Design: Jasyn Jones
Commentary: Phil Dack, Ks. Jim Ogle, Winston, Gordon R. Dell

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Torg is a cinematic multi-genre game. Its mechanics support not only multiple genres, but also trans-genre play.

Each genre is represented by a specific cosm- Orrorsh for horror, Aysle for fantasy, the Nile Empire for pulp action, and so forth. These cosms are rated in Axioms, numeric levels of advancement, and World Laws. Axioms are invariant- a 23 means the same thing in all cosms. World Laws are custom rules, unique to a cosm, that define and implement the genre of that cosm.

Earth's World Laws (originally published in the Delphi Council Worldbook) are widely regarded as among the worst. They are bland, uninspiring, and don’t seem to define any genre at all.

This is a consequence of the central problem of Core Earth. Unlike every other cosm, pocket dimension, and fringe reality, the genre of Earth has never been explicitly defined, something necessary for the proper implementation of World Laws.

This problem of genre definition has plagued Core Earth from the advent of the game until now. This article defines the genre of Core Earth, investigates the nature of that genre, and suggests colorful and epic World Laws for the cosm that embody its genre.

Defining Core Earth's genre involves a straightforward restatement of what Core Earth actually is. Torg is a cinematic action-movie "Hollywood blockbuster" game. Earth is the near Real World cosm of that game. Hence, Earth's genre is defined by near Real World action movies, Earth is the near Real World action movie reality, and the World Laws of Earth should be written to implement the genre tropes common to near Real World action movies.

This genre matches with the nature of Earth as explored in the game material, matches well with the themes and pace of Torg, and is represented by a host of different movies. Die Hard, Lethal Weapon, Under Siege, Executive Decision, Mission Impossible, The Rock, and other movies like them form the body of work we can look to for inspiration when designing World Laws.

Even given that, it has been difficult to identify World Laws for Earth, because so much of the genre tropes of near "real world" action movies have been subsumed into the game as a whole. This is a positive feature of Torg- as these are necessary for the game- but it leaves Earth high and dry.

The solution to the problem lies in the game as written and in the essence of the "cinematic" nature of Torg's action movie roots. It requires the willingness to look deeper into the genre tropes of Torg and to accept a fundamental reimagining of parts of Torg- to see them in a new way.

Most action movies follow a similar story template: a villain launches a dangerous plot, which a hero accidentally stumbles upon and, after a struggle against great odds, overcomes. This is the central plot of movies like the "Die Hard" series, "Under Siege", "Broken Arrow", "Face/Off", and others too numerous to mention.

This action movie plot template is central to the play of Torg, as well. It describes "High Lord of Earth," "Operation: Hard Sell," "The Gaunt Man Returns," "When Axioms Collide," and nearly every other Torg module or adventure seed. It even describes most of the Torg fiction. It is therefore an assumed part of the "cinematic" nature of Torg.

Yet, the above story template differs significantly from those that are found in most of the genres of the invading realities. For example, it isn't the template of horror movies or of cyberpunk novels.

Also, in the cinematic game of Torg, heroes are assumed to win most of the time. (See the "Adventure Response Form" for confirmation.)

Yet, when we look at the invading realities, this genre trope simply isn't true. Not in Orrorsh. Not in Aysle. Not in the Cyberpapacy. Not in Marketplace. Not in Tharkold. It isn't even true in the Nile. The realities of the High Lords are ones in which, not only can villains win, but they usually win.

Heroes, in the Possibility Wars, usually win. In other realities, removed from the Wars, this just isn't true.

For some reason, the plot templates of cosms involved in the Possibility Wars differ from those they would normally have. Heroes win, when they normally shouldn't. Obviously, there is some influence at work in the Possibility Wars that changes the normal order of things, even in invading realities.

What makes the difference? The reality of Earth.

The conceptual breakthrough is this: much of what we assume to be part of the default nature of Torg is instead a facet of Earth's reality. Heroes can win, because the reality of Earth says they can and makes this true even in places where it wasn't.

