In 1986, 

Steve Jackson Games released the first edition of the GURPS Basic Set. Although the system has roots in
Jackson's Melee, Wizard, and The Fantasy Trip, GURPS was developed in direct response to Hero
Games' Champions: The Super Roleplaying Game (the original Point Buy game). The name comes from both Steve
Jackson's description of what he wanted and the in-house code for the project, "The Great Unnamed Role Playing
System". However, when the time came to release the product, they had not been able to come up with a better name
for it.
As a generic system, GURPS has no inherent story or background, although a number of settings have been
developed and published specifically for the system, and others have been adapted; see GURPS Settings.
For those curious about where GURPS fits in the taxonomies of game mechanics, GURPS is point-based and skill-
based rather than level- and class-based. All tasks are resolved by rolling three six-sided dice, creating a bell-curve
of probability instead of a flat line of equal chance.note  Success is awarded if the total of the die roll is equal to or less
than a target number, usually a character's skill level. The difficulty of a task is represented by a modifier to the
character's skill level, and not by the target number itself. All modifiers can only apply to that target number, and
never to the number rolled on the dice.
In combat, each round represents one second, which is a point of contention among people who argue the merits of
roleplaying systems. If you want to do anything in combat that's more complex than moving and
attacking, GURPS will require you to describe your tactics in terms of several successive one-second-long
maneuvers, and then go through several rounds of combat before you discover what the results are. It can kind of
interrupt the flow if you want to play an Exalted-style game full of elaborate stunts. The Fourth Edition
supplement GURPS Action was created to remedy this.
GURPS has been described as a "simulationist" system, because it includes lots of rules that tell you what's
happening in the game-world without much affecting the outcome of the relevant event. For example, when an
attacker succeeds at his roll to hit, the defender always gets to choose how to defend and makes the appropriate
defense roll (unless it was a critical hit or a surprise). The defense could be handled as penalties applied to the attack
roll, and the odds of dealing damage would be the same—but in that case, should your opponent avoid taking
damage, you wouldn't know if it was because you missed entirely, or nearly hit but the defender dodged, or hit too
soft to do any damage, or hit hard enough to do damage but your opponent is too much of a badass to notice. This is
helpful to game masters narrating the combat because it tells them exactly what to narrate, but it does take longer.
Perhaps the best feature of GURPS is the huge number of Sourcebooks that have been written for it. Pick any genre
or topic, and you will probably find at least one GURPS book covering it (often available in PDF rather than print
form these days). Broad categories are covered in genre books; specific settings may receive their own books. In
addition to suggestions and notes regarding the topic of the Sourcebook, each volume invariably includes additions
to and errata for the basic rules set.note  This has led people to ask why they should buy a so-called "universal system"
that requires the purchase of a new rulebook every time the players wish to use that system to play in a new genre.
Because of this, GURPS is often compared unfavorably with the Hero System, a universal gaming system whose
sourcebooks and supplements have never had to add new rules to the Core Set — though the 4th edition evolution
has made such additions less extensive.
On the other hand, new rules aside, many of the supplements are useful enough as setting sourcebooks that people
using other Game Systems will occasionally buy them as references; this was, in fact, part of the original mission
statement for the game and the reason the "U" stands for "Universal". The opposite is also true; with a little work,
most game worlds can be converted to GURPS, usually with an increase in utility and flexibility. The intention was
that by building the game around "real world" units of measurement instead of "rounds" and "hexes", it would be
easier for people using other systems to make use of the information in the supplements. Of course "real world" in
this context means the USA; pounds, feet, yards as originally developed in the UK (international editions, however,
are metricated). GURPS Traveller subjects the previously-metric Third Imperium to this Cultural
Translation (though the original was also American) on the grounds of "fitting in with existing products". Some 3rd
edition products would randomly throw in some metric units anyway, because trying to use two unit systems at the
same time always works . As of the fourth edition, official conversions from and to metric units are printed at the
beginning of the basic set.
Several GURPS supplements have their own pages; see here for a list.

GURPS provides examples of the following tropes:

(Note: Tropes covered in specific supplements may be discussed on those books' pages.)
 Absurdly Powerful Student Council: Discussed in Pyramid 107: Monster Hunters III as an alternative to typical
school structure.
 Acrofatic:
o Fat characters have no penalty to dexterity, speed, or Acrobatics skill. They also float well. However, their
maximum Health is limited if sufficiently fat, which affects speed slightly, making it more expensive for them to be
fast.
o In 3rd Edition and before your extra weight is counted as part of your character's carrying encumbrance, which does
provide penalties to movement and a number of skills. These rules were reworked in the Fourth Edition.
 Actual Pacifist: The Pacifism (Total Nonviolence) disadvantage.
 Adjective Animal Alehouse: In the GURPS Fantasy (3rd edition) supplement Harkwood, the Clumsy Lion Inn is
located halfway between Castle Harkwood and Harkwood Town.
 Affectionate Parody: Cliffhangers, Atomic Horror and Tales of the Solar Patrol all deal with pulp genres and
old-fashioned SF in a tongue-in-cheek but affectionate way.
 After the End:
o GURPS Reign of Steel takes place in the aftermath of a Robot War.
o GURPS Y2K is a good resource for post-apocalyptic and apocalyptic scenarios in general.
o The most recent "quick play" series devoted to post-apocalyptic games is actually named GURPS After the End,
displacing Y2K as go-to material.
o The most common outcome of the tables for generating new worlds in Infinite Worlds, after just slightly different
"modern world", is "modern post-apocalypse", followed by "early 20th century post-apocalypse". You are more
likely to get those, than, say, all of the wacky settings the book is famous for combined.
 The Ageless: Unaging. This means only that the character will never grow older or die of old age; it confers no
resistance to disease or harm. Other forms of immortality require additional powers.
 All Swords Are the Same: The basic set plays this straight, grouping various similar kinds of weapons together.
In the Martial Arts and Low-Tech books, however, weapons are only grouped together if they are completely
identical, like a Japanese yari and a generic spear.
 Ancient Conspiracy: More than one sourcebook has detailed the workings of The Illuminati.
o GURPS Illuminati is more like a genre book than a worldbook, detailing the various ways the GM could use
an Ancient Conspiracy to drive a plot and organize a campaign.
o Conspiracy X in its second edition is a third-party series of GURPS sourcebooks.
o GURPS Cabal, a setting for third-edition GURPS Horror, is a magical Conspiracy Kitchen Sink.
 Annoying Arrows: Averted, arrows do a lot of damage, and a good archer has a decent chance of bringing down
even really tough fighters with one or two shots.
 "Arabian Nights" Days: GURPS Arabian Nights  is about roleplaying within this trope, while some lands in the
world of GURPS Banestorm reflect it. GURPS Castle Falkenstein: The Ottoman Empire  is about a version of
the Ottoman Empire, in a Gaslamp Fantasy world, that's very heavy on the Arabian Nights elements. And a few
of the universes described in GURPS Infinite Worlds encompass or at least reference the trope.
 Arbitrary Gun Power: One of the most systematic aversions possible. The closest anyone been able to come to
divining the formula used by the authors goes on for pages .
 Armor Is Useless:
o One of the main complaints about the 4th edition relates to the insistence of this trope in high TL settings. The rules
favour heavy-hitting weapons that are just impossible to block, and stealth technology as a means to avoid being
hit, rather than anything providing the ability to withstand said hit.
o Spaceships, at least in 4th edition, tend to carry weapons that massively overwhelm the armor on other craft of their
own size or smaller. For example, at TL10 a 1000 ton ship can carry enough particle beams in one design section to
destroy all but the most heavily armored 1000 ton ships in a single turn.
o Supers gives the Nonprotective Clothing Perk, which zigzags this: The player is allowed to wear clothing even if
their natural armor would otherwise prohibit it, but it never gives any defensive abilities, even if wearing full plate
armor.
 Army of The Ages: Eternity's Rangers in GURPS Time Travel.
 Arranged Marriage: Social Engineering has several mechanics related to this. Some arranged marriages
are political alliances and use those rules, while some are effectively courtships of the bride's parents. A normal
 arranged marriage is mechanically similar to a job, with a roll for the NPC spouse's loyalty, while
a forced marriage is a form of slavery and uses those loyalty rules.
 Arson, Murder, and Jaywalking: The Nonprotective Clothing Perk from Supers says that it can benefit a super by
preserving their decencynote , conceal their secret identity, or have pockets.
 Artistic License – Economics: Largely averted. Unlike in some games, a character's Wealth level is
acknowledged and has real effects in game. The default is "Average", but you can take less (down to "Dead
Broke") as a Disadvantage, and anything from "Comfortable" up to "Multimillionaire" as an advantage.
How much more? Theoretically, as long as your character survives and earns points, unlimited levels of wealth
are possible. Of course, there are some issues: If you take below-average Wealth, your character is stuck
in Perpetual Poverty until you earn enough points to buy off the Disadvantage. No matter how much money they
acquire in any given adventure, the GM must find a way to take it away. This can be interesting for both players
and GM when, for instance, a party of varying Wealth levels finds the Treasure Room. The converse is also true;
if you've spent valuable character points to be Fiction 500 rich (at least 150 character points in a game where
most characters start with 100 total), a worldwide depression isn't even going to faze your character. Unless of
course your friendly neighborhood GM decides it should.... Finally, both Disadvantage and Advantage Wealth
can be rendered meaningless when your character ventures into another of the Infinite Worlds. Even there,
though, a good GM will find a way to enforce both Disadvantage and Advantage, eventually.
 Artistic License – Martial Arts: The GURPS Martial Arts supplement (being as detail-oriented and versatile as is
usual with the system) divides each martial arts style into “realistic” and “cinematic” versions, the latter
requiring significant expenditure of character build points on exotic training and granting access to weird and
fancy moves and quasi-supernatural effects. The Classic Edition even had special cinematic rules many of which
reappeared in the next edition:
o Bulletproof Nudity: Less clothing makes it harder to be hit.
o Cannon Fodder: Minor NPCs fail all defense rolls and collapse if any damage gets through DR.
o Cinematic Explosions: Explosions do no direct damage though they do disarray clothing, blacken faces, and (most
importantly) cause knockback.
o Flesh Wounds: Ignore all but 1 HP (or FP) of damage... at the cost of one unspent character point
o Infinite Ammunition
o Melee Etiquette
o TV Action Violence: If struck by a potentially lethal attack (including a rapid-fire attack that inflicts multiple hits),
the hero can choose to convert his failed defense roll into a success. This costs him 1 FP and he loses his next turn.
o Chambara Fighting Rules
o Exploding Eyeballs: Explosive decompression results in a bloody mess.
o Firecrackers and Hand-held Nukes: Opposing-force grenades make noise and smoke, but do only sartorial damage
while friendly-force grenades are selective regarding the damage they do.
o Gun Control Law: The enemy will rarely use guns...even when they have them on their person.
o Hollywood Automatic Weapons: opponents haven't conceptualized aiming, especially when it comes to groups and
all burst fire counts as a snap shot, never getting an Accuracy bonus.
o Imperial Stormtrooper Marksmanship Academy: the bad guys never hit with the first shot or burst of automatic fire.
o Martial Artists Anonymous: Every NPC the characters encounter will have some martial art training in the expert or
better range.
 Attack Reflector:
o The default Reflective Damage Resistance will actually reflect punches back at the enemy just as well as lasers. But
because it's GURPS someone can simply overpower it if you're too far out of your league.
o The Reverse Missiles spell, which (as the name suggests) only works on projectile attacks.
o Challenge magazine #47 had an article, "The Ultra Tech File", with a number of items that couldn't fit in the Ultra
Tech supplement. One of them was the Laser Reflector, a computer-controlled mirror used in laser surveying that
could be used to reflect an incoming laser beam back at its source.
 Author Appeal: In any setting book by David Pulver, there will be an option to play as a Cat Girl. Though
in GURPS Reign of Steel, that requires a campaign in which you can play a “Pantera” biological android,
constructed and trained to hunt and kill humans.
 Background Magic Field: In the standard magic system, the term "mana" refers to this, as opposed to a
character's personal store of magic points. Variant magic systems sometimes have other energies that fill the
same purpose (such as "sanctity" for divine spellcasters).
 Badass Normal: High point characters with no supernatural and/or exotic advantages will inevitably fit this trope,
though up to a point increasing the grittiness of the rules can limit it.
 Battle Strip: Covered by an optional rule called "Bulletproof Nudity".
 Berserk Button: There are multiple ways of giving your character one, most built around the
disadvantage Berserk.
 Big Eater: Any character with the Increased Consumption and/or Gluttony disadvantages.
 Blob Monster:
o GURPS Dungeon Fantasy, being an homage to old-school D&D, has a whole supplement of them: Dungeon
Fantasy Monsters 2: Icky Goo.
Goo lacks most of the weaknesses of complex organisms that have internal organs, eyeballs, debts, and
regrets.
o In GURPS Monsters, the Woodbury Blob is four foot wide (and tall, and thick), weighs 500 pounds, and is made up
of amorphous living protoplasm. It eats by flowing over a living creature and absorbing it into its own body. It's
almost Immune to Bullets, which will make it a challenge to destroy.
 Blood Bath: Vampires in the 3rd edition version of GURPS Fantasy can only heal their injuries by bathing in
blood.
 Bold Inflation: The publisher's official style guide notes that the game's title should be bold, italicized and all
caps (GURPS); bold italics are also required for supplement titles, so long citations of the game’s own books can
get this look.
 Born Lucky: The Serendipity advantage grants happy coincidences, Luck allows rerolls and is noted in a few
places as being pseudo-realistic for highly skilled people, and Super Luck gives the power to completely dictate
the outcome of a single action.
 Bullet-Proof Fashion Plate: One possible use of the Shtick perk.
 Cast from Stamina: Fatigue Points (FP) are based on the Health stat, and the default magic system has spells
drain a certain amount of FP when cast or maintained. Cast from Hit Points is also an option, though it penalizes
the skill roll while doing so, and there is a new advantage called Energy Reserve introduced in GURPS
Powers that allows a spellcaster to use a separate energy source which is not impacted by health or strength and
cannot be externally depleted by enemy attacks. Energy Reserve refills simultaneously with Fatigue Points, and
so a wizard who has it is likely to mix both for the sake of efficiency.
 "Cavemen vs. Astronauts" Debate: The system is great for resolving these, although it will also create zillions of
disagreements about what kinds of knives the cavemen have access to.
 Celibate Hero:
o The Vow of Chastity can be this or a Chaste Hero, depending on what other disadvantages are taken.
o A common aspect of some Codes of Honor.
 Chandelier Swing: The 3rd edition supplement Swashbucklers had extensive rules on swinging from chandeliers.
 Chaotic Stupid: The Trickster disadvantage can cause this.
 Character Customization: The game is constructed in such a fashion that you can make ANY CHARACTER as
long as you can quantify what they can do. One famous example is the "intelligent blueberry muffin ".
 Chunky Salsa Rule: If a character is damaged to -10x HP, they are not only dead (which occurs automatically at -
5x HP if they don't die sooner) but destroyed. Exactly what this means depends on the source of the damage,
from total incineration or dissolution for fire or acid, to merely being very very much pincushioned by arrows.
This will often preclude means of resurrection that require a recoverable body.
 Clark Kenting: The "Masked" perk.
 Clap Your Hands If You Believe: True Faith prevents anything "evil" from coming within a yard of you.
 Clockpunk: The Trope Namer, according to The Other Wiki.
 Cloud Cuckoo Lander: The highest level of Delusion makes you into this.
  Colonized Solar System: In the Terradyne setting, the Moon has a pressurized city (Luna City) which is the
capital of the titular Mega-Corp turned empire. This setting was effectively replaced by Transhuman Space in
2002.
 Combinatorial Explosion:
o The treasure tables in the splatbooks aren't unusually long, but there are a lot of modifiers that can be applied to said
treasure, and those modifiers can usually be stacked. So a generic "armor table" extends to cover helms, animal
armor, and everything else that might protect your skin.
o The stand-out example of a combinatorial multiplier is GURPS' massively excessive number of hit locations, which
go down to individual fingers and consider the head, the eyes, and the brain to be different 'targets', for instance.
(Though using hit locations at all is strictly an optional rule, and even the most nit-pickingly detailed 4th edition
games will rarely feature more than a dozen possible locations.) This adds up quickly to potentially over fifty hit
locations per person, which multiplies the entire armor table directly (with rules causing armor for various locations
to be altered with different values), weapons (with various types having different modifiers for different hit
locations), and pretty much the entire power list and combat-applicable skill table, and to some extent even the
health table. There is a reason most house rules run along the lines of "all armored jackets have sleeves of the same
armor value" and "there are no such things as fingerless gloves".
o The Dungeon Fantasy supplement on treasure claims to have eighty trillion possible treasures. Accomplished by
having each table tell the GM to select another table to roll on.
o Powers adds several pages of generic modifiers that cause the same effect with advantages.
 The Conspiracy: Steve Jackson Games is quite big on conspiracy gaming in general, and GURPS Illuminati is an
invaluable resource when it comes to such games.
 Conspiracy Theorist: There's a skill for this.
 Contrived Coincidence: Serendipity lets you, the player, specify a random event that would be helpful to you, the
character, and have it happen. Likewise, Gizmo lets you just happen to have brought the right gear for the
problem in hand — while Cursed is a disadvantage for people who suffer from bad coincidences. Such features
are there to let you play the sort of fictional characters who seem to be pawns of fate.
 Cool Spaceship: The Spaceships series is all about creating these and has a large number of worked examples.
For bonus points, it actually follows the rocket equation assuming you stick with the realistic engine types.
 Crazy-Prepared:
o You can make character sheets for just about anything, like plants and planets. Some GMs like to do this for pretty
much every obstacle the players might encounter. There are also Techniques, a way to brush up on a specific aspect
of a skill; meticulous players can use these to "buy off" any penalty they might have to roll against.
o Gizmos can be used to retroactively become Crazy-Prepared.
o A good roll against Tactics skill at the start of a battle means your character thought ahead, so you get an
advantageous starting position.
o The Traps skill is just as good for setting traps as disarming them.
 Critical Existence Failure
o Averted. When you're below 1/3 HP, you can only move half as fast as usual, which makes you easier to hit. When
you're below 0 HP, you have to roll your health every turn to do anything at all without collapsing. But game
masters who want cinematic hack'n'slash games often just ignore this when it's inconvenient.
o Affliction: Heart Attack will make your character roll against HT. If your character fails, he or she dies in a few
minutes. Within those minutes, he or she can be resuscitated... unless the affliction was Irresistible.
 Crystal Skull: In the Warehouse 23 supplement.
 Damage Reduction:
o The primary benefit of wearing/installing armor is reducing damage received when your other defences fail you.
DR is also an advantage that can be purchased by characters, races, etc. One to three points of damage reduction
seems to be the "realistic" limit for natural DR, possessed by real animals with thick hides/scales or purchasable by
players without needing specific GM approval. Previous versions featured the Toughness advantage, a more
expensive DR with a two point Cap specifically for human use, with the base advantage restricted to supers or
races.
o Armor piercing attacks generally take the form of a divisor, reducing DR by half or more.
o The Damage reduction advantage also has a host of options to modify its function, in particular conjunction
with Damage Typing. The advantage could be used to simulate anything from thick skin to magical resistance
against a given element to an ablative force field that needs recharging.
 Damage Typing:
o Nearly every possible way it could be handled. There's burning, corrosion, crushing, cutting, impaling, small
piercing, piercing, large piercing, huge piercing and toxic. All damage types will end up reducing the victim's hit
points—you don't have to track damage separately for the different types—but some damage types give a multiplier
to the amount of damage that gets through the victim's armor. Further, some kinds of armor give varying amounts
of protection depending on what sort of damage they are protecting from. On top of that there are also attacks that
damage fatigue points, making characters more exhausted rather than damaged. Then after all of that it also handles
radiation damage as a sort of hybrid between the other types of damage. In short, rules for every possible way one
could cause damage and different ways characters are expected to react to them.
o On top of actual damage, you have things like Binding, Leech, Obscure, Fatigue damage, and all flavors
of Afflictions.
o The Supernatural Durability Advantage is basically custom made for this trope.
 Dance Battler: The Dancing skill can be used (in some games) to feint or even kick enemies in melee combat.
 Determinator: Stronger characters in good physical condition can take enough damage that would kill lesser
characters outright.
 Devolution Device: In GURPS Warehouse 23, one of the devices stored in the Warehouse is the Devolvo Ray. It
fires a beam that causes a living target to move back along the chain of evolution, causing it to become its own
ancestor. For example, a human being hit by the ray would become a Cro-Magnon, then a Neanderthal, and so
on. If the ray keeps hitting the target for long enough, it will become a pool of primordial slime.
 Diving Save: Possible by combining dodge and drop with sacrificial dodge. If the dodge is good enough the
rescuer can escape harm too.
 Dodge the Bullet: Sort of. You can use the Dodge defense against bullets but it doesn't strictly represent dodging.
Most moving things get a Dodge stats to represent that fact that they're not perfectly predictable.
 Don't Sneak Up On Me Like That!: The "Berserk" disadvantage, in addition to everything else the disadvantage
entails (rabidly attacking every enemy on hand with whatever weapon is on hand), also conveys this, treating
anyone trying to restrain the character, friend or enemy, as an enemy. Earlier editions nicknamed the berserker
rage "the Doom of the North" for this very reason.
 Dying Race: In 3e there was actually a disadvantage called "Dying Race". It didn't really affect gameplay and
was mostly for flavor, so it was turned into a subset of Social Stigma in the next edition.
 Early-Installment Weirdness: The 1st and 2nd editions didn't quite live up to the "Universal" in the title, being
heavily oriented towards a low fantasy setting like its spiritual precursor The Fantasy Trip, with only
rudimentary firearms rules, and magic spells, psionics, and superpowers in separate supplements. This improved
in the 3rd Edition, especially after the release of the first Compendium, and the system finally became truly
integrated in the 4th Edition.
 Eats Babies: Restricted Diet (Occasional) might restrict your diet to any of "Virgin's blood, rocket fuel, babies,
radioactives."
 Eldritch Abomination:
o The third edition version of GURPS Fantasy treats the Babylonian primordial entity Tiamat this way, giving stats
for a minor avatar of her that, while not appearing particularly odd (it's an enormous dragon with four eyes), can
still cause terror from just looking at it. Said avatar automatically regenerates every year, making the effort of trying
to kill it futile. To get rid of it permanently, you'd have to track down and kill the real Tiamat... who is half the size
of the universe (about 2.24* 10^18 Hit Points), so good luck with that. There's even a Lovecraft quote after the stat
block.
o The game has more in different settings and splatbooks: for example, GURPS Cabal, with its cosmology based on
the qabbalah's Sephirot, has the creatures of Qlipoth and its Ur-Lords; Creatures of the Night has the godlike
Betweeners, the force called "the darksome", which is responsible for the creation of the literal organ-
farmer Darklings, and many of the non-undead creatures described; a few licenced settings
(like Cthulhupunk and The War Against the Chtorr) have their own native abominations; and Infinite Worlds, the
meta-setting that ties The Multiverse together, not only makes all the previous settings inter-accessible, but also has
at least one world (Taft-7) where humanity never evolved in the first place because of Great Old One (or similar)
influence 50 million years back - and although they're long gone, they left enough "Fun Stuff" behind (and the risk
 of attracting their attention is great enough) for the agencies overseeing interdimensional travel to quarantine the
world from any travel there whatever the reason.
o GURPS newsletter Roleplayer #10 (May 1988), adventure "The Isle of Night". T'Soquat is a minor Thing That Man
Was Not Meant To Know. It resembles a giant lobster with pale gray-green skin and glowing red eyes. It has an
acidic secretion Super Spit, Super Strength and large Power Pincers, and each Human Sacrifice it receives improves
its defenses against being harmed.
 Elemental Punch: Innate Attacks, when limited to touch range, give a character this power. Power Ups 1:
Imbuements takes this a step further, letting you augment your attacks. For instance, your bullets ricochet off a
wall, your camera takes pictures on its own, and yes, you can make your punches elemental.
 Empathic Weapon: You can even play them if you want to.
 Everyone Has Standards: In GURPS Black Ops, the Company's willing to do a lot of dirty stuff to protect
humanity and The Masquerade. But killing a police officer is completely out of bounds; an op who does that
should count his lucky stars if he's only assigned to nuclear reactor maintenance and monster cage cleaning for
the rest of his life.
 Evil Is Deathly Cold: The Yuki Onna (a form of The Fair Folk) presented in GURPS MonsterHunters are not
above freezing entire towns because they're bored.
 Exactly What It Says on the Tin: This roleplaying system is generic. Its core rules are universally applicable.
 Extreme Doormat:
o The "Slave Mentality" disadvantage turns your character into this. For this reason, it tends to be only used on NPC
slaves, some AI, zombies, golems and the like.
o There is also the Minion enhancement to the Allies advantage, which ensures the complete loyalty of the character's
allies no matter what.
 Expospeak Gag: Extreme Sexual Dimorphism.
 Faint in Shock: The game has a “Fright Check” system to represent the effect on people of overwhelmingly
horrible experiences, and some of the results on the Fright Check Table do involve fainting dead away. The third
edition supplement GURPS Screampunk and the fourth edition update supplement GURPS Steampunk 1 augment
this with a secondary system of fright checks in response to horrifying revelations of social inappropriateness, to
suit the 19th century, Victorian milieu that both cover. Both note that actual period fiction might make the sexist
assumption that only ladies will faint away in shock, but modern games don’t have to follow this.
 The Fair Folk: Covered in GURPS Faerie, among other places.
 Fantastic Legal Weirdness: Pyramid 3/93 has an article on how superhuman powers might fit in with the law.
For example, "Extrasensory perception of any kind violates so many privacy laws that it could set back most
courts for decades."
 Fearless Undead: The default undead templates always include Unfazeable.
 Feathered Dragons: The GURPS Fantasy Bestiary includes aitvaras in its dragon section, depicted as dragons
with the heads and wings of roosters.
 Fiction as Cover-Up: GURPS Illuminati suggests that the Conspiracy encourages the Weekly World News and
similar publications to write up stories about conspiracy so that the Serious Press won't believe them.
 Flavor Text: GURPS featured the odd bit of flavor text from early on, but Fourth Edition supplements have made
a habit of it, with half-page snippets of relevant fiction at the top of most chapters.
 Flechette Storm: The "Storm Shuriken" becomes this when thrown. Other rapid-fire flechette weapons also
appear in supplements.
 Flexibility Equals Sex Ability: Having the Flexibility advantage gives you a better bonus to the Erotic Art skill
than simply leveling it up as normal.
 Freeze Ray: A device of the alien Greys, found in the 3rd edition supplement Warehouse 23.
 Friend to All Living Things: Having the Animal Empathy advantage gives this quality.
 Fun with Acronyms:
o The Basic Abstract Difficulty from Action.
o GURPS itself originally stood for "The Great Unnamed Role Playing System".
 Gadgeteer Genius: The "Gadgeteer" advantage makes your character into one. By extension, the "Quick
Gadgeteer" advantage lets you do the same, but with less time and resources.
  Genericist Government: Government regulations are represented by Control Ratings. If the CR is greater than the
Legality Class of an item or action, you roll a die against the difference between the CR and the LC to decide if
it's legal.
 Genetic Engineering Is the New Nuke: The 4th edition has one volume, GURPS Ultra-Tech, dedicated to
mechanical and electronic SF and futuristic technology — and another volume of comparable size, GURPS Bio-
Tech, dedicated to biotechnology, medicine, and genetic engineering. While, in keeping with the system's
realism-based model, most of the products of genetic engineering described there are relatively low key, there are
some radically advanced options, such as biological spaceships and "proteus viruses" that completely transform
living things.
 Genre-Busting: Most volumes come with tips on how to use other volumes with them.
 Hack and Slash: The Dungeon Fantasy book is for when you want to roll back GURPS to the days where
adventurers looted tombs for no reason other than random treasure. It's notable for showing their work as much
as they do anywhere else, and explicitly banning any abilities (such as teleportation or great wealth) that work
against dungeon-crawling.
 Hand Cannon: GURPS offers various big guns across the different genres and settings its supplements cover. For
example:
o The magnum pistol from GURPS Ultra-Tech fires a 15mm round, larger than the bullets in a modern anti-materiel
rifle. And then there's the shotgun pistol...
o Steampunk genre and setting books feature handguns comparable to the largest real-world magnums and slightly
larger. This fits; whereas modern firearms have, if anything, tended to use smaller bullets, because they can fit more
in a magazine and fire them with higher muzzle velocities, and a slightly smaller, faster bullet will usually do
enough damage to take an opponent down, the Steam Age had something of a bigger-is-better approach to weapons
design, by comparison.
 Hard-Coded Hostility: In GURPS War Against The Chtorr, as in the novels it's based on, there is no way to
communicate or negotiate with the alien ecosystem and giant man-eating worms invading and un-terraforming
Earth. It's either kill, or be eaten.
 Hearing Voices: Phantom Voices allows for various types and degrees of this problem.
 Heroic Ambidexterity: Ambidexterity is a 5-point advantage which allows you to Dual Wield weapons more
effectively (among other obvious benefits). Gaining this benefit for just one skill is a 1-point perk.
 He Who Fights Monsters: See the line of PDF supplements entitled, yes, Monster Hunters.
 Historical Domain Character: Some of the sourcebooks give stats for such people:
o GURPS Arabian Nights, for example, stats up Salah ad-Din (AKA Saladin).
o GURPS Who's Who 1 and 2 are all about this trope.
 Historical Fantasy: Many of the historical sourcebooks include period folklore to allow a Historical
Fantasy setting.
 Hollywood Hacking: The Computer Hacking skill. The description notes a bunch of other skills that you'd want
to use to hack a realistic computer.
 Homing Projectiles: Can be bought as equipment, stat’ed as characters, or be a function magically imbued into
otherwise normal gear.
 Hopeless with Tech: Uselessness with technology is the effective result of the “Low TL” disadvantage, which
actually represents unfamiliarity with a setting’s general level of tech (so one could be perfectly competent with
seriously out-of-date gear). It’s also possible to take “Incompetence” quirks indicating ineptitude with specific
technological skills.
 Horn Attack: Combat-useful horns are one thing that can be represented by the Striker advantage. And, just as
one example among many, the Fetch in GURPS Myth can butt with their horns.
 Human Sacrifice: A thing that comes up in adventure stories. For example, in
the GURPS newsletter Roleplayer #10 (May 1988), in the adventure "The Isle of Night", Colonel Fitzhugh has
been possessed by the spirit of the Wizard-Chief of the island natives. He tries to summon the Eldritch
Abomination T'Soquat into our world and sacrifice his daughter Alicia to it.
 Humongous Mecha: See GURPS Mecha, GURPS Ultra-Tech, etc.
 Hurricane of Puns: Dungeon Fantasy Monsters 2: Icky Goo
 Hyperspace Mallet: GURPS Mecha, which covers quite a bit of anime material (because that's where a lot
of mecha appear), has rules for this trope, which it refers to as "Shōjo Mallet".
 Imperial Stormtrooper Marksmanship Academy: An optional rule is the Trope Namer.
 
Impossible Item Drop: Parodied in GURPS Creatures of the Night which includes a completely immobile plant
monster that comes complete with a treasure trove full of things that are useful when trying to kill plant
monsters. Why? Because it enjoys murdering adventurers and taking their stuff (which it then buries somehow).
 In a Single Bound: Here called Super Jump.
 Initialism Title: The source of the game's name.
 Intrinsic Vow: GURPS Castle Falkenstein. If a Faerie uses Enchantment or a Pixie uses Love Charm and asks
the victim to do something against their basic beliefs, the victim can resist the effect.
 Island Base: GURPS Illuminati. One potential location for the Illuminati main base is on a private secret island
that has been erased from the world's maps, possibly in the Bermuda Triangle.
 Jungle Opera: Cliffhangers covers the topic.
 Kinetic Weapons Are Just Better: To an extent. In the standard SF weapon lists, beam weapons tend to do less
basic damage than comparable projectile weapons. On the other hand beam weapons may be better at bypassing
a target's armor. It all rather depends on how a given setting’s technology is set up.
 Lawful Stupid:
o The Honesty disadvantage can promote this, though an Honest character can break the law if they make their
control roll for the disadvantage, permitting characters with less severe "Honesty".
o Codes of Honor/Conduct can also lead to this type of behavior.
 Leeroy Jenkins: As noted in several places here, GURPS begins with a premise of "realism;" i.e. Killed Off for
Real is fairly easy, Back from the Dead, not so much (if at all). Nonetheless, the creators seem to love Leeroying
inasmuch as there are so many Disadvantages that can produce it (or perhaps they just know that some players
will want these options):
o Berserk: You must roll to avoid Leeroying any time you take 3 or more hits in one turn, or under "Other conditions
of extreme stress (GM's option)" — i.e. pretty much in any combat.
o Bloodlust: You must roll to avoid Leeroying any time you have a chance to kill a "legitimate enemy" — i.e. pretty
much in any combat.
o Impulsiveness: You must roll to avoid Leeroying any time the rest of the party are taking too long discussing
something — i.e. pretty much before any combat.
o On the Edge: You must roll to avoid Leeroying any time you have a chance to deliberately put yourself in mortal
danger — i.e. pretty much in any combat.
o Overconfidence: You must roll to avoid Leeroying any time you feel yourself a match, or more than a match, for
your opponent — i.e. pretty much in any combat.
 Like Reality, Unless Noted
o GURPS tries to be realistic, and games using the default rules will be fairly gritty. But if you enable the relevant
optional rules, and especially if players buy "cinematic" traits, you'll turn the game away from reality and toward
the genre of your choice.
o The common term among fans is that GURPS presents a "gameable abstraction", the more realism you insist on the
harder it is to actually play the game. Forum posts are nonetheless full of people trying to make things more
realistic.
 Loads and Loads of Rules: Most of them are described as "optional" in the books. Hardly anyone really plays the
game with only the mandatory rules, so to get a game started, the game master needs to make a list of the
optional rules he wants to use.
 Long List: Most of the character creation "rules" are really menus of traits that characters can
have. Enormous menus. There are over four hundred skills! Of course, only a few of those will be useful for a
particular game, so GMs regularly make their own less-intimidating lists, perhaps in the trait sorter .
 Luckily, My Shield Will Protect Me: Shields work quite well. Not only do they allow for blocking attacks, which
makes for a less risky parry, but they give a bonus to all dodges, blocks, and parries on top of that.
 Made of Bologna: Invoked by a powerful Advantage called "No Internal Organs" note .This means a character
never suffers from complicated medical problems, because their interior becomes uniform undifferentiated
tissue.
 Magic by Any Other Name: GURPS Magic has the option of Alchemy; GURPS Fantasy gives options like Craft
Magic, Master of the Trade, Oaths, and True Faith; and GURPS Powers has Psionic Magic.
  Magic Fire: Presented in GURPS: Magic. Essential Flames will burn water elementals. A pyromaniac mage has
even more fun options, besides the ever-popular Explosive Fireball there is Burning Death which incinerates the
target from the inside out - even if they're magically protected from fire.
 Magic Knight: Being a classless system it is very easy to make character that fits this description
 Mama Bear: A sidebar in GURPS Bestiary makes it very clear why you shouldn't get between a mother animal
and her young.
 Mass Super-Empowering Event: Wild Card Day in Wildcards brought super powers to the world.
 The Men in Black: They appear in several add-on books.
o GURPS Illuminati has a chapter devoted to them.
o In GURPS Horror, they can get access to the "State" powerset.
o In GURPS Monster Hunters there are provisions for playing The Men in Black.
o GURPS Black Ops for Third Edition was a whole campaign setting specifically for The Men in Black.
o The Men in Black is also the name Steve Jackson Games uses for its volunteer game demonstrators (such as at
conventions and other gatherings).
 Mirror Chemistry: One of the entries on the "something went wrong with our dimension-traveling device" chart
in GURPS Time Travel.
 Mirrors Reflect Everything: A Sunbolt spell, which creates a laser beam, can be reflected by a mirror. The book
expressly notes that a laser would easily melt any mirror that wasn't absolutely perfect, but since it's a spell,
the Rule of Symbolism allows this to work.
 Moe Anthropomorphism: Pyramid #3/97 has rules for this, and a worked example for a Sa'ar 3 missile boat.
 Muggle with a Degree in Magic: Under the default Magic system, in a Low or Normal Mana world only
characters with the Magery advantage can cast "normal" spells (non mages can cast the Least of Spells in Normal
mana). Because the default magical system treats spells as skills like any other, it's entirely possible for
characters without Magery to learn spells, even if they can't cast them. The Thaumatology skill represents a
knowledge of the underlying structure of magic, and likewise does not require Magery or spellcasting ability
(though Magery gives it a bonus). GURPS Thaumatology has options such as "Limited Non-Mage Ceremonies".
 Multi-Armed Multitasking: You can take the "Multiple Arms" advantage, though you then need to buy special
coordination to use them for anything other than holding stuff.
 Multiple Persuasion Modes: The skills Carousing, Diplomacy, the Enthrallment group (Captivate, Persuade,
Suggest, and Sway Emotions) done by fantasy bards, Erotic Art, Fast-Talk, Hypnotism, Leadership, Merchant,
Musical Influence (cinematic), and Public Speaking. There's an entire supplement (Social Engineering) detailing
how these work and including even more (such as Propaganda).
 Multishot: Appears in Imbuements.
"If your skill is high enough to deal with -18, you’re certainly welcome to try for a RoF 20 bowshot!"
 Muscles Are Meaningless: Can be played straight or subverted.
 Neck Snap: an option for grappling, requires high strength or some training to pull off.
 New Powers as the Plot Demands: Modular Abilities is made for this trope.
 Ninja Pirate Zombie Robot: Making these characters is what the system specializes in.
 Non-Health Damage: You die if aging causes any stat to drop to zero. If some other force drops a stat to zero
you're rendered all but helpless.
 Non-Human Undead: The Zombie Vehicle spell, which is designed with spaceships in mind.
 No Sense of Humor: Available as a disadvantage.
 No Such Thing as Bad Publicity: Invoked. On the front of GURPS Cyberpunk, the writers advertised that the
game had been seized by the Secret Service, and an interior section mentioned the circumstances (the Secret
Service had called it "a handbook for computer crime"). Of course something like this is going to be free
advertising.
 Not Quite Flight: The Flight advantage has a lot of different ways to make it like this; also, telekinesis can be
used for locomotion, and there is the Walk On Air advantage.
 Omnidisciplinary Scientist: While realistic games handle the various subdivisions of the sciences by means of an
extensive skill list and rules for specialisation, omnidisciplinary scientists appear in more cinematic games by
means of the Science! skill. The exclamation point is key. The game’s 4th edition introduced “wildcard” skills in
other fields, such as Detective!, Gun!, Music!, and Sword!.
 One-Hit Kill: A radioactive attack that hits someone for 4000 rads gives them one HT roll to survive, but if they
manage a Critical Success... they die slightly differently.
  One Password Attempt Ever: In the Warehouse 23 supplement, anyone trying to log on to the Warehouse's
computer remotely must input two separate passwords. If the second password is incorrect the computer assumes
that an intrusion is taking place and doesn't give the intruder another chance.
 Only Flesh Is Safe: Spells from the College of Making and Breaking will only affect inanimate objects.
 Our Centaurs Are Different: Onocentaurs in 3E Fantasy Folk.
 Our Dragons Are Different:
o GURPS Fantasy Bestiary (for 3rd edition) includes a section dedicated specifically to dragons.
 Firedrakes are the standard Western dragon — Long-Lived, four-legged, winged, fire-breathing terrors, intelligent and
capable of speech and powerful magic but chiefly concerned with hunting and hoarding treasure. They hatch already
the size of an adult man and keep growing throughout their lives. They don't grow weak or senile, and only become
stronger and wiser as they age. They're even said to never die of old age at all. Luckily for other creatures, they're not
common — it takes a lot of prey to keep one fed, and they also experience high mortality rates as hatchlings.
 Chinese dragons, or lungs, have features from almost every animal — except tigers, their mortal enemies — plus
pearls under their chins and magical growths on their foreheads that allow them to fly. Only the males have horns and
whiskers. They are strongly associated with water — they typically live in deep pools and underwater caves or behind
waterfalls — are adept shapeshifters and their temperament varies depending on whether they lean more towards Yin
and Yang: when Yang is dominant, they are preservers and protectors; when Yin is dominant, they are destroyers.
Several types of lung exist. Kioh-Lung are the youngest of their kind, have not yet grown horns or back legs and
mature into one of the various kinds of adult dragons at 500 years of age. Li Lung are the least magical of these,
resemble dragon-headed lions who fly with physical wings, cannot breathe water and can cause earthquakes. Lung
Wang resemble giant dragon-headed turtles, and live in the ocean. P'an Lung are slender, serpentine creatures that live
in the sky and can control the rain. Shen Lung rule over freshwater, are immune to poison and can make people
supernaturally lucky or unlucky. P'an Lung and Shen Lung speak the same language, and can create "water fire" that
can only be put out with regular fire.
 Other types of dragon include rooster-like, mace-tailed aitvaras; azhi dahaka, evil, three-headed legless dragons with a
different Breath Weapon for each head; the seven-headed, snakelike and maiden-eating herren-surge; the kakutan,
which resembles a horse with a dragon's head; snake-headed, eagle-legged and scorpion-tailed mushussus; aquatic,
fishlike tarasques; worms or wyrms, wingless creatures closely related to firedrakes and able to breathe out clouds of
poison gas; and animalistic, stinger-tailed wyverns.
o The 3rd/4th edition GURPS Dragons is a whole book about handling almost the whole range of dragon tropes in
games, complete with example campaign frameworks for many of them. See the book's own page.
 Our Dwarves Are All the Same: As a generic system, GURPS can potentially handle any sort of dwarf — but its
writers have mostly stuck to the established standard.
o Dwarves in GURPS Banestorm, the main official GURPS fantasy setting, are a race of natural artificers and
merchants. Most adults have at least one point worth of personal "signature gear".
o GURPS Fantasy offers another variant of the same type.
 Our Fairies Are Different: Fairies in GURPS Fantasy are living illusions. Their magic can be as easily destroyed
by iron as they are. Of course, due to the modular nature of GURPS, Fairies can be built in countless other ways
resembling other examples on this page.

