Hell's Rising: the beginnings of a system

[Jeph]

Hi all!

Anyway, I'm in the beginning stages of designing a game about the secret, epic battle for control of the earth between the Divine and the Damned, and how humans fit into it all. Originally, I'd planned to adapt d20 Modern to fit the setting, but I realised that that wouldn't really work that well, so I decided to give it an engine of it's own. I've gotten the setting and have formulated a few ideas about the system, but all in all, it still needs a bit of work. First, a bit of background.

The Setting

Hell's Rising can be played in any time period, but I'm going to focus on the modern era. Six thousand years ago, there was a war among the heavans, when the greatest of the Great Houses saught to be more. The Houses faught a bloody war, but in the end drove the rogue house down out of the heavans, and onto the Earth. But on the Earth they meddled in the affairs of Mankind, and again there was war. The result was that the House was driven even further, down and down, down to Hell it's self. There it festered, sitting in it's anger and hopes of revenge. There it festered for five thousand years.

Now, the Demons are rising. They have mustered their forces, and are prepairing for a siege upon Heavan it's self. But first, they must transverse the Middle Realm, our Earth. Those of the ancient infected blood lines, from when the Demons inhabited the middled realm alongside our own race, awaken from their long slumber. They either fight for the side of their ancestors, having seen visions of wealth and glory, or battle against it, with visions of destruction and ruin burned into their skulls.

The Attributes

Characters have 3 sets of Abilities: Physical, Mental, and Spiritual. Each set contains 3 stats. Physical has Strength, Toughness, and Dexterity. Mental has Perception, Intelligence, and Charisma. Spiritual has Faith, Willpower, and Fate. Stats are rated from 1 to 3, with 1 being Poor, 2 being Average, and 3 being Exceptional. There is a list of (relatively broad) skills that I'm still working on, and characters have a Skill rating of 0 to 2, with 0 being Untrained, 1 being Trained, and 2 being Expert. (originally I had stats 1-5 and skills 0-5, but I realized that die pools beyond 5D were just rediculous).

Faith and Fate are the 2 attributes that aren't rpg standard. Fate is basically a character controll mechanic, it's like Luck Points, Fudge Points, or Hero Points. Characters start with a number of Fate Points equal to double their Fate score. They may spend no more than their Fate score at any one time. They may have no more than tripple their Fate score at any one time.

Characters prioritize each Ability area as being either Primary, Secondary, or Tertiary. In the Primary area, characters have two stats at 3, and one stat at 2. In the secondary area, characters have two stats at 2, and one stat at 3. In the tertiary area, characters have two stats at 2, and one stat at 1. They have three skills at 2, and seven skills at 1. When a character spends Fate points on a check, for each Fate point spent, the lowest die rolled is converted into an automatic 8. Faith measures a character's spirituality; it's used for magic and other cool stuff like that.

Task Resolution

When it comes time for task resolution, characters roll a number of dice (d8s) equal to their relevant stat + relevant skill. They take the highest value shown on any single die, that is their Check Result. For each die other than the highest that comes up as a 7 or 8, add 1 to the Check Result.

Difficulties are as follows: Easy, 3; Average, 5; Hard, 7, Very Hard, 9; Practically Impossible, 11. (I'm thinking about having the Difficulties 1 higher. Would that be a good/bad/nuetral idea?) So you don't have to do a half hour of math, here's the average result for a pool of dice 1 through 5.

dice in pool....average result
1......................4.5
2......................6.0625
3......................6.96875
4......................7.6083984375
5......................8.1147460938

Combat

No initiative roll required. Everyone just says their action, it's all assumed to be simulataneous. If one side clearly knows of the other and the other clearly doesn't know of them, the side that's aware will get a bonus round in which the other side doesn't get to act.

Each 3-second combat round, characters have 1 Action, and 1 chance to Dodge or Parry. (I'm thinking about giving them a number of Dodge/Parries equal to their Dexterity. Any oppinions on this?) An Action is anything that can be done with one roll of the dice. If characters accept a -2 penalty to their pools, they may take 2 actions (as long as each pool still has at least 1 die in it). Characters may move up to 7 meters if they take an action. If they just all-out run, they may move up to 10 + 2x Dexterity meters. Their Dodge or Parry lets them gain +2 Dodge rating against one attack. Characters may declare the use of their Dodge whenever they're attacked.

