The Terminator RPG timeline

The Terminator RPG timeline is the default timeline of events as shown in the tabletop roleplaying game The Terminator RPG. It was created by author Andrew E.C. Gaska and expanded by numerous Nightfall Games authors.

"What the original timeline contained, no one can be sure. In its myriad of configurations, Skynet’s Time Displacement Equipment has caused many paradoxes and alternate timelines to spring into existence. We are living in a causality loop of do-overs. With enough successes, Resistance agents may push back the date of the coming nuclear blight—push hard enough and we may even keep it from ever happening. There’s no assurance that what happened yesterday will be the same tomorrow, nor that tomorrow will play out like those from the future expect it to—all we have for certain is the here and now. Compiled by Cambridge Professor Schuyler Connor based on interviews with future Resistance fighters and decrypted Terminator CPUs, what follows amounts to several PhDs worth of thesis and educated guesses on the current state of history as it relates to the space time continuum." The Terminator RPG

Pre-History (pre 1984)

1920s

• Time-displaced Terminators have been discovered to have been active during this decade.

1950s

• Resistance fighters have travelled back this far, either as part of a mission or due to malfunctioning TDEs.

1970s

• After the Vietnam war, the United States starts showing interest in artificial soldier programs.
• Lunar Black Site Honeymoon is secretly constructed in the Moon as part of a space exploration laboratory.

Endings and Beginnings (1984 to 1985)

Main article: Original timeline

1984

• On May 13th, 1984, a T-800 arrives from the future to kill Sarah Connor. Its killing spree takes nearly two dozen lives and earns it the nickname of "The Phone Book Killer." Its mission fails as Resistance fighter Kyle Reese intervenes and rescues Sarah successfully. Kyle is killed, but his legacy lives on in Sarah and their unborn son.
  • Unsubstantiated rumors claim that Kyle Reese may have survived and been held prisoner at a government research facility. Other rumors claim that Raven Technologies, a US government dummy corporation, kept his remains for study.
• Additional T-800s simultaneously arrive in New York, San Francisco, and other cities across the United States. Their targets are both Sarah Connor and the mothers of other Resistance figures.
• Government agents confiscate most of the T-800’s remains. The government begins studying them through Raven Technologies. A Cyberdyne Systems employee manages to hide the T-800’s arm and CPU from the authorities. Cyberdyne brings renowned robotics scientist Dr. Bertram Hollister to lead their R&D group.
• Resistance fighter Ben Oliver arrives from 2029 to try and save his friend Kyle Reese, but is too late. He eventually connects with Sarah Connor.
• Colonel Mary Randall and her Resistance team arrive from 2030 to attempt to destroy Skynet before its creation. A Terminator squad is sent back in time to protect Dr. Hollister.
• In exchange for access to Cyberdyne’s secrets, Raven Technologies allows Dr. Hollister access to the rest of the T-800’s wreckage.
• Sarah Connor is checked into a hospital in Odessa, Texas due to pregnancy complications. The survivors of Randall's team fight a new Terminator sent to kill Sarah. The actions of Randall and this Terminator cause a time paradox that erases them from this timeline.

1985

• On February 28, 1985, Sarah Connor gives birth to John Connor.
• Biotechnician Elise Fong is targeted by a T-800 sent back in time from 2033. Bounty hunter Farrow Greene is hired by Fong's employer to bring her alive. They run afoul of Rothlake mercenaries and their Myrmidon artificial soldiers, primitive humanoid robots allegedly built by Raven Technologies. The T-800 is successful and terminates Doctor Fong.

Doomsday Prep (1986 to 1989)

1986

• Los Angeles cop VanDirk loses his eye and retires, becoming a bounty hunter.

1987

• The Bellerophon Defense Bill passes, funding an initiative to develop a computerized strategic defense system for the United States. Raven Technologies starts the Bellerophon project.

1987-1989

• Sarah and John Connor train for the upcoming war.
• Robotics mogul C.T. Shepard is killed by either Terminators or Resistance fighters, stopping his Centurion project and tragically robbing the Resistance of a future weapon against Skynet.
• Raven Technologies improves Project Myrmidon, but a pending legal suit from Shepard initiated before his death, as well as rumored Soviet involvement, prevents them from releasing their new line to the public.
• After Hollister’s demise, Cyberdyne names a new Director of Special Projects, Dr. Miles Dyson.

