Getting Started

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Chapter 1: Getting Started

Welcome to Tellus

Tellus is a disc-world with fractured continents and swirling seas, encircled by the roaring current of the Realstream. Cyrus burns across the sky by day, while Karos and Lunas cast their rival lights across the night. The gods dwell atop Empyria, ancient powers stir beneath the earth, and the World Engine turns of its own accord.

Across the ages, divine conflicts, fallen gods, cataclysms, and wizard-kings have carved their Legacies into the world. Their echoes remain in lost cities, hidden tombs, haunted battlefields, and shattered mountain chains. Nothing in Tellus is untouched by what came before.

Your story begins in Galtia, where the human duchies struggle to recover from elven invasion and plague. Thrones stand contested. Old alliances are strained. Ancient treasures wait to be claimed. Will you shape the fate of kingdoms, delve into the ruins of the First Ones, or earn gold and glory as a Freelancer?

The world is vast. The choices are yours.

What is Adventure's Edge?

Adventure’s Edge is a tabletop roleplaying game where players take on the roles of freelancers, relying on their wits, their character’s training, and the luck of the dice to brave dangerous lands, overcome formidable challenges, and defeat powerful foes. These are the Player Characters.

The Gamemaster describes the world and portrays all else who inhabit it, guiding the unfolding story through encounters, conflicts, and intrigue. Over time, characters grow from untested beginners into stalwart heroes through tactical combat, meaningful exploration, environmental hardship, and player-driven choices.

The world is magical, but physical laws still apply. Fatigue, morale, terrain, and light shape every journey. Preparation and strategy matter. What emerges from this structure is a dynamic, shared story created by everyone at the table.

Although Tellus is the default setting, the rules of Adventure’s Edge can be adapted to nearly any fantasy world you wish to use.

Why Adventure’s Edge?

Adventure's Edge Roleplaying is a modern D20, skill-driven fantasy roleplaying game about exploration, wonder, and hard-earned victories that brings back classic elements of the original roleplaying game. It was designed for players who want character complexity in a streamlined system and for gamemasters who want to run longform campaigns without the system breaking down at high levels. It is especially for those who want challenging play and meaningful choices, where danger remains real but not grim. It is a game of planning and not power fantasy.

Making characters in Adventure’s Edge gives you customization without restriction. The stats may be familiar, but they define your character in a truly unique way. You can choose from twelve different races including Humans, Dwarves, Elves, Fairies, Gnolls, Goblins, Ottrali, Trolls, and more, and all have special abilities and roleplaying styles. While each of the 18 classes grant specialized abilities, no character is locked into rigid progression trees. Anyone can learn to wield weapons, customize fighting styles, brew potions, develop adept powers, or cast spells. No one class is required in the party.

Adventure’s Edge balances depth with playability. The most complex part of the game is building your character. Once play begins, resolution is streamlined. Skill checks are consistent, sub-systems are limited, the action economy is static, and combat actions are resolved quickly. You won't find alignment, dark vision, clerics, feats, spell-slots, weapon damage dice or HP bloat. Dice rolls are active player only, combat has dynamic initiative, facing, reach, wounds, and minimal tables. What you will find are over 600 new spells, 100 adept powers and nearly as many combat maneuvers. The monster codex includes over 100 creatures and an extremely simple conversion process to use any D20 bestiary available. This allows gamemasters to readily use any material published over the last fifty years with minimal conversion issues.

There are no “Tiers of Play.” Characters grow in skill, influence, and capability, but the core action economy never changes. A sword remains dangerous. A misstep remains costly. Combat is decisive, and strategy matters at every level. Experience is earned by overcoming challenges, not simply defeating enemies, so the world remains logically consistent from first level to twentieth level. Adventure’s Edge sits left of center on the spectrum between realism and fantasy. Equipment choice and preparation matters, and you will see arming swords and chainmail hauberks alongside fireballs and dragons.

This is fantasy, reimagined.

What you need to play

• To play, you need a person to be the Gamemaster; this person will be responsible for organizing and preparing the game, and who should be the most familiar with the rules. The Gamemaster should read the Running the Game section thoroughly if it is their first game.
• You will need people to play the game; Adventure’s Edge can accommodate as many players who can sit around a table, but the ideal number is three to five, in addition to the Gamemaster.
• While only one copy of the rules is required, it would be useful to have a few copies for players to consult the rules in order to make characters and to use during play.
• Each player will need pencils and paper to complete their characters and to take notes during the game.
• Each player will need several six-sided and twenty-sided dice which they can find at most game stores.
• Players should also have a miniature to represent their character.
• The Gamemaster will need their own supplies, including miniatures for the creatures the characters will battle with, along with maps and other play aids discussed in the Running the Game chapter.