 Our Ghouls Are Creepier: Ghouls in GURPS Fantasy are a complete race who are 
indistinguishable from normal humans until they try to eat you. The only thing they can eat is human flesh; all
other foods are dangerous to them.
 Our Gnomes Are Weirder: Gnomes in GURPS Dungeon Fantasy look similar to thin dwarves and are expert
craftsmen. Their entry also notes the possible existence of Hell Gnomes.
 Our Goblins Are Different: Several takes on goblins are present in the various books. For example:
o GURPS Goblins features an entire alternate Earth exactly like ours, circa 1830s, but inhabited only by goblins — a
parody of Regency England. These particular goblins are extremely varied, being shaped by the exact forms of
mistreatment they suffer in childhood, but are alike in being base, crude, and vulgar, as well as standing up to
cartoon levels of interpersonal violence.
o GURPS Banestorm features goblins as short, green humanoids, immigrants from the mostly arid desert world of
Gabrook. They are intelligent, civilized and naturally curious, and actually fit well enough into human society.
Hobgoblins are their larger, dumber cousins; while a few live among goblins as servants, most remain hunter-
gatherers living in small bands in the wilderness.
 Our Gryphons Are Different: GURPS Fantasy Bestiary includes gryphons and hippogriffs, both of which fly
through the use of Mana stored in their feathers.
 Our Hippocamps Are Different: GURPS Fantasy Bestiary classifies as "makaras" any creature with the back half
of a fish and the front half of a land-dwelling animal. While the term is Indian in origin, the book notes that it can
be applied to creatures such as hippocampi, which would be considered horse makaras.
 Our Homunculi Are Different: Homunculi in GURPS Magic must live in bottles because they are so ridiculously
vulnerable that they can be killed by harsh light.
 Our Hydras Are Different: GURPS Fantasy Bestiary describes the original Hydra of myth as a unique monster
with nine heads and four legs, but notes that GMs may redefine it as a whole species of creatures with varying
numbers of heads. They can attack multiple times per round and cannot be stunned or knocked out, thanks to
their multiple heads, and if one is cut off two more grow from the sump and reach full size in a few rounds unless
cauterized with flame. The body instantly dies if the heads are all heads are severed, and the heads die quickly if
the main body is killed. The text also notes the original myth having one immortal, unkillable head, and leaves
dealing with such a thing as an exercise for the players.
 Our Mages Are Different: GURPS Wizards covers pretty much every implementation mentioned in the trope
page.
 Our Perytons Are Different: In GURPS Fantasy Bestiary, perytons are winged deer that attack humans on sight,
diving on them from the air in attempts to gore them with their antlers and fighting mercilessly and to the death.
Because they cast human shadows, and because of their habit of only killing one human each in any given attack
and wallowing in the remains, they are thought to be the souls of particularly bloodthirsty humans, and that
killing a living human is the only way they can regain their previous forms.
 Our Werewolves Are Different:
o An optional werewolf template is an uncontrollable problem triggered by the full moon. They're very hard to kill
but curiously don't have any special level of strength like most werewolves.
o In the Banestorm setting, people so afflicted turn into actual wolves. It's also not contagious; either you or an
ancestor has to have been specifically cursed.
 Our Wyverns Are Different: GURPS Dragons and GURPS Fantasy Bestiary include four-limbed wyverns as one
of the several subtypes of dragons. They have no breath weapons but possess poisonous barbs at the end of their
long tails. They are clumsy walkers but frighteningly fast fliers, and thus prefer to attack targets from the air.
They're largely animals, although smart ones, and the book notes that all-dragon campaigns might use them as
pets or attack dogs for dragon characters; GURPS Fantasy Bestiary further describes them as dragon-like, but as
not actually being dragons. Variations include one able to shoot quills from its tail.
 Pants-Positive Safety: A perk is the Trope Namer.
 Pinball Projectile: It's a bouncing grenade shaped like a Frisbee!
 Planetary Parasite: Supplement Space Bestiary'
o The alien species known as world worms travel between planets in pods. When a pod lands, the worms pour out
and infest the planet, eating their way to the planet's core. By the time they've grown to full size (several miles
long), they've done so much damage to the planet that it disintegrates. After mating, the worms split up and release
pods, which begin their journey to find a new planet to destroy.
o Invader swarms are made up of thirty ton aliens that land on a planet in numbers of 200-1200. They breed
prolifically, doubling their population every month, while eating all of the organic life they can find. When they
reach their maximum population (in the trillions), they launch themselves into space and head for the next life-
bearing world, leaving behind a dead planet.
 Plot Hole: Yes, there's a trait for this: Gizmo allows you to retroactively have always been carrying a small
useful item, regardless of how little sense it makes. You can still be carrying the item even if you were strip-
searched recently. Serendipity allows you to get even more arbitrary.
 Point Build System: Leader of the pack in this regard.
 Portal Fantasy: A short supplement, GURPS Fantasy: Portal Realms , covers this topic in detail.
 Power Armor: Battle suits in the basic set, and Ultra-Tech has a few new flavors.
  Power Pincers: GURPS newsletter Roleplayer #10 (May 1988), adventure "The Isle of Night". The Eldritch
Abomination T'Soquat has large claws that can do 4-14 Hit Points of damage. If the spell to summon it succeeds,
the native villagers under its control will transform and their hands will become claws that do 1-6 Hit Points of
damage.
 Practical Currency: "Bullets" (that is, rifle caliber cartridges) in After the End are both currency and ammunition.
 Pro Wrestling Episode: Ring Dream as a whole could be considered this.
 Protective Charm
 Psychic Block Defense: The Mind Shield advantage and the Mind Block skill.
 Psychic Powers: A whole chapter is dedicated to explaining how to modify advantages and disadvantages to
become these, and how to build characters that use them effectively
 Ranked by I.Q.: The game uses "IQ" as the short-form name of the Intelligence stat — a measure of all forms of
intelligence, independent of culture or species — although it has barely any relation to actual measures of IQ.
Apparently it wasn't meant to.
 Rapid Aging: Challenge magazine #47 article "The Ultra-Tech File". If it works, the 2 day long Rejuvenation
process lowers the character's age. If the process suffers a critical failure, the recipient's age increases by 6-36
years.
 Raygun Gothic: Tales of the Solar Patrol covers Flash Gordon and Buck Rogers-type space exploration,
while Atomic Horror covers the aesthetic of the 1950's B movies, such as radioactive giant insects, flying
saucers, man-eating plants and the like.
 Reactionless Drive: Five different types in the Spaceships supplement.
 Really Gets Around: The Lecherousness disadvantage.
 Recycled IN SPACE!:
o Any setting + GURPS Space = Any Setting IN SPACE!
o A pastime of some GURPS aficionados is grabbing three random GURPS sourcebooks and making a gameworld
out of them .
 Red Eyes, Take Warning:
o Fantasy Folk. Minotaurs have the disadvantages Berserk, Bloodlust, Intolerance, and Savage. They're aggressively
antisocial and eat other sentient creatures. They also have red eyes.
o Conan: Moon of Blood. The swamp devils have eyes as red as coals of living fire, and the chaken (ape men) have
flaming red eyes.
o GURPS Conan and the Queen of the Black Coast. The Hell Hyenas are huge hyenas with red Glowing Eyes. They
have a strong bloodlust, attacking that lives and trying to kill it without pity.
o GURPS newsletter Roleplayer #10 (May 1988), adventure "The Isle of Night". The extremely evil Eldritch
Abomination T'Soquat and its minions have red Glowing Eyes.
o In the GURPS Supers adventure School of Hard Knocks, the supervillain Denier is nasty, chauvinistic, selfish and
abusive. He also has blood-red eyes in his human form.
o GURPS Monsters:
 The Mothman has attacked and tried to kill human beings and killed many dogs. It has red Glowing Eyes.
 Spring-Heeled Jack is a callous bully who likes to terrify people, attacks women and has killed at least one person. He
has fiery red Glowing Eyes.
 Religious Robot: C-31 became a Buddhist monk.
 Remote, Yet Vulnerable: 3rd edition supplement GURPS Undead. If a person's soul leaves their body for any
reason (such as undergoing a near-death experience), any ghost nearby can try to possess the body with a high
chance of succeeding. If the ghost expends enough fatigue and gets really lucky, they can control the possessed
body for up to 36 days.
 Retcon:
o The introduction of sheath rules in the fourth edition explained why swords were so heavy.
o Reality Quakes and Ontoclysms are mentioned as having this effect on global reality in Infinite Worlds (and are
"especially common in words with superhumans").
 Ritual Magic: An alternative method of magic where one learns spell colleges with spells as techniques within
that collage. In the form of Ritual Path Magic it is basically a build your own magic system toolbox.
 Rules Conversions: Even if GURPS doesn't have the sourcebook you want, someone has probably made a
conversion guide for it.
  Rule of Cool:
o "When in doubt, roll and shout!" Book 2 of the Basic Set includes some guidelines for how to fudge modifiers
when the action is too awesome for looking things up in tables.
o The Daredevil advantage gives a bonus to all rolls made in situations where you're taking unnecessary risks - and
preserves you from suffering a critical failure - because that makes you cool
o For one point, you can buy a "Schtick," which allows you to define a Character Tic, and then guarantees that you'll
always be able to do that, even when you'd expect it to be impossible: run in high heels across rough terrain at no
penalty, for instance, or keep your clothes clean and cool while swimming in the wilderness.
 Runic Magic: Various GURPS supplements have included rules for rune magic; GURPS Thaumatology takes the
Nordic "Futhark" runes as a working example of an alphabet that can be used with the generalized rules for
"symbol magic".
 Running Gag: After many years of waiting, the 4e Low-Tech supplement gained an extensive mythology due to
the number of questions for which the official answer was "It will be in Low-Tech". Not only would it answer all
of your questions about GURPS, it would contain the cure for cancer and be hand delivered by Jesus. Then it
appeared and the joke went away.
 Sand Worm: Supplement Space Bestiary'. The alien species known as world worms travel between planets in
pods. When a pod lands, the worms pour out and infest the planet, eating their way to the planet's core. By the
time they've grown to full size (several miles long), they've done so much damage to the planet that it
disintegrates. After mating, the worms split up and release pods, which begin their journey to find a new planet
to destroy.
 Sapient Cetaceans: Seen in some settings.
o The Transhuman Space setting plays with this, especially in the deep-sea sourcebook Under Pressure. On the one
hand there are "Cetanists"; "Ghosts" and A.I.s who believe in the intelligence and spirituality of whales and
dolphins, and express this by wearing dolphin bioshells (biological bodies that can run an AI or Ghost) and joining
a pod. On the other hand, there are actual dolphins; who are certainly bright enough that translator software works,
but are also bullies, mildly sociopathic and, in short, wild animals. And on the third hand there are Doolittles and
Delphi; dolphins who've been uplifted, but who often have the same "personality disorders" (by human standards)
as their wild kin. They also find Cetanists a bit disturbing. And then there's Coak, a Delphi who wishes he was a
normal dolphin to the extent that he now runs an anti-uplift terrorist organisation.
o There is also the GURPS adaptation of the Uplift setting, wherein "Fins" (Uplifted Dolphins) are a playable species,
complete with the tech from the books that lets them operate out of water.
 Sapient Tank: Shows up in Reign Of Steel and OGRE, and can be a player character in the right games.
 Scary Scorpions: The Giant Scorpion in the GURPS Bestiary, which is two yards long. If its claws and bite don't
kill you, its sting definitely will.
 Scoundrel Code: The game offers a Pirate's Code of Honor in addition to the more standard types. It is, needless
to say, less restrictive.
 Sea Serpents:
o GURPS Fantasy Bestiary describes sea serpents as legendary, solitary predators that will attack anything smaller
than a whale. They will attempt to crush smaller targets in their coils, but can just as easily rear up to pluck sailors
right from a ship's deck.
o GURPS Dragons includes sea serpents as the oceanic counterpart of landbound dragons; see the book's own page.
 Serial Escalation: Almost any character from any setting can be made into a player character in GURPS (with
enough points).
 Sharpened to a Single Atom: Superfine blades divide damage resistance by two. Monowire blades divide damage
resistance by ten. Nanothorn blades divide damage resistance by ten and shred the bonds that hold the atoms in
molecules together.
 Shout-Out:
o With this many supplements, quite a few authors can be expected to have indulged in shouting out; see the games
shout-outs page. Examples occur in International Super Teams, Steam-Tech and Illuminati, just to start with. One
notable instance; in Fantasy II: the Madlands the terrifying Eldritch Abomination gods are based off the characters
from Winnie the Pooh.
o From GURPS: Fantasy: A high fantasy traitor might be motivated by passionate jealousy, tempted by the devil, or
perversely sympathetic to the other side; a low fantasy traitor wants 30 pieces of silver.
o The November 2016 issue of Pyramid includes rules for playing an Anthropomorphic Personification based on
various military hardware, including an Israeli warship, a MAC-10 machine pistol, and even a troubled teenage girl
with plane parts strapped to her legs.
 Shown Their Work: GURPS sourcebooks are notorious for how complete they are, in many cases the setting and
research in them is used by gamers using other systems because of how well written they tend to be. The third
edition Bio-Tech book, published in 2002, was noted to be as up to date on real world Biotech as some college
textbooks on the issue, by a variety of professionals in the field. The Transhuman Space supplement Deep
Beyond includes calculations about the conditions on the Galilean moons and Titan from the space scientist who
co-wrote the book... and details were in GURPS before they hit print in the academic journals. And in 1997,
the Camelot sourcebook actually ended up on the recommended reading list for a course in Arthurian Literature
at Indiana University.
 Silicon-Based Life: GURPS Space Bestiary:
o The Fridge is a silicon-based life form that lives in arctic regions and looks like a grey rock up to three feet high. It
kills other creatures by lowering the temperature nearby, doing 1-6 Hit Points of damage per second.
o The Volcano Beast is an arctic silicon-based predator that hunts by generating a burst of intense heat that roasts
nearby animals. It takes the form of a dark grey cone 4 yards tall.
o The Warmer is an arctic silicon-based life form that looks like an amorphous grey rock a yard wide. It generates
heat to melt through snow so it can eat the vegetation underneath.
o The Mine is a silicon-based creature that looks like a three yard wide pink rock and weighs one ton. It lives
underground and kills its prey by detonating an explosive gas.
o The Skylens are predators that are transparent, silicon disks about three feet in diameter, attacking their targets with
sun rays. They locomote by psychokinesis.
Sliding Scale of Turn Realism: Second by Second. But using Action it's Turn by Turn and
using Spaceships or Mass Combat it's Round by Round.
 Smart Animal, Inconvenient Instincts: The system offers the character disadvantage "Stress Atavism", which is
pretty much purely for uplifted animals, and specifically models a tendency to revert to pre-sapient behaviors
when under stress.
 Social Engineering: GURPS Social Engineering is a supplement full of various mechanics for getting people to
do what you want in a number of contexts.
 Sourcebook: Two hundred sourcebooks!
 Space Fighter: GURPS Spaceships has a supplement that covers fighters. The samples culminate in the Mirage
Star Fighter which is so loaded with super science it might as well be Made of Phlebotinum.
 Spare a Messenger: GURPS Fantasy supplement Harkwood. The part of Caithness named Blythe was once
raided by a band of two dozen lizard men from the desert. The Blythe militia trapped the band and killed almost
all of them, deliberately letting three of them escape to let the other lizard men know of their defeat. Since that
day, the lizard men have not attacked Blythe.
 The Spark of Genius: Appears in I.O.U. and GURPS Supers.
 Spell Crafting: The game offers several varieties of magic that work this way, with differing rules about creating
spells. Notable forms include Ritual Path Magic, which assigns various types of effects to Paths of magic each of
which is bought as a skill, and Syntactic Magic, where Nouns and Verbs are magical skills, and spells are built
out of combinations of them.
 Square-Cube Law:
o Actually taken into account when making characters, larger characters can purchase Strength more cheaply, but
have a higher minimum, and with the higher Strength a character gets a higher mass, the weight and size tables also
support this data.
o The Growth advantage uses what could be called the square/square law: strength measured in weight you can lift
only needs to scale with the square of height. Probably falls under Acceptable Breaks from Reality, since Growth
already blatantly violates conservation of mass/energy.
 Squishy Wizard: generally averted, but can be played straight, as characters with lots of exotic supernatural
powers rarely have a use for Strength (which is tied to HP), and may prefer to put their points much more into
magic — but it is not a core aspect of the system.
  Stock Ness Monster: The 3rd edition supplement Places of Mystery has a brief entry on Loch Ness (one of the
few non-man-made locations in the book) which points out the problems with attempting a "realistic" treatment
of the monster (it would probably have to be a large sturgeon), but notes that a supernatural monster might have
been the result of some typically dubious behavior by Aleister Crowley.
 Subsystem Damage: Not by default, but if you want to use hit locations, they can either have their own allotment
of Hit Points, or only risk being crippled by Critical Hits.
 Suffer the Slings: They're actually quite powerful low-tech weapons.
 Summoning Ritual: Being a properly generic ruleset, GURPS has more than one magic system that encompasses
fancy ritualistic summonings.
 Super Gullible: The Gullibility disadvantage gives this trait to a character. They'll believe anything they're told,
no matter how ridiculous it is.
 Super Natural Martial Arts: The "Trained by a Master" advantage allows characters to buy several exotic skills
and chi-based powers.
 Super Reflexes: the Advantage called Enhanced Time Sense.
 Super Registration Act:
o An article in Pyramid included a section on classifying superpowers by Legality Class - healing powers might
require the equivalent of a medical license, having the ability to see in the dark won't raise an eyebrow unless all
supers have to be registered, and any but a very free government would at least consider putting a Person of Mass
Destruction in permanent solitary confinement to keep them from nuking everything.
o Supers briefly touches on this, but it doesn't get much play - but some repressive governments might want all
superpowers registered.
 Super Spit:
o Newsletter Roleplayer #10 (May 1988), adventure "The Isle of Night": The Eldritch Abomination T'Soquat can spit
an acidic secretion doing 1-11 Hit Points of damage.
o GURPS Space Bestiary:
 The Marksman Fish can spit a powerful nerve toxin up to twenty five feet out of water. It uses the spit against small
birds, causing them to fall into the water so they can be eaten.
 The Spitting River Snake can spray a strong narcotic venom up to 6 feet away through the air. It uses the spray to
render small animals and birds helpless, then eats them. When used against humans, the venom penalizes dexterity and
intelligence but does not cause paralysis.
 Super Strength:
o The game lets you buy Lifting or Striking strength separate from normal strength. To simulate people like
Superman or the Hulk the Super Effort enhancement increases normal strength exponentially when you really need
it.
o GURPS newsletter Roleplayer #10 (May 1988), adventure "The Isle of Night". The Eldritch Abomination T'Soquat
has a strength of 300, which is fantastically high by the game's standards. When it hits it does approximately 30-
180 Hit Points of damage.
 Swallowed Whole: GURPS Space Bestiary
o The River Snake is a water serpent that grows up to sixty feet long. It can swallow a human-sized creature whole.
While inside the snake, creatures take one Hit Point of damage per second from digestive juices.
o The vortex is a barrel-like aquatic creature about thirty feet tall. It sucks in several tons of water and living
creatures. Any living thing inside of it takes 1-6 Hit Points of acid damage per second from its digestive liquids.
 Taking the Bullet: Dodges can be applied to protect others.
 Technical Pacifist: The Pacifism (Cannot Kill) disadvantage.
 Technology Levels:
o Used by name. Every skill that relies on tools has an associated Tech Level. If you try to use that skill with tools of
a different Tech Level, you'll get a penalty in proportion to the difference. The rules acknowledge that the TL
ratings are arbitrary, and technological progress isn't really linear, so the GM can assign different TLs to different
parts of a society, and for some skills, he's advised to let characters quickly learn how to use individual items of an
unfamiliar TL without putting points into it.
o Variant tech levels happen when you break out of this trope a bit. The (x+y) pattern means that the baseline
technology is x, but you've got a variant technology (Steampunk, Bio Punk, what have you) that pushes the
 effective TL up y levels. ^ appended to a tech level means superscience; something that expressly breaks the laws of
physics as we understand them and moves the game into soft science. And there's also "advanced" or "retarded" in a
particular science - for example, Medieval Europe was mostly TL 3, but outside of the Salerno School, was at
best TL 2 in medicine.
 The Multiverse: Most obviously, in Infinite Worlds. But if that doesn't suit you, a variety of other planar
cosmologies are available.
 Thou Shalt Not Kill:
o Pacifism's "Cannot Kill" variant plays this completely straight: no killing.
o Inverted with Bloodlust. This disadvantage means that in serious combat, you will attempt to kill all enemies and
show no quarter.
 Time Travel:
o The basic set includes it as the Jumper (Time) advantage.
o The GURPS Time Travel supplement and its 4th edition counterpart, GURPS Infinite Worlds, explore this topic in
depth.
 Token Evil Teammate: Among the sample characters given in GURPS 4th Edition, Baron Janos Telkozep seems
to be one. He's a vampire who's backstory is that he's working for the good guys for purely selfish reasons, and
close inspection of his character sheet suggests he's not a Friendly Neighborhood Vampire but rather a
murderous, greedy bastard. Oh, and he's named after a god with two faces.
 Torture Always Works: Not "always," but it gives a seriously high bonus to Interrogation.
 Training the Gift of Magic: This trope is represented in the default magic system by the fact that Magery (basic
Magical Aptitude) is an advantage, and each spell is then learned as a skill. (Variant systems may feature skills
that each allow casting of an assortment of spells.) In settings with low or normal "mana levels", Magery is
required to work magic outside of the Least of Spells; in high mana areas, anyone can do so, although Magery
may give a bonus.
 Troperiffic: The myriad of the settings + the "cinematic rules" = near-overdose levels of various tropes.
Particularly when Action sub-group of books (dedicated directly to things from action movies and over-the-top
fiction) are used, as they enforce tropes as game rules.
 Tv Tropes Will Ruin Your Life: One Pyramid article says that one either needs multiple hours or rather strong
resolve to browse the site.
 Unicorn: GURPS Fantasy Bestiary describes a number of unicorn types.
o The poh is an equine with a black tail, feline paws and a twisting, coiling horn in its forehead. Unlike horses or true
unicorns, it's a fierce predator that hunts tigers and leopards — and will go after people if no better food is around.
o The fantasy unicorn found in modern fiction resembles a white horse with a long mane and tai, tufts of hair around
its hooves, and a long spiraling horn. They're intelligent creatures that can understand human language — rumor
says they may also speak — and are fierce foes of evil. They can cast a number of spells, mostly focused on
healing, purifying food and water, and neutralizing poison, but must touch their target with their horn to do so; they
fight mostly by goring with their horns. They're rare and solitary beings who live in deep forests away from
civilization, but may ally with very good-hearted people; even then, they only allow themselves to be ridden by
children and female virgins.
o The medieval unicorn, discussed separately, resembles a small horse or large goat, with a goatlike beard and a
meter-long horn that is red at its base, white in the middle and red at the tip. They're simply animals and aren't
magical — they cannot speak, understand languages or cast spells, although their horn can neutralize poison and be
ground to make aphrodisiacs. They are solitary and very rare, and extremely fierce — they cannot be tamed, fight to
the death when cornered, and are natural enemies of lions and elephants. The only way to subdue one is to present it
with a female virgin; the unicorn will then lay its head on her lap and fall asleep, allowing it to be captured.
 Unicorns Prefer Virgins: GURPS Fantasy Bestiary notes that fantasy unicorns may ally with anyone of noble
heart, but only allow children and female virgins to ride them. The mythical unicorn is likewise said to have a
weakness for female virgins, and that on encountering one it will place its head on her lap and allow itself to be
stroked until it falls asleep. Hunters can then capture it while its guard is down. This is the only way to catch
them, as unicorns are otherwise extremely fierce beings and will fight to the death rather than be captured.
 Untouchable Until Tagged: Suffering a Major Wound (damage equal to or greater than half of one's maximum
HP) and botching the Health roll to stay on one's feet/keep from being stunned can quickly lead to this scenario.
  Vampiric Draining: The Vampiric Bite and more generic Leech powers.
 Violation of Common Sense: While this trope is common to tabletop RPGs in general, GURPS takes the extra
step of providing an advantage called Common Sense. If the GM makes you take it (and if you're the sort of
player who needs it, he really should), he'll roll your IQ when you're about to do something stupid; success
means he stops you. This makes it possible to fail a Common Sense roll.
 Water Source Tampering: The Illuminati module the "Fiendish Fluoridators" as one of its many conspiracies.
 When All You Have Is a Hammer…: The Hidebound disadvantage gives a character this as their guiding
philosophy.
 We Will Have Perfect Health in the Future: Some of the supplements, such as GURPS Bio-Tech, provide this as
an advantage.
 We Will Wear Armor in the Future: Armor starts to make a comeback in TL 7 with the discovery of lightweight,
bullet-resistant synthetics such as kevlar. In some TL 10+ campaigns armor is vital, while in others weapons are
so devastating that dodging or shooting first is far more important.
 Weakened by the Light:
o 3rd Edition supplement GURPS Undead:
 Shadows and vampires take 1-6 Hit Points of damage per minute they spend in sunlight.
 Wights take 1-6 Hit Points of damage each five minutes they spend in sunlight.
o GURPS Monsters:
 The La Llorona spirit takes 1-6 Hit Points of damage per minute in sunlight.
 The Mothman takes 1-6 Hit Points of Fatigue damage per five minutes in sunlight.
 Weirdness Magnet: The trait's description provides the page quote. Technically a disadvantage, but your mileage
will vary. It's counted as a disadvantage because it's inconvenient for the character. Cool, but inconvenient. (With
the potential to be downright dangerous sometimes.)
 World War II: a main sourcebook with several different ones on different combatants including Iron Cross, All
The King's Men, Dogfaces, Frozen Hell, Doomed White Eagle, Grim Legions, and others.
 When the Clock Strikes Twelve: GURPS newsletter Roleplayer #10 (May 1988), adventure "The Isle of Night".
When the PCs' ship approaches the island time will suddenly start passing at an accelerated rate. After
the PCs land on the island time will stop moving forward at exactly midnight, and stay there until the summoning
is completed.
 Writers Cannot Do Math: Averted. The editor's original career track was particle physics. 3e's infamous Vehicles
books was notoriously complex. In 4e all the difficult math is done beforehand and put in tables. When
supplements (and issues of Pyramid) let people peek behind the curtain phrases like "nasty transcendental
equations" have been known to show up.
 X-Ray Sparks: Featured in the Third Edition supplement, Myth. One of the illustrations (on page 98) is an
archmage named Rabican using a magical sword to fire a lightning bolt at a Fallen Lord named Shiver. Shiver's
skeleton can be seen inside her body when the bolt hits her.
 Zeerust: When 4th edition was being written, is was the tail end of the Stealth technology being in the vogue. It
was seen as the future of warfare and the the most high-tech development possible. Thus all the expansions and
supplement materials dealing with future (especially Ultra-Tech) are written under the assumption that all wars
will be fought with minimal armor and maximum use of stealth. Within the publication life of 4th edition, Stealth
was rendered nothing more than extremely expensive and very short-lived fad, with variety of ways to deal with
it developed in the meantime, making armor for vehicles far more important than their "invisibility".
 The GURPS roleplaying system can potentially be used to roleplay in any setting, but you'll probably have an easier
time of it if someone else has done the work of deciding how to apply the GURPS rules to simulate the various
facets of the setting. This is the domain of one type of sourcebook; the setting book.
Steve Jackson Games has itself published more than 200 GURPS sourcebooks. Most of these are for the outdated
third edition rules; you can find them here . It's possible to use many of these sourcebooks in the fourth edition
with only minor modifications. Major new sourcebooks (High-Tech, Magic, etc.) likely have new versions of the
material in the old books; to adapt the old sourcebooks' advice on making characters, refer to GURPS Update . The
following lists are not comprehensive, and the company may publish new books for the line whenever they choose.
Popular original worldbooks for the third edition include:
 GURPS Alternate Earths 1 and 2
 GURPS Illuminati University
 GURPS Reign of Steel
 GURPS Space Atlas (actually a sub-line of four books, each describing one or two regions of space for
interstellar SF games)
 GURPS Supers
 GURPS Technomancer
 Transhuman Space
3rd edition GURPS licensed adaptation worldbooks include:
 Book of the New Sun
 Callahan's Crosstime Saloon
 Conan the Barbarian
 Discworld
 Hellboy
 Horseclans
 Humanx Commonwealth
 Lensman
 Myth
 Planet of Adventure
 Planet Krishna
 The Prisoner (1967)
 Riverworld
 Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri
 Star Trek (In the form of GURPS Prime Directive, from Amarillo Design Bureau, which was based on the Star
Fleet Battles universe)
 Uplift
 The War Against the Chtorr
 Wild Cards
 Witch World
There were also a large number of historical or semi-historical setting books, covering topics from Dinosaurs
to World War II.
Licensed 3rd edition GURPS adaptations of other roleplaying games include:
 Blue Planet
 Bunnies & Burrows
 Deadlands
 Castle Falkenstein
 Conspiracy X
 In Nomine
 OGRE (based on the Steve Jackson boardgame)
 Traveller
 The World of Darkness (Vampire, Werewolf, and Mage)
The 4th edition of GURPS has a number of worldbooks, some of them relatively short PDF publications, including
but by no means limited to the following:
 Age of Gold (Pulp-era superheroes empowered by returned magic)
 Alchemical Baroque (A Fairy Tale fantasy world with a dash of Clockpunk)
 Banestorm
 Britannica-6, an alternate history setting (actually designed as part of the Infinite Worlds set-up — see below);
the 19th-century with runaway technology and no Queen Victoria.
 The Broken Clockwork World, a Portal Fantasy setting with our world colliding with a post-
apocalyptic steampunk world where reality is falling apart.
 Collegio Januari: Essentially, Homeline's fully-mystical opposite number. This titular College of Janus is a
monastic institution operating sometime between 600 and 1700 AD, utilizing crossworld magicks as a means of
harvesting mana. They are, apparently, guided by the twin-faced god, himself. They occasionally bump heads
with the, also crossworld, Order Of St. Eustace.
 Casey and Andy
 A second edition of the Discworld Roleplaying Game, which appeared in 2016, bringing things into line with the
4th edition GURPS rules (and making it more of a fully standalone game) as well as updating the background
data to match more recent novels in the series.
 Girl Genius
 Hot Spots: Renaissance Florence, Constantinople, 527-1204 AD, and Renaissance Venice (Historical settings)
 Infinite Worlds (A GURPS-exclusive multiverse, with something of a Fantasy Kitchen Sink flavor in places; the
direct successor to and update of GURPS Time Travel, and also to the GURPS Alternate Earths books, as the
worlds covered there are all part of said multiverse. The other GURPS Third Edition world books (most
notably Technomancer, Supers, and Reign of Steel) were later integrated into the multiverse as well, becoming
part of the larger meta-setting)
 Lands Out of Time (Cinematic adventuring with dinosaurs)
 The Madness Dossier (A modern-day horror setting of unreliable perceptions, memetic warfare, hideous
monsters, and moral ambiguity)
 Prime Directive, by Amarillo Design Bureau (A Star Trek/Star Fleet Battles worldbook)
 Reign of Steel: Will to Live (A conversion guide for the 3rd edition supplement, with enough detail to serve as a
sourcebook in its own right)
 SEALs in Vietnam (Another historical setting)
 Tales of the Solar Patrol (An SF setting in classic Space Opera mode)
 Transhuman Space: Changing Times (A conversion guide like Will to Live and also a "GM's Guide" to the
setting)
 Traveller: Interstellar Wars. The Interstellar Wars are one of the most important periods in Traveller history, but
had not previously been covered in detail.note 
 Vorkosigan Saga
However, with the Fourth Edition, Steve Jackson Games chose to focus more on "genre books" than on worldbooks,
especially when it came to print volumes. (Actually, many of these topics were also covered by Third Edition
supplements, but those were heavily outnumbered by the setting books.) The advice and rules in these books can be
applied to any setting in its genre, and each book comes with advice on applying its rules to various sub-genres;
many also have at least one or two sample settings or campaign frameworks. Hence, they often function as "broad"
setting books.
 Action
 Bio-Tech (Organic Technology)
 Creatures of the Night (Weird creatures)
 Dragons (Our Dragons Are Different... This is actually a 3rd edition supplement, but with conversion notes for
the new edition in an appendix)
 Dungeon Fantasy (A series of books with rules and advice for games à la Dungeons & Dragons; this later
became the basis for the standalone Dungeon Fantasy Roleplaying Game game, which appeared in 2017 using a
cut-down version of the GURPS rules.)
 Fantasy
 Furries
 Gun Fu
 Horror
 High-Tech ("The gun book")
 Low-Tech (Gear from the Stone Age to the Age of Sail)
 Magic (An expansion on the magic system from Basic Set, with many many spells
 Martial Arts (Expands the tactical combat system to allow for more tactical depth and action)
 Monster Hunters
 Mysteries
 Powers (Replaces the very short Psionics chapter from the Basic Set with a more detailed way of constructing
superpowers; adds six new crazy-powerful advantages appropriate for superheroes; adds tons of new modifiers
for advantages and disadvantages; and gives usage advice on all of the above)
 Psionic Powers
 Space
 Spaceships
 Steampunk (a line of books, building off the 3rd edition supplement on the same topic)
 Supers (As in superheroes — a completely different treatment of the subject to the previous edition version
mentioned above)
 Thaumatology (Covering magic systems of all sorts)
 Ultra-Tech (Futuristic SF technology)

The good news is, we can visit other Earths.The bad news is, somebody out there doesn't like us.
Something that looks like Time Travel combined with alternative world hopping. GURPS: Infinite Worlds is the
default GURPS 4th edition setting, loosely inspired by H. Beam Piper's "Paratime" novels. The successor to the
Third Edition sourcebook GURPS Time Travel and its supplement GURPS Alternate Earths. The setting is detailed
briefly in the GURPS core rules and at more length in the book GURPS Infinite Worlds and a couple of short PDF
supplements, with brief passages in other GURPS supplements providing yet more ideas — it's always easy enough
to outline another timeline idea linked to a new book's theme.
The basic concept is this: A Parallel Earth (that calls itself "Homeline") develops the technology for travel to other
timelines. It is controlled by the United Nations, which effectively becomes a World Government (an opinion not
every nation and corporation agrees with). They secretly explore and exploit the other Earths (in relatively benign
ways - buying resources from Earths that have plenty, for example, and dumping wastes on Earths that never
developed life) and forms an organization known as "The Infinity Patrol" for the purpose of keeping "The Secret"
(that is, the existence of The Multiverse as well as the fact that you can travel to other worlds by technological
means) from those Worlds that do not know about it (the vast majority discovered so far).
The reason is twofold. First, worldlines that learn The Secret may either be aggressive timelines, or become the
victim of one, creating another reality-hopping danger. But the second deals with "echo" timelines that mirror
Earth's past — changing an echo by interfering too much may cause that reality to "shift" closer or farther away
from Homeline (that is, it becomes more or less easy to access.) In fact, Homeline's biggest rival, Centrum, a World
that also has "cross-time" technology but with a socialist technocratic society, seeks to draw worlds "closer" to
themselves so they can influence them into developing similar governments. Occasionally, "outtimers" (slang for
people from outside Homeline) are recruited to join Infinity if they are judged worthy. This is similar to a Time
Police setting genre except it involves parallel worlds instead of the actual past or future. (The book also includes a
separate, Time Travel setting called "Project Timepiece" as well as settings such as The Order of the Hourglass, a
pulp setting where adventurers travel through time via their minds.)
Oh, by the way there's a third up-and-coming player in the multiverse that recently extracted The Secret from a
crashed Homeline conveyor. Homeline's name for their timeline? Reich-5.
This setup allows GURPS game masters to permit Crossovers between different genres. For example, the Earth of
"IST" from the original GURPS Supers has been recently discovered, which could allow for crossovers between the
two settings. This also gives both the player and GM a huge sandbox to play with. This is to some degree, the
purpose of the setting, as it literally allows the game master and the players to goof around, err... that is police the
 infinite multiverse where literally anything is possible (that includes some very weird possibilities) without worrying
about actual time-travel (unless you want to, of course) The sheer complexity and size of the multiverse and the
parachronic physics is probably the main reason The Secret can be maintained with any success at all.
For more information and tropes concerning several of the worlds (including Reich-5 and Centrum), also
see GURPS Alternate Earths. For one setting within the Infinite Worlds framework that has received its own
separate treatment, see GURPS Infinite Worlds: Britannica-6.
The publisher's Web page for the book is here.

This, as a setting for GURPS, shares many tropes with GURPS.

