AstralFire
2009-10-26, 05:30 PM
Hey. So, I'm relaunching my Anteheroes site as a webcomic, and with that, I've been getting a... surprising number of requests for the promised redesign of the system. So let's start laying down the blueprints. For your browsing pleasure, the previous version of the system can be found at this thread:
http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?p=4877118#post4877118
Premise
The Anteheroes is set in a universe parallel to our own modern day. Magic has always existed in this world, but in the shadows; it's something that has become purely the purview of government ops and illegal corporate research, as well as a few secret cloisters of traditional magicians.
There are two types of magic: learned and inherent. Learned has a wide variety of effects, but tends to be subtle. Inherent magic is very powerful, but very focused. There are also a rare few people who are born with a natural tie to a leyline but weren't born with a way to channel that magic; with sufficient training, they function as a mid-point between the two extremes.
System Aims
Defeat should be a constant possibility.
Death should be uncommon.
Battles must be kinetic, rather than turn-based Final Fantasy.
Combat should try and recreate the chaos of real combat.
In short, action and adventuring should be cinematic, like a movie.
The mundane equation of the battle system should be somewhat realistic. Guns are preferable for most situations, but with powers or in close quarters, melee might be preferable.
All conflict between two or more people should be covered.
Social mechanics should be integrated into the system.
One-liners and bravado should have a mechanical reason to exist as well as a reason to not exist, depending on the player.
Barring exceptional situations, people should always have more than one viable option for how to address a situation, be that the choice between talking and fighting, or special combat maneuvers.
The rules must be simple enough to introduce to someone casually, however, and make rerolling an easier prospect.
People of similar threat levels, regardless of the source of origin, should always be able to make meaningful decisions in tense, threat-appropriate situations. (Can be fights, or other things.)
How to Achieve Them:
Every attack will always have an effect on a target who is not being actively protected (such as by a wall.) Attacks do have a chance of actually hitting a vital spot, called a hit.
HP will be split up into Life and Stamina. Misses strike Stamina. When enough damage from Stamina is taken, you take a point of Life damage instead. Hits strike Life directly.
As Life gets low, players suffer penalties to actions and rolls, creating a 'death spiral.'
You do not die at 0 life. An attack has to be made against you after you drop to 0 or below for you to die.
Stamina also fuels attacks and special abilities.
Values for anything should not ever get higher than late teens, and ideally most will be single digit.
Social combat can affect Stamina, deny or control actions that other players are able to take, making taunting an active element of combat.
Social combat determines your ability to persuade a character short-term. Long-term is a character growth choice, and thus should not be mechanically represented.
Random numbers have to be generated by d6 or d2 only. Everyone has coins and monopoly, not even all roleplayers have d20s.
Dice rolling should be kept to a minimum.
The system will not attempt to describe things outside of its purview, such as someone's education or their skill at playing music.
Turns are written in advance. Everyone submits their planned round of actions to the GM, who then resolves actions simultaneously.
In the event that actions are no longer possible (handing an item to someone who just died), that character loses that round, but can revise their next round and gain priority over everyone else for that round.
You can take training in order to gain 'else if' statements for conflicts like above, to avoid losing rounds. This is going to be complicated to work on; I'll need to make a handful of else statements that are broadly applicable
Prescient characters thus can actually be prescient, by getting the DM to read them the next round of actions.
I need to work on type and number of actions.
Character advancement will likely be similar to the previous edition, where characters are actually grouped by government 'security threat level', measured in-game as 'advancement points.' Considering including experience level as a variant system, but will probably be too much work.
Hm-hmm. Posting this as much to help sort my own thoughts as I am looking for help.
Contribution disclaimer, somewhat plagiarized from the Erfworld wiki:
All work on this project is considered a contribution, given freely in the spirit of a supportive, collaborative effort. Anything you post to this thread may be used by yourself or others within the terms of a Creative Commons noncommercial license. You also grant unlimited use of any work posted here to Team Anteheroes, without claim to compensation or attribution. Note that "use" means "we can use it" not "we own it." It's just that you also grant license to the community to use it noncommercially, and to the creators to use it in any way.