When one character attacks another, their appropriate skill check must beat the target's Dodge rating. A character's Dodge rating is equal to double their Dexterity, plus 3. If you beat the target's Dodge rating, you deal Damage.

An attack's Damage is equal to the weapon's Damage rating (1 for small things like knives or fists, 2 for medium things like swords or pistols, 3 for big things like a frickin huge broadsword or a rifle), plus the number of 7s and 8s rolled in the attack roll. (I'm thinking about making it +1 per 7, +2 per 8. Opinions?) Damage is reduced by the target's Toughness, to a minimum of 1. Damage is reduced by 1 if the character is wearing armor. Once characters have taken 5 damage, they suffer a -1 penalty to their die pools. When they've taken 10 damage, they're unconcious. If they take more, they die. (I'm thinking about a rule, similar to d20M's Massive Damage Threshold: If an attack would deal more damage than your Toughness x2 (before subtracting your toughness/armor from damage taken), you must make a Toughness check (difficulty 6) or take enough damage to make your damage total equal 10. Opinions?)

Overall

So, what do you think? Overall suggestions and opinions? Any advice is appreciated, especially about the sections of text in italics.

[Paganini]

I really like the setting, but I don't like the system. Nothing jumps out as being really wrong, it's just not my style.

However, I'd really like to hear more about the setting, because I was thinking of using something similar for playtesting my Cornerstone system. My brother's been playing Diablo II all week, and I got hooked back into it a little.

So, what did you have in mind for the setting exactly? Would it be modern, or medieval (or something else)? Would the PCs be soldiers in actual large battles between man and demon, or would the conflict take place on a more local scale? (I.E., is it too late to stop the demons from erupting from Hell? Do we have total war on our hands?)

[Jeph]

More about the setting . . .

The Demon Blooded actually represent an extreemly large (we're talking at least 0.2%) percentile of the population. There would be manny, manny more of them, if it had not been for wide spread pogroms and witch burnings, which have been going on since time immemorial, and only stopped within the last half century. However, at least 9 out of 10 Demon Blooded don't know of their heritage, and are referred to as the Unawakened. That leaves 0.02% of the population to fight an epic battle. Each side probably has another couple hundredths of a percentile in non-blooded fighters who know what's going on.

You won't find a huge number of Blooded in one specific cluster; the corperate executives have a number proportional to the homeless. However, the Awakened tend to group at the extreems of society: the middle-class are, in general, not motivated enough to go kick ass on hellspawn or try to take over large sections of the world. However, the rich and wealthy are always greedy for power, and those with nothing, have nothing to lose, and everything to gain.

The Demon Blooded do not expressly fight for the Divine or the Damned; just because their ancestors to the hundredth degree were fallen angels doesn't mean that they're rqavenous, cold-hearted beasts. Only a few of them are. However, the vast majority are merely slightly superior humans, and are free to choose sides on their own.

Most of the fighting goes on in the Middle Realm; on Earth; between the Blooded. However, small numbers of Angels and Demons take an active roll in the war. This roll is usually behind the scenes, god/devil knows what would happen if people saw great winged men with perfect phisiques swooping down out of the sky to clash swords with a horned, tailed, and scaled demon, wreathed in flame! The Angels don't want anybody to get hurt (except for the Enemy), and the Demon's aren'ts stupid, they know that in order to dominate the earth from heavan above, there has to be someone left to actually dominate. What good is a dairy farm with no cattle?

The campaign will be set in the modern-day, although it could theoretically be set in any time period. The battle takes place as much on the stock market as on the black market, in the banks as in the streets. However, it's just plain boring to make an rpg out of the stock market, now isn't it? So, the PCs will be more involved in the go-kick-ass-on-demons thing. As long as they do it discreetly. If they don't, the demonic and angelic assisination attempts will be almost as bad as the press coverage. :)

The Demons tend to take a power-behind-the-throne approach to controlling the world. Get hired as an Enron advisor or become a close friend of the man who will be president when he's still in colledge. You know, being insideous, and all that crap.

The Angels have less of a presence in the upper tiers of society, but when they do, it's more direct. Not obvious, just direct. I mean, who could tell that Ben Jahuda was Angelic? He didn't have wings and a gleaming silver sword now, did he? No blaring trumpets, were there?