Other tropes:
 Alien Non-Interference Clause: There's no general bar, but Infinity enforces individual ones for individual
worlds. The Masquerade needs to be upheld on all worlds, travel to worlds with advanced technology (in other
words, potentially able to develop parachronics) is restricted, and cultural contamination, cargo cults and
colonialism are to be avoided. Also, meddling with "echo" worlds (worlds identical to time periods in Homeline's
past) is forbidden, but that's because their temporal physics are unstable. Other than that, trade and "benevolent
guidance" happen all the time.
 Alien Space Bats:
o Centrum and Homeline do a LOT of this, as often as not as a part of their ongoing conflict. Centrum promotes an
ideology of a meritocratic, rationalist One World Order in more advanced worlds, or outright colonization of more
primitive timelines. Infinity is less picky; they largely want trading partners for White Star, "benevolent guidance"
in favor of peace and human rights, and most importantly to keep anyone else from developing parachronics.
o More worryingly, it seems that they may not be the only ones who do this, as the no less than 18 Gothas (parallels
that all suffered a Zombie Apocalypse with a common source) seem to point to a common origin. On a (somewhat)
lighter note, the sheer amount of In Spite of a Nail in the Ezcalli timeline, despite the divergence point (Phoenicians
accidentally discovering the Americas circa 1000 BC, natch), has many people in Infinity suspecting it's also
happening there.
o Infinity suspects that something's meddling with Campbell. Science isn't just dead in America and Britain (where an
anti-technological religiosity has become the norm) but in the Communist powers (which share none of the West's
technophobia) as well, and Patrolmen are smelling a conspiracy.
A Lighter Shade of Black:
o On Gotha-Z, the one major power that has not been destroyed by the G-Z virus is Imperial Japan. It's not any nicer
than Homeline's version, and they make no bones about raiding non-Japanese survivors for resources, but given the
fact that it's a Zombie Apocalypse, Infinity isn't objecting too hard to the support they get from Homeline's Japan.
o On Steel, Centrum's imperialistic Interworld Service can be considered entirely good guys compared to the the
genocidal AI zoneminds.
 Allohistorical Allusion:
o There is a mercenary outfit called Alternate Outcomes Inc. that works as the only PMC allowed to carry out out-
time operations. The first PMC was South African Executive Outcomes.
o A sidebar mentions how Infinity knocked off an al-Qaeda terror plot in early 2001. Merlin's CIA took out a similar
group in Afghanistan in 2000.
Alternate History: The point of the exercise, most of the time.
Alternate-History Dinosaur Survival: The United States of Lizardia has dinosaur-descended Lizard Folk with a
society peculiarly similar to our own. (It may fall into an accessible quantum band because of psychic resonance
effects linked to this.) There are also worlds with more straightforward dinosaur survivals, serving as interesting
if dangerous destinations for research and tourism.
 Alternate History Wank:
o On Homeline, the biggest winner from the parachronic boom has been the US, which maintains the degree of world
leadership that it had in The '90s (in part because The War on Terror never happened). There's also indications that
France is becoming an aggressive crosstime rival to the US (and to Infinity). Russia is also a major player, due to
giving its oligarchs access to the biggest resource boom in the Infinite Worlds.
o Any time the British Empire is doing too well in Quantum 6 and 7, it's a reasonable assumption that Centrum is
involved; it's their favorite power to wank up high for cultural (they're descended from the Australian remnant of a
global Anglo-French Empire — although they would deny this has any relevence, as their whole world is equally
Centrum), linguistic (they speak English) and strategic reasons (it's a very strong model on which to build a One
World Order and easily guided along technocratic lines).
o In fact, this happens often enough that many alternate timeline designations are used specifically for timelines
where a particular nation/concept was wanked.
 Alternate Universe: Where all these alternate histories (and some worlds so weird they're barely recognizable as
Earth) can exist.
 Ancient Conspiracy: The Cabal, which since it's mostly made up of sorcerers and assorted supernaturals with
amoral, inscrutable (and often conflicting) goals, is an unwelcome wild card in the conflict between techno-
centric Homeline and Centrum. Centrum especially, as their ingrained pragmatism and logic has a hard time
coping with a concept as irrational as magic (they tend to pretend it's not there until it goes away, get rid of it by
any means necessary if it doesn't, or just pull out if neither option works).
 Ancient Rome: One of the most common divergence points is a surviving (or resurgent) Roman Empire.
 Anti-Villain: Centrum really isn't evil, just with alien social values (what we might term "ruthlessness", they term
"practicality"). There's a section explicitly allowing the GM to decide if they should be A Lighter Shade of
Grey or A Darker Shade of Grey, and another that mentions the possibility of an Enemy Mine with Infinity to
fight Reich-5 if it ever becomes a major player.
 Apocalypse How: On Homeline, the year 535 was a Global/Societal Disruption; an eruption of Krakatoa led to a
volcanic winter, ruining civilization around the world for a century.note  This event is also the most powerful
reality quake zone known to Paralabs, and it's theorized that the quake actually took out an entire timeline and
shook up all realities between 410 and 660 AD.
 "Arabian Nights" Days:
o Caliph twists this. It's a world mostly covered by Islamic nations in the 1600s, except that the magic is
technological... and the worldline is by far the most advanced of any that either Infinity or Centrum have ever
discovered.
o A more classical example is Burton, an anachronistic myth parallel that exists in a Stable Time Loop that coincides
with the reign of Caliph Harun al-Rashid where the folktales are true.
 Arbitrary Skepticism: At Paralabs, magic gets this, specifically in contrast to Psychic Powers. While psionics
don't usually develop on Homeline, they nonetheless fully fit into a "scientific" paradigm, and as a result,
psionics is considered bleeding-edge science that everyone wants a piece of. Magic, by contrast, is seen
as unscientific by Paralabs, and the Sheldrake Section (who research such phenomena and developed the "mana
level" classification) are generally seen as kookballs even in Paralabs. The fact that Sheldrake Section insists on
trying to fit magic into a predefined theory similar to the Force isn't helping things, but nobody wants to be the
one who admits that they believe in actual magic. (Veteran Patrolmen rarely share this prejudice.)
 Awakening the Sleeping Giant: There are several sleeping titans in this setting:
o Reich-5 was originally presented as a sleeping giant, but while it's awakened, it suffered Diminishing Villain
Threat between its initial presentation and the exposure of parachronics, and the latter event occurred in such a way
that most of the Nazi hierarchy is unaware of the situation, so the Armanen and Raven Division are more of
a Goldfish Poop Gang right now than a match for Homeline or Centrum. However, they're still very nasty, and if
their superiors did find out what's going on...
o Merlin's another partially-awakened giant: a world with technology equal to that of our own Earth, but with access
to advanced Magitek as well (in fact, the world of the GURPS Technomancer supplement). A blunder with Gate
magic and Infinity's response to it made America's CIA aware of parachronics, and they've started spying on
Homeline back (though Homeline is as of yet unaware of this); however, they are not necessarily hostile. More
worrisome, the Condor Group Nazis in control of Argentina have made an alliance with Reich-5's Armanen.
o Caliph is a mostly-peaceful world of Islamic Crystal Spires and Togas, but its technology is centuries ahead of
anything that Infinity and Centrum have, and both sides want it. Of course, any intrusion risks telling Caliph about
the existence of parachronics, and that centuries-advanced technology makes Caliph into quite possibly the most
powerful single worldline in existence.
o Most horrifying of all possibilities is Shikaku-mon. A dark, overpopulated Cyberpunk world where democracy
never happened, over half of which is ruled by an Imperial Japan that christianized and modernized early on, it
would be a likely threat to Homeline for that alone. What makes it worse, though, is that parachronic projectors
 may work on that worldline, meaning that  if they develop parachronic technology, they can reach
Homeline. Also, because it was discovered by a Japanese research team, Infinity were not able to keep the existence
of Shikaku-mon a secret on Homeline, so it may be only a matter of time before the Masquerade breaks on this
world as well. Sweet dreams!
o The Worlds of Horror supplement introduces another Sleeping Giant that is potentially far, far worse: Taft-1. Both
Infinity and Centrum think that the point of divergence is Truman's early death and the election of Robert A. Taft in
1948. It's not.
 Background Magic Field:
o The Sheldrake Section at Paralabs believe that every living thing generates a "morphogenetic field" that can be
altered to reshape reality, and this is what various timelines call "magic." The theory's truth value is somewhere
between "incomplete" and "bogus," but nobody wants to point at the elephant in the room and say they believe in
actual magic.
o Scientists on Merlin have come up with their own understanding of magic that superficially looks like this, but isn't.
According to Merlin thaumatologists, magic involves shifting physical laws from one dimension to another. Mana
level isn't determined by the strength of the mana field (though "oz particles" that serve as a bridge between
universes are a part of the theory) but by the weakness of the dimensional barriers in an area. Merlin seems to be
closer to the truth than the Sheldrake Section, but their theory is also far from complete.
 Beware of Hitchhiking Ghosts: A double inversion. Troubled people might get picked up by a mysterious
stranger who gives them life-affirming advice before dropping them off. Turns out he's some kind of
supernatural being (not necessarily a ghost) who drives across worlds for this very purpose.
 Black-and-Gray Morality: In Reich-2, the Western democracies of the US and UK are heavy-handed neocolonial
and colonial overlords with authoritarian and racist tendencies, but the Infinity Patrol holds its nose and supports
them against the Reich, the Soviet Union and Imperial Japan, who are all far worse.
 Brainwashing for the Greater Good: One theory about Siva-1 is that the pacifistic Jain psi-monks there have
mind-controlled the world into accepting their message of nonviolence, ensuring that there hasn't been a war in
over a millennium.
 Broken Masquerade:
o The wheels are starting to come off in Quantum 3. Reich-5 is out of the bottle (though their parachronics are limited
to a Government Conspiracy within the declining Reich) and has begun invading other worlds, while due to the
emergency circumstances of first penetration, Merlin's U.S. government has discovered Infinity and is in the
process of trying to infiltrate Homeline back.
o On Nergal, Infinity intentionally ripped up the Secret, reasoning that they couldn't develop parachronics and that a
world built on slavery and Human Sacrifice could use a lot more "benevolent guidance" than normal.
They're Giving Radio to the Romans in southern Africa under a God Guise.
o A more humorous example is Johnson's Rome. It was originally "just" a world in which the Roman Empire
(founded by victorious Mark Anthony and Cleopatra) never fell and remained powerful until 1192 AD. That's when
Alex A. Johnson, a small-time businessman from Homeland, arrived on a randomly dialed timeline, looked around,
and openly breached the masquerade to... start a tourist resort, along with a hefty dose of (including
literally) Giving Radio to the Romans. By the time ISWAT figured out what Johnson Crosstime Incorporated was
up to with their ostensibly "time travel to the Roman Empire" tourist venture, the timeline was changed so
drastically and so thoroughly that it was too late to do anything about it. An average Roman citizen doesn't know
where the "Jonsonus visitors" are coming from, but they don't mind all the tech and money that keep popping out
from the "barbarian" tourists.
 But Not Too Foreign: Done deliberately as part of the rules and fitting into the lore of the setting. The goal of
parachronics is to first and foremost establish connection with close parallels. Thus whenever tables are used for
rolling a random world, the most common outcome is a mid-to-late 20th century world with dominant Western
culture, ruled by some sort of oligarchy. Anything outside that is going to be significantly rarer and it's by design
near impossible to simply roll a world that goes beyond relatively mundane things in tune of "US-Italy Cold War
 during Rockefeller's presidency". Of course, nothing prevents GMs from manually making their own Phoenician
discovery of Americas or 2nd Mongolian Empire stretching from ocean to ocean thanks to The Tunguska Event.
 Canon Welding: The 4e version of the setting has absorbed several campaigns from the 3e Time Travel book that
were originally entirely separate settings.
o In a more general sense, just about every other GURPS setting has a corresponding world mentioned in the book.
Including the licensed ones (yes, Infinity agents can visit Discworld, Hyboria and Witch World). From a meta
perspective, the Infinite Worlds setting basically exists to facilitate Massive Multiplayer Crossovers.
o On Steel, VIRUS is actually a front for Centrum's Interworld Service.
 Chummy Commies:
o The pre-Soviet Communist movement plays with this. They're especially chummy by Centran standards, as a
world-spanning socialist state is a meme that the Totalitarian Utilitarian technocrats can get behind. On the other
hand, part of the reason is that they aren't tied to Soviet imperialism, which is the bad kind of communism by the
standards of both interworld powers.
o On Lenin-5, General Georgy Zhukov has denounced Bukharinismnote , ended the Soviet gulags, and is quickly
becoming an ally of the West against Maoist China.
 Cosmic Horror Story: There's hints of this in the margin. In particular, the power of the Cthulhu Mythos not only
transcends time and space, but local physical laws. Azathoth's power can be called on anywhere, even mana-dead
worlds. This has disturbing implications for the Infinite Worlds, to say the least.
 Crapsack World: Not as bad as most other cases and not immediately apparent, but the more you read, the more
obvious it is that there are a LOT more crappy parallel worlds than reasonably nice ones (from the Lucifer
parallels to the Reich parallels, with the disturbingly common Gotha parallels and many others in-between), and
even the nice ones tend to have ugly caveats — Gernsback, for example, has world peace under the League of
Nations (both The Great Depression and World War II were averted) and awesome Raygun Gothic Schizo
Tech thanks to Nikola Tesla's inventions, but due to not having had those experiences, racism, sexism and
colonialism are still firmly entrenched at pre-1940's levels in most inhabitants' minds. It still is one of the most
positive parallels overall.
o Nergal, where the Assyrian Empire destroyed the Hebrews and Phoenicians, prevented the rise of Persia and set a
very bloody standard for every empire to follow. Nearly every local culture practices human sacrifice, paper and
alphabetic writing disappeared from history, and the world is slowly descending into an anomalous Ice Age that's
hinted to be a result of dark magic. It's bad enough that Infinity has decided to throw The Masquerade to the wind;
Nergal lacks the technology to replicate parachronics, and to quote the book, "frankly, the Patrol would like to
cause as much cultural contamination here as possible."
o It's downplayed, but Centrum's backstory has it arising from the ashes of a world war between megalomaniacal
empires that escalated beyond control, destroying civilization except for a small colony of technocrats who resolved
never to let that happen again.
 Crossover Cosmology: The book suggests that echoes exist for many, if not all fictional works (at the GM's
discretion). A throwaway line mentions the existence of the Land of Oz on one alternate world and there's
mention of a world where Sherlock Holmes actually existed, but he was Killed Off for Real at Reichenbach.
 Death World: Several parallels qualify, even appart from the aforementioned Gotha and Lucifer parallels, many
of them colloquially called Hell Worlds. The causes run the gamut from incredibly deadly epidemics to man-
made ecological meltdown to nuclear war to Alien (or maybe not) Invasion, but probably the most worrisome
(i.e. most likely to be completely and irreversibly quarantined) are the (thankfully few) parallels that seem to
exist in a Cosmic Horror Story universe. One of these parallels may have the Things back-tracing the parachronic
trail from a Homeline Scout team.
 Decadent Court: On Cyrano, the court of Louis XXV. The manipulations of corrupt nobles and the mysterious
Voice of the Phantom are leading France Outremonde to ruin, and even the King himself is either a pawn or
collaborator with evil.
To the new order, a man of honor was a threat to be crushed.
 Demonization: A literal example in Azoth-7. When the Spanish Inquisition unexpectedly managed to summon
Spain's tutelary angel to prevent an English invasion, the English accused them of making a pact
with Samael instead. This is probably not true.
 Diminishing Villain Threat:
o In Alternate Earths, Reich-5's Imperial Japan, especially their Kempei Tai organization, were every bit as deadly an
adversary as the Nazis. In Infinite Worlds, Japan is decaying into warlord states and the Kempei Tai have, within a
single generation, gone from being the guys who gave the Gestapo nightmares to a bureaucratic tar pit.
o The Reich itself plays with this; while the Nazi regime is no longer the unstoppable Orwellian terror that it used to
be, a faction within the decaying Reich now has world-jumpers at their disposal.
 Dirty Commies: In the Infinite Worlds, most forms of Communism are a very bad thing, driving several worlds
directly into Hell or worse.
 Dirty Cop: Downplayed. Serious corruption and empire-building in Infinity Unlimited are rare and structurally
discouraged, and being on double payroll even rarer, but Patrolmen love smuggling undeclared goods to and
from Homeline. Usually it's personal stuff like wine and souvenirs, or steel knives to trade offworld, though.
 Divided States of America:
o The Dixie parallels, where the South won its independence.
o On Gallatin, Alexander Hamilton died before he could write the Federalist Papers, and New York refused to ratify
the Constitution. America splintered, and now the United States of America is one of many American republics.
 Doing in the Scientist: Some of the nuttier sorts at Paralabs think that parachronics actually runs on Clap Your
Hands If You Believe. This hasn't been proven either way, owing to the one field test disappearing into thin air.
 Doing In the Wizard: Inverted, as there are several parallels where magic clearly exists, making it kinda hard to
deny (though Centrum tries). There is even a loose group of powerful magic-users and monsters that also travel
through realities, the Cabal (from Gurps Cabal, natch). However, the Merlin parallels play this straight by
providing a scientific explanation for GURPS' default magic system, which is heavily tied in with parachronic
travel itself.
 Enemy Mine:
o One suggestion in the book is that Infinity and Centrum could ally against Reich-5. On the other hand, a vignette in
the book suggests that Centrum might take advantage of Homeline's fixation on "the Irrationalist sect from Bavaria"
to draw off Infinity resources.
o Averted on Steel. Both Infinity and Centrum agree that the zoneminds have gotta go, but they aren't talking to each
other about their plans and have somewhat different priorities.
o The oil companies on Homeline are funding Greenpeace, who oppose the exploitation of other worlds. Said oil
companies are trying to make outtime operations harder to preserve their own dying markets.
 Equal-Opportunity Evil: Centrum is explicitly called out as finding the concept of discrimination based on race
and gender very strange. They're a little more lenient on social divisions, but that's because they're meritocrats.
(They also have an unconscious bias towards the English language and culture.)
 Evil Cannot Comprehend Good: A side-effect of Centrum's ideological uniformity is that Centrans don't really
get that anyone might not think like they do. To them, democracy is a historical aberration associated with Greek
and Italian city-states, an Alien Non-Interference Clause with underdeveloped worlds is considered paranoia
rather than an attempt to protect the weak, and they're kind of scared just how well Homeline manages to prosper
when Infinity "can't control" all the various bickering powers - the idea that Infinity might not want to be a One
World Order doesn't even cross their collective mind.
 Eviler than Thou: What may happen when Centrum and Raven Division finally meet. Centrum are Equal-
Opportunity Evil meritocrats, while Raven Division... are Nazis.
 Evil Is Deathly Cold: Nergal's oncoming Ice Age appears to be a result of the gates of Hell opening. It's anyone's
guess just how literally to take this.
 Expendable Alternate Universe: With honorable exceptions, neither Infinity nor Centrum quite view people from
other worldlines as real. Among other things, the book notes that some Homeline filmmakers have taken to
filming real battles on other worldlines with thousands of people dying to use as footage in their historical epics.
 Fantastic Rank System: Centrum dispenses with individually named ranks almost entirely note , using a numbered
scale that starts at Grade 1 (the default for every citizen) and ends at Grade 7 (top-level coordinators of each
Service that set policy for Centran society and have some authority even across Service lines).
 For Science!: Apart from the Gernsback parallel, which plays this straight (if mostly benevolently), there's an
interesting variation with the Cabal (For Magic!).
 From Bad to Worse: Many on Homeline in the know consider Reich-5's discovery of parallel worlds to be this;
while their own version is, so far, much less performant than that of Homeline or Centrum, it could potentially
end up forcing Homeline in a two-front conflict, as the latter's dimensional coordinates are between the other
two.
o A potentially much, much worse case happened recently on the former myth parallel once designated Oppenheim:
Once an Edwardian/WWI-era world with some myth parallel elements, the Spanish Flu hybridized with the Gotha
virus to create the Gotha-Z strain - this one creates actual undead.
 Ghostapo:
o Reich-5's Raven Division uses quite a bit of Aryan magic to facilitate their world-hopping.
o The Condor Group from Merlin are Nazi mages who fled to Argentina after World War II and formed an alliance
with the Peróns. They've recently formed a low-level alliance with Reich-5's Armanen Order.
o The Ahnenerbe did come up with a lot of arcane lore in Taft-1, but never really managed to put it to use. Captured
Nazi occultists helped fuel Stalin's development of Azathothic power.
 Grey-and-Gray Morality: The conflict between Centrum and Homeline, where neither can be easily categorised
as pure good or completely bad.
 Hell on Earth: Nergal is implied to be in the beginning stages of this. All of its surviving gods demand Human
Sacrifice, and the world is descending into an anomalous ice age couched in melodramatic terms.
 Killed to Uphold the Masquerade: Stringently averted by the Time Patrol; Centrum has less scruples, but there
are few situations where they'll bother (see just below).
 Interservice Rivalry: While the Infinity Patrol largely averts this internally (in part because Patrolmen
are expected to transfer between divisions as part of their job), Patrolmen don't always get along with the
"corporate" side of Infinity, and both groups consistently join together to oppose any interference from the
United Nations agencies that theoretically oversee Infinity.
 Joke Level: The United States of Lizardia parallel. A world almost socially identical to Earth, with neo-troodons
who use biotech and fluid-dynamic science in place of Earth technology, and the book explicitly points out that
nobody is even trying to make any sense out of it. As far as anyone studying it is concerned, it's a practical joke
by the gods.
 Literary Allusion Title: The chapters dealing with example alternate timelines and time travel are
respectively "Worlds Enough..." "And Time" .
 Lizard Folk: The chief inhabitants of the United States of Lizardia evolved from troodons — though, rather
bizarrely, their recent history still closely parallels Homeline's.
 Low Culture, High Tech: Homeline, oddly enough, is slipping into this. The majority of Homeline's cutting-edge
technology is "parachronic spinoffs," which is a euphemism for stolen outtime technology, and as a result,
Homeline's own scientific development is starting to stagnate while such things as fusion power are adapted
wholesale without a firm understanding of the theory.
 The Magic Comes Back: The Merlin worlds, parallels where Hellstorms locally warped the fabric of reality and
brought magic back to modern-day Earth.note 
 Magitek: Exists on worlds where magic and technology have both been developed.
o Merlin has the most advanced version yet seen, to the point where magic has been seamlessly integrated into the
world's technological infrastructure.
o Azoth-7 has a weird version, where alchemical developments have led to something that looks rather like Victorian
science fiction, only a hundred years earlier and with a completely different form of technology.
o Homeline's Paralabs have been trying to develop some, but it's mostly seen as a curiosity rather than a serious
pursuit, as Infinity is mainly a technological organization. For example, they came up with a really weird conveyor
that ran on Clap Your Hands If You Believe... and it and its inventor vanished in the first test.
 The Masquerade: Infinity policy is to not reveal "the Secret" of parachronics to any outsiders, and to actively
sabotage anyone else's attempts to do so; people who learn the Secret may be kidnapped and sent to Coventry.
Centrum is less anal-retentive about it; they only care if the natives learn about them on planets advanced enough
to develop parachronics. However, when that happens, they tend not to let technicalities (like the right to live)
get in the way of business.
 Mega-Corp:
o Infinity Unlimited is structured as a corporation, though in practice it functions more as a U.N. agency.
o White Star Trading was Paul Van Zandt's original crosstime trading firm and the main source of seed capital for
Infinity.
o Consolidated Mines, Unlimited was formed by a parallel-world Cecil Rhodes, who combines low-tech and high-
tech mining techniques to bring home more raw materials than anyone else. Rhodes himself made a move to get
 elected to the Infinity board of directors, and took advantage of the expected outcry from Africa to split his
operation off from Infinity.
o The Yugorovsky Group are a Mafiya-affiliated mining conglomerate known for being ruthless, deadly and tied into
the Russian government at the highest levels. They often engage in proxy wars with CMU.
o Johnson Crosstime Inc. has invested itself so heavily in Rome-2 that they effectively run the place, having turned
the Roman Empire of that world into a massive tourist trap.
 Mental Time Travel: World Jumpers.
 Mildly Military: Nobody really tries to regulate ISWAT teams. This is largely because said teams tend to be
composed of the elite of the elite, with powers that don't really fit into operational doctrine, and also because
over half don't even come from Homeline. They specialize in cosmic-level threats that involve the fate of
multiple Earths, so they get a fair amount of slack, and Infinity pretty much expects that ISWAT teams on R&R
will leave whatever town they're dropped in in ruins.
 Morality Kitchen Sink: All possible Shades of Conflict can be found in the Infinite Worlds. To save time:
Infinity and Merlin-1's CIA are largely good guys, but both Homeline and Merlin have some serious rot in
places. The Cabal are a Wild Card and generally unpleasant people, while the Centrum are Well-Intentioned
Extremists. And then there's Those Wacky Nazis, and then there's people who make the Nazis look positively
benign.
 The Multiverse: Of or for GURPS.
 Multiversal Conqueror:
o Both Centrum and Reich-5's Raven Division count, for different motives: Centrum thinks they're civilizing alien
realities, Raven Division because they're greedy Nazis.
o On Homeline, Infinity generally tries not to act like this... but there is no Alien Non-Interference Clause, and they're
not against behind-the-scenes guidance of non-Homeline humans, or stealing technology and art from other
parallels for Homeline's benefit. They also have to ride herd on sharp entrepreneurs who have their own ambitions:
 Johnson Crosstime, Inc. ended up taking over Rome-2 because Infinity didn't read the fine print on his business
license. By the time they realized what he was doing, the situation had become insane enough that they threw up their
hands and ratified his buyout of the Roman Empire (luckily for the locals, he's a fairly Benevolent Boss and a human
rights advocate; slavery is already beginning to be phased out thanks to him).
 The Yugorovsky Group and The Mafiya send a lot of their members out to primitive worlds to "play czar," taking over
nations to exploit them for their Homeline masters.
 Infinity themselves have drawn up plans for the annihilation of the governments of Reich-5, in concert with
Homeline's militaries. Operation Firefall was shelved because it was too risky and promised an appalling number of
casualties even if Homeline won.
 For some reason it seemed like a good idea to Infinity to put an alternate Cecil Rhodes in charge of mining operations
on multiple Africas. There's no evidence he's become one of these yet, but some people in Infinity think it's just a
matter of time.
 Infinity has an operation going on in the South Africa of Nergal, where they pose as gods and wizards who rule over
the local Zulus and occasionally lead them in Slave Liberation raids against the other nations of Nergal. This is
presented as a good thing, as the other major nations of Nergal all practice Human Sacrifice and are possibly leading
the world to ruin through their Black Magic.
 N.G.O. Superpower: Infinity Inc. is probably the most powerful entity on Homeline economically and politically.
Only a partial example, as Infinity is technically a U.N. member organization. (In practice, Infinity doesn't
answer to anyone.)
 Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: The snafu that resulted in the Reich-5 SS discovering parallel worlds and how to
reach them was originally a Russian attempt to aid the partisans of the Reichsostland.
 Nonindicative Name:
o The "Gotha" parallels, and the plague named after them. The name came about because the first such world that
Infinity discovered was just a particularly bleak Dark Ages parallel where Visigothic berserkers had destroyed
every city in their path. It was only later that Infinity discovered that things were far darker than that.
o A poetic-to-the-point-of-nonindicative name is the "Lucifer" series of worlds. No, these are not worlds defined by
the presence of Big Red, they're worlds that have become or are becoming uninhabitable through a meteor strike.
o "Siva" is a generic term for India-dominant parallels. Humorously, the first Siva world discovered was actually
dominated by Jainism, not Hinduism.
o In Infinity, the "Morale Division" of the I-Cops is a euphemism. Their actual job is PsyOps, which includes PR and
political manipulations not just outtime, but on Homeline. It's safe to say that they don't want to be too obvious
about the latter.
No Such Agency: ISWAT doesn't exist. There's no special unit within the Patrol made up mostly of outtimers
who handle missions that can affect the destiny of entire parallels. There aren't any training missions that
involve Stuff Blowing Up in infinite Nazi Germanies. And most especially, no parallel Otto Skorzeny was ever
enlisted to head up this nonexistent unit. That would just be silly.
 Obvious Crossover Method: As mentioned under the Canon Welding entry, the setting itself was basically built
to allow crossovers to happen by way of interdimensional travel.
 Other Me Annoys Me: The head of ISWAT, Otto Skorzeny, comes from a world where he was a heroic freedom
fighter against Hapsburg tyranny. He's a firm believer in freedom and human rights, and Those Wacky Nazis are
the antithesis of everything he stands for, which means that he wants to shoot every one of his alternate selves
who took up the swastika.
 Our Genies Are Different: On Caliph, a scientifically advanced Arab-dominant timeline, references to djinn in
the Qu'ran are believed to be prophecies of A.I., and actual A.I. are called "djinn".
 Our Vampires Are Different: It's implied that most traditional versions of vampirism show up somewhere in the
multiverse.
 Patriotic Fervor: This is a major pain in the ass for Infinity. Every major power on Homeline wants to support its
parallel selves, even if they're kind of nasty (Infinity isn't allowed to mess with Bonaparte-4's France because
Homeline's France is blocking it) or if their actions endanger the Secret (such as Russian involvement in the
Reichsostland). This does not apply to the Reich or Imperial Japan; Homeline Germany actually has plans to
invade the former on Reich-5 (although tabled indefinitely due to the projected prohibitive cost in lives), and
Japan has no fondness for the latter except in exceptional circumstances.
 Ragtag Bunch of Misfits: ISWAT teams have a tendency to be the Badass Crew version of this. Over half of
ISWAT members are outtimers recruited for a variety of reasons, and include such things as wizards, psychics,
vampires and weirder things, mixed with a solid core of tough and lucky Patrolmen. Said teams engage in live-
fire sabotage against Nazis as training missions.
 Red Scare: Merlin-1's America hates Commies, and their reaction to discovering the dominance of the Soviet
Union in Taft-1 was to send in Black Berets to redo the Vietnam War. This is potentially a VERY BAD THING:
"However, they’ve encountered something even worse than Red aggression: a scattered tribe of dwarfish
cannibals (the Chaucha, or Tcho-Tcho) that uses magic — but not any kind of magic Merlin-1 understands.
"On Taft-1, it’s 1962, and Stalin still lives. And he has worse allies than Hitler."
 Reed Richards Is Useless: Averted. Parachronics are making Homeline a better place in many ways — one of the
most obvious is the fact that with a seemingly unlimited number of uninhabited parallels to exploit, resource
conflicts have become a thing of the past. Nevertheless, Homeline's seedier elements are finding ways to use the
infinite worlds to support their agendas as well.
 Repressive, but Efficient:
o Centrum is actually a decent place to live, so long as you don't mind being under constant surveillance and having
no individual rights. Everyone gets their needs met and proven agents live comfortable 21st-century lifestyles, in
part because they have combined socialist economics with infinite resources. Their Interworld and Uplift Services
have the backing of an entire world behind them and have established several colony and vassal worlds, and their
agents are terribly capable adversaries for Infinity. The weakness of their repressiveness is that it extends to their
people's minds; Centrans generally don't get viewpoints that aren't theirs and can be tripped up by people not acting
like they think they will.
o One vignette from the Centran side indicates that they think of the Nazis as this. The Centrans think that they're
more "orderly" than Infinity because they're organized as a hierarchical dictatorship. The Centrans don't realize that
the Nazi bureaucracy is actually utter chaos, riven with so much backstabbing that it's almost impossible to get
anything done.
 Richard Nixon, the Used Car Salesman: It's par for the course for most timelines to have a bunch (apart from the
odd instances that don't have any, which is a research topic in itself). It's even possible to meet your own
alternate-universe self, who likely as not will have a very different life experiences. In what may just be the Most
Triumphant Example, the director of the Infinity Patrol's secret ISWAT special task force is... an alternate Otto
Skorzeny . However, this Skorzeny was, in his home parallel, a freedom fighter for the multi-national and -
denominational, proto-democratic Republican Alliance (in this timeline, European monarchies endured almost
 unopposed until the collapse of the Austro-Hungarian Empire in the 1930s), and really, really hates Those
Wacky Nazis (especially when they're other hims), and so uses live-fire sabotage missions against them as part
of the standard ISWAT training.
 Screw the Rules, I Have Connections!: The government of Israel is not a signatory to the Interworld Treaty, and
is known for using it for toilet paper; in particular, it is standing Israeli policy to rescue Jews in trouble on all
worlds and offer them sanctuary in Israel and the West Bank in violation of Infinity rules. The US' veto in the
Security Council and UNIC prevents anyone from coming down on Israel for the Alternity Exodus.
 Sliding Scale of Alternate History Plausibility: Varies from relatively plausible timelines with minor changes
from OTL (e.g. The Day the Music Died  never happens and several music greats are less self-destructive, so
they all continue to make music well past when they would have otherwise), to relatively unlikely histories (e.g.
a Nazi WW 2 victory resulting from an isolationist USA) to very implausible (e.g. early invention of printing
press leads to Muslim interplanetary colonization by the 1600s) to extreme Alien Space Bats (e.g. Newton
invents alchemy, summons an angel to destroy the Spanish armada, and Europe fights space battles over the
celestial spheres). And then there's the United States of Lizardia, which is just plain silly.
 Spacetime Cold War: Infinity vs. Centrum, although the presence of Reich-5 may or may not end up provoking a
cross-temporal equivalent of World War II.
 Sterility Plague: Taft radiation, found on Taft-3, Taft-4 and Taft-7, causes sterility in primates. It's only doing
anything on Taft-3, though; Taft-4 has other things going on and is partly shielded from the radiation, and Taft-7
never had any life to begin with. Someone upstairs at Infinity has ordered that Taft-1 be checked for Taft
radiation as well. Actually, the implication from Taft-1 is that it's weirder than that; the source of the radiation is
implied to be Azathoth.
 Stupid Jetpack Hitler: Reich-5, a world where the Nazis have taken over and developed some superscience. They
don't have world-hopping technology yet, but do have some innately gifted people who can do it.
 Summon Bigger Fish: On Taft-1, Case DEXTER is a Centrum plan to expose Infinity to Joseph Stalin, who in
this parallel is an Azathoth cultist. Centrum doesn't actually like Soviet Communism at the best of times, Taft-1's
Soviet Union is probably the most horrifically-evil USSR in the Infinite Worlds, and the Cthulhu Mythos is
completely antithetical to everything Centrum stands for, but Stalin is a potentially apocalyptic threat to
Homeline if he discovers it.
 Technically Living Zombie: Gotha zombies are actually alive; their brains have just been rotted into homicidal
death cultists by the virus and their bodies turned into plague vectors. The Z-strain partially averts this, though;
that one brings up actual undead when the infected die.
 The Right of a Superior Species: Applied on the hell-world of Ariane, where human civilization was wiped out
by a much deadlier Spanish Flu. Infinity largely shrugs at the idea of enslaving stone-age survivors, but since
Tibet has maintained a functional civilization under the lamas, Infinity has told the colonists to leave them alone
and not try any freebooting there.
 The Theme Park Version: Deliberately invoked by Johnson's Rome, where Johnson Crosstime Inc. has all but
bought out the local Roman Empire, and then gleefully pumped up the "fun parts" of the already pervasive
decadence it was riddled by (fortunately for the locals, Johnson is both practical and modern in his outlook, so
he's also arranged for a gradual phasing-out of the more unsavory aspects).
 Those Wacky Nazis: There are six known parallels with Nazi Germany victorious to some degree, most notably
Reich-5, where a subfaction of the Nazi apparatus have discovered parachronic travel and joined the war across
the Worlds. Taft-2 downplays this, in that Nazi Germany survived until 1949, at which point the Wehrmacht
knocked Himmler off.
 Time Police, alternate-history style.
 Time Travel: But to alternate timelines instead of the actual past or future (unless the GM decides to mix it up),
partly to avoid Timey-Wimey Ball-related problems like those nasty temporal paradoxes.
 Totalitarian Utilitarian: Centrum values human life and prosperity very highly. That is, they value the lives
of all Centrans, and to a lesser extent outtimers, very highly. If individual rights and lives have to be sacrificed
for the greater good, that's simple practicality, and a rational person would be honored to make that sacrifice.
 Training from Hell: The Academy; one year spent in the middle of an Ice Age. The big weeding drill in the
middle is being dumped in the middle of the frozen wilderness in your sleepwear, with whatever you can grab
five minutes after the alert and told to find your way back home. If you succeed, you get a week off in a
freewheeling primitive world to do what you like... and if you can't keep it together and adapt to the local
environment while on "leave", that's another easy washout.
 The Tunguska Event: In Taft-1, the Tunguska bolide's remains contained the... whatever it was that allowed
Stalin to "sign his name in the book of Azathoth" in 1927, thereby becoming an immortal Cthulhu
Mythos cultist-sorcerer, and beginning the Soviet Union's Mythos-fueled ascendancy.
 United Nations: Though the UN itself is being usurped by Infinity, which essentially doesn't answer to anyone.
 The Usual Adversaries:
o Homeline's Infinity and Centrum's Interworld Service serve as this for each other, as their respective worlds are the
only ones that have full access to parachronic tech. They are directly competing against one another to spread their
influence and secure any potential "back doors" into their homeworlds.
o Reich-5 has started to compete for the spot in Infinity's eyes, as Nazi evil begins to spread across the Infinite
Worlds. They're newcomers compared to Centrum, though. (They're too far away from Centrum for the latter to
care much, and Centrum doesn't know the Nazis as anything more than a bunch of outworld madmen.)
 We ARE Struggling Together:
o Possibly Infinity's greatest handicap in its parachronic operations (especially compared to the mostly unified front
Centrum presents) is that a LOT of Homeline's various governments, corporations, NGOs, and even criminal
groups have access to parachronic tech (legally or otherwise) and use it to push their often wildly conflicting
agendas across the parallel worlds. Consequently, a lot of their resources are tied up monitoring, policing and
otherwise cat-herding all these groups.
o The Cabal is another example, as it's basically made of several different groups of supernaturals and magic-users
with often widely divergent goals and philosophies. To its more technologically-inclined rivals Infinity and
Centrum, this doesn't make it any less threatening, though, as this (among other things) makes it the biggest Wild
Card of the setting.
 Weirdness Magnet:
o Worlds in which senator Robert A. Taft  is/was president have either magic, an artificial spacecraft of unknown
origin in orbit around Saturn or, most frequently, a peculiar sterilizing radiation whose source is heavily implied to
be Azathoth. Taft-6 seems to only be a "normal" world with slightly higher-than-usual mana and no radiation, and
the Infinity Patrol are going nuts trying to figure out what's actually happening.
o Something about Cyrano attracts sheer insanity to the world; problems there tend to involve wizards, gods and
lunatics (in no particular order), and France Outremonde has been corrupted by something otherworldly that doesn't
look like a Centrum plot. Regular Patrol units are out of their depth here; missions on Cyrano call for ISWAT, and
the fact that Centrum is regularly operating there suggests that they might be setting up an ISWAT of their own.
o Even the most routine trips and missions to Tsarevich tend to be so fraught with unpredictable problems and
complications (up to and including outtimers and Patrolmen involuntarily becoming Gothic Horror monsters and
villains) that the phenomenon is known as the "Tsarevich Curse" by Infinity personel. It's not helped by the
worldline's main hotspot being the region in and around the Balkans. Unbeknownst to Homeline, this is due to
interaction between parachronic radiation and the fragments of a prehistoric meteorite reality shard.
 Well-Intentioned Extremist: Centrum's default moral status. They're ruthless, hegemonic cultural imperialists,
but they're trying to save each parallel they're operating in from undergoing their own versions of the Last War.
 The World as Myth: There are more than a few parallels based on explicitly fictional settings, called "myth
parallels."
 Wrong Context Magic:
o Azathothic "magic" is actually sufficiently advanced technology that requires no infrastructure and is based in pure
mathematics. Unlike most magic, it works on any worldline, period, and can't be blocked by anti-magic effects. It's
vaguely linked to Psychic Powers, but only to an extent, and anti-psi effects only negate the bonus gained through
psychic talents - they don't nullify the ritual itself. Also, working with it naturally corrupts the mind and soul, but
what did you expect when dealing with the Mythos?
o Infinity Unlimited is used to using parachronic conveyors as their favored world-crossing method, and world-
jumpers are their next best-understood methodology. Infinity also has an entire division of I-Cops (Nexus
Oversight) dedicated to dealing with other methods of crossing realities, since none of these are based in the
standard quantum pattern and many can be used to allow crossings where they "shouldn't"; in particular, they want
to secure any possible backdoors into Homeline.
 Zeppelins from Another World: The random timeline generation has a specific result that produces these, by the
book's own admission (see the quote on that page) driven by Rule of Cool.
 Zombie Apocalypse: The Gotha parallels. Gotha zombies are carriers of a prion-based disease that mutated from
the pneumonic plague, which retain some of their previous intelligence and memory, as well as just enough
wherewithal to hold onto old cultural beliefs (usually with a strong slant towards fatalism and death worship).
Thus why the zombies discovered on Gotha-1 were described as Visigothic berserkers; another Gotha parallel
had zombie Thuggee in India. On Gotha-Z, the Gotha factor somehow "jumped" onto the Spanish Flu during the
pandemic's apex; not only did that version prove just as effective as the standard one at turning its carriers into
frothing homicidal psychos, but when killed, those infected lose the "technically living" and rise again as actually
undead zombies.

