Introduction

They are everywhere, although we don't realize it. They are the invisible empire, forgotten and in rejected in a way. But they don't complain.

They are toys, childhood partners and nowadays surprisingly extended everywhere, no matter their owners' age or job at the moment. Yes, we can think that it is not this way, but take a look around you: you should easily find one; a plush above a monitor, or in the dashboard of a car, or in your work table, or in a bookcase. Of course, their unquestionable Kingdoms are usually the children rooms, but you cannot obviate their almost ubiquitous presence.

Toys are the faithfulest partners, because they are always there when you need them. They always make what you want (except, possibly, the mechanical toys, and even this way your form of playing with them is what dictates what they do, in the end), without uttering any complaint. Sure, you'll think, they are only inanimate objects, or not? Clear mistake...

The secret

In fact toys develop a simulacrum of life based on the attention that their owners or close people dedicate to them. This attention, denominated Imprint, could be defined like a quantity of psychic energy that their masters infuse them unconsciously, when attributing them life and conscience, and that's what feeds their existence. The more attention, more alive they are, and they can do more things, and vice versa. In fact, a toy without any attention is just inanimate junk.

It doesn't work always, the only toys able to reach a pseudoliving state are the toys that have been manufactured with alive beings' appearance, and with articulations or similar, otherwise they couldn't move! With a toy car, no matter how much do we play with it, we don't pretend it is an alive being (usually), but a mere vehicle. On the other hand, a teddy bear plush, for example, walks, runs, sits down, eats, etc, all of it in the mind of whoever plays with it.

Hard to believe? Do you need proofs? I'm sorry, we can't show you proofs. The same energy that gives them life is incompatible with the conscious process of humans and most alive beings. That's why we call it the invisible empire: it is not invisible, but rather they don't let anybody see them. They can't let anybody see them. If a human saw a toy moving, and it happens sometimes, his rationalization process would literally dissipate the Imprint of that toy, giving a rational explanation to the confused witness (How could the teddy fall? It may have been the wind..."). In most cases, the imprint loss is so serious that the toy becomes inanimate again, until it receives enough attention to become animated again... with a new personality, probably! It is, in the end, a form of dying.

Nevertheless, some toys are able to survive that experience. They develop certain forms of spending their internal energy, less expensive than direct evidence, to confuse the humans. Nevertheless, I repeat, they shouldn't move in humans' presence. They can be aware of all that passes around them, but they cannot move. Also, they shouldn't leave evident proofs of their activity, because the very rational process of humans who notice this activity easily can burn great part of their Imprint reserves. That doesn't mean they can't do anything; humans sometimes think that another person has moved something, or that some things fall on casually, etc, when in a toy was the one who did it. If the toys are sufficiently subtle they can escape without any harm in many occasions. In fact, one of the first things that a toy knows when it wakes up, it's how it was put exactly where their owners put them, which helps them a lot to return to his place and to avoid unwanted attention.

Anyway, it is not an easy life. It is not as breathing, or eating which it's supposed you can get for yourself, without too many problems. On the contrary, a toy depends totally on its "masters" to keep existing, and they know it from the very moment in which they are aware of themselves. They also know, that sooner or later their owners will forget them... but up till moment, they cherish what they have.

As we've already said, the Imprint of a toy is the energy that gives life to them. Every time that they do anything they spend a little, for what they always have to maintain a difficult balance among the being and doing. Anyway they always have the option of sleep: a toy with little Imprint can opt to allow the time pass in an indefinite way, hoping its master dedicates attention again later, to recharge its "soul". But that option has many risks, maybe when it decides to wake up again to selfawareness, the conditions have changed substantially; maybe its master now has other toys that have won his affection and that will have taken advantageous positions in the race for his attention. Perhaps the toy has been damaged accidentally, or in a malicious way for another jealous toy and it cannot fix the damage before its master discovers it, which would imply to maintain that damage permanently with the risk of being discared and thrown to the garbage, etc.

Neither it is reasonable staying awake the whole time, unless you are the favorite toy of a boy with a lot of free time, winning Imprint almost continually.

Personality (or, what do you want to play today?)

