Time Lord (role-playing game)
tabletop role-playing game
Time Lord — Adventures through Time and Space is a Doctor Who role-playing game, written by Ian Marsh and Peter Darvill-Evans and published in 1991 by Virgin Publishing.
Gameplay
This game is totally unrelated to the previously released Doctor Who RPG by FASA, having different and simpler mechanics that often seemed arbitrary. For example, the companion Polly is a secretary yet according to her statistics, she can hardly read or write.
The system lacked any method for creating original player characters: it was suggested that the referee give the players a particular Doctor and his associated companions, or a group of Doctors. A later on-line supplement, "Timelord: Journeys", written by Nathaniel Torson, provided a system for creating original player characters. A variety of basic templates were provided ("The Soldier," "The Specialist," The Alien") and die roll ranges provided for determining attribute and skill values. Rules for purchasing alien abilities, generating random adventures, and using "Drama Points" to increase abilities and use Genre Tropes to simulate standard situations from the series were also provided.
The system revolves around the concept of "beating the difference" - Actions have a difficulty rating, from which the relevant attribute and skill is subtracted; the remaining number is the difference. Players roll two six-sided dice, and then take the difference of the two rolls; if that number is higher than the difference, the action is successful. The game includes many skills which are especially appropriate to the tone of Doctor Who, such as cheat death and macguffin.
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