You will be credited for any contributions; this is just me getting stuff out of the way for if this is ever commercially released.
http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?p=4877118#post4877118
Premise
The Anteheroes is set in a universe parallel to our own modern day. Magic has always existed in this world, but in the shadows; it's something that has become purely the purview of government ops and illegal corporate research, as well as a few secret cloisters of traditional magicians.
There are two types of magic: learned and inherent. Learned has a wide variety of effects, but tends to be subtle. Inherent magic is very powerful, but very focused. There are also a rare few people who are born with a natural tie to a leyline but weren't born with a way to channel that magic; with sufficient training, they function as a mid-point between the two extremes.
System Aims
Defeat should be a constant possibility.
Death should be uncommon.
Battles must be kinetic, rather than turn-based Final Fantasy.
Combat should try and recreate the chaos of real combat.
In short, action and adventuring should be cinematic, like a movie.
The mundane equation of the battle system should be somewhat realistic. Guns are preferable for most situations, but with powers or in close quarters, melee might be preferable.
All conflict between two or more people should be covered.
Social mechanics should be integrated into the system.
One-liners and bravado should have a mechanical reason to exist as well as a reason to not exist, depending on the player.
Barring exceptional situations, people should always have more than one viable option for how to address a situation, be that the choice between talking and fighting, or special combat maneuvers.
The rules must be simple enough to introduce to someone casually, however, and make rerolling an easier prospect.
People of similar threat levels, regardless of the source of origin, should always be able to make meaningful decisions in tense, threat-appropriate situations. (Can be fights, or other things.)
How to Achieve Them:
Every attack will always have an effect on a target who is not being actively protected (such as by a wall.) Attacks do have a chance of actually hitting a vital spot, called a hit.
HP will be split up into Life and Stamina. Misses strike Stamina. When enough damage from Stamina is taken, you take a point of Life damage instead. Hits strike Life directly.
As Life gets low, players suffer penalties to actions and rolls, creating a 'death spiral.'
You do not die at 0 life. An attack has to be made against you after you drop to 0 or below for you to die.
Stamina also fuels attacks and special abilities.
Values for anything should not ever get higher than late teens, and ideally most will be single digit.
Social combat can affect Stamina, deny or control actions that other players are able to take, making taunting an active element of combat.
Social combat determines your ability to persuade a character short-term. Long-term is a character growth choice, and thus should not be mechanically represented.
Random numbers have to be generated by d6 or d2 only. Everyone has coins and monopoly, not even all roleplayers have d20s.
Dice rolling should be kept to a minimum.
The system will not attempt to describe things outside of its purview, such as someone's education or their skill at playing music.
Turns are written in advance. Everyone submits their planned round of actions to the GM, who then resolves actions simultaneously.
In the event that actions are no longer possible (handing an item to someone who just died), that character loses that round, but can revise their next round and gain priority over everyone else for that round.
You can take training in order to gain 'else if' statements for conflicts like above, to avoid losing rounds. This is going to be complicated to work on; I'll need to make a handful of else statements that are broadly applicable
Prescient characters thus can actually be prescient, by getting the DM to read them the next round of actions.
I need to work on type and number of actions.
Character advancement will likely be similar to the previous edition, where characters are actually grouped by government 'security threat level', measured in-game as 'advancement points.' Considering including experience level as a variant system, but will probably be too much work.
Hm-hmm. Posting this as much to help sort my own thoughts as I am looking for help.
Contribution disclaimer, somewhat plagiarized from the Erfworld wiki:
All work on this project is considered a contribution, given freely in the spirit of a supportive, collaborative effort. Anything you post to this thread may be used by yourself or others within the terms of a Creative Commons noncommercial license. You also grant unlimited use of any work posted here to Team Anteheroes, without claim to compensation or attribution. Note that "use" means "we can use it" not "we own it." It's just that you also grant license to the community to use it noncommercially, and to the creators to use it in any way.
You will be credited for any contributions; this is just me getting stuff out of the way for if this is ever commercially released.