The Town is an interactive table top role playing game.
It takes place in a small town in Oregon during the Hight of the cold war.
During the game Government agents (the players) are tasked with solving an extraterrestrial related mystery. It is a race against time before the Alien or cryptid is revealed to the public.
This webpage is for player use only
How to play
The Town is an Table top role playing game, Strategy, imagination and dice are all that's needed. This page is to help guide players and be a referenced when you play.
To start out the agents (the players) are assigned a mission to solve. Before embarking on this mission they can equip and choose a variety of tools and weapons as well as one disguise to help complete the assignment. How effective the agents are in completing the mission determines if they will win or fail. Throughout the game agents perform actions and gather clues, doing so by rolling dice, talking to people and investigating the area.
The town is a beginner friendly interactive table top game and the GM or Game Mater will guide you how to play. Brand new players often understand how to play after the first 2 rounds.
If your unfamiliar with Table top RPG's the game is run by a Game Master who has set up and tracks the actions in the game. The Game Master also voices the non playable characters that the players might communicate with. The Game Master provides and explains everything happening, the players communicate what they would like to do and either by persuasive intentions or by rolling dice the Game Master will determine an outcome. This is a mix of on the spot adaptability and rigorously planed out mystery set in an imaginary setting. As you play the locations, NPC people and aliens are planed out well in advance of playing to provide a grounded and realistic experience.
Gameplay
The main part of the game is the action rounds, these are limited and correspond to in game time.
Each game usually has a maximum of 30 rounds for normal missions. Rounds are either split up 10 rounds across 3 days or 15 rounds across 2 days, each day has 2 downtime events. Mini missions are 6 rounds with 1 downtime event.
Depending on the mission round amounts can change, making missions longer and easier or shorter and fast-paced.
During these rounds collection clues is the main priority to find the alien, determine its threat level and cover up anything civilians can find that could jeopardize your cover.
Action rounds, during an action round each player will have an opportunity to perform an action (listed below) to help the investigation, acquire clues, cover up alien activity or question local people. There is no order to what agents go first, but everyone can do one action.
Downtime, This is time to explore the town, get food in game or rest. There is increased likely hood of someone in the town mentioning clues about the mission. Players will not be able to roll for anything during downtime, instead they can use normal roleplaying to interact with towns folk to get clues.
Final rounds, At the end of each day the players need to rest after the final round for that day, usually after a final round there will alien activity at night and add 1-3 additional clues for the following day.
If the mission is not resolved by the end of the last final round the players will lose the game. The Alien or cryptid will have either escaped, survived or exposed itself to the public in a way that the players could not cover up.
Flow of time, As the mission progresses every hour or every other hour new clues or events happen actively in the town. Agents can find these clues sometimes hours later, the closer in time to the happening of the clue the closer to the actual location of the alien the players get. For instance the players would be closer to the alien on a fresh clue then one a few hours or days ago. Missions have the presence of the alien mapped out hour by hour.
Actions
How to perform an action? Well start off with the action type you want to do (Reference the list below), let the GM know and roll a D20 dice, add or subtract any modifiers from the disguise credential. That final number determines your success, let the GM know the number and he will explain what happens or what you find depending on the outcome of the roll.
Credentials also have a unique ability that only that disguise can do, at any given time instead of an action you can use your ability.
Action types
Searching: Takes an area and looks for out of the ordinary activity or looks for a location of interest on the map.
Stealth: Keeping cover and not being noticed by people or aliens, like hiding in plain sight or going to areas people would not normally allow strangers. for instance, gaining access to gated community's or local government offices.
Investigation: Looks for clues directly related to alien activity or actions. like foot prints, weird oozes, bite marks or radiation burns.
Interview: A persons ability to get others to open up or talk about wired things they have seen or heard. A welcoming charisma or position of power people would naturally trust.
History: Finding knowledge of alien strengths or weaknesses, as well as local history of the mission area. Such history could be vital to tie up lose ends or complete the mission quicker.
Ability: A unique action grated use by a tool or Credential, stated so as an action.
Combat
Combat is divided by two turns, the Players usually in order around the table and the Alien or threat.
During a players turn they can move or complete an action, during combat is the only time the attack action can be used.
To attack, players must first roll to hit. This is a D20 and depending on the roll vs the targets resistance determines the lethality of the hit.
After the hit roll the player rolls damage, the damage characteristic is unique to each weapon. That roll with the roll to hit lethality modifier determines how much total damage is done.
Resistance level Explained
Everything has a resistance level in addition to their hp, this level is based on the dexterity, health, armor or damage immunity's or weaknesses it may have.
Resistance modifiers, If a target has a resistance of 10 a D20 hit roll of 10-19 will be full damage. 2x the resistance (in this case a roll of 20) will be 2x damage rolled. 1/2 resistance or higher (in this case rolls of 5-9) will do 1/2 damage rolled. Rolls under 1/2 are a complete miss and deal no damage (in this case rolls between 1-4).
Starting out agents have a resistance between 8-10 depending on health or backgrounds.
Agents can add to their resistance level by wearing armor or optimizing their agent builds.
Resistance level can range from 4 to 16 this varies from small objects to large spaceships or entire buildings.
Aliens
Capture, elimination or extraterrestrial protection are all parts of the mission assignment. this provides a wide range of difficulty's for the players. From highly dangerous world concurring foes to interplanetary tourists or refugees.
Each alien is unique and provides varied challenges that even repeat players wont expect.
just remember that not every alien is a threat.
Cryptids
In addition to aliens, Cryptids can be included in missions to increase the challenge for the players or to balance a mission for higher players counts.
Additionally cryptid only missions are available for easier introductory missions.
Cryptids can add a lot to the mission and challenge the players in unique ways.
Cars & Travel
The Agent issued car is a very important part of the game.
It allows the players to travel around the town and also acts as storage for tools and weapons.
Storage, all agent tools, weapons and credentials/disguises are in the car. A player can go to the car and switch tools and weapons at any time or automatically when traveling.
Traveling, Players can split up during an investigation but they will need to be together to move to a different area by driving the car. At the end of the complete round the players will have an opportunity to move locations freely in the car or if moving locations is urgent a player can burn their turn that round to dive the car and pick everyone up to move locations.
Losing the car, if the car is lost or stolen players can use the bus at the end of every other round. They will also be without any weapons or tools not on hand.
Travel times, Time is very important in the game so likewise is travel time, most places in the town can be reached in 5 to 15 min and this wouldn't take over a players move, some times though if the players want to move from one side of the map to the complete other a players turn might have to be burned to do so.
Multiple Cars, In games with 5+ agents there will be two agent issued cars. Two cars means two groups of agents that can move around independently. But a group would still have to stay together at their car unless they are in the same location as the other group and then have the opportunity to change passengers.
Town Maps
Palmain Oregon is a small town in the central valley area. The central valley runs down the middle of Oregon and is known for its contrasting biomes. To the West of the valley are high elevation dry rocky deserts and barren volcanic mountains. While the East and center of the valley is marked by rivers, lush thick forests and large lakes. South of the valley are sprawling open grass plains full of rich fertile soil that's easy to farm and manage.
