Not a whole lotta time as I'm supposedly "on vacation" and should be "away from the computer" for five days...

I was pondering The Film on the way down to Baltimore last night and wondering how I would do the Moria scene justice using a RPG. Of course, there's talk on other site forums about the same subject and yes, D&D was mentioned.

And I totally, totally, agree. D&D could easily be used in that kind of scene.

And it would be totally, totally the wrong choice.

Because D&D is too cerebral (!!!). Too much brain, not enough heart -- and there's my major criticism of the game system. I don't need to mention GNS concerns or Stance or whatever because it's all there -- the game has no heart. Not in a "WotC are evil corporate bastards" way. But in a "think with your head, not with your heart" kinda way -- it rewards intelligence, not emotion in play.

Get it? Got it? Good.

Hero Wars would PROBABLY be your best bet re: published fantasy games. But of course, I had to tempt the Fates and work on my own fantasy game system.

It's really basic -- I might use this system for other games I'm working on (different genre than "fantasy," no elves, etc., but it's the same exact feel).

Races? Check. LotR obviously incorporates various races that are quite different than one another. Classes? Nope. There's no reason to bust people up into arbitrary classes like D&D does. Forgive me, but it's not "realistic." Therefore, people are good at what they are good at, not what their profession says they should be good at (if that makes any sense).

What caught in my craw most about the movie was the Moria scene and especially the differences in fighting styles of the Fellowship's members...especially Gimli (brute strength, emotion, chaos) and Legolas (cool detachment, silence, pragmatism). To Gimli, it was personal. Legolas just had a matter-of-fact attitude (not that he didn't care, just that he focused on the task at hand to the exclusion of all else).

Okay, how to DO it using a game system.

Picture a pile o' dice. What Gimli does is pick up a handful of the highest-rolled dice and slam an opponent with them. Legolas on the other hand, he picks and chooses dice...very selective and methodical. Then it hit me.

There are only three attributes:

Strength (embodied by Gimli)
Skill (embodied by Legolas)
Luck (embodied by Frodo)

Each attribute affects how that character (ie: you, the player) sees his dice.

Your character has 10 points to spread between those three attributes.

When the battle scene starts, you roll a handful of six-sided dice (we'll say 10 dice for now). Your opponent does the same. Then you both shove dice at one another, trying to "overpower" the other guy. Like, you roll a bunch of dice:

1, 1, 2, 2, 4, 4, 4, 5, 6, 6

And you use a 6 -- six points of damage. Your opponent uses his (only) 6 to block the attack. Blah blah keep going until you run out of dice. But wait, there's more...

Your STRENGTH rating is the number of dice you can use for any one attack.

I have a Strength of 4...so I could add 4 of those dice together for one huge attack.

Your SKILL rating is the number of attacks you can make on your turn.

I have a Skill of 3, so I could make three separate attacks (in conjuction with my Strength rating, I could make 2 attacks using 2 dice and 1 attack using 1 die, or whatever).

Your LUCK rating is the number of extra dice you add to the initial roll.

I have a Luck of 3, so I add three more dice to my roll (giving me 13 dice to work with during the fight).

Your Race gives you bonuses (Dwarves get +1 Strength and +1 Skill when using Axes, Elves get +1 Skill and +1 Skill when using Bows, Hobbits get +1 Luck and +1 Skill when defending against attacks). Frodo's Mithril shirt gives him a Luck bonus.

I also use the dreaded Hit Location for this (yikes!). Each number you can roll corresponds with a hit location:

1- left leg
2- right leg
3- left arm
4- right arm
5- stomach, chest
6- neck, head

When you make an attack where damage "gets through" defense, you roll a die and bam, there's your damage. Each point of damage subtracts a die roll from your pool of dice. So if I take 1 point to the Head, I lose a 6 (if I have one) from my dice.

If you sacrifice one of your own dice (when you attack), you can use that die to determine the hit location (it's an aimed attack, effectively).

You can also double-team an opponent by sharing dice, assisting with defense or using a die of your own to declare a hit location on an emeny (basically, setting your opponent up to be gut-shot by your buddy, or whatever).

It's not done, but that's the start of it. Now, I await judgement by you lot.

- J

Special thanks to Mearls (for the initial idea) and my girlfriend Rebecca (for valuable assistance).

