Nine attributes based on body parts

[Kensen]

The number of attributes (Strength, Intelligence...) varies from game to game, but I guess usually the number is somewhere between three and seven. As far as I know, attributes based on body parts have only been used in the Cat RPG. My system has nine attributes:

mind logical acuity
ears aural acuity and musical ability
eyes visual acuity
tongue eloquence and voice
body health and fitness
arms strength of the upper limbs
hands manual dexterity
legs strength of the lower limbs
feet balance

Mind and body are not body parts, per se, but I think they sound better than brain and torso. :smallbiggrin:

Well this is all I've got so far. No character creation rules, no skills, no combat rules, no setting. But I like the idea myself, it's different from what we're used to.

I've been thinking that instead of getting a bonus to skills from just one attribute, most skill checks would involve two attributes. Examples:

throwing
accuracy: eyes + hands
damage: arms

speaking a foreign language
mind + tongue

picking a lock
mind + hands

singing
ears + tongue

string instruments
ears + hands

dancing
ears + feet

climbing
chance of success: hands + feet
speed: arms + legs

Thoughts?

[Zom B]

Somewhat similar to the WoD method of adding your ranks in two different skills in order to do something, but with body parts. Personally, I really like this idea.

[Latronis]

I like the idea too, though it'd need a lot of work to umm work

[CarpeGuitarrem]

Somewhat similar to the WoD method of adding your ranks in two different skills in order to do something, but with body parts. Personally, I really like this idea.
Totally my first thought too, and I really like that system. It allows for (theoretically) 72 different attribute combinations. So there's no straight choices to specifically buff, and you can vary attribute rolls very subtly.

Something that WoD does, though, that you don't, is balance the attributes. You don't have a lot of Social attributes (WoD has three Mental, three Physical, three Social, and each group has a Power, Finesse, and Resistance stat), so that will require a lot of rule-tweaking and on-the-fly thinking. Personally, I'd pare down the number of physical options, and maybe get a little more abstract, to allot for spiritual/emotional/social options.

[phoenixcire]

I like the idea, not so sure about the current execution. Also, I think that musical ability should not be attaced to the ears. There is so much that goes into music. And to be honest, properly working ears are not necessarily a part of it.

[Zom B]

I'd pare down the number of physical options, and maybe get a little more abstract, to allot for spiritual/emotional/social options.

So maybe

Soul spirituality, inner fire
Heart emotions, empathic ability

I think social options falls well under the realm of Mind and Heart combined.


And to be honest, properly working ears are not necessarily a part of it.

I'm going to be inclined to disagree. One historical case (Beethoven) does not a precedent make. After all, he did not even start becoming deaf until 28 years old, so he had plenty of time to establish a memory bank of what music sounds like.
Even with a deaf character, it would be sensible to allow musical ability to be a function of Hand and Heart or Tongue and Heart.

[Harperfan7]

Congratulations, sir, in your artful and logical addition to gaming.

Please continue to bring the awesome.

[Kensen]

I like the WoD system, but frankly, an attribute like Social Resistance would see little use in most of the games I like to play. In this rules system I'll let the player decide if his character is intimidated by something, i.e. things like that are roleplayed. If rolls are called for, Mind, Ears or Eyes can be used to detect lies, for example.

Ears, Eyes, Hands, etc. not only include the tissue in the relevant part of the body but also relevant nerves and parts of the brain. Ears is not so much about the ability to hear (in healthy people there is relatively little variation in hearing ability) as it is about the ability to detect rhythms, identify pitches and different types of sounds and so on - in other words, to understand what you hear. In D&D, Charisma largely determines your musical talent. In WoD, I don't know. Anyhow, I think Ears is a lot more accurate attribute to describe musical talent than what most RPGs have.

The physical heart has little or nothing to do with emotions, and the soul is not a body part. :smallwink: I'll let the players roleplay the emotional side of their characters.

Body covers things like the respiratory system, blood circulation (including the heart), immune system and other things that keep you going. It's a lot like Constitution in D&D.

Mind covers the conscious, thinking part of the brain. Its equivalent in D&D would be Intelligence.

[Kensen]

Come to think of it, I did consider adding a social attribute, Face. Face would cover affecting reactions with your expressions (and body language). Face would therefore be important in bluffing, persuasion and intimidation. But not sure if it's necessary. There may be too much overlap with Tongue.

[Latronis]

There's nothing wrong with basing social skills off tongue and a 'body' stat. It's rather logical.

