Slashdot Mirror
Paranoia RPG Returns in New Edition
Allen Varney writes "The classic tabletop roleplaying game PARANOIA, originally published by West End Games in the 1980s, returns in a new edition this August from Mongoose Publishing. PARANOIA, the game of a darkly humorous future, is set in an underground Alpha Complex ruled by an insane Computer. I am writing and (re)designing the main rulebook, under direction from original PARANOIA co-designer Greg Costikyan, with contributions from novelist and game designer Aaron Allston. I'd be happy to answer questions from Slashdot's gamers."
This was one of the coolest games back in the day :)
too bad i don't know what this games about :(
and yes, I should be working, and no, i don't have a life.
Mmm, hot fun.
Is the computer still your friend in this edition?
You see? You see? Your stupid minds! Stupid! Stupid!
Is there any other type?
i like this from their website. i found it quite humorous.
One Hasbro(R) to rule them all
One Hasbro(R) to find them.
One Hasbro(R) to bring them all
And in the darkness bind them
Parker Brothers(R), Milton Bradley(R), Selchow & Richter(R), TSR(R), SPI(R), Avalon Hill(R), and Wizards of the Coast(R) are registered trademarks of Hasbro, Inc. Their use here is not to be construed as a challenge to their trademark status.
Paranoia! Late night playing sessions in the dormitory bathroom (helped the atmosphere of the game somehow). Jeez, what a game.
Of all the old roleplaying games, the only one I still own and cart with me when I move is Paranoia. I'll probably never play it again, but I can't bear to get rid of such an entertaining rulebook.
Good luck with the next edition. It will be hard to write a book that stands up well next to the original.
Phiwum's law: anyone that names an obvious law after himself and then puts it in his own sig is just pathetic.
This is *awesome*.
As a somewhat younger and more recently-introduced gamer, I have never actually seen a copy of this game. However, I have heard about it.. heard very much about it. This game is absolutely legend and I always thought it was a shame it had been lost to the world.
What is different in the new edition? What do you think about the old ed needed revision? Has anything in particular changed about the spirit or tone?
Long live to the computer! The computer is your friend and wants you to be happy! /me falsely smiles (don't want to get killed)
May the source be with you!
- Dave #2
Have you got your copy of the Paranoia RPG, citizen? What's that? The old version? SCRUBBERS!
Who is that looking over your shoulder?
Strange women lying in ponds distributing swords is no basis for a system of government.
what color paper is the book going to be published on?
Its worth pointing out that the story/idea behind Paranoia was also the primary basis for Resident Evil. The original coders of Resident Evil had been playing Paranoia literally for weeks prior to writing the game. I know from personal experience. :)
The most intriguing part of the game for me was the encouraged use of screw your buddy notes. AKA FYB notes, these were fun because you really did get the feeling that everyone was out to get you and this prompted you to scribble off another note the to GM to perfrom a preemptive strike on your team mate because he was obviously a communist.
Pretty widgets? What pretty widgets?
Oh my god, This is a game that lived up to its name. How does that song go?
I'm an Alpha complex commie. no that's not it.
Does anybody remember the Alpha Complex tune ?
Anyone trolling this article must report to the nearest execution booth. Have a pleasant day, citizen.
Alas, Babylon.
So tell us...
Does the computer REALLY love us?
I can once again take bootlicking as a skill!
I pulled out my old second edition Paranoia stuff one night with the group I played D&D with. They had never even heard of the game before, but got the hang of it quick enough. Within the first 30 minuets 2 players were already down 3 clones apiece, several others had lost a clone, and a major reactor leak killing several thousand citizens resulted from an over entusiastic attempt to retrive a bag of crunchy-time algea chips from a fission powered snack machine. Even if I never get the chance to play it, I will definately be buying the book.
In short, it's the best pen and paper RPG ever made. Not that I am biased or anything.
On Wall Street they say "buy low, sell high" On the pad we say, "buy high, sell high" Isn't that somehow better?
As a long time Paranoia player (I love Randy the wonder lizard), is there going to be a beta testing program? Where can I sign up? And are the modules going to be updated as well? What mods to the tech trees are you going to add considering "pre-whoops!" developments like the Internet?
I have the original, here on my left...
Will the new version have a brand new system, use an existing system (D20, GURPS, ad infinitum), or use a mod of it's original system? Will we see Living Paranoia anytime soon?
Will the tinfoil for hats come in blue?
future World controlled by a computer? are Matrix and Terminator ideas from Paranoia?
Rock that crushes, Paper & Scissors that don't matter.
Can I get Ultra-Violet clearance now?
Oh wait, that's illegal...
(enter clone #2)
Can I get Ultra-Violet clerance now?
(enter clone #3)
(Happy Officer takes a core sample)
(enter clone #4)
Can I have a happy pill?
You're no match for my Keyboard of Trollness +2 Tragdor! Surely you do not wish to feel the bitter taste of my keyboard leaving an acrid Trolling in your eyes!
Set down the dice and nobody gets modded...
"Please God, help me cleanse the computer of viruses and evil photographs which disturb and ruin my work..., so that I shall be able to cleanse myself"
I think this is the only time I've ever seen a product-existance-denial actually be in-character.
Vintage computer games and RPG books available. Email me if you're interested.
Looks like the Slashdot editors accidently posted this to the front page. Please move it to the approriate area. k, thx.