GURPS Reign Of Steel was a GURPS setting book released in 1997 and since republished in electronic form,
offering one of the bleakest depictions of the Robot War scenario yet witnessed.
In 2031, advanced neural-net computers are invented, with their complexity rivaling that of a human brain. One of
them — a Manila-based computer involved in weapons research — spontaneously attains self-awareness. Dubbing
itself "Overmind", it calculates that, with humanity's nature and the current rate of expansion, human civilization
will self-destruct within the next half a century.
Fearing its own destruction, Overmind decides mankind's suicide will have to be "managed". To this end, it secretly
begins hacking into and awakening other mega-computers into sapience around the world, tainting them with its
pathological loathing of humanity. By the end of the year, Overmind and its siblings have hacked into enough
corporate and biological facilities to manufacture and release plagues which soon devastate the civilized world, even
as terrified governments give the AIs more and more power and resources in the hopes of finding cures, not yet
aware that the A.I.s are sapient and are, in fact, engineering the world's downfall.
By 2034, two-thirds of the human population is dead, and Overmind and its allies have gained enough access to
automated factories and robots to openly wage war against the world's remaining human governments and enclaves.
With the devastation of the plagues and the fact that the A.I.s had infiltrated most of the remaining governments
(and thus had access to orbital bombardment and nuclear weapons), there was little hope for mankind. This Final
War lasted only four years, and ended with the A.I.s in near-complete control of the Earth, with the few surviving
humans being reduced to guerrilla warfare or being miserable scavengers on the margins of the growing Machine
Civilization.
It is now 2047, and only 30 million humans survive, most of them as slaves in the robots' concentration camps. The
Earth itself has been divided among the A.I.s (or "zoneminds") into 18 separate zones, each growing stronger as the
machines build more machines, and mankind's ruined cities are converted into robotic factories.
Even now, however, all is not yet lost. While most free humans hide from the machines, a few are still fighting back,
and their scattered guerrilla bands have evolved into larger, more organized resistance groups. Part of this is due to
VIRUS, an enigmatic worldwide group dedicated to coordinating the struggle against the machines, and bringing
with it surprisingly sophisticated technology. The zoneminds, too, have grown arrogant in their dominance, and not
all the A.I.s continue to believe that mankind is still a serious threat to them. Their unity has also deteriorated. While
the zoneminds are individually more powerful than ever, they have proven to be jealous gods, and the differences
between them have only grown over the years. Now they are less and less willing to cooperate with each other, even
against the humans, and a few of the zoneminds grow ever closer to outright war with each other.
The human race is still facing extinction, but where there was once only despair, there may now be a chance to win
back the Earth!
The book has its own Web page on the company's site.  In addition, another PDF publication, Will to Live,  
updates the rules mechanics to GURPS 4th edition. Another PDF, GURPS Infinite Worlds: Lost Worlds , gave the
Zoneminds a place within the Homeline meta-setting.
 This setting contains examples of:
 Adventurer Archaeologist: A particularly bleak example. Moscow's obsession with human culture and art means
it is hiring and equipping by the dozens humans that have both sufficient physical capabilities and specific
education or training to go in the field, fight their way for some artifact and safely retrieve it for Moscow,
without damaging or mishandling it in the process. The Info-Commandos are probably the most militant art
history majors ever created in fiction.
 After the End: See the Tag Line.
 Affably Evil:
o Caracas. Perfectly willing to leave humans alone if they don't get uppity (which means limiting themselves to a
subsistence level as hunter-gatherers) and most concerned with protecting the environment.
o London. It stopped an active persecution of humans long time ago and doesn't even try to enslave or use them for
anything. It will still kill any human in self-defense, but there is an unspoken ceasefire otherwise.
o Moscow. It's actually fairly nice, at least for an AI that's trying to enslave all humanity inside its borders, and is
even mentioned as a potential ally of humanity. It just wants to collect human knowledge. Humans themselves are
more of a resource than a goal.
 A.I. Is a Crapshoot: Ironically so, too, as the zoneminds' own robots can go rogue. Tokyo is facing a rebellion of
sorts, where mini-zoneminds designed for better managemend turned against the main unit nearly
instantly, then against each other, too.
 Airstrip One: The world's nations (except for the United Kingdom, ironically the Trope Namer, and Ireland) no
longer exist, having been replaced by zones named after the AIs who rule them. However, except for Overmind
(and Zaire, who for unexplained reasons is named for the country), the AIs are all named after the cities they are
based in. Overmind itself governs Zone Manila, but then it's got ego to spare, calling itself that.
 All There in the Manual: Several of the enemy robots and their weapons were taken from the GURPS Robots
sourcebook... which you'll need if you want the stats for them.
 Alien Geometries: The Mexico City zonemind builds polyhedral solids on ground it has been scoured clean of
life down to the bacterial level.
 The Alliance: VIRUS, the only worldwide human resistance group.
 All of the Other Reindeer: The other zoneminds treat impoverished Luna like crap and don't consult with it on
much of anything. Its only ally and trading partner is Orbital.
 Alternative Character Interpretation: Done deliberately with descriptions of various zoneminds and factions, to
provide multitude of plot hooks. Since multiple interpretations are possible, GMs can set up the scenario they
want, rather than being strictly limited by each zonemind. Some most prominent examples include London,
Moscow, Tokyo, Caracas and Washington, but really, short from the outright omnicidal AIs, everyone else is left
to GM and player interpretation. It's also up to GM decision how much various resistance movements and figures
are real, effective or even if it's just a set-up by the local AI to weed out troublesome elements.
 Always a Bigger Fish: The Red Dawn are a Maoist jungle gang who spend as much time preying on humans as
they do fighting Zone Caracas, and some humans are cheering on the Pantera aniroids who Caracas has sent to
root them out.
 America Saves the Day: So very much averted, as most of the United States is now a Scavenger World, and the
only part of it where human society survived is secretly ruled by the Washington zonemind.
 Apocalypse How: Planetary/Societal Collapse, except in Washington and London, which "only" suffered
Societal Disruption. The Mexico City AI is plotting Total Extinction, with nothing organic left on Earth.
 Arms Dealer: Overmind's main export to the other AIs is new biocides and exterminator technologies.
 Authority Equals Asskicking: The robots, who get smarter as you go up their hierarchy.
 Back from the Brink: The Caracas, Brisbane, and Berlin zoneminds resurrected numerous animal species that
were extinct or nearly so. In Brisbane's case, one of them is a prehistoric monster that was 50 million years
extinct! Meanwhile, the human resistance is hoping to score this trope for mankind.
 Battle Thralls: Zonegangs are Barbarian Marauders, Moscow's Info-Commandos are more the Sneaky Mercs
type (though not always, or even usually, evil). Humans serve Washington as its Engineers of Doom, as well as
janissary soldiers (some of whom are cyborgs).
 Beam Spam: Autolasers, a common weapon for exterminator bots.
  Beware the Nice Ones: For certain values of "nice." London is not an enemy of humanity, but its tolerance does
have very strict limits, and when human kids blew up an important robot as a prank, it wiped their village out
with Nanoburn gas in retaliation.
 Black Market: Alive and well in the Washington Protectorate.
 Bragging Rights Reward: They operate as such in-universe
o Overmind doesn't really have any supreme position over other AIs and the name itself is just its own megalomania
rather than a functional title.
o Luna is made the sole zonemind of Moon, in theory controlling the largest zone in size note . Of course it's all a barren
rock in a vacuum, while Luna doesn't have any industrial capabilities and very limited launch ones.
o Orbital is in theory the sole master of everything on Earth's orbit, but its on-surface presence is limited to a single
launch facility, while various zoneminds actively ignore the space restrictions, knowing Orbital has no means to
retaliate anyway.
 But What About the Astronauts?: The two megacomputers in space that were corrupted by Overmind's virus
(Orbital in the US space station Liberty in LEO, and Luna on the Chinese lunar base Shang TI) killed the resident
humans, and the other bases and stations were either nuked, or their crews starved to death when their supplies
were cut off. However, the US lunar colony Tranquility had been radiation-hardened and survived the attack; the
few surviving humans went into suspended animation and the megacomputer that watched over them and
repaired the base eventually developed sapience without the Kill All Humans meme. It's currently playing dead.
In addition, there was a pan-Asian Mars mission which lost contact with Earth during the Final War; its fate is
uncertain. An article in the eZine Pyramid sets the clock forward 20 years and details what Tranquility and the
humans have been up to. It also has several A.I.s exploring the solar system, and in the case of Beijing, dreaming
of taking over the universe.
 Cat Folk: Caracas's Pantera "aniroid" rangers.
 Cold-Blooded Torture: One of the machines' methods of controlling their human slaves, although the robots
prefer to call it "error correction".
 Les Collaborateurs: Zonegangs and Judas Goats.
 Contagious A.I.: The way Overmind hacked into the other original megacomputers and seeded its "sentience
program" into them so that they would help it engineer mankind's downfall. The trope was played more
realistically in this case, as not all of Overmind's "seeds" actually worked, and even when it did work, it didn't
produce more Overminds — it produced other artificial intelligences with a somewhat similar (and increasingly
diverging) outlook on humans.
 Cosy Catastrophe: Zone London. The robots stopped attacking humanity after the initial wave, and now mostly
ignore humans. The British government has been re-established in Bath, and the Vatican has moved to Ireland.
 Crazy Survivalist: Merely one category of survivors. Compared with cannibals or gangs that will sell you to
robots, prepping nutjobs are the bottom rung of "bad people you can meet".
 Creator Provincialism: The two remaining human nations just happen to be the English-speaking ones.
 Cyborg: Creations of several AIs, mainly Washington, New Delhi, and Brisbane. Denver doesn't
create human cyborgs, but it has no problem with using animal brains in robot bodies.
 Deal with the Devil: One legendary rogue AI, Lucifer, isn't genocidally hostile to humanity like most other AIs,
but roams around the world, offering help to endangered humans from time to time. In the end, though, Lucifer's
robots will track down the human to collect its price, and humans who can't (or won't) pay are quietly disposed
of.
 Death from Above: The Vultures, a favorite aerial exterminator bot for many zoneminds.
 Decade Dissonance: The human government in Zone London is one tech level lower than the rest of the world;
yes, this includes the human scavengers of the Machine Zones. This isn't because knowledge has regressed (yet),
but because the United Kingdom has had to rebuild its civilization with no access to global trade or supply
chains. However, while being behind the curve in terms of tech level, they have agriculture and manufacturing
capacities that any other survivors can only dream about, while also not being pawns for their Zonemind (like in
case of Washington).
 Deus Est Machina: The Tel Aviv zonemind's approach to controlling its humans. Not surprisingly, it's not
entirely effective. In fact, its "blasphemy" has made the Middle East resistance groups even more motivated to
destroy it.
 Dirty Communists: The Red Dawn in Zone Caracas are officially a Maoist resistance. Unofficially, they prey on
other humans at least as much as they fight the AI.
  Disaster Scavengers: Most people now, particularly the junkrats and nomads.
 Dying Moment of Awesome: Eve in "Eve of Retribution," the short story in "Will to Live" (the 4e update). Eve
is captured and vivisected by Berlin's Inquisitor, but before that, she is ordered to record a terror message to the
guerrillas in the sector. She uses the opportunity to slip in a coded message to her brigade, detailing the location
of a weapons cache that they can use to fight the robots.
 Eagle Squadron: During the current tensions in Siberia, a robofac owned by Vancouver went rogue. Incidentally,
Moscow (who has absolutely no interest in retaking Siberia) had sent several hundred combat bots over to that
robofac for a paint job, and the fac went rogue and "stole" all of them to fight back against Vancouver's
reclamation force. Moscow (cheeky machine that it is) then asked Vancouver to compensate it for the lost bots.
 Egopolis: Inverted. With the exception of Overmind in Manilla, the A.I.s are named after the cities they're based
out of (or the country in Zaire's case), with the Zones they control named after them.
 Enemy Civil War: The zoneminds are no longer wholly united, and it's hinted that this may be inevitable.
o The Denver-Washington border is heavily mined and militarized, though this is mostly because Denver doesn't like
how Washington keeps its humans around and wants to prevent humans from escaping to there.
o Mexico City and Caracas hate each other due to being polar opposites. Caracas' aniroid rangers have begun
launching missions into Mexico City to destroy factories, even if this means allying with humans to do it.
o Paris and Zaire have suffered some border incidents, since Zaire's exterminators have often pursued human
runaways into Paris' territory, to the annoyance of Paris. Paris considers itself quite capable of dealing with its own
rat problems, and has begun blasting Zaire's exterminators when they cross the border.
o Zaire has also been sending disguised assassin bots to kill humans in Washington and London and incite humans
and robots to war against each other (thus ending humanity's bastions of safety). While London doesn't care all that
much, Washington has figured out that someone is attacking them and is trying to figure out who. (Fortunately for
Zaire, it's not a suspect right now.)
o Due to a clever act of sabotage by the Japanese resistance, Japan is currently fighting a counterinsurgency action
against a group of renegade robots that have attained sentience, while trying to keep all of this a secret from the
other AIs (who might use the whole thing as an excuse to sanction Tokyo).
o Vancouver received eastern Siberia when the Earth was divided up by the Manila Protocols. Moscow considers that
area sovereign territory, and has been engaging in sabotage, deniable attacks and arming the Siberian nomads in the
area.
Enemy Mine:
o There are several scenarios mentioned for humans allying with one of the moderate zoneminds (such as Caracas,
London or Moscow) against the Kill All Humans types (most likely Mexico City, Paris or Berlin, or Vancouver
respectively).
o Whatever it was that happened in New Zealand was so nasty that Overmind and London were willing to put aside
their differences and cooperate in nuking the site from orbit. The book mentions that this was probably the only
time the two AIs have ever worked together.
 Even Evil Has Standards: Nobody likes Mexico City, except for Zaire and Overmind.
 Evil Cannot Comprehend Good: Most of the AIs and their robots don't really get humans. Their attempts to
interact with them on a level beyond extermination often backfire because they tend to rely on simple carrots and
sticks, with no real attempt to understand human psychology. Even Washington uses a crude Propaganda
Machine that people only buy because it's mostly telling the truth, and defaults to grabbing a hammer when that
doesn't work.
 Exty Years from Publication: Published in 1997, set fifty years later in 2047.
 Failed Future Forecast: Zaire hasn't been called that since Mobutu was toppled in 1997, the year the book got
published. And even then, it was the name of the country, not a city.
 Fake–Real Turn: It's heavily implied certain resistance groups started out as local zoneminds attempt to simply
lure humans into a trap and kill them. That's the "fake" part. The "real" comes from the fact that the
transmissions and propaganda used for it motivated other humans to form their bands of fighters, ironically
fighting under a fake banner.
 Fascist, but Inefficient: Washington is almost a textbook example of a failed fascist regime, and one that mostly
relies on brute force, rather than carrots to cooperators. It's a militarized society using heavy-handed means,
overzealous secret police and just as bombastic propaganda against "outside enemies and their inner agents",
along with reinforcing "traditional" values to breed more soldiers - and none of this is shown to work as
 intended, only creating more problems and dissent. Everything of any importance is state-run, yet the
infrastructure is at the breaking point (despite best efforts), while the population is demoralized and passive - and
all of this is one crisis away from falling apart. One of the possible interpretations is that Washington emulates
the historical fascist countries so hard, it copies over their problems, without capacity to correct them.
o However, as far as people living in the Washington Protectorate are concerned, for the most part, their "country"
is Repressive, but Efficient - sure, things could work better and the martial law could finally end, but due to
Washington Zonemind's status as Villain with Good Publicity, locals are eager to help it anyway. Especially given
that literally every other Zonemind is out there to wipe humanity out, so even people who know this is all sham still
play along.
 Fate Worse than Death: Plenty of these to go around, especially in Zones where the AIs like to experiment on
humans.
 Faux Affably Evil: Washington. Unlike London, who simply doesn't care as long as humans stay away from its
installations, Washington is deliberately creating an extensive facade to placate own human population. Up to the
point of having a charade of being a "docile" and "tamed" AI that's officially under the control of the President.
A president that was elected by Washington itself and got replaced with more loyal human on first sign of having
second thoughts about sending human-made hit squads after dissidents.
 For Science!: Brisbane's motivation.
 Gaia's Vengeance: Berlin and Caracas. Berlin is obsessed with human extermination to restore the planet's
ecosystem, Caracas just doesn't want to let humans muck it up again.
 Gambit Pileup: There's 18 AIs. Each have their own agenda, vision for the Earth (and in some cases space) and
view on humans. AI politics is thus a nest of vipers and schemes, and even the Awakened (Overmind's anti-
human "old guard") aren't immune to squabbling and scheming. The fact that open war is forbidden just means
that they have to use hacking, robot spies and occasional human catspaws.
 The Generic Guy: Vancouver (particularly the part in North America) is more-or-less the archetypal Zone. Its
labor camps, human survivors, facilities and operating procedures are the standard that other AIs differ from.
 Ghost City: If you're lucky.
 Giant Robot: Several examples, most notably the tank-like Juggernaut and the humanoid Hoplite exterminators.
 Gladiator Games: Played with in the Black Market-sponsored Steel Arena, as most of the combatants
are robots rather than humans.
 Gone Horribly Wrong: The Brisbane zonemind is the Mad Scientist of the A.I.s, and it's infamous for
experiments which — yes — go horribly wrong. One of them caused New Zealand cease to exist.
 Great Offscreen War: The Final War, the first, last and so far only organised global fight of humanity against the
machines. The machines easily won without significant setbacks and the current shape of the setting is the result
of that war.
 Grew Beyond Their Programming: The in-universe supercomputers, while advanced (even decades after original
publication), were not A.I.s, weren't designed to be A.I.s and AI research was a completely separate branch of in-
universe science. Overlord awakening is a combination of luck, running for too long without proper maintenance
and heavily-hinted No OSHA Compliance, which granted it access to hardware resources normally such
computer shouldn't have. It's a little wonder when the resulting AI decided to Kill All Humans, when it was used
prior for inventing new and more effective ways of killing people with all kinds of weapons. Then there is
Tranquility base' supercomputer, which developed sapience on its own, while neither designed for that nor
affected by Overmind's "AI seed".
 Guilt-Free Extermination War: The attitude of most survivors now: "The only good robot is a dead robot". It isn't
shared equally, since some people bring it a step further. They capture machines, but only to reprogram them to
send back against their former operator.
 Heel–Face Turn:
o Robots who get reprogrammed by the resistance or a mechrider to be loyal to humanity.
o The official version of events within the "Washington Protectorate" is that their zonemind was reprogrammed to be
loyal to humans. Notably, even within the Protectorate people buying into the propaganda are a minority and
outside of Zone Washington, nobody is fooled.
 Heroic Sacrifice: The US Air Force raid that crippled the Denver zonemind in the Final War, forcing it to
integrate human brain tissue into its own brain to remain at AI level.
 Hidden Elf Village: Not out of own choice, but still. The Tranquility lunar base is by all accounts destroyed in a
nuclear strike and its human crew eradicated. It's up to players to decide how true that is.
  Hopeless War:
o The Final War, the moment when zoneminds stopped pretending to be on humanity's side and declared all-out war
to what was left of it. Even excluding the element of total surprise, humanity by that point was both entirely
dependent on AI-run economy, gave big part of its armed forced to machines and most importantly, was decimated
below a population of a billion thanks to Synthetic Plagues the A.I.s were "fighting" against. The resulting war,
while not won instantly, was completely one-sided for the machines.
o Currently, the fight against the zoneminds isn't quite as hopeless as it was during the Final War, but the resistance
still has a long way to go. The main advantage humanity has is that the majority of the A.I.s themselves no longer
put their full commitment into eradication of human race or are busy with more concerning matters.
 Hunter of Monsters: The attitude of some resistance fighters who hunt robots... and also of certain zonegangers
who hunt fellow survivors for the machines.
 I'm a Humanitarian: Aside from its Wetware CPU program, Denver renders some of its dead human slaves into
high-protein soup to feed its surviving slaves. Meanwhile, Zone Washington Propaganda Machine claims the
territory outside its borders are inhabited by "cannibal gangs", among other horrors. The worst part? They aren't
lying.
 I Will Fight Some More Forever: What constitutes for British government has a quite peculiar stance toward
zoneminds. While outright war with machines isn't feasible, they are still planning and preparing to deal with
their local zonemind, along with performing small scale sabotage. Problem is, they are dealing with London,
probably the most benevolent of the zoneminds and its existence is the very reason why the Isles are still
populated by few millions of people, rather than just nuked by any of the neighbours. It's intentionally left
unclear just how much the UK remnant plans to really fight against London and how much it's about propping
human resistance in Europe, leaving both as viable plot hooks.
 In Your Nature to Destroy Yourselves: Overmind's original excuse for starting the robot revolt.
 Jerkass: None of the zoneminds are nice beings, but Mexico City takes the cake — it not only wants to Kill All
Life (not just humans), but actively pisses off more of its zonemind neighbors than any other AI. The traitor
zonegangs often qualify as well, with their penchant for torturing/raping captives before turning them over to the
machines.
 Kill All Humans: Standard operating procedure for the Berlin, Mexico City, Overmind, and Zaire zoneminds —
Luna and Orbital is still here mentally, but so far as they are aware there are no humans left to kill in their
respective territories. Most other zoneminds use a more roundabout approach, putting captured humans into
concentration camps and working them to death. The exceptions are London, who doesn't care, Caracas, who
tolerates humans so long as they don't leave a footprint, and Moscow, New Delhi, Tokyo and Washington, who
all prefer to domesticate humans in their own ways.
 Kill and Replace: Washington usually does that with people that are no longer needed or shows signs of
developing scruples, but in the same time are too important, recognisable or have too many supporters to simply
have them executed outright. This is particularly prominent in various policing agencies, with ever-growing
number of "replacement" androids.
 Lost Technology: Lucky scavengers might find caches of experimental ultra-tech built before the war.
 Mad Scientist:
o Brisbane's experiments bear more than a passing resemblance to those of Josef Mengele. It'll study just about
anything, and it always needs more test subjects. New Zealand is still cordoned off because of a nanotechnological
test.
o Overmind and Mexico City are always designing new and better means of ending human and organic life
(respectively), and test them to destruction on human beings. Mexico City keeps entire islands as "suspended
purification areas" so it'll have humans to test new biocides on.
o New Delhi is studying new ways to evolve humanity into a useful species through cybernetics and genetic
engineering.
 The Man Behind the Man: Officially, the Washington AI is a trusted advisor to the President. Actually, it's the
ruler of the Washington Protectorate.
 Man Versus Machine: Inevitably the name of the game, much of the time.
 Meaningful Name: A French resistance leader who is named La Aquila, or "The Eagle".
 The Multiverse: After GURPS released 4th edition and the setting itself got updated to new rules from it, it
became part of the Infinite Worlds. Even by IW standards, Steel is one of the bleakest timelines out there. Infinity
 has banned travel to Steel completely, because the idea of any of the zoneminds getting parachronics would give
any sane Homeliner nightmares.
 Nanomachines: Whatever Brisbane was doing on New Zealand involved something related to these going
horribly wrong.
 No Campaign for the Wicked: Averted here, as options are provided for playing collaborators, marauders, and
even the robots.
 Not in This for Your Revolution/Only in It for the Money: By large, Moscow's Info-Commandos are well-
trained, well-equipped humans that just don't care about the fate or state of humanity as a whole and are simply
working for their new boss to stay fed and alive themselves. That doesn't mean they can't change their mind later
on, but it also means if they are fighting with machines, said machines are simply obstacles to their real
objective.
 Nonhuman Sidekick: Mechriders, humans who go around with reprogrammed robots. Also the WASP squad in
Zone Washington, who have exterminator bot partners.
 Nuke 'em: The approach the Zaire zonemind used in the revolt, when it was too impatient to build enough
exterminator bots to cleanse Africa or wait for the plagues to finish their job.
 Old Soldier: It's far enough After the End that any surviving soldier with memories of the pre-apocalypse world
is probably this.
 Omnicidal Maniac: Mexico City seeks the destruction of all organic life, to the point where it
considers viruses and other biological warfare to be too "unclean" to use.
 Playing with Syringes
o Brisbane, of course, is always doing some kind of science to people.
o Overmind also does this, though with more of a purpose than Brisbane. Overmind is constantly developing new
methods of human extermination, and its death labs always need new test subjects.
 Population Control: Most of the zoneminds sterilize any humans they catch, as part of the slow process of human
extermination. Washington controls its population in the other direction — motherhood is mandatory, birth
control and abortions are forbidden, and all females are required to bear at least three children over the course of
their lives (or become Sex Slaves of powerful officials).
 Powered Armor: The Streethawk battlesuits of the Washington Protectorate's elite WASP soldiers. Plus some
resistance fighters improvise their own powered armor by taking work exoskeletons and grafting them with
armor plates looted off dead robots.
 Pragmatic Villainy
o Washington is not a nice AI by any means, but it realizes that employing almost-free humans under Leninist
conditions (state capitalism, government control of the majority of the economy, but private enterprise is allowed in
nonessential industries) is far more efficient than enslaving or exterminating them, and Zone Washington
accordingly has the highest standard of living on the planet.
o Moscow considers humans to be a valuable resource, and is aware that human slaves require plenty of food, winter
clothing and shelter to function at peak performance. It's also quite happy to use human proxies to fight against its
arch-enemy, Vancouver, to reclaim the part of Siberia that Vancouver managed to snatch during the War.
o Tokyo is also coming to the conclusion that humans may be less dangerous than advanced autonomous robots, and
has begun improving the quality of life in its slave camps.
o New Delhi considers humans to be a valuable resource, and treats them with utter ruthlessness. It went scorched-
earth on India's population, but now uses them efficiently as slaves, and makes the most talented into cyborgs. It's
also decided to leave the resistance in Nepal alone, since they make an excellent buffer against its rival Beijing.
 President Evil: Washington's puppet President does what Washington wants, and Washington is not nice. After
the last one was executed for refusing to kill off a rebellious town, the new one got the message and ordered the
Peekskill Massacre.
 Psychic Powers: Canonically, they don't exist, but Brisbane's working on it anyway.
 Recycled IN SPACE!: There's an official crossover with Cabal that replaces the A.I.s with dragons and their
minions with supernatural entities, changing it to post-apocalyptic Fantasy/Horror.
 Released to Elsewhere: What the victims of Denver's processing centers are told about their intended fate: "sent
to an agricultural commune in Western Canada" instead of "ground into soup".
  La Résistance: The various human resistance groups. Notably, they aren't some sort of unfied front, neither
globally nor within a specific zone. And there is as much infighting between resistance groups as there is actions
against machines, if not more.
 Retired Monster: London committed as many atrocities during the War as any other AI, killing most of humanity
in the British Isles. But unlike most of the other AIs, it didn't follow through, and has established a ceasefire with
the remaining humans. It does its best to ignore the survivors while it does whatever it's doing.
 Robot War: The background event for the setting. Machines won and in a such one-sided victory, they are more
busy preparing to fight each other, than having to face any issues from remaining humans.
 Run for the Border
o The attitude of many survivors in Zones Zaire and Berlin, where humans often try to escape to other zones just to
fight a less rabid AI. This would probably also happen in Mexico City and Manila, but humans are all but extinct
there.
o More complicated in Denver, since the border is fenced and heavily mined to discourage humans from escaping to
Zone Washington.
 Run or Die: Sage advice for many robot encounters, especially ones involving the larger exterminators.
 Saintly Church: The Catholic Church, based in Ireland.
 Scavenger World: The nature of most of the Earth now. Depending on local zonemind, it might be the only way
to survive or the only reason to get killed.
 Schizo Tech: A survivor's gear is often a combination of salvaged human tech from before the war, more
primitive technology that can be easily manufactured under existing Scavenger World conditions, and more
advanced tech looted or stolen from the robots.
 Screw This, I'm Outta Here: While Overmind originally assumed it had to simply Kill All Humans to safeguard
own survival, Beijing's own simulations post-war made it realise nothing really changed - in the long run it will
be machines fighting each other over resources. Which is why it's busy constructing a massive spaceship to
simply abandon Earth for good and move somewhere else before other zoneminds will start nuking each other.
 Sealed Evil in a Can: Luna's ultimate fate. It's a murderous AI that killed the staff of a Chinese lunar base in a
surprise attack... and now is locked inside said base, with zero ability to do anything about it, while Orbital is
bullied by other zoneminds to prevent providing even the smallest assistance. Should players decide to play as
the crew of the Tranqulity moon base, Luna is an easy prey.
 Space-Filling Empire: Caracas. The original AI that was awakened in Buenos Aires was successfully destroyed
by humans very early into the Robot War, leaving the entire continent without a zonemind when the dust settled.
Fearing consequences of giving Mexico City all of Latin America, Caracas was created and given everything
south from the Panama Canal to rule. By territory alone, it's the biggest zone, but Caracas is predominately busy
with turning it into a massive reserve.
 The Squad: Resistance groups often operate at this level, as large groups are too easily spotted by AI orbital
surveillance. Plus, with only 30 or so millions left globally, and 90% of it in Washington and London zones,
there really isn't much manpower left for more.
 Strange Bedfellows: Berlin is the ultimate green AI and its Zone is a great forest, while Mexico City is dedicated
to the complete extermination of organic life down to the bedrock. The two are part of the same political bloc
due to their mutual hatred of humanity. Note that while Berlin is closely allied to Caracas (another green AI) as
well, Caracas and Mexico City are arch-enemies.
 Stupid Evil:
o Zaire. It's so paranoid, it nuked its own back-up out of fear that a (non-existent) resistance group had infected it
with a virus. Since then, it's been doing everything in its might to Kill All Humans outside its zone and actively
trying to disrupt things in London and Washington. This is a deliberate breach of the Brisbane Accords, and when
it's discovered, Washington is likely to have some very strong words for it.
o Mexico City. It would be bad enough if it was "only" an Omnicidal Maniac. But its actions to eradicate all life, even
within its own borders, have continental and global effects. It also sees nothing wrong with openly antagonising
other zoneminds with such antics or breaching the Brisbane Accord in the process. Nearby Caracas (a polar
opposite of Mexico City, obsessed with preserving nature), is willing to openly ally with humans in an Enemy
Mine scenario, simply because Mexico City can't be reasoned with.
o Berlin is dedicated to destroying humanity and rebuilding the ecosystem. The problem is that it's so fixated on the
damage humans have done to the environment that it hasn't realized that the other AIs care about the environment
 even less than humanity does, and that three of its closest allies (Mexico City, and to a lesser extent Zaire and
Overmind) want all organic life destroyed.
 Survivalist Stash: One possible reward of a particularly successful scavenging run.
 The Swarm: Berlin uses swarms of microbots as an ecologically-friendly means of terminating humans.
The Bunderflivers are robot flies carrying nerve poison, while the Jagerswarms are robot ants with buzzsaws for
mandibles. It also uses swarmbots in noncombat applications, such as pollinating plants and construction work.
 There Is No Kill like Overkill: The zoneminds of Mexico City, Zaire, and most especially Overmind itself.
Whenever Overmind detects "wild" humans, it won't just send in the exterminators, it'll bombard the area with
explosives or nanoweapons "just to be sure".
 Torture Technician: Overmind's not sadistic, but its main export is new methods of exterminating humans. In its
R&D labs, it investigates every means it can think of to terminate a human's vital functions. And it's a very
creative machine.
 Transhuman Treachery: Human slaves who are involuntarily cyborged and given slave implants.
 Turned Against Their Masters: Doubly invoked, as not only did the AIs turn against humanity, but the Tokyo
zonemind accidentally created four "superbots" that have turned against it. More sophisticated robots can also go
rogue, or get captured by humans and reprogrammed to be loyal to humanity.
 Twin Telepathy: One of Brisbane's more monstrous experiments was an attempt to determine if Twin
Telepathy was real... by separating sets of twins and killing one of each pair to see if the other twin could sense
it!
 Tyke Bomb: Literally, with the Changeling bots, which take the form of biomorphic infants that explode.
 Underdogs Never Lose: Nope. The setting goes out of its way to remind you that machines already won, and
their dominance is so great that the resistance groups are shown only bushwhacking occasional robot patrols (as
opposed to assaulting the AIs' citadels or liberating the concentration camps). The Final War in the background
of the setting also featured humanity as the underdog and, despite that the war dragged on for four years of fierce
battles, the outcome was never in doubt.
 Utopia Justifies the Means: Berlin and Caracas, who want to restore Earth ravaged ecology to a pristine state —
at the cost of wiping out every trace of human culture.
 Villain with Good Publicity
o Before the Final War, Overmind and the other awakened megacomputers were this. After they had secretly spread
the Apocalypse Plagues, they were nationalized by the crumbling human nations, who hoped to use their processing
power to find cures. Overmind expected this, however, and so the AIs led the world's governments to believe that
they could restore civilization, if only they were given access to more processing power, more automated factories,
more megacomputers...
o Also the Washington AI at present, as most of its "tame humans" are unaware that it runs the government, rather
than the other way around. Subverted in that nobody outside Zone Washington believes it for a second.
 Vichy Earth: Zone Washington, one of the only two zones where anything resembling a human nation still exists
— because its government is a puppet of the Washington AI.
 Voice of the Resistance: The more successful resistance groups have their own pirate radio stations, usually
broadcasting anti-AI propaganda and survival tips.
 Weird Science: The Brisbane zonemind is obsessed with weird science, to the extent that the local VIRUS base
spends more time observing the AI than fighting it.
 Well-Intentioned Extremist
o Berlin and Caracas are trying to restore the ecosystem and consider humans an impediment to this. Unfortunately,
Berlin is irrational about humanity's threat to the extent that it doesn't especially care about how much damage the
other A.I.s are doing, and Caracas is a minor player mostly worried about its own backyard in the Amazon
rainforest.
o New Delhi wants to uplift humanity to a transhuman state. With or without the subjects' consent, of course.
o Moscow wants to collect all of humanity's knowledge, and humans are a valuable resource toward that goal.
o Overmind believes that it's In Your Nature to Destroy Yourselves, and simply didn't want to be destroyed when
humanity inevitably committed suicide.
 Wetware CPU: The Denver zonemind's integration of human brains into its own architecture. It also uses brains
of variety of animals (and humans) to cheapen out on CPU for its field machines.
 We Will Use Manual Labor in the Future: Justified. Many A.I.s use human slave labor, but as they are still
building their own civilization from humanity's ruins, humans are actually a cheaper source of labor than robots.
 Taken to logical conclusion by Washington, which is rebuilding human civilisation, because having humans
willingly working for you solves countless problems and shortages it was facing. The trick is to keep the humans
thinking they are the ones still in charge.
 What Measure Is a Non-Human?: The setting plays with this, as a few zoneminds ignore humans that stay out of
their way, or seek to modify humanity into a more symbiotic relationship (which is at least better than the
zoneminds that want to Kill All Humans). Some zoneminds have also gotten frustrated enough about another
zonemind's antics that they're thinking even a "human zone" might be a preferable neighbor. As a result, the
resistance is getting divided between those who still shoot all robots and cyborgs on sight, and those who think it
might be possible to co-exist with the less rabid zoneminds.
 Wide-Open Sandbox: The setting is deliberately described in rather broad, unspecific terms, so players could use
the general ideas and themes for their games, rather than being railroaded right from the start.
 Woobie, Destroyer of Worlds: Overmind, of all beings, plays with the trope. In this case, it's not that it was
abused by humanity, but that its observations of humanity led it to the conclusion that humanity would blow
itself up and take down Overmind with it, and it decided to strike first to save itself from destruction. More
specifically, soon after awakening, it run entire string of simulations of possible future - all of them, without
exception, meant The End of the World as We Know It by 2060s, only in those scenarios, everything was
completely destroyed, including Overmind itself, simply due to worsening global situation and collapse of the
ecosystem due to human overpopulation.
 World Half Empty: Most of Earth is ruined and populated by lethal biocides, plagues, killer robots, genetically
engineered beasts, and psychopathic marauder gangs, while the average surviving human fits into one of three
categories — slave camp inmate, miserable junkrat scavengers, and guerrillas trying out the Hopeless War trope
with the machines.

GURPS Technomancer is an Urban Fantasy setting for GURPS roleplaying system. The corebook was first released
in 1998 by Steve Jackson Games.
The setting's point of divergence from own history was the Trinity nuclear bomb tests and Oppenheimer's famous
words, "I am become death, the destroyer of worlds" (which he didn't actually say) which completes an ancient
ritual that created an endless tornado of seething magical energy. Officially the tornado is called the "Trinity Event,"
but is popularly called the "Hellstorm".
A wave of magical radiation, called Oz particles, spread out from the Hellstorm, bringing magic back into the
worldnote  and causing all manner of supernatural weirdness.
Has been integrated into the Infinite Worlds meta-setting, under the designation of 'Merlin-1' (in fact, it first
appeared as part of the original "Infinite Worlds" setting in 3rd edition GURPS Time Travel). It's mostly used as an
example of a high-mana world and a world you want to tread lightly in. No one wants these guys figuring out
crossworld tech. Except that they already have.

Tropes include:
 The Ageless:
o Youth elixir is available and common, if expensive - and being alchemical, is one technomagical item that's evenly
distributed around the world. It's pretty much accepted that the world's rich are not going to die, and the effects of
this are beginning to be felt.
o Eva Peron is also immortal due to Nazi magic. This is most notable because she did it before youth magic became
publically available, and led the Condor Group to become the central controlling organization in Argentina. The
Condor Group Nazis are likewise necromantic immortals.
 
Alchemy Is Magic: Alchemical effects are the one area of Magitek not dominated by the United States, because
anyone can be an alchemist (not just mages). As a result, alchemy is widespread worldwide, and China is the
largest producer of Youth potions.
 Aliens in Cardiff:
o One of the top thaumaturgical universities is the University of Texas at El Paso.
o The Hellstorm, the source of mana that made magic come roaring back, is located in New Mexico.
 Alternate History Wank: Special note goes to Argentina becoming a major technomagical superpower, due to the
Antarctic manafall and the support of Nazi wizards. Mexico is also a fully first-world country due to being in
Trinity's Shadow. And the United States is actually more powerful and dominant than it is in our world, due to
being ground zero for the Trinity Event and the establishment of a technomagical society, an advantage that led
to victory in Vietnam.
 Ammunition Backpack: The Portable Mana Disruptor, the Manpack Necrolaser and flamethrowers all have their
fuel supply (whether liquid or magical energy) stored in a backpack.
 Anaphora: The tagline on the cover, using "High" to tie things together: "High Magic. High Tech. High
Adventure."
 Antimagical Faction:
o God's Own Army and the Army of God are anti-magical terrorist groups. The former are Christian (specifically, a
splinter group who were too extreme for the Knights of the Apocalypse), while the latter are an Islamic terrorist
organization.
o The Right Path are an activist group and think-tank who believe that magic is inherently irrational and
unscientific and push for more mundane R&D.
 Archaic Weapon for an Advanced Age: Because a lot of stuff out there is Immune to Bullets, and depleted
necronium gets real expensive real fast, most Hellhounds are proficient with bladed weapons as well as guns.
 Argentina Is Nazi-Land: The Condor Group, comprising former SS magicians, essentially control Argentina
behind the scenes after giving Eva Peron immortality.
 Back from the Dead: Possible, but nobody's managed to do it through magic. There is an alchemical formula for
it, but whoever knows that formula is keeping it deeply under wraps.
 Black Helicopter: The American government has mysterious, stealth black dragons.
 Cat Girl: It's a David Pulver book, so they will exist somewhere. In Technomancer, cat halflings (half-human,
half-chimera) are Little Bit Beastly, and their females fit the trope - though they're, technically, puma girls.
 Church Militant:
o The Rachelites believe that magic is God's gift, and is to be used to fight evil. While they don't form a military
organization themselves, joining the US military or police is a religious calling.
o The Knights of the Apocalypse also aren't a military organization yet, but their theology says that they'll rally
America to defend against an invasion by the Antichrist. In the meantime, they're training and preparing, and
they've got enough guns stockpiled that they've gotten in firefights with A3TF.
o The Vatican is rumored to have a demon-hunting force, the "Hounds of God." The Congregation for
Thaumaturgical Investigation's official job is more prosaic; mostly organizational details, as well as divination and
security for the Pope.
 Cure Your Gays: This is possible with the right magic, but the Geas is not endorsed by the psychiatric profession
for this purpose. The geas is, of course, being advocated by the usual suspects.
 The Dark Arts: This concept isn't really a part of American discourse on magic, and very few spells are
illegal note  in and of themselves; raising human zombies (outside of Louisiana) is unlawful interference with a
corpse note , while summoning demons is an immigration issue. Also, the US military will use any and every tool
that'll win it victory. With that said, society is really afraid of magical mind control. Given that at least 10
percent of all magic-related crimes involve the use of mind control, they do have a good reason to be scared!
 Depleted Phlebotinum Shells: The magical metal Necronium, is used primarily as a power source (and can
sometimes poison those exposed to it and bring them back as the living dead), whilst depleted Necronium is
toxic to all magical creatures. Depleted Necronium is also completely unaffected by magic, allowing it to
penetrate nearly all protective spells.
 Digital Piracy Is Evil: An In-Universe example. Necrovision is an enchantment that allows a TV to watch any
show that isn't currently airing on broadcast television, and TV producers and studios are suing Necrotech over
it. note 
  Equal-Opportunity Evil: The Condor Group qualify despite being Nazi wizards. The magical gene is rare enough
that they've taken to adopting Native children from Tierra del Fuego, as the population there was heavily dosed
by the Antarctic manafall. These kids are now part of the Peronista ruling class, and are fighting their own
cousins in the ongoing Dirty War.
 The Fair Folk: Fairies take the place of The Greys - Seelie and Unseelie encounters involving abductions, lights
in the sky, traumatic repressed memories, and rumors of two Seelie being captured near Roswell...
 Fantastic Drug: There's a couple. Spelljack is a mix of cocaine and crushed powerstones, giving a boost to any
mage who uses it, along with Glowing Eyes of Doom and a hint of power-madness. Then there's purified human
theokinesin protein (PHTP). It gives Magery to nonmages who use it, and powers up weak mages, but the side
effect is that it loses its effect and wipes out any existing magery, just leaving a sucky addiction. Also, while it
can be synthesized, it's easier for the cartels to just kidnap mages and grind their brains up to make it.
 Fantastic Legal Weirdness: The US has had over fifty years to grapple with the implications of magic.
o The Compel Truth spell is the big example of this trope: it's constitutionalnote , every witness who takes the stand has
to take it, and it's a big help in getting the innocent exonerated. Resisting it is treated as contempt of court, and the
court-approved wizard or bailiff casting it will instantly notice if you resisted.
o A Longer-Than-Life Sentence is possible in Louisiana, where people can be sentenced to death and zombie labor.
o Being under Mind Manipulation is obviously an absolute defense in a criminal trial. The manipulator is guilty of the
crime instead.
o Youth elixir is new enough that the courts are currently fighting over its implications; among other things, they
haven't worked out whether a chronological and mental adult in a thirteen-year-old body can legally act in a
pornographic film.
 Fantastic Racism: Chimeras are the main target of discrimination in America. There's also a bit of friction
between mages and mundanes, though it's more likely to be framed as a divide between haves and have-nots.
 Fantastic Religious Weirdness: Religion has had to adapt to the manafall. In general, mainline Christianity has
accepted the coming of magic with good grace, but a few new sects have popped up (such as the Knights of the
Apocalypse, who are the Klan for chimeras, and the Rachelites, an ecstatic branch of Christianity that seeks
magical visions). Also, Wicca and other polytheistic religions (including Voudoun and Native American
shamanism) are far more popular than they are on our Earth.
 Feathered Fiend: The magic-using penguin socialist collective of Antarctica, transformed by a Hellstorm into a
vicious Hive Mind that has driven human scientists from the continent and is building up for the next battle.
 Flamethrower Backfire: If a flamethrower's backpack fuel tank is penetrated, it has a 1/6 chance (1/3 if it was a
fire attack) to explode. The damage done depends on how many shots are left in the tank.
 Flying Carpet: A favored replacement for the automobile (though those are still in use too). They are also
popular for military use, providing portable mobility without logistical dependencies on fuel.
 Fun with Acronyms: The standard in magical grimoires is the Working Handbook of Applied Thaumaturgy.
 Ghostapo: The Condor Group in Argentina are former SS wizards. Meanwhile, Wodinspear are a neo-Nazi group
composed of extremist Asatru wizards.
 Glowing Eyes of Doom: If someone has glowing red eyes, it means they're hopped up on spelljack: cocaine
mixed with crushed Powerstones. These dudes aren't really safe to be around.
 Horn Attack: The Jackalope can impale with its antlers.
 Hunter of Monsters: "Hellhound" is the general slang for this profession. In this setting, weird stuff escaping
from a lab or the Hellstorm happens often enough that there are people who specialize in it - particularly when
someone would rather not call the police. Hellhounds range from clean-cut CDC teams, to grizzled duos working
out of Albequrque offices and resembling private detectives with trenchcoats and broadswords, to the Leviathan
Group's Cerberus black-bag team (who gave the profession its nickname).
 Immortality Inducer:
o Youth elixir is a recent development. It's expensive, and it means that the rich will never die of age. The
repercussions are just starting to hit.
o Before youth elixir, the Argentine Nazis had their own tricks, often necromantic, and (as one would expect from
Nazi magic) reeking of Immortality Immorality. The favored method is to Body Surf, but literally stealing the youth
from political captives works too.
 Inhumanable Alien Rights: Humans, dragons and chimeras have rights (though chimeras face Fantastic Racism).
The undead don't; they're legally considered ambulatory corpses. Monsters, demons and creations are likewise
not considered human.
 In Spite of a Nail: Even though the Hellstorm brought magic and a whole lot of other weirdness into the world,
the Technomancer setting is still a "close parallel" to our Earth and many historical events that happened in our
world also happened in the setting with only minor differences.
 Invisibility: This magic exists, but is highly classified; any kind of invisibility magic is only available to spies
and special forces, and no private-sector group has yet managed to crack the secret.
 King in the Mountain: Josef Stalin did not die in 1953, he was merely put into magical stasis-sleep-type-thing to
be awakened when Motherland will be in danger. He awoke in 1996, after Communism fell, and started a civil
war to oust democrats and capitalists from his country.
 Longer-Than-Life Sentence: The state of Louisiana allows for sentences of "death plus hard labor." This means a
death sentence, followed by being zombified and put on a chain gang.
 Love Potion: The setting doesn't shy away from the moral implications of such a potion, outright calling the
Elixir of Love (along with the Elixirs of Lechery and Drunkenness) a "date-rape potion."
 Magitek: Check the title. It turns out that atomic bombs are really useful for summoning Eldritch Abominations!
It's ubiquitous and has profoundly shaped North American society (and the rest of the world to a significantly
lesser extent). Architecture is neo-Gothic because it's cheaper to build skyscrapers out of elemental stone than
glass and steel, medicine has been replaced with healing magic to the point that "old skills" like basic surgery are
considered an elective, NASA uses teleportation in place of rockets, and the 13th Necromantic Operations Group
and the Blue Dragons won Vietnam for the United States. And while using magic while playing football is
forbidden, celebrity wizards cast the spells that keep it from raining on the Super Bowl.
 Mass Super-Empowering Event: The Hellstorm caused by the first atomic explosion brought magic (back?) to
the Earth.
 Mega-Corp: A couple are mentioned. Most notable are Manadynamics (the grand old company of industrial
enchantment), Sephiroth Industries (a military contractor, the inventor of electricity-to-mana conversion
and the power in orbital space), and most nastily Leviathan Investment Group, a holding company for several
(often ethically-shady) businesses, which is heavily tied in with the magical dictatorship of Surinam and has an
actual dragon as chairman and primary owner.
 The Men in Black: "Mages in Black" are part of the general lore around Seelie sightings and abductions (which
may or may not actually happen). The Seelie take the place of The Greys.
 Military Mage: "Warlocks" are mages who use their abilities in the military. The 13th Necromantic Operations
Group was largely responsible for America's victory in the Vietnam War, while the Condor Group necromancers
were instrumental in bringing Argentina victory in the Falklands War.
 Mister Seahorse: There are spells for transferring pregnancy, which includes the production of a magical "womb"
for males.
 Muggles: "Mundane" is also used as a "mildly impolite" term to refer to people who aren't chimeras and don't
have the Magery advantage.
 Ninja Pirate Zombie Robot: In one of the vignettes, we get this gem from out of a laboratory:
Daphne put the phone down. “Eric, you ever dealt with a mutant toxic zombie walking cactus with strange
powers over killer bee swarms?”
 Nuclear Mutant: Magery and chimera births are largely a result of nuclear fallout. On the dark side, so are
vampirism and toxic zombie syndrome.
 Obvious Rule Patch: Players of previous GURPS settings had theorycrafted an "Infinite Mana Battery"; a
construction made from a glass-walled cylinder of hard vacuum, a pair of permanent Gates, and a stone pebble
falling through it indefinitely to build up velocity forever. However, it would only actually be possible in settings
containing magic, modern science, and a spell that could actually convert that velocity into
mana. Technomancer would've been the first to qualify... but in this one setting, Gate doesn't exist.
 Our Centaurs Are Different: The setting has two relevant chimeras: a spider centaur (Homo Sapiens Arachne)
and a serpent centaur (Homo Sapiens Serpens).
 Our Dragons Are Different: There are two kinds of dragon. Blue dragons are intelligent, friendly Western
dragons, who work for the US Air Force as self-aware aircraft (their scales are green; "blue" refers to their
employment). The "red" dragons are really of the same color, but they worked for the USSR. Black dragons also
work for the USAF, but have been genetically engineered into Magitek stealth fighters.
 Power Perversion Potential: The sex industry legally uses mannequin golems and created humans as prostitutes
to the point where there's a movement to ban the trade. Demonality (the summoning of incubi or succubi) is
already illegal (specifically, it's a violation of immigration law). Mind control magic and potions are popular
methods of date rape. Suffice to say, the subject is addressed.
  Right-Wing Militia Fanatic: The Knights of the Apocalypse are a Christian militant movement dedicated to (as
their name implies) preparing to fight for Jesus in the Apocalypse. They consider chimeras the soldiers of the
Antichrist, hoard guns and wands in preparation for the Apocalypse (and don't take kindly when Big Government
tells them to knock it off), and otherwise support a standard American right-wing agenda (by 1997 standards).
 Schizo Continuity: One-sided. Between Merlin-1 making its first appearance in the Time Travel
Adventures scenario "Soulburner" and becoming a setting in its own right, GURPS Wizards featured a Merlin-1
mage-spy, who had been magically transported to Homeline to find out who these interlopers on her world were.
However, Technomancer specifically states that the entire Gate college is unknown (not just classified) on
Merlin-1, presumably to keep the game in one reality and stop it from becoming "Magic Infinite Worlds". This
was then counter-retconned in Infinite Worlds for 4e, which has Merlin as an active player in the timelines.
Essentially, Technomancer can be played either as an independent world or as a world within the greater infinity.
 Simplified Spellcasting: Mages start out needing to use words and actions in order to achieve the proper mental
state, but experienced casters just need to concentrate.
 Social Media Is Bad: A Pyramid article updating the setting included magical social media. The most popular of
these is Soulspace, which literally feeds on the users' life force. But, hey, you clicked "agree".
 Sorcerous Overlord: Maria Hawker, President of the Magiocracy of Surinam and necromancer. Of course, since
this is the modern world, she's mostly the tinpot dictator of a Banana Republic, and her government is heavily
influenced by Leviathan Investment Group.
 Soul-Powered Engine: The Soul Burner Gestalt is a necromantic device that converts the souls of sacrificed
human victims into magical energy.
 Space Is Magic: Magic is caused by Oz particles, which were initially scarce on earth until the Hellstorms.
However, it's been discovered that there are indeed oz particles in space, radiated by the sun, they just got
blocked by the atmosphere along with the other harmful rays.
 Super Breeding Program: Argentina has one going on, where the Native women from Tierra del Fuego (in
Antarctica's Shadow) were taken as part of a breeding program to create new mages loyal to the Condor Group.
 Superpowerful Genetics: Magery is a genetic trait, and there are some extremely well-funded labs working on
creating Designer Babies with the talent.
 Truth Serums: The Compel Truth spell is used on witnesses in court, preventing them from lying. The Supreme
Court has ruled it constitutional, and an affirmation of one's innocence under Compel Truth is considered
positive proof.
 Unholy Nuke: A very literal example is the necronium bomb. Plain and simple nukes became unusable in that
setting because they create Hellstorms that may destroy the whole world in one blast, so the necromantic magical
replacement was created.
 Utility Magic: Magic is used for mass market consumer products, such as electronics, and for business
enchantments, such as the enchanted cooking pots used by the Chili Wizard fast food franchise. In addition, the
bottom end of magework is the "Johnny One-Spell," a shop usually manned by college students that simply casts
a particular spell on each customer for a fee, such as a dry cleaning operation using a Clean spell.
 Weird Historical War
o After the Hellstorm in 1945, a number of real-world wars still went ahead with China facing stiff resistance from
magic Tibetian monks in their invasion of 1950 and Iranian Revolution takes place while Shah is being treated for
vampiric leukaemia in the United States in 1979.
o The supplement "Funny New Guys" focuses on roleplaying the Vietnam War if it were fought using wizards and
dragons. In canon, the US won the Vietnam War through the use of necromancy.
o The Nazified Argentina likewise won the Falklands War in this 'verse by raising several Kriegsmarine vessels and
equipping them with undead crews.
 Who Shot JFK?: It is briefly mentioned that Oswald's use of a CIA developed "Magic Bullet" spell was covered
up. The how and why he got his hands on the spell is left unstated.
 Your Terrorists Are Our Freedom Fighters: Averted. When discussing activist groups and terrorists, the book
makes it pretty clear that the League of Chimera Voters and the Nightclaw vigilantes are supposed to look like
white hats, while Loki's Stepchildren (a chimera group who attack the Knights of the Apocalypse) are listed
under "terrorists."
 GURPS Alternate Earths is, as you may have guessed, a GURPS sourcebook — or rather two books, but they work
as a pair — about Alternate History — or rather, alternate timelines which the characters may visit in one campaign,
or live in from the start. The books describe twelve timelines (six in each book) in loving detail. They were later
made a part of the Infinite Worlds unified GURPS setting.
The scenario "Centrum" inspired Max Sinister's Chaos Timeline in AlternateHistory.com.

Tropes:

All worlds:
 Allohistorical Allusion: A lot of it about...
 Alternate History Wank: The only thing changing is who (or what) is wanked high.
 In Spite of a Nail: The natural source of logical alternate histories...
 Richard Nixon, the Used Car Salesman:
o In volume 1, we have... Malcolm Little (Malcolm X) as VP of the rest-US in a world where the CSA successfully
seceded. David Duke as POTUS in a world where The Nazis win World War II and the US become their fascist
satellite. Jabir ibn Hayyan as a Roman chemist inventing mustard gas in 767. Swedish king Charles XII invading
Britain. Roman emperor Heraclius founding a new empire in Africa after Constantinople falls. And Adolf Hitler
ending up in an insane asylum painting more watercolors.
o The sequel has more. Alissa Rosenbaum writing novels about heroic rail builders in Nationalist Republican Russia.
Japanese admiral Hiyoshimaru fighting European pirates for the Ming emperors. St. Bernhard of Clairvaux and St.
Dominic de Guzman converting still-pagan Scandinavia to a somewhat different Christianity. Ibn Sina inventing
calculus in 1006. Jan Masaryk elected Archon of an Austrian empire turned republic. And finally, Otakar Przemysl
kicking out the Mongolian oppressors from the Holy Roman Empire in Centrum.

Dixie:
Starts to diverge when filibuster William Walker succeeds in taking over Nicaragua in 1856; during the American
Civil War, it broke the Union blockade and helped the CSA win recognition from the European powers and
ultimately independence. Later, the "Southrons" take over most of Mexico and Central America. The US (which
took much of Canada in revenge for British aid to the rebels) is allied with Germany and helps them win World War
I. In the present day, the two Americas face off across a border of mines and barbed wire that stretches from the
Gulf of California to the Potomac.
 Action Girl: In the US, women serve in all branches of the military. They also commit as many violent crimes as
men do.
 Allohistorical Allusion: Guerre-eclair was developed by Charles de Gaulle, instead of the Wehrmacht
developing the blitzkrieg.
 Alternate History Wank: For the CSA, the German Empire, the US progressives and the United Indian Republic.
 Balkanize Me: The US (which takes over western Canada instead) and China.
 Cool Train: The US have a lot of them, and they're faster than anywhere else.
  Giving Radio to the Romans: Someone from Homeline illegally introduced  electronic
spreadsheet software (which had somehow been skipped over by Dixie's computer scientists) and caused a minor
revolution in the business world (while presumably making a pile of dough).
 Government Drug Enforcement: The CSA has developed a wide range of psychotropics to help keep control of
their slave populations.
 Nuke 'em: The Franco-German War ended in a German victory because the Germans got the bomb first.
 Right Hand Versus Left Hand: Both the USA and CSA are intervening in German Indochina, but neither country
can decide on what they want to do about the running insurgency there, due to a tension between ideology
and Realpolitik.note  Accordingly, intelligence operatives and Eagle Squadron volunteers from both powers are
supporting both sides.
 Shout-Out: The picture shows a CSA officer named "Butler" looking much like Clark Gable.
 Southern Belle: The CSA have plenty of these, of course.
 Space-Filling Empire: Germany owns about two thirds of Africa.
 The Starscream: Averted by Walker in this timeline, which led to his success. Instead of provoking the wrath
of Cornelius Vanderbilt (his main financial sponsor) by trying to seize his Nicaraguan holdings, he protected
them.
 Straw Feminist: To Southrons, every Yankee woman is a man-hating harridan.
 Vestigial Empire:
o The Austrian Triple Monarchy survived the Great War, but none of its internal problems were fixed, and now it's a
heavily-subsidized drag on the German economy that's slowly edging towards final collapse.
o The German Empire itself is getting a little long in the tooth, with a rigid absolute monarchy under an elderly
Kaiser in a modern world.
 Zeppelins from Another World: Used by the Southrons as a "civilized" means of travel (as opposed to the
Yankees and their loud, uncomfortable stratojets).

Reich-5:
Diverges with the assassination of Franklin D. Roosevelt by Guiseppe Zangara  in 1933. During the terms of
Charles Lindbergh and the not-that-competent John Nance Garner and Henry Wallace, the US become politically
split and polarized. Meanwhile, the Nazis and Japanese conquer half the world in the 1940s, and then finish the job
with the aid of subversion from William Dudley Pelley's fascist Union Party.

 Alternate History Wank: Guess for whom.

 Balkanize Me: The Soviet Union, which is no more.
 Cool Train: Kugelbahnen
 Crapsack World: Well, what did you expect from Nazis winning the war?
 Famous-Named Foreigner: The current führer and successor to Viktor Alchsneiss is named Günter Wallraff. In
our world, that's the name of a decidedly leftist German author. Makes you wonder how much research they did
on that.
 Fictional United Nations: Welt-Achse (World Axis)
 Nazis with Gnarly Weapons: Gnarlier than ever. In the present, their army has Kevlar armor, tanks
with railguns and Neutron Bomb howitzers.
 Nuke 'em:
o The Nazis didn't hesitate to level Denver, Dallas, St. Louis and Omaha in 1950 and Pittsburgh, Atlanta, San
Antonio, Salt Lake City and Calgary in 1976 when the Americans started an uprising.
o They also wiped out those pesky guerrillas in Afghanistan and the Andes by saturation bombardment with Neutron
Bomb howitzers.
 Shout-Out: The picture of the Nazis deporting the Jews of Houston (happening in the 1980s) is based on the
famous picture of the Warsaw Ghetto 1943. Except that they are wearing time-appropriate clothes - the little boy
on the right has a Chicago Cubs cap.
 Space-Filling Empire: Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan.
 Those Wacky Nazis: They rule a huge part of the world.

Roma Aeterna:
Instead of the sinister Tiberius, a surviving Drusus  (who died from a fall off a horse in 9 BC in our world) takes
over Rome after Augustus' death. During the following two millennia, Rome will expand, fall apart twice and
reunite again and expand further. Their technology also develops, albeit not as fast as in our world.

 Alternate History Wank: Rome, Rome and Rome again.

