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Amar - the realistic, simple and community-driven Role-Playing Game

Quick introduction
What is a Role-Playing Game?
Some people sit around a table with their player character described on a sheet of paper in front of them. The Game Master (GM) sits at the end of the table hiding his secrets behind a cardboard screen. The GM tells the players what their characters see and what they meet. The players respond by saying what their character does. Whenever there is a chance of failure, a dice is rolled to see if the character is successful in that task. The players usually play only one character each. The GM plays every non-player character (NPC) the player characters (PCs) meet. Small metal miniatures are sometimes used to represent the PCs and NPCs, especially to help track combat situations.
What is the Amar RPG?
Amar is two things: a) A realistic rule system that guides the GM and players in the game. The rules makes it possible to easily determine if a risky task like attacking the troll under the bridge is successful. And b) Amar is a fantasy world where the game play takes place. This site covers the rules of the game as well as information about the Amar fantasy world.

This is the site of the Amar RPG - the simple yet realistic Role-Playing Game. The game is the result of more than 35 years of development and play testing. Its forerunner, The Mega Role-Playing System (Fantasy Edition) was published in the UK in 1987 and aimed to be the most realistic RPG. The target audience was seasoned RPG players. An RPG simulating real life was bound to be quite complicated and thus cumbersome. The developers (Geir Isene and Bent Brakas) decided to cut down and simplify the rule system.

While still maintaining a high degree of realism, the rules were simplified and simplified and simplified. Until the rules themselves were only a small fraction of Mega. The system is now one of the simplest yet most realistic. The Amar RPG uses only a 6 sided dice (d6) for determining outcomes of risky events. It is easily learned by the Game Master in an evening. The players catch on in an hour or two. No sweat. Just pure role-playing fun.

Introductory Podcast

Here is a podcast that will give you a 20 minute introduction to the creativity, fun and excitement of Role-Playing Games in general and the Amar RPG in particular: What are Role-Playing Games?

Amar Lite

If you would like a dead simple game system to get introduced to role-playing, try the one-page system, Amar Lite. You can use this together with The first Amar Lite adventure as a one-off evening game or use the system for a campaign with very young or beginner players. It offers one of the simplest systems around while maintaining realism. Here is the podcast introducing the Amar Lite RPG.

Amar RPG and the Kingdom of Amar

This wiki gives you the complete game system as well as information on the Kingdom of Amar. As a Game Master, you will also find the Amar Tools helpful.

To help you understand the rules better, our contributor, Katageek, has written a story that exemplifies the rules in a simple way: Amar rules 101.

The Amar RPG follows a very simple system for everything a character does. The character has a value in a skill, such as "Climb", adds the result of a dice roll to match a certain Difficulty Rating for climbing that wall, tree or obstacle. The Difficulty Ratings (DRs) are given by the rules system. The character increases in skill values as he or she gets more experience or training in that skill. With higher skill values comes the opportunity to best more difficult DRs. Amar RPG uses a special dice roll called an "open ended dice roll". When you get a 6, you throw the dice again and again, adding one to the total as long as you get a 4 or higher. When you throw a 3 or lower, the "open ended dice roll" stops. When you get a 1 on the initial roll, you throw the dice again and again subtracting one from the total as long as you get a 3 or lower and stop rolling if you get a 4 or higher. By using such an "open ended dice roll", even the most skillfull characters can mess up and the unskilled peasant can get that lucky strike.

The Amar RPG Rules

• Introduction – an introduction to role-playing and the Amar RPG.
• The Character – rules covering character generation, attributes, skills and the experience system.
• Combat – rules covering melee and missile weapons, armour and … combat.
• Equipment – all kinds of goods and equipment as well as salaries for various professions.
• Magick – rules covering magick and all the various spells.
• Movement and Weather – rules covering movement in different terrains and weather conditions.
• Encounters – description of humanoids and monsters.

The Kingdom of Amar

• The Rise to Infamy – a short story giving the background to Amar.
• Mythology – the creation of the world, current religions and the calendar.
• The World - information about the world in which the Kingdom of Amar resides.
• The Kingdom of Amar – an introduction to the Kingdom of Amar.

Resources for the Game Master

• Character Sheet (Character Sheet w/Magick)
• Advice to the GM – tips for new GMs.
• Podcast: The value of improvisation in Role-Playing Games
• The First Adventure – to get a fresh GM started.
• Amar Tools - online generator for encounters, NPCs, Villages/Cities/Towns, residents relations, weather and more.
• Compacting information - Adventure descriptions to the point - create information with no bloat.
• Conversion from other RPGs - Convert characters and monster from other RPGs (Runequest, AD&D, Pathfinder...)
• Image Library – lots of graphics, floor plans, etc. Free for personal use.
• Other Resources - links to external resources (adventures, graphics, dice etc.)
• Universal Amar - Amar RPG system in other settings; pirate, modern, sci-fi, etc. (with guns and laser weapons)
• Great ambient sounds for your gaming sessions.
• Inspirational music for the Amar RPG.

To get you into the right Amar mood, listen to Derek and Brandon Fiechter's music on Youtube:

To create your own Amar RPG book, click Create a book at the bottom of the menu to the right and collect the pages you want in the book.

Contact Geir Isene (g@isene.com) to register as a user and contribute to this wiki. You will receive an e-mail with basic information on how to correct errors in the text, add new skills, spells or rituals, potions or magical items or new creatures.

Latest announcements

• 2024-09: Added the video "Hymn of Amar" and several minor edits
• 2023-11: Lots of artwork refreshed and updated
• 2021-11: Lots of artwork added (on all the God's and lots of scenery across the pages)