My system basics

[Lacloix]

Here are the basics of my system, as is. I'm looking for advice on fine tuning some elements.

The Mechanic:

1d20 blackjack roll-under

The Attributes (range 1-13):

Build - overall strength and health
Agility - speed
Perception - the five senses
Intellect - pretty obvious
Bearing - "spiritual" presence

The Skills:

Skills function basically the same as GURPS. Every skill is linked to an attribute. So, something like Brawling might be Agility -3 +ranks. A character with an Agility of 8 and 4 ranks in Brawling would have to roll a 9 or under.

The Adjustments:

1) I'm thinking it might be better to have attributes range from 1-20. This way I can do attribute tests and have them be on the same scale as skill tests. Otherwise, I would probably have to add a constant to an attribute for a check. However, a constant seems artificial. In terms of the attributes relation with skills, if I increased the range from 1-20, I would then have to do something like halve the attributes when determining base skill values. Any thoughts?

2) I'm tempted to split Build into Strength and Health. The idea is that you don't have to be strong to be healthy. However, this would make Strength almost useless in a contemporary setting I have planned as physical strength is valued less (like in most industrial/post-industrial societies), and there really aren't many skills I plan to link with it. I could use suggestions on this one.

3) Also, I want to rename Bearing. It's used for the "magical" elements and social skills. These may seem like oddly different categories to lump together, but it actually works with the metaphysics of the campaign. Charisma sounds too social and Spirit/Soul sounds to metaphysical. I can't think of a good word to cover both elements.

4) Skill ranges. As you can see, it's possible to have skills that exceed 20. Now, this isn't a problem is penalties stack up enough to drop it down again. However, a player can still develop a character's skill to a near flawless level. Would putting a cap on skills be a reasonable solution, or would that just be too artificial as well. I'm open to other ideas on this one.

5) Automatic/Critical Success. I don't just want to go with a "1 is always a success". Setting the "luck" factor at a solid 5% is a little too high for me. What I was thinking is that if the penalties stack up so much that the task is "impossible", then only impose enough penalties to drop it to a 1. If that roll is successful, then roll-under again (possibly carrying over the remaining penalties. Critical success (which would only apply to "possible" tasks) could work the same way. If you roll a 1, roll under the skill again. If successful, you have a critical success. I'm open to hearing other options, though.

6) Automatic/Critical Failure. Likewise, I don't want to go with "20 is always a failure". Also, I want something smaller than the 5% margin. Actually, I had something different in mind. Instead of having a player roll, coming up with a critical failure and acting accordingly, I was thinking of having critical failures secretly determined by the GM. Why? How about this? The bookworm character is deciphering some text on an ancient tablet. The player rolls, thinks he succeeds, and the party heads off in the wrong direction because of bad info. Sure, the player could roll, crit fail, and RP it out. However, if I was a player, I would actually think it would more fun not to know that I tanked before my character could figure it out. For the game(s) I plan to run, something like this provides more of an opportunity to throw in some more sub-plots and side-quests. Anyway, I'm still working on a mechanic for this. It might be a burden to have the GM (likely me) make a secret roll or two every time a player makes a check, but that's the only solution I've come up with so far. Any other ideas?

Thanks for any advice.

[talysman]

OK, here are some questions/thoughts:

0) What's a 1d20 blackjack roll-under? What does a failed roll mean? What does a success mean?

1) Why do you want attribute tests? Depending on what failure/success means (see #0, above,) why is it important for attribute tests to have the same chances of success as skill tests?

2) Why split Build? Is it important in your setting/game that Strong people not necessarily be Healthy as well?

3) How about Presence?

4) If a skill is too high to fail, why not just skip the roll?

5 and 6) I can't understand the critical/automatic success and failure until I understand the part about "blackjack roll-under" and what it means to succeed or fail, but again, before answering whether to have a particular auto/crit system, I have to ask: is an auto/critical success/failure important? Why?

[Lacloix]

First, I should mention that I talked over the general system idea with my group and they like the idea of a system that has the elements I mentioned and isn't a rules-lite storytelling system. What I'm looking for is advice on how to fine-tune the mechanics. Anyway, to answer the questions.

0) Blackjack roll-under means you want to roll as high as you can while not exceeding the test value. For example, if I'm rolling against a 13, a 3 is ok, a 8 is better, and a 12 is even better than that. Statistically it's the same as a regular roll-under, but you don't have to bother subtracting what you roll from your skill to determine the margin of success. As for success/failure, what exactly are you asking? A failed roll means you failed at the task, and a successful roll means you succeeded. Though I would think that would be obvious.

1) I want attribute tests because they could be necessary. Two characters are lunging for the same item. I'm not just going to say the highest attribute wins, nor do I think I should have a "lunging" skill. Instead, it's a simple Agility test. And it's important for attributes to have the same chances of success as skill tests because it just makes sense that way. A test is a test. No matter what one is testing, for this system, it needs to be on the same probability scale.