Getting Started

The best way for new players to start is to make a character. You will begin your journey with Chapter 2. Before you go, whether or not you have played any other roleplaying game, you should read through the common terms.

If you are brand new to roleplaying, you should read the Example of Play, then the Common Terms.

It would also be a good idea to read the Tellus Primer.

Time and Turns

Narrative Action, Intervals, and Action Rounds

In Adventure’s Edge, everything that goes on during a game happens either through narrative action, intervals, or in action rounds.

One of the strengths of table-top roleplaying is its use of narrative action. Narrative action occurs when the Gamemaster uses unstructured time, meaning time can be sped up or slowed down to fit the story telling. Players can perform long actions that can take hours, days, weeks or even years, and the Gamemaster can resolve those actions fluidly, passing time as needed.

An example of narrative action is when the party returns to the city after an adventure and they want to sell their loot, gather information, or rest and recuperate. Players can tell the Gamemaster what they want their characters to do. If the situation warrants roleplaying, the Gamemaster can roleplay out important interactions. If any checks are required, such as to gather information, players can roll those, and the Gamemaster can resolve each character’s actions in any order through dialogue. The Gamemaster can then summarize the actions of the day and move time to the next day to continue with the story.

Intervals are used during exploration; one interval represents 10-minutes of time. Intervals allow longer actions but still keeps time structured when tracking the passage of time is critical for tracking resources, spell durations, and chance encounters. When characters are exploring dungeons, they can perform exploration actions such as searching rooms, checking halls for traps, or resting, and each passing interval can potentially trigger location events. This is detailed further in the exploration section. 

Action rounds occur when the situation requires short, structured time. Action rounds are used when the characters are performing simultaneous actions that can be resolved in a very short time, from seconds to minutes. Action rounds are useful for certain actions such as investigation, infiltration, or exploration sequences, and most notably in combat sequences. The primary purpose of action rounds is to manage what characters can accomplish when time is a critical factor. Action rounds can be performed one turn at a time by each character, which is necessary in combat rounds. They can also be done in short sequences in non-combat situations

Action rounds are three seconds in length.

Combat rounds are action rounds that are resolved round by round sequentially. Each character only gets one round at a time due to the fast-paced and dynamic nature of battle. Combat rounds are detailed further in the Combat section.

Common Terms

These rules use terms that may be familiar to you; however, you should review them carefully if you have played similar games. If you are brand new, don’t be overwhelmed! Read this section to start learning the common terms, but don’t worry about memorizing any of these yet.

• Action: Everything your character does in the game uses an action, such as picking a lock, casting a spell, or attacking with a weapon.
• Adept Powers: Adept Powers are mystical abilities that allow characters to perform superhuman or heroic feats. Any character of any class can learn Adept Powers by gaining ranks and proficiencies in Discipline.
• Attack bonuses: Characters can have numerous types of attack bonuses, which include strength attacks, dexterity attacks, and spell attack bonuses. All attack bonuses are derived from a skill by dividing the character's skill ranks in half and adding a stat bonus.
• Averaging stats: Many character traits and skill bonuses are modified by averaging two stats or averaging two stat bonuses. Throughout the book this will be indicated by the stats in question separated by a “/”. For example, if you see “Strength/Dexterity”, that means average your Strength and Dexterity stat. If you see STR/DEX, that means average your Strength and Dexterity stat bonuses.
• Background Skills: Each character starts play with ten skills and proficiencies that represent their childhood and adolescence development. See Making a Character. 
• Check: A check is a d20 roll added to a skill total. Every action that your character performs in the game that is not an automatic success requires you to roll a check.
• Class: Classes represent a character’s profession and training. Each class also has some unique abilities that cannot be learned by other classes. Every character has one class, and though everyone can learn any skill or proficiency, it is not possible to “learn” another class.
• Class Skill: Each class has four skills which are the character’s class skills. A class skill is a skill that the character trained in extensively when learning their class. Each character will start off with five ranks in their class skills.
• Combined Action: In combat, all combatants get two actions each turn. However, there are some longer actions, called combined actions, that require both of a character's actions and their movement to complete.
• Complexity: Some tasks cannot be resolved by a single roll; this is due to the complexity of the task. A task with a Difficulty of 15 and Complexity of 3 requires three skill checks of 15 or greater to succeed. 
• Defense Bonus (DB): All creatures in the game have a Defense Bonus. This bonus represents how hard it is to hit a creature in combat. As with other bonuses, higher is better. A creature’s default Defense Bonus is their Dexterity stat plus their Armor damage resistance. It increases with shields, magic, or special maneuvers.
• Dice: Adventure’s Edge uses two standard polyhedral dice including the 6-sided and 20-sided dice. If possible, each player should have three or more of each one. The game uses a standard convention for rolling dice and adding modifiers; for example, whenever the rules say roll 1d6+3, this means roll a 6-sided die and add 3 to the die roll.
• Difficulty Level (DL): Whenever a character or creature attempts to perform an action where success is not guaranteed, the difficulty of that action is assigned a target number by the GM. This is the total needed to succeed by combining the roll plus the appropriate skill bonus.