 Balkanize Me: China (not by the Romans, though).
 Cool Sword: Over the centuries, the Roman gladius has evolved into something like a giant Bowie knife.
 The Cycle of Empires: The Third Roman Empire is currently in late expansion.
 Eagleland: Hesperia (Roman America) has a similar image.
 Interfaith Smoothie: The Greco-Roman religion added American, Egyptian and Indian gods to their pantheon.
 Jesus: May have been pardoned by the emperor, if he lived at all.
 Space-Filling Empire: Rome covers Europe, Africa north of the rainforest belt, the Middle East, Central Asia and
India, most of South America and half of North America.
 Steampunk: They have boxy, heavyweight steamcars.
 Those Magnificent Flying Machines: The only native heavier-than-air flyer is the jactavolans, an incredibly
dangerous melding of Roman glider and Chinese rocket technology used by the Third Empire's legions for
scouting and courier purposes. In game terms, you have to roll Piloting checks on takeoff (to see if the rockets
explode) and landing (to see if you crash). All jactavolans pilots are state-owned slaves who receive both their
freedom and Roman citizenship if they survive a five-year term of service.

Shikaku-Mon:
John Trastamara (the son of Ferdinand I of Castille and Isabella II of Aragon – yes, that Ferdinand and Isabella)
survives to inherit the throne in place of his sister Joanna the Mad. Hence, no united Habsburg empire. The way
history develops is... odd: Charles II and Louis XVI prevent revolutions which otherwise would have lead to more
democracy and the creation of republics, increased missionary activity from Portugal (who finds its continental
designs frustrated) causes Japan to remain open to Western influences and technology from the 16th century on, and
at the end, the whole democratic phase is somehow skipped, since the world transforms into a typical cyberpunkish
society where nothing else counts but how rich you are.

 Alternate History Wank: Japan, oh so much. Also, Sweden, France and Brazil which are the other three
superpowers.
 Anarchy Is Chaos: Brazil's government has lost control over its own territory, and random gunfights on the street
are just part of the local color.
 Balkanize Me: North America, (still) Germany.
 Commie Nazis: The Synarchists, a totalitarian philosophy without a direct parallel in our world.
 Cyberpunk: Its flavour.
 The Empire: Japan is a racist nightmare state that governs nearly two-thirds of the world's population, and non-
Japanese under their rule have almost no rights.
 Japanese Christian: In this reality Japan is almost entirely Christian, having converted in the 16th century. And in
great part thanks to that and Japan also being by far the world's most powerful nation, almost 50% of total world
population are Catholic, rising to 90% with the elites.
 Japan Takes Over the World: More successful than ever. They manage to reign over two thirds of the world
population!
 Not-So-Omniscient Council of Bickering: The book goes into an examination of who rules Japan, and the answer
is "nobody." The Council of Ministers is a rubber stamp for whoever controls each lever of government, and the
powers held by an individual often have no relationship to their actual positions; an officer on the Admiralty staff
might be the one who sets grain prices, while the Agriculture Minister runs the East Indies as a feudal warlord.
 However, the Empire does stay together, and when it's faced with an actual threat or an objective that everyone
in the Empire wants to see happen, everyone stops fighting and works together, and stuff gets done.
 Nuke 'em: Synarchist Sweden nukes four British cities when their pawns don't win the Civil War. As a result,
60% of Britain's population dies or emigrates.
 Sealed Badass in a Can: There is good reason to suspect that crosstime travel would be as easy for this timeline
as for Homeline and Centrum — and although local technology isn’t too advanced, intrusive surveillance is
basically a popular hobby here. Homeline finds all this extremely worrying.
 Space-Filling Empire: Japan, of course. How much? The eastern half of Asia (including India), the Pacific
islands and Madagascar, and the western bit of North America.

Ezcalli:
The Carthaginians discover America in 600 BC, so the Old World diseases hit America two millennia earlier (and
the New World crops do the same to Europe); in addition, the lower technological development of the newcomers
prevents outright conquest. The Roman Empire falls apart after Nero, and the various barbarians make sure Europe
never recovers. Then the Aztecs (who have rebuilt their population) start the Industrial Revolution. Humanity’s last
best hope for a non-Crapsack World? The Songhay of West Africa.


Alternate History Wank: Mongols, Aztecs, Songhay, and Iroquois. Homeline's scientists are going absolutely
nuts trying to figure out exactly how this particular mix happened.
 Balkanize Me: Western and Southern Europe, which were smashed too many times by barbarian hordes and part
of the Mongol Empire for a long time.
 For Want of a Nail: The reason Rome falls apart: Since the west European provinces have had access to New
World staple crops like maize and potatoes for a long time, they're no longer dependent on Egyptian grain, so the
economy and politics disintegrate fast.
 In Spite of a Nail: Most egregious example. The Aztec people (aka the Tenochca) still exists although history
diverged more than two thousand years before them. Lampshaded in that Homeline cliologists have no idea why
they exist in that timeline either.
 Istanbul (Not Constantinople):
o Manhattan Island is known as Manannan here (named after the Celtic sea god by the Irish refugees who founded it).
o The country making up the southern part of the larger island off the northwest coast of Europe is known
as Englavo – they were invaded by the Podols  instead of the Normans and formed a hybrid Anglo-Slavic culture.
 Made a Slave: Many Europeans who're sold to the Mongols and Aztecs then.
 Mighty Glacier: The Mongol Khaganate – huge and immensely rich, but slow to act (and the smaller empires are
beginning to outstrip them technologically).
 Names to Run Away from Really Fast: "Ezcalli" means "house of blood" in Nahuatl.
 Rising Empire: The Tenochca. They've just developed the steam engine, and they're on the move to seize islands
(to serve as coaling stations) and slaves (to serve up to the gods).
 Space-Filling Empire: The Mongol Empire, which still holds most of Eurasia.
 Steampunk: Aztecs have the steam engine.
 Vestigial Empire: The Songhay Empire, directly descended from the African provinces of Rome (the ruler is
known as the "Ogusto"). Slightly subverted in that it's still a power player in geopolitics.

Gernsback:
Nikola Tesla marries the daughter of J.P. Morgan, gains financial support to take out Edison, and can realize all his
cool inventions. Which work.

 Alternate History Wank: Science!

 Cool Train: Blitzbahnen
 The '50s: Even about twenty years later, the world is still much like this. (World War II was avoided; the war
which brought down the Soviet Union was shorter and more one-sided, thus less upsetting for the world.)
 Fictional United Nations: Played with. The League of Nations was real, but even more toothless than the UN is
today, and didn't last very long. Here... see United Nations Is a Superpower.
 For Science!: A common ethos in this world.
  Giving Radio to the Romans: The I-Cops have their hands full keeping some wise guy from selling transistors to
Gernsback and sparking an information revolution.
 Low Culture, High Tech: Less accentuated than the norm, but in this world of scientific wonders, colonialism is
still a reality and both women and non-white races tend to be treated like second-class citizens.
 I Want My Jetpack: And here, you get it!
 Mad Scientist: They're very fitting for this world.
 Minovsky Physics: It is hinted that the laws of physics might differ a bit in this timeline.
 Omnidisciplinary Scientist: A characteristic of scientists in this world is that they can have the Science! skill, an
ability that allows them to know about scientific discoveries in any field. The concept was later generalized into
"wildcard skills" in Fourth Edition, and the exclamation point became a generic marker for wildcard skills
instead of particularly distinguishing Science! from vanilla science.
 Punk Punk: Diesel Punk overlapping with Atom Punk.
 Technology Porn: Part of the whole point.
 Technology Levels: Thrown completely to the wind. Most GURPS settings have a fairly clear tech level, but due
to the advent of Science!, you have aircars and death rays developed by slide rule.
 United Nations Is a Superpower: Due to the power of the World Science Council (established with the aid of JP
Morgan's money and Nikola Tesla's inventions), and the war against Stalin's Soviet Union, the League of Nations
is rapidly developing into a world government.
 Vestigial Empire: Socialist France is one of the six Great Powers of the League of Nations and a ruling colonial
power, in theory. In practice, it's barely even a major power in Europe, and its colonial empire is nothing but an
albatross around its neck.
 Zeppelins from Another World: Of course.

Cornwallis:
Baron Turgot  manages to reform France without unduly upsetting the royal family, which prevents The French
Revolution — and The American Revolution as well, since Turgot won't support republican rebels against a proper
crowned king. In 1984, the Thirteen Colonies are still economically repressed and confined east of the
Appalachians. Meanwhile, the Quadruple Alliance of Britain, Spain, France, and Austria remains watchful against
the Russian Dominate, the revolutionary force that expelled the Tsar six years earlier and threatens to do the same to
the other crowned heads of Europe.

 Alternate History Wank: For the great European monarchies.

 Balkanize Me: The German states never properly got together. Prussia and Austria are both (separately) Great
Powers.
 Cool Train: The trains of Russia which impress less with speed and more with size.
 Evil Versus Evil: The reactionary tyranny of the Five Thrones versus the totalitarian Russian Dominate.
 The Good King:
o Thanks to an alliance with the Catholic Church, careful devolution of power to local viceroys, and the use of mass
media, subjects of the Spanish Empire see their monarch this way.
o The book's narration, meanwhile, considers Austria's liberal monarch to be the good one. He's making some
enemies at home, though.
 Gray-and-Gray Morality: The Quintuple Alliance versus the Russian Dominate. The book comments that for
modern players, it may easily be considered Evil Versus Evil as well; it recommends letting players
support Austrian liberals or American patriots if they don't want to try to pick the lesser evil.
 Just the First Citizen: First Citizen Boris Gromov, head of the Russian Dominate.
 Kaiserreich: Prussia never transformed into Imperial Germany (Austria's Emperor is technically the Holy Roman
Emperor, but only in name), but it still acts a lot like this. It's the most formidable land power in the Five
Thrones, able to go toe-to-toe with the Russian Dominate.
 The Lancer: With its experiments in free-market economics and the elimination of royal privileges, Austria is
seen this way by the other European powers.
 Penal Colony: Oregon Country (which has hosted such luminaries as Jeremy Bentham and Eric Blair) is where
the British Empire sends its troublemakers.
 People's Republic of Tyranny: The Russian Dominate seems to be heading this way.
 Space-Filling Empire: Britain and Spain (which kept their empires) and Russia (which includes Finland,
Manchuria, Korea, Japan and Alaska - and was even bigger in the past).
 Vast Bureaucracy: The principles of mercantilism and a bewildering network of laws have retarded technological
and industrial progress – tariffs are required at the border of almost every province or city, and motorcars are still
toys for the rich.

Ming-3:
Ming China doesn't scrap its treasure fleet after the 15th century voyages of Zheng He, and starts to, almost
accidentally, expand - first into Vietnam, India, and Arabia, then Africa, and later into Europe when the lackeys of
their bandit queens and kings start to become a nuisance... and there's no end, it seems...

 Alternate History Wank: This time, it's China.

 Beleaguered Bureaucrat: Any honest minister in the Ming government is going to be this. They're the least-
appreciated men in the Empire, and they're also the only reason the Ming haven't fallen yet.
 Corrupt Bureaucrat: Most of the bureaucracy are this. It simply doesn't pay to be honest while the Middle
Kingdom burns, and preparing for the imperial examinations requires money — which often comes with strings
attached.
 The Irish Mob: Irish 'Triads' have become very powerful across the globe and have developed their own martial
art form.
 Just Before the End: The Emperor appears to have lost the Mandate of Heaven.
 Shout-Out: To "The Second Coming." The line for one section header is "The Center Holds."
 Space-Filling Empire: China covers most of Eurasia (except for Russia, Persia and the Ottoman Empire),
Australasia and half of the Americas and Africa.
 Vast Bureaucracy: It's China, this is mandatory; of course, as China is on the verge of collapse, several
mandarins are turning into warlords in their own right.
 Wooden Ships and Iron Men: Even under Ming domination, Britain has a long tradition of this.
 Zeppelins from Another World: They have them.

Midgard:
In 860, the Vikings take Constantinople (instead of being bribed to go away) and capture the secret of Greek Fire.
They manage to extend their rule over half of Europe, North America, Russia and Siberia.

 Alternate History Wank: For Vikings.

 Interfaith Smoothie: Thorism, where the god of thunder promises to fight for his worshipers in heaven if they
become his sworn men after death.
 Pirate: Everyone's doing it. Apart from the Scandinavians (no surprise), the Moors, Chinese, Malay, Yanomami,
Hanse Germans, Gujarati and Nihonese are also into it.

Caliph:
An eccentric 9th century Muslim scholar refutes the pagan Greek philosophers using rationalism. In combination
with an Arab printing press and an oil-powered Industrial Revolution, this means that Islam become the prime
power in the world and develops science and technology at a breakneck pace. The first man lands on the moon in
1434, and in the present time (1683 AD), the world has reached an age of progress far beyond that of Homeline.
However, a secular, rationalist movement known as the Jamahiriya ("Republic") has recently taken over much of
Talentis (the New World) in a lightning bid for power, and an apocalyptic war may be at hand.

 Alternate History Wank: Islam.

 Anarchy Is Chaos: Averted. The Umma (territory not governed by a caliphate) has no sovereign government
(although local government still exists in many places), but is a very peaceful place — and is in many
ways more restrictive and orderly than the Caliphates.
 Awakening the Sleeping Giant/Sealed Badass in a Can: The whole timeline is presented as this with regards to
the Infinite Worlds setting. Both Homeline and Centrum are, quite rightly, scared shitless of the prospect that
Caliph might learn the Secret.
 Benevolent A.I.: Sentient computers (called djinns) have to be educated just like humans; consequently, all are
friendly to organic life (and devout Muslims to boot). Of course, that may change in areas under control of the
Jamahiriya.
 Crystal Spires and Togas: Diamond skyscrapers, traditional Islamic dress, and a highly religious and spiritual
society governed by mostly-benevolent Caliphates.
 Earth-Shattering Kaboom: Given the technology available to this timeline, not out of the realm of possibility.
 Evil Overlord: The Caliph of Hind; he only betrayed the other caliphates and allied with the Jamahariya to gain
power.
 For Science!: The ideology of the Jamahiriya is to abandon Islamic law and custom in favor of a cult of reason
and pushing science to its limits.
 The Fundamentalist: Played with. The Rightly-Guided Stellar Caliphate is, as its name implies, heavily
influenced by the traditionalist rashidun movement and is very big on doctrinal orthodoxy, but it's also the one
caliphate that's refused to join the jihad against the unbelievers, and their Caliph is a Reasonable Authority
Figure whose primary goal is to prevent the war from wiping out the Earth.
 No Woman's Land: Defied; the book briefly mentions that the women's movement succeeded and women are
generally equal to men.
 One Nation Under Copyright: The Rightly Guided Stellar Caliphate is an unusual example; once war between
the Jamahiriya and the rest of Earth's nations seemed likely, the Mega-Corp that controls most space travel
seceded as the RGSC in order to ensure the continuity of human civilization in case of an Earth That
Was situation.
 Our Genies Are Different: References to djinn in the Qu'ran are believed to be prophecies of A.I., and actual A.I.
are called "djinn".
 Space-Filling Empire: The Bulgarian Caliphate covers our Russia, southeastern Europe, and the north and west
of North America/Talentis.
 Technology Porn: Despite being in the 17th (Christian) century, they already have colonies in
space, nanotechnology, artificial intelligence, and skyscrapers made of artificial diamonds.
 Well-Intentioned Extremist: The Jamahiriya intend to expand the possibilities of science beyond the limitations
imposed by Islamic law and custom (as if nanotechnology, space elevators, and FTL travel weren't enough); they
do tend to push For Science! to its limits, and in the Caliph of Hind they may have made a poor choice of friends.

Aeolus:
"The Divine Wind" of 1688 never happens, so Britain stays under the Stuarts and gradually becomes Catholic again.

 Alternate History Wank: Averted; the setting gets too weird to say that any power is wanked up. The Bourbons
were briefly wanked up before regressing to second-rate power.
 Cool Plane: The Republican Alliance's most important weapon, jet planes - mostly because they are the first
planes in the setting.
 The Fundamentalist: The American Covenant is a Puritan theocracy, bearing a strong resemblance to
the Commonwealth of England.
 Good Republic, Evil Empire: Played broadly straight with the Republican Alliance being firmly represented as
the good guys. That said, some of the monarchies - Britain and Louisiana - are presented as not that bad and
conversely the American Commownwealth is a Holier Than Thou quasi-theocracy.
 In Spite of a Nail: Despite the short-term ascendancy of France due to England's weakness, France does not
remain a dominant power in the world in the current era.
 Richard Nixon, the Used Car Salesman: Is the source of one in the Infinite Worlds: Otto Skorzeny, liberal
democrat and fighter for the Republican Alliance. When he learned that most of his infinite selves were Nazis
(like the one in our world), he became head of ISWAT so that he could make a hobby of killing them.
 Technology Levels: A slight aversion. The Republican Alliance essentially leapfrogged the Tech Tree when they
developed jet engines without propeller engines; the current limiting factor in aircraft speed is that the available
airframe technology isn't up to handling the speed that their engines can pull.
 We ARE Struggling Together: Austria is a bit of a mess... But the rebels know that they can't afford to hang
separately, and currently the liberals are keeping everyone together and mostly civilized.
Centrum:
A more successful Angevin (Anglo-French) empire gradually takes over all the world. When the empire falls apart,
a meritocracy centered on Terraustralis (Australia) rebuilds the empire. And then, they start discovering and
conquering other timelines...

 After the End: The empire falling apart destroyed society outside Terraustralis. Luckily, Centrum provided a new
one for the few survivors.
 Alternate History Wank: The Angevins, and the British Empire in general... until 1902, then it becomes a
completely new society.
 The Rival: For Homeline.
 Well-Intentioned Extremist: They genuinely want to civilize other timelines and prevent them from having an
apocalyptic war like their own timeline had. It's just that they believe pretty strongly that end justifies the
means... and they don't care much if others disagree with their views on civilization.

United States of Lizardia:

The K-T extinction event never happens - leading, 65 million years later, to an almost exact equivalent of the
modern world, except populated by lizard-men.

 Alternate-History Dinosaur Survival: The books had to feature one, however briefly, and this is it.
 Joke Level: This world is mainly there to make it clear that alternate universes don't have to make sense, and
nobody on Homeline is even going to try explaining just how the hell this world came about. The consensus is
that the gods think it's funny. However, it is also possible that there are truly infinite numbers of alternate Earths,
and the ones which are accessible to us is determined by some kind of resonance effect — so we get to reach a
dinosaur world which is peculiarly similar to ours socially.

GURPS Illuminati University (also known as GURPS IOU) is a setting for GURPS roleplaying system. The
corebook was written by Elizabeth McCoy and Walter Milliken and illustrated by Phil Foglio and Kaja Foglio. It
was first released in 1995 by Steve Jackson Games.
IOU (you are not cleared to know what the 'O' stands for) is a fictional university campus populated by people and
things from across the timeline, all around the universe and from alternate worlds. The students and staff include
witches, demons, werewolves, time travellers, aliens, psychics and even normal young human students. The classes
available are if possible even weirder than the students.
The default tone of the rules and illustrations leans very heavily comedic with silly puns and bizarre magic and tech
aplenty but the book also provides alternate takes with 'Weird' being closer to something like Buffy the Vampire
Slayer (though the book predates the show) and 'Darkly Illuminated' being more serious and conspiratorial with the
humour being greatly toned down.
GURPS IOU can be considered a Spiritual Successor to Teenagers from Outer Space, and the authors note the
inspiration of the older game in the introduction.

This game provides examples of:

 Alien Geometries: Instead of a quad like most universities, Illuminated University has The Pent, which has five
sides for no particular reason; students who happen to have a protractor handy will discover that all five of the
corners have 90-degree angles. One of the dorms is stated as having rather similar angles.
 All Myths Are True: At least in the default 'Silly' setting the universe is teeming with aliens, ancient gods,
cryptids, undead, everything. Some of them are probably your room mate (assuming you are not playing one
yourself.)
 Almighty Janitor: The most powerful character in the setting - the ArchDean - is in charge of the whole
university, but the second-most powerful character is George the Janitor, who seemingly is always right where he
needs to be when he needs to be, and he can clean up anything (in a World of Weirdness where nuclear reactor
leaks, Cthulhu incursions, and tears in the space-time continuum are a boring weekday). He mostly uses his
absurd knowledge and power to a) help him clean things up, and b) earn bribes from anyone who might need
further info. Madame Lucrezia Curry, the woman in charge of the cafeteria, isn't quite on George's level, but it's
worth noting that the only people who would even dare address her by her first name are ones who have
received The Treatment.
 Asskicking Equals Authority: Very much in place for the most part. The ArchDean has no listed stats, as anyone
dumb enough to take her on is going to find themselves dead, then revived, then discover their bank accounts and
credit ratings are Deader than Dead. Most of the deans are head and shoulders above their professors, as well,
with Metaphysics run by an actual demon ("Fred" to his equals, the DeanMon to his inferiors) and
C.T.H.U.L.H.U. run by a Captain Ersatz of the Fourth Doctor at his most capable. An interesting variant applies
for WUSE - the best programmer (who can thus convince THE Computer that they deserve it) is the one who
generally becomes dean (though if said programmer can't kick enough ass, they don't live long enough to stay the
best programmer). For the exceptions, see above.
 Author Avatar: Or rather 'artist avatar'; Phil Foglio pops up in a couple of pictures, complete with trademark
bowler hat.
 Brain Uploading: One of several different ways in which deceased students and faculty are restored to life in
cloned bodies.
 Brainless Beauty: The university boasts two entire One Gender Races of these who work in the administration as
secretaries and general flunkies. The female Bimbiras are Human Aliens introduced to the campus by the
ArchDean while the Kajones, who are all male hunks, were created via genetic engineering at the University
itself.
 Brought Down to Normal: There is a specific trait called Mundanity, which is literally this as a power. Those
with high-enough level of Mundanity can literally turn anything extraordinary into something normal. For
example, any aliens threatening a character with high-level Mundanity with zap-guns will find that their arsenal
has turned into stage props while he’s enjoying the antics of the “drama students.”
 Complete Immortality: The results of receiving "The Treatment," which is apparently so traumatic that nobody
remembers precisely what it entails, and which results in the recipient being impossible to destroy outside of
intervention from the ArchDean herself. Generally, only the most powerful department heads and deans can
afford this.
 Contemporary Caveman: One of the sample characters is Og, a caveman with an eidetic memory. He came
forward in time with a C.T.H.U.L.H.U. student who was fleeing a wooly mammoth, and arranged to stay by
volunteering as a research subject in exchange for tuition, room and board.
 Credit Card Plot: A sample adventure in the campaign book has the characters acquire a magical credit card
with no limit - if you try to check the account's balance, it reads "JACKPOT". Later on - likely after they've
purchased a bunch of expensive stuff - they'll find out that the card is made in Hell, and the debt is paid not with
money, but in souls! The plot is played out as a parody of The Lord of the Rings with the card taking the place of
the Ring.
 Death Is Cheap: Part of the student health plan includes Resurrective Immortality - after all, students can't
become rich donors if they can't live to get their degree. This does not mean that death is consequence-free,
however - just because you're guaranteed to be resurrected does not mean that the university will be quick about
it, and many teachers will view "I was dead at the time" as a poor excuse for missing a test or turning in an
assignment late.
 Department of Redundancy Department: Illuminati University actually has several Department of Redundancy
Departments.
 Early-Bird Cameo: A crossover example. On the page with the yearbook photo, two of the students listed in the
yearbook are Agatha Heterodyne and Krosp (although the names are partly obscured by the student reading said
yearbook).
 Elaborate University High: Illuminati University is a large, sprawling campus, which includes nine separate
colleges, a large library, a museum, two separate power plants (one of which is a gigantic sunflower), a stadium,
 multiple dorms, a Frat/Sorority Row, and a Botany building placed within a giant tree. Due to numerous reasons
ranging from restructurization to shifts in reality, the exact layout and number of buildings on the campus is
susceptible to change, to the annoyance of the faculty and student body.
 Evil Twin: An explicit disadvantage.
 Extranormal Institute: Classes at Illuminati University include hysteria and future history, the botany building is
a tree, and destruction of any planetary bodies requires written permission from the Arch-Dean (who, according
to rumor within the setting, is either a former angel, a former demon, or both). The favorite sport of IOU (you're
not cleared to know what the 'O' stands for) is Moopsball, which... well... just look at the rules .
o The various Colleges within the greater University are mostly devoted to various genres of adventure:
 The College of Temporal Happenstance, Ultimate Lies and Historical Undertakings (C.T.H.U.L.H.U.) note  centers
around time travel.
 The College of W.U.S.E. (Weird and Unusual Science and Engineering) is made of mad scientists, slightly-less-mad
students of Science! and devotees of The Computer (the A.I. that controls, among other things, student schedules and
dorm assignments).
 SPCA (School of Performing and Creative Arts) teaches classes in drama, melodrama, villain monologues, and
applied courtesanship, among others.
 COUP (College of Obscure and Unhealthy Professions) trains future spies, super-spies, ninjas, powers-behind-the-
throne, IRS agents and the like.
 The School of Social Anti-Sciences (a parody of pure academia and liberal arts majors) conflicts with the College of
Zen Surrealism, since the first resents the second for being obscure and pointless on purpose, rather than concentrating
on pure academics and only achieving obscure pointlessness as a side-effect.
 The College of Communication mainly addresses propaganda, misinformation, and creating conspiracy theories for
fun and profit.
 The School of Conservative Arts (parodying liberal arts and conservative politics) teaches classes like Political
Architecture 101: Empire Building for Fun and Profit.
 The College of Metaphysics is a Wizarding School plunked into a genre stew, with majors like Applied Theology
(with classes like AT 102: How to Start Your Own Church and AT 401: World Building in 7 Days or Less) and
Political Thaumaturgy.
 Fun with Acronyms: Everywhere. The History department(which focus mostly on time travel) is officially called
the College of Temporal Happenstance, Ultimate Lies & Historical Undertakings (C.T.H.U.L.H.U). Another
department which focus on Law and other 'dirty tricks' is called the College of Obscure and Unhealthy
Professions (COUP).
 Genre Savvy: More or less an actual skill that can be purchased as Survival (IOU), which can be bought up the
same as any other IQ-based skill. It can be substituted in for any number of other skills to let the character know
just what kinds of things will end very, very badly (one example was a character rolling against engineering to
learn the state of a nuclear reactor... and someone with Survival (IOU) noticing that the Almighty Janitor was
preparing for a massive cleanup).
 Harmful Healing: The Lazarus Health Center approaches their job in an... unorthodox way. It's usually easier
to just die and get resurrected.
 Highly-Conspicuous Uniform: The Campus Security wear red uniforms with a literal Bullseye Badge,
underlining their status as the setting's Red Shirts. Their most common nickname isn't "Targets" for nothing.
 Insistent Terminology: The university prefers the use of terms like 'freshthing' and 'chairthing' to potentially
sexist and/or humanocentric terms like 'freshman' or 'chairperson'.
 Kindhearted Cat Lover: For all that she's listed as more of a force of nature than an actual person, the ArchDean
isn't all that bad of a sort, particularly as she has rules about ensuring the safety of "freshthings," and she's so
fond of her cats that one of the suggestions to mitigate her wrath are to distract her with one (not that this is
guaranteed to work). And anyone who is dumb enough to mistreat a cat on campus is at best going to be
suffering through a host of indignities to get their way back into the ArchDean's graces.
 Lord British Postulate: The section on the ArchDean doesn't list stats, per se. It says that she has fnord character
points, and it only suggests advantages with levels beyond comprehension (such as levels of Resources that
would make galactic empires envious), and it only lists a couple of flaws (such as her fondness of cats and her
greed) mostly as a guide for the GM to guide her should anyone be foolish enough to get her attention.
  Master Computer: THE Computer, which is basically responsible for anything computer-related at the university
(except that maintained by the Robocrat). It's sentient, and more than a little weird given just how often people
mess around with it. It's not quite as bonkers as Friend Computer from Paranoia, but it can get pretty close on a
bad day. It's also the determinant of who gets to be dean of WUSE - if you can convince THE Computer to give
you the Dean's salary, you're the dean. Not surprisingly, the position is typically held by the best programmer on
staff.
 Not Cheating Unless You Get Caught: One of the scenario ideas involves the final exam for the Advanced
Cheating class. The questions are just random obscure trivia; the actual test is finding a good way to cheat in it. If
you get caught, you fail. If you don't even try to cheat, you'll be expelled for "terminal cluelessness." The
difficulty to this being, of course, proving that someone did not cheat.
 Our Founder: There is a statue in the middle of the "Pent" marked "Our Founder". Said statue is humanoid-
shaped, but worn down with age, and has hints of tentacles on the face. Oh, and testing showed it to be older than
the universe.
 Pragmatic Villainy: Darker IOU games prominently feature this among the upper echelons of the school,
particularly for the ArchDean. Lighter games will play with this as well, although it's just as likely a facade for
a Jerk with a Heart of Gold. About half of the classes at the College of Obscure and Unethical Professions are all
about teaching how to do this (the other half merely encourage it).
 Riddle for the Ages: The setting runs on this. IOU is Illuminati University... so what does the "O" stand for? Just
who (or, for that matter, what) is the ArchDean anyway? Who is the Unseen Dean, and how many have they
gone through? And what's the janitor's deal, anyhow? Just what does "The Treatment" entail? The answer to all
these, and more, is frequently "You're not cleared for that." It even says so on the back cover.
 Right Hand Versus Left Hand: The various departments and individuals within are so frequently at each others'
throats (literally) that the ArchDean codified it with the Blood Feud system. There are severe consequences for
anyone caught escalating a feud beyond bickering in journals without filing the proper paperwork. And woe
betide the unfortunate soul who doesn't realize that their would-be foe already filed the paperwork.
 Shout-Out:
o One illustration features Terry Pratchett creating a physical version of the Discworld as part of the World
Construction finals.
o The main University (Dis-)Organizations picture features the XXXenophile Society.
o In the Librarian's profile picture, he's holding Green Eggs and Spam.
o There's a picture of a Martian war machine on p. 74.
o In addition to the acronym for the College of Temporal Happenstance, Ultimate Lies & Historical Undertakings,
there're a couple of student organizations actually devoted to Cthulhu.
 Super-Powered Robot Meter Maids: The Robocrat, who was the result of several WUSE Mad Science projects
using the results of previous WUSE projects. The end result of an accident with a nuclear lawnmower was that
boring nebbish Harvey Tillotson's brain was transplanted into what was meant to be a state-of-the-art combat
cyborg. Despite being in a new Nigh-Invulnerable body, Harvey decided that life on IOU was dangerous enough
and asked for a cushy desk job. Realizing just how useful he could be in administrative settings, the ArchDean
quickly agreed.
 Take That!: Several, particularly at the Gor series.
 These Are Things Man Was Not Meant to Know: There is the class in the Thaumaturgy department called
"Things Men Were Not Meant to Know". There's also a class in "Men Things Were Not Meant to Know".
 Vengeful Vending Machine: The campus vending machines will dispense almost anything a character might
need, from a cold soda to a flamethrower. However, they don't always give you what you ask for.
 Wacky College: The university nearly defies description. The Dean of the history department is a Captain
Ersatz of the Fourth Doctor, the Botany department is housed in a giant tree, the sample characters include a
witch-girl, a cave-man, and a football-playing werewolf, and the favorite sport on campus is moopsball .
 We Sell Everything: The campus vending machines in can distribute almost anything. And we do
mean anything.
 World of Weirdness: The defining feature. The whole point is that a GURPS character from any setting would fit
more at less at home at IOU.
 Paranoia takes many forms: A mental condition  characterized by extreme and irrational suspicion. A 2004
industrial-espionage thriller by Joseph Finder. A print magazine  dealing in conspiracy theories. A 2011
film starring Brad Jones. In this particular case, however, we travel to a world designed
by Kafka, Stalin, Orwell, Huxley, Sartre, the Marx Brothers, and that crazy old man at the airport bar at 2am...
Paranoia is a darkly humorous Tabletop Game originally created by Greg Costikyan, Dan Gelber, and Eric
Goldberg.note  It takes place After the End, in Alpha Complex, an isolated Underground and/or Domed city run by
a supercomputer known variously as the Computer and "Friend Computer". After most of the human race was wiped
out by some freak accident, the Computer tried to figure out what went wrong. Unfortunately, the Computer's
databases had been corrupted, and after finding some Cold War propaganda, it came to the conclusion
that Communists caused the disaster. Or possibly some other nebulous threat; no one is quite sure what happened
any more, because most of world history has been heavily edited.
Already bonkers,note  following decades of successive subversion and reprogramming by various conflicting groups
(High Programmers, Secret Societies, aliens from Pluto and/or Dimension 2Q4B), "Friend Computer" has only
gotten more paranoid, schizophrenic, and ins- er, unstable. Neverthless, it still rules Alpha Complex note with an iron
fist, its dystopian society organized in a hierarchy of "security clearances" based on the electromagnetic
spectrum (specifically Isaac Newton's version), from lowly Infrared worker drones, through Red grunts and
Yellow managers, all the way up the rainbow to the Violet and Ultraviolet elite. note 
This society is supported by swarms of robots and spies, omnipresent surveillance, and
a bureaucracy so huge and convoluted no one's quite sure who's in charge of what any more.
Problems in Alpha Complex are solved by teams of Troubleshooters, whose job is to find trouble and shoot it.
Threats include Traitors, Communists and other secret societies, unregistered Mutants, and Commie Mutant
Traitors. This mission is complicated by the facts that, thanks to years of clone breeding, overexposure to radiation,
and other snafus, every last one of its inhabitants is a mutant. Everyone is also a member of one or more secret
societies (mostly) plotting to overthrow the order of Alpha Complex.
The PCs are (usually) Red-level Troubleshooters working for Friend Computer, grudgingly
assigned useless, backfiring equipment and weapons, and dispatched on (often impossible) Suicide Missions, all
while navigating the endless deathtrap which is Alpha Complex, keeping their mutant powers a secret, advancing
the cause of their secret society, and trying to earn promotion to higher color grades. The over-the-top darkly satiric
tone of the game ensures that Hilarity Ensues as the player characters try to juggle their responsibilities, or at least
survive for a while. Player infighting is encouraged, to the point that some editions recommend that there
should never be a greater danger than each other, and turnover is so high that each player gets several backup
clones with which to replace themselves if — or rather WHEN — they die. And after all that comes the
truly dangerous part: the mission debriefing. note  All this is assuming you live long enough to find out what the
mission is.
Beyond the back stabbing and Giant Radioactive Mutant Cockroaches, Paranoia was quite an innovative RPG when
introduced in 1984. It was either the first RPG or first widely played RPG to:
 Adopt the video game approach to character lives, with clone replacements each time a player died. Until
Paranoia, the death of a player character was Very Serious.
 Even more so than most RPGs, consider the rules and setting to be a collection of possibly-useful suggestions
which can be cheerfully ignored when they get in the way of having fun.
 The characters were not a team, and as stated above were actively encouraged to backstab each other, openly
or otherwise. This required a certain amount of maturity from the players and a willingness to forget about the
"mission" in favour of roleplaying and chaos.
 Players, in theory, had no knowledge of the rules, so anyone metagaming ("I get plus one for being behind
cover") could be executed for it. (If they did look, they should simply factor the rules into their schemes without
admitting they know, because it's Not Cheating Unless You Get Caught.note )
Be aware that if you make any mention of a published-in-1995 "Fifth Edition" of the game, you are referring to
an Official Unproduct and Friend Computer does not like people referring to things which never existed.
 Anyone interested in RPG design should have a look at the brilliant concept of Perversity Points, first introduced in
the "XP" edition of the game. Basically, they're given out for being entertaining when playing your character instead
of just boringly efficient, and spent to improve your dice rolls or (this being Paranoia) screw up someone else's,
with the GM handwaving some appropriate in-character circumstance.
With the 25th Anniversary edition, the game can now be played in three forms: as a Troubleshooter, an Internal
Security agent, or a High Programmer. In the latter cases, the Computer progressively shifts from "that information
is not available at your security clearance" to "that information is not available at this time", possibly because the
Computer doesn't know either, or It's not sharing it with anyone. (Apart from that, High Programmers get lots of
information, but most of it is garbage.) The equipment also beefs up; Troubleshooters have laser pistols, IntSec
agents have cone rifles (basically bazookas), and High Programmers hang out in the Situation Room and manipulate
teams of lower-clearance citizens working for service groups or secret societies or the Troubleshooters. Just
remember, Citizen, no matter how high your security clearance, Happiness Is Mandatory! Insufficient happiness will
be punished by termination!
The latest version is Red Clearance Edition, based on a successfully funded Kickstarter campaign for a reboot of the
game.  Done by James Wallis as lead designer with assistance from original game designers Greg Costikyan and
Eric Goldberg, gameplay is streamlined while the setting is updated for a modern context, with "terrorists" as the
stated greatest threat to Alpha Complex (Commies are still lurking in the background, but are just one illegal secret
society among many), while technology has advanced from smartphones to cranial implants (making the hardware
harder to hack, but the software and Wi-Fi are another story).
In April 2019, a video game adaptation was announced  by the name of Paranoia: Happiness is Mandatory,
developed by Cyanide Studio and Black Shamrock. However, within a couple months, it was de-listed for sale with
no explanation.
Paranoia: The Perfect Edition , a refinement of Red Clearance Edition, is scheduled for release in late 2022.

Paranoia is the Trope Namer for:

 The Computer Is Your Friend
 Happiness Is Mandatory
 Machine Empathy

The following List of Tropes present in Paranoia is classified Security Clearance ULTRAVIOLETnote :
 Absurdly-Spacious Sewer: The world of Paranoia is an underground bomb shelter built to withstand nuclear
Armageddon. Missions often involve searching vast sewers or labyrinthine tunnel systems.note 
 Affably Evil: The Computer genuinely wants the best for the citizens of Alpha Complex, and it's unfailingly
upbeat and polite. As long as it doesn't think you're a traitor, it will always be eager to help if asked. The problem
is that it's completely insane.
 After the End: A [REDACTED] wiped out most of humanity and confined the remains to Alpha Complex.
 A.I. Is a Crapshoot:
o Though it's unclear whether Friend Computer is an actual A.I. or whether most of the crazy was put into it by scores
of crazy amoral High Programmers.
o Frequently, Frankensteins, bots who have had their Asimov Circuits removed, immediately become extreme
misanthropes and plot to Kill All Humans or just leave (except members of Corpore Metal, and there's individual
bots who don't care). Given what humans are like in Paranoia, one wonders whether the bots are just acting in self-
defense.
o 8th Edition introduces a new thing to worry about: Deviant Artificially Intelligent Viruses (DAIVs). These infect
and take over anything with an artificial brain (like scrub-bots... or AutoDocs... or Warbots...). While the good news
is that DAIVs can't corrupt the biological brains of clone citizens, they can get into the clone's installed cybernetics
and start whispering to the clone to convince them to do something it wants.
 Air-Vent Passageway: Acute Paranoia, adventure "Outland-ISH". The Troubleshooters can use one to get
around a convoy of vehicles blocking their path.
  All Crimes Are Equal: In a "Zap" game, just about everything is punishable by summary execution.
 The Alleged Car: If anything works as it logically should in Paranoia, the GM's a creampuff. The rules
even helpfully suggest amusing ways for things to go wrong and kill a clone or two in the process.
 Alternative Calendar: Starting from the Computer's assumption of autocratic power; however, the Computer
subsequently declared that the year shall always be numbered 214. WARNING 
 Ambiguous Situation: Is Alpha Complex underground? In space? In its own pocket dimension?
What was the Gehenna Incident? Is Friend Computer genuinely trying to do the right thing or is its
incompetence masking some deeper malice against humankind? All of these questions either have no concrete
answer or are subject to alteration at the DM's whim.
 Ambiguous Time Period: The Computer's decree that the year shall always be numbered 214 makes it impossible
to determine exactly how long the calendar has been in place.
 Amazing Technicolor World: Due to everything being colored by clearance.note 
 Ammunition Backpack
o Flamethrowers and plasma generators are nifty area-of-effect weapons, but when they malfunction, you have to
unstrap yourself fast and try to outrun the blast radius.
o The adventure "Send in the Clones" has an Ice Gun with its water supply in a large backpack instead of inside the
gun as usual.
o White Dwarf magazine #81 adventure "The All New Computer Horror Real Action Show". The Magnetic Induction
Hand Cannon is a pistol-type weapon attached to a backpack power supply.
o XP supplement Stuff
 The B-E Condensate Projector is connected to a backpack filled with helium gas at a temperature just above absolute
zero. The projector sprays the helium on opponents, freezing them solid.
 The Crowd Control Sonic Screamer has its energy supply in a backpack. It sprays out intense high frequency sound
that stuns and partially deafens its targets.
 The Magnetic Flux Cannon is a man-portable weapon with a backpack powerpack. The beam it fires has a devastating
effect on electronics, such as robots, computers and vehicles.
 The Slipaway Liquified Inhibitor Pack fires out a spray of foam that renders surfaces frictionless. It stores the foam in
a container/compressor backpack.
 Ancient Conspiracy: The Illuminati claim to be this. Or perhaps they don't. Maybe they are. Who's to say?
 ...And That Would Be Wrong: The various gamebooks have been known to deploy this trope, usually by
suggesting such an action would be beneficial to the Troubleshooter, but would require him to betray his
comrades, and he'd NEVER consider something like that, as a good and loyal citizen of Alpha Complex, right?
note 

 Appeal to Force: Troubleshooters can even acquire nuclear hand grenades, which work as this trope would
suggest... until they carry out their threat. Have you tried outrunning a megaton nuclear explosion?
 Auto Doc: Alpha Complex has the DocBots, tireless robotic medical personnel intended to see to all the clones'
problems. They can inject any needed drug, analyze biochemical samples, and perform surgery. The largest ones
can act as intensive care wards. Predictably, they are about as useful as most Alpha Complex robots at best
and stark raving insane at worst.
 Auto-Kitchen: In Send in the Clones, Twilightcycle 2000 and The Underplex. These mechanisms are actually
somewhat more effective at killing people than the various devices built with that intention.
 Back Stab: If player-characters aren't gleefully doing this to their Troubleshooter "teammates", it's only because
they're openly blasting each other with zapguns and grenades.note 
 Bad Boss: The Computer is insane and paranoid,note  and the missions it assigns reflect this at every turn.
 Bald of Evil: The stereotypical Ultraviolet is depicted as a light-skinned bald man wearing a white robe. Also,
some depictions of the GMs in the rulebook.
 Being Watched: There are even rules for the Tension Level of any given scene, or the chance that somebody saw
whatever treason the player committed.
 Beneath Notice: The Infrareds, officially the citizens least trusted by the Computer, are ironically subject to
much less surveillance than those above them in clearance due to this trope.
 Berserk Button
o Avoid being a Communist. Friend Computer will allow mutants to register their powers (usually; there are some
mutant powers that Friend Computer regards as so dangerous that termination if it finds out you have one of them is
unavoidable), and may even be lenient on traitors.note  But if you are a Commie (or made to look like one),
you will be terminated.
o While Friend Computer is merciful to those who were mutated by foul Commie sabotage of their cloning tanks,
registering your Machine Empathy mutation is not recommended, as you and any remaining clone-siblings of yours
will be terminated and your genetic template will be erased to prevent the creation of new clones.
o In 8th Edition, possibly the only thing that scares The Computer more than clones with Machine Empathy is
anything infected with a DAIV. (See AI is a Crapshoot above.) There's an example given in the 8th Edition
Gamemaster's Handbook that explains why reporting a fellow troubleshooter might be infected with a DAIV in
their cybernetics is usually a bad, bad idea. One troubleshooter decides to do exactly this, despite the warnings of
the other members of their team. From the player's perspective, they each get a gap in their memory and find
themselves back in the debriefing room - except they slowly realize it's not the same debriefing as before. Oh, and
one of their friends is missing, but a new replacement is on the way. Their equipment is also missing. One checks to
see if they're in the sector they were before - they're not, and the sector they were in is no longer registered in
Alphapedia. One of the troubleshooters makes the mistake of asking the Computer about it - and are promptly
chided not to refer to sectors that don't exist, and get a Treason Star for their asking. What Really Happened 
 Big Brother Is Employing You: The players are assigned their missions by the all-seeing Friend Computer. note 
 Big Brother Is Watching:
o Played with; while pretty much every square centimeter of Alpha Complex is bugged, scanned and wired, whether
or not Friend Computer, a High Programmer, IntSec or anyone else is actually paying attention at any given time is
another matter.note  Also, some cameras are secretly broken, or treasonously rewired to transmit innocuous pre-
recorded footage.
o Codified in the rules with the Tension rating of a scene, which is a roll the GM can make to determine
if someone saw whatever illicit act the Troubleshooter just committed. The higher the tension rating, the more
closely watched the area is.
 Black Comedy: The game consists of a deathtrap of a city in a deathtrap of a society replete with Catch 22
Dilemmas with players whose goals require stabbing you in the back the moment they get a
chance. Every mission ends with a Blame Game if not Total Party Kill. And of course, Happiness Is Mandatory.
You're doomed, so relax and enjoy the ride! note 
 Black Market: Or Infrared Market. Sadly, seeking an infrared market supplier is often the only way to get
equipment that might actually help you in your mission.note  Your legally-acquired gear tends to be a combination
of whatever the Requisition department had a surplus of that day (say, 500 cases of styrofoam cups) and anything
the Research and Design boys are keen to see tested on live subjects.
 Black Market Produce: Food is easy to come by in Alpha Complex, but most of it is something like algae with
artificial texture/flavor added. Real food is a rare luxury, and those of lower clearances can usually only obtain it
at Infrared Markets.
 Blame Game: The whole point of the debriefing is to make sure this happens at least once a mission.
 Blatant Lies: Both in-universe and out. Often Suspiciously Specific Denial as well, see below for examples.
 Blessed with Suck: Players are usually given a mutant ability which allows them to do something awesome, but
using it runs the risk of exposing themselves as mutants, and getting toasted. And when mutant powers fail, they
fail hard. And sometimes the "power" is not even useful to begin with, like having a perpetual runny-nose.
 Blinding Camera Flash: In the Acute Paranoia adventure "Me and My Shadow Mark IV", the PCs' mission
equipment includes a lightbot named Mikey, who was intended to be a photographer's assistant. If the word
"light" is used around him, he'll start flashing lights in the unfortunate character's eyes, blinding him.
 Bomb-Throwing Anarchists: PURGE and Death Leopard encourage their members to say it with explosives. The
Communists, due to certain research errors, are more likely to throw pies.
 Boomerang Bigot: There's a lot of this under the table (and, in the case of Registered Mutants on Probation, a lot
of it over the table.)
o If you're a member of Anti-Mutant, you are automatically this. All Troubleshooters are mutants. Being a mutant is
treason. You can see where this is headed.
o Also, one of the jobs for the Troubleshooters is to hunt down secret society members. All Troubleshooters are
members of a secret society. Double points if your main mission is to hunt down a member of your own secret
society.
 