I recently forked over $75 for a set of the original first edition Paranoia because our local gaming group was getting way too obsessed with their stats and game mechanics. The ensuing pandemonium and infighting didn't solve the problem, but at least it entertains the game master, which is the point of it all, right?
I'm especially happy to hear that the new edition won't be using d20. I've been using Active Exploits, a free, diceless game system, and it has worked very well for keeping the game fast and simple -- an essential for Paranoia.
There are also some excellent resources for individuals who want to play Paranoia online; Paranoia-RPG is probably the best place to start.
And, finally, if Paranoia tickles your fancy and you want to try a different comic genre, check out Atlas Games' Over the Edge, a lightweight conspiracy game that makes Fox Mulders' wildest guesses seem tame.
Weapons of Mass Analysis
I'm sure the graphics will be quite a bit degraded from the original, as back in the 80s we had vivid imaginations driven by hormones and angst at what seemed like an inevitable nuclear confrontation. Now that young people thing with their thumbs I'm sure the graphics will take quite a hit.
-dameron
Well, I don't remember the "official" Alpha Complex song, but there was one that got bounced around a bunch of my college buddies that was sung to the tune of the "Oscar Meyer Weiner" song.
Oh, I'm glad I'm not an Alpha Complex commie,
That is what I'd really hate to be
Cuz if I were an Alpha Complex commie,
All the citizens would shoot at me.
Or this one, to the tune of Billy Joel's "Piano Man":
It's 9 o'clock in Computer time,
A communist crowd shuffles in
There's a White-Class sitting next to me
But I'm not cleared to look straight at him...
Let's not go there, though. That was a silly time.
"Linux doesn't exist. Everyone knows Linux is an unlicensed version of Unix"- Kieren O'Shaughnessy
Allen Varney writes [...] I'd be happy to answer questions from Slashdot's gamers."
:o)
How's your brother Jim doing?
Maybe the "XP" is for "eXtra Pretty."
who you say you are? This could be a trick.
Please have knowledge of the topic at hand before giving out "offtopic" moderations.
http://www.textfiles.com/rpg/song
Scroll down to THE ALPHA COMPLEX SONGBOOK
Now I know that the article is mainly about an update to the RPG rules themselves, but I can't help but think how awesome a computer game set in that universe would be. One of the great points of Paranoia is that you go in knowing you're probably going to die a number of times, so you get really attached not to the clones, but to the game play. There are levels of sorts, but not in such a way that the game is about leveling up, so it would still be fun for new players (and/or yourself when you've run through your clones). With the "unseen enemy" angle, you can constantly have the goals of a troubleshooter changing so it would never get stale. The article states rights have been sold for a text version, but if someone wants to make a killing they should snap up rights for a graphic version.
killing several thousand citizens resulted from an over entusiastic attempt to retrive a bag of crunchy-time algea chips
You'd be a lot safer sticking to soilent green. In fact, there was a lot more of the stuff around after this accident. Not sure why.
Don't blame Durga. I voted for Centauri.
Sorry, nothing can stand the humor and sheer absurdity of HOL's rulebooks [if you can call them that.]
GET YOUR WEAPONS READY! --DR.LIGHT
This is going to be fun!
Like Slashdot with dice!
I may have heard of Paranoia once or twice in the past, but this is the first real discussion I've read of it, and it sounds like something worth looking into.
:)
:)
I used to be a hardcore tabletop gamer, but I stopped several years back for a whole heap of reasons. The only gaming supplies I still have are a set of stock DnD dice, a couple of first edition DnD books (my ex roommate needed money), the Lunch Money* CCG (best. CCG. EVAR.), and the HOL** manual and expansion.
If the Paranoia rulebook is even HALF as entertaining as the HOL manual, I'm buying two- the article links paint the game up into a similar category, which is good- this is the first I've even thought about tabletop gaming in months.
Good thing there's a gaming store about three blocks from work.
* Lunch Money : You play a catholic schoolgirl on a playground. You beat the crap out of your opponent(s). Suggested to use consumable items such as M&Ms as life counters. You buy the deck and you get the whole game- none of this Endless Diarrhea of Expansions that other CCGs suffer. Also an excellent card based hand-to-hand combat system.
** Human Occupied Landfill. The most heinously WRONG gaming manual ever written.
Ah yes, Paranoia. The game where knowledge of the rules was punishable by death.
I hope this does not become a d20 based game by the time it is released.
The Paranoia rule book (2nd Edition) actively encouraged the gamemaster to ignore the rules. It was one of the few RPGs I played (AD&D, Mechwarrior, various GURPS) that emphasized having fun above all else. I hope the new edition stays true to this spirit!
That - and I loved the wry satirical and self-referencing tone in which 2nd Edition was written. Sometimes I would sit and just read the rulebook for fun! Reading it as a teenager, I learned a lot about both pop-culture and serious political thought ("Imagine a world designed by Orwell, Sartre, Kafka, Stalin and the Marx Brothers...")
Basically, if The Onion did a sci-fi RPG, it would be Paranoia.
Can't wait to see the new edition!
and remember...THE COMPUTER IS YOUR FRIEND! ALL HAIL FRIEND COMPUTER!
Back in the 80's, it was OK to make fun of people and organization. I wonder if the publisher will have to tone down the game because of the prevalence of political correctness today.
:wq
in black citizen, as befits your infra-red security clearence.
That, whomever lost all of his (or her) clones first, 'won'.
He won a lot. Even when given a seventh clone.
I am a science fantasy fan
R&D Department
*shivers*
That's a fine and useful service you provide. You sir, are a credit to the troll community.
