# Subway Runners tags: #game/rpg/subway-runners ![[Subway Runners (cover).jpg|600]] **Subway Runners** is Dan Phipps's 32-page **[[Forged in the Dark]]** micro-game, and its pitch is the most gig-economy thing the hobby has ever produced: the secret to immortality has been found, so *nobody retires anymore*, all the steady jobs are taken, and the only way to make quick cash is to sign up as a subway runner and hunt monsters in the tunnels below the city. It's *Metro* and *Monsters, Inc.* and a bad contractor gig all welded together, and — as its publisher is fond of noting — it made Polygon's best tabletop RPGs of 2024. ## Setting The action is in **Pociopolis**, where immortality has thrown the labor market into ruin: with nobody retiring, there are no openings anywhere, and the desperate turn to the **Metro Authority**, which hires **contractors** — not employees, the game is careful to point out — to do the jobs the immortal working class won't touch. Those jobs involve the subway, whose tunnels **dug too deep** and now need periodic sweeping of whatever crawled up out of the dark. You're a runner, a low-status contractor with a crew and a gig, hunting monsters and repairing line breaks for the privilege of not being broke. The tone is pulp and dream-logic — the book cheerfully embraces its own weirdness. ## Mechanics The engine is the standard **Forged in the Dark** action roll — a d6 pool equal to your action rating, keep the highest die, **6** clean success, **4/5** partial with a consequence, **1–3** failure — with the usual **stress**, **resistance**, **push yourself**, assistance, **trauma**, and **wounds** dials. What makes **Subway Runners** distinctive is its love of random generation and its genuinely odd gear: every runner gets a different action list, so your list never matches your teammate's; traumas range from "rude" to "romantic"; and the kit splits into strange buckets like **Domain & Magic dice**, **Weapon & Fightin' dice**, and **Armor & Resistance dice**, plus **Accessories** and **Pack Inventory & Coin**. The game is built to run online — characters, gigs, and adventure details are generated from free perchance.org tools, so you can be playing within minutes and never run the same runner twice. ## Editions - **Subway Runners** — a 32-page color FitD game by Dan Phipps (Gem Room Games), released free/isolation-copy with a low buy price. *In the library* (the full PDF plus its rules reference). ## References - [Subway Runners — itch.io (Gem Room Games)](https://gemroomgames.itch.io/subwayrunners) - [Subway Runners — Polygon's Best Tabletop RPGs of 2024](https://www.polygon.com/gaming/505466/best-tabletop-rpgs-2024)