First, tell me if I'm reading this right.

Let's say we're playing the tomb scene in Moria. Do you roll one big batch of dice for the whole combat and start the process of shoving dice at the opponent? Would there be a second roll? I assume there would be if the oppenent lived through the first wave.

This is interesting in a few ways. First, it seems to eliminate some of the more long-standing "realistic" combat traditions like initiative and hit points. And rounds, it seems.

So if Gimli has Str 4, he could possibly slam the cave troll twice if his Skill were at least 2, right? No more than twice because there are only 10 dice (plus luck)?

Am I on track so far?

Wether or not it would work and flow well I can't possibly say until I try it, but the concept is awesome! I love pool mechanics. This one strikes me as being fierce and fast when it needs to be, but slow and methodical when that is in line. Good deal.

About classes. I have the same problems with classes as most people do. Too limiting. Yet classes represent archetypes and archetypes are life-lines or hard-wires to characterization. When you say "I'm a wizard" people automatically know what you mean, and *you* know what it means. The same goes for warriors and for woodsmen and all that. So I've been thinking a lot about classes and ways to use them more effectively.

Not that your idea needs them. Just pointing out what I do like about them. LotR is, of course, the basis for DnD classes, so it makes sense to use them from that perspective. Looking at the party who entered Moria, you have all the classes of the basic DnD game, sans the cleric and the thief which were probabaly inspired by other works like those of Fritz Leiber.

I like your use of three stats. They get the job done. However, how would this system work in non-combat scenes? Does Strength apply only to raw physical power, or does it have a broader range of applications? For example, Galadriel is undoubtedly powerful. Would she rank high in Stregth because of her mystical might? Can Stregth be a measure of will, "sticktoitiveness"?

Perhaps a bit of fortune-in-the-middle approach. Name your general intent, then roll. Thus if Galadriel is using Strength (as in inner strength) to resist the Ring's tempation, she would use her dice in that fashion. I can't see her bashing cave trolls like Gimli.

Am I getting this, Jared?

Let's say we're playing the tomb scene in Moria. Do you roll one big batch of dice for the whole combat and start the process of shoving dice at the opponent? Would there be a second roll? I assume there would be if the oppenent lived through the first wave.

So if Gimli has Str 4, he could possibly slam the cave troll twice if his Skill were at least 2, right? No more than twice because there are only 10 dice (plus luck)?

Wether or not it would work and flow well I can't possibly say until I try it, but the concept is awesome! I love pool mechanics. This one strikes me as being fierce and fast when it needs to be, but slow and methodical when that is in line. Good deal.

About classes. I have the same problems with classes as most people do. Too limiting. Yet classes represent archetypes and archetypes are life-lines or hard-wires to characterization. When you say "I'm a wizard" people automatically know what you mean, and *you* know what it means. The same goes for warriors and for woodsmen and all that. So I've been thinking a lot about classes and ways to use them more effectively.

I like your use of three stats. They get the job done. However, how would this system work in non-combat scenes? Does Strength apply only to raw physical power, or does it have a broader range of applications? For example, Galadriel is undoubtedly powerful. Would she rank high in Stregth because of her mystical might? Can Stregth be a measure of will, "sticktoitiveness"?

Perhaps a bit of fortune-in-the-middle approach. Name your general intent, then roll. Thus if Galadriel is using Strength (as in inner strength) to resist the Ring's tempation, she would use her dice in that fashion. I can't see her bashing cave trolls like Gimli.

I love 'good' fantasy stuff, and the Lord of the Rings film embodies that for me - but I had the same problem - not system available does that well. I don't think so anyway.

As a result, this is of great interest. Keep going.

This is not a laboured pun.

I suggest you add "Will" and "Grace" as the two virtues to the system. Will is basically the character's inner resolve. It's used to resist temptation (i.e. the Ring, Saruman's voice, etc) and can be used to add a bonus dice to any pool at the cost of a point of will. Spent Will is restored by resting at a Haven like Lorien.