Is there any point in asking questions?
We all know we won't have a high enough security clearance for the answers.
Player: Are you using the d20 rules system?
The Computer: No. PARANOIA is fun. D20 games are not fun. The Computer says so.
And we all know Friend Computer is always right.
I was also wondering, what does the "XP" stand for? Though...with my clearance, I probably shouldn't even ask.
-Car-O-LYN
Like Daddy always said: if you can't dazzle 'em with brilliance, baffle 'em with bullshit.
Is the computer your friend?
Spend two evil to turn into a pack of your favorite vermin. Reappear at a convenient place close by.
GET YOUR WEAPONS READY! --DR.LIGHT
After a few email exchanges with people associated with Mongoose I'd not give them the time of day anymore, much less my money.
Human Occupied Landfill is definately a more interesting read - but I always found myself more interested in actually playing Paranoia. That game rules.
Do you have ultraviolet clearance?
Did you read this thread?
Indeed, paranoia is by far more fun to play, and is a far better actual game.
I soooo hope you're kidding. You realize it's a pen and paper game, right?
Sig.i>
I would love a scenario where the troubleshooters go to the SCO section to find IP that has mysterioulsy vanished from the computer. The prime suspect would of course be the high programmer Linus-U-NIX.
That's going to make it much easier to suspend disbelief.
I don't want knowledge. I want certainty. - Law, David Bowie
Long live Pax Computer!
That said one of the things I most enjoyed about playing paranoia was the lack of character generation. You could generate a chracter if you wanted, but what was the point? It was going to be dead soon. This got rid of the four hour character generation marathons caused by people taking 20 minutes to decide if they wanted to buy an extra flask of oil or a ten foot pole with the last of there money. More games ended before they started due to the fact that character generation bogged the night down so bad the adventure never got started and no one was hooked to come back the next night. Paranoia was great, people got together, you handed them a character, they read it for ten minutes and bam you were playing and having a good time.
So I guess the question inherent in this babbling is. Are you going to keep the preferences for pre-generated characters in the new edition?
Papa Legba come and open the gate
They're calling it "Paranoia XP", which I hope is a thinly-veiled dig at Windows XP. I hope the new game comes with a shrink-wrapped license and pages of bilious marketing screed, detailing just how much better Paranoia XP is over Paranoia 3.1 or even Paranoia 95. It won't mention Paranoia Me though - I hear it was a complete disaster.
Having playtested and contributed idea-wise to "Tales From the Floating Vagabond" as well as gaming for ages, I'm glad to see a new Paranoia.
My only question is: Do you need any playtesters?
Some simple advice:
Keep your laser handy.
John Poindexter is good, Trust John Poindexter :-)
-Dave
My poor players never knew what they were in for when I ran that game. Hot fun and happy pills!
I always broke out Paranoia when my CoC or Champions players started getting a little too big for their britches with five hour character generations and rules lawyering.
This game was truly a masterpiece of catharsis for overworked gamemasters. I am so glad it's getting a rework, I could just implode with delight.
Thank you Greg! The computer is the bomb!
No wait! It's just an expression! I didn't really mean bomb! I just...ZZZZZZZZZZZZAAAAAPPP!
Mike-O-Phile2...you are lucky enough to have been activated for duty in service of the Great and Benevolent Computer! You are to report to Mission Room 5 in Slashdot Sector immediately for briefing.
Imagine a dating website like Friendster controled by The Computer... and you got http://parano.be ! :)
Sound crazy, but that work !
That is the most awesome emoticon ever!
Thanks to the vast improvements in modern graphics capabilities, it'll now be a side-scrolling platform game, a la "Super Mario Brothers." Other than that, however, no major changes are planned.
In high school, my friends and I would play all sorts of things. I ran a Shadowrun campaign, another ran a Star Trek RPG, another ran a Rifts campaign, etc. We'd switch it up pretty regularly, keeping it all fresh.
One of the guys decided to do a one-off Paranoia game. Here's how it started:
COMPUTER: Troubleshooters! Report to briefing room B-X-37-Y for your mission briefing!
ME: Friend computer, where might one find riefing room B-X-37-Y?
COMPUTER: What is your clearance?
ME: Red, friend computer.
COMPUTER: You are not cleared for that information.
Analiese: [sarcastically, momentarily channeling her D&D character] Well, I cast a spell to locate the briefing room.
ME: Argh! Mutant powers! Shoot her shoot her shoot her!
[Much expendature of Red lasers into Analiese.]
Analiese Clone #2: [arriving] You guys all suck.
ME: Argh! Questioning the wisdom of Friend Computer! Commie traitor! Shoot her shoot her shoot her!
[Much expendature of Red lasers into Analiese's second clone.]
COMPUTER: Well done, citizen! You are now cleared for Orange access.
And things degenerated from there. I don't think we made it out of the briefing room.
Paranoia is one of the few RPG games that new players do the best.
If you are a regular player, you care about your character. Newbies go for broke.
I once knew a cop that attended a Nancon convention here in Houston (back in the day) who had never played Paranoia, but threw himself into the role and won the tournament.
I always wondered if being a cop gave him an edge in that game....i.e. maybe he is a professional Paranoia player...
"Only one thing, is impossible for god: to find any sense in any copyright law on the planet." Mark Twain
Will it still be set in the unending cold war against the Communists, or will the enemy now be Terrorists?
