Alternity Reality

For most when they think of pen and paper RPGs, the first they think of is the giant gorilla in the corner called Dungeons and Dragons. And rightly so. It is the pioneer for the industry, and a very good fantasy game to play when with friends. My brothers and I have done several campaigns and all of them memorable.

But for me, my RPG experience didn't start with D&D. It started with an old sci-fi game called Alternity.

The game was made by the company TSR (which was the company to invent the D&D we know today), but was discontinued shortly after creation. Which is a shame because it was an awesome game. It was true blood scifi space opera on paper. We really got into it because they actually released a setting for it based on the video game Starcraft. My brothers and I enthusiastically began creating our characters. We all had an idea of what memorable unit from the game we wanted to be. My friend Austin made a Protoss High Templar, with psionic power radiating from his cold eyes. My brother Jacob played a professional stealthy Terran Ghost, with his high powered canister rifle. James, my 2nd brother, was a devout Protoss Zealot, a soldier that would go into fits of blind rage, slaughtering any Zerg that stood in his way. And finally Jarom, my 3rd brother, played a Protoss Dark Templar, the invisible rogue, which evidentaly didnt have the luck-o-the dice on his side, as he couldnt stealth past anything.

All in all the game was full of win. But unfortunately shortly after we started playing it, we also stopped. We couldnt always get together as much as we wanted and plans fell through. My books began gathering dust on the shelf.

Nowadays, James Jarom and I get together weekly to play a game of D&D. We have been having fun with it, but are sort of getting bored with the generic fantasy setting. When we finish this campaign we might dabble back into the old scifi settings and pick up alternity again. I got so excited about it and looked back again at all the old books i had. Now with as much roleplaying experience i have under my belt, i notice a whole hell of a lot more about the old game than i ever did. Some rules that didnt make sense to me at all back then give the game a lot more sense and depth now.

So since i like to keep myself busy, i made a custom character sheet in Microsoft Publisher. The original character sheet is adequate, but doesnt have all the possibilities for a character, and
takes up too many pages. So i made a booklet.

PAGE 1

PAGE 2

PAGE 3
PAGE 4
PAGE 5

PAGE 6

Each page is printed on a 8.5 x 11 sheet. Page 1 and 2 are printed front and back, and page 3 and 4 are printed front and back. Page 5 is cut out and glued onto where its instructed on page 4, making a nice card pocket. When the the 2 pages are put together then folded over, it makes a 4 page booklet. The 6th page is just some reference cards you can make when you cut them out. I would used them to put down rules that apply to your character the most or keep track of gear. It helps with things on the go. Kind of like how D&D 4th edition uses the power and gear cards. Everything you need is on your character sheet, but having cards for that stuff makes it much easier.

Everything in this character booklet makes more sense when you are more familiar with the game Alternity.