something i'm calling "matches"

[dopefingers]

Little note: I'm not real well read in games anymore, so this might have been done. If it has, let me know. I'm looking to write a game from the bottom only because it seems easier than modding out something else.

So there will be twelve stats in this.
head, face, nose, mouth, lungs, heart, guts, back, hands, feet, joints, and blood.

Each stat has a number of abilities tied to it. So head would be sort of cognitive skills, blood would be purification or hasting/slowing of the body, joints athletic skills, that sort of thing. A player will assign points to each stat, and then assign the points from each stat to the abilities under it. All of the scores in the stats will be added up to be the mother pool. From that, standing and sitting pools are divided out. So if the player has 30 points in the mother pool, he could have 20 in standing and 10 in sitting or however he wanted it. Standing pool points are assigned to physical combat abilities and skills and sitting pool to magical abilities and skills. The thinking behind this is that magic is going to use the entire body in the same way that combat will.

I'm thinking of something like feats, but not sure if I'd rather make everything either mother pool or stat abilities. There will be concentrations, which would be sort of class like, but not at all restrictive. More like groups of abilities and feats and perhaps some things only available through that concentration. I like the idea of titles, as well, which would be more role playing devices showing some allegiance or membership in groups or societies or something. I don't know about those yet.

Resolution is sort of simple. If the conflict is a simple test, the player rolls 2d6 once to set the goal. Then he rolls 2d6 again to see if he can match. Any points he has in the ability being checked would be sort of a buffer. So if a character has three points in an ability, he can put two higher and one lower or three higher or however he wants to do it around the goal. So then a 4 with three buffer points above would make a 4,5,6,or 7 a success.

If the conflict is a contest between characters, the defender rolls 2d6 to set the goal, then the attacker tries to match. Again, the score translates to a buffer, but if the defender has points in the ability being checked, those will offset the attacker's buffer. Three points for the attacker and two for the defender leaves a one point buffer for the attacker's roll.

Solid points would be points that cannot be offset. These would be spent last, so if the character has one solid point and the contest leaves him with two points in his buffer, it doesn't really matter. but if he would have none through the offset, that solid point would still be available.

A match is always a success. Double ones and sixes are always failures. Seven and eleven are criticals and add one solid point to the following rolls in that contest.

As far as some limit of how much a character can do, standing and sitting pools can be exhausted. So for every point in the buffer, before offset, the pool in temporarily decreased. This continues until there is rest. A player can do nothing more when the pool falls to 0. So there could be 18 points in a pool and the ability could use 4 points for a buffer. If all of these are used, the pool drops to 14. A player can opt to use less in his buffer in order to conserve his pool.

I think it's kind of a pretty system, but I'm not sure on a couple things. First, I have no idea how the probabilities work out or what the numbers should be. That seems like a big problem. If there's a place that'd help me figure that out, I'd appreciate a little direction. I've seen a couple probability threads here, so I might just look around more. Then there's the issue of filling out the abilities and spells and skills and all that. Really, I got the system idea as I have been beginning to think about setting and style of play, so it's all a jumble now. But I'm not asking for help with that. I need to do that myself. I suppose what I'm asking is if this seems viable, if there's somewhere I can look that has similar mechanics or somewhere that might help me figure out how to work the points and make sure it works right, and if it looks like it might be worth fooling with some more.

Thanks,
Bill

[Wordman]

I think it's kind of a pretty system, but I'm not sure on a couple things. First, I have no idea how the probabilities work out or what the numbers should be.

One thing I'm not sure about is why the goal is determined randomly. What are you trying to do there?

As for probability, using 2d6 gives you a "bell curve" (actually more of a triangle, in this case), that looks like this (where each * is a die combination that yields that result):

Code Select Expand


2: *
3: **
4: ***
5: ****
6: *****
7: ******
8: *****
9: ****
10: ***
11: **
12: *


So, of the 36 ways a roll can come up (6² = 36), six of the result in a 7. Probability of that roll is, therefore 6/36 = 1/6 ≅ 16.6%.

Note that, given that a 7 or 11 gives a "critical", a critical will be generated nearly a quarter of the time. That seems a bit high to me.

Figuring out the odds of a match in a generic way is quite difficult, prior to the goal being rolled. Once the goal has been rolled, however, it is fairly simple to figure out what the chances of matching that goal are. There would also be very obvious strategy on how to use the "buffer" you mentioned. (Basically, you assume that any roll you make will be 7, and use the buffer accordingly.)