2) It is somewhat important that healthy people are not necessarily strong. This is another one of the it-makes-perfect-sense-to-me things that I'm hung up on.

3) Good idea. I think that might work.

4) Because I want the player to feel that s/he can try anything s/he wants, even if there is only a sliver of a chance for success.

5 and 6) Yes it's important. Regarding auto success/failure, I don't want any guarantees in this system. No matter how small, there's always a chance things can go south. Crits are also important because sometimes people are able to perform beyond their normal ability, and sometimes people just screw up. That's life. Sh*t happens, sometimes for the better and sometimes for the worse.

[Simon C]

Hmm, it sounds like you're pursuing a goal with your game design that's not really popular around here.  Which is not to say that it's not a valid goal, just that if you don't get the response you want, that's probably the reason.  It sounds like you're trying to create a "realistic" set of rules, which for many reasons is a bit of a minefield.  I'm going to ignore these issues though, becasue there are a hundred threads that explain why this is a problematic goal, and a hundred articles explaining why you can't create the game you're trying to. I'm going to assume you've read all these, and are still interested in doing this.

It's hard for me to give you answers to your questions, because ultimately they're design choices that only you can make.  I have no idea what kind of "reality" you're trying to model with your rules, and I don't know what effect you're trying to create, so I can only suggest questions you might want to ask yourself.

Here are a few questions which commonly cause complications for this kind of system:

What happens when two characters try to help each other?

What happens when two characters are opposing each other?

How does the GM (if there is one) decide what the difficulty of a task is?

How do you set stakes? (This means "how do you decide what the consequences for sucess and the consequences for failure are?" Most systems have a very detailed system for doing this with combat, but almost no system for any other kind of roll.  Also, they tend to foucs on what you can do if you succeed, but don't discuss what happens if you fail) An interesting answer to this question could be the difference between a great system and an average one.

What are the limits of a skill? Who decides what actions are covered by what skills? How many skills are there in your game, and how broad are they?  The number and type of skills you choose will drastically effect your game.  Consider the difference between a game with a "fighting" skill, and a game with a "bladed weapons - one handed" skill.  Please, please, resist the temptation to have a huge shopping list of skills.  It is in every respect a bad idea.  The skills you choose to detail will determine what is important in your game.

The last, and (in my opinion) most important question, is "why this game?" Why play this game, and not the myriad of other, better playtested, better supported, more well known systems out there.  GURPS, d20, Savage Worlds, Fate, Fudge, Rolemaster... There's an endless list of games, from "realistic" to pulpy, with great fan support, years of playtesting, and often free rulebooks.  What's your game got that these ones don't? This doesn't mean that you should give up and play those games, just that you need to identify what your game does that those ones dont.  Think about why your game will be the best for your group, and focus on that.  Make it the centre of your system.  If you think there's no other game that makes the "effort" a character puts into an action important enough, build your game around an "effort" system.  If you think every other game makes it too easy to get killed, make an innovative system for keeping characters alive.  Above all, play, read, and understand those games.  Learn from them, steal from them, and you'll make a better game.

Good luck!

[Lacloix]

Hmm, it sounds like you're pursuing a goal with your game design that's not really popular around here.

I'm here and on RPG.net, too. It seems to me that designing a game with a focus on game mechanics is pretty unpopular anywhere. However, the main reason I'm designing this game is that I don't want to play a game that is "rules-lite" or "storytelling".'

I could be wasting my time by trying to discuss mechanics and crunch some numbers, but I figure it's worth a shot.

It sounds like you're trying to create a "realistic" set of rules, which for many reasons is a bit of a minefield.

I don't think I used the word "realistic" anywhere. If I did, it was a mistake. A long time ago (I've forgotten my username since), I started a thread about a system I was working on that I wanted to be "realistic". I couldn't get any conversation going about how to develop such mechanics, and the whole thread turned into an attack on my system philosophy with some people going so far off the subject they were basically stating that one can't realistically define anything so you should just play FATE or FUDGE (which was so far from what I wanted).

I'm hoping that I can prevent that from happening by saying this. For me, reality is simply a subjective element that exists solely as I define it to myself. As per my definition, FATE, FUDGE, and Storyteller are very unrealistic systems for the intents of my game and setting.

However, I'm not trying to sound like a jerk with all that. I'm merely trying to make it clear that I'm going for a crunchier system that is much less player defined than most systems out there. In fact, in regards to your questions, I think addressing this would answer all of them.