Earth's central paradigm is this: "Villains plot to do evil, that heroes may strive and endure and overcome them." In Earth, heroes have the upper hand. This is simply not true of the other realities.

So why does Earth's paradigm suffuse the Possibility Wars, to the extent of dominating the game? The nature of the Earth World Laws provides the answer.

The World Laws

One: The Power of Hope
Two: The Threat of Villainy
Three: The Gift of Imagination

The Power of Hope

The Power of Hope states this: "Whenever villainy manifests, a hero will arise to confront it. If the hero perseveres, they can overcome and succeed against incredible odds. No matter how bleak the situation may seem, there is always hope."

This World Law drives the central assumptions of the Possibility Wars: villains launch plots, but heroes will always be there to oppose them and, no matter how difficult the opposition, the heroes can prevail. (Of course, failure is always possible.)

The High Lords are used to winning. After all, they have always won. Other than Kranod, every High Lord who invaded Earth has won every single invasion. Most High Lords can muster such overwhelming force that their targets have no chance to resist. In Earth, this situation no longer holds true.

This, the first World Law of Earth reality, is a Power, like Orrorsh's Powers of Fear and Corruption. Thus, it automatically affects all those who enter the Earth cosm (and that, without contradiction). But this World Law does even more. It holds sway even in the foreign realms attached to Earth.

The reality of Earth is powerful, and it intrudes even into places where it otherwise wouldn't. It molds Possibility Energy and uses it to cancel the possibilities the Everlaw of One would normally use to enforce its dictates.

The reality of Earth is so powerful (being driven by an immense reservoir of Possibility Energy filtered through the cosm's Possibility Nexus), it has effects even in the home cosms of those realities attacking Earth. In those realities, the Power of Hope enforces the above template: when villainy arises, heroes are there to fight it, and these heroes have a chance to win.

This World Law causes the plot template of Earth to be a force in all the realities of the Possibility Wars. It manifests itself in other ways as well.

The first of which is this: whenever a Threat of Villainy arises (see the next World Law) a Storm Knight will be there to counter the plot. Storm Knights are drawn, through apparent coincidences, to the place where Threats of Villainy will manifest (or have manifested).

Ords in Earth live lives virtually indistinguishable from those lived by people in the "Real World." Storm Knights in Earth tend to be at the center of unusual events much of their lives. Coincidence drives them to stumble upon Threats of Villainy, and villains seem inexplicably drawn to them.

If there were one Storm Knight in all of California and one vampire in all of California, the vampire would coincidentally choose to attack the hometown of the Storm Knight, or his sister, or him. The same stuff can happen to a guy twice, no matter how outré it seems.

This World Law has altered the possibility nexus of Earth in such a way as to draw Storm Knights to this cosm from other realities, even realities far removed from the Wars. Through coincidence or happenstance, ancient enemies of the High Lords are finding themselves drawn to this cosm (see the Torg Rulebook, pg. 103).

In extreme circumstances, there may be no Storm Knights close enough who can stumble upon the Threat of Villainy. In such cases, the World Law will create one- it will simply cause an appropriate ord to transcend. The ord gains the reality skill at 1 add, 10 possibilities, 10 attribute points and 3 skill points.

This event is a modified Moment of Crisis. It occurs when an ord confronts a Threat of Villainy and chooses to act heroically. The Power of Hope responds by empowering the ord with the ability to overcome the Threat.

The Power of Hope ensures that, no matter the ploy a villain (including a High Lord) attempts, a Storm Knight will be there to oppose it. This story template- when a Threat of Villainy arises, a Storm Knight is there to oppose it- is now true in the realities of the High Lords as well.

Earth had an abundance of Storm Knights even before the invasion- the World Laws of Earth created them. Due to the intrusion of this aspect of the Power of Hope, new heroes (that is, Storm Knights) are being created in the home cosms of the High Lords (see pg. 103 of the Torg Rulebook). These heroes can fight the High Lords on their own home ground and win.

