Paranoia - Starter guide

What is Paranoia?

Paranoia is a dystopian comedy roleplaying game set in Alpha Complex, a sealed city of the future run by Friend Computer, an artificial intelligence that loves its citizens very, very much. Happiness is mandatory. The rations are delicious, secret societies do not exist, and anyone who says otherwise is a traitor. You play a Troubleshooter: a low-level agent sent out to find trouble and shoot it. Your teammates have the same job, which is unfortunate, because at least one of them is quite sure the traitor is you.

The joke at the heart of the game is that everyone is guilty. Every character hides an illegal mutant power and a membership of a banned secret society, and Friend Computer punishes both with summary execution. Missions make no sense, orders contradict each other, and the mission report will still insist that everything went perfectly. Where most roleplaying games ask for teamwork, Paranoia asks for teamwork in public and betrayal in private, and gets its biggest laughs from the gap between the two.

The game was designed by Greg Costikyan, Dan Gelber and Eric Goldberg and first appeared in 1984 at West End Games. Today the line belongs to Mongoose Publishing, and Netherbook stocks the newest version of the Paranoia Core Rulebook, the fully revised edition from 2023 that folds four decades of satire into a single book and quietly retires the card decks of the previous edition.

How does the system work?

The core mechanic is a pool of ordinary six-sided dice. Add a stat to a skill, roll that many d6, and every five or six counts as a success. One die in the pool is special: the Computer Die. When that die also comes up a success, Friend Computer has taken notice of what you were doing - wonderful news if you were being loyal, rather less wonderful if you were not. Misbehave and you collect treason stars, which make the Computer Die pay attention more often. A small pool of Moxie lets you push your luck and fuels the mutant power you are legally required not to have.

Alpha Complex is sorted by security clearance, a ladder of colours that runs from Infrared at the bottom through Red, Orange, Yellow, Green and Blue all the way up to Ultraviolet. You start at RED, which means most doors, corridors and forms are above your station. Knowing rules above your clearance is treason, which is why Paranoia actively prefers players who have never opened the rulebook. Only the gamemaster needs to know how anything works.

Then there are the clones. Every character comes as a six-pack. When your Troubleshooter dies - shot, dissolved, accidentally recycled, executed on a misunderstanding - the next clone walks in, usually mid-scene and slightly confused, and the mission continues. Death is not the end of your story here; it is the punchline before the next one.

What do you need to start?

The core rulebook is the entire game. It contains character creation, the dice system, a tour of Alpha Complex, equipment up to and including experimental R&D devices with three buttons and no manual, tools and tables for building missions, a cast of characters, and genuinely useful gamemaster advice. Add a handful of six-sided dice, pencils and three to six players, and you are ready.

Only one person has to prepare: the gamemaster reads the book and practises a straight face. The players need to learn almost nothing, which makes Paranoia one of the easiest games there is for introducing complete newcomers - they only need to understand that the Computer is their friend, and that they should act accordingly.

Who is this game for?

Let us be honest first. Paranoia is not the game for groups who get attached to their characters. Characters die by the handful, and that is the joke; the six-pack of clones is a budget, and the game intends to spend it. It is also not the game for a long campaign with slow character arcs. Most groups play it in one-shots and short bursts between other campaigns, because the joke loses pace when it runs every week for a year. And if player-versus-player betrayal sours your table, stay away: betrayal is the engine here, not an accident.

It is very much the game for groups who want to laugh out loud at the table. It shines on party evenings, as a palate cleanser between heavier campaigns, and in groups with changing attendance, because a new player is only ever one clone away from joining. Gamemasters who love to improvise, escalate and deadpan get more room here than almost anywhere else.

How does it compare to other systems?

Compared with Dungeons & Dragons 5e, Paranoia points the whole hobby in the opposite direction. D&D invests in a character who grows session after session; Paranoia hands you a character that takes five minutes to make and expects to lose several before dessert. The rules are far lighter, the tone is pure satire, and the campaign is an evening.

Compared with Mothership, the two games share a lot on paper: science fiction, short formats, expendable characters and a high body count. The difference is what the dying is for. Mothership plays fear straight and builds tension; Paranoia plays death for laughs and builds farce. Pick by the mood you want in the room.

And if what you actually want is science fiction played seriously, with trade, star charts and a campaign that runs for years, read our full comparison Traveller vs Paranoia, which sets this game against its stablemate at Mongoose.

Where do you start?

The gamemaster reads the core book, or at least the rules and the gamemastering chapters; the mission material can be mined as you go. Pick a short mission, hand the players characters, and tell them only three things: the Computer is your friend, your teammates are your friends, and rumours of a traitor on the team are themselves treason. Then let them loose.

Run it as a one-shot first. Keep the briefing absurd, say yes to schemes, let the experimental equipment do what it wants, and end with a debriefing in which everyone lies. If the table walks away quoting the mission report, you have played it correctly, citizen.

Recommended products at Netherbook

Start with the Paranoia Core Rulebook: one book, the complete game, and everything the gamemaster needs. When you want ready-made material, Brave New Missions adds five ready-to-run missions, which suits a game that lives in one-shots unusually well. You can find the whole line in our Paranoia collection, and Paranoia keeps fitting company in our Dystopian & Post-Apocalyptic, Comedy & Satire and Sci-fi collections.