Heh...
when my brother moved away from my parents, this was also the only RPG that stayed with me, out of tenths of books we owned together.
-><- no
Did anybody like Torg better? I never played Paranoia but all the people I used to play torg with consistently liked it better than Paranoia, and for some reason always compared it to Torg.
Torg, I can say, is a GREAT game with a great, original story.
There are two kinds of people in the world: Those with good memory.
Besides updating the game to include more modern references, what changes are you making to the system?
Paranoia always seemed to me to be the perfect one shot adventure game. With the mortality rate what it was you had a hard time having clones left by the end of the adventure, let alone for more than one. I've always wondered if there was a way to make campaign play possible, or if that was even desirable.
Good to see it coming back, though, as that will mean we should see more games happening at conventions!
ALL HAIL KING TORG! Oops, sorry, was thinking of Kobolds Ate My Baby.
Sounds about right to me. In a first-time Paranoia party, if they survive all the way to the mission briefing room, you are clearly doing something wrong. :)
Warning: The following text is classified ULRAVIOLET. Do not read if you are not a Game Master. Should you accidentally make out some of the words as you scroll by, terminate yourself immediately. Your clone will be commondated for your loyalty.
One campaign which I designed that I never get tired of running with new groups of players is a scenario where key high-level people in Alpha Complex who were members of the "trekkie" secret society conspired to have a fully-functional "Enterprise" built. The party is sent up to command the bridge. Lots of great conflicting interests from secret societies (The "Whovians" consider it blasphemous and want it destroyed, for example), lots of tech that can go wrong: There are the insanely dangerous transporters. All five clones are stored in stasis on board for faster activation from the captain's chair (now you know what all those buttons are for!) An android First Officer who suffers from MPD (fans of different eras of Star Trek wanted him to be like different "logical" characters from the series, so one moment he talks and acts like Spock, the next like Data.) Lasers are replaced with "Phasers," which penetrate reflective armor, but are prone to "overload" and violently explode.
I even wrote an element of the campaign where they actually encounter a "Klingon" opponent, but the one party that lived long enough to encounter them never even turned on the view screen. When they were detected by the ship's sensors, the conversation between me and the guy playing the Communication Officer went sort of like this:
"A red light starts blinking on your console."
"Does anybody else seem to have noticed."
"No, everybody else is too preoccupied"
"I ignore it then."
A few minutes later...
"The light has begun blinking again, faster this time."
"I unscrew it and pretend nothing is wrong." (Note: clearly an experienced Paranoia player, that one!)
Information wants to be anthropomorphized.
I like Paranoia, but I like it in much the same way I like HOL or Orkworld. Great read, fascinating ideas, but is it actually playable? The best summary of Paranoia's problems I've seen amounted to basically, "Paranoia feels too much like a private joke between the author of a given adventure and the gamemaster." To players things (notably death) seems a bit arbitrary. The jokes often aren't comprehensible if you don't have context that only the GM has. (The "disco" scene in Yellow Clearance Black Box Blues comes to mind).
If Paranoia is just social commentary and satire, well, that's and interesting read, but it's a basis for a game I play more than once. If it's about humor than the jokes need to be visible to everyone; I'm not going to play a game to amuse my GM. I think that the core game play of Paranoia is supposed to be about the struggle to survive in a bureaucratic nightmare, but that's not the feeling I've gotten from the games I've played. It's unfortunate, because it's such an appealing premise.
I see a lot of potential, but I've never seen it pay off in actual game play. Maybe I've just been unlucky and didn't have GMs up to the task (I've been in love with Shadowrun since the second edition, but only recently actually played in a game I enjoyed), but Paranoia seems like a fundamentally difficult game to get right. The only "famous" module I've played was YCBBB. YCBBB is is generally held to be one of the best modules for the game. What I saw wasn't terribly impressive and appeared to have a strong "private joke between the author and the GM" element. (To be fair, given that the players weren't haven't alot of fun, we stopped playing after only a few sessions.)
So, is the accusation that Paranoia is a private job between the creators and the GM fair? Is there any truth too it? Is Paranoia fundamentally an extremely difficult game to run? Are you changing anything to address these concerns (including possibly working to clarify incorrect perceptions)? What do you feel is the key attraction to playing for players?
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Suddenly, all my blood is running out of me
I'm not half the vamp I used to be
'Cause you believe in Diablerie
How much did you drink? I don't know, I couldn't say
But I think it's much more than I drank all yesterday...
"Linux doesn't exist. Everyone knows Linux is an unlicensed version of Unix"- Kieren O'Shaughnessy
Sorry, I'm not familiar with that one.
When did it come out? I stopped playing RPGs some time around 1989 or so. Maybe a little earlier.
Phiwum's law: anyone that names an obvious law after himself and then puts it in his own sig is just pathetic.
Those lyrics were written by Warren Spector, my collaborator on the early Paranoia adventure Send in the Clones. Truth! Warren has since become a well-known producer of computer games, including Deus Ex, and runs the game studio Ion Storm Austin.
If you want a game to just read rather than play, the highest honors go to Macho Women With Guns.
Information wants to be anthropomorphized.
Panting and sweating as you run down my corridors.
I remember the days when I was in college at the University at Buffalo and a member of their gaming club. I learned to play Paranoia by signing up for their LARP version of Paranoia. It's a lot more fun with evil props and no rules. Challenges were arbitrated with the use of old land cards from Magic: The Gathering. If you drew a color that was lower than your security clearance, you won the challenge. Of course the "computer" would always stack the deck against you...