The Power of Hope creates new Storm Knights, but it also empowers those reality-rated individuals who choose to act like Storm Knights. Reality-rated individuals who are willing to act heroic will find themselves placed in situations where they can strike back at High Lords.

This World Law means that, for any High Lord involved in the Wars, the stakes are very high. Most High Lords rule their home cosms unchallenged. Storm Knights, those who fight the High Lords, are rare and rarely succeed. The odds are just too heavily stacked against them. In Earth, this isn't true. More, because of the Power of Hope, it isn't true in the High Lords' home cosms anymore.

They may be able to achieve Torg-hood, but the sudden creation of dozens or hundreds of new Storm Knights- who, against all odds, have the upper hand- threatens their power base. If they falter, they may fall.

In other realities, reality-rated individuals receive 5 possibilities upon transcending (see the Ravagons Sourcebook, pg. 42). In Earth, Storm Knights (those who transcend because of a heroic choice) receive 10 possibilities when they transcend. Also, because of the Power of Hope, newly created Storm Knights from the other realities attached to Earth receive this benefit as well.

Reality rated individuals, because of the attribute and skill increases and their ability to boost skill checks, usually become significant individuals within their home cosms. There is no guarantee of this, however. A transcended reality-rated individual is just as likely to be a retiring, bookish type as a great leader or other impressive figure.

In the reality of Earth, this is different. The World Laws of Earth seek to influence reality-rateds to act as larger than life heroes or conspiring villains. Those who transcend from the Earth reality are far likelier to be heroes or villains because this reality proactively acts to transcend heroes and villains. It transcends ords who will fulfill either of those roles and it provides benefits for those who choose to act in those capacities. The benefits of Villainy are explained in the next World Law. The benefits of heroes are few, but potent.

The Power of Hope empowers individual Storm Knights, that they may succeed when placed into improbable and improbably dangerous situations. The Power of Hope allows Storm Knights to inspire their group (as the conflict line advantage, see the Torg Rulebook, pg. 60) once per module. Heroes can also seize initiative (as the card) once per module. Lastly, Storm Knights have one additional card in their hands and can place one card into their card pools immediately at the start of round play.

(These effects are only available to Earth Storm Knights, or alien Storm Knights in the Earth reality who make a contradiction check. They are not available to all Storm Knights in the Wars.)

Even as the Power of Hope empowers individual Storm Knights, it also seeks to empower groups of Storm Knights. The Power of Hope, working through apparent coincidences again, also drives the creation of Storm Knight groups (who can manifest Group Powers). Outrageous and improbable circumstances tend to drive complete strangers into close proximity, all of whom are Storm Knights (or potential Storm Knights). These strangers then form close bonds and quickly learn to trust each other, even when circumstances might indicate otherwise.

The Power of Hope empowers these Storm Knight groups. In Earth (and thus, in the alien realms and the home cosms of the High Lords attacking Earth), only groups of Storm Knights can manifest Group Powers. Groups of stormers simply cannot.

Earth's reality seeks to encourage reality-rated individuals to act as either heroes or villains. Not all people in Earth are heroes or villains. The vast majority of humanity are just people, without the drive to conform to heroism or villainy. It takes great drive and ambition to be a hero or villain.

Ords may be heroic or villainous, but they lack the ability to achieve the significance and power of true heroes and villains. Those ords who do show such drive, are proactively transcended by these World Laws. This World Law ensures that Earth has more and more active reality-rateds than any other cosm.

This is the reason that the areas that have been conquered by the High Lords exhibit more Storm Knight activity than the High Lords are used to. Earth's reality, in its last act before being overwhelmed by the invading reality, creates heroes to fight the villains. Thus each new stelae triangle that is created also creates more heroes to fight the invasion.

In the past, High Lords only needed to send a few stormers into newly conquered areas in order to subdue the heroic backlash. This response was inadequate for Earth, and stemmed from a fundamental misunderstanding of Earth's nature. High Lords who do not take this into account may find each stelae triangle they take to be more trouble than it is worth.