We've seen that a toy with imprint acquires selfawareness, at a rudimentary level without a doubt, but intelligence. It is a minor intelligence, anyway, of a day by day, without thinking of the reasons why they are here neither what for. Also, the personality of a toy is given in great deal by the role that its owner has defined to him, and for the one who manufactured it, no doubt. An action figure with which his master plays as an adventurer, is very different to a teddy that watches over your co-workers from the heights of a monitor.

In many cases a master changes the personality of his toys in an unconscious way, sometimes in a permanent way and sometimes only for a while. The relationship is reciprocal, a toy does its best to maintain its personality, like any person with selfawareness, and in fact it can spend part of its energy to inspire its owner to avoid changes. But if it fails, it will spread to try to avoid future changes, as it tried in the first case.

This same personality is the one that defines the "goals in life" of the toy. They are not very complicated, since in the bottom they are little more than mockeries of alive beings, but as they are aware of themselves, they have goals. They can be very simple, inherited of their masters, in an unconscious way (as being jealous of the toys of his master's workmates, workmates to whom his master is also jealous in turn), or to explore his surroundings, in the case of owners that take them to his trips, etc, etc. Each master and his toys are unique.

We have seen that apparently toys are predators in search of all the attention they can get, even to the point of destroying competitors (when the humans aren't looking) to avoid extra obstacles. It happens in some cases, but it is not as common as you could think, for several reasons that we will enumerate next.

• For the danger of getting the unwanted attention of the humans, revealing yourself.
• For solitude.

The danger of getting the unwanted attention of the humans is the same case than the one of moving things around a lot. Destroying another toy is not very subtle, as soon as a human notices that the toy is shredded to bits or that it is gone, what happens more usually is that the toy who caused it all suffers a loss of Imprint when the mortal rationalizes the fact. Although there are ways to redirect that loss to another toy, as moving another toy from its place in a way so obvious that it will be noticed (and that poor toy will lose Imprint, not the malicious one). In most cases those actions are transitive, the cause-effect relationship harms in the end the toy who caused the permanent effect in the real world, and thus it is dangerous trying.

And solitude... even toys suffer of solitude, maybe a lot more than we can imagine. They need of others of their "species" to be able to have a life worth that name. Without Imprint they aren't alive, if nobody is around, it is not worth the effort of waking up. Many toys, in fact, have as main objective playing, or playing the role that their masters have granted them, and for that they need other toys to play with in turn.

Don't underestimate the power of the Imprint

Imprint not only gives toys life. It also allows them, through trial and error, and later from direct experience, more refined uses, let's call them powers. Those powers are sometimes granted directly by their owners, as attributions during the game that later the toys keep. Although it is more usual is that they learn how to use their Imprint to survive.

Moving every day, on their own, burns away some of their Imprint. Other powers, as fixing damage that they have received to continue being beautiful and tempting to play with them, to inspire their owners to keep their personalities unchanged, etc, are other uses that they have learned and they will continue learning with time the most diverse toys.

FUDGE: toys

For an setting like this, as we will see later, it is so wide and full with exceptions to the rules, I prefer using a system like FUDGE. FUDGE, for whoever of you who doesn't know it, is a generic system where you choose all you want to use, and at the same time it keeps a consistent and balanced set of core rules.

ABOUT FUDGE

Fudge is a role-playing game written by Steffan O'Sullivan, with extensive input from the Usenet community of rec.games.design. The basic rules of Fudge are available on the internet at http://www.fudgerpg.com and in book form from Grey Ghost Games, P.O. Box 838, Randolph, MA 02368. They may be used with any gaming genre. While an individual work derived from Fudge may specify certain attributes and skills, many more are possible with Fudge. Every Game Master using Fudge is encouraged to add or ignore any character traits. Anyone who wishes to distribute such material for free may do so - merely include this ABOUT FUDGE notice and disclaimer (complete with Fudge copyright notice). If you wish to charge a fee for such material, other than as an article in a magazine or other periodical, you must first obtain a royalty-free license from the author of Fudge, Steffan O'Sullivan, P.O. Box 465, Plymouth, NH 03264.

