Help me! I am going mad! A new rpg plagues me and I am very tired.

[Dirk Ackermann]

Hi,

here is a rough version of a mechanic of my long maintained and often overwritten rpg.

The goal is to be in comfort to simulate every imaginable situation in which a being can

get.
I have to admit that this can read a little bit too deterministic, because of all the theories

behind it - mostly biological, psychological and philosophical. I am not the kind of

person to say everybody should have its place or one or the other culture or race is the

better one. But I have to say that the most interesting thing is whether or to what a

point do we have a free will. The game and a few of its mechanics will adress this point.

These are sketches, I would like to discuss and get more ideas.

Up to this day there is no world or setting, maybe it will show itself to me or the players

have to do it.


So we start with the PCs. And the whole NSCs of the world too and with their


Genetics:      5%   are genious      is 5
         20% are up the average   is 4
         50% are on the average   is 3
         20% are under average   is 2
         5 %  are lacking somewhat...is 1 dices.

The players have to roll a percentil dice and see how gifted they are. Once they know, the points (I do not know how many because the number of attributes are not decided upon) are given in to the:

Attributes:      Strength
         Power
         Endurance
         Strengthendurance
         Speed
         Reaction
         Agility
         Coordination

         Toughness
         Perception (with the senses parted, aka 5 traits)

         Attractiveness (just the physical) (in reallity this is just the             form of the average)

As you see the psycological ones I will come up later with. Because they are the hardest to differ, it is more a choice which school I follow and to what an extend Free Will, Karma and Debt as ressources will have an impact. (and if there will be such a thing as free will as a mentioned gamemechanic)

These attributes are linked to one another. You can not be the strongest Person in the world without any Power in your body. Power is linked to Strength and Speed because it is so. But not every olympic lifter is a knock-out-artist because he lacks Speed and so on. I will provide the links in a later post. A little sportstheorie in there.

The attributes in themselfs have the same differing as the genes as a whole. That means if you have the genes to wrestle a bear you give Strength a 5 and if you are the average gifted than it is a 3.

These numbers shown are the number of dices you can throw at the best.

Now lets see to the top athletes in the world: do they hold their max fitness the whole life through? No. They just can peak 3 weeks or so. Then it will decrease. That means thes are not your starting numbers. That is your

Background:      How old are you? What did you do with all this time then?
         What are your hobbies, of what you are making your          living? What do you do the whole day?
         Because the things you are going to do more often will be          better in terms of reaching genetical maximum. Of course          this depends also on the quality and the richness of the          environment and that is why this will a be a deciding          factor.

Lets say the Strength-5-being is forced, because of the political, environmental or free will situations to farm, to climb, to train hard with weights or to be a smith, then he will be very trained in his Strength and very near his genetical maximum. Lets say 4. Wow!
So we have the current - meaning the starting numbers or your Traininglevel in each Attribute.

But, you say, he will be strong as a farmer or a weigthlifter but that does not mean he will have the same strength in, for instance: rowing! Right I say.

And that is where the skills come in handy. They will tell against what a number you have to roll.

Skills:          Never heard of. Untrained:         6
         Ah, I remember. Beginner:   1 month      5
         I do this.:         1 year      4
         Journeyman:      5 years      3
         Master:         10 or more years   2.

One hit is a success. That is all you need. Two and three are better or good ones. Four or more are the work of a genius. (Compare your rolls, if neccessary just as in Heroquest or the like. I do not know how I will do this, maybe you have a clue?)

That means your training aka time and quality determines your dices of your attributes and how long and sincere you do a skill (or how do you like it to call) gives you the number to reach.


How to process this is not 100% clear. But I search for a clever and lean mechanic.

Just to give you glimpse:

You can roll all your attributes and hope for high scores in the right attributes. And for this you will have a high Karma. Or if you decide a lot attributes then your Karma will be low. Karma will be one of the ressources with which you can have an impact on the world. (Not unlike storietokens in Capes, but I did came up with this before I read this gamejewel, it is just logical I think.)

Oh yeah! Did I mention that this game will be GM-less?

So. This is the first part. But befor I post this I will read your ideas and questions. Because I am going mad with this game. (all the years now...) Then I will evaluate and maybe the one or the otherwill jump on.

My time is very limited and this game plagues my free-thinking-time. It comes up everytime my mind wanders and drifts away. And I do not like to be consumed that much from a thoughtbubble, if you know what I mean.

I am very sorry for the bad style but I feel like Zeus as he gave birth to Athena.

Thank you for your time.

Dirk

[Dirk Ackermann]

Hi again,

as I have written: my time is limited but that does not excuse the bad english writing and the messed up form of presentation.