The Threat of Villainy

This World Law states: "Heroes and villains are extraordinary individuals who have made a choice to follow a specific moral path. Heroes choose the path of benevolence and selflessness, villains the path of selfishness and malevolence. Villains will conspire to gain power, wealth, or to indulge other selfish drives."

This World Law is a Power, like the Power of Hope. It follows similar rules, in that it automatically affects all those who enter the Earth cosm. It also affects all in foreign realms attached to Earth and it even affects the home cosms of those realities attached to Earth.

The heroes and villains of Earth are, by definition, reality-rated individuals. Indeed, making a strong choice for villainy or heroism is what triggers transcendence in Earth. Heroes are "Storm Knights", villains "stormers." As villains, stormers are encouraged to conspire and plot, so that the Threat of Villainy may manifest. As heroes, Storm Knights are placed in situations where they can oppose the plots of villains.

The most basic facet of this World Law is to define villainy and heroism, that is, to define what separates the "good guys" from the "bad guys." In most cosms, there is no definite line between heroism and villainy.

The Nile is an obvious exception, with its stark contrast between Good and Evil. Nevertheless, the Law of Morality doesn't define the difference between hero and villain- a shopkeeper who is Good isn't necessarily a larger-than-life hero.

In contrast, cosms like Tharkold lack a definite morality, and moral decisions are colored in tones of gray. The very notion of a "hero" would strike most Tharkoldu or Race members as a bizarre, aberrant state of mind- a person who tried to act heroic in Tharkold would very quickly wind up dead. The odds are just too stacked against him. The ugly, grinding brutality of the War makes heroism impractical. In addition, the World Laws of Tharkold encourage behavior that is unheroic (Domination, Pain, and so forth). The morality of Earth lies somewhere between the stark Good/Evil of the Nile and the brutal moral ambiguity of Tharkold.

Villains are people who seek to fulfill their own needs and desires above those of any other. They have little concern for others, save in those cases where others can help them achieve their goals. Villains are malevolent. They enjoy the suffering of others, or simply ignore it. They have no desire to help those in need. Villains, in Earth, are known as stormers.

Earth heroes are those who take up the burden to defend the innocent, protect the defenseless, and act with courage in the face of danger. Heroes are people who have a strong sense of duty, selflessness, and responsibility. Heroes seek to aid the needy, protect the helpless, and ease the suffering of others. They are benevolent, decent, and charitable. Heroes, in Earth, are called Storm Knights.

Even those reality-rated individuals who transcended long before coming to Earth find themselves being forced to choose sides. People fighting against the High Lords for the reality of Earth often take upon themselves the moral outlook of Earth heroes. Those who act as heroes are considered Storm Knights. Those fighting for the High Lords often take upon themselves the moral outlook of Earth villains. Those who act as villains are considered stormers. These two phenomena are encouraged by the World Law, but are not mandatory.

Unlike the Nile, these categories are not proscriptive- no one is forced to fit into either. On the contrary, these are descriptive- they define certain behaviors, and individuals who follow those behaviors are proactively transcended, while those who do not remain ordinary.

Transcendence, in other realities, is a matter of pure chance. Whether by confronting an alien reality or through the graces of the Everlaw of 4, those who successfully transcend do so on a random basis. A strong moral choice is required to become reality-rated, but this doesn't mean that the individual will continue making strong moral choices. Many individuals are morally gray, and there is nothing that indicates clearly which they are- hero or villain. Some may act like a hero in certain circumstances, but act like a villain in others.

Earth's reality acts to encourage reality-rated individuals to choose between acting heroic or acting villainously. It is intolerant of those who choose to do neither. Reality-rateds who refuse to act as a hero or a villain, or who are weak, retiring, or vacillating face penalties, as do Storm Knights who refuse to confront a Threat of Villainy or villains who refuse to plot to create a Threat of Villainy. Just as this World Law causes ords to transcend when necessary, it can also change Earth reality-rateds back into ords, stripping them of their special abilities.

