Hello. This is my first post here on the Forge, though I?ve been lurking for quite awhile. I?ve read a lot of the posts, most of the articles, and have finally progressed to a point with my little project that I feel justified in putting something up. Here goes.

It seems that most people?s concerns here seem to be focused on RPG design as derived from first principles in sort of a bottom-up approach. This seems logical, and I therefore have tried to start out by focusing more on my initial experience and goals, as opposed to pulling out any task-resolution or combat system right off the bat. Here?s why I?m here:


I?ve only been playing roll-playing games for a few years. Unlike, I suppose, a lot of people?s introduction to the hobby, I never played D&D, or any other form of d20 until very recently, and then only limitedly. My first introduction to role-playing was a crazy one-shot of Paranoia about four years ago, followed by a few touches of GURPS, followed by a fairly consistent stint of Shadowrun. I?ve also played bits and pieces of Riddle of Steel, Nobilis, Mutants and Masterminds, and maybe a few others that slip my mind at the moment.

What, I suppose, originally got me thinking about making my own RPG, was that the more I learned about the hobby, the more it became evident that:

1. I gravitated more and more strongly to the sci-fi aspect of any given RPG than the fantasy.

2. Sci-fi always seemed to be second-fiddle to fantasy in a lot of RPGers minds, which was just the opposite of my basic tendency (more on this later).


However, it wasn?t just a hankering for sci-fi in general that gave birth to the ?Hey, I could just make my own!? idea. To illustrate, I digress for two paragraphs:

You know what the cool part about Star Wars was for me? That absolutely anything could, and already did exist, and had for millennia. Not really, but at least that was the way I pictured it.

I mean, maybe in Middle Earth its true that they had wizards and orcs and halflings and elves and all sorts of stuff, but no matter what, you were never going to find a fleet of interstellar warcraft. However, in Star Wars it is conceivable that you might find a wizard, or orc or halfling or elf. Who?s to say? After all, its quadribizillions of worlds and planets and people. Who?s to say that rich, deep, well-written atmospheric Middle Earth isn?t out there on the Outer Rim somewhere? Only George Lucas, I suppose.

Point being, that I want a sci-fi universe, not like Shadowrun or several of the GURPS supplements (or even Star Wars in actual fact, as opposed to my idealistic deliberate misinterpretation of it) where a lot of stuff can and does exist. I want more than lots. I want somewhere where you can have it all. All player-conceivable tech can exists, does exist, done had been existing and so forth. It can all be used.

What?s more, anything that?s sentient (or even non-sentient if you can figure a way to do it) can be run as a player character. Go ahead, be a sentient nano-swarm, a time-travelling hologram, or maybe just a good old-fashioned pre-teen mech pilot. Through my life every sci-fi book I?ve ever read and every cool movie I?ve ever seen have filled my head with all sorts of crazy notions, and now I want to be able to play a game where I can find myself facing any of those things at any time, or find them standing at my side as I face pre-teen mech pilots. I want it all!

Oh yeah, the thing I mentioned earlier. I don?t want any fantasy. Yeah, yeah, I know?what does that mean? True, Star Wars is no more or less ?fantastic? in terms of divergence from reality than Tolkein or Dr. Seuss for that matter. I guess what I?m looking to avoid is that fantasy-feel that comes part-and-parcel with so many games these days. Shadowrun was a lot of fun, but there was always something about that porcupine shaman that sorta bugged me in a very ?i-can?t-put-my-finger-on-it-but-there?s-something-about-this-game-that-is-detracting-from-my-overall-meta-gaming-experience kind of way. I suppose if it came down to a definition I would say ?supernatural? or ?metaphysical? is what I?m looking to avoid. Supernatural effects produced by pseudo-science but no magic per se. I?m not sure if this makes any sense. Please let me know if further clarification on this point is needed.

So that?s where I stand. I have some stuff written up, and more in my head, but any comments on these initial thoughts would be welcome. Is it too much? Should I focus? Am I dreaming the impossible dream?

By the way, where, exactly, do I post my crunchy stuff?

What?s with all the '?'s??? ;)

Ok, here is what I think of it: It seems like a fantastic idea, but would be impossible for you to implement on your own. You would have to come up with some sort of system that was so flexible that any kind of race / entity would be able to be derived from it, which would be difficult.

