I’ve come to think of my work on Alternacy as an attempt to solve a number of problems I’d encountered in other games. My basic goal was a game containing a detailed method of quantifying character traits married to a flexible means of handling action resolution. I wanted a comprehensive skill list that was still flexible and reasonably brief, thus Techniques and Custom Skills were born. My desire for a detailed assessment of character attributes led to a whopping sixteen Talents. The system for determining the advance and decline of skills, both at character creation and during play, allows for a wide variety of skill levels tied directly to character activity and ability rather than a standard experience/character point approach. The dice mechanic provides centralized results more often than extreme highs and lows, and the ref’s tools for rating the difficulty of attempted actions is based on perceived challenge, allowing for varying power levels unique to each referee. In a sense, Alternacy is my attempt to refine and advance upon the accomplishments of traditional gaming.
In my view, Alternacy is a moderately complex game. Character creation and advancement both require a fair bit of time and effort, but actual play moves rather quickly. It’s a universal system, meaning it can be used to play in any genre or setting. As already mentioned, it strives to give players a detailed assessment of their character’s abilities, but leaves the details of game events to the discretion of referees. It includes some steps towards a rules-light approach, but I think I’d still classify it as a more or less conventional system.
I'm not sure if I'll be doing any more work on Alternacy or if it's current form represents the final version. I'd like to adjust the wound system as it seems more cumbersome than I'd like, and I've thought about going through and cleaning up the writing, hunting a few typos and making things more clear. I'd still like to make a magic system for it, and have toyed with multi-game magic tools that would be suitable. I haven't worked on it for ages, though, so it's probably complete, or at least very close. At any rate it is certainly playable as is.
Alternacy is available for online reading, each of the links below leading to a chapter of the game. I hope you enjoy it.
Terms of Use/Copyright: Alternacy and Mnemonic, along with all other A-ZG material, are copyrighted works. Permission is granted to download and print the games for personal use. You're also free to spread them around your local gaming scene, at a game store or convention for example, though I would really appreciate it if you'd send me an email letting me know how that goes. Just make sure the copyright info and Alpha-Zulu Games web address are included with the text. If you're considering providing the games in an electronic format or as part of a printed product please contact me first for approval. Do not try to distribute them for profit; give them away, but don't sell them. And remember to share your feedback, via email to or at the Forum. These are free games, so that's the only payment I get!
Alternacy comes in a zipped folder that contains both .doc and .txt files. The .doc files include much nicer formatting, with the .txt versions present to make sure that pretty much anyone will have something compatible with whatever system and software they possess. You can save the files to your own computer by right-clicking on the link below. Note that the Alternacy files do NOT contain the game's charts. The folder has two .html files that summarize the game's charts, these can be printed from your browser (or viewed on your computer while playing). A simple character sheet is also provided.
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