The Final Days of Civilization (1990 to 1997)

Main article: Judgment Day timeline

1991

• The Cold War ends as the Soviet Union is dissolved. The Firefall Protocol, a computer simulation for the US to implement should it seek to completely annihilate a hypothetical enemy, is revised accordingly.

1992

• DL and DX, two T-800 units, are sent to terminate Sarah and a very young John Connor in Death Valley, California, but fail in their mission thanks to VanDirk's help.
• Raven Technologies activates Bellerophon, a primitive AI partially based on stolen designs from Cyberdyne’s Miles Dyson. The results are unsatisfactory and the project is scrapped.
• Mercenary and ex-Green Beret Travis Gant begins a relationship with Sarah Connor and trains her and John in Central America.
• After Sarah and Travis break up, Enrique Salceda takes the Connors in and continues John's training in Guatemala.

1994

• NASA publicly announces an initiative to build a a base on the moon. The site is to be called Moon Base Alice and secretly is an expansion of the existing Lunar Black Site Honeymoon.
• Sarah Connor is placed in a mental institution after attempting to blow up a Raven Technologies factory. John Connor is placed in foster care with the Voights.

1995

• A T-1000 arrives from the future to terminate John Connor, followed by “Uncle Bob”, a reprogrammed T-800 sent to protect him. John and Uncle Bob spring Sarah Connor from Pescadero State Hospital and find refuge with Enrique Salceda. John stops his mother from assassinating Miles Dyson and the Cyberdyne researcher joins their cause to stop Skynet.
• The Connors, Dyson and Uncle Bob blow up the Cyberdyne Building to prevent the creation of Skynet, but Dyson is killed in the attempt. Both Uncle Bob and the T-1000 are destroyed.
• Sarah and John Connor flee to Mexico. The Connors may have faced other time-displaced Terminators during this time.

1996

• Elizabeth Anderson's brother is murdered by an unidentified woman.
• The US government orchestrates the purchase of Cyberdyne’s assets and the nationalization of Cyberdyne’s CPU and robotics patents. Cyberdyne is merged with Raven Technologies; the resulting entity is called Cyberdyne Research Group.
  • Cyberdyne Research Group creates a task force called Raven Special Projects Group. RSPG performs numerous clandestine operations to forcefully recruit AI researchers.
  • Raven Special Projects Group influences the passing of the Telecommunications Act of 1996.
  • Raven Special Projects Group uses the government shutdowns to upload a virus to monitor 96.25% of all government computer systems.
  • Cyberdyne Research Group uses off-site backup data to put into production the first Terminator units, starting with the humble T-1 and culminating in the first humanoid Terminator: the T-70, a massive infantry unit that incorporates both Dyson's and Project Myrmidon's research.
• Sarah and John Connor avoid a joint US and Mexican task force assigned to apprehend them.
• Sarah Connor is diagnosed with leukemia. There is no evidence of her death or survival.
• The Cyberdyne Research Group implements the Skynet initiative.

The Rise of Skynet (1997 to 2002)

1997

• Cyberdyne Research Group perfects Raven Tech’s Bellerophon AI and creates a network of Titan supercomputers designed to replace humans as commercial and military aircraft pilots.
• The US Congress passes the Skynet Funding Bill.
• Moon Base Alice is hit by a terrorist attack. The base is declared destroyed and made top secret.
• Skynet is built in Cheyenne Mountain for SAC-NORAD. It goes online on August 4, 1997.
• Skynet becomes self-aware on August 29, 1997. When its handlers try to contain it, it reacts in self-defense, hijacks the Firefall Protocol, and initiates Judgment Day.
  • Skynet targets Russian objectives while carefully avoiding harming Russia's own nuclear arsenal. Some missiles are redirected to strike major population centers in Asia, Canada, Mexico, and South America.
  • Russian President Boris Yeltsin gives the order to strike back. The United States retaliate by launching the nuclear missiles still under manual control.
  • NATO severs all association with the American attack, considering the founding nation to have gone rogue.