I think this is the URL for the club web page: http://wings.buffalo.edu/sa/sarpa
--The Programming goddess from Gorflaz
if you want "No More Hiroshimas" then I say "You First. No More Pearl Harbors."
Yeah, it's a great website. I'm a member of it and I enjoy beeing there.
does Friend Computer run? Is it Open Source? Is it based on code from Windows or Linux or MacOS or...
OK, I'll be heading to the nearest termination center. Though, ahem, could you give me the address of said center, or is it also classified above my security clearance? Nevermind, I didn't ask this quest<PROCESS TERMINATED>
-- Faré @ TUNES.org
Reflection & Cybernet
o/~ Join us now and share the software
In 1991 West End published a book named Extreme Paranoia: Nobody Knows the Trouble Ive Shot that is set in the Paranoia universe. It is hilarious, and I highly recommend it.
Check out Chad's News
That information is restricted, citizen. Knowledge of restricted information is prohibited. Please report to the liquidation vats. Have a nice day!
You must think in Russian.
I have most of the set sitting on the shelf beside me (the binding was terrible though). I loved the gameplay that emphasized fun over rules. In one campaign, the R&D folks distributed "powerful weapons" to us instead of lasers. One person got a vacuum cleaner, another a toaster, ect. Turns out, the vacuum cleaner shot homing lightning. Of course, you had to plug it in somewhere, and there haven't been power outlets in Alpha complex forever. :)
I just opened the box.
Second Edition, Acute Paranoia, Crash Course Manual, and "The computer always shoots twice."
Fun reading, even more fun to play.
www.voiceofthehive.com - Beekeeping and Honeybees for those who don't.
I seem to remember that there was a game available for the MajorBBS (by Galacticomm) that was a Paranoia ripoff, and if so, you could have tons of people playing at once.
Maybe I'm misremembering and it was just a TRS-80 game....
If anyone can help, it would be much appreciated.
(Fry) "I'm not so sure I--"
(booth) "Slow and Painful. Thank you, have a nice day."
(Bender) "Bring it on!"
(Fry) "Aaaaaah!"
With apologies to Matt Groening. That really was the greatest space opera ever (Star trek, of course, being prophecy). =)
"A witty saying proves nothing." ~Voltaire
"d'Oh!" ~Homer
tenths of books
Tenths? Did you do halvsies on everything?
Obviously George found an old copy of the RPG on his desk and mistook it for The Presidential Handbook.
You know, Earnest?
BTW - what ever happened to him?
There are 01 types of people in this world. Those that understand binary, and me.
Now this game was a blast from the past. I remember spending a ton of hours with friends playing Paranoia and Junta. Do you think they'll add /. as a secret society within the Paranoia Universe?
A great RPG that can keep a GM entertained for hours on end. Entertaining the players, however, is an entirely different matter.
Happiness is relative, Based upon the way we live.
Oh my God! I used to play that! I loved it! I've been trying to remember it for a while now... Mmmmm I wish my friend could impliment this on his BBS. But it's a Synchronet BBS set up to look like MajorBBS and well... I can't code.
Very different kind of game that TORG, I wouldn't say that comparing it and Paranoia is exactly comparing apples to apples. Torg was more or less serious (in an absurd sci-fi sort of way) where as Paranoia ranges from subtle satire (subtle like a hammer to the junk) to toilet humor (and it always gets there eventually)
I played Torg a few times, it had a similar combat system to Paranoia (healthy, wounded, or dead instead of HP) but players had cards that they could use to change the rules or affect the story. Some types of cards would gain bonus points if played (and the type that gained the bonus would change periodicaly) It was a cool idea really, say the party was stumped with a puzzle or trap or something, one of them might have a card that lets them call on an old friend for help. Or one player may have a card that causes another player to gain a love interest or nemesis, stuff like that. Interesting game, I liked Paranoia better personally.
On Wall Street they say "buy low, sell high" On the pad we say, "buy high, sell high" Isn't that somehow better?
I love Paranoia, but I thought the weakest point of the game (and perhaps a bigger detterent to gameplay than I thought) was the art. I really, really don't like Jim Holloway, for some reason.
So who's going to be slapping the chrome on this edition?
Will there ever be a new edition of Globbo?
I was recently leafing though some of my Dragon Magazines from the mid-80's and this game is often mentioned. Paranoia seemed like a fantastically humorous game. It will be nice to see what this iteration will bring.
Paranoia was one of the few RPGs we played in college (this is 1989-92) where pretty much everyone was happy. With AD&D, Mechwarrior, Battletech, Shadowrun and even Warhammer 40K we always had one or two disgruntled people. With Paranoia people literally fought to get into our games. The whole secret society angle by itself was priceless.
Pedro
----
The Insomniac Coder
holy COW!
this was the end-all be-all of bbs games, next to galactic empire. frenzied macro-firing!
ZAP A_Commie
ZAP A_Commie
YEEEHAAA!
anyone here use micro*LINE's majorBBS?
As the only white clearance troubleshooter of the bunch, you are all in direct violation of your security clearance by reading this white backgrounded forum!
Computer, I request immediate authority for summary execution of all fellow forum readers! I'll fill out the termination vouchers in triplicate later.
Damn I love Paranoia!
- OrbNobz
Here's a question I'd like to see answered-- what steps are you taking to make sure it won't suck as badly as Mongoose's d20 "updated version" of Macho Women With Guns?
