DIE: The Roleplaying Game
You’re trapped in a fantasy world stitched together from your obsessions, dreams and nightmares. What will you do to get home safe? What will you do to stay here forever?
WINNER: Best role-playing game core product, Origins Awards 2023.
DIE RPG is a roleplaying game based on the comic of the same name by Kieron Gillen and Stephanie Hans – and it too has been made by Kieron Gillen and Stephanie Hans! In DIE, you play a group of authentically flawed and desperate real-world people (Personas) who are sucked into a cursed roleplaying game and take on the form of heroes, villains and power players (Paragons).
Some of you might want to get back to the real world for whatever’s waiting for you there. Some of you might want to stay in a reality where you can finally get what you want out of life. You all have to agree whether you stay or go, and dead people can’t vote. It can get pretty bloody.
More than 400 pages of clever words and beautiful art are yours for the taking in this gorgeous PDF published by Rowan, Rook and Decard. Gillen’s original beta manuscript has been refined, polished, trimmed, tweaked and edited into one of the best games you’ll ever read.
What's in the book?
DIE RPG features:
- Six unique classes adapted from the pages of the comic
- More than 60 new full-colour illustrations from Stephanie Hans,
- Guest appearances from a range of illustrious comic artists including Tula Lotay, Abz Harding, Marguerite Sauvage, Elsa Charretier and Gene Ha, and writers including Adrian Tchaikovsky, Becky Annison, Cat Evans, Emily Allen, Tini Howard, and Sasha Sienna.
- Rules and advice for running DIE as a one-shot, a short campaign, or a grand epic
- A bestiary penned by RPG and comics luminaries that talks at length about not only the combat abilities of different monsters, but also their place games, literature and folklore
Charles Smalls –
DIE is a game that continues to surprise. It provides the framework for an introspective and provocative gaming experience like nothing else I’ve ever seen.
Wil –
DIE is the only RPG in which the players have decided that the best way to resolve a boss fight was to text the actual organiser of the convention at which we were playing, and have it confirmed that the behaviour of the Big Bad was a violation of the convention's safe spaces policy and they would be, at the very least, kicked out of the con.
The comic is wonderful and this isn't a normal tie-in product, this is the other half of the work. The two are in concert with one another in a way I'v…
DIE is the only RPG in which the players have decided that the best way to resolve a boss fight was to text the actual organiser of the convention at which we were playing, and have it confirmed that the behaviour of the Big Bad was a violation of the convention’s safe spaces policy and they would be, at the very least, kicked out of the con.
The comic is wonderful and this isn’t a normal tie-in product, this is the other half of the work. The two are in concert with one another in a way I’ve never seen before. Art.
matthewmaufe –
DIE is an incredibly fun system to play in and to run.
It's pretty low-crunch and has a strong narrative bias towards one kind of game: you're trapped in a fantasy world, with friends you've fallen out of touch with, and it's going to force you to confront the realities of your life.
Each class feels and plays quite differently, with fun unique abilities from level 1, and the game really encourages you to dig deep with roleplay and build interesting characters that flesh themselves out a…
DIE is an incredibly fun system to play in and to run.
It’s pretty low-crunch and has a strong narrative bias towards one kind of game: you’re trapped in a fantasy world, with friends you’ve fallen out of touch with, and it’s going to force you to confront the realities of your life.
Each class feels and plays quite differently, with fun unique abilities from level 1, and the game really encourages you to dig deep with roleplay and build interesting characters that flesh themselves out as you continue to play.
I’d say that my one criticism, which is really more of a warning than a problem with the system, is that it’s fairly rigid in the *kind* of game that you’ll play. You’ll enter DIE, confront your character’s failings and desires, and vote to stay or leave. The middle bits may change, but it’ll generally always follow that theme.
And within those bounds, it does a fantastic job – it’s just not as flexible as some other systems might be.
Admittedly, I haven’t done any campaign play with it (which it does support) and I suspect that that would enable more flexibility with it – looking forward to doing so one day.
Lowell Prevost –
Being a huge fan of the graphic novel, I always thought "man... A Die RPG would be so cool.." one day I walk into my LGS and what do I find that apparently just released?! After reading through the book I'm very excited to run DIE. It's a simple system with significant depth and lots of variation between classes. This game does not suffer from the sameness other fantasy RPGs are riddled with. I want to have a session zero soon, so I can sit down and take my time building an epic world around my …
Being a huge fan of the graphic novel, I always thought “man… A Die RPG would be so cool..” one day I walk into my LGS and what do I find that apparently just released?! After reading through the book I’m very excited to run DIE. It’s a simple system with significant depth and lots of variation between classes. This game does not suffer from the sameness other fantasy RPGs are riddled with. I want to have a session zero soon, so I can sit down and take my time building an epic world around my players personas. It’s also a beautiful product, fantastic art from the same Talent as the Graphic novels, thick pages, solid bound hardback. Definitely happy with my purchase.
Jason McCracken –
Ok ok, hear me out. This is pretty intense. I haven't had a chance to play this yet but I have played hundreds of different systems and games. I've GM'd professionally, personally, and for marketing. This is my passion. I have a knack for understanding how systems pan out. Die will pan out. There's a lot of opportunity here for very different types of games. Easy enough to pick up for the introductory GM with lots of guides and suggestions and tons of depth to take a game with an experienced GM …
Ok ok, hear me out. This is pretty intense. I haven’t had a chance to play this yet but I have played hundreds of different systems and games. I’ve GM’d professionally, personally, and for marketing. This is my passion. I have a knack for understanding how systems pan out. Die will pan out. There’s a lot of opportunity here for very different types of games. Easy enough to pick up for the introductory GM with lots of guides and suggestions and tons of depth to take a game with an experienced GM to the next level. Loved reading it, very excited to trick some personas into an adventure for my personal gain!