For me, it's all about player agency versus character agency. For most of the games I've seen out there, I think there is too much player agency (for my and my group's liking). A system like Storyteller screams "cops and robbers" (or "cowboys and indians", or whatever variant one played as a kid) to us. In ST, the system is almost entirely irrelevant, especially in a game like Exalted where characters are god-like and can do pretty much anything they want anyway. A game like that focuses way more on the RP than on the game. A few of us played one of the WoD games once (in other groups), and none of us liked it. To us, it seemed that all that free-form business was one step away from a LARP. We honestly couldn't see a reason for having dice or character sheets in that game. In fact, we all thought that "stunt dice" were a total joke. Just because a player describes a situation more elaborately, they should have a better chance at success? None of us liked that.

In any case, when a game focuses on RP, the actual character and the game itself loses its "limitations" and any significant meaning. It's merely just a group of "gamers" sitting around a table, playing "make-believe". So, progression, success, and even storylines are influenced not by the characters within the setting, but by the players who are constructing the "game" (which really isn't a game at this point) by exercising their own personal agency. Of course, one could just say that it's an issue of good vs. bad RPing, but that's besides the point. There are no rules in these universes that make a character more than just a malleable facet of a player's agency.

We don't want that kind of game. We want a game where one creates a character and it's the character's agency that determines the outcomes. Player's are not the "gods" of the game's universe. Instead, the universe has laws and rules, which apply to the players as much as anyone else in the setting. Essentially, a player's agency is filtered through his/her character. As a result, it's not that player that becomes a "force" in the game, but the character being played. This would place more of an emphasis on character investment and development. It's also one of the reasons why I am designing with the intent to prevent the players from knowing more than their characters. I'm not worried about metagaming with my group, but all the good RP in the world doesn't erase the significant cognitive differences between "knowing" and "not knowing".

I should add, that you did ask a question about the consequences of success and failure and how most systems do this elaborately with combat, but not other areas. I do intend to have system elements that address social networks and other non-combat elements. However, I can't develop these ideas further until I have my core system down.

Why play this game, and not the myriad of other, better playtested, better supported, more well known systems out there.

Quite simply, none of them fit the setting I have in mind. I've looked at many systems, and they just don't work. I really wish they did, as it would make my job easier, but it's just not the case. d20 and GURPS come close, but so much stuff would have to be house-ruled to fit that it just wouldn't be worth making the conversion. I'm also limited in learning from other systems. I don't intend to spend loads of money (or really any money) for a game that I'm not really going to use. Also, most of the free games I've seen are freeform rules-lite games (which doesn't do me much good). Anyway, what my game has (or will have) that other games don't is the mechanical ability to handle the universe that I am going to create. In fact, one of the goals of the campaign series is for the players to learn about the nature of this universe. Unlike other settings, the players aren't going to know any of this going in. They will have to use their characters (with all their strengths and limitations) in order to discover this.

And this all brings me back to my original post. Other than number three (for which talysman gave a good solution), I still have to address how to handle these mechanical issues.

[Simon C]

Ok, cool.  What I'm hearing is that you've got a very strong "simulationist" agenda (This means, roughly, that play is about exploring the setting and experiencing "being there" in the fictional world). That's not very popular here as a primary goal, but it is a popular and functional way to play, and I'm sure you can make a game that works well for your group.  That said, all of the questions I posed above still stand.  Of particular interest to me is this:

Quite simply, none of them fit the setting I have in mind.

Can you tell me more about how your setting is different so that it doesn't fit with any other published set of rules? I don't mean "well over here are the orcs, and up here is this big old magic thing, and a hundred years ago there was this was which...".  I mean, what is it about the "reality" of your setting that makes it work differently from how we understand reality? Is it a "high magic" world, where all actions are influenced by the magical presence of a character? Is it a primitive world where technology is almost absent? A world where the dominant form of sentient life is markedly different from humans? What's the deal? Answering what it is about your setting that makes it special and completely different will help you to decide what it is about your rules that needs to be completely different.  Otherwise, there are a number of very easily customised "generic" games out there, which could fit your setting.   This isn't meant to sound like I'm telling you to use a published game, I'm saying that defining exactly why you can't use one will help you make a better game. 

RE: Stake setting.  This is just as important given your goals as in any other type of game.  In most simulationist games, the rules work something like this:

Player: I'll climb the wall.
GM: Roll climbing.
*clatter*
GM: You fail
Player: I'll try again.
*clatter*
GM: You succeed.

or

Player: I'll ask around town to see if I can find out more
GM: Roll presence
*clatter*
GM: You fail
Player: Ok, what do we do now?