I don't know about the rest of you, but I'm still cheezed off that DISNEY owns paranoia.com. Any of you that are old enough to remember what used to be on paranoia.com should get a chuckle :)
It seems all the paranoia games I've played in have lead to charges of treason even before getting to the mission briefing. Its a gag game, and as long as you take down your fellow citizen, who cares if you get vaporized as well? Is there going to be an attempt to address this problem, or are the people we play with just curs?
The Friend Computer gives you a mission to kill a Commie Mutant Traitor in the form of one of the programmers with UV clearance(The player chars are nowhere near that, of course), and remains secluded in his UV clearance sector manse. When the characters eventually talk to the programmer, they find out that the computer has really been reprogrammed by Commie Mutant Traitors(And he has real proof that there has really been tampering, and that he's not responsible). The characters must reprogram the computer to fix the problem. Have fun =)
Or when you let all the players have Machine Empathy.... Because the computer has recently been upgraded to a biocomputer....
If anyone else is up for some truly pointless fun, you can get the binary here
tenths of books, eh?
so you and your brother played a lot of Synnibar?
Darth --
Nil Mortifi, Sine Lucre
For example, if you are a group of high school seniors, invite a freshman kid over to play. He will try way too hard, and will be way gullible. If he's not, then congratulations, you actually found one worth keeping.
Always make sure that nobody knows more than one other person present (excluding gamemaster).
It's a lot easier to fear the unknown.
Always take each individual aside and assure them that you are on THEIR side against everyone else.
Everyone wants to feel special
ABOVE ALL ELSE: Don't forget the tactical nuclear hand greandes.
Boom ---- Yeah, way cool about the continuation of this game. This literally made growing up bearable. Reading and grocking paranoia makes it a lot easier to understand the world, and try to keep going. BTW, anyone ever read the six part comic series? Beautiful work, I miss my copies.
HaXXXor.com - Naked Chicks Teach You How To Ha
ALLENVA-R-NEY, you have displayed knowledge of the location of the ultraviolet citizen-programmer WarrenSpector. This information is far above your security level. Please send your head and all contents to the Traitor Re-Education And Termination Services (TREATS). Please dispose of the rest of your body in a conveniently located recepticle for recycling. Don't forget to fill out form ZZa23766195 Stroke 12 so that your replacement clone is appraised of your traitorous thoughts.
No boom today. Boom tomorrow. There's always a boom tomorrow. - Cmdr. Susan Ivanova
If you liked how Paranoia encouraged fun over simply following the rules, then you may also like "Hunter Planet" - The Australian role playing game.
t ml
Hunter Planet was set somewhere in the future after the Earth had been discovered by the FOP (Federation of Planets) (not *that* Federation) and sold to an alien safari tours company.
The character classes are completely open, limited only by the player's imagination - anything alien is fine. Back on their home world most characters are shop assistants or salesmen, etc, and are expecting an "exciting" safari tour on this primitive world, called "Dirt" by the natives.
I used to love stumping the players with difficult "puzzles", such as how to open a human door...
"The wall has a rectangular recessed section, with a raised outline, approximately 2 metres high and 1 metre wide. There is a round protuberance about 1 meter high on its left hand side. What do you do?"
(I walk/roll/hover through the "door")
"You bump into it. It doesn't open."
(I push on it)
"Nothing happens"
(I pull)
"Nothing happens"
(I twist the knob)
"Which way?"
(Left)
"Nothing happens"
(Right)
"It turns. Nothing else happens"
(I twist the knob right, and push)
"It turns. Nothing else happens"
(Argh!! I shoot it!)
"What blaster setting, 1 to 5..."
(1)
"There is now a small smoking patch on the recessed panel's surface"
(5)
"OK, the blaster starts to hum slightly, more, and more, until it reaches a deafening pitch, growing uncomfortably hot to hold, and glowing slightly. Do you pull the trigger?..."
Mayem ensues.
http://www.freewebs.com/ariel_archives/Hunter.h
Sadly, it is _long_ out of print...
- The computer is your friend
Basically, every player starts out with 6 clones, a couple of mutant abilities and membership in a small handful of secret societies.The computer is your only friend
Trust the computer
Trust only the computer,
and remember: in all likelihood the computer wants you DEAD
You (usually) start at one of the lowest security ranges (InfraRed) and your goal is to climb to the highest security range (Ultraviolet -> programmer) -- mostly by fixing the damage done by secret societies, commies and mutants.
Oh, and did I mention that exposure of either your mutant abilities or your secret society membership is cause for instant termination??
In any case, my favorite mission occured with a couple dozen of us playing at a science-fiction convention (Orycon, if I remember corectly). Within 45 minutes we had about 8 dead and another dozen or so seriously wounded.
We hadn't made it out of the briefing room.
Free Software: Like love, it grows best when given away.
our Friendly Computer Overlord..
That sounds like Commie talk, bub. Let's see some identification.
Atario
Clearance level: plaid
"A great democracy must be progressive or it will soon cease to be a great democracy." --Theodore Roosevelt
I think they've finally gone overboard with that lameness filter
Irritable, left-wing and possibly humorous bumper stickers and t-shirts
I've always wanted to run a Red Level Trouble Shooter accidentally warped into DND. He'd kiss the ass of the low-level clerics (dressed in white) and treat the high-level mages/clerics (in black) like dirt. Naturally, he'd be afraid to go outdoors as the "ceiling" would be blue, far above his own clearance. The possibilities for creative misunderstanding and basic loose cannon exploits are endless. Of course, you need a GM that's both willing and able to handle the consequences...
