Note: This game inherently uses Judao-Christian terminology. This isn't in any why a claim of support or admonishment for that, or any other, religion.

Evolution is a game of logistics and imagination played by two or more people. These players assume the roles of gods who each have domination over an Eden of 50 neophyte humans. Since, at the start of the game, these humans are blank slates, each "god" shepherds his people into forming a unique civilization based on that god's foresight and whim. The game is divided into various phases of play: The Genesis, The Exodus, The Acts, and The Apocalypse.

Genesis
Before game play can begin, each god should prepare a game sheet. During the course of play testing, we have found that graph paper is the best paper to make the game sheet on. A basic outline of the game sheet would be at the top of the paper write the headings Name, Population--under this make a division for male and female, and Possibility. Below these headings there are eight columns: Economy, Social, Technology, Faith, Action, Evolution, Death's Toll, and Gods' Counil.
1) Name: Simply put, this is the name of your civilization--this may, or may not,correspond with the name of your god.
2) Population: You start of with a population of 50.
3) Possibility: This heading will be explained later. Every god has a possibility rating of 13.
The headings will be explained later.

The playing field for Evolution is also constructed from graph paper. The gods decide on the land form--or the geography of the "known" world rather--on which the game will play. Then each god chooses a single grid which contains their starting village, or Eden. *Recently we have devised a method of map notation for games played over the internet or through regular mail. The rules for this style of play, however, will be included in later Evolution supplements.

The game is divided into turns called generations. In respect to game time, a generation is approximately thirty-two years in length. During the course of a single generation each god take turns proposing developments under each category, or column. After the last god has performed his Evolution Column, the gods initiate a council in which they rally favours in order to influence aspects of the entire game. Once the God's Council has ended, the next generation begins and each god calculates his Population increase.

Exodus
Although life in Eden might sound appealing to our modern sensibilities, the inevitability of having paradise is that it will eventually be lost. Or to put it in the context of the game, as the neophyte humans begin to advance, they will reach a point when the advantages of their initial village will become nonexistent. When this occurs, Eden dies. After the dissolving of Eden, the game enters the Exodus phase where in a particular people's advancements must be weighed against certain constraints, i.e. outside of Eden one must learn to feed themselves, clothe themselves, maintain shelters, etc. It would be an exercise in cruel punishment to suddenly strip away Eden only to find that your people die. Therefore a god spends the initial generations of the game preparing for Eden's disappearance, as well as laying ground work for the incarnation of his people's civilization. In order to organize, and have some sort of mediation over, the possible randomness available through this game. Three mechanical features of Evolution come into play: Population, Possibility, and Dice Rolls.

Possibility: Aside from the game being composed of gods in play, there are two other innate forces that hold some form of dominion in the game. The first is Nature and the second will be spot lighted later. Although the game setting begins in multiple Edens, weather conditions exist outside of Eden--another potential hazard once Eden is gone--and even inside Eden Nature's laws hold dominion. The gods you will be playing are not by fortune omnipotent. How then can a god exert his will? The answer is by rolling against his Possibility score, with possibility being the potential for a god to influence nature.

Population You might be wondering how population is grouped under a mechanical feature, or more specifically how it has a mediating roll in the game. This aspect of Population will be discussed in a later section, but first the rules of population and population growth must be addressed. It's been stated that a god begins the game with fifty people, and it was brought up that the division is evenly split. The exception to this rule is that every generation a god gets the chance to influence the male to female ratio of his population. The player does this by rolling under his possibility score with 4d6. This does nothing, however, to explain population growth. Assuming at the start of the game a god has twenty-five males and twenty-five females, there aren't any rules that these people will mate monogamisticly--remember there have been no developments made towards any relationship practices. Therefore any one male could have multiple mates, and anyone female could have from zero to say three kids per pregnancy. Since a generation is thirty-two years, and taking into the ability, or lack there of, for older humans to reproduce, there can be any number between zero and 3x number of children--with x being the number of birthing capable females. This would point to a feature of the game that could be overbearing, especially with the addition of larger populations. We remedy this by saying that for any new generation, the incoming population increase is equal to the number of females present at the end of the previous generation. To go back to our example, at the start of the second generation, there would be 25 new people to add to the total. This 1:1 ratio of mothers and children is also how we compensate for natural" death in Eden.

