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Magic Window Studios presents

A Tabletop Roleplaying Game by AlienOvan

Metaforce is a genre-agnostic, modular tabletop roleplaying system designed to allow a wide variety of game settings and scenarios while enabling players to build and customise their character’s powers, skills and abilities with numerically-backed scores known as Metaphors. Fate-altering Meta Powers give players the power to survive even the most dangerous situations, allowing Game-Masters to run more intense scenarios without high risk of TPK. Metaforce uses d12s as the key die.

The current build for Metaforce is BETA 2.22, expected to finalise major systems within the year 2026.

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Game/Wiki News

Written by AlienOvan

9th February 2026
In preparation of the 2026 Playtests, I've updated the Character Sheet for the system, as well as a few progressions regarding Level ups. In order to keep a character's defensive stats relevant to increasing Skill and Magnitude increasing Metaphors, level-ups give +1 Evasion (and Deflection), as well as increasing the character's Status Resist scores for their Core values. Metaphors like Fitness and Discipline-Will grant bonuses to Body and Mind cores respectively to help those who want to keep their special defenses high.

Attribute Tiers have been properly depreciated, focus will mainly be on balancing the number stacks of Attributes, Metaphors and Metaphor Components. Characters who would otherwise be leagues more adept at an Attribute will now have proper Attribute property tags saying so. Attributes can be marked 'Proficient' or 'Expertise' to indicate universal Advantage states for species or individuals who get them.

Other highlights include the introduction of Dashing: When your character spends no other actions other than movement, their speed for that Action Frame is increased by 2x. Now that Encounters now only give characters 2 Action Frames per turn, this roughly gives characters roughly the same movement speed options and action economy as they would in other popular games and systems.

Proficiency in a Attribute or Metaphor means a character rolls with Advantage when no other complication affects the difficulty of a check. But now Expertise has been formalised as "Treats the roll as being average or higher, rounded up", meaning rolls with Expertise can transmute 'Roll 1' disadvantages into the average of the die, which would be 6 for d12s.

Feb 10th update
I have added a Spells & Powers section below the main section of the Character Sheet. Now your character can have a distinct section to list things such as spells that wouldn't work very well under Metaphors or Arcs & Features. The Description box should wrap text around to ensure everything is visible. The Spells & Powers section is given a Red colour code.

Additionally, there is a new XP curve for the sheet. I will update Experience curve to be 10 plus 5 per level instead of 10 per level stacking.

Master Categories

For a full list of game mechanics, see Mechanics

Getting Started

Before you start playing Metaforce, best to read up on the basic terms and concepts.

• Character Creation A section to help new players start creating their first character.
• Character Sheet Explains the Character sheet used to play Metaforce.
• Race Explains the Race/Species articles and provides a list of them.
• Attributes A section explaining the six essential aspects of a characters capabilities.
• Core Value A section explaining the three core stats that affect everything else, including resistances.
• Meta Dice A section that covers the unique dice used in Metaphors, Attributes and more.
• Metaphor A section that covers what Metaphors are used for and how values are assigned and used.
• Recommended Metaphors A list containing Metaphors players would find helpful in most Metaforce games.
• Level A section that goes over the importance of a character level, level-ups and progression.
• Arc A section that explains the special features a character gains as they level up.
• Experience A describing how Experience points (XP) are gained and used to progress a character.
• How To Play An explanation how games are run and what to do and when to do checks.
• Debt Explains the concept of Experience Debt and Boosting (to modify progression).

Playing Metaforce

These concepts make more sense after understanding the basics, or might only be relevant after starting your first session.

• Meta Point An important section that goes over Meta-Points (MP), a resource used in Meta Powers.
  • Meta Power Narrative interventions that enable players to influence the outcomes of their character's fate.
• Equipment A section that covers how equippable and usable (consumable) items work, and how they can be modified or enhanced.
• Inventory A section that details the carry capacity and Inventory rules for characters.
• Encounter An in-depth look on how combat and special scenarios work in a Metaforce game.
• Action Frames A break-down of what Action Frames are, how to use them in Encounters.
• Magnitude An explanation to how Status Conditions and Magnitude work, and how they can be used to measure stamina and action costs.
• Complication Describes the circumstances in which a character may lose advantage or suffer disadvantage during checks.
• Resistance Explains how the difference Resistance (and Anti-Resistance) properties function.
• Size A section that goes over the effects of Size and various considerations to take involving gigantic or tiny creatures.

Game Mastery

For a full list of topics relating to running games, see Game Mastery

Features

Modular Skills and Powers Metaphors are skills, powers and abilities a character can use to defend themselves or gain an advantage within their environment throughout various campaigns and settings. The Game Master and Player should communicate to each other to create and design Metaphors that are appropriate to the campaign.	Exploding Dice Dice with 12 sides (and sometimes other forms of die) can ‘explode’, allowing an additional die with the same number of sides to be rolled and added to the result upon rolling its highest value. Typically, Skill, ToHit, and Damage Dice can explode in this way.
Meta Dice Meta Dice appear in Attributes and Metaphors with a value of +1 or greater. Starting at d4 and working up to d6, d8, d10 and d12. Meta-dice have a minimum number relative to the initial value of the Attribute/Metaphor, at its strongest, the d12 can't roll lower than a 5.	Attributes / Core Values There are 6 Attributes (Strength, Endurance, Agility, Perception, Intellect, Charisma) that can be added to various checks, these Attributes contribute towards 3 Core Values (Body, Reflex, Mind) which govern a number of other stats including Health-Points (HP), Meta-Points (MP), Deflection and Evasion.
Status Conditions and Magnitude Status Conditions affect characters in different ways, and even keep track of various resources they may have. Magnitude is used to track conditions and if it exceeds a character's relevant Core Value, they may become affected by a condition.	Size and Size-Rating Size Rating determines the physical size of a character or creature, scaling its statistics such as Max Health, Damage dealt, Reach, Move Speed and more. The rules and adjustments for size work the same for player characters and NPCs.