I was wondering what the simplest rpg system possible would be, fufilling most basic expectations of a system, such as:

1. Characters have different capabilities.

2. Descisions on success are not for the most part made arbitarily by a GM.

3. Outcomes are not easily pre-determined.

4. Things make a fair amount of sense within the setting, with no horribly glaring parts.

My suggestion:

The game setting is a utopia hopefull, not so much that pain and discomfort are removed from people's lives as the workings of man covering his enviroment is strongly developed, and there is very little of the natural world left, replaced with artificial dirt, artificial trees. I'm guessing that the most intereasting people to play through is those who would rebel against such a state.

Anywho... the setting serves to simpilize the system quite abit. Every object in the world is made so finely that it either A) Allows you to do what you wish what it, very easily. B) Resists unwanted action to it to the best of it's makers ability. Also, as the world is quite sterile and sanitized, there's very little in the world that would make up situationial modifers.

So, characters have a Physical trait and a Mental trait, both even numbers from 2 to 12, 6 being the average. What you roll is dependant on which is the more important factor for the task at hand.

Action resoloution is always done as an opposed roll, if you are trying to do something to an object in the world and it's maker made it to resist that action, than you roll 1d(your Relevant Trait) Vs. 1d(the maker's Mental trait), Meeting it or going higher means success, you can do whatever it was resisting. Failure means that you can't. Both results are permanant per that object, if you ever tried again you would either succeed or fail per the first time.

Multiple people can attempt to do something, they all roll at the same time.

The combat system:
Every character at any paticular time that wishes to engage in a combat sortie rolls a dice equivilant to their physical trait. They can choose to damage anyone that round that rolled a number less than theirs, inflcting Attacker's rolled number - Defender's rolled number in Wounds... Wounds are penalties that lessen that person's physical trait as it's rolled, rounded off to the higher even number. One wound dissappears in the amount the character has squared days. In action movie fashion, guns and armor are just colorful flair.

Creating objects:
To create an object, you must present a realistic way you are able to construct it, I. E., what objects you can scanvage to build it, not building anything that's taller than you have means of reaching up, and than say what it normally does, what it is built to be resistant to doing to it. Creating anything takes a day, thus you can only create one thing in a day. Also, if you wish, you can make it so that attempted actions will cause a trap to spring, which damages those who fail at the action with wounds of how short they come up of your number.

One example is a character who wants to create a robot to serve drinks and sassmouth his guests for the amusement of all. Getting in touch with some general robotics parts(The factory lets him have them, as he has significant connections in this psuedeo-socialist system), he decides what he wants it to do, that being serve drinks and mingle. He also wants it to be resistant to tampering with by anyone , espicially the nosy maid. After one day of working on it, it is functionial. Unfortunately, said for maid happened to try prying open it's head sometime later on in the afternoon, receieving abit of a shock in the process.

The most unresolved issues I can figure would be getting medical attention(Which I've never seen done all that well in an rpg anywho.)

Sirogit

Hey, let me say welcome to the forge. Wanted to make an important point. Indie-games is for discussing elements of a specific game design you are working on. As explained in the Forum policy specific to Indie Game Design and Indie Design policy announcement Threads. If you want to discuss ideas for RPG mechanics in general, such as your applied knowledge thread or this one, or some other general/theoretical RPG design element the RPG Theory forum is in the right place.

best

Very sorry about that! Wasn't entirely clear about that, as both ideas are more or less engrained in a single game to me, while at the same time are based on a basic approach to game design... so... yeah, I'll be carefull about it.

This is sorta a tough question. I mean, what constitutes something that satisfies your criteria is going to be pretty subjective. I mean, let's look at Freeform. Let's say the system is the following:

There are only players, and they can Narrate anything happening, as long as they don't step on other player's toes.

Let's see how our system measures up.

1. Since character capability will be determined soley by in-game narration, they have an infinite capacity to be different from each other.

2. No GM, no arbitrary GM decisions. Though I bet that you meant no arbitrary decision by any participant.

3. Outcomes are totally impossible to determine since the other players are creating them as much as you are. Hence three quarters of the results in a four-player game may completely surprise you.

4. The players having no mechanics to follow are free to make results as sensible as they are able to. Often results in Freeform games are much more "sensible" than those in non-Freeform games.


Now, I'm not actually acting as an advocate for Freeform games here. What I'm pointing out is that your criterria don't seem to neccessarily need any mechanics to acomplish. OTOH, I'm cheating slightly, as I think that your statement about Arbitrary results is actually about having a system.

The problem I have, really, is with the assumption that any of these things are required. That is, whatever you might say about Freeform, it works for the people who use it. And Tabletop works for the people who use that sort of system.

The point is that there is no "ultimate" point here. Whatever you choose is not "simplest" or "best" for some style of play. It's merely your choice. That is, you could go more simple than the system you have, or you could go more complex, and you'd still get a system that works. So don't worry about that sort of thing, just worry about what you want the game to do.

For example, what's so good about simple? I mean, the usual reason for simple is that you want to avoid system interjecting itself in such a way as it detracts from other aspects of play that you want to heighten. The real question, however, is what is it that you want to heighten? Figure that out, and work towards that, and the game will end up exactly as complex as it needs to be.


A couple of other comments. What you have for resolution is what's somtimes refered to as Conflict resolution, or maybe is. The problem is with your statement of the system. It says that a character who attempts the same thing after failing will automatically fail. This is not very satisfactory to any sort of player for various reasons, mostly centering around the fact that it's just not very realistic.

What seems to work better is simply to say that the character will not attempt the same thing more than once, because once the result comes up, the Conflict in question is over. So, if I'm trying to get through a door, and am using lockpicking, if I fail, I did not fail to pick the lock, but I faild to get through the door using that method. See the subtle difference?

What it means is that you can never do the same Conflcit twice in a row. If I lose that Conflict, I can start a new one trying to get through the door by bashing it down. Or maybe the GM starts a new Conflict about having to evade some guards. But never should I be allowed to do the same Conflict twice in a row.

It's a good way to look at it that people can readily accept.

Also, if simplicity is really a goal, then why the combat system? See Mike's Standard Rant #3. I post this because I want to point out that what you have as assumptions about what's "essential" to an RPG are just traditions that you can question in your design.

Mike

If you're looking for a simple, yet thorough system, I suggest my own design (of course) Minima. It is designed to be compact, simple, and flexible. Of course, even if you don't use it all, you might find bits you like.

(Sorry if anyone is offended by my shameless plug)

Minima Homepage: www.eccentrix.com/members/knarf/index.html

I like to base simple on dismissing an unmentioned stat as "average"

Basically, your scratch character is the average for everything, whatever that means?

You can go into great detail of describing one or a few single characters with tonnes of stats and say that you simply get handed this. You modify it from there. The modification necessary depends on the level of complexity players / GM agree on. I called in the "random person." This is especially useful when PCs have to interact with someone in the crowd, and suddenly it's becoming like a character. You modify it based on what to expect in the crowd, then modify just a little further to make it more than a drone.

Naturally, the game won't work if you just say "modify it to the extent you want." But it's a great way, once you have your minimum agreed, to simply come across a problem, and say: "I'm doing whatever standard does here, but I'm adding in this and losing that."

It's just a judgment call by GM in Simulationism. But Gameism would require a VERY EXTENSIVE object, but utilizing it would be very simple. "Okay, this is a grapple attack. Let's look up 'grapple' on the standard."

Has this been done before? Should I try developing this?