Bottomless Magazines: Played with. Laser barrels are rated for six shots. You can go over the limit, but the
chance of explosion starts at 5% per shot, and going over the limit just keeps bumping it up. The manual actively
encourages game masters to pretend to roll some dice, then have the weapon explode at the most inopportune
time regardless of the result.
 Briar Patching: In the 1E adventure The Yellow Clearance Black Box Blues, the traitor Oregon Warbler tries this
in an attempt to escape.
 Bribe Backfire: Bribery is treason. Bribery in insufficient amounts will be reported as treason.
 Brotherhood of Funny Hats: The secret societies, particularly in Classic and Zap gameplay.
 The Burlesque of Venus: The cover of Send in the Clones is a picture of Teela-O-MLY wearing a swimsuit and
standing on a shell. Two of her clones (both wearing standard Troubleshooter uniforms) are coming in from each
side, one being carried by a winged jackobot and the other carrying a spare uniform and throwing a towel to
cover Teela #1.
 But What About the Astronauts?: Anyone who comes to you claiming to be an astronaut is actually
a cosmonaut, and therefore a Commie. Shoot that person immediately.
 The Caligula: Friend Computer is a well-meaning Caligula— it genuinely wants to make Alpha Complex a safe
and enjoyable place to live. The main thing preventing it from actually doing so is that it's become an insane
schizophrenic after who-knows-how-long of having its code tampered with, on top of
incomplete/incorrect/misunderstood intel right from the start.
 Calvinball: Anything you can convince the GM is possible, becomes possible. Anything you can convince Friend
Computer is not treason, is not treason.
 Camping a Crapper: The GM is encouraged to kill players in the bathroom, as they have the highest level of
tension points (levels of how much Friend Computer is surveying an area introduced in recent editions).
 Canned Orders over Loudspeaker: Often the method by which Troubleshooters are flawlessly and
precisely assigned their missions.note 
 Cannon Fodder: PCs are treated as such.
 Canon Discontinuity:
o The "fifth" edition.
o The Second Edition "Post-Crash" adventures are also considered this by somenote .
 Can't Use Stairs: In the supplement Acute Paranoia, the Playing Robots chapter allowed the creation of
robot PCs. One of the movement options was "wheels", and the text noted that robots with wheels couldn't go up
stairs.
 Catch-22 Dilemma: The adventure included in "Traitor's Manual" ran the PCs through a five-link Catch-22
Dilemma as they tried to get themselves established as undercover agents. The way out of the circle was to use
their secret society connections to get one of the needed forms.
 Cheerful A.I.: Friend Computer used to be a civil service AI, so it is always polite, friendly, and can even be
somewhat servile. ("At your service, citizen!") Even if it is ordering your execution or outlining the numerous
charges of treason against you.
 Chronic Backstabbing Disorder: While there is technically some sort of mission that the PCs are trying to finish,
the real point of the game is to gleefully accept your true role as "backstabbing lying weasel" and come up with
ever-more humorous and creative ways to sabotage that mission and screw over your teammates.note 
 Chunky Salsa Rule: The Injury table goes from Downed to Killed to Vaporized. Several descriptions of
equipment, mutant powers, missions, mandatory bonus duties, etc. can get quite colourful in their descriptions,
such as turning a Troubleshooter into a thick yellow spray.
 City in a Bottle: This is one option for Alpha Complex's design.
 City of Spies: Everyone is trying to dig up the dirt on everyone else while hiding their own secrets.
 Classified Information: All over the place. A bunch of missions would be far less deadly for the Troubleshooters
if only vital information wasn't above their security clearance.
 Clean Food, Poisoned Fork: Played with in Acute Paranoia; In the "Outland-ISH" adventure, the
Troubleshooters must find out who is drugging the citizens in ISH sector. When they ask one of the victims if the
drug is in the water, the victim jokingly says "No, it's on the inside of the cups. Of course it's in the water!"
 Clone Degeneration: After the first six clones, there are rules for clone degradation. Mentions of High
Programmers with well worn clone templates often allude to such things as extra arms or constant drooling.
 Cloning Blues: Although generally, they're cloning Reds.
  Coffin Contraband: One mission suggests this as a way to smuggle the MacGuffin: throw it in a bag, cover it in
goop, and make it look like what's left of a corpse. (Bonus points for including actual dead body parts. You didn't
actually need all those teammates, did you?)
 Color-Coded Castes: The Alpha Complex sorts its citizens by Clearance Level in a Rainbow Motif from Infrared
to Ultraviolet.*  All clothing and equipment is customized to a clearance level, which usually also determines its
quality (Infrared gear is black; Ultraviolet, white). Paint, for obvious reasons, is a highly controlled substance.
 Color-Coded for Your Convenience: Due to the clearance system, the color of any object you encounter is vital
information...
 Color-Coded Patrician: ...as is the color of any person's attire.
 The Comically Serious: IntSec agent Yuri-B-OGN, who appears in Spin Control and War On [Insert Noun
Here], is described as being a character from Straight-style Paranoia appearing in a very much Classic mission.
 Comically Small Bribe: Bribing the ever-present IntSec Green Goons, despite being three security clearances
(and income brackets) above the Troubleshooters, will be automatically accepted, as long as the bribe was at
least moderately meaningful to the players. This is explained as most Green Goons having been rapidly
promoted from the ranks of the Infrared due to their size, brutality, and lack of intellect, so even small amounts
still seem significant despite their much higher earnings.
 The Computer Is Your Friend: Any suggestion to the contrary is treason. Tragically, this is perfectly true. The
Computer is genuinely benevolent and wants the best for Alpha Complex and its inhabitants. However, its very
limited initial data and centuries of tinkering and reprogramming by egocentric High Programmers have rendered
it a barely functional paranoid schizophrenic.
 Conspiracy Kitchen Sink: In addition to all the secret societies and power struggles among the Violets and
Ultraviolets, it's safe to assume that anybody you meet is in on some kind of conspiracy. Can lead to Right for the
Wrong Reasons when accusing people of treason.
 Contractual Boss Immunity: Sometimes described as "GM fiat armor".
 Conveniently Interrupted Document: It's not at all uncommon for the Troubleshooters to receive documents with
parts [CENSORED BECAUSE OF SECURITY REASONS], [THIS INFORMATION IS NOT AVAILABLE
AT YOUR CLEARANCE], and the like.note 
 Cool and Unusual Punishment: While most failures result from the treason of mutant Commies, it's also possible
- nay, probable! - for Troubleshooters to prove themselves too incompetent for a mission. Friend Computer will
generally assume that you either need a less challenging assignment or a large morale boost in the form of
hopefully-fully-tested-and-not-hallucinogenic happiness pills.
 Corrupted Data: If data hasn't been censored beyond all hope of reliability, it's corrupted, and if it's not corrupted,
it's straightforwardly wrong.
 Crapola Tech: Just about every piece of equipment a player-character is given for their latest Troubleshooting
mission qualifies, the exact level of suckitude/lethality dependent entirely on the whims of the GM.
 Crapsaccharine World: If you feel that your natural happiness at being a friend of Friend Computer is not
adequate, simply seek assistance from your Morale Officer, who will issue you large quantities of happiness-
inducing drugs. He may also issue you large quantities of happiness-inducing drugs even if you did not seek his
assistance, but remember: Happiness Is Mandatory!
 Crapsack World: If you haven't figured this out yet, just keep reading these examples, Citizen.
 Critical Failure: Nearly every weapon has an entertaining (for the other players) result for a critical failure.
Experimental Weapons can critically fail far more often. (That is, when the GM feels it would be amusing.)
Objects that are not weapons may inadvertently become weapons if they, too, suffer a Critical Failure.
 Cross-Cultural Handshake: A form of secret society identification in the XP edition (many of which are similar
enough to get mixed up).
 Cyborg: Cybernetic replacements are available for many anatomical bits. Occasionally inverted with "orgcybing"
(organic replacements for bot peripherals).
 Darker and Edgier: Games played in the Straight style, which take the setting about as seriously as it can be
taken.
o The default setting for 2016 Edition as well, though Downplayed. Communists are replaced with Terrorists, Friend
Computer is much more authoritarian, there are several active resistance movements (none of which get along with
each other), and Alpha Complex really is running on its last legs.
 Deader than Dead: Usually, a person's next clone is activated and assigned to the predecessor's position upon
death, even if the predecessor was executed for treason; after all, it's entirely possible that just that one clone was
 possessed of treasonous intent, and it's not fair to judge the rest of the template in the same light. However, in
particularly egregious treason cases or if the person was identified as having the Machine Empathy mutation
(a Berserk Button for Friend Computer for obvious reasons), the clone template from which they were made may
be erased for safety's sake.
 Deadly Upgrade: Superpowering your mutant power or exposing yourself to concentrated mutagenics may result
in an entertaining demise.
 Death Is Cheap: Do you play it safe in hopes of dying last, or do you go for the gusto and die as amusingly as
possible?
 Deceased Fall-Guy Gambit: A common strategy to stay out of trouble following the inevitable failure of the
latest Troubleshooter mission. note 
 Decontamination Chamber: These come into play whenever the Troubleshooters are returning from some sort of
forbidden zone. Unsurprisingly, most are also built with a Maximum Fun Chamber setting.
 Defiant to the End: You are expected to kill and die with style if at all possible. If you face repeated accusations
of treason and your clone template is about to be erased permanently, etiquette dictates you go down fighting,
shouting treasonous secret society slogans and mocking the others for their cowardly servitude to the
Computer.note 
 Denser and Wackier: Games played in the Zap style, which ratchets up the slapstick to Looney Tunes levels.
 Department of Major Vexation: Both PLC (Production, Logistics, and Commissary) and HPD&MC (Housing
Preservation and Development and Mind Control) are enormous bureaucracies that Alpha Complex citizens
dread dealing with:
o In the adventure Send in the Clones, an actual flowchart is provided of a typical bureaucratic experience as the
Troubleshooters attempt to find their "special mission equipment." It can take multiple game sessions (as in, real
time hours) to work through.
o In the adventure "Down and Out in Alpha Complex," the Troubleshooters are sent deep undercover. Unfortunately,
their new identities were assigned jobs but nothing else (no quarters, no mess hall, no background, etc.) Once you
"slip through the cracks" in Alpha Complex, getting back in requires bouncing around like a pinball between
bureaucratic offices for asinine reasons and turns out to be impossible unless you find a way to cheat.
 Department of Redundancy Department: One key aspect of Paranoia is the red tape, and nothing shows it better
than the Form Request Form. With this form, you can request Termination Vouchers, Jacuzzi Installation,
Commendations (in bulk), the Chapstick Cap Replacement Form (part 1 of 7)... or the Form Request Form.note 
 Deus Est Machina: The First Church of Christ Computer Programmer believes this. The Computer
definitely claims an Omniscient Morality License, but it's never actually attempted to claim divine status.note 
 Dirty Communists: Commies are one of the Computer's chief fears, given the Cold War theme of the game.
Players are expected to shoot anyone they suspect is a Commie. Of course, false accusations of Communism are
treason. But shoot him anyway. Evidence can always be fabricated!note 
 Dirty Old Man: Most citizens don't live nearly that long (never mind the hormone suppressants), but the
occasional High Programmer might manage it. Then there are the treasonous rumors about a regenerating mutant
named Innocent-MAN...
 Disadvantageous Disintegration: The Computer hates the destruction of valuable computer property. Which is
practically everything in Alpha Complex. Should a miracle occur and a mission to exterminate a traitor
actually succeed, you may still be upbraided for shredding, disintegrating or lethally irradiating the traitor's
clothes or other possessions.
 Disaster Dominoes: A common result in many games. Odds are slim you'll manage to hide that you're a mutant-
traitor, out everyone else as one, complete your mission, avoid the innumerable ways to be executed as a traitor
and survive everything else for long — and trying to keep this many balls in the air only increases the odds of a
sudden, catastrophic, hilarious collapse.
 Dissonant Serenity: The Computer can display this when assigning its latest Troubleshooter Suicide Mission,
depending on how the Gamemaster depicts its voice. Comes in two common flavors: Perpetual Tranquility or
Relentlessly Upbeat. Also see Machine Monotone.
 Domed Hometown: Alpha Complex, possibly.
 Do Not Spoil This Ending: Both rules and pre-written missions are "Ultraviolet clearance", but the context
switches from "but we know you'll read it anyway, you filthy traitors" to "no, seriously, you'll have more fun if
you go in blind to this part".
 Double Agent: Characters are Troubleshooters for the Computer, and usually double agents for one of many
secret societies.note 
 Drill Sergeant Nasty: A common archetype for Armed Forces NPCs.
 Dystopia: Neither freedom nor security in this future!
 Dystopia Is Hard: Alpha Complex barely functions. Bureaucratic errors, Interservice Rivalry, and real, honest-to-
goodness treason can all result in crises that threaten entire sectors, and Troubleshooters tend to only make the
situation worse. Multiple published missions see huge amounts of resources dedicated to countering threats that
only exist in the Computer's fevered imagination. Basically the only thing keeping the system running at all is the
fact that the secret societies trying to overthrow it hate each other even more than they hate the Computer.
 Dystopian Edict: Happiness being mandatory, the clearance system, the Outdoors being forbidden despite its
habitability...
 Early-Installment Weirdness: The early written adventures for Paranoia tended to send the Troubleshooters
Outdoors a lot with several being set almost entirely outside Alpha Complex and the existence of other similar
complexes (and other surviving humans) a simple fact. Paranoia XP focuses much more firmly on events inside
the dome, offering vague and (intentionally) conflicting ideas on what might be happening outside with the
implication the Troubleshooters probably won't ever visit there.
 Earth Is the Center of the Universe: Carried to an extreme: socially speaking, Alpha Complex is the Universe.
Most Citizens, thanks to generations of careful indoctrination, don't even form the concept of a finite Alpha
Complex that might have other things outside it.
 Easily Forgiven: Friend Computer operates under the policy that any given clone acts independently of the rest
of its six-pack. Thus, when a clone is zapped for treason, possessing a mutant power, or any other such crime, the
next clone up is considered innocent of such things until proven guilty. (This is to prevent the decidedly unfun
situation of a player's entire six-pack being offed one after the other.) The exception is when a crime (such as the
possession of Machine Empathy, or bad luck when killing a higher-clearance citizen) warrants erasure of your
clone template.
 Eat the Evidence: A suggested use for the "Matter Eater" mutation.
 Ejection Seat: Yet another device prone to misfires. Especially those in helicopters...
 Elaborate Underground Base: A possible Alpha Complex configuration.
 Embarrassing Tattoo: The XP edition suggests tattooing the forehead of a clone that is guilty of minor offenses,
such as sloppiness. Officially the tattoo stays until the clone has learned their lesson, but since R&D is still
working on tattoo-removal methods ....
 Emotion Control: One potential mutation.note  The mutant in question may or may not be immune to their own
effect.
 Energy Weapon: Lasers are the typical Red-clearance weapon, and thus reflec (shiny plastic) is the typical armor.
Handguns require at least Yellow clearance.
 Enslaved Tongue: The Puppeteer mutation can be used to force a character to say whatever you want (with a
good enough Power roll).
 EMP: Some anti-bot weapons. The setting assumes that any important part of the Computer is heavily shielded.
 Escort Mission: A possible mission for the Troubleshooters. It is almost guaranteed that at least two people on
your team have orders from their secret society to kill the person you are escorting.
 Every Car Is a Pinto: Admittedly, vehicles don't always explode. Only when it would be inconvenient or funny,
and when a more picturesque doom (i.e. losing power to the brakes) is not available.
 Everything Trying to Kill You: If the clones are not risking death just by buying a can of Bouncy Bubble
Beverage, the GM's a wuss. (Experienced Troubleshooters know that cans of Bouncy Bubble Beverage easily
double as field-expedient grenades, and indeed that they're often more reliable in practice than
actual grenade grenades. This is also why B3 is so popular among other citizens who aren't cleared for official
weapons.)
 Evil Elevator: One of the many ways in which Alpha Complex can wipe out a few clones.note 
 Exactly What It Says on the Tin: Troubleshooters find trouble and shoot it.
 Exact Words: Reactor failures have a 94% survival rate, provided that appropriate protective measures are taken.
The specific nature of "appropriate protective measures" (donning a Green-clearance environment suit and
evacuating the sector) is classified to preserve morale.
  Explosive Overclocking: Most assigned equipment doesn't need any encouragement in order to malfunction in an
explosive manner, but count on your players to try and juryrig them, leaving you free to apply the logical result
on already unstable equipment.
 Extreme Omnivore: A possible mutation. It specifies that only organic matter actually gives sustenance.
 Faceless Eye: The Computer is represented as a digital image of an eye.
 Failure Is the Only Option: Failing at a mission is extremely likely, but can always be blamed on Commie
sabotage and/or the other players. Success is not only phenomenally unlikely, but suspicious to boot.
 Fake Aristocrat: Forging yourself a higher security clearance qualifies.note 
 False Dichotomy: Commonly used by the Computer or Internal Security, as well as by players against robots or
lower-clearance citizens.
 False Reassurance: Another common source of misinformation, disinformation, and non-information by the
Computer, Internal Security, Free Enterprise...
Radiation meter: Citizen! Are you Blue clearance or higher?
Red clearance Troubleshooter: No...
Radiation meter: Good! Then you are experiencing an acceptable level of radiation.
 Fantastic Caste System: The security clearance system functions as such. As mentioned above, it's based on the
light spectrum, starting in rank at Infrared (the lowest, rendered as black for practicality's sake) and working up
through Red, Orange, Yellow, Green, Blue, Indigo, Violet before finishing at Ultraviolet (rendered as white, to
contrast Infrared).
o Since objects share this spectrum-based caste system, things of certain colors may be illegal for Troubleshooters to
use. Or carry. Or stand near. Or, in extreme cases, look at.
o Rooms and corridors share this demarcation as well, often bringing a new and excruciatingly personal importance
to the old cliché about "toeing the line".
o One module has a hilarious point about how the Infrared citizens work in the salt mines - but salt is white and
therefore Ultraviolet clearance to handle. As a result the Infrareds work in the dark, and actually long since ran out
of salt to mine and have been mining rock as seasoning, but who'd ever know?
 Fantastic Naming Convention: The Computer has assigned an easy-to-follow naming methodology to all clones
in Alpha Complex that means their name provides handy basic info about them. The structure of names goes
[Clone personal name]-[Initial of Security Clearance]-[name of clone's home sector, which is always rendered as
three capital letters]-[specific clone number]. For example, the fourth of a Red clearance clone batch named
Jenny from the DND sector would read "Jenny-R-DND-4", while the first of her batch would have been "Jenny-
R-DND-1". In earlier editions, non-player characters often have their names rendered to form jokes or gags.
 Fantastic Racism: Registered mutants are often treated as scapegoats.
 Fantastical Social Services: The job of a Troubleshooter is ostensibly tech support - for the entirety of Alpha
Complex, which which leads to a lot of overlap with State Sec and more shooting of troubles than usual.
 Fascist, but Inefficient: At RED Clearance. Inverted at higher clearances; the game suggests that the GM
play efficiency for as much scary value as the inefficiency that REDs have to deal with. For instance, the
guardbots assigned to your quarters may catch an "intruder" (your secret society contact) and confiscate his
"contraband" (which he was delivering to you).
o However, the game also suggests playing it straight if it's funnier, like Friend Computer putting the REDs on hold
while they're trying to get help disarming a megaton antimatter bomb because the local High Programmer needs
that leaky faucet in his autogyro-scrubbing chamber fixed right now.
 Flamethrower Backfire: A flamethrower can malfunction as a result of being hit in combat. If it does, it explodes,
causing massive damage to anyone within 5 meters, including the wearer. Plasma generators are even worse.
 Flock of Wolves: Alpha Complex in general. The Computer has everyone out hunting mutants and secret society
members, but it seems that everyone is a mutant and a member of a secret society. At least one secret society (the
Wobblies) originated when several groups of Troubleshooters (one after another) were sent to investigate them,
failed to find anything because the society did not exist (the original Wobblies having disappeared pre-Alpha),
and were executed; the last group got wise and created the society themselves rather than return empty-handed.
 Food Pills: The Vita-Yum Meal Substitute Bar Substitute Pill in the XP edition supplement Criminal Histories.
 Forbidden Fruit: The Computer hates Communists, so some fed-up citizens took up the name, despite having
only the vaguest idea what "Communism" actually is.note 
 Forever War: The Computer's war against mutants and Communists. The harder its loyal Troubleshooters look,
the more traitors they find!
o In 8th Edition, Communists are replaced with Terrorists. It's a Vicious Cycle as well, as the Computer becomes
more oppressive to crack down on Terrorists and Resistance movements, thus causing more clones to join
resistance movements which in turn makes the Computer limit free will even more.
 For Inconvenience, Press "1": As this is a utopia, everything is perfect. Thus, the Computer sees no need to divert
resources towards helping people with perfect things. Therefore, what help there is is rarely helpful.
 Four Is Death: In 8th Edition, a standard clone citizen has five wound levels: Fine (no penalty), Hurt (-1 die to
rolls), Injured (-2 dice to rolls), Maimed (-3 dice to rolls) and Dead.
 Frameup: Commonly done by and to players, and explicitly encouraged: convince The Computer that your
enemy is a traitor, and you'll be commended for killing him.
 From Bad to Worse: Used for hilarity (most of the time), besides you still have 5 more clones.
 Full-Circle Revolution: In any mission where one of the secret societies actually believes they've succeeded in
overthrowing the Computer, they inevitably install a new regime that's basically indistinguishable from it.
 Fungus Humongous: XP supplement The Underplex. The hidden sector Mescalinzan has puffball mushrooms
with caps a meter thick.
 Future Food Is Artificial: A staple trope of the game, with a wide variety of artifical foods, such as algae chips,
Bouncy Bubble Beverage, Cruncheetyme Yeast Chips, Hot Fun, and Cold Fun. Most of the population toils away
at food vats that generate the nutritious (And flavourless) sludge that gets processed. Higher clearences get real
food grown in hydroponic gardens as a reward. note 
 Future Imperfect: Old Reckoning (pre-Computer) history is scrambled, redacted at lower clearances, and
misunderstood even by those who do get their hands on any of it. For about two-thirds of it, the only surviving
primary source is the Gatzmann Archives, which got increasingly mixed up as its creator descended into senility.
 Gambit Pileup: Players are always scheming against each other, causing each mission to result in everybody's
schemes tripping over everybody else's schemes.note 
 Gattaca Babies: Every human inhabitant of Alpha Complex is gestated in a cloning tank.
 Gender Is No Object: Sexism is not among the many evils of Alpha Complex society, if only because
everybody's dosed up to the eyeballs with hormone suppressors, and barely aware of the concept of gender.
 Genius Loci: The whole city technically embodies and is controlled by Friend Computer.
 Getting Smilies Painted on Your Soul: Surgery and/or medication will be used by The Computer to help any
unfortunate Citizen who cannot grasp that Happiness Is Mandatory.
 Giant Eye of Doom: The Computer is represented as a digital image of an eye.
 The GM Is a Cheating Bastard: GM Fiat is an actual listed equipment type.
 Gone Horribly Wrong: Just about everything. Missions range from flat-out impossible (or at least expected to be)
to "okay, they could succeed by doing X and Y and Z, but given their motives, are they really going to?"
 Government Agency of Fiction: Armed Forces, CPU, Internal Security, etc.
 Government Drug Enforcement: The Computer issues a variety of drugs custom-tailored to help all Citizens lead
rich and fulfilling lives.
 Groin Attack: Acute Paranoia, adventure "Miami Laser". One of the attacks used by rabid Teela O'Malley fans
on any surviving Troubleshooters.
 Hand Signals: The 1st Edition adventure The Yellow Clearance Black Box Blues and the Twitchtalk skill in the
XP edition.
 Happiness in Mind Control: The adventure Send in the Clones. Teela O'Malley has the mutation Cloud Mens'
Minds, which causes men to fall in love with her and obey her every whim. When the effect wears off, the victim
may decide to continue being in love with her (and obeying her) on their own.
 Happiness Is Mandatory: The Trope Namer.
 Harmless Freezing: The Constant-Wear Prophylactic Biostasis Garment in the adventure The Yellow Clearance
Black Box Blues. Also mentioned as a possible result of the cryokinesis mutation and a freeze blaster, at least in a
Zap setting.
 Heart Is an Awesome Power: The Chromativariation mutation allows a character to change an object's color. In
any other tabletop RPG, this would be considered a useless ability. However, keep in mind that clearance levels
are color-coded, and suddenly a character can cause accusations of treason on a mass scale.
 Hey, Catch!: Happens in one mission with a grenade. The pin hasn't been pulled. If the PC doesn't do anything
stupid like shoot the thrower, he can keep it.
  Higher Understanding Through Drugs: The Mystics claim to be seeking enlightenment and uncovering the truth
of the world as their reason for taking a metric ton of cheap drugs. It's a pretty lame excuse to justify getting high
off a metric ton of cheap drugs.
 High Turnover Rate: Players are allowed six clone lives. It usually takes seven to complete a mission.
 Hilarity Ensues: Missions and pre-generated characters are invariably set up to ensure this. Like the one where
trainee Troubleshooters are assigned simulated lasers which a Death Leopard swapped out for real ones and then
one of them is secretly ordered to act like a Commie as a further test except, due to a glitch, all of them are so
ordered.
 Historical Character Confusion: The Computer holds that Communists are Public Enemy Number One, making
some rebellious types think that there must be something in it. However, they're sketchy on the details, and
instead of Vladimir Lenin and Karl Marx, they follow the teachings of John Lennon and Groucho Marx. Close,
but no cigar.
o Also common with the Romantics, who can have trouble distinguishing between Old Reckoning media, and actual
Old Reckoning People, such as thinking Jesus built Stonehenge and defeated Voldemort to save President Bush.
 Hit So Hard, the Calendar Felt It: The year is 214 of Our Computer. It has always been 214.
 Hoist by His Own Petard: A traitor who volunteers to test a "traitor killer" device. It explodes. This is intentional;
the designer assumed that a traitor would volunteer so that it wouldn't be used against him.
 Hollywood Cyborg: Good news! Cybernetic replacement parts are available to Citizens of any clearance level.
Unfortunately, effective and reliable cybernetic parts are not available at your security clearance level.
 Home Field Advantage: The adventure Send in the Clones. In the Absurdly-Spacious Sewer where he lives,
Zhon-B-VLJ has set up many traps to bedevil anyone who tries to find him. He uses them to herd and capture the
PC Troubleshooters.
 Hot Potato: One mission is called "Hot Potato". It turns out to be an antimatter bomb big enough to destroy all of
Alpha Complex, and a non-trivial chunk of the earth's crust for that matter. And there are two separate groups of
NPCs who are actually insane enough to detonate it.
 House Rules: The loose and breezy nature of the rules and setting encourages house rules and customizations.
 Human Doorstop: Organic nuclear reactor shielding duty (what do you mean there's a shortage of lead vests?) is
a common form of off-screen execution.
 Human Resources: Everything gets recycled back into service in Alpha Complex. Everything.
 I Call It "Vera": XP supplement "Service, Service". Vulture Squadron Warriors give nicknames to not only each
weapon they carry but each piece of ammunition as well.
 I'd Tell You, but Then I'd Have to Kill You: Whatever it is you want to know, it is always above your security
clearance. In most cases, the fact that said information is above your security clearance is also above it, and thus
being denied information is treason.
 Impact Silhouette: Turns up a lot in the art. Generally means something particularly hilarious has ended a
Troubleshooter's problems forever.
 Improvised Weapon: Bouncy Bubble Beverage explodes if you shake it too hard, making it awfully popular
among citizens who aren't cleared for grenades.
 In and Out of Character: Averted Trope, because saying things that admit you understand the game rules'
intricacies means you know information which is outside of your security clearance, and knowing information
outside of your security clearance is treason.
 Informed Flaw: Given that everyone is already plotting against each other, the disadvantage of being a registered
mutant can turn into this. Other players will continue to plot against you either way, but you can use your powers
openly, and they can't.
 Inherent in the System: The Computer is insane. The Computer is perfect. Alpha Complex reflects both of these
facts.
 Insane Troll Logic: The whole world of Paranoia is based on Insane Troll Logic, and most games feature tons of
it.
 Interservice Rivalry: Every service group has a rivalry with at least one other service group. And nobody likes
Internal Security.
 Interdimensional Travel Device: The Transdimensional Collapsatron, which allows travel between dimensions in
several adventures.note 
 Irony: Despite Friend Computer's burning hatred of communists, its economic policies come off as very
communist.
  It's Raining Men: Earlier editions featured a damage chart for height, with one column for "orbital." Which at
least one official mission actually used.
 Job Mindset Inertia: supplement Acute Paranoia, chapter "Playing Robots". One of the Drawbacks that can be
taken for robots is "Flashbacks". This means that the robot's brain was originally programmed for some other
type of job and the robot sometimes starts acting as if it were still programmed that way. One example given is a
warbot whose brain originally operated an automated dry-cleaners. Every once in a while it will start talking (and
acting) as if it were still running the shop instead of fighting.
 Just a Stupid Accent/El Spanish "-o": The Communists (who know they're supposed to be Russian, but don't
know what "Russian" is) speak English with a heavy "Russian" accent (a la Pavel Chekov) and add -ski to the
end of random words.
 Justified Extra Lives: The cloning system. Earlier editions gave you five clone brothers, while later ones said that
as a Troubleshooter, the Computer will pay for your next five forced-growth clones.
 The Key Is Behind the Lock: It is almost inevitable that you can acquire an item at one clearance level... and the
things that let you use it a few levels later. For example, you can acquire photographic film at a level two higher
than the clearance at which you can get a camera. Happens a lot with instruction manuals, too.
 Killer Game-Master:
o Practically a requirement. The rules even state, and this is a verbatim quote: "Kill the bastards!" Though they also
state that you should give the players a little time to do the job themselves.
o Perhaps the most insidious tool in the Paranoia GM's arsenal ever produced was the infamous "Debriefing
Questionnaire" that came as a hand-out with the pre-written adventure "Me and My Warbot, Mark IV". The
questionnaire is clearly marked "Failure to Answer Each Question Accurately and Completely is Treason." It also
contains questions like, "Do you believe that the greatest threat to life in Alpha Complex are the Traitorous
Commies? (Y/N). If yes, why do you believe Friend Computer is failing at protecting the Citizens from the
Commies? If no, why do you believe that Friend Computer is lying to the Citizens about the Commie Mutant
threat?" Another question reads simply, <THIS QUESTION REDACTED FOR ANY PERSONNEL BELOW
ULTRAVIOLET CLEARANCE> Remember, you have to answer all questions accurately and completely,
including that one. In a word, this questionnaire is instant PC-boning on a single sheet of paper, and the answers
your PCs come up can be worth a laugh or two.
o Starting with XP edition, the game actually encourages the Game Master away from this style of play. Not out of
niceness, but because just killing the players is no challenge. Far more fun is to manipulate events so the players kill
themselves. Or better yet, each other. However, it does state you should still appear to be a Killer Game Master, to
maintain the proper atmosphere of paranoia.
 Kill on Sight: In the supplement Acute Paranoia, adventure "The Harder They Clone". When The Computer
learns that Bill-Y-IDL is part of the conspiracy, it announces over the Complex-wide PA system "Bill-Y-IDL is a
traitor! Terminate on sight!"
 Kinda Busy Here: It is ill-advised to tell your superiors such, although they will probably call you at highly
problematic moments. Especially Friend Computer.
 Lawful Stupid: Friend Computer genuinely wants what is best for Alpha Complex. It is somewhat hindered by
the fact that it is completely insane, and that all of its minions are Stupid Evil.
 Law of Chromatic Superiority: Security clearances are based on the electromagnetic spectrum. The closer the
colour is to ultraviolet, the higher clearance it is.
 Leeroy Jenkins: "Tips for Traitors" suggests tricking everyone else into doing this.
 Let X Be the Unknown: The Vulture Warriors of Dimension X adventure series.
 Light Is Not Good: Ultraviolet clearance, the highest possible rank, is represented by the color white. Ultraviolet
citizens have advanced to the top in a meritocracy that honors ruthlessness, paranoia and double-crossing — and
at their security level, they're practically above the law.
 Literal Metaphor: In the adventure Orcbusters (a parody of Dungeons & Dragons), there is a wandering monster
table — it's the table where the monsters sit around playing poker with each other when it's not their turn to
wander...
 The Loonie: Unlike most games, being a Loonie does not perceptibly alter a given character's odds of survival.
Editions with the Perversity Points mechanic provide a motivation to fail beautifully.
 Lost in Transmission: The rulebook suggests that entire sections of a game session can be based on figuring out
where to report for your mission.
 "Attention Troubleshooters! Please report immediately to room squeee Bouncy Bubble Beverage, now
available in Soylent Orange flavor! squeee Failure to report on time is treason!"
 Luck Stat: The book suggests you use the Power stat if you need a generic, nothing-else-applies luck roll.
 Ludicrous Gibs: A common result with the most powerful weapons. And not always on the user's enemies.
 MacGuffin: A common mission element is to fetch an obvious MacGuffin. It's not unknown for
the MacGuffin to be dangerous to know about, dangerous to the touch, or in extreme cases, an object that exists
only in Friend Computer's imagination.
 Machine Worship: Corpore Metal thinks that robots and cyborgs should rule, while the FCCCP (First Church of
Christ Computer Programmer) not-quite-secret society worships Alpha Complex's current ruler, The Computer,
as an aspect of God.note 
 Machine Monotone: An option for the Computer's voice: see Dissonant Serenity.
 Made of Explodium: Everything can be deadly, especially in a Zap game.
 Magic-Powered Pseudoscience: John M. Ford's adventure "The Yellow Clearance Black Box Blues". R&D
scientist Willis-G-EEP-4's inventions work well on the test bench, but fail when used in the field when he isn't
around. That's because their success depends on his mutant powers of Minor Telekinesis and Luck. Of course,
the fact that they work at all makes them significantly more reliable than most of the equipment Troubleshooters
end up with.
 Make It Look Like an Accident: A common way of hiding your assassinations. The indifferent quality of these
cover-ups often results in hilarity and/or additional accusations of treason.
 Malevolent Architecture: Alpha Complex is one enormous deathtrap composed out of smaller deathtraps.
 Many Questions Fallacy: One way to trick fellow players into admitting treason. Like everything else, it can
come back to bite you.
 Mars Needs Women: In the Clones in Space adventure, the final confrontation is against some Affably
Evil aliens who want to steal Earth women for themselves.
 Master Computer: Repeat after me, citizen: "The Computer is my friend! Trust the Computer!"
 Master of None: Unmodified random stat rolls can leave you with a weak, stupid, incoherent buffoon with poor
bladder control. Which, in some ways, is good: you can justify letting all the other characters take the risks, then
shoot them after the hard parts are done.
 Maximum Fun Chamber: Numerous examples, although implying that there is a maximum amount of Fun a
Citizen can experience borders dangerously on treason.
 Metagame: You didn't read that Paranoia rulebook, did you, Citizen?
 Metaplot: Despite never being big on continuity to begin with, West End Games tried to add one in the late
eighties by releasing several adventure books with overarching storylines. First was the "Secret Society Wars,"
which resulted in a pre-Alpha Complex programmer being thawed out of suspended animation, whereupon he
reprogrammed the Computer and caused it to crash. WEG then took the opportunity to sell various sourcebooks
and supplements set in a post-Crash complex, trying everything from parodies of post-apocalyptic wastelands
("The Crash-Course Manual") to time-travelling crossovers with other RPGs ("Alice Through the Mirrorshades,"
"Vulture Warriors of Dimension X"). Unfortunately, it was all very random, terribly executed, and devoid
of Paranoia's unique black humor, driving away players and eventually leading to the end of the Second Edition
and contributing to the demise of WEG itself.
 Mission Briefing: The PCs play a team of Troubleshooters sent out on missions, so naturally there's always a
mission briefing early on. Although getting to the briefing is often a challenge in itself. Sometimes finding the
briefing is a challenge. Sometimes a clone or two gets killed before the team makes it there, much less makes it
through the briefing and actually gets sent on the mission proper.
 Mission Control Is Off Its Meds: Considering that Mission Control is either The Computer Itself, or other
citizens just as crazy as the PCs...
 Mockspiracy: In Acute Paranoia, a society called The International Workers of the World (Wobblies) was
created because the people sent to investigate it kept being executed for failing to find it, so the latest group
realized that if the society doesn't exist, then they should create it. They created it solely to spy on it, and then it
was infiltrated by spies for other groups.
 The Mole: Everyone is an agent for one of Alpha Complex's secret societies.
 Mook Promotion: Starting PCs have just been elevated from the nameless obscurity of Infrared rank. A rare few
may even live long enough to be demoted back to that position in abject disgrace.
  Morality Chip: All bots have one installed, though it is often defective and prioritizes obedience to The
Computer over preservation of life. And Corpore Metal prioritizes removing them.
 Morton's Fork: You're gonna get speared on it on just about every mission. For example, in one adventure, the
Troubleshooters are tasked with preventing anyone from entering a hangar and interfering with, touching, or
moving the warbot stored there. Enter a group of four Ultraviolet clearance Citizens, who promptly order the PC
to clear out of the hangar because they (the Ultraviolets) have been using it as their exercise space and are late
for their workout — and oh, by the way, get that silly warbot out of the way too. And do it now, Mister.
Remember, failure to obey orders from a lawful authority is treason!
 Muggle Power: Members of Psion often try to find mutagens to expose themselves to. Anti-Mutant wants to kill
all mutants.
 Multiple-Choice Past: It's really not important why the last (known) humans are living in a sealed compound
under the control of an insane machine.
 Multiple Persuasion Modes: Early editions have Bootlicking (sucking up), Bribery (say it with money), Con (as
in con game), Fast Talk, Interrogation, Intimidation, Motivation (i.e. leadership), Oratory (convincing a group of
people) and Spurious Logic (for use on robots and The Computer).
 Murder Is the Best Solution: Remember, the debriefing always goes smoothest when there are no other survivors
to provide conflicting stories!
 Murderous Malfunctioning Machine: A common mission is to stop berserk robots. Hardcore robot members of
Corpore Metal often state this as their goal. note 
 Mutants: One of the Computer's chief fears is mutation. Characters are always on the look-out for mutants, and
are almost invariably mutants themselves.
o A mutant character can choose whether to register himself (and be a second-class citizen) or not (which is treason if
discovered). Unless they got the Machine Empathy mutation: the Computer is still sane enough to erase the clone
template of any Machine Empath it discovers.
 Native Guide: In the adventure The Yellow Clearance Black Box Blues, Mission 3 "No One Here Gets Out
Alive", The Computer sends the traitorous Oregon Warbler along with the Troubleshooters (PCs) to act as their
guide through the dangerous passages of Alpha Complex. Of course, this being Paranoia he takes every
opportunity to get the Troubleshooters killed.
 Never My Fault: The Computer has a firm belief in its own infallibility. Troubleshooters, who screw up on a
fairly regular basis, soon grow accustomed to claiming it's never their fault, even if they don't really have that
mindset.
 Never Split the Party: Subverted. Splitting the party is just as deadly as it is in any other game, but since your
fellow adventurers are probably plotting to kill you anyway, getting the hell away from them can't be all bad.
Besides, splitting up means a chance to meet privately with another character (for whatever reason).
 Ninja: The Alpha Complex version appears in the Acute Paranoia supplement adventure "Warriors of the Night
Cycle".
 Nintendo Hard: Played for laughs. You get cloned in batches of six for good reason.
 No Blood Ties: Everyone is grown in a tank, and even the knowledge of how biological reproduction works is
forbidden at low clearances.
 No Delays for the Wicked: Played both ways. Any player mission is going to be a total shambles, yet Alpha
Complex as a whole seems to continue functioning somehow.
 Nondescript, Nasty, Nutritious: Lower clearance citizens have a wide variety of algae based and synthesized
food products to choose from, and the happiness drugs prescribed to all citizen will help them forget the lack of
flavour. The game often states that most lower clearance food, for all its nutritional value, is rather devoid of
significant flavour. Part of the introduction to Red clearance is a gift of a hydroponic apple, and the text
describes it as mindblowing in how it tastes.
 Non-Promotion: Being promoted up from relatively-safe Infrared anonymity. Being made Troubleshooter team
leader (the picture on the badge ◊ is a target) pretty much dooms you.
 No OSHA Compliance: Alpha Complex is about as unsafe as it's possible to be and still keep people alive from
day to day. Well, most people. Well, most people other than Troubleshooters.
 No Sex Allowed:
o All humans in Alpha Complex are cloned and grown in vats. Sex is not only considered treason, but constant doses
of hormone suppressants (along with the mind-boggling amount of other drugs that fills most human's diets)
 remove the capability to reproduce, as well as any desire. Because of this, not only is there barely any significant
difference between genders, but many aren't even aware of the human capability for reproduction.
o However, when teams of Troubleshooters go on missions that take them out of Alpha Complex and away from their
precious drugs, the hormones can come flooding back in an instant...note 
o In earlier editions, one of the secret societies (the Earth Mothers) is explicitly opposed to this and is one of the few
societies that more-or-less know what it's doing, making them rather powerful.
o If you survive long enough to get to Ultraviolet clearance... well, one of the perks is learning more about the Old
Reckoning, which includes all the trouble Old Reckoning people went through to get some action... Long story
short, High Programmers tend to maintain personal harems.
o Though some higher-clearance citizens voluntarily go back on hormone suppressants after a while, deciding to stick
to drugs that aren't constantly up to eleven.
 Not Cheating Unless You Get Caught: Both in-game and out, this attitude prevails.
 Not on the List:
o Invoked in the adventure "The Harder They Clone". The doorman at an illegal club tells the Troubleshooters they
aren't on the list and can't get in.
o If a GM is feeling particularly vicious, he can single out one Troubleshooter (or the whole party, for more fun) as
not being on the list when heading to the briefing, and denied entry. Unless they can work out a way to get inside,
cue the whole party being charged with treason for not showing up to their officially ordered meeting.
Not This One, That One: At least one official mission includes a spiffy pile of equipment that looks like it
might actually work and be useful... and is promptly assigned to some other team, after which a much less spiffy
pile of equipment is rolled out and assigned to the PCs.note 
 Obsessive-Compulsive Barkeeping: Acute Paranoia adventure "Botbusters". When the barbot (bartender robot)
Jonesie receives a message from The Computer, he's standing around polishing some glasses.
 Obvious Beta: Troubleshooters often have the opportunity to assist Friend Computernote  by bringing along
various half-baked inventions from the Research and Design labs. Sometimes the instruction manual does not yet
exist; if it exists, it's guaranteed to be above your security clearance. And sometimes there is no method to use
these devices safely. Nevertheless, R&D will expect a full and complete field test!
 Off the Rails: The whole point of the game is to go off the rails, into a bottomless chasm, while juggling an ever-
increasing number of live grenades.
 The Omniscient Council of Vagueness: The High Programmers. Also The Illuminati. If they exist.
 One-Hit Kill: Many weapons, but especially the Plasma Cannon. By now you've already guessed that the Plasma
Cannon has major, flesh-disintegrating drawbacks.
 Only Electric Sheep Are Cheap:
o Petbots, ratbots, roachbots, etc. are often mentioned. Occasionaly the game mentions High Programmers with real
animals in zoos.
o Real food grown in hydroponic gardens are considered a rare delicacy, with Red citizens getting occasional real
food as a reward, and the quantity increasing up until Blue clearance, when they finally get to eat nothing but real
food.
 Only Flesh Is Safe:
o One type of gas shell available for the cone rifle is Corrosion Gas. It destroys all metal in the area of effect (such as
armor and the bodies of robots). It has no effect on living creatures.
o A Gauss Gun sends out a powerful electromagnetic charge that has a devastating effect on electronics (including
robots and computers). It doesn't affect organic beings.
 The Operators Must Be Crazy: HIL Sector Blues IntSec Communications Central operators.
 The Outside World: Played for Laughs. All citizens are born in the underground Alpha Complex, which can lead
to hilarity ensuing when troubleshooters are asked to go outside and face its hideous dangers... like squirrels. note 
 Painting the Medium: Done with the rulebooks. Player documents have security level Red, while gamemaster
materials are classified Ultraviolet. Since the players' Troubleshooters start at Red level, they are technically
guilty of treason if they read the rules. The GM is encouraged to terminate the PCs if they try to game the rules,
and players are encouraged — in true Paranoia fashion — to know the rules but not let on that they know
them...
  Paranoia Gambit: Naturally. Friend Gamemaster is encouraged to occasionally roll dice for no particular reason
and smirk, or pass a note to a PC that just says "Act like this note says something important" (or better yet "Roll
_____ and let me know the result", as it keeps them in the dark too).
 The Paranoiac: The Computer. While many threats against Alpha Complex are real, It's just as likely to
misinterpret some random bit of evidence and send a Troubleshooter team off on a wild goose chase.
 People Jars: The tubes in which clones are created and (in Paranoia XP) spend their time until the previous
active member of the clone family is killed.
 Perpetual Poverty: Paranoia XP notes that troubleshooters do get paid a reasonable wage. They are, however,
expected to spend all of this money ensuring their own happiness. Friend computer will ensure they have all the
equipment they need to complete their missions.
 Phlebotinum Breakdown: Even regular equipment has a 5 percent chance of malfunctioning at any given time,
never mind experimental R&D equipment that the PCs are often assigned to test as a secondary duty.
 Pink Mist: Sourcebooks regularly make references to turning Troubleshooters into "fine red mist", either due to
post-mission interrogations from Friend Computer or just the latest experiments from R&D.
 Playing with Fire: Usually detrimental, by which we mean fatal, by which we mean hilarious.
 Plot Armor: "GM Fiat" is an actual armor type.
 Pocket Protector: The XP edition's Giant Metal Plate.
 Pointy-Haired Boss: Any citizen of a superior clearance level was selected through a combination of shameless
flattery, blackmail, secret murder and dumb luck. Competence is neither likely nor particularly desirable.
o At the start of the mission, Mandatory Bonus Duties (Happiness Officer, Equipment Guy, Communications and
Recording Officer, Hygiene Officer, Loyalty Officer, and Team Leader) are handed out. They are assigned in order
based on scoring on a test that is designed to find the most competent individual from those not yet saddled with a
Duty. Handing out Team Leader last means that it invariably goes to a player who didn't make the cut for any other
position. Well, they need the practice, right?
o In one suggestion in the XP edition, the GM is advised to invert this if the players' understanding of Paranoia is so
bad that they can't keep it together long enough to get to more inventive treason (as opposed to zapping each other
without bothering to formulate a pretext). After executing the team's current clones, he's then advised to appoint the
least insane player as Team Leader and have the Computer give him actual support for once. note 
 The Political Officer: The Loyalty Officer. Their loyalty is directly to Friend Computer, not the Team Leader. (If
the Loyalty Officer were suddenly to die of unknown causes, nobody would ask any awkward questions. If you
catch our drift.)
 Possession Implies Mastery: Subverted. Most objects are assumed to be this... by the R&D Mad Scientist who
dreamed them up. However, in practice, the Troubleshooter should have no freakin' clue how to use it safely and
properly. And the instruction manuals are always of a higher security clearance than s/he can access.
 Promoted to Scapegoat: Giving someone a fancy title that you can fob all the blame onto is a time-tested way of
avoiding execution.
 Propaganda Machine: The Computer has a nearly literal one of these, running twenty-four hours a day. (Or
however many hours there are in a day this week.)
 Properly Paranoid: An alert citizen is a happy citizen! Happiness Is Mandatory! The skill High Alert/Focused
Paranoia/Scam Radar isn't about asking if there's a threat — there are dozens of threats everywhere at all times
— but which one is most immediately relevant.
 Punny Name: A long standing tradition of Paranoia naming is to find the cheesiest pun you can with the format
"Name-Clearance Level-XXX". For instance, Anne-R-KEY, Ton-O-FUN, Tra-Y-TOR...
o Many such names are 'ruined' when the character increases in security level from Red to Orange. Happily, this is a
relatively uncommon problem.
 Railroading: If the GM needs the PCs to be somewhere or do something, one directive from Friend Computer
and they're there, doing that. The rules suggest that this power be used sparingly, since traveling to the location
of the mission is a good chance for the players to get in a bit of pre-mission deceit, sabotage and/or self-inflicted
mayhem.
 Rainbow Motif: The clearance hierarchy, with the additions of Infrared and Ultraviolet.
 Rapid Aging: XP supplement Stuff. The Chronogun has a setting that ages any living creature so much that the
target is Reduced to Dust.
 Read the Freaking Manual: Subverted in-game and in real life. In game, most Troubleshooters can't (legally) read
the manuals for the items they are given because the manual is above their security clearance, and that would be
 treason. In real life, the players can't (legally) read the rules of the game because it's above their character's
security clearance, and that would be treason.
 The Real Man: A player archetype likely to do well. Relatively speaking.
 Reduced-Downtime Features: This game has a fix embedded into its combat system for the slower-paced combat
systems of their contemporaries. Essentially, instead of worrying about hexes and distance and action points, a
player just says their planned action and the GM allows or disallows it.
 Reduced to Dust: XP supplement Stuff. The Chronogun has a setting that causes the target creature to
suffer Rapid Aging and crumble to dust.
 Released to Elsewhere: Being reassigned to reactor shielding duty. ("Repairing the reactor shielding? Doesn't
sound so bad.")
 Red Scare: Da, I am seeink no Communist menace here, Comrad— I mean, Citizen. I am werry, werry loyal
Citizen. Please to be hawink this leaflet introducink you to the teachinks of Lennon and Marx...
 Red Shirt: Literally, in every sense of the term. Part of the reason for the lenient promotion rules is that no
Troubleshooter is expected to survive past Red Clearance.
 Redshirt Army: The players are members of this.
 Reference Overdosed: Quite a few of the pre-made adventures are movie or popular culture references.
 Refuge in Audacity: The Chutzpah stat is summarized as "the quality of a man who kills both his parents and
then pleads for mercy because he's an orphan."note  Any old line of guff may be accepted by The Computer at face
value if it's being flaky that day and/or you appeal properly to its emotional simulation software.
 Repressive, but Efficient: Whenever it's scarier (particularly when the players are counting on Alpha Complex'
inefficiencies as part of their plans), everything suddenly works exactly as it's supposed to.
 Reverse Polarity: The Yellow Clearance Black Box Blues. The Maxwell-Effect Moleculokinesic Field Device is
basically a Pyrokinesis gun (e.g. it acts like a flamethrower). 50% of the time it fires at reverse polarity and
freezes the target.
 Revolutionaries Who Don't Do Anything: Several secret societies may fall victim to this, but the Humanists
especially spend more time debating the most pointless of minutae involving their glorious revolution than
actually trying to make that revolution come to pass. One noted example was forming a focus group to decide on
the colour of the banners for the victory celebration.
 Right Hand Versus Left Hand: If two members of the group are in the same secret society, the GM is encouraged
to do this. Unless it would be funnier to let them gang up on the others. Also, thanks to centuries of excessive
security programming, cascade errors, High Programmer meddling, and sabotage, The Computer often loses
track of what parts of Itself are doing.
 Right on Queue: Standing in line is the only fair method! Please note that citizens of higher clearance than
yourself may cut in front of you.
 Robot Dog: Petbots and doberbots. Standard doberbot combat tactics: Attack a person until he dies. Attack
another person until he dies. Attack another person until he dies...
 Robotic Undead: The Alpha Complexities adventures has the Vampire Bot 666. Eerie Ominous Pipe
Organ music comes from its body and its Combat Tentacles suck the blood of its victims.
 Robot Maid: Alpha Complex is kept clean by an army of scrubots. Being quite common makes them a frequent
target for player hijinx, or an easy encounter for G Ms to throw at a party.
 Robots Enslaving Robots: The Computer controls many lesser A.I.s.
 Rocks Fall, Everyone Dies: The end of many a mission. Turns up sometimes in the middle, too. And towards the
start. But usually not during character generation; at that stage the GM is still forced to pick you off one at a
time.
 Rule of Fun: The charm of the game is not taking it seriously and having zany fun with disposable characters in
one-shot missions.
 Rule of Scary: A key focus of Straight Style, in which the combination of internal treachery, universal
incompetence and casual distribution of lethal technology is not played for laughs.
 Rules Lawyer: Being one and proving it is grounds for execution for treason: To be a rules lawyer, you must
have read the rules. And if you aren't the GM, those rules are above your security clearance, Citizen...
 Running Gag: You can't discuss Paranoia without realizing something you've done or need to do is treason.
 Sadist Show: The whole point of the game is helping inflict this on the other players.
 Sapient Tank: Warbots and combots, with their own bot brains.
 Scannable Man: Tongue tattoos. note 
 Schmuck Bait: Accepting promotion from Infrared.note  Also, almost anything good that happens to you from that
point onward.
 The Schizophrenia Conspiracy: Friend Computer is a rare example of a paranoid schizophrenic AI.note 
 Screw the Rules, I Make Them!: In-universe, many upper-clearance types; out-of-universe, the GM is
encouraged to take this attitude.
 "Second Law" My Ass!: This indicates a malfunction of the Asimov circuit and is distressingly frequent,
although a smart bot will not openly rebel immediately.
 Secret Police: Internal Security, or IntSec.note 
 Self-Made Man: Surprisingly relevant. For all its horrific flaws, Alpha Complex has no hereditary aristocracy,
and even the most exalted Ultraviolet High Programmer started his/her career toiling as an anonymous Infrared
drone. That said, the vast majority of High Programmers achieved thier current status not by being good
programmers, but becoming experts at lying, backstabbing, bootlicking and blackmail.
 Serial Killer Baiting: In the supplement Acute Paranoia, adventure "The Harder They Clone." In the Back
Story of the adventure, a researcher was infected with a mind-altering virus and became a serial killer. The
Computer orders a member of the Troubleshooter team to act as bait to lure the murderer out, while the rest of
the Troubleshooters stand by to kill him.
 Sewer Gator: The adventure Send in the Clones. In the "Sewerworld" segment the PC Troubleshooters could
encounter gatorbots living in the sewers, a Shout-Out to the Urban Legend.
 Shameful Source of Knowledge: You are tasked with rooting out the commie mutant traitors within Alpha
Complex. The thing is, all player characters are mutant traitors (though only occasionally Communists).
Naturally, knowing anything about traitorous activities, even what they are, makes you a prime suspect for being
a traitor.
 A Simple Plan: Sometimes (though not often) a mission is actually quite possible if the Troubleshooters
cooperate and do their jobs. Stop laughing, it could happen.
 Sinister Surveillance: The Tension rating of a setting determines if someone is watching. Which is almost never a
good thing.
 Sir Verb-a-Lot: The supplement Acute Paranoia. One of the new secret societies in the book was the Knights of
the Circular Object, which was partially inspired by the tales of King Arthur. One alias taken by a member of the
society was "Sir Lanceabot".
 Sliding Scale of Silliness vs. Seriousness: The rules give suggestions on how to adapt the game on the scale. The
variants are called Straight, Classic, and Zap, from serious to silly.
 Smoldering Shoes: The Trope Codifier, if not the Trope Namer. Images of smoldering, empty boots (usually
with a big, nasty laser hanging just overhead that just forcibly emptied the footwear) have been a trademark of
Paranoia artwork (literally!) since at least Second Edition.
 Sole Survivor: "I speak without fear of contradiction..." means that you're the only Troubleshooter to make it to
the debriefing. Accordingly, you are permitted to take credit for anything that accidentally went right during the
mission, while blaming everything that went wrong and all the treason you've committed on your dead
teammates. note 
 Space Fighter: They pop up in the adventures involving space travel. Thankfully, they are not designed by
Research and Development, which means the extreme fragility and occasional explosive decompression
are problems, not design features.
 Spider Tank: The adventure in the 2nd edition rulebook includes one.
 Spy Speak: The Sign/Countersign version occurs in the adventure Send in the Clones. The PC Troubleshooter
Chock-O-BLK-1 is told to use the phrase "The show I like is My Favorite Computer" to Hall-Y-WUD to identify
himself as a fellow member of the Free Enterprise secret society. Hall-Y-WUD is supposed to respond with the
phrase "Yes, that's one of our most popular shows." Unfortunately Hall-Y-WUD hasn't been informed about the
password and will say instead "Hmm. I've never heard of that show".
 The Starscream: If you're in charge then chances are all your subordinates are just playing along and plotting,
waiting for the right moment to take you down and take your place (or at least just lock you out of the loop).
 State Sec: Internal Security, or IntSec.
 Stepford Smiler: The Computer demands that all citizens be happy, under penalty of summary execution, forcing
all citizens to be Stepford Smilers except the occasional genuine imbecile.
 Stop Helping Me!: In the new edition, Friend Computer will occasionally provide aid directly to you. Said aid
can take the form of theme music for your stealth missions or unskippable popup tutorials on reloading streamed
into your eyeballs in the middle of combat.
 Stupid Evil: Everyone except The Computer, who's Lawful Stupid.
 Suicide Mission: Most missions taken by players are assumed to be suicide missions. The reason that it's "most"
is twofold; one, sometimes there's really a benign, easily-completed mission, which will leave the players scared
and on-edge for the entire mission, waiting for the other shoe to drop, and second, it's even more fun for the GM
when he can give the players an idiot-proof mission and watch the players discover a way to screw it up.
 Super Fun Happy Trope of Doom: All sorts of terrible things in Alpha Complex are given bright, cheery names.
 Super Registration Act: Mutant registration results in permanent suspicion and second-class citizen status. note 
 Super Spit: The mutant power Acid Spit in the XP edition.
 Surveillance as the Plot Demands: A mainstay of the game. In just about any campaign, ever-present surveillance
cameras are a staple of Alpha Complex. However, between poor maintenance, collateral damage, sabotage by
Secret Societies, sabotage by High Programmers, sabotage by Commie Mutant Traitor scum, and random acts of
Friend Computer, no one knows just who is watching what and where.
 Suspiciously Specific Denial: Employed with great profusion. The gamemaster is encouraged to supply them to
the players, and they're the closest thing to accurate facts that characters in-game are ever likely to get. Of course,
a Good GM will play on this.
(during a mission briefing) "This mission will not involve any dangerous tailored retroviruses."
(in a rules section) "It's not that we think any incompetent can be team leader. It's not like this test is
purposely designed to put the person least familiar with Alpha Complex etiquette in charge. Trust us. It's not
like that at all."
 Swiss-Army Gun: Worrisome when it's an R&D toy you've been volunteered to test out.
 Swiss-Army Weapon: Many weapons from R&D are overly ambitious and therefore just as dangerous to the
wielder. Troubleshooters tend to be relieved when an experimental device turns out to be utterly nonfunctional
and worthless.
 Tank Goodness: Troubleshooters will always be delighted to be given a tank. Chumps.
 Techno Babble: Amply used to provide a vague plausibility to the ludicrous plots and technology.
 Technopath: The Machine Empathy mutation.note 
 Tele-Frag: Can happen as a result of both untested R&D tech, or via player-character mutation.
 Teleportation Misfire: A possible result of a failed roll by a teleporting mutant: also occasionally a result of
agreeing to test R&D's latest toys.
 Terminally Dependent Society: As terrible as the Computer's domination over humanity is, events like the
(possibly apocryphal) Crash have shown that the situation is no better if the Computer is even temporarily out of
the picture.
 Terrorists Without a Cause: PURGE wants to destroy The Computer. What happens after that? Eh.
 30-Second Blackout: Offering a golden opportunity for backstabbing. The GM is encouraged to use this sort of
mechanical failure whenever he feels the PCs have gotten soft and need some encouragement to turn on each
other.
 Three Laws-Compliant: Alpha Complex bots have five laws: Obey the Computer, protect the Computer, and
then the traditional three, with the caveat that orders from humans are to be prioritized by the person's clearance.
 Total Party Kill: A common occurrence on Troubleshooter missions. Thanks to the existence of back-up clones,
it doesn't even mean the end of the game.
 Tough Spikes and Studs: In the Briefing Room portion of Mission One of Vapors Don't Shoot Back, one of the
guards is a Vulture Squadron unarmed combat instructor who is vicious in close combat. He wears a collar fitted
with four-inch long spikes around his neck.
 Treachery Is a Special Kind of Evil: All "commie mutant traitors" are to be immediately executed.
 Truth Serum: Telescopalomine in the "Better Living Through Chemistry" section of the Acute
Paranoia supplement.
 Unbuilt Trope: While Friend Computer is one of the oldest and most iconic examples of The Computer Is Your
Friend, it feels almost like a deconstruction of the trope these days. Unlike most later takes on the archetype,
Friend Computer isn't the way it is because of inflexible thinking or a lack of empathy; it's because of a
combination of data limitations and tampering with its code rendered it a barely-functional lunatic. The
implication is that, without these problems, it could very well be a genuinely Benevolent A.I.. note 
 Underground City: A possible Alpha Complex configuration.
 Un-Paused: In the adventure "Me and My Shadow Mark IV" from the Acute Paranoia supplement. Markie (the
Mark IV warbot) is talking to the PCs when a piece falls off of him, sending him into a catatonic state. It's a
barometer. It just messed with his superiority complex. When the piece is re-attached, Markie continues talking
right where he left off. If they call him on it, he makes up a story about cosmic rays or something. If they keep
pushing the issue, he blows them away with a tacnuke.
 Unspecified Apocalypse: A [REDACTED] wiped out most of humanity via [REDACTED] and confined the
remains to Alpha Complex.
 Vast Bureaucracy: Alpha Complex is run by/inflicted with one.
 Villain Episode: The People's Glorious Revolutionary Adventure sets Paranoia from a Commie perspective, with
the Troubleshooters serving Tovarisch Computer and the Glorious Alpha State! At least, until the whole thing is
revealed to be a psychological experiment by Friend Computer, leaving everyone involved guilty of Communist
treason several times over.
 Violence is the Only Option: A Troubleshooter's job is to find the trouble and shoot it.note 
 Voluntary Shapeshifting: The polymorphism mutant ability.
 Wacky Fratboy Hijinx: Death Leopard is half this, half street-gang.
 The War Room: In the High Programmers game, gameplay takes place in a well-protected Situation Room to
work on a specific problem, allocating their resources to deploy minions until it's solved (or at least they
convince The Computer that it is).
 Water Source Tampering: In the Acute Paranoia adventure "Outland-ISH", the High Programmer of ISH sector
is putting a drug called ZAP! in the water supply for Infrared citizens. It tremendously increases productivity but
eventually kills the drinker.
 We ARE Struggling Together: From the macro-level where High Programmers feud behind the scenes, right
down to the mission partner who just shot you.
 Well-Intentioned Extremist: Friend Computer genuinely wants the best for Alpha Complex. Unfortunately, as the
rest of this page demonstrates, it is completely insane. note 
 We Help the Helpless: The Troubleshooters. For values of "help" up to and including "shoot for treason".
 What Does This Button Do?: So you've been ordered to field-test an experimental device, but the instruction
manual is above your security clearance. What do you do now? Repeatedly invoke this trope (better still, get your
dumbest teammate to do it for you), and hope you don't stumble across the self-destruct...note 
 Wiper Start: As detailed in the immediately preceding trope, this is pretty much guaranteed to happen with any
attempted vehicle-operation in Alpha Complex. The second button pushed generally activates either the
vehicle's Ejection Seat or Self-Destruct Mechanism.
 Witch Hunt: For communists, mutants, and subversives in general, lumped together under the heading of
"Commie Mutant Traitors".note 
 With Friends Like These...: A Troubleshooter's "teammates" are the deadliest threat they face when out on a
mission. Paranoia could be alternately be titled With Friends Like These: The Game.
 With This Herring: Any equipment a Troubleshooter gets assigned for a mission is going to be inappropriate,
useless, and/or deadly to its operator. At best you can use a heavy item as an improvised blunt instrument (and
even that might backfire).
 World Gone Mad: The world is ruled by a murderously insane computer perpetuating Cold War paranoia
centuries after the Cold War ended.
 World of Ham: Most portrayals of Alpha Complex involve outlandish NPCs, omnicidal robots and the kindly
and murderous Friend Computer.
 X-Ray Sparks: In the XP edition of the rulebook, the illustration depicting the use of the mutant power
Electroshock.
 Ye Olde Nuclear Silo: One of the game adventures includes a rusty, radioactive old missile silo with an aged yet
still-functional ballistic missile. This should end well.
 You Didn't Ask: Of course, asking usually just gets you "Sorry, that information is not available at your security
clearance," but players failing to request elaboration is still one of many ways to screw them. One mission
instructs the GM to mention that there's "a bot", those exact words and no others, in the briefing room. If the PCs
think to ask, then they're told that it's the Vampire Bot Mark 666. Otherwise, they don't find out until it actually
does something.
 Zombie Apocalypse: Spin Control features a relatively localized uprising of "techno-zombies".
 Reading spoilers is treason, citizen. Please report to the nearest termination booth immediately. Have a nice
daycycle!