Dice Rolls: Note: Up to this point, these rules have assumed that you have some experience with Role Playing Games, as well as dice notation. To quickly explain, the 4d6 roll to control one's population make-up is read thusly: the D stands easily enough for die, or dice, the number after the D, in this case a six, tells what type of die to roll and the preceding number, 4 in the example, tells the number of dice to roll. An endearing feature of Evolution is that it uses only six sided dice. This was developed to include 1) those who don't possess, or might not have even heard of, standard role playing dice or 2) those tired of messing with them.

You've probably figured out by now that dice rolls are made against your Possibility rating. This is particularly easy with small amount of dice but, as reason would explain, gets difficult with the more dice you have to roll. Here lies the political nature of Evolution. When a god is presenting his idea for the category in play, the other gods confer and then assign a number of d6's for the presenting god to roll. If this player believes that the assigned number of dice is too high, he can argue against it, using his past applicable successes as material, in hopes of lessening the roll. Once the number of dice have been set, the presenting god rolls the dice and totals the number rolled, with the exception of any rolled 1's which are counted as zeros. If the sum of the roll is under thirteen, his proposed idea is successful and becomes an active institution for his people.

Acts
This really isn't a concrete phase which can be achieved and eventually passed through, but rather the abilities and actions that compose the other phases. Once your people have moved away from Eden, it is your aim to achieve the concept you have for them. The Acts, then, are what you have your people do towards this end.

As stated above, there are eight columns that come into play in an Evolution game: Economy, Social, Technology, Faith, Action, Evolution, Death's Toll and God's Council.

Economy: This is the column which houses any development that governs the economic ideas and transactions of your people. Economy, defines the very nature of your peoples' material concerns. It reflects their interactions, when obtaining, utilising, or processing material resources. Economy tends to be vaguely defined as a concept, in the capitalistic terms of money and money matters. This is a rather narrow view of this category, because economy's varied possibilities.

Examples: Value system, Sharing, Bartering, Currency system, using established trade routes, etc.

Social: This column contains all the developments that lead to the social and eventually the political nature of your people. When dealing with the concepts of communication, culture, and communal values, the social category becomes absolutely vital. The social category encloses all of the social scieneces, especially Sociology. The social category encompasses the principle ideas and structure of your people's society.

Examples: Communalism, Tribal government, Establishing a Monarchy, Reforming Diplomatic ties with neighboring countries, etc.

Technology: These are the technological advances that your people assimilate into their everyday lives. This category, is possibly, the single fastest way to give your people access to advantages over their enemies. in technology, you define your peoples' developments and ability to cope with serious enviornmental concerns. It is in this category where the techniques of weapons and the tools of your people are made.

Examples: Simple Tools, Discover Fire, Ship building, Thermo-nuclear weapons, etc.

Faith: This column houses the developments which influences your people's philosophy and possible religions. These philosophys allow you to further influence and aid your other categories. you can make your people fanatical zealots who seek to stamp out your enemy's people, or you can make introspective thinkers who can adapt and evolve the ideas of your enemies people over to your own ideas and religions. It is in this category that a society is made whole.

Examples: Learn about Mortality, Value Human Life, Dream of the End of the World, Worship me as a Water God who will protect their naval and merchant ships, etc.

Action: This column isn't as cut and dry as the others. This column houses direct commands that you have your people perform, as well as, any self-contained miracle of nature. Self-contained, it is used because this miracle cannot act as a second evolution, and developes your people in a much more category oriented system.. In any case the other gods are able to rule on the validity of any miracle.

Examples: My people walk into the ocean, A persons happens upon an item of particular note", A pillar of Stone suddenly erects in the middle of Eden, A Prophet is sent down to lead my people, etc.

Evolution: This is the fun column in the game, and the one which incidentally bares the games name. If a god wants to Evolve either his people, or his land, beyond the point that natural selection allows, it is placed in this column. But evolution is more than that. Evolution developes your people, somewhat independently of the other categories. A God, for example, could adapt his people through both the evolutionary concerns and the various other categories, to survive or better control, specific enviornmental factors.

Examples: Altered Reproductive structures, Superior physical build, My people have magical abilities, My land grows trees which can talk, etc.