DISCLAIMER

The following materials based on Fudge, entitled Fudge: Toys and Toys: the forgotten, are created by, made available by, and Copyright (C) 2002 by Jorge Arredondo, and are not necessarily endorsed in any way by Steffan O'Sullivan or any publisher of other Fudge materials. Neither Steffan O'Sullivan nor any publisher of other Fudge materials is in any way responsible for the content of these materials unless specifically credited. Original Fudge materials Copyright (C)1992-1995 by Steffan O'Sullivan, All Rights Reserved.

Toys is a game filled with exceptions because except if you follow popular toys lines, each character is completely different to the others. Some are made of plastic, others of cloth, others are stuffed toys. Some are hard, other soft. Almost none has hands, some don't have legs, even some have neither arms nor legs, etc. To cover that whole fan of possibilities would be a crazy job and a loss of time, so I will only give some few typical examples of the possibilities available.

Except in specific cases, my proposal is generating each character as usual, and the adjusting if needed skills, gifts and faults. Let's notice that, at least in this atmosphere, the characters don't have reasons to be more or less balanced. There are always toys that you like more and you play more with them, and with others not so much. For that reason, a toy that has many faults, doesn't have reasons to have many skills to compensate them. Anyway, as the Gamemaster you can allow this balance, if you wish so.

Note: I'm still working with this setting, it still lacks a lot of subjects I'm still working in.

Atributes

Toys will all have the following attributes:

• Fortitude: toys, according to their construction and their materials, are more or less strong and more or less resistant. Both are related in this setting, and so we won't have a Strength and Health attribute but a single Fortitude one. This attribute will be used for raw physical strength and to soak physical damage. Let's notice that toys don't get tired, since they are not alive at all. A character cannot improve its Fortitude, since it doesn't have muscles to train..
  Note: if you wish so, you can add a character a gift like Resistant that improves their absorption of damage, or a fault like Fragile that worsens it. Or gifts that modify their strength capacity.
• Dexterity: it includes manual dexterity and the agility of the toy. A character can improve its dexterity, since because by living longer it gets used to make quick and more agile physical movements.
• Reasoning: it's the mental power of the toy, its capacity to associate facts and solve problems. Let's notice that the intelligence of the toys is very basic, they don't possess any type of complex knowledge, neither they know hardly anything of its environment beyond the house/office/car where they "live", and not very further away. A character can improve its reasoning, because by living longer it acquires more experience than can helps it with future problems.
• Perception: the capacity of the toy to be aware of their environment, including all the classic senses except smell (toys don't breathe). A character can improve its perception, since he can learn how to be more aware, and where it should look to find what it is looking for.
• Willpower: it's the capacity of the toy to restrain itself, of resisting external manipulations, etc. A character can improve its willpower, as he learns how to be overcome its limitations and better selfcontrol.
• Imprint: it measures the psychic connection between the owner of the toy and the toy. A character, a priori, can't improve its imprint without its owner's attention. The toy needs that its owner dedicates it more attention before being able to improve this attribute; that can be done with some imprint powers, on the other hand.
  Note: a related subattribute of Imprint is the Imprint Points (from now on IP). In a numeric scale it measures what the toy will be able to do. Its initial value depends on the value of the Imprint attribute, of the character's additional details, of the uses it make of them, etc. It's a total that burns away and doesn't replenish by itself, but rather wears out with each use, and grows back as the owners dedicate attention to the toys. In fact it doesn't have a superior limit. Every time that a toy is able to improve its Imprint its IP increases its amount, in the difference of the initial value of its old score and the new score.

All the attributes have a base value of Fair and each character has 3 free levels to distribute among them, using the standard rules of FUDGE (the numeric final sum of the attributes must be +3).

The base amount of IP bases that a toy has on the start it's base on its Imprint attribute, and it is calculated according to this table:

Imprint	Imprint points
Terrible	3
Poor	5
Mediocre	7
Fair	9
Good	11
Great	13
Superb	15

Many gifts and faults can modify the base value base of IP. As will see it later, we only add a comment: having a real toy that models the character, gives a +1 IP free to that character :)

A toy has a default a scale of +0, roughly the size of toys of approximately 15-20 centimeters tall (around 6-8 inches), and a weight reasonable for that size. This is one of the biggest sources of exceptions in this setting, since there are toys of almost all sizes. We leave the scale to the player's free will with the narrator's supervision, but it is necessary to keep in mind a couple of things:

• Every day that a toy wants to spend awaken, it must spend its scale in IP + 1, with a minimum of 1 IP. This makes having huge scale, in spite of the advantages to soak and inflict damage, be very expensive for a toy.
• Each three complete levels of scale difference between two toys, give to the smallest toy a +1 to avoid the bigger one's attacks, and a +1 to attack it. For example, a small action figure (Scale -2) against an huge plush (Scale +2); the difference of scales is 5 (-2, -1, 0, 1, 2), and so the action figure has a +1 to dodge attacks of the plush, and a +1 to hit it (although anyway it is unlikely that it can damage the bigger toy...).
• Soft toys (plush toys, or made of cloth, etc) soak bludgeoning damage with a +1, and inflict bludgeoning damage (unarmed, we mean) with a -1. Impaling or edged damage is soaked on the contrary with a -1.
• Hard toys (action figures, etc) soak edged and impaling damage with a +1, and they inflict bludgeoning damage (unarmed) with a +1. Bludgeoning damage, on the contrary, is soaked with a -1.

Anyway we're going to offer a base scale that I think is quite appropriate to the Toys universe:

Scale	Size
Terrible	Tiny (you can hold a handful of them in your hand)
Poor	Very little (you can hold a few in your hand)
Mediocre	Little (you could barely hold more than one in your hand)
Fair	Typical toy (it fills your hand fully)
Good	A bigger toy (bigger than your hand)
Great	Even bigger (you can carry it in one hand but it is easy to see)
Superb	A huge toy (you almost have to carry it with your two hands)
(Legendary)	A colossal toy (almost as big as yourself!)

Typical skills

We'll just hint a small list of skills a toy character may have. Just remember toys aren't humans, there are many things they can't do because of their simpler minds. Most knowledges are way far from their ability.

Physical skills

• Acrobatics/tumbling
• Balance
• Brawl
• Climbing
• Dancing (you can bet Barbie like dolls may dance a lot!)
• Dodge
• Jumping
• Riding (friendly horse like toys)
• Running
• Shield (whatever a toy may use to stop physical blows)
• Throwing
• Stealth (quite useful!)
• Weapons (having in count the weapons they can use are far from true weapons)

Knowledge skills

• Area lore (usually they only know about the room the live in, in higher levels it would mean they know all the house)
• Human lore (the higher the level you have in this skill, the better you are able to understand human behaviour and environment; besides, you'll be able to understand more of human speech or even single out humans besides your master)
• Specific lores (limited to their environment)

Social and communicative skills

• Bluff
• Diplomacy
• Interrogate
• Intimidate
• Oratory
• Persuade
• Storytelling (some toys look wise)
• Teaching

Perception skills

• Detect Lies
• Search
• Spot
• Listen

Toy characters will receive a total of 20 free skills levels which they can distribute as they wish. They must reflect of course how their owners play with them, though experienced toys also find they like doing some things more than their owners allow them to do.

All the skills have a base score of Poor.

Example gifts and faults

A toy character isn't forced to choose gifts and faults, it is not mandatory, though usually in a way or another he'll have a few. Take a look at the examples I've writte and you'll understand what I mean.

Gifts

• Handmade: a handmade toy is much more potent that one done in an assembly chain with thousands of copies. The affection and the interest dedicated in its construction makes it have much more empathy, giving it 3 extra IP.
• Skillful hands: to have hands with enough manual dexterity is a gift for a toy because usually, if they're lucky, have hands but can't move the fingers independently (they're stuck to one another, without manual dexterity).
• Special equipment: these are objects that the owners have "given" to the toys because they thought that they suited them well, and that are quite useful to the toys (on the other hand, the toys can hardly equip themselves... where would they keep their things? What would happen as soon as somebody realized some stuff is missing? Although borrowing things and returning them later might work...). For example, a letter opener that the character can use like a lance or sword (the owner put to the toy holding the letter opener, as if it watched over it).