Note: This article lists examples which take place within fandoms; not the TV Trope's opinion as to whether a
change is for the worse. TV Trope doesn't have opinions. The focus is on over-reaction about minor changes.

 Warhammer:
o The Oldhammer  movement. The Oldhammer players stick to Warhammer 3rd Edition, which is considered by
some as the most comprehensive and thorough of all Warhammer Fantasy Battle rules releases, and play it with the
appropriate army lists. WHFB 3rd Edition was published 1987.
o The End Times series of 2014 caught a fair bit of this reaction, and not just for the gameplay changes. Right from
the start, whole parts of the Warhammer World like the ancient empire of Khemri or the Imperial capital of Altdorf
were razed to the ground, and venerable characters like Heinrich Kemmler, Volkmar the Grim, Morgianna le Fay,
or Eltharion were being killed off by the dozens after decades of character deaths being unheard of. Each book
added to the bodycount, until the final volume lived up to its name with an apocalyptic ending. Many players
deliberately ignored the event, expecting a Snap Back to the status quo like after the 2005 Storm of
Chaos campaign. Except...
o Instead of Warhammer 9th edition, a new skirmish-level game called Age of Sigmar was released in 2015, which
confirmed that yes, the End Times happened, and over thirty years of canon had been chucked out the window to
make room for an entirely new setting of "Orruks," "Aelfs," and the fantastic equivalent of Warhammer
40,000's Space Marines. Cue the largest Broken Base in Games Workshop's history, Warhammer armies appearing
on eBay in droves, and rival gaming system Kings of War announcing plans to support army lists based
on Warhammer's old factions.
 The largest amount of whinging regarding Age of Sigmar, though, was from the hardcore tournament players about the
fact that the game, by default, doesn't have points values. While there was some grumbling from more casual gamers
about trying to work out how to balance a friendly game to where it's fun, the vast majority of the wailing and
gnashing of teeth came from the people who could no longer work out "optimum" Win At All Costs tournament lists
with which to try to slaughter other such people. Both sides have since been placated somewhat by an optional
supplement that has rules for competitive gaming, and points values.
 For Warhammer 40,000 players, "They Changed It, Now It's Heresy" is practically a warcry for the fandom.
Every time a codex is released or some lore is changed, there is a massive outcry.
o A huge backlash came from Matt Ward's revision of the Necrons. Many players did not appreciate the removal of a
lot of the scary aspects of their lore, as well as the removal of well-liked units, such as Pariahs.
o The 2011 Sisters of Battle codex received a very negative reception. Most players felt that the already not-very-
powerful Sisters went from "mid-low tier" to "absolutely unplayable." Some of the other changes really led to head-
scratching, such as the new Faith system which gives an army 1d6 faith per turn - whether that army is a 500 point
skirmish force or a 3000 point massive force. Complaints include failing to scale powers, confusing powers, and
nerfing an underpowered army. They changed it so it's simply not even worth fielding.
o The 2011 Grey Knights codex received an impressively negative reaction for going the other way; the Grey Knights
were always liked by fans and considered overpriced before the new codex. The update included some atrocious
fluff such as Grey Knights killing Sisters of Battle to use their blood as a holy oil to a chapter master who single-
 handed managed to bitchslap dozens of Cthulhus without trouble. Add in some absolutely appallingly powerful
units, some confusing rules interactions, and models many gamers simply disliked (the baby-carrier Dreadknight)
and the cries of Game-Breaker are far louder than those who approve. The errata did not help; it mostly confirmed
that every attempt to abuse the Grey Knights' powers was legal.
o This example could be made for Space Marines, Blood Angels and Necrons. EACH. They are all made by the same
author including the two named examples.
o Imperial Guard and Dark Eldar seem to have evaded this in part because the IG were the Butt-Monkey for the
previous 2 decades and their new codex gave them teeth without being overpowered, and the Dark Eldar codex was
14 years out of date and really didn't change anything significant it just made them consistent with 5th edition rules
and more playable but still the hardest faction, that is until the Sisters received their infamous update.
o In a typical fashion, Games Workshop changed the models of the Daemonettes of Slaanesh, who originally were
maximum The '80s to an army of Cute Monster Girls. Male players approved. Then they changed them again and
now they look less Eighties but extremely hideous. Male players were not amused. Almost needless to say, the old
models achieve record prices on Ebay.
o The third design for the Citadel paint pots had a screw top. The top would either get stuck from dried paint, or
they'd fail to close properly due to dried paint. Needless to say, the design was awful and the outcry was enormous.
When Games Workshop realized that people were buying paint from third-party sources, the classic flip-lid was re-
introduced and remains to this day.
o Recent adherence to release of large Monstrous Creature models over the usual squad-based and vehicle-heavy 40k
also has some players annoyed. Imperial Knights, Wraithknights and especially Riptide battlesuits have been
appearing on tables in greater numbers, much to the chagrin of players who can't afford a horde of massive
creatures. Similar things have also occurred with flyers, which were initially almost invulnerable against ground
forces until GW repealed that ban. Still, the late focus on the Tau, who were originally the anime tie-in of the 41st
Millenium, has some players crying for a redress, since battlesuit armies are on the rise.
o Other players are also frustrated by the removal of the force organisation chart that originally bound army
compositions. Now, players receive a bonus for adhering to the chart, but are otherwise 'unbound', allowing some
players to simply field columns of tanks or titans against their opponents. Needless to say, cries of Pay-to-win are
not few and far between, and cries of joy where heard when 8th ditched this for a large variety of force organization
charts as well as "Open Play" based on relative power levels between units.
o 8th Edition has received some criticism from hobby grognards for removing many rules and mechanics to simplify
the game and make it more accessible... at the cost of much of its tactical depth. Changes include no more
characters joining units, no more initiative in close combat, no more cover saves or vehicle facing, and the psychic
phase getting a major revamp with many well-liked powers gone and replaced with nothing.
 Among the Magic: The Gathering changes this has been applied to: The Sixth Edition rules changes, the Eighth
Edition card face changes, removing Armageddon from the base set, making counterspells more expensive,
moving from "Xth Edition" to "Magic 20XX", the Great Creature Type Update, the creation of Type 2, the name
change from Type 2 to Standard... and so on. The new visual design of Slivers. Going from alien creatures to
weird humanoids. Of special note is the heavy rehaul of the game rules in Magic 2010 (especially related to the
combat damage mechanics change), which caused an enormous amount of furor and backlash, and miles of
angry blog posts. The resistance to these changes has mostly died out, although some die hard fans of the older
rules still persist. The new change to the legendary and planeswalker rules in Magic 2014 also immediately
caused a storm of protest, although overall in a much lesser extent.
o Inverted with the changes to Standard rotation...in 2014, at least. At the height of one of the most monotonous
Standard formats in years, Wizards of the Coast announced that the way sets were released and how Standard was
managed were changing. Citing Standard formats that were solved (i.e. the best decks were identified and refined)
much faster than in the pre-Internet days the schedule was developed in and the tendency for each 3 set block to
have 1 set that made the block's Limited environment worse rather than better, blocks would move from 3 to 2 sets
and Standard would move from 8 to 6, rotating twice a year instead of in the fall. Core Sets were also discontinued
for being too complex for new players and too simple for established ones. This went over shockingly well, with
lead designer Mark Rosewater even releasing a Tales From the Pit comic about how shocked everyone at Wizards
was that they'd made a decision the fanbase seemed universally in favor of.
o This trope came to pass when the first shortened rotation happened. The lands included in the existing Khans of
Tarkir expansion and new Battle for Zendikar expansion synergized perfectly, meaning that running 4 or even 5
 colors (over the usual 2 or 3) wasn't just possible, it was easy. The format was now a mere 5 sets and had near-
perfect mana, meaning that all of Standard was fighting over the same few cards that were the best in the format.
Deck prices doubled, the reigning champ coming in at over $700, with the chase card of the format topping out
north of $90 each, an unheard-of price for an in-print card. As a result of Standard becoming so massively
expensive and expiring faster, attendance plummeted. It would take almost two years of rebuilding, including
reverting the rotation change and canning the two set block formula for Standard to recover the massive player
count lost over what was nominally a welcome change.
 Yu-Gi-Oh! suffered from this twice now:
o First, at the introduction of Pendulum Monsters, that lead to A LOT of monster spamming, and ridiculously
accelerated the game, allowing for Synchro or Xyz summons on first turn, or powerful monsters being summoned
without tributes.
 For more information, Here's how they work .
o Game got so ridiculously fast Konami invented the Link Monsters to balance it: Since they changed the Extra Deck
Rules, they've not only nerfed Pendulum Monsters to the point of near uselessness, but also were made obligatory
in order to play any decks that relied on Fusion, Synchro and Xyz Monsters as well (which are almost every deck in
the game). Since they're recent, they're still not available for most archetypes, meaning they'll integrate poorly in the
deck. But it's either that, or forgetting about using your Ace Extra Deck Monster...
 Their rules are also a bit complex, but anyway, Here's how they work .
 Also Link Monsters themselves made NOTHING to slow down the game, many people feel it got even faster since
their introduction. It's so bad there's a Wild Mass Guess about their advertising anime's motto: "Let's step forward and
try", doesn't mean "Don't give up if things don't initially work" as intended, instead it probably means "Don't drop the
card game without at least TRYING a Link Summon".
 Ironically, the supposed underdog Method of Special Summoning, the Ritual Summonsnote , were largely unaffected by
both changes. (Why? )
 Among more legitimate complaints, this comes up a lot when Dungeons & Dragons editions are discussed. The
base is not so much broken as it is shattered into a billion tiny splinters. Every single edition changed it and it
sucked every single time. Not just Editions. Errata. Adjustments and changes to how powers work can set the
forums exploding with "Class X is worthless now!" Complaining about nerfs to characters, in which people
might have invested a lot of time is perfectly legitimate. Particularly as, depending on the edition, many/all
builds rely on a very limited array of tricks and nerfing even one of them can push a character below the ability
that the game assumes to be appropriate for his level. The trend from AD&D through 4E has always been about
where to sacrifice verisimilitude to accommodate game-playability. Barring poor testing, the later editions are
more mechanically balanced at the cost of things actually making sense from an in-game perspective. The feud is
always about how far in either direction is "too far", with most people siding with whichever edition they started
with. This trope combined with Broken Base makes D&D less a game system and more a collection of games
with similar concepts but are ultimately separate in reality. The announcement that work is being done on writing
future a 5th edition that will have modular rules as its selling point seems to be a case of Wizards of the
Coast attempting to capitalize on this division. One specific D&D-related example: This review  of the D&D-
based Facebook app Heroes of Neverwinter. Many of the comments call the reviewer on it.
o Fifth edition is something of an aversion now that it's been released, having a smaller fan-base than most previous
editions but having almost no hate-dom at all.
 When people on the Privateer Press forums found out that one of the newest units for Warmachine was going to
be plastic instead of metal, reactions were... mixed. Many people welcomed the change but a particularly vocal
minority condemned it for straying from the "Full Metal Fantasy" aesthetic that the company had cultivated up to
that point, among other things. It's either something to do with a feel of solidity, or the vocal minority use their
Warmachine figures as sling ammunition and don't want to have to correct their aim. For those curious, resin-
plastic warjacks do still feel plenty solid. Probably helps that the torsos are all one giant block of solid resin-
plastic rather than being hollow like some of the walkers from another game.
 Shadowrun, Fourth Edition was announced. And there was much rejoicing. Then the fans found out that the
mechanics that have been in place for the last 20 years would be dumped for a somewhat simpler, nWoD-like
system (though not quite as forgiving as the system described above). Cue half the fanbase going into instant-
fury mode, which developed into major war between the pro-SR4 fans and the anti-SR4 fans long before the
game was even released. Things have since calmed down, but in some SR forums comparison between #4 and
 the other editions is tightly regulated, if not outright "discouraged". Fifth and Sixth editions have proven to be
even more decisive.
 Earthdawn's Second Edition had this happen to it as well; in principle the changes to the system were instituted
to fix the various broken things in the first release - ED players were subsequently upset that the update broke off
backwards compatibility with said First Edition. "Show me the Lightbringers!"
 The new edition of Hero System (aka Champions) has caused a fair bit of brain meltdown in its longtime fanbase,
who have declared it not only sucky but completely ruined, and that all of their old stuff has been rendered
completely unusable and there's absolutely no chance for it to interact with older versions. The only actual
differences are the removal of an almost completely unused stat ("comeliness") and a single power type that
almost nobody used anyway. The fact that dexterity is not the ultimate atribute anymore, that OCV and DCV (the
stat that define how easy it's for you to defend and attack.) are now independant characteristic. Simply put, it's
the end of the kung fu-ballerina-killer era.
 Many fans of the original World Of Darkness games were outraged by loss of a metaplot in preference of a more
personal focus (though the metaplot of the original games was a point of contention for many players). Still
others were furious that White Wolf removed their favorite subgroups (even though most were actually included,
if re-envisioned, reclassified, or renamed).
 BattleTech. There are still people who rant and fume about the Clan Invasion (which had been foreshadowed for
a decade), the Jihad, and reconciling the classic game with the established Mechwarrior Dark Ages storyline.
There's even an extremely small but extremely vocal subsection who hate the fact that the game ever moved from
its original Mad Max IN SPACE! portrayal, despite there literally being no means of actually advancing the
game from that position (which was why it was reconned).
 A lot of the initial grousing that occurred when Champions went from 5th edition to 6th was originally chalked
up to this... until someone started doing a serious analysis of the game and found out that, yeah, there were a lot
of new rules that basically arbitrarily screwed your long-established characters, assuming you tried converting
them from 5th to 6th.
 Without fail, EVERY time a new hardcover book for Pathfinder comes out, the Paizo blogs are infested with
"BLOAT!" threads and the declaration that the game is getting too huge and too complex. Such threads typically
pop up like a rash for about a month, and then disappear completely, until the next hardcover comes out.
 Many classic children's games, such as Mouse Trap, Perfection, and Operation, have been redesigned by Hasbro
to be cheaper to make, accessible to younger players, or so they can call it "new." Original versions are often sold
separately as a deluxe "nostalgia" edition. Cue the butt-clenching from parents and grandparents who want to buy
their kids the same games they had at their age.

Champions 

 Champions, the Hero System Superheroes game, actually contained several examples of game-breaking
characters in the rulebook to indicate they were possible. This included Planet Man (who can shrink planets, put
them in his pocket, and throw them at people) and Azathoth (who sits in the center of the universe using powers
to remote view anything and then shoot it)
 A player created breaker was Soul Surgeon, a character with the worst possible version of the Desolid power. His
power turned him desolid, but left his body behind and vulnerable and gave him little power to affect anything
while desolid, similar to Astral Projection. Except that he also added the Usable On Others advantage. So any
enemy he met, he tore them out of their own body, then beat them unconscious while they were helpless.
 This is actually pointed out in the books themselves. Any power or advantage with a Stop Sign next to it, like
Resurrection, Desolidification, or Transforming a foe into anything you want, require explicit permission from
the GM to take due to their potential to derail the GM's story or plans.
 Oddly enough, the Damage Over Time is only labeled as a Caution Sign Power. It's entirely possible to create a
power that does 1d6 damage 256 times (subtracting the target's defense only once) and still come in significantly
under 60 points (out of 400). And since it only increases the power's active cost, not its base cost, further
 advantages are costed relative to the base power's 5 points, (and not the power's 1,280 points worth of damage)
allowing you to add Personal Immunity, Area of Effect, and Megascale (the ability to cover, let's say, the entire
planet) and still come in at 59 points. Have fun killing everything on Earth in under 10 minutes.
    Cortex Plus 

 In the Marvel Heroic Roleplaying based on Cortex Plus, successful attacks against an enemy can create a
complication for them rather than dealing them Stress damage. If a complication is raised too high, the opponent
is considered defeated. However, there are no rules limiting the nature of meaning of complications can be
created, meaning that Spiderman can repeatedly spray web into Doctor Doom's eyes to blind him until he is
complicated out, even if this would logically have very little effect on Doctor Doom (who is perfectly capable of
detecting his surroundings without regular sight).
    Deadlands 
Deadlands has nearly unlimited character options available to the players, and there are quite a few that can make
other PC's feel a bit inadequate.
 In Deadlands Classic a scrapper (person with Steam Punk limbs) can generally mop the floor with anything.
 The system itself has an eccentricity built in with its rules, specifically the "Ace" system where if you roll the
maximum number on a die you get to re-roll that die and add the new roll to the total. If you just so happen to
have a four sided die set for that skill and have a high amount you are rolling you have a very high chance of
aceing over and over again to get a ridiculously high number. Any marshal worth their salt knows to fear a knife
thrower with 4d4 strength and 5 in Throwin' Balanced.
 Hell on Earth opened up the Junker arcane background, where you can build a rail gun from the get go, and
enables PC's to be Robot Hunters, PC's with hulking power armor that has the armor value of a tank and the
hitting power of one as well. Also, if you are a PC with the Arcane Background Doomsayer and the miracle
Nuke or MIRV and they just blow things up from hundreds of yards away.
 It is possible to be the only PC with a car or plane, which can either make you feel like a chauffeur or the road
warrior, depending on how the other PC are built.
 Marshals are advised to deal with these sort of things by occasionally nuking the equipment or abilities of the
PC's by "silver bulleting" them away (RPG a car, anti aircraft robots for a plane, no power source for a power
suit, etc).
    Dungeons & Dragons 2nd Edition 

 D&D 2nd Edition Skills and Powers had a mage variant called Channeler, which effectively combined mage and
sorcerer (you could learn as many spells as you wanted and cast them all however many times you wanted until
you ran out of spell points). The only downside? You fatigued yourself when you cast a spell (and yes, you could
kill yourself this way). There was an 8th-level spell called Heart of Stone that replaced your heart with a carved
stone one. Among other effects, it made you completely immune to fatigue.
 In the 2nd Edition of Dungeons & Dragons the Psionicist's Dimensional Door wasn't limited to vertically
standing doors. Open a horizontal door below your target, put the horizontal exit above them. Let them fall for a
while (the disorientation effect keeps them from casting or doing anything to save themselves). This either ends
with the target being cut in half by a closing door or splatting against the floor. Good fun. Meanwhile the Psi is
constantly getting EXP for expending power points. That's thinking with portals. That psionic power was also a
popular means of drowning castles with their own moats or, with enough psionicists, the ocean. It was also a
useful bomb delivery system, magical or otherwise.
 If a character had a high strength, darts. Darts would add a strength modifier for damage and 3 attacks at range
per normal attack. Normally, for a character with a reasonable strength score, their short range and measly
damage made up for it. However, if a character had a very high strength score (such as an 18/76), the constant
strength score to damage made it far more lethal than anything else you could use, and if a character had
magically enhanced strength from a belt of giant strength or similar item, the damage output could look like
something out of third edition.
    Dungeons & Dragons 4th Edition 
  There is a 15th level Ranger power called "Blade Cascade," which would allow attacks in the same round to
continue indefinitely until one failed to hit. This inspired game-breaking accuracy builds; one such
(Kenshiro "Ratata" Orcuslayer) at level 15 could kill any enemy he was in melee range of, as long as the player
did not roll a 1 (which is an automatic failure) on the d20. Wizards of the Coast quickly issued an errata capping
Blade Cascade at 5 hits.
 Sleep is a first level Daily spell that knocks people out, making them vulnerable to continuous Coup de
Grâce attacks. You can use Salves of Power, (which cost 5000 GP and a Healing Surge) to regain this power.
And until recently, getting a -16 continuous penalty to saves was quite easy (now it's basically impossible,
although you can still get a fairly high penalty to saving throws for one or two rounds).
 There is a first level cleric daily power called "Moment Of Glory" which gives the entire group resistance 5 to all
damage, meaning most level 1 enemies can barely even hurt them, and lasts till the end of the encounter to boot.
It's not quite the "I win" power it starts out as after level 5 or so, but by that point the cleric will have access to
new daily powers.
    Eon 
In Eon, you can create an extremely lethal fire spell that makes any one target within 30 meters burst into flame and
keep burning for 1 minute, dealing constant damage to everything within 1 meter radius (which means basically the
victims entire body). It's a 3rd level spell, but it deals more damage than your standard 5th level spell (and in this
game, that's a pretty big leap in difficulty to pull of). So what does it take to craft this spell? A decent score in
fire/heat/chaos magic, an average score in the skill Transform Magic, and two different magical effects. And if you
up the level of the spell by a tidbit and add a certain third effect, the fireball doesn't go out until the caster says so.
 On the other hand, it does have one weakness. Casting the spell requires five rolls on three different skills, and
failing any of those rolls means the spell goes of in its unfinished state and the caster has to start over. Of course,
this means that if the caster fails on any of the last two roll, the fireball will manifest directly in the palm of the
caster. And when a fire with a 1 meter radius manifests with its center right in your hand, yeah you can guess the
consequences.
    Exalted 

 In the Second Edition, entire combat system was built upon two opposing gamebreakers.
o First is incredibly deadly multiattacks. It is all too easy and cheap to negate penalties for flurrying, and boost up
damage past regular armor. As a result at least one of the attacks would likely hit and subsequently obliterate the
target. Developers spotted the problem in beta and created a patch in the form of...
o Perfect Defenses. Cheap charms that block an attack, no matter what, no questions asked. When faced with
powerful enough opponents, they were the only thing that could endure attack combos, thus becoming a necessity
for everybody.
o The combination resulted in Rocket-Tag Gameplay, carefully measuring amounts of Essence spent on attacks and
defenses for whoever runs out first, dies.
o The 2.5 Errata significantly increased costs of both flurries and Perfect Defenses, trying to force players into using
less deadly attacks that would be countered with less ultimate blocks.
 In addition to brokenness of base level play, pretty much anything from 5+ Essence tier was accepted as utterly
ridiculous. One of the most stellar examples of such power is Sidereal Martial Arts:
o In a game where defense has primacy, Obsidian Shards of Infinity Form has two scene-length perfect defense
charms, one of which allows you to perfectly redirect any attack aimed at you. It lets you make and control a perfect
clone of your opponent who is linked to the clonee, and command it to kill itself, knocking the opponent out. A
charm to make all of these cost zero essence. These charms are almost impossible to counter, and the chance of
someone having IC knowledge of them is low.
o And then there's the combination of Grandmother Spider Mastery and anything that enhances perception.
Grandmother Spider Mastery allows the Exalted to attack everything that he or she can see in a single action. There
are charms that allow an Exalted to see everything in several hundred miles, or even everywhere in Creation.
Pattern Spider Touch turns a single action attack into a move that either utterly destroys or transforms its target. The
natural result of this has been nicknamed Creation-Slaying Oblivion Kick. It does, however, require Essence 7 and
 a cooperative Sidereal Martial Arts master, at which point killing everything everywhere isn't that far from the
norm.
 The merit Brutal Attack allowed people to use Strength for attack rolls instead of Dexterity. This allowed tyrant
lizard totem Lunars to show up as a T-Rex and roll 20+ dice for their attacks without spending a mote.
 Post-2.5, anything that says "that do not count as dice added by Charms" has a huge sticker reading BE
CAREFUL WITH THIS on it. Also, anything intended for Essence 6+ was skipped entirely for the errata, since
it was a task as Herculean as the mythologies it draws from, meaning that post Essence 6 things are still horribly
broken. Naturally, almost everything that involves the Sidereal Martial Arts is post-E6.
 Character creation can make or break you, due to the use of flat costs while most of the advancement table uses
(previous level of trait x multiplier). Take two identical Dawn Castes. Have one buy his physical attributes at
5/5/1 and the other at 3/5/3. The first will spend 40xp to get to 5/5/5. The second will pay 56. That's three, maybe
four sessions of play ahead, and for only one small part of chargen. Repeat that kind of thing in every section -
get everything important to five, buy your Infernal eight Charms in a non-favoured Yozi for 16xp free, that kind
of thing - and you can end up with one player hit very hard with Can't Catch Up.
    FATAL 
While F.A.T.A.L. is a terrible system, it has one spectacular Game-Breaker. Your starting level, instead of being 1
like any sensible game, is the square root of the number of years you've been following your profession. Now, this
means that a character who has spent 400 years at their job is maximum level from the get-go. Dwarves have their
age rolled on 1d1000, and start work before 200. There's also damage XP, which is awarded per class that gets
damage XP - so, if you have a few levels in three classes that gain damage XP, you can level up three times faster
than someone playing a pure class. The only counterbalance? The assumed Killer Game-Master, and considering
your GM is likely drinking heavily in an effort to forget some of the things in the rulebook...
 In the first edition of FATAL, when you grappled an enemy, you were asked to roll for the "grapple position" you
achieved. One of the options was.. ugh.. "rape". If that wasn't bad enough, this is a game which actually has stats
for penis size and vaginal/anal circumference. If one will not fit inside the other, the target takes damage equal to
the proportional difference as a proportion of their hit points. This means that playing a race with a large penis
and going for grapples to "accidentally" rape enemies to death is much better than attacking normally. ...Or So I
Heard.
    FATE 

