Wayfarers is a pencil and paper role-playing game

Role-playing game

A role-playing game is a game in which players assume the roles of characters in a fictional setting. Players take responsibility for acting out these roles within a narrative, either through literal acting, or through a process of structured decision-making or character development...

 (RPG) released in the fall of 2008 by the Ye Olde Gaming Companye (YOGC). It was created by Jimmy T. Swill and Gregory Vrill. The names Jimmy Swill and Gregory Vrill are used within the book as names for example characters.

Wayfarers is a swords and sorcery

Swords and Sorcery

Swords and Sorcery is a 1963 anthology of fantasy short stories in the sword and sorcery subgenre, edited by L. Sprague de Camp and illustrated by Virgil Finlay. It was first published in paperback by Pyramid Books...

 fantasy RPG, and it references the Wizards of the Coast

Wizards of the Coast

Wizards of the Coast is an American publisher of games, primarily based on fantasy and science fiction themes, and formerly an operator of retail stores for games...

 (WoTC) Open Gaming License

Open Gaming License

The Open Game License may be used by game developers to grant permission to modify, copy, and redistribute some of the content designed for their games, notably game mechanics.-Language of the licence:The OGL describes two forms of content:...

 (OGL) and System Reference Document

System Reference Document

The System Reference Document, or SRD, is a set of reference role playing game mechanics licensed under the Open Game License by Wizards of the Coast and based upon their Dungeons and Dragons role-playing game. The SRD forms the basis of WotC's various d20 System role-playing games, including the...

 (SRD), an open source

Open source

The term open source describes practices in production and development that promote access to the end product's source materials. Some consider open source a philosophy, others consider it a pragmatic methodology...

 document allowing publishers to employ material from the d20 system

D20 System

The d20 System is a role-playing game system published in 2000 by Wizards of the Coast originally developed for the third edition of Dungeons & Dragons...

 version of the Dungeons & Dragons

Dungeons & Dragons

Dungeons & Dragons is a fantasy role-playing game originally designed by Gary Gygax and Dave Arneson, and first published in 1974 by Tactical Studies Rules, Inc. . The game has been published by Wizards of the Coast since 1997...

 RPG, which is published by the WoTC. In addition, the YOGC publishes Wayfarers under its own Open Gaming License.

Wayfarers is similar in style and form to the first edition of Advanced Dungeons & Dragons (AD&D) by Gary Gygax

Gary Gygax

Ernest Gary Gygax was an American writer and game designer best known for co-creating the pioneering role-playing game Dungeons & Dragons with Dave Arneson. Gygax is generally acknowledged as the father of role-playing games....

 and Dave Arnenson, but has a classless skill-based player character creation system and employs character proficiencies similar to those in the 2nd edition of AD&D by David "Zeb" Cook.

Despite referencing the WoTC SRD, Wayfarers is not true to the mechanics of D&D as games such as Labyrinth Lord

Labyrinth Lord

Labyrinth Lord is a fantasy role-playing game written and edited by Daniel Proctor and published by Goblinoid Games. It emulates the rules and feel of classic era Dungeons & Dragons using the Open Game License from Wizards of the Coast...

, OSRIC

OSRIC

OSRIC, short for Old School Reference and Index Compilation, describes itself as "a compilation of rules for old school-style fantasy gaming...intended to reproduce underlying rules used in the late 1970s to early 1980s" . It is a role-playing game...

, and Swords & Wizardry which also reference the SRD, and due to their similarities to this source material are often called retro-clones or simulacra. As an example, unlike D&D, armor in Wayfarers reduces damage, and there is no Armor Class

Armor class

In some role-playing games, armor class is a derived statistic that indicates how difficult it is to land a successful blow on a character with an attack...

. It has been suggested that Wayfarers is a 're-imagining' of D&D, wherein the game evolved towards a class-less, level-less approach like GORE. The game is sold in hardcover, paperback and PDF. The YOGC and the "YOGC community" produces a publication called the "Wayfarers Guild Journal" that supplements the game, with the first issue published 01/19/09.