[Nevercast] - Mechanics Reference

[Ar Kayon]

I've taken a cold, hard look at the dice rank setup adopted by Nevercast.  It worked perfectly for my fantasy game, but firearms changes everything because a lot of aspects are based heavily on chance.  The dice rank system fell apart when I looked at situations when a character goes up point blank range for 1d4-1 attack die and simply cannot critically fail. 

This is a sobering reality, but I can think of several alternative methods where the same outcome concept (sans the critical failure oddity) is possible.  I just need to figure out which will be the most streamlined. 

[horomancer]

sorry for breaking your game

[horomancer]

I was doing some thinking on your critical failure conundrum. Currently your skill system is just that, a skill system. The non-skill based chance of mechanical failure in a firearm is outside the scope of the skill mechanic. It would stand to reason that a much better method of dealing with this probability is to add an additional mechanic, loathsome as that may be for clean game design, rather than rework the skill mechanic to accommodate.
Unless you want a critical failure possibility for every action, like kung fu master slipping in mud or 1337 computer haxor pulling cord out by accident, in which case a new mechanic may be in order.

Barring that, you may want to have a fire arm failure rate that gets rolled every time an attack is made with a gun. A shitty firearm, poor ammo, or lack of proper care could boost a failure rate into the double digits on a percentile, while professionals that spend serious money would have failure rates in the sub 1% category. Rolling percentiles wouldn't be unwieldy, but it would be far from elegant.
The problem i see is that well made and well maintained firearms have issues far less than 1% of the time currently, and your dice mechanic is poor at dealing with such small percentiles, hence a d100, or better yet a d1,000 (3d10). Such low probability could be glossed over as an 'It just doesn't happen' to the combat focused characters, but I know you like simulation to much for that.

[Ar Kayon]

Take note that the combat system does not simulate blow for blow mechanics.  On the contrary, a combat action is actually a series of actions based upon a generalized tactic.  So, when you fire a weapon, you are more than likely to squeeze the trigger several times within a combat phase. 

However, I have conceived of an alternative dice rank method.  In this model, the success/failure target numbers aren't fixed.  Instead, one die is used for everything, and the target success ranges are based on the dice rank.  The die I used for this model is a d100.  I like the d100 because percentile dice seem to fit a futuristic motif, in my opinion (a combat scanner may take your firing stats in training and then model your chances as a percentage, for instance), and I also like the evenness of numerical progression.  So, DR 0 could have a 50% success rate; perhaps the critical success being 90-100 percent and moderate success being 75 to 89.  Critical failures could be set at 5 percent for every dice rank.  Perhaps for firearms, an effect roll would be required after that, but a roll would only occur for 1 in 20 combat actions for an individual character, rather than once every combat action in your proposed model.  And even then, a weapon malfunction may not occur as a quality weapon would require a high roll (if the weapon is so good that failure is 1 in 1000, then rolling 99-100 on the failure die would model that, if my shitty math is correct; the initial die is 1 in 20, so I multiplied 20 times 50: the average number of rolls it would take to score a malfunction on the failure die).

[horomancer]

The only trouble i see from such a mechanic is having to keep a chart handy for your success brackets. It was nice in the multi dice mechanic knowing that 1= Major Success, 2= success, and 3= Minor success. The dice took all the thinking out of it, which is nice.
All and all that is a small price to pay, and makes for less rolls so hopefully it doesn't complicate any other matters.
Given a larger, non-changing numeric range to work with, will you keep weapon and equipment stats effecting the 'skill' number to calculate DR, or will you have them be fixed % that apply directly to the roll?