Faults

• Nameless: not having a name, for a toy, it is a clear flaw. A nameless toy has 3 IP less initially.
• Handless: even worse that the toys without truly functional hands, are those toys that only have arms, being even clumsier doing things that those that have a mockery of hands.
• Without extremities: it is a fault worth double. The character doesn't have neither arms nor legs, and so it can only move by crawling or bouncing.
• Short legs: it is not a too serious fault, it only implies that its maximum speed is less than normal due to the disproportion of its legs regarding its body.
• Lacks some extremity: usual in old toys, it didn't have time to fix the damage to itself and thus it is handless or lame. It is not suitable for heads or it would rather seem like a Michael Jackson's video.
• Protégé: motivated by its owner's influence, the toy feels it is the protector of another toy (it happens often in the case of big toys regarding other tinier ones), whom it does its best to protect whenever it can.

Imprint powers

Using their internal vital energy, toys are able to carry out certain special actions, although have they always a price. In each case they must decide if it is better for their survival to pay the price or not.

A toy that loses all its IP must make a Great or better Imprint roll or it will lose automatically a level in that attribute. It also falls in lethargy until it is infused a little imprint again. If it fumbled that roll (it rolled a -4 on the dice), its personality will be lost forever, even if it's revived it will never be the same, ever.

All the Imprint powers spend a IP if they fail, and more if they succeed, depending on the power.

Every day that the toy has its master near, it can make a Imprint roll with a variable difficulty (the Gamemaster must choose the difficulty; not every day the owners will feel like they want to pay attention to their toys), usually Good. If they pass the roll, they win a IP more one for each level of success. If they roll a critical success (a +4 in the dice) they will be able to invest experience points in improving their Imprint attribute. If, on the contrary, they failed the roll, they won't earn anything, and if they fumbled (they rolled a -4 on the dice) they must roll another 1DF. If they roll another -1 (for a total of -5) they will lose automatically a level of Imprint.

The basic powers that the toys use to survive are these:

• Moving: as we've already seen, it costs Scale+1 IP. The toy must make a Mediocre or better Imprint roll to be able to move, and should keep trying if it fails, until it succeeds. It lasts a day.
• Heal themselves: provided the damage they've received has not been (yet) discovered by a human, they can use its Imprint to heal it and survive. The difficulty depends on the "wound" type. A scratch has Mediocre difficulty, a Hurt has Fair difficulty, a Very Hurt wound has Good difficulty, a Incapacitated would has Great difficulty, and finally a more serious wound has Superb difficulty.
  The costs of IP to heal those wounds are related to the smallest value in the numeric scale according to which they were inflicted. For example, a scratch would cost 1, a hurt would cost 3, etc. The scale doesn't count in these cases. Let's notice that if a character accumulates wounds of different types but not more serious wounds, it should only cure the concrete wounds that it has, although in the end we would apply the biggest penalizations for wounds.
  Let's notice as well that a toy doesn't suffer penalizations for pain. It notices the blows, lacerations, imaplings, etc, since it has senses, but it doesn't feel pain. Nevertheless, we will apply the standard penalizations of FUDGE if they are applicable. For example, if a toy has been beaten down to Very Hurt wounds, it doesn't receive penalizations to mental actions, to most of his perception skills, to Imprint powers, etc. But if it tries to run, dodge, fight or similar actions, the damage that its cloth body has received hinders him and penalize him the same as if it were hurt. For that, gifts and faults that ignore or increase pain partially aren't applicable.
• Conceal: power used when a human has come too much close to discover the activities of the toy. With a difficulty equal to the human's willpower (with a minimum value of Mediocre), and with a cost equal to his willpower if it is positive, again with a minimum of 1 (that is to say, between 1 and 3, usually), the toy "builds" an excuse that makes the human not think too much about the topic, protecting in that way the toy's valuable imprint. If the toy activity will be found in the future, make the roll when the effect is done but apply the loss of imprint later, when found.
  You can also use it against registration devices (many toys learn the bad way that if they move at night in offices with movement sensors, they won't have to wait for long before the security guards come causing them serious losses of IP); in that case the difficulty is Mediocre and the cost is 1 IP, lasts a whole day and it affects all the registration devices (except surveillance cameras) that are in active, but only for that toy (the systems are not disabled, they only don't register that toy).
  Without this power, a toy caught while doing anything must make a Superb Imprint roll or lose all its IP. If on the contrary it succeeded, it loses all its IP minus 2, or all if the total was less than zero. If the suspicious situation was not so serious, the difficulty is Great and it would lose all its IP-2 in the case of failure and it would lose only 2 if it was successful.
• Inspire their owners: it only works with their main owner, since it is the one that pays more attention to the toy in question. If the toy realizes that they will "brainwash" him, changing its personality, it can also use this power. With a difficulty equal to the human's willpower (minimum difficulty Mediocre), and with a cost equal to this willpower if it is positive, with a minimum of 1 (that is to say, between 1 and 3, usually), the toy reinforces its link with its owner that will keep having appreciation to the toy like it is, avoiding forced changes of personality that would destroy its life like it is now. If it is frequently used in a successful way it also allows the toy to spend experience points to improve its Imprint.
• Special abilities: the special abilities are very specific powers that the owners have granted to their toys for the mere form in which they play with them. An example would be an action figure that can fly, because its owner played with it that way; another example would be a plush mouse dressed as a wizard that can cast fireballs. These powers are very different to each other, and for that the Gamemaster will have decide in each case the cost of use in IP, and the difficulty of the Imprint rolls needed (to more cost, bigger difficulty). Let's notice that the effects can't leave physical marks; in the case of the mouse mentioned before, it can't burn the house neither other toys, the effect is the same than when the owner plays with his toys; the mouse pretends it casts an spell, and the owner pushes around the other toys like if they were blown up. They can only damage each other by physical means, not by using Imprint powers.

