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Anything goes???
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Beale Knight
First Post
About Torg
Torg was a RPG from West End Games released in the early ‘90s. The jist of it centered around the idea that Possibilities were an energy that could be quantified and gathered. Extra-dimensional warlords, called High Lords, teamed up to invade Earth because Earth had so much Possibility energy it would have shrugged off any single invading dimension without humanity even having to do anything.
The US east and west and part of Canada were invaded by a primitive, highly spiritual lizard like people. England was invaded by a fantasy realm who switched sides almost at once. France was invaded by what was initially an oppressive medieval theocracy but soon became an oppressive cyberpunk theocracy. Egypt was in the hands of a pulp style pharaoh villain, like an Egyptian Doctor Doom. Japan was subtly invaded by a high tech, paranoid corporate culture that was playing all sides against the others. Finally, Indonesia was invaded by the mastermind of the joint invasion, a High Lord of a Victorian Horror realm. Later “Space Gods” landed in South America (again, they’d visited some thousands of years ago), a bizarre tunnel world developed, and cyber-demons took over Los Angeles.
It is long out of print, but much of the material is still available on line (sources fail me at the moment though.). The best web source for more information IMO is here:
http://www.aoc.nrao.edu/~jogle/TORG/
I GM’ed the game for about four years and it made for an interesting setting, and could easily make for the party you described. Just ignore the details of the meta-plot. If you get your hands on a copy.
[ps-IIRC someone on these boards was in talks to acquire the rights and had plans to re-release it.]
edited to complete a sentence.
arwink said:
Torg was a RPG from West End Games released in the early ‘90s. The jist of it centered around the idea that Possibilities were an energy that could be quantified and gathered. Extra-dimensional warlords, called High Lords, teamed up to invade Earth because Earth had so much Possibility energy it would have shrugged off any single invading dimension without humanity even having to do anything.
The US east and west and part of Canada were invaded by a primitive, highly spiritual lizard like people. England was invaded by a fantasy realm who switched sides almost at once. France was invaded by what was initially an oppressive medieval theocracy but soon became an oppressive cyberpunk theocracy. Egypt was in the hands of a pulp style pharaoh villain, like an Egyptian Doctor Doom. Japan was subtly invaded by a high tech, paranoid corporate culture that was playing all sides against the others. Finally, Indonesia was invaded by the mastermind of the joint invasion, a High Lord of a Victorian Horror realm. Later “Space Gods” landed in South America (again, they’d visited some thousands of years ago), a bizarre tunnel world developed, and cyber-demons took over Los Angeles.
It is long out of print, but much of the material is still available on line (sources fail me at the moment though.). The best web source for more information IMO is here:
http://www.aoc.nrao.edu/~jogle/TORG/
I GM’ed the game for about four years and it made for an interesting setting, and could easily make for the party you described. Just ignore the details of the meta-plot. If you get your hands on a copy.
[ps-IIRC someone on these boards was in talks to acquire the rights and had plans to re-release it.]
edited to complete a sentence.
Last edited:
It sounds like a fairly high-powered session of the Buffy rpg to me. 
Seriously - it depends on the players. You can go with "anything goes" as long as they all keep to the same tone. The problems will start when two players come up with serious, heroic characters torn from their worlds and sent to fight a cosmic evil, and the third player wants to play Zippy the Cartoon Wondersnail.
Work out what you want to do with the game and discuss it with the players first.
Seriously - it depends on the players. You can go with "anything goes" as long as they all keep to the same tone. The problems will start when two players come up with serious, heroic characters torn from their worlds and sent to fight a cosmic evil, and the third player wants to play Zippy the Cartoon Wondersnail.
Work out what you want to do with the game and discuss it with the players first.
Jürgen Hubert
First Post
When I was developing my homebrew system I used a campaign called Elseworlds. (this was before DC stole my title).
I wanted to see if my rules held up under different genres.
You couldn't be like giant robots or monsters but any human/near human could be played high or low tech. Here is a list of characters played all fairly successfully.
A Jedi knight (Post rebellion era just after movie 6)
A pirate
A wind mage
A mid 90's homocide/vice cop. (deadly with her two 9 millimeters)
A homeless ex Vietnam vet who had been experimented on by the government. (once punched a metal robot to death)
A shaolin Monk
A lizard man wizard.
A high tech Engineer/weaponsmith.
And several others that fail my memory.
Basically gates opened up dragging you from one world to another. Once a gate grabbed you the more likely another gate would find you etc.
You also rolled at random to see how much gear you had when you were initailly grabbed. From butt naked to driving a tank. (Jedi knight came through with his X-Wing then wrecked it)
They went on all sorts of missions ending up in all sorts of different worlds/tech and magic levels.
It was a lot of fun but failed in one important aspect, It didn't have a real goal. An end point.
I wanted to see if my rules held up under different genres.
You couldn't be like giant robots or monsters but any human/near human could be played high or low tech. Here is a list of characters played all fairly successfully.
A Jedi knight (Post rebellion era just after movie 6)
A pirate
A wind mage
A mid 90's homocide/vice cop. (deadly with her two 9 millimeters)
A homeless ex Vietnam vet who had been experimented on by the government. (once punched a metal robot to death)
A shaolin Monk
A lizard man wizard.
A high tech Engineer/weaponsmith.
And several others that fail my memory.
Basically gates opened up dragging you from one world to another. Once a gate grabbed you the more likely another gate would find you etc.
You also rolled at random to see how much gear you had when you were initailly grabbed. From butt naked to driving a tank. (Jedi knight came through with his X-Wing then wrecked it)
They went on all sorts of missions ending up in all sorts of different worlds/tech and magic levels.
It was a lot of fun but failed in one important aspect, It didn't have a real goal. An end point.
Eridanis
Bard 7/Mod (ret) 10/Mgr 3
Sheesh. I come to this thread expecting as discussion of Cole Porter music, and instead, I get an RPG discussion. Where do you people think you are?
To be on topic, I think Horacio has a point; I'm not sure of the long-term viability of such a thing, but it would be a blast to try.
To be on topic, I think Horacio has a point; I'm not sure of the long-term viability of such a thing, but it would be a blast to try.
Jürgen Hubert
First Post
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