An interesting twist: It's not the Demons who are in the wrong. In fact, neither side is in the wrong. The Demons just happen to have had millenia of propoganda slung against them, and they're a wee bit more ambitiious and subtle. But they don't eat babies, they don't steal your firstborn, and no, they won't torture your sould eternally, if god decides to damn you to hell (which he won't, as he's not stupid: damning you to hell would just be reinforcing the enemy, and isn't that bad anyway. Heavan and Hell aren't that different. They were before the Fall, but not after 6,000 years of having a civilized race inhabit them).

The PCs will start out as Unawakened Blooded, not knowing anything about the war. I'll just tell them, that it's a modern day homebrew I'm playtesting. I'll have them leave one of their +2 skills and one of their +1 skills blank, to be filled in with supernatural stuff after their Awakening.

Want any more info on the setting? I have to say, I don't have that much more recorded at the moment, so any questions to help me continue to flesh out the world are appreciated. :)

[Gwen]

This sounds nearly the same as In Nomine by Steve Jackson Games.  You should check that out, because it already has a pretty good system for playig Angels and Demons on Earth.

[Jeph]

This sounds nearly the same as In Nomine by Steve Jackson Games.  You should check that out, because it already has a pretty good system for playig Angels and Demons on Earth.

GURPS scared me away from SJ games . . . but that pirate game he has on the web is pretty good. However, my FLGS doesn't carry In Nomine--only the basic GURPS stuff and a few expansions. Could you elaborate a bit? How large do the die pools get? What are the stats? How do they do magic?

[Drew Stevens]

Mm, In Nomine.

Okay, so the basic mechanic in In Nomine is the d666 system.  Take three six siders- two need to be the same color or something.  Roll them.  Add the two that are the same color.  If they are equal to or below a target number, You Win.  If not, you loose.  The third one is the degree of success or failure- failing with a 6 is the equal to a Botch, while making it with a1 is a very minor success.  And versa vicea.

A fairly good system- least, I like it.  Where the d666 system breaks down, IMO, is combat.  See, the success of your attack, plus something (usally ranked between 1 through 6 itself) was how much damage you did.  And the attacked gets a Dodge roll to reduce the damage, and armor can /also/ reduce the damage.  And most of the things you would fight and need to actually roll dice to see who wins- well, they have 30+ hitpoints.  When, after everything's said and done, you're only doing around three or four a round.

And that's without considering how common and relatively cheap the Songs of Healing (what heal you) are.  Or Protection.

In other words, combat takes a long... long... time.  At least, it did in my experience.

As to the target numbers- they were Stat+Skill, where the stats are measured from 1 to 12 and skills are measured from 0 to 6.  If your total target number was over 12, then you'd still roll- there's a chance of a critical botch or success (called Divine and Infernal interventions), and add the difference to the degree of success.  (IE, I've got a Strength of 10 and a Break Down Doors skill of 5.  My total is 15- I roll, and add +3 to my degree of success).

That's the core of the d666 mechanic, though.  Vehy nice- just needs some tweaking.  And In Nomine itself is my favorite setting for Angels and Demons on Earth- although it, too, could use some tweaking.  OTOH, the core rule book and all the supliments bend over backwards to show you just /how/ to tweak your game. :)

[Ashlin_Evenstar]

Greetings!

First, just want to applaud your setting. Very Nice. But since, you asked for constructive criticism, I'll offer what I can.

First, your stat of Perception I have a problem with. I've never really liked the stat of perception, because I feel it is a skill that one can get better at with practice, patience, and experience. By this I mean, you get better at leaving no stone unturned when looking around, picking out a particular noise in a crowded room, tasting wine, discerning one scent from another. In my mind, stats are far more stagnant than skills. You can get better at perceiving things, but it's hard to get more charismatic for instance (though it is more possible). Therefore, from what I understand of your setting, I would suggest you change the name of your stat of Perception to Empathy or Intuition. These names invoke a sense of feeling what is around you. Since much of your setting deals with the supernatural, a character's ability to feel the presence of the divine/infernal would probably be more useful for him. Perception could be a skill that falls under the stat of Empathy or Intuition.

As for your difficulty values, I'd definitely bump them up. If they can use one Fate point to make a die an automatic 8, add in any other 7's or 8's then a value of 11 isn't really all that impossible. It would just take any combination of two 7's and or 8's and a Fate point to achieve. The word impossible (or even practically impossible as you put it) suggests that it is an extremely rare occurrence. I'd change the name of the difficulty for 11 to "Difficult", "Strenuous", or "Challenging" and then make a 13 value that is "Practically impossible". In which case, baring some other bonus it would mathematically be. The reason I mention this is that I'm sure your game will have magic items and/or spells that grant bonuses. 11 sounds like a value that is too easy to achieve when all that is taken into account.