Good, inexpensive web hosting
I just want to add my voice to the chorus praising PARANOIA. I've been a hardcore RPG player/writer/master for years (I even got paid for DMing games for 2 years). I'm now out of the "scene" but PARANOIA is the only rulebook I still read from times to times, just for fun. It's the best RPG I've ever played. Period.
Good work Allen and company, I'm glad another publisher continued the work after WEG.
All Hail Discordia. Hail Eris. Fnord.
Paranoia is the only game where it's fun to be the GM. You really get to flex those "thinking up new and interesting ways to kill someone" parts of your brain.
I have been volunteered and told to report to the service of Friend Computer, however I cannot seem to find the place I am to report to.
Where around here might one find a place to serve Friend Computer? The commie mutant traitors and their terrorist threats must be delt with!
Just thought I would bring something to the attention of anyone interested in playing Paranoia over the net.
Paranoia-Live is a site dedicated to organizing and carrying out games of Paranoia over the internet, using a neat li'l Java app known amazingly enough as JParanoia.
HOL! Oh my god, I thought I was the only one who ever heard about that game. :)
All Hail Discordia. Hail Eris. Fnord.
Don't get me wrong, I LOVED Paranoia.. well reading the sourcebooks, that is. I found playing it paled in comparison. It was fun, but the lack of structure makes it hard to really play, imho. And I'm used to non-structured play. I often was the GM for my little RPG crew, and most of my adventures were totally ad-libed. I once based an entire adventure around a small metal ball that the player find. There's a button on it, and when you press it, the ball becomes 300lbs heavier. I had absolutely no background thought up or anything.. the party just assumed they'd get in trouble if anyone saw them with this ball, so naturally hijinx ensued as they they tried to carry this around and hide it.
It's just too easy to go off the deep end with Paranoia, to the point where you're not even really playing a game anymore and it's more like improv comedy or something. And your friends aren't professional comedians; no matter how funny you find their antics it's hard for even professionals to do improv for more than 15-30 minutes.
1. One of my players realizing the full, evil power of his role as Hygene Officer, in a roomfull of "Real Role Players". He brought along some old bottles of cologne, Listerine, and, soap for the washing of commie, mutant traitors. The poor bastards even went along with it.
...and the side-effects that happen when you take 'em all at the same time.
2. A paranoia mission known as "Whitewash", wherein players were tasked with painting an Ultraviolet-clearance hallway Black. A Code-7 masterpiece, it was fully capable of killing dozens of clones with literally no prompting on the part of the GM.
Experienced players don't even bother with that one.
3. Telescopalmine. Visomorpain. Rolactin.
4. Invisible Commies, sub-bots and Plaid-clearance rooms in "Alpha Complexities".
5. The sheer, character destroying joy of "Me and My Shadow", in which characters are tasked with guarding a Mark IV Continental Siege machine.
Anyone remember the simple joy of "A Piece Falls Off"?
-- I wanna decide who lives and who dies - Crow T. Robot, MST3K
I guess I have two questions:
Will you be at GenCon Indy, and how do I get in the game?
Fella-O-Fish
Viv
Gmail invites for ip
Since we are on the subject of more obscure games--does anyone remember the game Tales from the Floating Vagabond?
links are
here
and
here
I loved it, but haven't seen it. If I can find a copy, I would love to buy it. Like paranoia, the rules are purposely vague.
"We don't know what we are doing, but we are doing it very carefully,..." Wherry, R.J. Personnel Psychology (1995)
Oh,no, at least one hollywood type found it. They made it into Soldier
I thought the book came from Microsoft Press
@ in the only Paranoia game i experienced, i was given the Test, the one where they ask questions like "What would you do if the computer was wrong?". Quickly i asked the computer if it was treasonous to suggest that the computer could be wrong, it said "Yes". So i killed the much higher ranking test administrator, and for the rest of the session, the computer liked me! i lost 3 clones, about one per hour.... One was when someone had a laser that could change its color, ROYGBIV. Stupidly i said, "Oh like a rainbow." @ Does anyone know if it is d20 based?
Utilizing the synergization of benchmark e-solutions to pre-workaround action items!
2004-02-19 17:18:50 Paranoia RPG to come back as Paranoia XP (articles,games) (rejected)
Yeah, I'm bitter. Blow me slashdot!
What is all this talk of termination centers? The computer is your friend. There are no termination ceters. There are only reeducation (and potein retrieval) centers.
Within the first 30 minuets 2 players were already down 3 clones apiece
I had no idea there was so much dancing in early 80's games. It obviously took its toll.
No, really. He is.
So is Aaron Allston.
Horrible people, for decades.
You should ignore them.
The Computer Is Your Friend.
(And Teenagers From Outer Space should be reissued.)
There was talk of the cabal that ran the NanCon sessions of WEG releasing a NanCon collection. Sadly, that died out, and we ended up with Crash Course Manual and its ilk. I still have fond memories of the awards ceremonies at the end of the con when the Paranoia GMs would come in singing the Alpha Complex Fight Song, disrupting EVERYTHING ELSE. Totally rocked...
"Stupid! Stupid stupid stupid stupid! I touched the hot wire right there - I'm an idiot!"
"If anyone has ideas for making a conventional campaign fun and interesting, I'm listening."
