Amber Diceless RPG
The Amber Diceless RPG (Amber or ADRPG for short) is a game with a different approach to rules and to roleplaying in general. Based on the Chronicles of Amber, a series of books by Roger Zelazny, the game assumes a passing familiarity with the Amber universe and cosmology.
Zelazny's books provide you with plenty of glimpses and conjectures as to what is behind the scenes and you are left to answer the many unanswered and unsolved mysteries in your own campaign. Detailed setting is simply not needed as the world of Amber is a world of infinite possibilities and alternate pathways, with characters being able to shift and shape reality as they wish. This puts a lot of freedom of creation in the hands of the players themselves allowing them to mould their vision of Amber.
The ADRPG does not therefore provide you with a body of fact, instead, it provides you with a wealth of material, including conjectures on possible conspiracies and secret alliances, alternate interpretations of events from the novels and various musings of a more cosmic nature. This approach is also used with the main protagonists from the novels, which get not one but three distinct sets of statistics and powers, depending on the game master’s vision of that character’s abilities, motives and overall power-level.
Whereas most games give you a fact book, the ADRPG gives you a tool kit – and a very good one.
The ADRPG was originally written by Erick Wujcik and published in 1991 by Phage Press (ISBN: 1-880494-00-0). The rights to the game have subsequently been purchased by Diceless by Design who have promised a 2nd Edition release of this wonderful RPG.
While the Amber Diceless Role Playing Game is currently out of print, there are often copies available from Ebay or Amazon. PDF copies can be purchased from DriveThroughRPG. That said, the rules are relatively straight forward and you won't really need the DRPG unless you're interested in the finer details.
Conventions: The AmberConUK gaming convention is held annually, usually in July, in Reading and is a must for anyone wanting to join in in some exceptionally good Amber Roleplay. Other cons are held worldwide and information about them can be found at AmberCons.
While Amber DRPG is a relatively rules light gaming system, there are a number of 'alternate' power summaries available, many of which are very useful in defining the capabilities of a power. This can be especially useful to players who have not player in an Amber game before and are considering where they can 'stretch their legs'.