Grace is supposed to reflect the fundamentally Christian morality of LOTR. Characters don't start will any grace, but earn it by acts of mercy and sacrifice. The twist is that you can spend Grace to give *other* characters a reroll. The two examples of Grace earned in the books would be when Gandalf sacrifices himself to stop the Balrog, and when Frodo refuses to kill Gollum at Emyn Muil. Gandalf spends his point of Grace to give Frodo a Will reroll at Amon Hen. Frodo probably spends his point to keep Sam going at Cirith Ungol.

Despite D&D's class-abuse, turning the game (as Jared points out) into a mental exercise of "how do I tweak the dice?" I think classes reflect reality better than a lot of other game systems. Fact is, "class" is how we define ourselves in the real world; if someone asks me what I am or what I do, I'm an "attorney" not a guy who is married, and is passionate about rpgs and can ride a bicycle and incidentally can read and write well enough to practice law.
And, having a class there are various skills that go along with that. And, for practical purposes, it doesn't matter if I have differing abilities in the different skills. Some people are better at some things some at other things (E.g. some baseball players are excellent hitters but only so-so fielders), but overall you have a "rating" or an "ability" or a "level" in your chosen profession which is the sum total of your skills and abilities and "attributes."

I do like the idea of applying attributes in different ways to the same roll.

Hey Ron,

Fact is, "class" is how we define ourselves in the real world; if someone asks me what I am or what I do, I'm an "attorney" not a guy who is married, and is passionate about rpgs and can ride a bicycle and incidentally can read and write well enough to practice law.

Back when I was recent college graduate, ten or so years ago, I started to notice something interesting at social gatherings. If a guy walked up to another guy he maybe knew peripherally, perhaps they'd gone to college together, or known each other in high school, the conversation always started with a question like, "So, what do you do?" or "You still working at Ford?"

If a woman walked up to another woman under similar circumstances, the conversation would start with questions like, "So, how long have you known Susie?" or "Are you still dating Steve?"

It's hardly conclusive evidence, but perhaps men tend to define themselves by their "class" and women tend to define themselves by their relationships?

Paul

Well, I don't have a job, so...

Anyway.

This is not a Lord of the Rings game -- it's merely an idea for a system that could handle a Moria-esque scene while not becoming a series of "I hit. I miss."

I had more to say but I'm sick.

Great idea, I like that the difference in strategies that can be used for any given scene. Actually, now that I've watched the movie, although I knew D&D to be heavily influenced by it, I didn't think how much it straight ripped without any improvement from LOTR. It seems that the Ranger class was made SOLELY from Strider(two weapons, kinda woodsy), since I have never seen why rangers should use two weapons...

I've also wondered about how to make a mechanic that reflects multiple attacks without doing a back and forth tennis match of die rolling. Having a martial arts background, I find it hard to represent the a realistic view of combat, since it seems that most games that try give you a gigantic list of techniques(aka the spell list for fighters), that doesn't really seem to make a solid system. The technique/magic power/ability/spell list always seemed like a cheap patch to a system, not like a integral and well built idea.

I'll be happy to see where you take this. Would you apply this type of strategy to other things than combat?

Bankuei

Ideally, I see the game as being played with metric buttloads of dice. Like, 50 dice for each player.

And that's all you get. So you roll them all and then pick and choose.

The scout uses a 5 and a 6 (which equals 11) on her perception check, beating the 7 of the ambushing band of orcs. We see them and engage them in battle. I use my two actions (Skill 2) to loan two 6's to the scout -- who uses those 6's to target a duo of orcs right in the head. She pumps two 5's in each (for 10 pts of damage, each). The GM decides to save his dice so the orcs die, messily (six points in the head or chest is lethal).

That's how it could work. I'm not sure how the GM's die pool would work (if the GM's forces are represented by a single pool, what happens when individual bad guys are killed or injured?). Lots of thinking to do.

And as for as inner strength goes, I'm totally not concerned with that kind of dramatic inner conflict. BUT if I were to do something with it, I'd have the character make a Willpower check (spend a die from your pool and roll equal to or less than the number on the die). So, there's an unopposed roll mechanic for ya.

Jared, you're brilliant.

That's all I wanted to say.


Take care,
John

Hey, this die mechanic is trippy cool. By your system, how would you envision the Bormir death scene playing out?

