From the Mind of Trevor Stone

In celebration of the 20th anniversary of Over the Edge, the roleplaying game of surreal danger, Atlas Games is open sourcing the game's core rules as WaRP: Wanton Role-Playing System. The Open Game License is a popular "open source" license for role playing games, introduced by Wizards of the Coast when they released Dungeons & Dragons version 3.

Over the Edge has a very simple and flexible rule system that's designed to let you play any character you can imagine and tell any story you like. I've created Over the Edge characters as mundane as a mystical soup-makin' chef from New Orleans and as wacky as a sentient trench coat who psychically controls the person wearing him, questing for his lost wife (a fedora) and their two young boots. I've also wanted to play Count Von Count in a one shot :-)

Over the Edge is set in the imaginary island of Al Amarja. It's a place full of conspiracies and fringe science and street gangs and ancient mysteries. It's a great place to play, and the WaRP system can expand the playground to anywhere you can imagine. Space westerns? High fantasy? Regency romance? International thriller? Blaxploitation? Give it a go! And with the OGL rules, you can send all your players a link to a PDF so they can arrive at your house ready to play.

Q: Alice, how are things with Bob?
A: We have a solid platonic relationship. We role play every week.

The days are getting shorter. The air is getting colder. The summer adventures among brooks and trees will soon turn to winter adventures among books and teas. It's time to make mulled cider and bring to fruition an idea I've been mulling for close to a year. Help make it a success!


Hey you. Yeah, you. You're invited to be part of my role playing game! Even if you've never role played before. Even if you don't own polyhedral dice. Even if your schedule is pretty tight. Even (especially) if I don't know you very well. If you're in the Denver/Boulder area (even occasionally), you can join the fun.

My goal is to tell interactively a cinematic character-focused story. Imagine that we're collaboratively creating a hit new indie TV show. You get to be a voice actor and story teller assigned to a fascinating character. There will be very little time spent "rolling to see if you hit the goblin." There will be lots of time spent thinking of creative ways for characters to solve interesting problems. There may be numbers which describe your character, but they won't be as important as the words which describe your character.

Character concepts will evolve as the game proceeds, so we'll start with some basics. When was he born? Where? When did he die? How? What sorts of things did she like to do? What was she good at? How did she struggle? Who was important in her life? These questions allow a lot of freedom. Different characters may come from different parts of the world (or a whole other world), from different times, from very different backgrounds. Perhaps you'll play a hero of ancient Ireland, killed by the English lord who stole his land. Perhaps you'll play a writer whose plane crashed as he was researching a book about a corrupt world leader. Perhaps you'll play a small furry creature from somewhere in the vicinity of Betelgeuse whose planet was destroyed by a Vogon constructor fleet.

Although your concept will include the character's death, events in the game may change that outcome or at least right the wrongs done her and those for whom she cares. Perhaps one week the group will work to thwart the avarice of the Irish hero's nemesis and save his family from becoming farming thralls. Maybe the next week we'll learn how a band of concerned time travelers worked to ensure the author's research was published and the despot forced from office. And the following week the story might take place on a space ship fighting an intense diplomatic and physical battle against the mindless bureaucracy of the Vogons.

The game will progress in episodes. From time to time (once a week? once a month?) I'll pick a day I want to play and send a call to everyone who's interested. Some subset will be available to play that day (limit: something reasonable like six or eight); those players' characters will be the focus of the episode. The plot of that episode will revolve around events in one (or more) of those characters' lives. Not everyone will play in every game, but that's okay because not everyone will be able to come to the same place at the same time. Over several sessions, you'll have an opportunity to interact with a subset of the interesting bunch I call friends.

Interested? Drop me a line. I'll ask you some basic questions like "When's generally a good time to play?" "What RPGs have you played before?" and "What sort of character are you thinking of?" I'll then work with you to come up with a character that will be interesting for you to play and a setting that will be good for telling stories. Once I've got a feeling for the characters people want to play and the stories they want to tell, I'll pick a system and we'll say some things formally about the characters. The system will probably be on the free-form end of things and will mainly be used for a tool where an uncertain but structured outcome is desired.

So what are you waiting for? It only takes a few seconds to respond and say "I'm interested!" Then the ball will roll where it may.