Native Earth reality-rateds (and only natives) who do not make a definite moral choice and stick with it, but rather drift between the two, are often stripped of their status as stormers. Also, Storm Knights who are placed into a situation where they can confront a Threat of Villainy, but who refuse to do so may find themselves stripped of their status as a reality-rated character. Villains who, upon being offered the opportunity to create a Threat of Villainy, decline may be stripped of their status as well. In each case, the individual loses their reality skill, all Possibilities, 6 skill adds and 10 attribute points.

This World Law also exists to encourage the Threats of Villainy that heroes encounter and fight against. It empowers villains to take those actions that cause a Threat of Villainy to manifest.

Villains have many goals, chief of which are wealth and power. In order to achieve these goals, Earth villains devise and enact intricate and improbable plots. Normally, these plots are planned and launched with no interference (the World Law ensures that this is so). It is only after the plot has progressed far enough to constitute a dangerous threat that a hero will stumble upon it.

Not all crimes qualify as a Threat of Villainy. Shoplifting or even a normal bank robbery is simply not intricate enough or significant enough to matter. An attempt to blackmail the President with a satellite that causes earthquakes (see the Gift of Imagination, below) is significant enough.

The police can solve normal crimes. Threats of Villainy require the direct intervention of a larger-than-life hero, or even a group of heroes. A Threat of Villainy is a plot so large, so ambitious, and so dangerous that only reality-rated heroes have a chance to stop it, and then only after a significant, sustained effort in the face of nearly overwhelming opposition.

Villains who organize a plot find that this World Law actively aids them. As with the Power of Hope, this World Law manipulates events through seeming coincidences. These coincidences can even inspire the plot in the first place, by providing the villain with previously unavailable information.

In a bar, the villain may overhear a whispered conversation about a rare diamond that is coming to a local museum. A childhood friend, now working for the Pentagon, might inadvertently reveal the existence of a devastating weapon. The villain may accidentally learn about the peccadilloes of a prominent politician, making blackmail a real possibility.

Whatever the specific manifestation, the coincidence will provide enough information for the villain to begin plotting and planning. (Villains who reject an opportunity thus presented, often find themselves stripped of their reality-rated status.)

Nor do the coincidences stop there. Through seeming coincidences, the villain will find just the individuals they need to carry out their plot. They will find lieutenants with the knowledge and skills that are required, they will find officials who can be bribed, scientists who can be blackmailed, or inventors who have created the exact tool that the villain needs. (Very often, their chief lieutenants will themselves be reality-rated villains- assisting in another villain's plot satisfies the demands of the Threat of Villainy as well.)

Apparent coincidences will aid the villain in other ways. The police, the FBI, and other mundane authorities will remain ignorant of the plot, allowing the villain to carry out most activities completely unopposed. The villain will conveniently gain access to plans, blueprints, or other sources of information. They will gain access to enough money to finance the elaborate scheme. Very little will go wrong, up until the moment when the villains plan has progressed far enough to prove a real threat to a band of heroes. At that point, the Power of Hope takes effect.

The Threat of Villainy causes these seeming coincidences to occur. Like the Power of Hope, it affects events in other cosms. Thus, villains in and from other realities attached to Earth will find that the Threat of Villainy aids them as well. Their plotting and planning will go far better than mere chance would dictate, up until the moment when a hero responds.

It may seem that this World Law is opposed to the Power of Hope. In reality, this World Law seeks to provide the circumstances that allow Hope to exist. If there were no dangers, courage would be impossible. If there were no challenges, hope would be superfluous. Villains exist to endanger and challenge innocents and heroes. In this manner, villains make hope possible.

The Gift of Imagination

This World Law states: "Heroes and villains are larger-than-life. They have access to abilities and resources beyond those of ordinary people."

For the vast majority of the population, life in Earth is indistinguishable from the life of people in the real world. Life for villains and heroes is not. Not only are both drawn to plot or to oppose plots (respectively), but the parameters of the plots themselves tend to be both baroque and grandiose, no matter how simple the original goal. The reality of Earth acts to maximize the breadth and impact of any individual plot, upping the ante for both villains and heroes.