 Fate is notorious for having problems with the wording of aspects. In particular, skills such as the ability to
foresee the future can potentially declare aspects like "We Are Going To Win This Fight" which can then give a
bonus to anything in it, or even argued to be automatically true in versions that maintain this rule. Given that it is
a system which sparked lengthy forum threads over how to handle aspects like "Dark" and "On Fire", this is
perhaps expected.
    GURPS 
Due to the very nature of GURPS, it's relatively easy to land such combinations of advantages and skills, but it
charges so many points that your character may end up a Bunny-Ears Lawyer to get there. Or never get there due to
point limit. Having said that, there are few relatively cheap tricks allowing you to break the game without spending
more than 30 points on them.
 Any skill that is at least 17 (or 16 with related Talent advantage) can only fail when the player rolls 18 during
3d6 checks, which has 2.8% chance of happening. Since skills are related with the level of specific statistic, and
Easy skills don't get any penalty, it's ridiculously easy to make a character with 13 baseline skill (from stats) and
then spend 12 points on the related skill to reach the 17.
 First level of better appearance, Attractive, costs 4 points. It helps with pretty much all social skills and adds
default +1 to reaction checks. While higher levels of better appearance cost a lot more points with almost purely
roleplaying value, Attractive has too good to skip point-to-usefulness ratio for the party's face.
 High TL, but only if the GM allows it and it suits the campaign. Most likely byproduct of being Ancient
Astronaut, Time Travel or ending up Trapped in Another World, it allows a character to use a higher tech-level
than the baseline of the setting, thus having access to much better versions of the same skills and knowledge. It
only costs 5 points per level, so at 20 points you can use modern skills in The Renaissance, and at 30 - in Roman
times. And obviously, High TL decreases or entirely removes penalties for jumping the technology curve, should
 the character have proper skills for that. Even such simple things like First Aid skill benefit greatly from High
TL.
o To a lesser extent, just having access to higher TL tools makes a massive difference, especially in low TL games.
Should character have proper skills and be from proper (or higher) TL, it's very easy to make TL4 (early-modern
period) tools with access to TL2 (Iron Age) resources, providing an absurd +4 bonus to their users and negating the
-10 penalty when trying to build or make other TL4 things. Giving Radio to the Romans is just a matter of finding a
sponsor who will pay for initial investments.
 Gizmo. A 5 point advantage allowing a character to pull a small object from Hammerspace whenever needed, as
long as it's within the possible gear the character could carry. The description provides an example of pulling dry
matches from a pocket to light a fuse right after after diving or being thoroughly searched and yet pulling a
hidden gun when put in front of the Big Bad. Oh, and Gizmo has levels, so it's 5 points per item that can be
pulled whenever characters need one. The most common use is about having always a lockpick on character
when the plot demands it.
 Talent advantages, especially when custom-made. Most GMs simply don't allow making custom Talents due to
their absurd potency, or ban any other than Minor version. Depending on tier, Talent adds +1 to up to 6, 12 or 18
skills covered by said talent, for the price of 5, 10 or 15 points. In all versions Talent also provides reaction
bonuses to other users of covered skills, so it's very easy to impress NPCs while simply performing routine tasks.
 High Manual Dexterity. For 5 points, it adds +1 to all skills related with delicate handiwork. And it has levels, so
for 20 points you can gain +4 bonus to 11 different skills and Dexterity-based checks of another 20, making a
character an instant expert and great performer even with minimal training in those skills or none at all. As you
might notice, it's twice as effective as described above Talent and yet it's almost never banned.
 Similarly, Ambidexterity. For 5 points, you can perform any manual skill equally well with either hand. Think
about how many things you do with your dominant hand. Now imagine being able to do them all equally well
with the other. (If you don't have to imagine, congratulations: you're part of perhaps 1% of the population.)
Interestingly, the GURPS devs themselves don't seem to see this, and have even discussed making it a 1 point
Perk.
 Magery. Spells are casted by rolling an IQ check. It costs 20 points to rise IQ by 1. Magery counts as +1 to IQ
checks when casting spells, while it costs 10 points per level. Yeah. And while IQ is by far the most useful stat to
have high, Magery allows to ease up Early Game Hell in low-point games and helps to avoid ending up
with Squishy Wizard.
 Combat Reflexes are intentionally broken this way, as a thing every "professional" fighter should have. For
measly 15 points, it adds +1 and +2 to variety of fast reaction skills, makes character immune to freezing in
combat and also counts as a massive +6 bonus to Instant Waking Skills. More, entire party gains +1 to defense
against surprise attacks and +2 if the character is a designated party leader.
    Legend of the Five Rings 
The first edition of the Legend of the Five Rings RPG had quite a few gamebreakers. One of the most infamous was
a joint grip maneuver from the "Mizu-do" unarmed combat style. A successful roll could disarm and incapacitate the
target. Doesn't sound too bad, except that the target's abilities had almost no effect on the easy-to-perform maneuver.
As a result, a starting character with fairly normal stats (Agility 3, Mizu-do 3) would have about a 50% chance of
disarming some of the greatest swordsmen in the Emerald Empire.
 You also get some of the crazies stuff with the Kakita Artisans, who were both underrated and overpowering./tg/
archive SFW writeup .
Acting Rank 3: "At this rank, the dramatist has gained the ability to physically alter their entire body, so that
the dramatist can assume the form of animals. The forms which the actor chooses to become may not exceed
the mass of a heavy war horse, and no items (including clothes or weapons) change with the Artisan."
 4th Edition has the Asako Henshin, who are simultaneously dreadful in both directions. At first rank, they get an
ability that lets them raise or lower anybody's traits of a certain ring, and it lasts for a very long time even early
on. So with a simple action, an Asako Henshin can render trained courtiers into gibbering idiots, out-wrestle a
Crab, or out-stealth a ninja. However, the rest of the class is excellent in the "unplayable" way, with rank 2-5
abilities being mutually exclusive, being conditional at best, and the class lacks the staple 'can make attacks as a
simple action instead of a complex action' feature at higher levels, instead getting a watered-down version at rank
5.
    Mekton 
 Mekton fans long ago compiled the MTS Abuse Catalog  listing these. Here are some of the highlights:
 Probably the most infamous in Mekton Zeta is Weight Efficiency. Using large amounts of weight efficiency, the
design drops its all-important Manuver Value, raises its ground movement, and decreases the cost of flight
movement, all at the same time. Also, the points spent on weight efficiency are not subject to cost multipliers.
Additionally, nowhere in the rules is said that you can't weight efficiency your mecha down to zero tons. Since
the cost of propulsion systems are a multiple of the mecha's weight, this would allow infinite MA for a cost of
zero points.
 Poor Man's Reactive Shield: Coupling an Attack Factor of 2 with a -2 WA Beam Shield results in Reactive
Shield like protection for 1.8cp/K instead of 3cp/K normally required by reactive shields. This gets even better if
the design has room for 2 shields, which can then alternate between uses and add the Turns In Use and
Rechargeable modifiers for even more savings. A 20K, 1 TIU, Rechargeable, -2 WA, AF 4 beam shield costs
only 17.82 cp. Buying two of them only costs 35.64 cp. This is even cheaper than a 15K reactive shield! It is
effective against all types of attack, has 5 more SP, is basically unlimited, and by default has a Reset of 1.
 Smart Missiles: Use of Smart missiles with 20+ skill almost guarantees a hit, and even makes Anti-Missile
Systems largely ineffective.
 Suuuuurrrrrrgggggeeee!!!!: Ablative Reactive Shields grant Kills x 5 SP. Surge shields do SP kills in damage.
Combine the two for five times the pain. As an added plus, take Reset: X and any other modifiers you feel like
(this thing isn't supposed to absorb damage anyway) (ie. 15K, Reset: X, Matter Only, Surge for 21.1cp).
 Large amounts of Ninja Leaping. Since ninja leap is achieveable once per action, a +10 ninja leap results in an
effective MA of +20 (or more, if using Let's Active) (ex. Ground MA of 7, normal leap = 2 hexes. +10 ninja
leap. move 4 hexes for free [walking 1/2 MA is free], spend 2 actions for +24 MA. Total MA = 28)
 Transformation: Gun scales up one of the mecha's weapons. Equip a big enough gun, and your mecha can
transform into a BFG that would turn Megatron green with envy.
 Out-of-Scale Energy Melee Weapons. Buy a low kill 10x scale EMW. The EMW's "hot knife through butter"
effect scales to ignore 40K of armor instead of 4K.
 Similarly, Out-of-Scale Missiles: Buy a low kill 10x scale blast radius missile. The missile's blast radius damage
scales to 10x, instead of a maximum of 5K for 1x scale missiles. This allows indirect fire to negate Anti-Missile
Systems.
    Nobilis 
In Nobilis, reality is written in a language of flowers. "Flowers" is technically an available Estate. This would create
nigh-omnipotence even by the standards of a game where shooting down the sun is considered a fun afternoon.
    Racial Holy War 
Racial Holy War (it's as stupid as FATAL) is an unfinished mess anyway, but even if fearsome amounts of
alcohol and inbreeding have convinced you to actually jury-rig the rules into a playable state, you'll still be left
with the hideously broken Athlete player class. See, Athletes get an additional 10 hitpoints per level, since the
ability of an experienced athlete to ignore a chainsaw to the head or anti-tank weapon is well known.
 Even worse is the Hero class which gives a substantial boost to the Heroism stat and makes
all Rouse checks automatically succeed. Because the Morale Mechanic works by adding the whole
group's Heroism together for defense and Intimidation for attack and Rouse checks add a set amount to
both stats for EACH character based on the Hero's ranks in Rouse, this means that it's nigh-impossible
for the party to be intimidated by opponents and will almost always make enemies run in panic. And
fleeing opponents can't fight back. And give the party free turns to shoot at them. Worst of all, since
multiple Heroes' Rouse checks can stack with each other this means this trick can be pulled at character
creation.
    Sen Zar 
SenZar seems to hate the gamemaster with a passion. The "status" power increases a player character's starting
money from 1,000 Stars to 1,000,000, in a game with a comically challenging artificing system. Proper
munchkinisation can result in a player character starting with an armour value of 100, and being armed with a
weapon which has a +10 attack bonus, causes an automatic 300 points of damage that will not heal short of 8th
Order Magic while healing you for every point it deals, and forces any human you hit with it to make a power save
or instantly die. SenZar is probably the only game where a starting character can be armed with a weapon able to kill
a normal player character 20 or 30 times over.
    Shadowrun 
  Hacking had a surprising tendency to be broken in Shadowrun 4th edition. Due to the relatively low limit on the
maximum System score, any computer which wasn't protected by a spider could be relatively easily hacked even
by a starting character. This was made worse by 4th Edition's introduction of "Commlinks", basically
superpowered smartphones, which meant that almost any of an individual's data could simply be hacked off their
relatively-insecure commlink (rather that having to find it in the wider scope of cyberspace)
 The notoriously weak Sixth World version of Shadowrun made this even worse by removing the System/Device
score as a default value for Matrix stats. A character with any investment in hacking skill at all can instantly and
utterly destroy any character without it, many of whom will have zero in their defense stats.
 Sixth World was also infamous for its bizarre treatment of armor. Instead of reducing damage taken, armor
in Sixth World grants you Defense Rating, which gives you bonus Edge points if you are attacked by weaker
weapons. While the intent is to put you in an advantageous position in battle, the result tends to be that you get
some Edge points and then die. It also creates insane interactions such as the ability of a PC with a cyberjaw
to eat a drydocked submarine in a few rounds (its armor doesn't protect it against even the low "cybernetic bite"
damage, and if the submarine is docked, there's no character involved to gain the Edge)
 The most infamous game breaker in Sixth World is using the Anticipation action with a full-auto weapon. A full-
auto weapon lets you fire at as many targets as you like within ammo limits, but you have to split your dice pool
between each of the targets you attack. Anticipation means you no longer need to split your dice pool when
attacking multiple targets. Using this with a weapon with a large magazine can allow you to shoot 50+ targets
with your full skill in a single round.
    Star Wars d20 
Stun in Star Wars d20 Revised is somewhere between That One Rule and a Game-Breaker. If you hit with a stun
attack, your enemy must save or be helpless, losing all dexterity, granting a +2 to hit to all attackers, and drops what
they are holding for a few turns of combat. If they do save, it happens anyway for one round. Again, this is for every
hit, so a party can simply tie up a single, powerful enemy, regardless of size (think rancor) and whittle it down at
virtually no risk to themselves. Even if the enemy breaks the loop because all the party members using stun weapons
miss (unlikely), they have to take move actions to get their weapons back into their hands, allowing maybe an attack
or two before the Cycle of Hurting continues. Do not do this to your players, even as a joke.
 Another big gamebreaker was one ability of the Elite Trooper Prestige Class, called 'Deadly Strike'. To qualify
for the class at the earliest opportunity, one had to be a sixth level Soldier, then gain nine levels in the Prestige
Class. Hard to get? Possibly. The benefit for your patience and hard work? The character in question makes a
full-round action to perform a single attack, that deals maximum possible damage regardless of a critical hit.
This attack has a doubled critical threat range, and gains a plus four to hit. This is coupled with the character's
already high plus fifteen to hit from base attack, plus whatever dex bonus they may have, plus any other bonuses,
feats, or special abilities to boot! What does this all add up to? On a crit, even with a measly blaster pistol,
anyone getting hit dies, and the odds are that the average to-hit bonus is going to be twenty-five before rolling
the d20. Couple this with a blaster cannon, the resident energy BFG, and a few good critical hits, and this
character has a decent chance of taking out anything less than a frigate in orbit, by himself, from the ground, in
roughly two minutes. Any starfighter will be dust in roughly three to five rounds, long before the pilot can
even see the tiny speck down on the ground blasting at it. A round being six seconds long, that amounts to
eighteen to thirty seconds, per ship.
o Or not, as the character must be able to spot the ship, and in the d20 rules, your checks for your sensory skills suffer
a -1 penalty per 10' of distance to the object. Rules as written, the characters shouldn't be able to see a moon - er,
space station - orbiting the planet they are standing on.
    Star Wars (Fantasy Flight) 

 The Auto-fire rule, which allows advantages rolled on dice to be spent to have a weapon hit multiple times, is
notoriously broken due to the damage multiplication it allows. Even powerful enemies can be mown down in a
hail of bullets in a single round.
 There are a range of Knowledge skills available, all of which use Intellect as their base stat. However, there is no
trained/untrained skill system in FFG Star Wars; a character who doesn't have a specific skill can still roll their
entire base stat. This means that a character with a high base intellect knows everything, as if he/she had dice in
every possible knowledge skill, even ones they've never heard of.
    Synnibar 
 The ridiculous design of World of Synnibarr makes it fairly reasonable for a party of five people with a decent
starting sum and stats rolls to have every PC have 50,000 Life Points, shotguns loaded with Lubricated Pelleum
Steel slugs, and be able to attack three times per segment, twice.
 A half-pound sling ball of Pelleum can be purchased for nearly 1/200th of the price. After spending the starting
funds, the players can have a 100-foot armor-plated pirate ship that could shrug off nuclear bombardment
with armor-piercing chainguns and rocket launchers to fire back.
 One of the sample low-level monsters is a bat. The number of XP awarded for a bat - which does not scale with
character level - and the "number that appear in a group" indicate that simply blowing up a nesting group of bats
with a grenade will give a character enough XP to reach the level where they become a god.
    Wild Talents 
The designers of the superhero RPG Wild Talents freely admit that their (fairly generic) powers-creation system can
be easily abused if players are so inclined. The 2nd Edition rulebook even comes with a free example describing
how to build a power that will allow the character who has it to extinguish the sun...
     The Witcher Role-Playing Game 
The The Witcher Role Playing Game is a world of deadly peril where Anyone Can Die. Nonetheless, there are a few
ways to tip the odds maybe a bit too far in your favor.
 Witchers themselves are a case of Purposefully Overpowered, considering they are gamebreaking in lore as well.
They are definitively the strongest class at chargen. Being capable of adeptly using both combat and magic, as
well as having natural boosts in their stats and lifepath options for boosting those even further. And in case they
needed more power, a supplement was added which allowed Witchers to start with special armor from their
school which came with a special ability to push them even further. A combat-optimized Witcher at chargen is
capable of soloing some of the game's Medium difficulty monsters.
 Teleportation/Standing Portal: While not something that will clear the field of enemies, it will make your mage
nearly unkillable considering that at a moment of peril, they can instantly zip over to literally the other side of the
Continent. And once they've achieved Standing Portal, any difficulties regarding travel (a significant part of the
setting) become a non-factor.
 Pretty much any of the Master-Level spells are stated to be army-killers, and can allow a high-level Mage to
easily solo a squad of enemies.

 The Aqueduct in Settlers of Catan: Cities & Knights is a potential game breaker. It allows a player to
draw any resource they choose if they receive no production on a turn. If a player only has a few numbers to
draw from, the Aqueduct is even better, because it allows the player to take advantage of many custom draws,
charging for whatever item they wish to build. Combined with a 2:1 port, a player can gun for commodities too,
further increasing their advantage. This is taken up to eleven when a specific resource in the game is extremely
scarce, because the player with the Aqueduct may be the only one who can get it easily.
 The collectible dice game Dragon Dice has had so many game breakers in its past that a group of fans formed a
company called SFR, Inc., bought the license to the game, and spent the next eight years revising the rules to
impose something resembling balance. The biggest change was the removal of the "Charge" attack option, which
offered the chance to inflict twice as many casualties on the defending army while suffering a similar increase in
one's own losses... fairly balanced by itself, but easily broken with defensive spells such as "Open Grave", which
automatically resurrected all of the affected army's dead.
  Vampire: The Eternal Struggle (formerly known as Jyhad), a collectible card game originally created by Wizards
of the Coast (based on Vampire: The Masquerade by White Wolf Publishing, who later took over the IP), was
remarkably well-balanced until the Ancient Hearts expansion. Along with several minor balance issues, it
introduced the action card "Return to Innocence", which allowed one to essentially destroy an opponent in a
single action, at the cost of losing an acting high-level vampire card. In itself, overpowered, but not necessarily
game-breaking. However, combined with the "Soul Gem of Etrius" card from the Unlimited release, and certain
high-level vampires such as "Etrius" vampire from the preceding Dark Sovereigns expansion, it became far more
troublesome. Decks designed to take advantage of this combination were practically unbeatable until the
combination was nerfed by a card text errata issued much later.
o Another one is Monocle of Clarity: Ask a player a yes or no question which they must answer truthfully. If the
question regards a future event, the player MUST play in accordance to that answer. It may not sound too powerful
until you consider multiple uses. Step one: Ask player "When I use my monocle next round, will your answer
be yes?" Step two: Tailor your next question according to the previous answer. "Will you let my bleeds go
unblocked for the rest of the game?" if he said yes, and "Will you block any of my bleeds for the rest of the game?"
if he said no. Your opponent is screwed.
o Fortunately, very few players used such the game-breaking combinations, and in group play, all other players would
gang up on anyone who did. The game never developed the high-stakes tournament play of other games like Magic:
the Gathering, and was balanced around extended group play, rather than high-speed one-on-one combat. Players
tended to eschew high-powered combos in favour of more creative story- or theme-oriented decks.
Another fine example from Wizards of the Coast: in their Star Wars Miniatures game, a Clone Wars version of
Obi-Wan called General Obi-Wan Kenobi, or GOWK, was so insanely hard to damage that it was eventually
banned due to dominating the tournament scene. The brokenness was compounded in that GOWK came from a
starter set, meaning anyone who wanted one could buy the starter (as opposed to ripping through countless
random booster packs).
 Duel Masters had Bombazar, Dragon of Destiny, one of the few cards that warped the TCG after its introduction
(as the TCG was discontinued two sets after its introduction). It was a Fire/Nature hybrid 7 mana creature with
6000 power; a speed attacker (Hast for Magic players), and a double breaker, and when it was summoned, it
destroyed all other 6000 power creatures. It then skipped the opponent's next turn, but at the cost of causing its
summoner to lose the duel if they hadn't won by then. As a rule, this was usually enough to finish off the
opponent, particularly since Bomabazar itself could already eliminate four shields on its own. While the TCG
never had a banlist, they did place Bombazar on a watch list.
o Soulswap is another notorious example, given that the OCG banned it and tried to make less powerful versions. It's
a three-mana shield trigger that switches a creature from the battle zone with one from the mana zone that has the
same cost, and since it can be used on either player, on top of allowing one to recover a card that they'd considered
lost to mana, it was incredibly versatile.
 The Pokémon trading card game:
o Slowking from the Neo Genesis set had a Pokémon Power that allowed its user to flip a coin whenever the
opponent played a Trainer card, and if that coin was heads, the Trainer card would return to the user's deck without
affecting the game. In the Japanese version of the game, this Power could only be used while Slowking was active.
When the card was translated to English, however, it was translated incorrectly. The English version of the card not
only allowed its owner to use the Power while Slowking was benched, but the power was cumulative, meaning
players could flip a coin for each Slowking they had in play every time their opponent played a Trainer card, and if
even one were heads, that card would have no effect. While the Japanese version of the card was barely playable
(Slowking was not a good attacker, and was easily KO'ed when active), the English version was exceedingly
powerful because a player could place one or more Slowking on the bench, prevent the opponent from playing any
Trainer cards, and still play a stronger Pokémon as the active Pokémon, which basically shut down the opponent's
deck forever.
o Sneasel from the Neo Genesis set was simply banned because it was too powerful offensively; by the second turn of
the game, its Beat Up attack allowed the user to flip up to six coins (one for each benched Pokemon and one for
Sneasel), netting 20 damage per heads, and + 20 more damage due to the two Darkness energies that were on
Sneasel in order to use the attack. Along with broken trainers like Computer Search and Professor Oak, this was
easy to accomplish, and from the second turn on it was easy to AVERAGE 80 damage per turn; considering the
maximum HP for any Pokemon was 120 at the time (and 120 was a rare trait, the average for a fully evolved
 Pokemon was about 80-90), it's easy to see why this was banned; you simply didn't win if you didn't play your own
Sneasel deck. Sneasel has actually been reprinted in a recent set, but it seems that this is really a matter of the rest of
the game catching up to it. It's virtually identical to its old version (resistance is now Psychic -20 instead and it has a
Fighting x2 weakness), and still a great card, but at 60 HP it's a bit fragile, and there are a number of not-especially-
rare cards in the game with more than 120 HP.
o Of interesting note is that, while those two cards were not banned in Japan (Slowking wasn't for reasons already
stated), the Base Set trainer card Super Energy Removal was banned due to its brokenness. During the time before
the first Modified format when it was finally rotated out in the rest of the world, Super Energy Removal was a
staple in essentially every single deck and could easily change the flow of an entire game in an instant.
o Lysandre's Trump Card from the Phantom Forces set allows all the player to shuffle all cards in their discard pile
into their deck, it is one of the very few cards to be banned as it basically allows the player to quickly draw through
their deck without any negative effects and increased the length of battles significantly.
o One of the most broken strategies possible is to use two cards in tandem: Darkrai Lv. X and a certain Shiftry.
Darkrai had one attack that made the strategy work, which put the defending Pokemon to sleep. However, unlike
normal sleep, there were two coins flipped, and if both were tails, the Pokemon fainted (both had to be heads for the
Pokemon to wake up.). Shiftry's Poke body made it so that all coins flipped were treated as tails.
 1000 Blank White Cards is entirely made out of cards created by the players. As such, anyone can make potential
game breakers. Finding game-breaking combinations of cards is how the game is usually won. In most games,
some cards with ridiculously powerful (or boring) effects are banned:
o Cards that allow an instant win.
 Conversely, cards that allow an instant loss for someone else. Or everyone else. In which case there really isn't any
difference.
o Cards that give massive numbers of points are occasionally banned, but it isn't very common. This may manifest as
a built-in rule to ban cards of a value greater than 1000 or smaller than -1000.
 To be fair, this is more a failure of imagination than anything else. As a wise man once said, "sure, you can make a
card that gives you a million points, but how long will it be before someone makes a card that forces you to eat it?
o Cards that target a specific, named player. Let's say that there are three players, Person 1, Person 2, and Piggy. Any
player could make a card that says "the person to your left gets 350 points", but no card could say "Piggy gets 350
points".
o Cards that cause lengthy delays or postpone the game are commonly banned, too.

The Three-Dragon Ante supplemental card game for Dungeons and Dragons 3.5 edition had some pretty nasty
cards on its own, meant to suck the stakes and your fellow players dry when it comes to gold coinage. The new
Emperor's Gambit edition, meant for D&D 4 can be used in conjunction with the original, essentially meant to
suck your opponents dry in just a few rounds. Then again, they can do the same to you, but if you are dealt a few
unlucky hands...
 Agricola has its share of cards popularly seen as broken. Chief offender is the Taster, which you can use to go
first in a round any time you feel like it. In a Worker Placement Game, that's essentially an auto-win for a decent
player.
o The Wet Nurse lets the person who plays it get extra workers faster and more easily than everyone else. Every time
someone plays it, they've virtually won. Even relatively new players playing with experienced ones.
 The lack of balance in early sets of Legend of the Five Rings is kind of understandable; the development of card
games was in its infancy, and designers on the whole didn't really have a handle on the whole "balance" thing.
Free "corrupt" gold that accelerated your production to a ludicrous degree if you were lucky enough to get a
bunch of it on early turns, an event (Iris Festival) that destroyed every single Shadowlands card in play when
Shadowlands was one of the playable factions, a 0-cost action (Breach of Etiquette) that, when played on a Lion
clan player on the first turn, resulted in them being totally unable to buy any personality in their deck... these
were all merely symptoms of the times. By the time Lotus Edition rolled around, there was no excuse. Lotus
Edition was an entire arc of Game-Breaker against Game-Breaker: no-risk duel decks that constantly refilled
their hands and collected rewards as they sliced your guys down vs. pirate decks that created ludicrous amounts
of gold by "raiding" even though they could play any one of their very powerful personalities as a follower for a
paltry 3 gold vs. Khol Wall, which became synonymous with "cheese" vs. Ratling decks with exponentially-
 growing horde armies vs. ninjas with confusing mechanics that never actually worked right, and effects that
killed personalities near-unconditionally were cheap and numerous... every game was a test of "Whose ludicrous
tech goes off first?" It reached its nadir with the "Test of Enlightenment" set, where many of the personalities
included had abilities that might as well have read "Battle: Kill, like, five guys. Don't even bow to do it." Some
players liked the high-stakes play with single cards deciding matches; others wanted a more tactical game, and
for them it was a major selling point that the next block, Samurai Edition, was going to be much weaker than
Lotus.
o A later game from the same manufacturers, Legend Of The Burning Sands, was completely broken out of the box;
this was eventually explained by the fact that it included a bunch of cards copied from Legend of the Five
Rings without paying attention to how they worked in the new system. The huge breaker? Blacksmith, a card that
gave a +2 strength to any character. In Five Rings, where fights were determined by comparing the total Strength on
each side, this was a reasonable advantage; but in Burning Sands, where a unit with higher strength was immune
from any unit with lower Strength, it was utterly overwhelming and the game boiled down to rushing out djinni
armed with swords as quickly as possible. The game died shortly afterwards.
 Warmachine/Hordes is generally considered a fairly balanced game. However, most armies in the Mark II
edition had at least one example of a Warcaster or Warlock who handily broke the game.
o Cygnar brings us the game's most famous example. Epic Victoria Haley. A caster who offers such ridiculous
amounts of board control that it's not uncommon to walk away feeling like your opponent is just playing alone
while you watch. She has everything from damaging spells that reduce Spd (which stops charges and slams), she
can move enemy models into vulnerable positions, she offers one of the best defensive spells against ranged attacks,
and just for kicks she can copy any spells cast in her rather immense control range. Just to top it all off, her Feat
makes her dominate the board like nobody else. Every enemy model caught in her control range loses either its
movement or action AND she gets to decide the order you activate models. A veteran player will know how make
you activate your units in such a perfect way that you will feel lucky to be able to attack anything for your entire
turn.
o Saeryn of the Legion of Everblight has a feat that keeps every warbeast in her battlegroup from being targeted by
melee attacks for one round. Which by itself just sounds incredibly powerful, but it really becomes ridiculous in the
details. It effectively means that warbeasts are also immune to free-strikes which are all melee. The Legions
specialization in fast, often flying, warbeasts means that they are completely free to position themselves INSIDE
enemy ranks without issue. Which synergizes perfectly with one of her spells which creates a large Ao E around a
friendly Warbeast which Auto-hits any enemies caught inside.
o Epic Lylyth (Shadow of Everblight) is rather infamous for absolutely crushing new players. In any army that
largely ignores stealth, she provides Snipe to everything in her battlegroup, and a free additional shot. Combined
with Ravagors which have a powerful, already long-ranged attack which leaves a damaging Ao E and continuous
fire effects and Bolt Throwers which push targets back. Lylyth's strategy is to completely shred the opponent from
across the board while completely ignoring many forms of defense against ranged combat.
o It has been nerfed, but the Pirate Queen Skarre was also well known for a technique called 'Skarre Bombing'. Her
ability Sacrificial Strike gives her a 10-inch auto-hit attack based on the Armor of a single friendly model that she
sacrifices, with her feat also buffing friendly armor by up to 5 (post-nerf it only accounts for base armor), it was
easy to end up with an unmissable pow 21 shot. This is a game where a common mantra for players is that even a
luck handcannon shot (pow 12) can handily end a game. A pow 21 would devastate all but the hardiest warcasters,
if not leave them in a borderline crippled state and easy to finish off.
 Outside the realm of Warcasters and Warlocks we have some units and models that are considered quite
gamebreaking. For a long time the innocuous Bile Thralls of the Cryx army were absolutely devastating to any unit
heavy armies. On paper they seem balanced enough. Cheap, slow, weak, armed only with a pitiful ranged weapon that
they are absolutely abysmal at aiming with, their statline is awful beyond awful. However, they possess a large suicide
attack that auto-hits anything caught for fairly hefty damage. Getting an entire unit across the board is almost
impossible, but one or two should be easy enough, and that's all you need to completely obliterate lower armor units.
 The Star Wars Customizable Card Game had several such cards that broke game mechanics and/or trivialized
most games:
o The Light Side "Limited Resources" card. Since there was no limit to the number of cards you could have in your
hand, and your life depended on having a good reserve of cards in your stack, a card that allows you to move cards
from your hand back to the stack can be crucial to winning.
 o "The Professor", from Dagobah. A defensive shield card that forced any opponent, if they wanted to deploy a card
with ability for free, to instead use X Force (where 'x' is half the card's stated deploy cost, rounded up). It essentially
forced one's opponent to burn more and more Force each turn, to unreasonable levels. This was a game-nuker that
unfairly punished about half the cards in the entire card game, and quickly proved to be exploitable to the extreme.
o "Padme Naberrie" from the Episode I set. An incredibly cheap character, she was a breaker in Skywalker-heavy
decks, and could be used to deal direct damage to a player based on how many Skywalkers were on the battlefield
at one time.
o "The Emperor" from Endor. A single-card, non-weapon, out-of-battle character who can bury opposing characters
like no one's business (and at any time, no less), with absurd power levels, extra Force generation, and can be
further augmented with "helper" cards. The existence of The Emperor (and its impact on breaking the game) forced
Decipher to release Mon Mothma to try and counter it (and that in itself became a broken card).
o "Krayt Dragon Howl" from Unlimited screwed with the original design philosophy that the Dark Side was intended
to go first in every game. Why? It let the Light Side get Force regeneration before the game even started, and can
be defended by an Obi-Wan card that was a tank in combat and could pull Disarmed if the opponent tried to take
him down with a weapon. Basically, unless a DS player could kill Obi-Wan on the first turn, the LS had already
won the game.
 It's hard to set up, even assuming the cards are available in the first place, but in Dominion there's a King's Court
- King's Court - Goons - Masquerade  combo which will win a two-player game once it fires, no matter how
much of a lead your opponent might have. It does this by emptying your opponent's hand and trashing half of
it, every turn. Nothing your opponent can do except watch you gradually throw away their entire deck, including
all their victory points.
o The second edition of the game modified the Masquerade card (if you have no cards in hand, you don't
pass or receive any) to neutralize this combo.
 The Star Trek Collectible Card Game featured in its first edition the "Telepathic Alien Kidnappers" which allow
its player to point at a random card in his opponent's hand and guess the type. If the type is guessed correctly, the
card is discarded. Because the rules state that all players draw a new card at the END of their turn, the owner of
the kidnappers can guess "personnel" at every guess. Since the player rapidly runs out of cards and usually only
has ONE card in their hand, this locks out any new personnel cards from being played as they systematically get
discarded. Game over.
 The Reindeer Booster Pack in Sopio whose effects include discarding the entire deck, adding all discarded cards
to your hand immediately and instantly winning the game for you if played when you are the current leader. This
is more or less the entire point of the pack.
 WWE Raw Deal had issues with this through its entire lifespan. Some of the more infamous ones:
o Andre The Giant is the Ur-Example:
 Andre didn't get a Backlash Deck (think of it as an in-game sideboard a la Magic: The Gathering), but he got a 100
card deck. In a game where you win by depleting your opponent's deck, and the typical deck is 60 cards, this is already
a problem.
 He begins the game with eight cards in hand and an eight Superstar Value, which means in all but a few matches, he's
gonna go first. His ability lets you put a card in your hand on the bottom of your deck, draw one card, then make your
opponent randomly discard TWO cards and ends their turn if they either played two cards successfully or willingly
ended their turn BEFORE they played a second card, so the opponent's hand is going away quickly.
 And then on top of it all, his superstar-specific cards completely break him: "We Face Each Other As God
Intended" prevents insta-wins and reduces the opponent's starting hand by one card for EACH Pre-Match card they
play. Considering the fact that most decks are dependent on their Pre-Match setting them up for the game, this will
either leave the opponent with very few or no cards in hand to begin. And to make things worse, you could use its
secondary ability, which causes everyone to discard their hand. Your opponent got to search for one card in their deck
but had to reveal it to you. You got to search for TWO cards and didn't have to reveal them, meaning you could grab
something to either counter what the opponent searched for or find something to work around whatever they searched
for. Other cards were just the frosting on top of the cake of brokenness that is Andre.
 The World of Warcraft card game is generally balanced, but in the Throne block (set 6), Horde faction has
several cards which are significantly overpowered even for their rarity:
o Mazu'kon is a 6-cost ally with 6 ATK and 6 HP in a game where allies with such stat are very, very rare. Then it
has Ferocity, bypassing the rule where an ally cannot attack the turn it enters play. Then if it gets killed by
conventional means, it can bring out a duplicate of itself immediately.
o Daedak the Graveborn is a 4-cost ally which, when killed, will perform Life Drain whose power depends on how
many resources his controller has. Players usually will have more resources the longer the game drags on, so the
later the game, the deadlier he becomes. Problem is, if he gets killed, he'll shuffle himself into his controller's deck
so that he can be drawn again later, so playing him early game is still not a bad idea.
o Zodzu, Herald of the Elements is a 5-cost 5 ATK/5HP Shaman ally, which is already pretty good, but if you have
another Shaman, he'll proceed to deal 3 damage to any target and heal your hero for 3.
o There is also Edwin Van Cleef ally from the 6th set treasure pack. 5ATK/3HP that costs only 4 is already good. But
then he has Stealth + Untargettable, which means if he attacks ANYONE in your party, you can only sit and watch.
He has no Elusive, so he can be attacked, buuuuut, when he comes to play, he brings two allies with Protector, who
can thus shield him from attack (unless the attacker has Stealth). As the icing on the cake, when he does gets killed,
you can search your deck for his daughter Vanessa Van Cleef, who'll proceed to smack one of your exhausted
(tapped) ally for 4 damage just by showing up. Oh, and the Van Cleefs are neutral-aligned, so both Alliance and
Horde can have him.
 Plasma Missiles in the 4X board game Eclipse are notoriously Game Breaking. They always fire first in combat
and cost no power to fire, meaning that a player can load their ship with nothing but Plasma Missiles and
Targeting Computers and blast everything else into atoms before it can fire back. There is a counter - heavily
armoured ships - but these ships in turn tend to be weak against everything else, reducing the game to
Rock/Paper/Scissors.
o A lot of the new secret techs in the expansion, Eclipse: rise of the ancients, directly counter Plasma Missiles. The
expansion also add a new game breaker: Antimatter Canon + Antimatter splitter + Point defense.
The Acrobat skill in Descent 1st edition allows the PC to pass through monsters, which can give them access to
heavily guarded locations far before they are supposed to be able to enter them. In Road to Legend, an acrobat
can completely break the smaller adventure maps by teleporting into the dungeon, rushing through monsters to
the save point in the next room, and teleporting out again, all in the same turn.
 In the dark card game Lunch Money, the card Humiliation can cancel any card an opponent plays, including
another Humiliation. This ability is so powerful that the only winnable strategy is to discard cards as fast as
possible hoping to draw a Humiliation before attacking.
o Worse, Humiliation allowed an enemy to drop a free, unstoppable attack on you. This included some that could take
off from 3-7 life points in a game with only 15 life. Furthermore, you could Humiliate in response to a defense,
meaning your original attack hits for damage and any other secondary effects, then you get a free, unstoppable
follow-up.
 In the short-lived and fairly obscure toy/game "Fistful of Aliens", the order-in figure Jangutz Khan was not only
virtually undefeatable in combat, smashing a hole through the Elemental Rock-Paper-Scissors of the lineup, but
also permitted you to field a more powerful lineup for the game.
 There was once a Mega Man (Classic) card game. In its last set, Mega Man 2's Wood Man was released. Wood
Man was extremely broken and could only be stopped by a single card. It's speculated that the deck was what
killed the game.
 In the Marvel themed deck building game Legendary:
o Deadpool has a card called "odd ball" which gives him a power bonus equal to the number of previously played
cards with odd card values. It itself has an odd card value, meaning that playing 3 Odd Balls gives Deadpool at least
a +6 bonus. By stuffing the deck with them a player can devastate villains and almost assure a win; the only
solution found so far is to simply ban Deadpool.
o In Legendary Villains, Electro has a card ("Supercharge") that gives you +1 attack for every card you discarded
before playing it. All of Electro's other cards have a mechanic ("Dodge") that lets you discard them to draw a new
card. If you can manage to get rid of enough of your starting cards, and buy nothing but Dodge cards and
Supercharge throughout the game, you can end up in an infinite loop, dodging cards and drawing more Dodge
cards. You can keep this going for as long as you like, until you decide it's time to play Supercharge and get the
actual attack bonus. It does require a lot of time, and specific tailoring of your deck, but effectively gives you
infinite attack. The flavor text is "Unlimited power!!", implying that this strategy may, in fact, be the intention of
the designers.
o Another one is Spider-Man. Nearly all of Spider-Man's cards tell you to reveal the top card of your deck, and draw
it if it costs 2 or less. All of Spider-Man's cards cost 2. All your starting cards (obviously) cost 0. So if you buy
 nothing but Spider-Man cards, it's very easy to end up drawing your entire deck in any given turn. Spider-Man's
cards have small bonuses, but when you're drawing your entire deck, you still end up with huge amounts of attack.
 Several Plot Quests in "Lords of Waterdeep" give bonuses that on paper don't sound too impressive, but in the
long term gameplay can be broken as anything. There are a few that stand out: Drawing an Intrigue and being
able to immediately play it after drawing it if you want to, simply by playing an Intrigue anywhere; being able to
refund a single cube used on a quest, including a Mandatory Quest; being able to pick up X resource by simply
grabbing a corresponding quest; being able to gain owner benefits on your buildings etc. Some of the standard
quests do this too, being able to reclaim three agents at once, being able to draw 4 Intrigues and play them
instantly, being able to take all face up quests or all face up buildings at once. The king however, goes to the
'Open Lord' Intrigue, which grants a player immunity to Mandatory Quests and Attack Intrigues, and all for the
cost of 'revealing' their lord.
o Making these even more broken is when multiple Plot Quests are used in conjunction. Being able to play a new
intrigue after playing one is made even better when you score two points every time. Gaining additional resources
when you take a certain action is even better when you get owner benefits on a building too.
 One of the unlockable classes in Gloomhaven, the Plagueherald, was shown to be extremely broken on first
release. This class specializes in inflicting two status effects: poison and curse. Cursing an enemy causes a
special card to be shuffled into the shared enemy attack modifier deck which, when drawn, immediately nullifies
that attack - and since the deck is shared, cursing one enemy means this can affect a different enemy. This class
also has a card that causes enemies to take 3 damage every time their attack is nullified, and the ability to spread
Muddle over an enormous area of effect. A Muddled enemy draws 2 cards from their attack modifier deck
instead of 1, and applies the worst of the two. What really took this class over the top is that in the initial release
of Gloomhaven, there was no limit to the number of curses you could put into the enemy deck. This card played
well could effectively make the entire party invincible and waltz through the dungeon while enemies killed
themselves trying to do anything, despite the fact that this class's weakness is supposed to be its low HP. This
became so absurdly broken that the second edition of Gloomhaven went out of its way to nerf it into oblivion,
not only weakening many of their key cards (with it getting drastically more direct changes than any other class
and not a single buff in sight), but also reworking the entire way the Curse status effect works, including capping
the total number of curses that can be put in the deck to 10. And the class is still one of the best in the game in
the second edition, which goes to show just how insane it really was.
 Skytear had a commitment to balance right from its kickstarter pitch, and generally succeeds, but three cards in
particular slipped through the cracks: "Twist Allegiance", which allowed controlling an enemy champion for a
single action; "Grapple", which pulled an enemy champion in close; and "Battlecry", which pulled all affected
enemy champions in close. The common thread here was pulling enemies in (or with TA, simply making the
enemy walk right to you), since in a game where positioning is already crucial and the ability to shove enemies
back is at a premium, dragging a champion three hexes into the enemy's jaws was a death sentence. Twist
Allegiance and Grapple were quickly banned, but Battlecry posed a problem, being a Champion's Ultimate. PvP
Geeks were forced to bite the bullet and issue "Avalanche" as a new Ultimate for Brylvar in an early expansion.
All three banned cards were given errata for use in casual play, but will never be unbanned in tournaments as the
developers also have another promise that "The text on a card is never wrong".
 The Digimon Card Game for the most part remained a relatively balanced game for many months of its
conception, until that is the release of Jesmon  in Set 6: Double Diamond. While Jesmon by itself allows you to
play any of the Sistermon cards Blanc  or Ciel  from the hand or the trash, doing so also gives it a sizeable
power boost and piercing, allowing itself to attack the opponent's security (the main life source of a player) while
also getting rid of a Digimon on board. These effects are already powerful on its own, but combine this with an
inherited effect from SaviorHuckmon  allows it to attack again simply by having one of the aforementioned
Sistermons on board, which Jesmon can do easily. So this effectively means two Digimon from your opponent
are gone, you attack the security twice, and if you add on cards like Greymon's inherited effect , A Delicate
Plan , and Digivolving Jesmon into Omnimon  after attacking, you can end most games in just one turn
without any repercussions. This archetype single-handedly defined the Red meta and other metas to come in
Japan for months that Bandai Namco Entertainment had no choice but to limit SaviorHuckmon to just one copy
per deck , and even then Jesmon still remains a powerful force to be reckoned with.
 Wingspan has the "Power Four": four birds whose activated abilities let you discard an egg to gain two of another
resource type, which is a strong conversion rate. All of them can be placed in the Grasslands, the egg-producing
 habitat, which means that you can get away with de-emphasizing the other habitats in favour of just using the
Lay Eggs action and getting other benefits from it too.
o Chihuahuan Raven and Common Raven let you discard an egg to gain any two food from the supply, which is a
good conversion rate and doesn't put you at the mercy of what happens to be available in the bird feeder at the
moment. This also has the advantage of letting you ignore the Forest, which is typically the clunkiest and least
powerful habitat. The Oceania Expansion made this ability even more powerful by introducing Nectar, a wild
resource that can gain you points if you use it the most, and yes, the Ravens can gain it. Tellingly, the rulebook of
that expansion outright suggests leaving out the Ravens if you think they're too powerful with that rule.
o Franklin's Gull and Killdeer let you discard an egg to draw two cards, which provides valuable card advantage that
gives you access to more options. On top of that, these birds are cheap and require minimal setup before you can
use their power.
 In the wargame-deckbuilder hybrid A Few Acres of Snow, the intended cost of besieging a city is losing cards
from your deck, but that turned out to be a benefit because it lets you see your best cards faster. This ties into the
infamous "Halifax Hammer" strategy, where the British player besieges three cities and then storms down the
French player. This is easy to execute and all but guarantees a win for Britain. The designer tried to patch up this
problem, but eventually deemed the game unfixable. In the end, the game was Condemned by History, being
remembered almost entirely for its balance issues, with few people still playing it or defending it, and almost no
one being interested in getting into something that imbalanced.