Action Difficulty Level (DL)
Difficulty Level	Description
Easy (5)	An easy task that even a novice can accomplish most of the time.  A character with 1 rank and no stat bonus succeeds on a 4 or greater (80%).
Average (10)	A basic task that requires nominal skill to succeed most of the time.  A character with 4 ranks and a stat bonus of +1 succeeds on a 5 or greater (75%).
Skilled (15)	A more complex task, something you would expect a journeyman to succeed on most of the time. A character with 6 ranks, and a stat bonus of +1 will succeed on an 8 or greater (60%).
Professional (20)	A challenging task that you would expect a professional to succeed on most of the time.  A character with 10 ranks and +2 stat will succeed on an 8 or greater (60%)
Master (25)	A difficult task for a very skilled character. A character with 15 ranks and a +2 stat will succeed on an 8 or greater (60%)

• Dodge Bonus: In combat it is assumed that combatants are continually dodging blows. The dodge bonus represents an active combat defense that adds to the Defense Bonus. Dodging an attack requires the use of a reaction. The dodge bonus is equal to 1/2 ranks in Athletics. For every 5 ranks in athletics, a character can dodge one additional attack as part of the same reaction (e.g., a character with 5 athletics ranks could dodge two attacks, and at 10 ranks, three attacks.) Additionally, characters can use dodge to dive for cover, or to dive out of the way of an explosive blast. If caught at the edge of a blast, and where either moving five feet would get them out of the blast, or if the character has enough protective cover that they can get under or behind it, a character can use dodge in conjunction with moving one space as a reaction, which results in them being prone in the adjacent space or under the appropriate cover.
• Edge: Any time your character rolls a check, there may be conditions that modify the result favorably or unfavorably – this is referred to as gaining or losing Edge. If your character gains an Edge, this means you roll two d20’s and select the higher value and add your bonus to it. It is possible to gain or lose several dice worth of Edge. For example, if you were to gain three Edge, that means you start with your initial d20, and gain three more, thus rolling four times and taking the highest value. Conversely, if you were to lose 2 Edge, you would roll three dice and take the lowest value. In most cases your character will not lose or gain more than one or two Edge, but situations can arise which result in any number of Edge modifiers, meaning there is no set limit to how much Edge you can gain or lose on a roll.
• Gamemaster: The Gamemaster is the person who “runs” the game, acting as the arbitrator and storyteller, portraying the game world to the players.
• Health Points (HP): Health Points are an abstract representation of a character’s ability to sustain injury or wounds. Health Points are detailed further in the Combat section. Health Points are not tied to race or level. Each character has a starting value equal to their Constitution stat. Characters gain more Health Points by purchasing two separate proficiencies under the conditioning skill. It is possible to be a very high-level character and never increase beyond your starting Health Points. HP is one of the two primary resources that a player must track for their character. 
• Initiative: Initiative is rolled once at the beginning of each round of combat to determine which combatant goes first. Initiative order goes clockwise from the starting character. For virtual games, characters should have a preset order in the initiative tracker which will not change. A character’s initiative bonus is his Dexterity stat bonus plus Wisdom stats bonus.
• Languages: Languages are proficiencies in Linguistics skill. Each language proficiency represents a language that a character can read and write. Characters automatically start off knowing two languages, and they can use background proficiencies to start with more. It is assumed that characters are literate in their spoken languages. If a character wishes to be illiterate for roleplaying purposes, they can choose to be so, and they could “learn” to read through the course of play via roleplaying instead of applying a mechanical limitation.
• Level: A level, or character level, is a value that represents a character’s relative skill and power. Characters start off at level 1 and increase their levels through play. Characters gain ten skill points and five proficiencies when they level up, along with certain class abilities and intermittent stat increases. There is no “max level”.
• Magic: Magic is the magical reserve that spell casters use to cast spells. Each spell costs a point of magic to cast. Starting magic is equal to the intelligence stat. 