[Kensen]

No, there's certainly nothing wrong with it as such. As long as it doesn't go against the main design principle of the attribute system which is attributing natural talent in certain areas to body parts that they are most closely associated with in real life. Thus, heart is out of question as a social attribute since all it does is pump blood and thus ensure that you get your oxygen.

But well, I'll consider adding social attributes later. I need to think about it.

It's important to note that I didn't attribute balance to Ears even though they play a major role in the sense of balance and body position. That's because you don't actively "use" your ears for that purpose. Rather, it's your feet that you use to, well... stay on your feet.

A sample character

In this example, the attributes have numerical values ranging from 0 to 6. 2 represents an average person. I'm creating an archer, so attributes related to shooting with bows will be the first priority.

I'm not an archer myself, but I assume that aiming a bow relies largely on hand-eye coordination, so Eyes and Hands will be the most important attributes. To use powerful bows, Arms is also an important attribute.

If the character is a woodland archer (a hunter for example), he'll probably also have to be stealthy and aware of his surroundings. Thus, Feet and Ears are also useful attributes.

Assuming that PCs have at least 2 points in each attribute, and 8 points may be spent to increase them, the attributes of an archer might look like this:

Mind 2
Eyes 4
Ears 3
Tongue 2
Body 2
Arms 4
Hands 4
Legs 2
Feet 3

[Ashtagon]

Come to think of it, I did consider adding a social attribute, Face. Face would cover affecting reactions with your expressions (and body language). Face would therefore be important in bluffing, persuasion and intimidation. But not sure if it's necessary. There may be too much overlap with Tongue.

Instead of Face, call it Cheek, then you can just roll the Tongue attribute into that.

[Kensen]

There's nothing wrong with basing social skills off tongue and a 'body' stat. It's rather logical.

Now that I read your comment again, I realized that you probably meant it slightly differently from how I first read it. Basing social skills off Tongue and one of the other physical stats might work. I was actually thinking that intimidation could be tongue + arms. Humans and other primates use their arms to make themselves look bigger. Big arms means you're more capable of causing physical harm, so it makes sense to me.

Not sure yet how other social skills should work.

[Lappy9000]

"Check it out, I've got a Tongue score of 6!"

"Kinky."

:smallbiggrin:

[Zom B]

The physical heart has little or nothing to do with emotions, and the soul is not a body part. :smallwink: I'll let the players roleplay the emotional side of their characters.

I mean more the figurative heart than the physical one. A person can be logical without being empathic, but with the system you have here, both are a function of Mind. Also, I know that Soul is not a physical body part, but it's the part of you that is attuned to the divine. It's what makes us different from animals, if you go by a lot of religious systems. How else do you have a cleric with this system? Mind? Then what seperates him from the Wizard, who also uses Mind? What seperates out the Sorcerer, whose magic would come from the Heart?

Also re: having people play their characters' social interactions - this sounds good in theory, but Jack of the Swiftblades is probably better at bluffing and diplomacy than his player, Tom the Computer Programmer. Maybe consider allowing it to be optional stats? A lot of games do this with social skills: make them optional.

[Fiery Diamond]

Instead of Face, call it Cheek, then you can just roll the Tongue attribute into that.

Augh! Horrible!

Do keep up this discussion. I find it fascinating.

[Kensen]

"Check it out, I've got a Tongue score of 6!"

"Kinky."

:smallbiggrin:

Haha yes that occurred to me too. Gene Simmons, anyone? :smallbiggrin:

Zom B, thanks for the comments. I'm not sure if a wizard/cleric/sorcerer division is needed for spellcasting. In D&D clerics are spellcaster/warriors, but most religious people are not warlike templars or such. I see clerics as leaders and scholars rather than spellcasters (or warriors).

But well, I'll add a social attribute later if it seems that the nine attributes I have now are not enough to cover all skills.

Magic will be somewhat different from D&D. Different attributes will be needed for different kinds of actions:

Reading magical runes: eyes + mind
Reciting a magic spell (cf. verbal components in D&D) or activating an item with a command word: mind + tongue
Tracing arcane symbols in the air (cf. somatic components in D&D) or activating an item with hand motions: mind + hands
Supplying the spells with energy: body

Generally speaking, I want magic to be a lot more subtle than it is in D&D. For the most part, magic spells can only cause things that could occur naturally. A healing spell will help the body to recuperate from injuries faster than normally, but a severed head is something that magic can't fix.

Only the most powerful of spells can break laws of physics. The flashiest "magic" is actually alchemy, but most people don't know the difference between the two.

Also, there won't be character classes, so basically anyone can learn magic through dedicated study. But in practice it's an esoteric art that few people even know to exist for sure.