Fear of the Unknown

Get your table playing in minutes, not hours.   GATEWAY RPG is a free, rules-lite d20 system built for zero-prep adventures, sudden one-shots, and seamless intro sessions. Familiar 5E-style mechanics with all the bloat stripped out, so you can run any genre instantly: neon-soaked cyberpunk streets, grit-filled noir alleys, high fantasy, cosmic horror, and everything in between. The Definitive Edition is now the main book. This is the complete, current version of GATEWAY RPG: updated core rules, solo play, a starter bestiary, and homebrew variants, character sheets all combined into one source. New artwork, professional layout, and everything players and GMs need in a single 132 page PDF. Want the history? Every older version of the rulebook, spanning 2017 to 2026, is bundled in the Legacy Zip below for collectors and the curious. Download the complete PDF bundle. AI Disclosure: This Enhanced Edition of Gateway RPG features some AI-generated artwork and layout assistance. The rules were still hand written by me and human proofread/playtested since 2017. As a one-man passion project with $0 budget, and $0 revenue gain from this game, this edition utilizes AI imagery only to provide a visually richer and cohesive experience while keeping the game entirely FREE. The original Classic Edition from 2017, featuring human-created artwork, is included as a bonus in the download files. However, if you are only looking for a gaming experience completely free of AI-generated assets, the standalone Classic Edition can be found exclusively on its own dedicated product page at https://gatewayrpg.itch.io/gateway-rpg-classic-edition. What’s Inside? Definitive Edition (Main Book): The complete game in one volume. Updated rules, solo play engine, starter bestiary, and homebrew variants. Legacy Zipfile (2017-2026): Every prior version of the rulebook, character sheet, supplement preserved as released. For archivists, returning players, and anyone who wants to see how the game evolved. Core Rules: The streamlined engine for players and Game Masters, in both English and Spanish (Reglas en Español). Character Sheets: Multiple Printable and Form Fillable Character Sheets Ready-to-Play Content: Pregenerated characters and one-shot adventure modules spanning multiple genres. Jump straight into the action. Player's Toolkit: Printable and form-fillable character sheets, a one-page quick reference guide, and the d20 Oracle for solo play. Starter Bestiary: 25 adversaries across 11 settings, from High Fantasy to Space Opera to Lovecraftian Horror. Homebrew Variants: Over 20 pages of optional mechanics, including Spark of Heroism (Inspiration), Pushing for Success (partial success), and genre modifiers for Survival and Cosmic Horror. Pocket Character Sheets: Compact sheets designed for portability. Solo Play Quickstart Zine: A portable, zine-style guide for on-the-go solo adventures. NEW: Android Player Companion App Character Builder: Create custom characters or select from 30 curated pre-mades. Pocket Rules: Quickly search core mechanics and references on the fly. Sheet-Integrated Dice: Roll checks directly from your sheet. Solo Engine: Built-in oracle for quick, on-the-go solo adventures. https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.aistudio.gatewayrpg.app Designer's Note: GATEWAY RPG grew out of a personal passion for tabletop gaming. Back in 2015, I discovered S. John Ross’s classic 1993 game, Risus: The Anything RPG. It was free, modular, ultra-flexible, and simple to pick up, but as I played more TTRPG's like DND5e, I missed the iconic d20 and the drama of critical hits and misses. I created GATEWAY RPG to capture that same beginner-friendly spirit while bringing back the thrill of the twenty-sided die and being able to use it for any setting. Whether you are running quick one-shots, playing standalone adventures, diving into solo sessions, or modularly introducing advanced rules as your group learns, GATEWAY adapts seamlessly to your table. GATEWAY RPG and Aurican's Lair are a Not-For-Profit Tabletop Roleplaying Game publisher.