I could also see using it for a kung-fu martial arts game with apropriate trait names:

Power (for strength)
Technique (for Skill)
Chi (for luck)

John, thank you very much. :smile:

Baileywolf,
Glad you like it. As for Boromir, he...

a) didn't roll well
b) used his dice to whup orcish ass, not realizing how powerful the Uruk Hai actually work
c) sacrificed his dice to help the Merry and Pippin escape (pyrrhic victory, that)

Choose one, or more.

Using it for Kung Fu would be neat...I'd call the attributes Chi, Tao and Fate. :smile:

Using it for Kung Fu would be neat...I'd call the attributes Chi, Tao and Fate. :smile:

Could be quite an amazing marketing campaign:

Jared Sorensen's Kung Fu, inspired by Peter Jackson's The Lord of the Rings.

Paul

[ This Message was edited by: Paul Czege on 2001-12-28 22:47 ]

Again, I love it.

This method sweeps everything into a single die roll and handles mutliple actions. Its great. I'm a HUGE lover of single-roll resolution.

Good stuff. When I go see IT again this weekend, I'll be considering this concept during all the fight scenes :wink:.

Howdy all,

First off, looking back over this is all very rambling. I hope it makes sense.

I had a bit of a different take on the entire system, one that has roots in the basic concept that I discussed with Jared but takes it in a rather different direction.

Characters have 3 aspects:

Might - a character's strength, stamina, and tenacity
Luck - umm, yeah, it's luck
Skill - a composite of intelligence, agility, and training

Each aspect is tied to a different die type:

Might: d6
Luck: d12
Skill: d20

All three aspects range from 1 to no theoretical upper limit.

During any conflict, everyone rolls their dice. To do anything, you spend dice from your aspect and add them together. This total must either beat a GM selected target number. In an opposed check, your opponent has a chance to select and total his own dice, then the two sides reveal their totals.

On any given action, you cannot mix dice from two aspects.

Attacks are broken down into two actions: the attack and damage. If you make an attack and beat your opponent's defense, you then select dice to allocate to damage. Normally, the total of the dice comes off your opponent's health.

Health and Hero Points

Health is equal to your Might times six. Every six points you lose off your health causes you to temporarily lose 1 Might die.

Hero points represent the phenomenal luck and innate skill that separate a hero from a horde. (More on hordes later.) Hero points can be spent for the following actions:

* Spend 1 hero point to prevent 1 point of damage. You may as many hero points in this manner as you wish each time you are hit.
* Spend 1 hero point to add 1 to a die. You may spend 1 hero point per die on any given check.
* Use hero points to fuel magic, enchanted items, and other abilities.
* You regain hero points over time and by overcoming obstacles

Realms

Realms are areas of expertise. A wizard may have several levels in the realms of magic, while a cunning swashbuckler cut from the Grey Mouser's cloth might have levels in the realms of society, trickery, and robbery. Realms operate a little like feats in d20. They let you do cool stuff that other characters can't do, plus they also include hard coded abilties that activate on specific combinations of die rolls. Realms allow you to break the rule that you cannot mix dice from different Aspects.

Here's an example:

Realm of Necromantic Magic
Level 3: We Are Legion
Summon a horde of 20 skeletons. This Realm requires skill dice totalling 10+ and luck dice totalling 4+.
Cost: 12 health (remember, you can use hero points to pay off health damage)

Other Realms include:
Society
Trickery
Warfare
Leadership


Hordes
Heroes are obviously a cut above the masses. Hordes are average footsoldiers, lackeys, orcs, and other cannon fodder. They attack en masse, and though they outnumber the heroes the rules treat them as a single creature for combat purposes. Hordes only have a Might aspect; they are neither Skilled nor Lucky. In battle, they roll their Might and allocate half their dice to attacks and the other half to damage. Hordes do not have hero points, only health. In addition, a horde's "health" is merely an abstract representation of its size. As the horde loses health, its numbers dwindle. Depending on the horde's size, it grants bonuses and special abilities to allied heroes who fight with it.

Example:

The Goblins of Moria
Might: 1/2 horde members Health: 1/1 horde member

Abilties:
5 goblins work together prevent a single hero from attacking any opposing monsters or villains
10 goblins swarm a hero and force him to spend half his total dice in attacks or defense against them.
20 goblins overwhelm a hero and force him to spend all of his dice in attacks against him.

