do write to [email protected]. I’d love to hear what you make of it. Thanks for reading and/or playing and/or existing. This will be an adventure. Kieron Gillen London WHAT IS A ROLE-PLAYING GAME? and try to find their way home – or not. Upon arriving in the world, each comes This is a classical question to answer in into possession of one of the six titular an RPG manual. In the modern age, if dice of the comic and is entirely you don’t know, I’d suggest just transformed into a heroic identity. googling something like Critical Role and watching for a few minutes. That. That’s This is the structure of many pieces of a role-playing game. pop entertainment, from the 1980s D&D cartoon to Jumanji. Without the For the majority of the play time, DIE transformational aspect, it’s the mostly operates like a D&D model game. structure that underlies The Wizard of Players state what they want their Oz and The Lion and The Witch and The characters to do. The GM generally says Wardrobe. It also underlies the famously what happens. For character actions brutal 1980s fantasy epic The which are uncertain, the mechanics are Chronicles of Thomas Covenant the used to ascertain the success or failure Unbeliever, so don’t assume those of that action. references mean that it’s fun. There are some exceptions to the As such, each player generates two above, but we'll hold your hand through characters. The identity of the person in them. We love you. We will not abandon the mundane world, and the identity of you. the person in the fantasy world. Clearly, this can be confusing. For clarity, a INTRODUCTION TO THE DIE RPG BETA Persona is the person in the mundane world, and the Character is an DIE is a role-playing game (not to be individual in the fantasy world. The confused with “the world of Die” where Player controls the Persona who the game is set). Its standard mode of controls a Character. play involves between one and five players (who each play a single So for example, Lucy is sitting down to individual) and a Gamesmaster (who play. She generates Bob the depressed controls the rest of the world, and acts IT guy, who is then transformed into a as a referee). We may shorten towering Barbarian Rage Knight in the “Gamesmaster” to “GM” if we're feeling world of Die. Lucy is the Player. Bob the lazy. depressed IT guy is the Persona. The towering Barbarian Rage Knight is the DIE’s main mode is horror-fantasy. How Character. much it leans towards horror and how much it leans towards fantasy will be It should also be noted that Character for you to decide, if only through your rules apply to all people in the world of perception. One person’s horror is Die, whether they are controlled by another person’s fantasy. players or the GM. If there’s ever a case where we need to separate player- Specifically, DIE is a role-playing game controlled characters and GM-controlled where a group of people find characters, we use the phrase Avatar themselves transported from their to mean player-controlled characters. mundane lives to a fantasy world. In this There’s none in the Beta at the moment. fantasy world, they have adventures Oh – and we use dice to mean both the it's equally as likely that the players singular and plural of dice. As the will have to fight the Gamemaster's game's called DIE it's going to get persona to go home. It's possible confusing otherwise. that at least some of the players' personas will change their opinions, DIE RPG STRUCTURE possibly multiple times. Drama! Climax! A game takes the following structure. I suggest running it across 2-4 sessions, In other words, this is a core scenario... though include some guidelines for but a very flexible core scenario. It is a running it in a single session or dramatic arc rather than a set series of extending it. events. After a certain point, your game will go in its own radical direction, • Players and Gamesmaster (”GM”) before gathering back together in the gather and each generate a climax. persona. This is a social group in the real world, complete with rivalries, In playtests, we’ve had games which passions and bitterness. Unlike have just ended in a glorious RPG- many role-playing games, the GM typical brawl. In other playtests, we’ve also creates a persona. had players sit down in a circle and • You then roleplay the personas basically have a therapy session. sitting around and about to play a Seeing what happens is absolutely the role-playing game. Each persona fun of the game. then generates a fantasy role- playing character. BETA? WHAT DO YOU MEAN “BETA”? • The personas are magically transported into the fantasy realm, It means it’s not finished. Here’s a list of and (likely) transformed into the some things which you may expect to characters they generated. They find in a full DIE RPG which are simply rapidly discover that this has all not in this Beta release. been part of a scheme by the Gamesmaster’s persona – the • Extensive details on the world of Master. The Master has trapped the Die as described in the comic. As players there. in, monsters, areas, locales, etc • The personas go on an adventure, • Campaign play trying to find their way home. On the • Character advancement way they discover that the only way • Non-player characters of the to go home is for all the personas to core DIE archetypes agree to go home. And dead • A lot of balancing personas don’t count. If a decision is • An acceptable level of not made, everyone will end up playtesting dying. Erk. • A suitably professional time for • The story reaches a conclusion as proofreading the personas come to a consensus • A lack of self-indulgence on whether to go home or not – • Lists that stop when it runs out which includes the Gamemaster's of content persona. While it is possible that a • Really, it’s bad at lists peaceful consensus will be reached, • Oh so bad at lists At which point you may be mechanics of the game. If you ever feel understandably wondering why this you need to know the actual mechanics, thing is as long as it is. I swear, it’s not feel free to stop and jump to The Rules just because we’re bad at lists. which will explain all of that. There are a few suggestions for how an (For those who are familiar with RPGs intrepid player may choose to add these and want a brief overview, DIE runs off a things, if they wish, but fundamentally dice-pool system, where you compare this is a work in progress by a the number of successes rolled in a dice determined if enthusiastic amateur.