Also

http://anydice.com/

this should be helpful

[Ar Kayon]

I've made some alterations to the proposed method in order to streamline the process.  To start, the actual numerical ranges of success and failure are now uniform throughout every dice rank (so no matter what, scoring a total roll of 55 is always a minor success).  Instead, dice ranks introduce a fixed modifier of +/- 10% to your roll (this is to prevent mucking about with un-rounded numbers because none of the subsystems delve into such fine granularity for that to be necessary).  For example, dice rank 0 has a 50% chance of success.  Dice rank 1 adds a modifier of +10% to your roll, whereas DR -1 introduces a -10 percent modifier.  Therefore, it's extremely easy to determine what each dice rank means without having to consult the manual (-2 DR...aha, it means -20 percent modifier!).  To reiterate: a uniform gradient of progression, no changing dice, and no changing target numbers result in a quicker rate of calculation than the original Graduated Dice Method. 

Not to mention it also solves the initial problem of weapon failure independent of skill.  It appears that, thanks to you, I may have created a much better core resolution system because you broke it.  This is exactly the kind of end result I was hoping for, and exactly the reason why I specifically asked for an objective assessment rather than an opinion of taste.

[horomancer]

That begs the questions-
1. Is it possible to have a DR rating of 10 or more to give you over 100% success? If So what does this mean for your game? Auto success with no roll? chance of super critical?

2. Is it possible to have a DR of -10 or more to give you a negative percentile? If so what would this mean for your game?

3. Will success brackets be even or will they be skewed so minor and regular success happen more often than critical?

And something that i've been meaning to ask for a while is what is a major, regular and minor success? What does it do mechanically for me? Are results just made up on the fly prior to the roll?

[Ar Kayon]

1. Is it possible to have a DR rating of 10 or more to give you over 100% success? If So what does this mean for your game? Auto success with no roll? chance of super critical?

-The DR ratings go from +5 to -5 (50% / -50%).  At these extreme ends, there is a 100% chance of success or failure, but rolling the die determines the gradient: minor, moderate, critical.  These extreme dice rankings are especially important for armor and composure checks.
In game terms, this means that DR 5 for armor causes any normal attack to be mitigated to some degree.  Rolling in the minor range could represent a square hit, or one that strikes a weak point in the armor.  Likewise, if you're at -5 DR for a composure check, your roll could be the difference between freezing up and being a lamb to the slaughter, being able to run away, or getting whipped up into a frenzy and going apeshit on whatever's in front of you (this is actually an NPC effect when successfully using certain skilled maneuvers on them during social situations, by the way).

3. Will success brackets be even or will they be skewed so minor and regular success happen more often than critical?

- The brackets will be uneven.  Right now I'm trying to tweak the dice so that your chance of a moderate qualifier increases the more the dice rank diverges from 0.  Also, to prevent balance issues, critical qualifiers need to be natural rolls, just like in D&D.  The byproduct of this mechanic is the intended mechanic I'm actually going for: a qualifier curve that gradually apexes in the moderate range.

And something that i've been meaning to ask for a while is what is a major, regular and minor success? What does it do mechanically for me? Are results just made up on the fly prior to the roll?

-I would like as little hand-waving as possible for my game, so just about every action covered under the skill tree explicitly states the effects upon rolling within each bracket.  Some actions, however, require only a binary success/fail roll, so rolling within any success range is an absolute success and any failure range is an absolute failure.  For example, trying to guess a password can only have two possible outcomes: you're either right or you're wrong.

[Ar Kayon]

Skills
In Nevercast, characters are predominantly defined by their makeup of skills.  Skills not only represent talents and practiced abilities, but also various aspects of physical and psychological makeup.  It is for this reason that skills are organized amongst three interacting tiers.

Tier 1: Category (Discipline)
The largest tier, a skill category represents your overall ability within a broad discipline of related skill groups.  Your level of Discipline measures how composed and confident you are when practicing under varying conditions.  Thus, a "Discipline Roll" is used whenever a significant amount of stress is placed upon a character during a challenge of skill.  Some examples of a skill category would be "Combat" and "Social Interaction".

Tier 2: Group (Aptitude)
A skill group represents how well you can execute any of the individual abilities the group consists of.   Your Aptitude level measures forcefulness, timing, and speed of application.  The "Aptitude Roll" is used whenever you make a skillful action in response to any significant challenge.  Some examples of a skill group would be "Firearms" and "Personal Combat" within the "Combat" discipline.