In case you do not look through I wll help.

Thanks,
Dirk

[dindenver]

Hi!
  It seems like an overly complicated system. At least the way it is described. A lot of paperwork and descriptions. It seems like every game has this, just expresses is in a more highly conceptualized way. There is not a lot of mechanics described here, but from what I read, you need to zoom out, right now it is written like you are looking through a microscope at their DNA. Most players want to work at the "What color is their hair level" maybe you can make a mechanic that quickly takes into account all of these factors?
  Also, what is the point of this system. What do you want/expect from players who roll a genetic levle of "1"? How would people have fun with this character? Sure, there is the fun of a challenge, but after that what's the point?
  Maybe you should make the destiny mechanic balance against gentics? The higher their genetics, the lower their destiny? I think you are flailing around with this system because there is not context. An RPG is not a simulation of real life, it's a way of telling a story. What story are you trying to tell with this system? I guess we need to break out the classic:
1 ) What is the game about? Not the marketing copy on the cover, what is it actually about?
2 ) What are the characters going to be doing? What are their most likely activities going to be?
3 ) What are the players going to be doing? How do they influence the story being told at the table?
  Well, it sounds like you know what you want, once you communicate that, it will be come apparent how to communicate that to your players.

[Starblade]

What about social aptitude? Some people are born to be very good with people, and some others are born to be very bad. This will be dependant somewhat on intelligence, and somewhat on personality, and still somewhat upon the roleplayer.

Given that your goal is to create an RPG that asks the question "To what extent does free will exist?" and have the players actions in the RPG answer it, I think having a social aptitude trait is necessary.

Then there is wit, which is intellectual speed, and memory. One can be intelligent but have low wit if it takes them hours to solve a problem, that would take someone with high wit less than half an hour.

These are just suggestions. Feel free to make of them what you will!

(...Starblade Riven Darksquall...)

[Dirk Ackermann]

Hi dindenver,

I give you that it sounds very complicated. I just messed it up because of my copy-paste and then post, without controlling it again. My failure. I am just learning to communicate via Internet.
I know that I am looking through a microscope. That is intented. Are we just slaves of our genes and of our heritage or is there more? I will have it as detailed as possible. If we have a lot of situations and a lot of reactions - and finally actions, then we will understand what makes us different. Is the sum of the parts really bigger than it should be? I think so. And thats why those splittings and overly simulating.
Of course I could do it another way but that is not my trying. I would like to do it from the small parts up to the big ones.
Assume you rolled a 4% in chargen. Bad. But where is the problem? You will not have every Attribute "1". Because you can devide the points (again: I do not know how much points there will be available, but the difference between the average and the genius or the "1-5%" is just 50% more or less points at the beginning) Also remind that this is just your genetical level. It is your maximum you can reach. (the ressource debt will give you the power to gain more for a small amount of time, but to that later)
That means your culture and your education and your friends, your whole life and the momentary situation your char is into, up to the point where play begins decides your starting points! Yes, this assumes that there is a chance that the genetically gifted one can have less starting points in the beginning! It is just a matter of what you and the playgroup decides at the beginning of play and world-and chargen. But the player who plays the gifted one will get more out of it the longer the game last? Maybe. The points and the genes are not the important part for the char! Life, situation, love, friendship, needs, longings, betrayal and revenge will drive the charakter (not the player, but to simulate it the player will feel it too, I hope)

You are right with your destiny. I call it Karma. I am musing about the chance to trade karma for a little help in chargen. But that is just a thought. I have to test it and play it to see how frustrating it is to play an "underachiever in genetics".
My first context was a zombiemovie. Your char had to deal with the sudden changes in the world with his genes and with his background alone. But that was long ago and I am not any longer into the zombiething. I am considering the chance to do this rpg a situational one, where the beginning is the hard and bad situation and now the chars have to deal with it, despite their heritage. (situations can be: sudden war, an earthquake, starvation, a murder under us or that... you can do it in every world and in every setting you like, that is why I am struggeling with a specific setting)
I can tell you that the simulation of real life will not be the point but it will be the natural context of this game. Because without it to see what free will is all about would be nearly meaningless.
I hope this told you better than my first post.

Hi Starblade,

I did not write it that exactly, there are psychological Attributes in this game. I thought it would be better if I am just mention the physical ones, e.g.: Creativity, Libido, Charme and Angst (you see a few of the big five of Cattell, Costa and McCrae - maybe I will structure it like the factors of H.J. Eysenck) , Apprehension, Memory, and so on. To this point I have not decided upon which to take. The principal that many of them are linked together is also true here.

My next post will go further into the ressources.

Thank you for your criticism. More of it please.

Thank you,
Dirk