"Virtual" clones - the clones are instantiated as avatars inside the computer, to hunt down rogue software (a perception adjustment may be required) elements. Of course this knowledge is above the clones clearance. Guns don't work, though I ams ure there are a lot of other ways to die (well >dev/null)
The Singularity is closer than you think
Quant
Gotta kill 20 seconds for
this otta do the trick...
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Thank you for your input, citizen. And thank you for volunteering for our pilot program. Please report to the appropriate Soylent Vat for your clearence level.
I have misplaced my pants.
I never got to play the game, but I did come across a comic book series containing 6 issues. I was quickly hooked and had to own all of them. I love the story and the premise. The scary thing is how well it parallels real life. It doesn't seem like such a stretch to imagine life in America mirroring this fictional world someday. Hell, they have our whole society completely medicated today. I wouldn't be suprised to see a law that forces you to wear a robot that forces you to smile by pulling at the edges of your lips with little mechanical arms. It seems like our individuality is slowly being whiddled away in favor of society's (and therefore our own) best interest as determined by someone/thing our there. Frightening.
/. has an update when the new material comes out. I'd definitely like to check it out.
Hopefully
Weird that they'd compare it, they seem about as different in setting and style as any two games could be. That said, I really loved both of them. Oddly, just a few weeks ago I was thinking about some older games (specifically torg and paranoia) and wondering what ever became of them.
Everything will be taken away from you.
The expansion mission with the triplicate applications was the best. Be on the look out for small brown agents in trees talking into devices.
Every normal man must be tempted at times to spit upon his hands, hoist the black flag, and begin slitting throats.
Will the "MegaWhoops" have taken place or will there be some sort of significant historical revisionism? Cause friend computer was a whole lot funnier before that tragic tragic event.
Knowing the rules is Treason...
That aspect of the game was always both one of my favorite and most hated parts.
I liked it because it meant that players concentrate on simply playing. They don't calculate odds (they can't, since Paranoia gamemasters are encouraged to be arbitrary for the sake of humor). They are ignorant of possible outcomes. It helped the gameplay considerably, I thought.
On the other hand, it meant that I couldn't share much of the funniest part of the rules with my players. Sometimes very frustrating.
Phiwum's law: anyone that names an obvious law after himself and then puts it in his own sig is just pathetic.
The anti-power gamer game. Though I never saw the need for a second addition. Please keep the game near impossible to live through. The RPG world needs an overdose of extreme reality every now and again.
I was thinking of the immortal words of Socrates, who said: "I drank what?" - Chris Knight (Val Kilmer)- Real Genius
The game dates from far back in the mists of time; it was originally adapted from a CYOA published in a magazine in 1977. It's a suprising amount of fun for something so small.
I use this to test new compilers and the such; it's a much more interesting variant on 'Hello, world!' (and not a lot more complicated).
File header follows:
* "SpaceGamer/FantasyGamer" magazine.
*
* Article by Sam Shirley.
* Implemented in C on Vax 11/780 under UNIX by Tim Lister
*
* This is a public domain adventure and may not be sold for profit
*
* $Source:
* $Author: tjcoppet $
*
*/
Ooops...
:-(
s/tenths/tens/
I was about to post it when I decided to erase the "hundreds" I had written for another thing. And them, I mistakenly decimated all the collection.
Paranoia: Like Logan's Run crossed with a Microsoft Ad.
(At least I think I remembered the wording correctly)
My favorite Paranoia experience involved the GM running a Call of Cthulhu game simultaneously and not telling us until afterwards.
"Computer" was apparently an ancient translation of "Chorazos", and all the secret societies were just variant cults.
Looks like we got slashdotted!
The site has been moved to a new host, we're waiting for the DNS records to catch up:
http://205.243.144.237/~paranoia/news.php
"PARANOIA II: Electric Boogaloo." ...I'll just go activate my next clone.
Seriously, I like "PARANOIA: Rebooted," which was suggested by an AC in another post. Or "PARANOIA Prime," because I'm a math geek. In the end, however, I'll buy it no matter what you call it, because I'm an RPG geek, too. (And then I'll complain about the rules differing from WEG's quirktastic mechanics, because I'm a glutton for punishment.) Please do keep the updates frequent.
-Carolyn
Like Daddy always said: if you can't dazzle 'em with brilliance, baffle 'em with bullshit.
I play with an experienced LARP troupe and oddly enough we were discussing a Paranoia LARP just a couple weeks ago. Is there any chance that you'll release Paranoia as a LARP? Do you need Alpha Testers? ;-)
Get a life, not a lifestyle. - Hikem Bey
is the lack of rules. Or rather, even a moderately skilled GM can run the game with a bare minimum of the annoying formalisms needed for most other RPG's. The group I played with cut even the minimal 2nd ed. rules down to just the bare nub--6 clones, you have a security clearance, and treason is treasonous. Is the new addition going to be just as unencumbered?
There was some downtime at a small SF convention so I started a Paranoia game. Four minutes of prep to make a cartoon doodle of each PC plus a list of what was in the pockets.
Six player with six clones each: they barely got out of the barracks. (Good thing, limited how much I had to create on the fly.) People still talk about The Tympani of Doom (to which they were all leashed).
Wish my first edition + copy of Yellow Clearance Black Box Blues hadn't been stolen. Probably worth something today.
I know this was aimed at Allen but I'll answer for myself. Hell yeah I'm going to be at GenCon. I was actually thinking of running a few Paranoia events. Even if I don't run a couple I'm sure I'll participate in some.
Hope to see you there!
Sapere aude!