What's problematic about this is that there's no clear rules for saying what happens when you succeed or fail.  This is about making the rules more prescriptive, not less.  Most games kind of handwave stake setting, leaving it up to the GM and the players to decide what's possible to achieve on a success, and what will happen on a failure.  This is problematic sometimes, because failing an important roll can derail a game, and because you can often end up with boring results, like trying over and over until you succeed.  Consider this alternative:

Player: I climb the wall
GM: Ok, roll to see how long it takes.  On a critical failure, you'll take some falling damage as well.
*clatter*
GM: Ok, it takes you a few minutes to scramble up the wall.

or

Player: I'll ask around town to see if I can find out more.
GM: Ok, roll presence.  On a failure, you'll attract some unwanted attention.  On a critical failure, you'll get into some serious trouble.
*clatter*
GM: Roll initiative...

So, the idea here is that rather than leaving the GM and the players in the dark about what happens on a success or failure, the game lets you nail that down.  This could be as simple as a line in your rules that says "before the dice are rolled, the GM must say what the consequences are of each possible result" - crit/regular success, crit/regular failure for example.  The mechanic you're looking to use is a good one for determining "degree of success" so you might want to go for a more granular level of different results.  That gets burdensome though. 

This way of rolling the dice is great for game masters because it means you're never in that situation of the players not getting that vital piece of information, or not crossing that chasm - unless you want them to be.  It's great for players becasue any result on the dice is interesting, reducing the feeling of suckitude when you fail a roll.  A game that has clear mechanics for setting stakes is a better game, in my opinion, and you need to build this in from the ground up.

I hope this is useful to you.  I think we're coming from pretty different philosophies about gaming, but hopefully I've given you some ideas that are germane to the way you like to game.  Seriously, I'm not trying to tell you that the way you play is wrong, I'm just asking tough questions that will (hopefully) help you make a game that works better for you.

[Lacloix]

Can you tell me more about how your setting is different so that it doesn't fit with any other published set of rules?

I'm probably going to contradict myself here. I'm trying to take a more "holistic" approach to chargen that is managed by the system (and not social exchange and negotiation by the gamers). At the same time, I want to be able to identify the significant distinct elements in order to establish their relationships with each other. It's why I can't see myself lumping strength and health together because it doesn't allow for the healthy "light-framed" character that isn't all that strong.

With that in mind, I'm also considering the relationship between "attributes" and "skills". I don't like d20s zero-average derived modifiers, though I like how GURPS uses them to set the starting ranks. In this sense, Skills are seen as more defined and developed uses of the more basic attributes. At the same time, I don't want a check to revolve around a single attribute all the time. For example, it would make sense to use Agility with a Melee skill, but what if you want to examine the quality of a weapon at the market or recall the local laws about carrying weapons openly? It would make sense that the check would be based on a separate attribute. Of course, I would explain when other attributes could apply in skill descriptions.

Anyway, I think you get the idea of what I'm going for here.

I mean, what is it about the "reality" of your setting that makes it work differently from how we understand reality?

A good question. In terms of "how people are", it's just like our own reality. There's not absolute "good" or "evil". Everything is relative. One of the biggest challenges for the players is determining which "side" to choose, and dealing with the consequences of these choices. In terms of high magic versus low magic, or high-tech versus low-tech, that's irrelevant. I actually plan to take a campaign series across history (not time travelling, later PCs/parties will start in later periods of time).

At the same time, a "generic" game wouldn't work as there are specific elements to this setting that carry across time. Human nature and society will be constant (even if it changes in appearance). The "magic" (though in concept I'm generalizing it to a metaphysical presence) will exist in all periods, but the ability to tap into it, and what it can do, is going to be influenced by how the society at the time perceives "magic" and the metaphysical.

What's problematic about this is that there's no clear rules for saying what happens when you succeed or fail.

I see what you're saying now. I'm planning on including a "try again" mechanic. However, each retry is going to to have cumulative penalties. However, if a PC totally flubs a check, there will be another option. In fact, that's one of the philosophies of my design. Progression will never hinge on a single check. There will always be other avenues to pursue. However, flubbing will have it's consequences. For example, time is a possible factor. If the players have to exhaust multiple options before progressing, it could set them back if the goal is time oriented. This could mean a smaller reward ($100 deducted for every day late), a situational effect (you didn't get the reinforcements in time so the existing force is diminished even more, etc.) This will also be built into adventure design.

Consider this alternative...

Exactly. These are all possibilities. The point is that there's options. This isn't really a system issue, though.

"before the dice are rolled, the GM must say what the consequences are of each possible result"

Well, it wouldn't be a total gimme for the players, but I'd give them the basics of success/failure. Maybe a successful Insight check (or something similar) could reveal more possible consequences.

I think we're coming from pretty different philosophies about gaming, but hopefully I've given you some ideas that are germane to the way you like to game.  Seriously, I'm not trying to tell you that the way you play is wrong, I'm just asking tough questions that will (hopefully) help you make a game that works better for you.

I totally appreciate your advice. You're approach is definitely more constructive than many other approaches I've seen in the past.