Note: the horde must be able to attack a hero in order to exert these effects against him.

Character Creation
I don't have a system created yet, but the basics are:

Players select an archetypal character from a provided list. Each gives a mix of Aspect values and provides bonus points to spend on Realms.

That's it for now. I have some more ideas swirling around but need to work on some other stuff today.

What I like about this system is the feel of give and take in combat, plus all the resource management options. Do I pump lots of dice into an attack and deal little damage? Do I hold back for a big hit? Defense also requires you to burn dice you might want to hold on to for other actions. I'm also thinking of using a bidding initiative system, where everyone selects dice in secret, totals them, then reveals the result. Highest goes first. Of course, hordes always go last.

- Mearls

One important thing I forgot:

Each "round" of combat everyone rolls their dice and keeps them secret. After everyone acts, all combatants reroll. I also want to include a cooperative mechanic, where players can combine dice of different types to yield a single effect. For example, Legolas and Gimli team up to kill a cave troll. Legolas uses his Skill dice to attack the troll, but Gimli uses his Might dice for damage.

I'm thinking of allowing this if players sacrifice dice from their roll. They must declare before rolling that they're teaming up.

Non-combat actions simple require players to roll and total an Aspect of their choice. Players can choose to automatically take a result equal to half (rounded down) of their Aspect's value times its die size rather than make a check.

- Mearls

I've always had a "3 measures" of any given trait in my head for a long time. It's always been about how powerful(might), control(skill), and how long(endurance). This particular scheme came to me from reading too many comics.

There's a big difference between being able to lift boats(might), manipulate atoms(control), and not sleeping for 2 weeks(endurance). I really like the three scale measure you have, even if its a little different than what I envisioned.

I definitely look forward to seeing your cooperative actions rules. :smile:

Chris

A few more ideas:

NPCs, monsters, situations, whatever can include blocks against particular Aspects. The cave troll, being so big and tough, has a block against the Might aspect. Using Might against him isn't as effective as Skill or Luck.

OTOH, everyone with a block also includes a heel, a weakness against one of the other two aspects. The troll has a heel against Skill. He hits hard, but his attacks are rushed and wild. Legolas dancing down the troll's chain is a good example of taking advantage of the troll's heel against Skill.

The basic system works like this: if a character makes an attack countered by his Heel aspect, one die used in that defense may immediately be applied to a manuever or attack.

If hit by an attack that uses his block, a character may force his opponent to discard two dice from his action.

Cooperative attacks or actions rely on building chains. If I take an action, my buddy can replace one or more of my dice that sum to exactly the total of dice he spends to augment my action. Example:

Legolas uses 3 Skill d20s to make an attack. The dice come up 7, 14, 16. Gimli sees this and immedialely replaces Legolas's 7 with a 2, 2, and 3 from his Might pool. He then chips in a 2, 2, 4, 4, 5, 6, and 6 to Legolas' damage, burning most of the dice he planned in using for attack and damage that round.

I'm thinking of building a Realm (Teamwork?) that makes this more effective. First level might be "Replace a friends' die with dice that are equal to or sum to at least 5 or more."

I'm also thinking of adding a rule that says you may only augment an attack using dice of lesser size to those used in action. Thus, Gimli can aid Legolas's Skill attack with his Might, but Legolas can't aid Gimli 's Might attack with his Skill. Thus, low rolls with skill dice are still very useful if you have friends helping you out.

- Mearls

My next epic fantasy campaign will probably use Hero Wars or this - amazing stuff. Keep it coming - and how/when will we see all this stuff in a 'final' format.

It's great, simple, but with deapth.

I assume characters can change the die types? So a character who has might as a focus can have D20's in his Might Score? Similar to Deadlands (for example purposes) in which your best 'stats' are multiples of a higher die type.

_________________
Ian O'Rourke
www.fandomlife.net
The e-zine of SciFi media and Fandom Culture.

[ This Message was edited by: Ian O'Rourke on 2002-01-02 08:02 ]

On 2001-12-28 20:11, Jared A. Sorensen wrote:
Using it for Kung Fu would be neat...I'd call the attributes Chi, Tao and Fate. :)

Hit Table

The Hit Table determines what value die your opponent loses when you hit them. If it's a head shot, they lose a "6" for every point of damage they take. If it's their left leg, they'll lose a "1."

