Hi.

I've been tossing around some ideas for an RPG with the working title "Spheres".

Theme:
The game will be on the hand about discovery and war in frontier places, and on the other hand about intrigues and policy at home.

What the characters do:
The characters are members of the aristocracy, military and perhaps other elites of a realm, that stretches over several Spheres. The Spheres are small worlds that resemble the medieval model of Earth (flat earth with sky dome above), and are connected by portals.

Not long ago the realm discovered methods to travel to new Spheres. The characters will do so to discover, exploit or conquer the new lands, while they still have duties and problems at home, to where they return regularly. I want the characters to more or less like seeing new worlds and getting out of their strict society, so I will probably include a gauge to measuere how much they do.

What the players do:
I want a GM, and the other players will be mainly responsible for one character. The influence of the GM should be somewhat greater outside the known territory of the realm.

The Setting:
I basically like the modell of universe, as it allows for rather fast, but not necessarily safe travel. (If you can't reach the portal, being one step away from home doesn't help either.)

The realm should be a little bit Louis XIV + Fantasy. I somehow like the idea, that noble blood grants some mystical abilities, although that won't be a dominant feature.

Technology is similar to the 17th century, but with the addition of Geomancy, a science that not only allows to predict portals, but also grants some useful tools, like lamp cristalls. Gun powder is not commonly used, as geomantic ray guns are more useful.

I made up a core mechanic to cover most situations:

Depending on character levels, the player will roll d4, d6, d8, d10 or d12. He can choose how many dice he wants, to represent how much risk the character takes. (Probably not more than 5d or so.)

After rolling the dice several things happen:

- The highest die shows, how well the character did. If more than one die show maximum number the result is the maximum number +2 for every other die. So, if you roll 4d3 for (4,4,3) the result is 4+2=6.

- Secondly, when a character acts, people might start to gossip, and therefore either good or bad things may happen. (I'm not yet completely sure, what to do, if there are no witnesses.)
For every two dice that come up even, the player can later describe a positive reaction.
For every two dice, that come up odd, he must describe a negative one.
In this context, the maximum number of the dice counts as both odd and even, for people will notice, when you do something extraordinary. A one normally doesn't count as either odd nor even.

- There are two special types of actions, with a special rule for rolles ones.
a) In physically dangerous actions, each one results in an injury.
b) In courtly situations ones are considered odd: It's just to easy, to say something wrong.

Now, I have a problem. I want the GM to have some influence on the difficulty of the roll, but not make it complete GM fiat. Giving the GM some resource to buy the difficulty, wouldn't be a problem, but then I'm not sure, how the GM should get the resource back. Do you have any ideas?

Apart from that, do you like the idea in general? If you have any other suggestions, I would appreciate it, too.

How about points shared by the GM and the players? Say that one or the other starts with a pool of points with which they can influence difficulty levels: players spend these points to reduce difficulty, the GM spends them to increase difficulty; both sides have to narrate the circumstances that affect the change in difficulty. After spending the points, they are given to the other side, i.e. when a player spends them, they are given to the GM and when the GM spends them, they are given to the player whose task they are interfering in.

As an alternative, the points could be spent to add to/subtract from the number of odd or even results rolled, i.e. the player gets 4 even results, so the GM spends 5 points: 3 to negate 2 of the evens and 2 to give them 2 odds. This would not directly affect the success or  failure of the player's actions, only the rumours that spread about them... but could you say a little more about how this works? Does gossip merely affect the PC's reputation or can have it have tangible effects too? For example, say my PC tries to rescue an innocent from predatory creatures in another Sphere (in full view of witnesses to his heroism) How does his success/failure interact with the gossip about him? If he succeeds but has mostly odds? If he fails but has mostly evens?

How very simple. I like it.

I basically wanted to add a mechanic that characters can have certain advantages and disadvantages from their background, like being especially rich, having a powerful patron or enemy etc. That can be easily incorporated into the resource cycle by making modifications that refer to the background traits cheaper. This way players have some influence on problems they might face as well.

Thanks. I guess that will do for a try.

For example, say my PC tries to rescue an innocent from predatory creatures in another Sphere (in full view of witnesses to his heroism) How does his success/failure interact with the gossip about him? If he succeeds but has mostly odds? If he fails but has mostly evens?