Alien RPG Integration and the Alien RPG Tools Suite

Why Integrate Alien RPG?

Most digital props for Alien RPG stop at aesthetics: a scanline overlay, a distress sound, a countdown. TTRPG Terminal Simulator does that too, but it also connects the terminal's actual mechanics (doors, hacking puzzles, encrypted files) to the numbers on each player's character sheet. When an operator faces a locked door, they're not clicking a generic "Try to Open" button. They're making the same Force or Bypass decision the rulebook describes, rolling the same dice pool their character would roll at the table.

None of this changes what the rules say. The terminal doesn't invent outcomes, adjust difficulty behind the scenes, or replace the GM's authority. It reads Wits, Comtech, Strength, and Close Combat straight from the operator's sheet and uses them exactly as written. Turn Alien RPG mode off and the terminal behaves exactly as it did before: every RPG-specific screen only exists when the host turns the game on.

How the Dice Checks Work

Every operator keeps a character sheet inside the terminal: four attributes rated 1 to 5, twelve skills rated 0 to 5, and, in the Evolved Edition, the derived Resolve stat. When a check comes up, the terminal shows the exact breakdown, for example "Wits 4 + Comtech 3 = 7 dice", and lets the player add a modifier for gear, talents, or being helped, the same way they would at the table.

For tables that prefer physical dice, a "Roll manually" toggle is available on every check. The operator rolls their own dice, reports success or failure, and the terminal accepts that report instead of rolling for them.

Character skill can only tighten constraints such as attempt counts or time limits. It never loosens them beyond what the host configured. The host's difficulty setting is always the ceiling, and the actual puzzle content (the hacking grid, the door's difficulty, the file's encryption) stays entirely under host control. A skilled hacker gets more room to work. They never get an easier puzzle than the one the host built.

Door Checks: Force or Bypass

Locked doors present operators with the same tactical choice the rulebook gives them:

Both approaches show the full stat breakdown and dice pool before the roll, and any host-configured door bonus or penalty is applied visibly. The operator picks their approach, the terminal shows the math, and the roll happens exactly as it would with dice on the table.

Hacking: Skill-Scaled Difficulty

Before a hacking puzzle starts, Alien RPG operators see a pre-hack screen with their Wits plus Comtech pool and the constraint tier it produces:

A panicking desperate character gets one attempt in five seconds. A veteran hacker gets five attempts and no clock at all. If an operator hasn't filled in their stats, they see a warning and can continue at the host's default difficulty instead of being blocked.

The host always bypasses this screen, and so do view-only operators, since the constraint only matters to whoever is actually at the keyboard.

Encrypted Content: Decrypt Checks

The same Wits plus Comtech check gates any button the host has marked encrypted: information panels, image galleries, video, audio, or embedded YouTube. A failed attempt locks the button until the host manually clears it, the same pressure as a failed hacking attempt drawing attention.

Multiple successes reveal the content in layers instead of all at once. Information panels reveal scrambled text a batch of characters at a time. Media buttons sharpen out of a pixelated mosaic as successes add up. Every roll visibly matters over the course of a scene instead of being a single pass-or-fail gate, and the same manual-roll option from hacking and doors is available here too.

Hosts can layer an animated static and glitch effect on top of any locked image, video, audio, or YouTube button, so a locked file reads as corrupted signal rather than just a blurred thumbnail. It's a purely cosmetic layer on top of the pixelation, so it never weakens the lock underneath.

Character Sheets & Operator Labels

Every operator gets their own sheet inside the terminal: four attributes, twelve skills, and, in the Evolved Edition, the derived Resolve stat. They fill it in once and every check afterward reads from it automatically.

Hosts can also give each operator a display label, a persona name that shows everywhere in the terminal instead of their account name or email. The same account can carry a different persona at a different host's table, which keeps player identity and character identity cleanly separate.

The Alien RPG Tools Suite

Separate from the character-driven checks above, the terminal also includes nine Alien RPG utilities built for the host, opened from a single header button whenever an Alien RPG game is active. They exist to generate or resolve something at the moment you need it, instead of pausing the scene to grab the book or open another tab. Switch between tools mid-session and each one keeps its state; the Combat Tracker even survives a full page reload.

None of these tools replace the rulebook. They put it within reach during the scene instead of on a shelf, so the pressure stays on the players instead of on you flipping pages.