Card-Based Resolution

[Jay]

Hi,

I started this thought in another thread, but thought to start a new thread rather than confuse my prior post with other tangents.

What are your experiences, thoughts, comments on card based resolution? I had read apost about custom decks, sorta like CCGs but where GMs award cards, you don't randomly collect them.

My thoughts were:

- a sucess/failure deck, in which a combination of stats allows you to draw a certain number of cards which describe "levels" of success or failure.

- weapon/defense decks, in which certain combat moves and blocks are found. Example: a bladed weapon might have strikes and parries. A combination of stats details how many cards you can hold at one time, how many you can draw, and how many you can play.

- magic decks, in which "components" are found. A character can play combinations of cards to achieve certain results... again, stats determine how many cards can be held, how many can be drawn, and played.

I like the strategic elements of many card games, and am wondering if this sorta RPG/card game idea has been tried or done elsewhere?

I also like the idea of "duels" in which players describe their moves as they play cards... the card gives the general move (vertical slash), and they elaborate on it narritively?

Does this appeal?

Cheers

[JimmyB]

- weapon/defense decks, in which certain combat moves and blocks are found. Example: a bladed weapon might have strikes and parries. A combination of stats details how many cards you can hold at one time, how many you can draw, and how many you can play.

You might want to take a look at Lunch Money, or one of its variants for a good example of this mechanism. Using one of these games as a system would be interesting to see.

- magic decks, in which "components" are found. A character can play combinations of cards to achieve certain results... again, stats determine how many cards can be held, how many can be drawn, and played.

The only thing that comes to mind as an example of this at the moment would be Once Upon A Time.

I like the duel idea, but wonder whether it would be simpler to build an RPG around a pre-existing card game than try to develop a custom deck specifically for the game. Either way though, it is an idea I'd be interested in playing.

[Vaxalon]

Yes, this DOES sound interesting.

There are several RPG's out there that use cards; you'll want to look at Castle Falkenstein's system very closely.  Everway uses them, too, but in a completely different fashion from what you describe.

The game you're describing might work best on index cards, where the DM can write up new cards as he needs them.  I would also recommend a system whereby the PC's are the onlyl ones "rolling dice" (a la Trollbabe) in order to keep down the number of cards that the GM needs to manage.

[Andrew Morris]

Jay, do me a favor and define exactly what you mean by "card-based resolution." Are you talking about simply using cards instead of dice for a fortune mechanic, or an entirely different system? Are you talking only about custom-made decks, or also systems that use standard (French/international) cards?

I'm a big fan of card mechanics myself, but mostly as a substitute for dice, and purely in theory. I recall an interesting mechanic that used cards a while back -- I believe it was called Danger Patrol. You might want to search for that thread and check it out.

[Jay]

Thanks JimmyB, Vaxalon and Andrew,

I am checking out the games mentioned.. I was thinking of only custom decks.. not standard cards.. although I suppose you could conceivably use a standard deck for success/failure...

I was thinking of three "resolution" system...

1. Actions (like lift boulder) would use a success deck.. whereby your statistics (ie: Body-Power) would determine how many cards to draw. Say you had a stat of 2... you could pick 2 cards.. you draw "Pitiful Success" and "Not Pretty but Accomplished"... you then "play" the better of the two to succeed at what you want to do...

2. Combat.. would use "Weapon" decks... your stats determine how many cards you can hold in your hand (Endurance), how many you can draw at a time (Skill), and how many you can play (Skill/Power)... ? The deck would contain "Maneauvours" like "Dodging".. "Attacks" like "Angled Slash - Right"... "Defenses" like "Horizontal Parry - Left" and "Specials" like "Roundhouse Flying Beserker Rage of Terror... " er.. or not ;)

Basically each move is basead of attacking or defending the 6 zones of melee combat (if you fence you know these.. ).. each of the attacks has a perfect defense, an ok defense, and a non-defense.. you loose a "counter" for each time you cannot defend an attack?

3. Magic... I am still working on this.. I don't personally like the D&D style "spells" system.. but I was thinking about some sort of component based system.. whereby the mage can use any of the components in the deck to "build" spells then success deck is used to figure out if it works..?

I am trying to figure out how to keep the cards to a minimum, but still have enough variety to make it interesting... then again.. I like lots of cards.. besides.. as I am doing this for fun.. I would make PDF printable card sets made to print onto an Avery index card template or something?

Thoughts?