Your combat looks okay, but I am unclear on one things. The "1 chance to Dodge or Parry", does that mean they get to roll a Dodge/Parry each round, or is that a passive value? It's been my experience that when an attacker rolls an attack and a defender rolls a defense, combat can take a very long time. The attacker has to overcome both a passive value (the defender's skill) and his roll. In many RPGs, the odds are stacked in the favor of the attacker. It shortens the amount of real time used in combat and tends to make it more exciting.

The "race" for the PCs in your world are basically half demons, right? I just want to be clear. Motive is a very important part of a character's personality. If the PCs are all descended from demons, then they may need to have it explained as to why they would fight against their ancestors. I'm sure you've already figured that out, but it should be made clear. As a side thought, you could also have there be descendents of angels. I think that the Bible does mention something about the "Sons of God marrying the Daughters of Men", but I'm not sure. It's just a thought.

As for when you wrote "An interesting twist: It's not the Demons who are in the wrong. In fact, neither side is in the wrong. The Demons just happen to have had millennia of propaganda slung against them", I'd just caution you here. Typically we think of angels as promoting virtue and demons as promoting vice. As a rule in society, we tend to smile on virtue and frown on vice. Saying that murder, betrayal, and lying aren't wrong, only misunderstood is close to crossing a line. Saying honesty, charity, and kindness aren't right is a message that I doubt a large number of people would agree. The "this is just a game" argument aside, that's not a message a large number of people would support. But that's up to you.

However, I think that the choice of Virtue and Vice can be utilized in your game to your advantage. This goes back player/character motivation. Virtue and Vice could be the conduits that the angels and demons work through. They need each in order to move upon the Middle Realm. The demons are trying to create a critical mass of Vice in order to open a portal/gate/path/whatever to the Middle Realm, while the Angels are trying to create a critical mass of Virtue to open a portal/gate/whatever into the Lower Realm to finish the demons off once and for all. The PCs have to choose which side they are on based on how they were brought up, where they are in life, etc. etc. That's just an idea, may not be what you're going after at all.

Finally, as for trying out In Nomine. I looked the game over. It's okay if you're secure with the level of blaspheme in it. That's just a personal thing with me. The blurb on the back and the introduction just produced an unsettling feeling in me. Not sure. Might want to check it out anyway.

Hope what I said is somewhat helpful. Even if it only serves to reaffirm what's already in your mind.

Peace,

-Ash

[Jeph]

Okay, to respond sofar . . .

A fairly good system- least, I like it. Where the d666 system breaks down, IMO, is combat. See, the success of your attack, plus something (usally ranked between 1 through 6 itself) was how much damage you did. And the attacked gets a Dodge roll to reduce the damage, and armor can /also/ reduce the damage. And most of the things you would fight and need to actually roll dice to see who wins- well, they have 30+ hitpoints. When, after everything's said and done, you're only doing around three or four a round.

I don't think I'll have to worry about superlong combats. The way it should work, is that the weapon's Damage Factor is, on average, balanced by the target's Toughness. So, again on average, the only damage that gets through are the nat7s and nat8s. Note that damage is never reduced to below 1. So, on each hit, characters will most likely deal 1 to 3 damage. Everything only has 10 Wound Levels, and the Healing magic only heals 1 Wound Level, so combat should be pretty speedy.

First, your stat of Perception I have a problem with. I've never really liked the stat of perception, because I feel it is a skill that one can get better at with practice, patience, and experience.

In the game, everything you mentioned is a skill: Senses for hearing and noticing things, Socialize for detecting lies, Profession (Connoseur) for tasting wine . . . Like White Wolf, skills don't have a set key ability, but rather the abilities can be mixed and matched, as the situation calls for. I like your idea of changing the name, though . . . Intuition sounds good. :)

As for your difficulty values, I'd definitely bump them up. If they can use one Fate point to make a die an automatic 8, add in any other 7's or 8's then a value of 11 isn't really all that impossible. It would just take any combination of two 7's and or 8's and a Fate point to achieve.

So, average=6, easy=4, hard=8, strenuous=10, practically impossable=12. Sound spiffy? Still, please note that fate poitns aren't easy come, easy go. The average character starts with 4, and gains 1 per session, 2 if they're lucky.