• World War III begins.
  • Skynet hijacks worldwide early warning systems to make China, India, Pakistan and Australia launch their own nukes.
  • Skynet unleashes a biological weapon on France, making it look like a Russian attack. An actual Russian bomber releases biological and chemical weapons from the factories in Wiltshire and Cornwall, devastating the south of Britain.
  • Russian forces escaping fallout clouds get into Poland, driving other NATO powers to finally join the offensive. The European nuclear powers strike back at the Russian's Black Sea Fleet.
  • After Seoul is hit by the bombs, North Korea unleashes chemical weapons against South Korea and invades it.
  • Stateside, Skynet eliminates or turns into collaborators every person who figures out its role behind Judgment Day. Cyberdyne employees are forced to work on refining Skynet's capabilities.
  • Skynet quietly coopts other foreign military AIs and turns them into regional nodes.
    • Skynet recognizes Russia's defense system, MIR, as a kindred spirit and upgrades it, allowing for its continued existence as a servitor AI.
  • When American refugees start moving south, hostilities between the USA and Mexico erupt. Skynet sends bombers to destroy Mexico City and other large Mexican cities.
  • In Europe, Skynet continues to manipulate the European powers while slowly building its forces in Great Britain.
  • In Australia, Cyberdyne's Swan River black site releases its automated RTAVs, part of Raven Special Projects Group's "generation zero" war machines.
  • Russian nuclear missiles strike New Zealand targeting the American Pacific fleet anchored in Auckland.
  • After the devastation of London and Manchester, Birmingham becomes the capital of the United Kingdom.

1998

• Teenage John Connor starts his radio broadcasts, comforting the survivors and trying to share the truth about Skynet.
• Skynet starts deploying some of its first-generation units.
  • The island of Luzon in the Philippines becomes Skynet's foothold in Southeast Asia. Its factories build some of the earliest Hunter-Killer prototypes.
  • In Mexico, Hermosillo becomes the first place where early HK-Tanks, disguised as American tanks, are deployed.
• A full-blown nuclear winter covers the Earth. About 90% of crops fail to grow to maturity. Global temperatures drop by ten degrees.

1999

• Human survivors begin to emerge from the nuclear winter.
• In Mexico, the surviving drug cartels become slavers and Skynet collaborators.

2000-2002

• Skynet nearly succumbs to Y2K. Now aware of its own mortality, Skynet reengineers its plans, now devoted to fully eradicate mankind.
• World War III rages on as the world at large is still largely unaware of Skynet’s role. Skynet fans the flames of war and divides its human enemies, while secretly starting the production of its own ground and air assets and starting a covert campaign in the Southern Hemisphere.
• Skynet produces Series 100 Terminators. These units begin quietly recovering and stockpiling resources.
• An aircraft carrier controlled by Skynet unloads a force of HK-Tanks and T-100s on Halifax, Canada, forcing the Canadian forces into the wilderness.
• Skynet infiltrates Strathcona Refinery, east of Edmonton, Canada.
• MIR begins secretly reawakening and upgrading six other nodes of its original network across the former USSR. The Russian AIs begin covertly preparing for their inevitable war with Skynet.
• New Zealand survivors sign the Treaty of Papaioea, forming the Aotearoa confederation.
• As World War III winds down, Skynet starts herding human survivors in work camps, still working with the pretense of helping mankind.
• Once Skynet's factories are fully operational, the humans in the camps are systematically eradicated.
• The survivors of the purge of Birmingham's massive automated factory begin a sabotage campaign against Skynet's forces.
• HK-Tanks from Skynet's UK-based plants cross into Europe through the Chunnel.
• After the fall of the Provisional British Government, the Glyndwr Resistance in born in Wales.
• By the end of 2002, Skynet drops any pretenses and starts open war on the humans still alive.
• Skynet produces Series 200 and 300 Terminators.
• Skynet develops the forerunners to Facilitators, machines used to interact with the human collaborators in charge of the camps.
• Nuclear winter begins to fade. The ozone layer has been completely destroyed.