Those six columns are the active columns in which the majourity of the game is played. As a hint, it is best to develop slowly, in that smaller jumps in advancement result in relatively low dice rolls. Another feature of the game deals with failures. We are assuming that a god is investing his energies towards any particular development, and despite the success or failure of the action, his energy is spent. Therefore if a god returns to a development that he has failed, his invested energy is cumulative. This translates in the game as such, if you attempt an idea that had previously failed, this entitles the conferring gods to lessen their original dice appointment. It is therefore wise to write both your successes and failures on your character sheets. Another feature of the game is the extra column. At the end of the last god's evolution, each god rolls a d6 and this grants them an extra column in relation to that number--the columns Economy through Evolution are numbered one through six respectively. Since this is a freebie column, you are allowed to trade with other gods for more favourable columns. These columns are dealt with in their respective number order and the actions are written in the appropriate column.

Death's Toll: Human nature is the second force, in the game, that exists outside of the god's control. This is related in the Death's Toll, or negative consequence, column. This represents the ills of a gods society and the dangers that come from his people's advancements. If, during the course of a presenting gods idea, one of the conferring god see's a negative consequence of the god's action, it must be presented to the god in play. Now, if he accepts the conferring gods' dice appointment and is successful, he must also take the negative from that action.

Example: One god declares that his people will have an understanding of Warfare. Another god could say that if this is so, then that god's people might have civil insurrections.

If a Death's Toll is presented, it too is given a dice amount. This amount corresponds to the number of d6 that the receiving god must roll against his possibility. This amount is correlative to the severity of the toll, hence a Death toll of jealousy might be only a decimal of a single die, and Hatred might warrant a complete die or even more. At the end of a generation, a god rolls the total number of dice in his death's toll column. If he fails the roll, he must roll a d3, or percentage die--this translates to a d6 with the numbers 1-2 equaling a 0, 3-4, a 1, and 5-6, equaling 2--where ten times the number rolled is the percentage of his population who died that Generation as a result of his society's dangers. Once a god receives a Death's Toll it remains in play until he, through a development in one of his columns, addresses the particular toll. Example: I can alleviate a 3d Death toll from disease if I advance my people's knowledge of medicine in my Technology category.

As with other aspects of the game, the effectiveness of any one attempt at quelling a Death's Toll is debated upon by the gods in play.

Gods Council: If one god is able to exert influence over external forces, then all the gods working as once are able to reach true omnipotence. The God's council column, like Death's Toll, isn't obligatory but is only activated outside of necessity. In this column all the gods bring consensual ideas into, with the understanding that it affects all the gods' peoples and stays in play until the end of the game, or until another consented time limit expires. An example of this would be to unleash a plague on all the people. It is here that the issue of Dissolving Eden comes into play. In any God's Council a god can either destroy is own Eden or bring up the responsibility of destroying all Edens. In the latter case, this must be consensual, that is unless a majourity of the gods are wanting to destroy their Edens. In this case they can give the minority god or gods a time frame, after which the Edens will automatically disappear.

Apocalypse

Since Evolution is basically a game, you might be wonder how one wins--putting this idea aside, a single game of Evolution has the potential to run for years.

If at any time the entirety of a god's people are destroyed, or if his people stop worshiping him as their deity in place of another, that god ceases to exist. Another way to state that is if you are the last god alive, you win. Here in lies the danger of The Apocalypse.

Combat: Due to the conscise nature of these Beta rules, the guidelines for combat are designed to move swiftly. A more indepth, an perhaps flawed, version of the combat rules will be available in the Complete Basice Evolution Rule Book. Since this isn't a wargame by design, combat is treated in abstract terms of opposing units, each with a combat score. The combat score is determined by the number of advantages minus the number of disadvantages. These advantages and disadvantages are debated at the beginning of the combat round, and remain until the end of that particular war. As a result, future combat ratings can be different.
Example: I'm waging war against a neighbouring people. Since I have complex stone weapons, my people have been evolved to be fighters, and their society is geared around warfare I have 3 uncontested advantages. However my people are mountain dwellers and I'm fighting in a desert, and I'm unfamiliar with the terrain, so I have 2 disadvantages. This gives me a combat rating of 1--obviously it wasn't in my best interest to initiate this war.

Once the combat score has been established, the two gods decide how many years his people will wage war. For every ten years of war there must be a round of combat--with shorter battles of course taking at least one combat round. If combat rounds extend over generations, then they are played over the course of that many generations.
Example: Two Gods, on with an army of 300, the other with an army of 175 decide to war for forty years. This converts to four rounds of combat. Since generations are 32 years, the first generation of combat would house 30 years, or three rounds of combat, and the second generation would house the last round or ten years.