For example, having a Strength Stat wouldn't work as certain "life-forms" wouldn't have it (say holograms to quote your example), but that wouldn't make them any "weaker" than, say, a strong human.

So the question is, can you come up with a system that is flexible enough to incorporate EVERYTHING, but still specific enough to have some sort of structure. If you can, then go for it! I'd love to see this idea played out.

That being said, it may be possible to come up with a system that allows players to define what their stats are, and then when it comes to some sort of task resolution (say combat for example) the stats that would pertain to that for their character would be used.

Not making any sense? Well I'll use combat as the easiest example. A human would use Strength, Dexterity, Reflexes, and many other things, while a Psionic being would use more Willpower and Intelligence. Do you see where I'm going?

Those are just a few ideas.

Oooh! I smell assumptions!

You want to have a game that can represent any sentient entity. This doesn't mean that you need to exhaustively specify their physical qualities(stuff like Strength, Dexterity); remember that stats in a game are just numbers that drive play. A holographic creature could be just as dangerous in combat as a physical one, by, for instance, manipulating antagonists' perceptions so that they attack each other.

If you're doing this from the Star Wars standpoint, then it could suffice to specify how these entities are different from humans (which are the explicit baseline).

I think that, from this standpoint, it makes sense to have "effective" abilities rather than "causal" abilities, by which I mean that you need only describe how good a being is at bringing things about, rather than defining several tools it has at its disposal, and then trying to bend your mechanics to explain how it causes things.

Oooh! I smell assumptions!

You want to have a game that can represent any sentient entity. This doesn't mean that you need to exhaustively specify their physical qualities(stuff like Strength, Dexterity); remember that stats in a game are just numbers that drive play. A holographic creature could be just as dangerous in combat as a physical one, by, for instance, manipulating antagonists' perceptions so that they attack each other.

Hi, and welcome to the Forge!

The way you're talking about science fiction reminds me a little bit of the Orbit rpg. You might want to look at it for some inspiration. Not trying to discourage you from doing your own game, because I think you have a cool idea with a lot of potential. But it's always good to see what others have done and are doing.

Hello,

I suggest checking out the game Over the Edge for some context about character construction and descriptors. Basically (and without a couple of if's and but's), you have three pools of dice: one with four dice, and two with three dice. Name them whatever you want.

So I might make up a character who's a floating eyeball with a dangling string of nerves and muscles. It has Freak People Out for three dice, Telepathic Zap for four dice, and Cosmically Wise for three dice.*

All resolution is always "just resolution" - doesn't matter what the hell is being used. The various effects of whatever is being used are always the outcome of the resolution system, in terms of points and numbers. So my Zap is one thing, and this other character's Desert Eagle .357 is another, and whichever one hits the bad guy will deliver whatever points get rolled, and if it's the bullet, he now has either a nasty graze or a sucking chest wound, whereas if it's the Zap, he has a headache or is sprawled unconscious.

I also recommend checking out the Hero System, and possibly its applications of Fantasy Hero and Champions. It's a more layered and numerical form of the same idea.

Best,
Ron

* Over the Edge experts: I'm discounting all the issues of costs and number of dice for "fringe abilities." Don't flip out.

You know what the cool part about Star Wars was for me? That absolutely anything could, and already did exist, and had for millennia. Not really, but at least that was the way I pictured it.

My original idea for rating effectiveness was that every character would have a certain amount of currency to split up between the following attributes:


Physical/Mental
(What type of resources do I need to resolve this issue? Do I need to rely on my brute strength, or my finesse, or is it more my ability to figure out the problem, or keep myself under control?)

Internal/External
(Where does my attention need to be fixed in order to resolve this issue? Do I have to focus on myself, or the outside world?)

Instant/Sustained
(Will the issue be resolved with a single pass/fail moment or action, or is it an issue of doing something as long as possible until other events force you to change?)



So lets say you have X amount of currency to distribute between the each of the three pairs above. Then, when something comes along that needs resolution, combine the three applicable attributes for the situation.