Say the goal is 7, for example, and the roller has a "buffer" that allows him to pick three numbers for a match. The clear choice would be to pick 6, 7, 8. Since this is case where any of those numbers work, you add their probabilities together:

5/36 + 6/36 + 5/36 = 16/36 ≅ 44.4%

So, on the most likely goal, the PC will succeed roughly 9 times out of 20.

How likely is this as an outcome of all the possibilities? The chance of the goal coming up 7 is 1/6 (see above), while the odds of success (given the goal) are 16/36. The chance of this all happening (that is, the goal coming up 7 and the PC succeeding) depends on both of these results happening, so you multiply them:

1/6 * 16/36 = 22/216 ≅ 10.2%

So, of all the possible rolls of goal and match, the character will match in this case 10% of time.

Finding some sort of generic formula for this is not really possible, not least because of the way the "buffer" works. For example, consider a case where the goal is 11. In this case, a "three number buffer" would be used completely differently than it is with a goal of 7, most usefully granting success on 9, 10, 11. Encoding that sort of knowledge into a single formula is probably not worth the effort, so you're left with a doing things on a case-by-case basis (by hand or with code).

Fortunately, the number of possibilities is on the smaller side. The dice alone can only come up 6⁴ ways, so looking at those possibilities over a range of buffers shouldn't be horrible, but you'll probably want to use code to figure it out.

[Abkajud]

Hey, Bill!

I'm intrigued by your use of "standing", "sitting", and a list of body parts for stats. What's the setting going to be like? Why did you choose those things? I'm so curious ^_^ The stat-list makes me think of a lot of modern occult games, somehow, and the "sitting" makes me think of meditation or prayer. What are your thoughts?

[Luke]

Hi Bill,
I like the basic mechanic and the idea of carving the body up into abilities. It's evocative.
What's it for? What's the game about? What do the players do in the game? How do they do that?

As wordman pointed out, your probabilities can get problematic using additive 2d6 plus bonuses. You've only got 11 numbers to work with. If 2 and 12 are always misses and 7 and 11 are always hits, you've trimmed that down to 7 numbers to work with -- 3,4,5,6,8,9,10. If I can add three to four possibilities to my match every time, I'm going to take two or more of these, 8,6,5,9, and I'm going to be successful a lot.

"2d6 plus" is a neat and simple idea, but it's not very grainy. It doesn't tolerate to much modification before it becomes an always hit or always miss situation.

-L

[dopefingers]

I appreciate the responses and I'm sorry for not doing this sooner. You were nice enough to read it and take time out to respond.

I had no idea the probabilities worked out like that. I don't have a real good head for math and all. I thought it'd be easier to get a success than it might be in other systems, but like I said, no idea it'd be lopsided. Something to think about, anyway.

The body parts come from this sense I get from the couple games I'm familiar with that all the things a character can do can be tied to a stat and that those stats can be represented by body parts fairly cleanly. It seemed a little different and cool, so I did it. The sense behind the standing and sitting pools is that magic uses the whole body to the same degree that combat does, but the focus of it does come from a more meditative, intense way with the magic compared to the louder, less strict ways in which combat might happen. Plus, I thought it sounded cool.

The setting hasn't been worked out in any real depth. I think that magic will be a manipulation of spirits or a use of some inner strength. Spirit magic would be more common. I have the idea for this world tree in the setting that has dew and all on it, and in the dew there are little universes. Some people drink a little and they have enormous power because of it. But both would require a sort of wrestling with these, literally.

The setting would be more Asian than European and I don't really like the idea of standard fantasy classes and races, or stories even. Some of the kingdoms and empires are in there somewhere, and some of the interesting things in the world. I like the idea of this forest that is so angry that grass cuts and trees eat people, so everything is along these massive roads, the whole thing teeming with the masses traveling and the traders and little makeshift cities, some permanent ones too. The forest has the natives so wired that they're actually a little prescient. Those sorts of little things. I don't know. It's fun to think about sometimes, but I haven't put in the work on it yet.

So thank you again for the comments.

Bill

[Abkajud]

Oh, neat - for some reason I kept imagining a modern occult setting. A raging forest sounds pretty cool; any ideas on how it'd affect play, and what happens in play?

[dopefingers]

A raging forest sounds pretty cool; any ideas on how it'd affect play, and what happens in play?

Some. The race native to the forest would have something like a danger sense and get bonuses to combat because of it. Also, travel through the forest in any other way than the roads would be difficult. There would be reasons to brave it, but that would require protection.

It is only part of the world, so it isn't necessarily the focus.