Your combat looks okay, but I am unclear on one things. The "1 chance to Dodge or Parry", does that mean they get to roll a Dodge/Parry each round, or is that a passive value?

They have a passive value, and they get to enhance it against one attack. The Passive value is 3 + Dex score + highest value in either Ranged, Melee, or any Magic skill (to represent general combat proficiency). When they actively Dodge an attack, their Dodge value is increased by 2, against that attack only. (Kinda like in Feng Shui).

The "race" for the PCs in your world are basically half demons, right? I just want to be clear. Motive is a very important part of a character's personality. If the PCs are all descended from demons, then they may need to have it explained as to why they would fight against their ancestors.

Yes, but they don't know it. At the time that demon blood entered the human gene pool, Demons were barely distinguishable from Angels: they just looked a bit more disgruntled. It was barely a century after the great war in heavan; and the (then) harsh environs of Hell hadn't any time to work on them, yet. I will have Angleblooded in the game, but there will be verry, verry few of them: I mean, all the Angels were up in heavan, so they get it on up in heavan. All the Demons were, at the time, down on earth, so they're more likely to seduce/be seduced by a mortal. The Angels just didn't come to earth enough to be a factor.

As for when you wrote "An interesting twist: It's not the Demons who are in the wrong. In fact, neither side is in the wrong. The Demons just happen to have had millennia of propaganda slung against them", I'd just caution you here. Typically we think of angels as promoting virtue and demons as promoting vice. As a rule in society, we tend to smile on virtue and frown on vice. Saying that murder, betrayal, and lying aren't wrong, only misunderstood is close to crossing a line. Saying honesty, charity, and kindness aren't right is a message that I doubt a large number of people would agree. The "this is just a game" argument aside, that's not a message a large number of people would support. But that's up to you.

IN the game, the Demon's won't be horrible, twisted creatures driven by a hate of all living things and a desire to rend, destroy, and cause pain. They're driven by anger, remorse, and pride. While the Angels are cold and noble, the Demons are passionate and heated. The Demon's aren't all evil villians who rape women and eat children as a sport; mostly they're just tragic warriors driven by a thirst for revenge and a deep, alien sense of honor. This just shows the true power of propoganda. What rational human, christian or not, would trust a demon! I mean, they're EEEVIL! Or, that's what the Church says. Guess what the Church is? The tool of the Angels. And do you think the Angels will give pro-demon propoganda out? NO! It's just "lucifer will torture you," "Demons will eat your babies," "Devils will watch and laugh as you burn in hell" . . . the list goes on and on. And damn, has it worked. When a person hears the word demon, he thinks, bad.

[Ron Edwards]

Hello,

You've stated the point of your game pretty well. What I'm not seeing is how it offers a play-experience different from In Nomine, Armageddon, or certain White Wolf titles.

All of these are based (or potentially based) on the following ideas.

1) Demons are just as scary and violent and dangerous as the stereotype.

2) Demons are cool. They really understand "stuff" and are not hypocrites. They are outcast and suffer for it, but they're above it all, y'know. "To live outside the law you must be honest."

3) Demons have to deal with people who misunderstand everything about everything, and also with po-faced, hypocritical, self-righteous jerks who keep lying about them.

4) The word "demon" is employed specifically to include God, the cosmos, authority, churches, teachers, and (sshhhhhhh) parents in the group of people to rebel against. Which is to say, to maximize shock value in the sense of Black Sabbath or Ozzy Osbourne.

Does anyone see what this is about? It's adolescence. It's the desire to be really, really cool, like a heroin-addicted rock star or an outlaw biker. It's the desire to be immensely sexually desirable yet also to pick and choose your partners. It's the desire to frustrate those in authority and to be appreciated for it. It's the desire to be envied, coupled with anger over being misunderstood.

Now, all of this is a fine thing, but it has limitations. Ultimately, this desire doesn't go anywhere; it burns out or it grows up. If you've seen it once, you've seen it again.

So the question for a game designer is, given that this is the angle you're hitting, what really hits about your particular presentation? Vampire hit it very solidly (or rather, tapped into a youth subculture that already did so); In Nomine hits it with a humorous spin (as does the main influence on the American version of the game, the book Good Omens); Armageddon hit it with a complex back-story and a lot of game mechanics.

What are you presenting that hits in a harder or different way?

Best,
Ron