(Okay, this situation is Physical, the focus of the situation is that guy over there, so its External, and you want to sneak behind him without him seeing you, so its Sustained). The problems I had with this approach were:

- The few people I ran it by had difficulty with the definitions. When does something stop being momentary, and start being sustained? Or, what if Im flying a jet? It takes quick reflexes and the mental ability to know what I'm doing.

- The search time for my base resolution system was more than what I wanted. You have to stop and ask three questions for every resolution. Factor in the problem with the definitions, and it makes it worse. After all, I still will need to include possibilities for every imaginable technology, so I want the base system to be pretty streamlined.

- The few times I play-tested it, it seemed that everything ended up being Physical, Momentary and Instant. It seemed that those attributes were more heavily weighted than their counterparts.

There were some awkward ways I came up with to get around these problems that I tried implementing, but after a while it seemed like it was more trouble than it was worth, and so I just ended up dumping the idea altogether. However, your comments have got me thinking if maybe there isn't some way to try and bring the basic concept back in.

My questions are, then:

1. What type of game would the system above facilitate, or is it simply too unworkable as stated to facilitate anything very well? For what type of game specifically would it be too vague/hard-to-interpret/hard-to-implement?

2. Would you have a hard time knowing when to use what? Are definitions an intractable problem, are they fine the way they are, or do they just need a little bit of tweaking.

3. Are certain elements too unevenly matched? Specifically I'm thinking about internal/external, as most problems will probably be external.

4. Can anyone think of a cool way to let players determine some of the above for themselves. I could see something where someone says "Okay, I put 8 points into physical, and since I'm a squidoid creature, here's what that means to me..."


Thank you for any thoughts you might have on the subject.

MC

Also, it seems that in my previous posting all of my apostrophes were changed to question marks. Does anyone know why that happens?

Also, it seems that in my previous posting all of my apostrophes were changed to question marks. Does anyone know why that happens?

You wrote the post in a word-processing application that displayed a curved apostrophe character, rather than a vertical keyboard apostrophe. My guess is Microsoft Word. When you copy-pasted here, the input area didn't recognize the curved apostrophes and they got converted to quotation marks.

Paul

A couple more systems to mention. First, I think that Heroquest's basic system could handle just about anything, but as a predecessor, Story Engine is even more robust in this manner (if messed up in some other areas). Also there are some systems that I've written or participated in writing that would handle this with aplomb, if I do say so.

Oh, and as far as the setting, it's already been done. The game was called Nexus, and is almost perfectly what you describe. It's an everchanging city in which eventually everything comes around. The system was related to Hero System and handled it all middling well, IIRC.

micahcomer wrote: My original idea for rating effectiveness was that every character would have a certain amount of currency to split up between the following attributes:

So lets say you have X amount of currency to distribute between the each of the three pairs above. Then, when something comes along that needs resolution, combine the three applicable attributes for the situation.

- The few people I ran it by had difficulty with the definitions. When does something stop being momentary, and start being sustained? Or, what if Im flying a jet? It takes quick reflexes and the mental ability to know what I'm doing.

- The search time for my base resolution system was more than what I wanted. You have to stop and ask three questions for every resolution. Factor in the problem with the definitions, and it makes it worse. After all, I still will need to include possibilities for every imaginable technology, so I want the base system to be pretty streamlined.

- The few times I play-tested it, it seemed that everything ended up being Physical, Momentary and Instant. It seemed that those attributes were more heavily weighted than their counterparts.

1. What type of game would the system above facilitate, or is it simply too unworkable as stated to facilitate anything very well? For what type of game specifically would it be too vague/hard-to-interpret/hard-to-implement?

2. Would you have a hard time knowing when to use what? Are definitions an intractable problem, are they fine the way they are, or do they just need a little bit of tweaking.

3. Are certain elements too unevenly matched? Specifically I'm thinking about internal/external, as most problems will probably be external.

4. Can anyone think of a cool way to let players determine some of the above for themselves. I could see something where someone says "Okay, I put 8 points into physical, and since I'm a squidoid creature, here's what that means to me..."

Oh, and as far as the setting, it's already been done. The game was called Nexus, and is almost perfectly what you describe. It's an everchanging city in which eventually everything comes around. The system was related to Hero System and handled it all middling well, IIRC.