Next the two sides are labeled Offensive and Defensive for the first round of fighting. Combat proceeds as follows, each side rolls their combat rating in dice. The two sets of rolls are compared with victories going to the respective side of the higher roll. In the case of ties the defenders get a re-roll against one of the Offensive side's victory dice. Re-rolls continue if more ties are thrown.

Example: Side A (Off. 300 troops, combat rating of 4) rolls 6,1,4,2--As in all other cases, 1's are discarded. Side B (Def. 175 troops, combat rating: 2) rolls 5 and 2. The five beats the Offense's 4. Since the two ties the offensive two, the defender rolls agains and rolls a 6. This ties the offensive 6, so the defender rolls again. He rolls a 2--if he had rolled a one it would have been discarded--and the defender stands with two victory dice for this round.

Example 2: Sides A and B square off--same stats, same Offensive and Defensive status--and Side A rolls 3, 3, 4, 6; Side B rolls 5 and 3. The defensive 5 beats the offensive 4. The Defender re-rolls his tie and rolls a two. The round ends with two victory dice for Side A and one victory die for side B.

After the number of victories is established, each side rolls a percentage die--the same d3 die used in Death's Toll and Natural Disasters--for every victory his opponent had against him. The corresponding percentage, 0%, 10%, or 20%, is shows how many casualties that side has. The role of Offensive for the next round of combat goes to the side with the most victory dice for the previous round. Combat continues until the number of years expires, at which point in time the battle is considered a draw, or a decisive vicotry is established. This decisivel victor is determined if one army is reduced to 15%, or less, the size of the other.

Conversion: Evolution Conversions:
Evolution, is a game in which the players must choose between accceptable losses, and the dire consequences of their Death Tolls. In this context it is not suprising to see that there is an option availible in the game, to convert people of another God and faith to your own faith. This unique Action category requires careful forethought and a consideration of the makeup of the other God(s)'s people(the prize for this action) and your own people(the tools for the transformation). The other god(s), still have a say in the final outcome of the conversion, but there are several stancdard human concepts which allow for a change and conversion of one faith, into another, by means of a more active society actively seeking converts. The requirements of this action may be the most difficult to aquire. Humans by nature tend to learn the communication of other groups of humans, but the world of evolution may not always be populated, just with humans. In several of the playtesting games, it was found, that gods would instill strange or alien concepts of communication on their people. Jerry would usually make it very difficult for his people to ever learn a spoken language of another God(s)'s people, but even Jerry's communities and tribes are not immune to the effects of Conversion. The communication of two, separate and entirely different races is handled, based upon a set method of terms based upon a calculated difference value. People with similar forms of communication (ie both spoken or both speaking sign language) have a difference value of 4d6. The difference value represents the number of d6's that must be rolled in the social category to overcome the barrier of a normal language. Each generation, spent in a social category on decreasing the difference value counts as a minus one An example:The first god, after putting his people into physical contact with the other civilization, the God finds a people with a spoken language--like that of his people, so 4D6 is the base--the people have a standard religion very different from his(+1 modifier), they use colors as metaphors(+1 modifier), their hands change color with emotional change(+1 modifier), and they have a racial fear of outsiders(+1 modifier). The first time the oposing God attempts to establish communication with these people depends on the turn in which they came in contact. In the firts generation of contact the roll would be 4D+4, the second would be 4D+3 and so on until an eventual 4D6 roll was reached in generation 6 after contact. The roll would only get lower if the God tried the task multiple times after the sixth generation mark, due to the standard decrease of the roll. this roll takes for granted that the people don't develope similar attributes in other categories or sway even farther from these calculated understandings, because both cultures would be present for these new changes. This system provideds several interesting factors for development.

Additions

The only addition to these rules would have to be Natural Disasters. The people in Eden are protected from weather conditions until their god sets them into motion. These still aren't, unless the god states otherwise, Natural Disasters. Once Eden is gone, however, these disaster come into play. At the beginning of the God's Council, each god without Eden rolls 4d6 against his possibility. If he fails then some sort of natural disaster happened that generation. The d3 percentage die is rolled to determine the number of fatalities from Nature's wrath.

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--- Evolution Basic Rules, beta ver 1.0 (c) 1996 by Infinite Possibilities ---