Example scenarios

• Department war: a scenario that can be difficult to believe but that is more real than you think :) An office where great quantity of the employees have toys in their work cubicles. The rivalry among departments is such that at night, when they all have left, the toys abandon their places of rest to "play" their particular war (a band against the other one), like commandos, although in a subtle way.

Example characters

To be more specific with all what I've been talking about, I'm going to write down one or two toy characters, I hope they'll be enough to show you all the spirit of this setting and at the same time make the few rules clearer.

• Sir Coon
  

  Sir Coon is a small (scale -2) racoon plush (obviously) which lives in a freakish bookshop of comicbooks, roleplaying games, merchandising, etc. His spends most of his time in the shelvings, surrounded by boxes filled with card games, place he thinks he has to protect. Besides, the humans in charge on the bookshop use to argue about their specific tastes, so he tends to compete with the action figures of a few movies and comics that fill other shelves. From time to time, if their owners have had an argument, they have fights to champion the "honor" of their "philosophical schools".

  Attributes

  Fortitude	Good
  Dexterity	Good
  Reasoning	Fair
  Perception	Fair
  Willpower	Fair
  Imprint	Good
  Imprint Points	base score 11 + 3 extra points

  Sir Coon has a true toy in which it's based, so he has one extra initial IP. Every day he tries to be awake he must spend 1 IP (scale+1, with a minimum of 1 IP). It has a name, what makes him avoid the loss of 3 IP. He's been made in an assembly line work, with hundred of others, so he doesn't have any extra PI.

  Gifts

  • Special equipment: a miniature chainmail which gives him a protection of +3 with a penalization of -1 to all his physical actions (it's heavy for him). That chainmail was built by his owner when he proclaimed him "Sir", to better intimidate the "bad guys". Moreover so, this object so specific and handmade counts almost as if Sir Coon were handmade as well, giving him +2 extra IP.
  • Magnets: where it should have hands and feet, it has magnets, which give him a +2 to climb rolls on metallic surfaces and a +1 to the physical damage he can inflict, obviating he's a soft plush toy.

  Faults

  • Handless: he doesn't have agile hands, because it is a relatively simple plush toy. It can walk without any problem, but he does manipulate objects a little clumsily.

  Skills

  Brawl	Great
  Dodge	Good
  Area lore	Fair
  Climb	Fair
  Intimidate	Mediocre
  Jump	Mediocre
  Listen	Fair
  Search	Mediocre
  Spot	Fair
  Stealth	Fair

  Imprint powers

  Only the basic powers, he doesn't have any special power.

Hits since 09/June/2003:

Back to SubterFUDGE main page
Back to Lich's Lair
Jorge Arredondo
Last update: 23/August/2006

---