Are these all "opposing" stats? Meaning, are Physical and Mental two stats, or one sliding scale where if Phyisical is lower, Mental is higher (as per Pendragon et al).

Are these "few people" players of other RPGs? It just might not be what they're used to. Which has ramifications all it's own. OTOH, you would have to put in lots of examples, and such so that players would know when things were this or that.

Well, I think search time is worthwhile if the resolution system does something special. What is is about the method that you've cooked up (outside of it's distinctiveness) that promotes something special in play? What is it that it promotes? If it's just neat, then it may not be enough.

See, frankly this is backass. You've come up with a resolution system and you want us to tell you what it's good for? You're supposed to have a goal first, and make the resolution system match that.

You wrote the post in a word-processing application that displayed a curved apostrophe character, rather than a vertical keyboard apostrophe. My guess is Microsoft Word. When you copy-pasted here, the input area didn't recognize the curved apostrophes and they got converted to quotation marks.

micahcomer wrote:

Are these all "opposing" stats? Meaning, are Physical and Mental two stats, or one sliding scale where if Phyisical is lower, Mental is higher (as per Pendragon et al).

The way I had originally envisioned it, yes, at least at character creation.

Are these "few people" players of other RPGs? It just might not be what they're used to. Which has ramifications all it's own. OTOH, you would have to put in lots of examples, and such so that players would know when things were this or that.

Yes, they play other RPGs. Are you saying that's a plus or a minus?

Incidentally, if I wanted to post a discussion regarding a breakdown of the definitions for the categories above, would that go here, or in RPG Theory?

Well, I think search time is worthwhile if the resolution system does something special. What is is about the method that you've cooked up (outside of it's distinctiveness) that promotes something special in play? What is it that it promotes? If it's just neat, then it may not be enough.

What I would like for it to promote is flexibility for my setting within a framework that is well-defined enough to prevent confusion or dispute among players. I don't know if this does it or not.

I envision a game where the players can have any type of sci-fi adventure imaginable, with the focus being on facilitating those possibilities. (Not to get too far ahead of myself, but would that be Simulationist, with exploration of setting?)

Anyway, along those lines, I want any system I use to be all-encompassing enough that it can smoothly incorporate new technologies or species (a la Star Trek's alien-of-the-week) into existing mechanics without resorting to merely glossing over already established mechanics.

Games that really grab people's attention approach their genre, or premise, with some particular angle that grabs the imagination of those who check it out. The game doesn't say, "You can do whatever," it says, "You can play the a vampire in a world in which they have an ornate culture riddled with politics." Or they say, "You can play an increasingly powerful fantasy hero who is out to slay monsters and accumulate treasure." Or, "You play a dot com start monster hunting franchise." People looking at a game like Vampire, D&D, or InSpectres immediately get a sense of what might be fun about play, and since they do, play tends to proceed in a tight and interesting manner. "Anything" games tend to meander when they get played at all.

- All of the above, none of the above, doesn't matter, as long as I just convey some sort of feeling that is unique enough to warrant investigation of my game over another. And, along with that, that in general players prefer a more narrow definition of purpose to a broader range of possibilities.

When I read the first post in this thread I thought of OTE right away. Ron`s presentation of it is slightly misleading, one of the traits is supposed to be broad, the other two narrow.
To use the eyeball example, its main trait would be "Floating eyeball". This trait would be used for floating around, eyesight, freaking people out, and any other typical floating eyeball activity, whatever that might be. Its two side traits would be telepathic zap and cosmically wise, these traits have a much more narrow application, but serves to make the eyeball even more unique.
For a scifi game like this it would probably be a good idea to define race and homeplanet/culture/sector.

Fudge might also be used, but my experience with it is somewhat limited.

The system you outlined looks interesting, but apart from the problems you pointed out, it seems to me that it would promote standardization rather than diversity. Both a wise floating eyeball and a orc hacking barbarian would be portrayed using the same three pair of stats.
How would this system separate between a strong sword swinging barbarian from the Yrettab-cluster, a nimble four-armed pit fighter on the run from the law, and Jim Raynor, marshall of these parts?
If diversity is a goal in itself, then I think player defined traits is definately the way to go.