A small robbery, involving two or three individuals and a hundred thousand in cash, can grow into an elaborate scheme, involving a dozen dump trucks, tons of gold, dozens of co-conspirators, and a series of explosive devices, each with an attached riddle that will disarm them. Because minor plots do not qualify as Threats of Villainy, the reality seeks to encourage and enable larger, more elaborate, and more dramatic plots.

The larger the potential impact of a plot, the more byzantine and sophisticated it will become. A plot to kill all mankind and reseed the earth with 24 perfect specimens of humanity may take decades to enact, involve the creation of whole corporations, the employment of thousands of soldiers and flunkies, the achievement of groundbreaking scientific research, and may even require the establishment of a secret space launch facility, all before the penultimate moment when the heroes stumble across the Threat.

In the real world, such plots would be highly implausible, overly complex, and virtually guaranteed to fail. The reality of Earth ensures that these plots remain undiscovered and unchecked, until the Threat fully manifests itself and a hero can rise to confront the villain. The reality of Earth rewards villains who do not think small.

This aspect of the Gift of Imagination affects other realities, like both the Power of Hope and the Threat of Villainy. It can affect villains in every cosm and realm, driving the villains to launch more ambitious plots. In the cosm of Earth, it has additional effects.

Heroes and villains of Earth have access to skills and tools that bend or even break the axioms of this reality. A villain's plan will often include inventions that are not possible at Tech 23 (such as a satellite that can cause an earthquake), or may include mystical or religious relics that do not operate under the cosm's normal Spiritual and Magical axiom limits. Likewise, heroes often have access to weapons, spells, miracles, or other tools that are just too advanced to be explained by the normal axioms of Earth.

This World Law allows for the existence of tools and effects that exceed the limits of the axioms of Earth's reality. During character creation, a reality-rated character can replace their normal axiom with one (and only one) of the following axioms:

This increased axiom is noted as a parenthetical axiom on the character sheet: Tech 23 (24). The use of these altered axioms does not in and of itself create a contradiction in Earth, nor in other realities (unless the tool's axiom is above the foreign reality's axiom, of course).

Not only do these axiom levels allow the character to use tools that violate the normal bounds of Earth's reality, they will (through improbable coincidences) find themselves in situation where extraordinary tools of the chosen axiom are placed at their disposal.

These altered axioms can also affect an area (or realm) of Earth reality. These are rare, but far more common in this cosm than in others. Areas of altered axioms do not have to conform to the altered axioms listed above, but should almost never be higher. An example of such an area is Haiti, with its increased Magic and Spirit axioms.

In addition, this World Law works with the immense amount of Possibility Energy of the cosm to make the axiom limits as flexible as possible. Due to this World Law, Earth is nearly all dominant zones (save for the areas around hardpoints).

Heroes and villains are extraordinary individuals. They have abilities beyond those of ordinary people and, because of this World Law, beyond those of other reality-rateds.

At character creation, Earth stormers and Storm Knights can get either a type specialization or a trademark specialization without spending any possibilities. More, they gain one free roll-again per module to use with that one specialization at any time. In general, characters who choose such a specialization will gain a reputation as being "the best" at what they do- it will become their signature feature, even above a tag skill.

This World Law seeks to raise the ante for both heroes and villains. It does so for villains by increasing the stakes involved in their plots. It does so for heroes by making the Threat of Villainy personal.

Whenever a Threat of Villainy manifests, a Earth Storm Knight can choose to activate a Personal Stake subplot (as the card) without having to draw the subplot from the Drama Deck. This subplot represents a friend, relative, partner, or other emotionally significant NPC being drawn into the villain's plot. The character must roleplay the subplot accordingly, evincing a desire to save their NPC, just as if the Personal Stake subplot was in play. This may only be declared once per adventure, and does not count towards the player's two-subplot-per-adventure maximum. As with all subplots, this is subject to GM approval.

Players can even choose to create a dependent, such as a spouse or child, who is frequently drawn into their adventures. When they player chooses to activate their "bonus" Personal Stake subplot, this dependent is the character who has become embroiled in the plot.