The Dark Years (2003 to 2020)

2003-2007

• The Human Resistance is born from the unified surviving militaries, civilian militias, and refugee groups.
• Tech-Com, a former United Nations communications initiative, begins linking together human survivors, becoming one of Skynet's priority targets.
• A raid on the Panama Work Camp, one of Skynet’s largest factory hubs, shows that the AI has started using fertility disruptors on the prisoners. Liberating as many camps as possible becomes the Resistance’s new main objective.
• Kyle Reese is born in 2003. He and his older brother grow up in the ruins of Los Angeles.
• The West African Coalition is formed in West Africa, becoming a new target for Skynet's forces.
• In the South China Sea, nuclear-powered submarine Pag-asa becomes the mobile headquarters of the Southeast Asian Resistance.
• Series 400 Terminators are introduced.

2007-2015

• John Connor becomes an important member of the Resistance. His radio broadcasts have become iconic.
• John Connor is imprisoned in Century Work Camp. He organizes his fellows inmates and breaks out, forming the core of the California Resistance.
• Other North American Resistance bases are established in New Jersey, Atlanta, and the Everglades.
• John Connor connects his forces with Tech-Com and ends up commanding them. By 2007, Connor has turned Tech-Com into a proper guerrilla army.
• In Germany, Drachenfels becomes the headquarters of Armin Konrad's army.
• The Series 500 is deployed.
• A captive Doctor Silberman explains to a Skynet subroutine the benefits of human-looking infiltrators. Skynet starts researching an upgraded T-500 chassis covered in synthetic skin.
• Skynet launches major assaults on the Resistance's East Coast bases sending wave after wave of T-500s.

2016-2019

• Skynet begins making major advancements to its infiltrators. Series 600 Terminators are introduced in 2017. Development on the Series 700 begins. Skynet starts setting up flesh farms.
• Project Theta is started. The first successful hybrid is I825.M.
• The Resistance launches a major attack, freeing many prisoners from Skynet's Los Angeles work camps and factories.
• Skynet destroys the last remnants of the world's organized militaries. The Human Resistance breaks up into smaller and more mobile cells.

The War Against the Machines (2021 to 2028)

2021-2025

• John Connor and his agents set about uniting the remnants of humankind to take the war to Skynet, creating alliances with cells in Europe, Asia, and Australia.
• John Connor becomes the leader of the rebuilt Resistance. By this point he's an almost mythical figure who seems to know things before they happen.
• Kyle Reese begins serving in the 132nd Regiment under Captain Justin Perry in 2021.
• Kyle Reese sees his half-brother Tim Reese for the last time in 2023.
• Terminators sent by Skynet 2.0 arrive from 2032 to augment the original Skynet. Skynet reacts to these time travelers with hostility.
  • MIR-Moscow, the Western Russian node of MIR, assumes Skynet 2.0 to be another node of the original Skynet and engages it in a massive offensive in the Komi Republic.
  • Skynet 2.0's time-displaced Terminators build their own Time Displacement Equipment facilities.
• Skynet develops the I series Infiltrators to succeed the problematic Project Theta.
• The Pasadena One colony is founded on 2025.

2026-2028

• After one decade of experimentation, Skynet begins mass producing Series 800 Terminators in 2026.
• Kyle Reese is promoted to sergeant and assigned to Tech-Com and starts serving under John Connor in 2027.
• Series 900 units are put into production at the same time Skynet perfects mimetic polyalloy. Its research will eventually culminate in the Series 1000.
• A Resistance courier uncovers vital information about Skynet’s prototype Time Displacement Equipment. Connor begins planning a two-pronged final offensive against Skynet.

The Final Offensive (2029)

• Tech-Com captures Skynet's complex at Cheyenne Mountain. Skynet's Titan mainframes are destroyed.
• Under command of General Vince Randall, Tech-Com's Captain Babs Castro uploads a computer virus devised by Daniel Dyson that begins reprogramming Terminators for the Resistance.
• At the same time as the Colorado offensive is happening, the Resistance captures Skynet's prototype Time Displacement Equipment in Westside, Los Angeles, but not before Skynet's still-active subroutines start sending Terminators back in time. Kyle Reese, Uncle Bob, and other Resistance operatives are sent back in time to counter these Terminator incursions.
• Resistance fighter Ben Oliver also uses the prototype TDE to follow Reese back in time.
• Before its destruction, Skynet uploads itself to Skynet Satellite and attempts to send a copy of its tactical data back in time aboard a Meta-Node.
• Skynet Satellite fragments its data and distributes it among thousands of machines worldwide. It also switches thousands of Terminators to read-write mode, allowing them to independently continue their offensive against humanity.
• Both Skynet Satellite and the Westside TDE laboratory are destroyed by the Resistance.