Actual damage is whatever they don't block. So if I do 10 points of damage to you and you block 9 of them, I only do 1 point of damage.

Suffer six wounds in any area and you're out (dead, crippled, unconscious, whatever).

What happens if you take a "6" shot, but don't have any sixes left?

On 2002-01-02 07:58, Ian O'Rourke wrote:
I assume characters can change the die types? So a character who has might as a focus can have D20's in his Might Score? Similar to Deadlands (for example purposes) in which your best 'stats' are multiples of a higher die type.

Baily,

If you hit someone in the head and they don't have any 6's, then nothing more happens. They still get the wound, just no blood in the eyes/cracked jaw/broken nose/ringing in the ears/whatever.

I've also wondered about how to make a mechanic that reflects multiple attacks without doing a back and forth tennis match of die rolling. Having a martial arts

The LOTR-Lots Of Tetrahedron(al?) Randomizers game

:smile:
Redcap

Jared

So... if you have no dice of a given value in your pool, then the part of the body represented by that die is invulnerable?

further so... whouldn't this lead to a furor of burning 6's at the start of combat to reduce lethal risk later?

A possible fix:

reverse your hit location order; make 1's a head shot...

No, it just means that you can't specifically target that area. If you don't target an area, it's done randomly with a roll of 1d6.

Perhaps the traits could be generically called: Force, Focus, and Fortune.
1) I like the goofy "f" thing. But 2) more importantly they could be redefined as anything. Force could be Strength or Magic whoop-ass. Focus could be training, or speed, or reflexes. Fortune could be luck, or inspiration, or divine favor.

I've played around with pool combat like this for a while and there are lots of really cool things you can do with it. But that -hit location cancels dice of a certain number thing- is friggin sweet. If all of your dice get canceled, you go down.

Theres a table top minis game called Urban Armies or something like that (you can find it in the discount bin these days) that used a die pool for space marine type combat.

It was roll a pool of d6s based on marine skill and weapon power. 6s were attack opportunities, 1s were defense opportunities. Any other number allowed you to move.

So the first figure would roll his fist of dice. If he didn't get any 6s he didn't get to attack. If he did he picked a target. That target then rolled his dice. If the target got a 1 he defended (cover, armor, whatever). If he didn't have a 1 he was dead (BFGs hurt).

Following this exchange the fig with the most unused dice got to go next. With unused dice being saved until the fig got his next turn.

Armor would give effects like a free 1 each turn, cover would allow 2s to count as 1s. Aiming allowed you to count 5s as 6s but you lost 1 defense for standing still. Stuff like that.

Never saw a mini game be so fast and brutal and have so much tactical depth.

Combat pool systems rule.

Theres a table top minis game called Urban Armies or something like that (you can find it in the discount bin these days) that used a die pool for space marine type combat.

Hi folks!

I didn't read this entire thread, only the first page, so be patient with me if I have missed something...

Box o' Dice
On first sight the idea looks great... but rolling 25000 d6 (yeah, exaggerated) is one of the two reasons why I stopped playing Shadowrun (the other reason was Shadowrun itself, hehehe). It's a mess... maybe using less dice with a little tweaking...

Beat people up
The rest seems to be a slightly modified version of the rules from Button Men! Roll and snatch the opponents dice. No offense, I love Button Men!
So how about using different types of dice (4, 6, 8, 10, 12):
d4: very fast, but very weak
d6: fast, but weak
d8: average
d10: slow, but powerfull
d12: very slow, but extremely powerful
Every trained character should be able to chose, lets say, 4 dice! Untrained peasants only 2 to 3. Other than that, use basic BM rules (lowest number goes first, power attack and skill attack, re-roll used dice, out of dice... out of the game).

Legolas: fast and determined... 2d4 (to ensure he goes first), 2d10 (to deal serious damage)

Gimli: powerful berzerker... 4d12 (he will only have the first strike with some luck, but will kill nearly any foe)

Frodo: staying out of trouble... 4d6 (not as quick as Legolas, but fast enough to avoid some attacks, no 'bad-ass' damage to expect from him)

Average Orc: 3d8

Powerful Orks: d6, d8, d10 (faster and more damage)

What do you think?
Hm... I guess I will work this out a bit... with some traits and skills and stuff!

