A Supragen Origin Story

In 2016, the Omnigenos Chronicles officially began… but it first started to take shape way back in the summer of 2000. Today, the Chronicles celebrate the next step in their growth from a crazy idea into something genuinely special.

The Omnigenos Chronicles are the stories of a sprawling, interconnected superhero universe that first began in the novel Next Alliance: False Starts. In this version of the world outside our window, a mysterious series of genetic sequences have been found inside some humans. These omnigenes come in many varieties and can be activated by different types of catalysts, but what they all have in common is that they grant people incredible abilities.

The Omnigenos Chronicles is the story of the eighty-eight years that these people—called omnigeni—influence the course of history on Earth. But set against that backdrop, it is a place where many different stories of struggle and triumph, of coming of age and heartbreak, and of action and excitement can be told. From the two current series—Next Alliance and Team-Up Tales—to the upcoming crossover event Titanstorm and beyond, the Omnigenos Chronicles is a sandbox and a playground for telling every kind of superhero story…

And one day I realized that there was room in that sandbox for more people than just me! Thus was born SUPRAGEN.

What is Supragen?

Supragen is a tabletop roleplaying game where players take on the parts of omnigeni while another player, called the Director, portrays the villains and bystanders of each story. For those familiar with roleplaying games, this probably sounds super familiar… but the idea of letting others behind the curtain to tell stories in this universe was a very daunting one for me. It had to play just right. The Omnigenos Chronicles is a series full of drama as much as explosions, and I wanted a game that allowed people to really be creative and thoughtful and focused on the story of their characters, not just how good they were at punching villains.

That’s what brought me to Supragen. Based on the amazing work that Vagrant Workshop—and especially Carsten Damm—did with Nathan Russel’s Freeform/Universal Engine for their Earthdawn: Age of Legend game, Supragen uses that narrative, story-first system as its heart. Players grab a hero from the Codex and take part in exciting stories of their own creation set firmly in the vast backdrop of the Omnigenos Chronicles.

Using a simple mechanism to determine success or failure, and heavily valuing collaboration among players and the Director in how those results are interpreted, Supragen is exactly the kind of RPG that I love to play. It’s a perfect match for this universe that I love so much, and an excellent, easy-to-learn game for novice and veteran players alike. Getting to work on this project with my friends at Vagrant Workshop—where I have been lucky enough to contribute to their amazing Equinox universe—is the icing on the cake!

What’s Next?

You can think about the Startup Guide as the first exciting issue in the ongoing series that is Supragen. Along the way, more content will release in issue-sized micro-releases to introduce new and expanded rules, new storylines to explore, and—most importantly—more heroes and villains to play!

Our very first micro-release will be the Supragen Character Catalyst, the rules for creating your own characters using every sequence and power class… and that’s just the beginning. In the months to come we will have additional micro-releases, the Supragen Action Pack full of helpful tokens and tools, and so much more!

Watch omnigenos.com for news about upcoming releases!