• Mishap: When performing a skill check, if a character rolls a 1 on the d20, and if the total result fails by 5 or more, the character suffers a Mishap. Mishaps vary by skill and the result of a mishap must be determined by the Gamemaster. The character could trip and fall if performing a physical maneuver, burn their food if cooking, ruin a crafting item, or even inflict personal injury commensurate with the riskiness of their action. Mishaps in combat are covered in the Combat section.
• Nonplayer Character (NPC): Nonplayer characters are characters created or run by the Gamemaster. NPCs are the characters that player characters interact with in the world.
• Parry Bonus: In melee combat it is assumed that combatants are continually dodging and parrying blows. The parry bonus represents a combat defense against one attacker. Parrying an attack requires the use of a reaction. The parry bonus is calculating by adding 1/2 a character's ranks in combat to their Defense Bonus. For every 5 ranks in combat, a character can parry one additional opponent as part of the same reaction (e.g., a character with 5 combat ranks could parry two opponents, and at 10 ranks, three opponents.)
• Player Character (PC): Player characters are characters created by players and solely played by them.
• Power: Every character has a pool of "Power". In fantasy fiction, this is often called Personal Power, Ki, or Chi. This power is what characters use to perform Adept Powers or certain race or class abilities. Its value is the Wisdom stat.
• Proficiency: Proficiencies represent specialized training within a skill. When characters make a skill check, if they attempt an action that they can apply a Proficiency too, they gain one Edge on the roll. One example of a proficiency is tight-rope walking. Any character can use their Athletics skill to attempt to walk a tight-rope, but if they have proficiency with tight-rope walking, they will gain an Edge on their check. Characters gains twenty proficiencies during character creation, and five proficiencies each level after level one, and they must be allocated to a skill that was assigned a skill point on that level, although any number of available proficiencies can be assigned to a single skill.
• Reaction: A reaction is the opportunity to spend an unspent action from your turn in response to another action. A common reaction is to parry an incoming attack.
• Round: Combat is tracked chronologically in rounds. A round passes when each combatant has taken one turn, after which Initiative is rerolled. A round is 3 seconds long.
• Rounding: When the rules ask you to round, always round up to the nearest whole number.
• Skill: A skill represents a character’s ability to perform a task, such as climb a wall or sneak past a guard. Most skills cover broad areas and can be further specialized via proficiencies. Character’s increase their ranks in skills by spending skill points. Characters are not required to have a rank in a skill to make a check. Anyone can roll any skill untrained. If a character does not have a rank in a skill, they roll at minus one Edge. If they attempt a skill check that requires a proficiency that they do not have, it is minus one Edge. If they have neither the skill nor the proficiency, it is minus two Edge. After all, anyone can get lucky.
• Skill Points: When a character gains a level, they gain 10 skill points to spend anywhere; Only at 1st level are four of these skills determined by their class.
• Drain Resistance: Spirit Drain resistance, or Drain, represents a resistance against supernatural attacks against a character’s faith, spirit, or soul. Drain is equal to character's Charisma stat.
• Statistics (or Stats): Every creature has seven stats: Strength, Dexterity, Constitution, Intelligence, Wisdom, Charisma and Luck; each stat has a value range from 1 to 20. A secondary bonus or penalty of -5 to +5 is derived from each stat. This is explained in detail in Chapter 5: Statistics. Characters start off with a set of stats that they purchase. At level 5 (and every 5 levels beyond), characters gain one point to increase a stat by one. Stats are not modified by race or class, only strength and dexterity are modified by a creature’s size.
• Stat bonuses: Each stat has a derived, smaller number, that is used to modify skills.
• Taking Your Time: Sometimes when making a skill check a character may have the opportunity to spend more time trying to achieve success. If a character is not being threatened and has not lost an Edge on the roll, they can choose to take their time and gain one Edge, but the action takes twice as long. It is still possible to experience a mishap, even when taking your time.
• Turn: During a combat round, every combatant gets one turn. During an individual turn, each combatant can move spaces equal to their combat speed and take two actions (or one Combined action).