The MARS Systems Reference Document (SRD) is licenced under Creative Commons License By Attribution Share-Alike which means you can use it for free, extend it, build your own content related to it, and even sell products based on MARS and your work as long as you provide attribution within your work to MARS and you share what you’ve created back with the community.

Attribution

MARS borrows and remixes concepts licensed from other gaming systems under Open Licenses. Specifically:

  • Dungeons and Dragons SRD: Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (“CC-BY-4.0”). Dungeons and Dragons is a trademark of Wizards of the Coast LLC.
  • Fate SRD: Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported License (“CC-BY-3.0”). Fate™ is a trademark of Evil Hat Productions LLC.
  • Cypher System SRD: Cypher System Open License. Cypher System is a trademark of Monte Cook Games LLC.

Big thanks to all the GMs and Creators online who generously share their ideas with the world for us all to use, in particular:

  • Matt Colville for his ideas around Boss Abilities among other things.
  • Baron de Ropp for his tips around designing random encounters and world-building.
  • Bob World Builder for his reflections on great and not-so-great mechanics in different systems.
  • Brennan Lee Mulligan for his deep philosophical musings on roleplay, improvisation and the role of a GM.
  • Jed Herne for his thoughts around how to write really compelling Antagonists.
  • Michael Hague’s insights on the ‘two journeys’ our hero’s take through the Joseph Campbell’s Monomyth.

Acknowledgements

MARS was developed by Andrew Ramsden and sponsored by the team at Peak State Global.

Special thanks go to Andrew Francois for the inspiration to start this project in the first place and his ideas and feedback around Modular Narratives and other game mechanics.

Play testing, feedback, ideas and other support gratefully received from: Daisy Ramsden, Sam Ramsden, Adelaide Harmony, Benjamin Woolfe and Brett Loccisano.