[M. J. Young]

There was a fantasy swordfighting game long ago that used cards; I can't think of the name of it right now. I received a copy of one of the books as a sample of the printer's work back in '97, which was my first encounter with it, and I never saw the cards but they were mentioned in the book). I have since seen it mentioned and praised by Ron and others, and I think it did something similar to your combat idea.

If I think of it, I'll come back.

--M. J. Young

[dewey]

Hi Jay,

You should definitely have a look at Dragonlance 5th Age.

In it players draw eight cards at character creation and assign them to attributes.
During play, everyone has (I think) three cards in hand, and can (or must?) add a card to an action. If the card has a corresponding suit, it's worth more. There are eight suits all, and the closer the card's suit to the attribute used in the action, the more bonuses it confers. I don't remember exactly, and I myself don't have the book, but I remember it was stylish, dramatic, and fast. Also needed lots of narration.

[Zoetrope10]

There was a fantasy swordfighting game long ago that used cards; I can't think of the name of it right now.

Not Lace and Steel was it?

René

[M. J. Young]

There was a fantasy swordfighting game long ago that used cards; I can't think of the name of it right now.

Not Lace and Steel was it?

René

Yes. Didn't that use cards to resolve combat? As I say, I never had it or played it--I perused one rulebook and realized that I didn't have necessary components for play, which my recollection says included a deck of cards, but it's a very slight exposure quite a few years back.

--M. J. Young

[simon_hibbs]

One problem with an aproach like this is consistency of the characters. Suppose I think of my character as a sneaky, deceptive sort that uses a lot of feints in combat. A 'symetrical' card-based resolution ssytem might mean I've got just as much chance of getting a 'Feint' card as anyone else. You might need some mechanism for allowing character's personal foibles to feed into the system.

I am favourably inclined towards resolution systems that use cards, I've written and run one that uses an ordinary deck of playing cards and it's worked very well (IMHO). In my game cards replace dice because the value of the cards take the place of rolling random results. they also replace 'fate points' and such because the player can choose how to play them, so they're a resource too, thus neatly unifying these two concepts in what I feel is an elegent way. I have considered using cards in more complex ways, but have always hit problems doing so.

If cards represent permanent, or persistent attributes of a character then that information is probably better noted on the character sheet. Keeping a set of cards along with the character sheet is inconvenient. If cards represent the ptential for specific actions or behaviour, then might this de-personalise the characters? Suppose I want to play a sneaky character, how do I make sure I get plenty of 'sneaky' cards?


Simon Hibbs

[Jay]

Thanks for the reference (Lace and Steel), I have been researching :)

As to the point of character depersonilzation... yes, I have been facing this problem.. one of my thoughts was that each player has their own deck, which is tailored to their character.. here are some of the complexities I am looking into:

- Multi-weapon combat.. (maybe alows for each "hand" to be played independently)

- Combat "style"... (I have been looking into "style" based decks... obviously a samurai fights deferently than a knight.. a thief fights differently than a monk.. or maybe not ;) ... )

Drawing from some of the interesting aspects of CCGs... I thought players might like to "build" decks to suit their characters.. ie: as a thief, I might want more tumbles and sneeks etc... but as a mercenary brawler I just want to SMASH! ;)

Does this add too much complexity?

As for character attributes.. these I want to keep on a character sheet... the only exception I can see is "health" which I have always favoured tokens for.. my personal choice is class tokens (those nice smooth flattens glass pieces).. but thats just my prefernece ;)

Cheers

[TooManyGoddamnOrcs]

Mein Gott... if some genius had this idea six years ago, using Rage cards as an optional combat system to Werewolf.  Value added plus hobby incest equals profit.

[Jay]

Hrm.. that raises an interesting point TooManyGoddamnOrcs... maybe using a "simple" card-based success/failure deck with an optional expanded combat deck system would be a more flexible way to go?

[Ron Edwards]

Hello,

Quickie reference: What are some RPGs that use playing cards?

There are some older threads that really go into nuances about card-based RPG resolution, but I haven't managed to dig'em up yet.

Best,
Ron

[John Kim]

Mein Gott... if some genius had this idea six years ago, using Rage cards as an optional combat system to Werewolf.  Value added plus hobby incest equals profit.

Are you aware of Changeling cards?  The first edition of Changeling: The Dreaming used a special card deck for faerie magics.  However, my impression was that it went over like a lead brick and it was abandoned in the second edition.  Other collectible-card RPGs from the time include http://www.dragonstorm.com/">Dragon Storm (1995) and http://www.gaslightpress.com/Everway/Default.asp">Everway (1995).