Tier 3: Type (Knowledge)
A skill type represents your knowledge and technical proficiency of a specific subject within a skill group.  Developing skill in a specialized sphere of knowledge will grant your character the ability to use "skilled maneuvers/techniques/abilities" during a challenge of skill, which may provide situation-specific advantages.  Furthermore, Some examples of a skill type would be the "Unarmed" and "Grappling" specializations of the "Personal Combat" group. 


Developing your Skills
The only tier you may directly influence is the Knowledge classification of skills.  After a certain period of time, you will earn points to distribute amongst skill types, based largely upon your profession.  Thus, skills within your field of expertise will naturally develop at a quicker rate.

In order to develop your Aptitude, you must allocate points to both the skill types within that skill group and auxiliary skill types within related groups.  For example, in order to develop Personal Combat, you must allocate points to individual modes of combat, such as Grappling, as well as individual skill types within the Physical Fitness group of skills.

In order to develop a Discipline,  you must role-play your skills, in which points awarded will be based on how challenging, stressful, or realistic the situation is.  When you earn points in this area, you simultaneously earn points in all Aptitude groups within the discipline.

[Ar Kayon]

I've done some new work on the mechanics.  Combat and weapons have been fleshed out more.  In the following posts, I will go over the major aspects of the combat system: battle sequence, battle grid, ranged combat, close-quarters combat, and weapons and armor.  Some information may be redundant, but I still wanted to compose everything together for the sake of clarity.
The discussion remains the same: examine the integrity of the mechanics, including resolution speed, consistency of rules, logic of rules (is it necessary, or can it be done better some other way?), and clarity of language.

[Ar Kayon]

The Battle Grid
I've examined the pros and cons of working with a grid against working without them.  Nevercast combat is predominantly based on small-arms combat, and upon constructing combat models, I've come to a few realizations:
1. Grid cells are usually 1 square inch; much too small for firefights that can occur at several hundred yards away.
2. Having a grid as an inherent part of the system means that grids have to be used, which is limiting.
3. Grid maps themselves can be too small to encompass the entire firefight.
4. I can't turn my living room into a huge battlefield.
So, after playing with my plastic army men on my computer desk (the machine gunner took an excellent position on top of my coffee mug and mowed down the oncoming attackers) and examining spacing structure, I've decided to go gridless for Nevercast combat, in which a ruler will be used for determining distance.  I feel that a ruler will not be cumbersome with this system considering that range increments are relatively large (half a foot to a foot).  This means that there should be many instances where distance/movement/spacing can easily be adjudicated without the need to use any tool for measuring.

[Ar Kayon]

The Battle Sequence
In Nevercast, combat time is not separated by individual turns.  The reasoning behind this is that individual turns make it difficult for me to accurately model how events might play out in real time.  So many things are happening all at once during combat, so why not try to emulate that chaos in a structured manner that doesn't make the GM go insane?

So, within a combat round, actions are resolved by an order of operations.  Take note that all of these actions are occurring at generally the same time, but their resolution is dependent upon the complexity of the action.
1 - Command.  When characters give out short instructions to other players during combat, that occurs before everything else plays out.  This is an extremely important aspect of combat because players are not allowed to coordinate their tactics outside of the game world.
2 - Movement and Positioning.  Next, all combatants that intend to move or position themselves (e.g. to move out of cover to fire) do so.  During this time, it is possible for other combatants to reactively attack them, which is akin to D&D's attacks of opportunity.  Even moving out of cover can elicit a reactive attack if an opposing combatant is aiming at that area.
3 - Ready Action.  Any combat action that is immediately ready occurs at this time.  So, if you plan on shooting after you just got out of cover, that action occurs here unless if you are taking your time to aim. 
4 - Prepared Action and CQC.  If you took the time to focus your aim, the action of shooting occurs here.  Hand-to-hand combat exchanges are also resolved during this time.