Hehehe... here it is:

The One Button To Rule Them All
Based on the original Buttonmen rules (no freaky poison/shadow/whatever dice)!

Classes
There are 5 classes (with starting dice noted separately):
0) children, small animals, etc.: d8 (only dangerous in large groups)
1) goons, average folks, not so nasty monsters, etc.: d8 - d8 (no match for a character)
2) regular characters, nasty monsters, etc.: d8 - d8 - d8 (this type can be tough)
3) heroes, very nasty monsters, etc.: d8 - d8 - d8 - d8 (you need a group to beat one of this type)
4) extremely nasty monsters, Sauron himself, etc.: d8 - d8 - d8 - d8 - d8 (Ooops! An army or at least a group of heroes is needed to bring down one of this type)

Modifiers
Modifiers are traits, skills, abilities, weapons, armor, etc. You may up- and downgrade a single die at the same time, but the effects cancel each other out...

Allowed dice: only use d4, d6, d8, d10, and d12. The d20 is reserved for monsters (like Dragons) only!

Degrading dice: Degrading a die - using one type lower (from d8 to d6 to d4) - makes your character weaker, but faster! Since the one who strikes first tends to win, being quick is rather important!
For each trait/skill/weapon that increases your speed, degrade one die by a step, your choice. You may degrade one die more than once, but not below a d4! Examples: Quickness, Fast Shot, light melee weapon, bow...

Upgrading your dice: The opposite of degrading; the higher a die, the more damage/power it deals, but the slower your character gets. A d12 is the limit for regular characters. Examples: Strength, Toughness, Strike Mighty Blow, battleaxe, chain armor, crossbow...

Freaky stuff: Items like Frodo's chainshirt might be a bit confusing... it protects perfectly but does not slow the wearer down. Emulate this by replacing one d8 with one d12 (good protection) and one d4 (no impairment)! These dice may not be modified further!!!

Combat
Use the regular rules from Buttonmen which can be found at http://www.beatpeopleup.com/butnrulz.html. Use the "Button Men: Basic Rules, Clarifications, and Example of Play" paragraph only... speed and berserk dice could be useful, but I havent thought of that so far!

After combat
Every lost die represents a wound: the more dice you lost, the more severly you are injured. Loss of all dice means death! Characters heal one die per week of pure rest, more under the influence of magic and potions and stuff...

Non-combat stuff
For 'regular' test, use a slightly different system!

Task difficulty and resolution
The GM stes the difficulty level of the specific task, which determines the target number:
easy: no roll required... hey, IT'S EASY!
average: 2
hard: 4
daunting: 6
heroic: 8
epic: 10
The player rolls one d4 and must roll equal to or greater than the target number. For every useful trait/skill/tool, the GM may allow the player to roll one higher type of die, maximum d12.

Opposed test
Both characters roll one die according to their traits/skills/tools (like with regular tasks) and the higher result succeeds.

Character Generation
Well... it's nearly 5am around here and I'm getting tired (okay, okay, I haven't thought about it now... but it really is that late!). I will think about it later!

I would be glad about your comments!

reptile2k1

Hmm...ButtonMen as an RPG...interesting idea...

Looking at the smallest "1 die" category (kids n' animals), a degrade would mean all loss with no gain. So the base d8 would be as "tough" as you could get. That's cool, but how about giving the option of degrading a larger die by making it an equivalent number of faces in smaller dice? For example, degrading 1d8 to 2d4. This is a sacrifice of power to a definite bonus in speed. I suppose you could also include 1d3's, 1d2's and 1d1's for more variation...then you could have a 1d6 and a 1d2.

Actually, using this "number of faces" mechanic might not be a bad idea for character creation. As defined, heroes get 32 (4d8) faces. Establish a maximum and minimum number of dice the hero could have (say, 6 max and 3 min). Going for maximum power at the sacrifice of speed, you could do 1d12, 1d12, 1d8 (32 faces). You want power and speed? You could use 1d12, 1d12, 1d6, 1d2. Want to be a speed demon, with a bit of power? 1d10, 1d8, 1d6, 1d4, 1d2, 1d2.

Of course since "more dice=more health" at this point....hmmm.