Monster of the Week (MOTW) is an urban fantasy-horror tabletop role-playing game developed by Michael Sands. It was first published in 2012, and a revised edition was published by Evil Hat Productions in 2015. The entire theme of the game is heavily inspired by TV shows like Buffy, Supernatural, X-Files, Fringe and many others. The system it directly evolved from is Apocalypse World Description Players in the MOTW system take on the role of monster hunters. Capable of dealing with most creatures that might get in their way. Using skills to solve mysteries, track monsters and eventually defeat them.  System Overview & Key Features Powered by the Apocalypse Engine (2d6) Players roll two six-sided dice (2d6) when performing actions, adding relevant character modifiers to the result. Rolling a 10 or higher is considered a success. 7-9 is a partial success, which will also carry some added consequences. Getting a 6 or lower means failure - you have not succeeded in whatever you attempted and dire consequences are soon to follow. Basic and Playbook Moves Game mechanics are categorized into discrete actions called "Moves." Basic Moves are universally available to all characters and cover common actions such as "Investigate a Mystery," "Kick Some Ass," or "Act Under Pressure." Playbook Moves are exclusive, specialized abilities granted by a character's chosen Playbook, allowing them to manipulate the narrative or game mechanics in unique ways. Finite Luck Points Each character possesses a limited track of Luck points. A player may permanently expend a point of Luck to retroactively alter a dice roll to a 12 (a complete success) or to entirely negate a single instance of sustained damage. Luck is a resource the players have to keep an eye on. Using too much can get you out of trouble, but if you don't have it when you need it most - trouble awaits. Harm and Exploiting Weaknesses Physical trauma is tracked using a short monitor called "Harm." Player characters and adversaries possess low thresholds for sustaining Harm, making direct combat inherently dangerous. To successfully defeat a primary antagonist, players are mechanically required to investigate and utilize the creature's specific weakness, as standard physical attacks are often insufficient to achieve a permanent victory. The Mystery Countdown To structure a gameplay session, the Keeper utilizes a tool called the Countdown. This is a chronological timeline detailing the sequence of events that will occur if the player characters fail to intervene. The Countdown is divided into escalating phases, ending with a catastrophic event. It serves to govern the pacing of the investigation and provide a sense of urgency.

Kids on Bikes is a nostalgic tabletop roleplaying game about ordinary people in a small town facing strange and powerful forces they cannot fully understand, designed by Jonathan Gilmour and Doug Levandowski and published by Renegade Game Studios. The first edition was funded on Kickstarter in November 2017, raising $93,471 from 3,069 backers, and published by Hunters Books in partnership with Renegade, which handled sales and marketing, with a release planned for May 2018. A second edition was funded on Kickstarter in 2022, raising $182,049 from 2,793 backers. The game won the 2019 Gold ENNIE Award for Best Family Game, and its Strange Adventures! Volume Two won the same award in 2020. The system is the basis of Teens in Space and Kids on Brooms, with a further game, Kids in Capes, forthcoming. Description Players take on the kids and adults of a small American town, who are brought together by a mystery in the manner of Stranger Things and E.T. The town is built by the table, and players and the Game Master (GM) answer questions about its landmarks and local sports mascot to produce a place with its own rumours and relationships. The game can be set in any decade of the last century or the present day. The game asks a table to build the setting together, and to accept that the characters are ordinary. The kids are not heroes, and even the optional powered character costs the story something. It suits groups who like character drama and shared worldbuilding more than tactics, and the sample module sets the story in Point Pleasant, New Jersey.

StarCar is a permanently free linear star systems cartography tool. It enables GMs running sci-fi campaigns to visualize and share star maps with their players easily. It allows a lot of different customizations for orbital bodies, like planets, secondary stars, Ringworlds, Dyson Spheres, and more. GMs can add notes to individual orbital bodies, stars, and moons. The notes can be totally customizable, or use either Traveller or Stars Without Number rules. If they want, the GM can even export a stylized PDF report that details all the notes in an easy-to-follow format. And if the GM just needs something right away? StarCar will roll the dice and generate a totally randomized system: random stars, planets, and even randomized plot hooks. Once the GM is finished, they can export it in a number of different formats: PNG, WebP, or JPG, or with settings like Printer Friendly or Transparent Background. Anything exported is licensed under Creative Commons 4.0, which means the person who makes it owns it. They can even use it in any products they sell, with attribution.

Simple tavern keeper making his way through the universe and talking about Dungeons & Dragons. Crispy's Tavern is a drama YouTuber who covers stories both inside and outside the TTRPG space on Crispy's Tavern: Tales and Tea. On the side, Crispy gives advice to aspiring GMs and posts cosplay photos on their social media.  Links youtube.com - Youtube channel patreon.com - Patreon page

Green Ronin Publishing brings fantasy roleplaying back to its dark and gritty roots with the Dragon Age RPG. Based on the hugely popular video games, the award-winning Dragon Age RPG brings the excitement of BioWare’s rich fantasy world to the tabletop. Designed by Chris Pramas (Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay, Freeport), Dragon Age features an original game system (the Adventure Game Engine) that’s both easy to learn and exciting to play. The Dragon Age RPG is the perfect portal to tabletop roleplaying. The Adventure Game Engine’s rules run on your wits and a roll of the dice. Dragon Age also features an innovative stunt system that keeps combat and spellcasting tense and exciting. So gather your friends, grab some dice, and get ready to enter a gripping world of heroic challenges and villainous rivals, of brave knights and bloodthirsty darkspawn, of mysterious gods and menacing demons, the world of Dragon Age!