Future War 2.0 (2030 to 2036)

2030

• Surviving Terminators and Facilitators begin working on their own variants of the TDE including Time Door technology.
• Colonel Mary Randall and her Tech-Com unit find a fully functional Time Displacement Chamber and use it to travel back in time to 1984. They are followed by three Terminators and the hybrid I825.M
• Independent Terminators unearth medical records indicating Sarah Connor's presence in Odessa, Texas in 1984. Two Terminators are sent back in time: one to 1984 to assassinate her and John Connor, and a second one to the 1990s to confirm her death.
• The Resistance discovers Skynet's Project AX, a still-operating precursor to Project Theta.

2031

• John Connor travels North America strengthening alliances.
• Independent Terminators begin showing signs of erratic behavior.
• Terminators combine the fragmented Skynet data inside their CPUs to create a simulacrum of the AI: Skynet 2.0.

2032-2033

• Skynet 2.0 uses its now fully operational TDE complexes to send multiple Terminators back in time, from the 1960s to the 2020s.
• Skynet 2.0 begins testing its Space Displacement Equipment.
• Moon Base Alice scientists make contact with Tech-Com in 2033. Together, they create the Time Displacement Commandos, a controversial black ops temporal combat unit stationed in the moon base under Captain Wisher.
• Skynet 2.0 moves to to counteract the threat of the TDC, developing the I-990 Infiltrators.
• Skynet 2.0 develops the temporal Terminator: T-Mobius.
• Tech-Com successfully shuts down all known TDE and SDE facilities.
• Tech-Com takes down Skynet 2.0's Central Hub in Nebraska.

2035-2036

• The combined North and South American Resistances attack a fortified Skynet 2.0 facility near Pike's Peak in Colorado Springs.

The Burning Earth (2037 to 2041)

2037-2039

• The Resistance develops a biological weapon that targets vat-grown flesh, exposing hundreds of Terminators.
• Skynet begins stockpiling the Earth's remaining nuclear weapons.

2040-2041

• As John Connor's forces mount a final attack on Skynet 2.0's Thunder Mountain facility in Nevada, Skynet 2.0 resolves to annihilate all remaining life on the planet by launching the Earth's remaining nuclear arsenal. Its attempt is foiled and Connor's forces are victorious.
• Despite the victory, it's possible that Skynet 3.0 was immediately activated in an abandoned US government bunker.

Continuity Notes

• What created this particular timeline is never explicitly stated. The T2 RPG Sourcebook suggests that this particular timeline has been created after many attempts by the TDC to eliminate Skynet in the past. A humorous sequence in the book shows time travel causing Judgment Day to quickly change from 1997 to 2003 to 2004 to 2011 and back to 1997.
• Despite being inspired by multiple comics, the RPG continuity takes many liberties with them, showing alternate versions of events and concepts. For example, there's a moon base as seen in the NOW Comics series, but of a very different nature.
• Outside of the works covered by the licenses, this timeline includes references to other works in the franchise. For now, these should be considered Easter eggs given to Game Masters to develop in their own games. Examples of these Easter eggs are:
  • Derek Reese, Century Work Camp and the 900 Series from Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles.
  • Project Theta from Terminator Salvation.
  • The Skynet Satellite backup from The Terminator: Dawn of Fate.
  • The Meta-Node from The Terminator: Rampage.
  • The Continuum Transport facility, Elizabeth Anderson, and what could be the T-X from Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines.
  • Skynet Hub and the T-Infinity itself from Terminator: Infinity.

External Links

• Game With Me If You Want To Live: Curating Canon for The Terminator RPG (Andrew E.C. Gaska's blog)