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Avianmosquito
2012-04-28, 12:18 PM
Basically, I'm looking to create an RPG ruleset in my spare time. Why? Because honestly I have too much spare time. I've started a video game design team as well, but at the moment my work there is at a standstill because my team is two people short, and this seems like a relatively productive way to occupy my time. I intend to base the RPG's rules off the video game's rules, which borrows elements from the D20 system, the SPECIAL system and several computer RPGs including TES 4&5. That said, it is mostly intended to be unique and most of its rules are to be unique as well, all the way down to the basics of combat.

What I'm looking for here is some help. A second, maybe even third person to work with me on this and help me cover everything that needs to be covered.

Also, just a quick note: I know not many people here are used to it, but this game will use the metric system. Not open to negotiation on that one.

Basic concepts:

Attributes:
This game features ten attributes instead of D20's six or SPECIAL's seven. The increased number of attributes allows for greater variety and precision, and makes the math easier for attribute-based levelling. These attributes are upper body, lower body, constitution, fortitude, metabolism, dexterity, sense, intelligence, charisma and attitude. Each of these stats in a representation of multiple factors which all lead to a single effect. Attributes are improved through usage and atrophy if neglected. Each attribute increase yields a feat, and if that attribute decreases a minor flaw is gained. If an attribute with minor flaws is increased, no feat is gained. Instead, a minor flaw is removed.

Skills:
There are sixty skills, thirty of which are linked to a single attribute, another twenty are linked to two attributes and ten are linked to three attributes. Higher skills means higher success on checks and greater effects. It also means bonus XP to the attribute(s) linked to it and a feat for that skill.

Character level:
A character's level is equal to the average of their ten attributes, rounded down. With each new level comes a perk, a stronger version of a feat. These are roughly equivalent to the feats of D20 or the perks of SPECIAL. Other than a basic measurement of your character's personal power, this is the only purpose a level serves.

Traits:
Each character has a number of traits that define who they are. Traits consist of an advantage paired with a disadvantage. You do not have to have any traits, and they can be weak or strong. You start off with three spendable trait points that can either be spent to purchase three seperate traits, purchase a single trait and magnify it twice, or anything in between. You do not get to save these points, but you do not have to use them. Every ten levels you gain another trait point that may be used to add a new trait, increase/decrease an existing one or even to remove a weak trait altogether. Some traits may not be modified.

Checks:
Checks work much like they did in the D20 system, except that some checks are D2 or D100. Some checks don't even have a roll and simply require a particular modifier. Checks are also the basis of combat, since an attack roll really is just a check by another name. Most checks can not only be failed by not meeting the DC, but also critically failed by not meeting half the DC. This results in a detrimental effect rather than just a failure. For instance, failing a check to pick a lock breaks your lockpick and failing a check to reload a weapon might cause you to drop the magazine.

Sequence:
Combat sequences work differently than in other games. Like other games, you roll initiative to see who goes first, but here you play out each round in ten seperate parts called "tics." Actions take a certain number of tics, no less than one but frequently more than ten. If two actions are set to occur on the same tic, whoever rolled higher on initiative at the start of the round is counted as going first and their actions may interfere with the actions of others.

Derived statistics:
There are a number of derived statistics for each character, such as health, integrity, stamina and will. These determine the condition a character is in. I don't think health and stamina need an explanation, but integrity scores represent the condition of the different parts of a character's body and will represents the condition of a character's mind.

Needs:
Characters need to eat, drink and sleep. (Well, most of them at least.) If they do not, they suffer status effects that get worse and worse as time goes on. Failing to eat or drink will eventually turn fatal, although failing to sleep will instead cause massive damage to their mind. (These effects are unpredictable. It may send them into a coma, or merely drive them insane. No matter what, it will be horrible.)

Rank:
Characters within a faction have a faction rank that measures their standing within a faction. This rank is gained in one of two ways: experience or prestige. In order to advance you must either gain enough experience within a faction (much like the XP of a conventional RPG) or gain enough prestige (a measure of your reputation within the faction) to meet the level for that rank. Note that you can lose prestige within a faction, but experience is permanent. Experience levelling requires meeting a certain total value, prestige levelling requires meeting a certain current value and costs that much prestige. For instance, advancing to the second rank comes at 100xp and can be bought with 100pp. This rank has little real meaning, the only purpose is to gain greater benefits within the faction, such as higher pay and greater authority.

Armour ratings:
There are two armour ratings, puncture resistance and incision resistance. These are a percentage, are uncapped and are countered by a value or formula on the weapon, which is directly subtracted from them. For instance, a human adult male (lv10, base stats) has a natural puncture resistance of 105%. A 9x19mm parabellum bullet subtracts 95%, leaving him taking 90% of the weapon's puncture damage. Note that most weapon deal more than one kind of damage, with the second usually being bludgeon damage, and this second type of damage is only affected by your resistance to it.

Resistances and reductions:
Each damage type other than puncture and incision has two values countering it. Resistances come first, are a percentage and take effect seperately from one another. Reductions come after, are a point value and are counted together. For instance, the human adult male used in the above example would have a natural 10% resistance to fire and a complementary 10pt resistance for being human, and would also have a 2.5% resistance and 2.5pt reduction from their fortitude score of 5. If hit with a 100 damage fire attack they would take 75.25 points of damage. (100*0.9*0.975-12.5=75.25) Note that all damage types covered by resistances and reductions has at least one special effect, usually three. These specials are not affected by reductions in the slightest, but they are affected by resistances.

Note:
Want to save some time? Figure out your total resistance and reduction values and write them down. Here, for instance, the 10% and 2.5% resistances come to 12.25% together, while the 10pt and 2.5pt reductions come to 12.5pts.

Attack roll:
Basically a check by another name. Match the target's hit DC to hit them. If it falls below the DC, it misses and has a chance to hit others within their square or on the other side of them within the reach of the weapon. If below half, it has a chance to hit others in adjacent squares or on the other side of them. If there is something between you and the target, you may be able to attack through it if the weapon's reach extends that far. However, your weapon must score more than 100% damage on the object between them. This excess is used as the resistance modifier on the target. Doing so incurs a penalty based on visibility. A completely concealed target is a -10, a 50% concealed target is a -5 and so on.

Efficiency roll:
Efficiency rolls are the equivalent of a damage roll in most other systems. They are a roll with a D100 and a modifier that determines the percentage of your weapons damage you deal. They only apply to melee weapons and cannot exceed 100%.

Placement roll:
Placement rolls determine where your shot lands on the target. You can choose to attack a number of regions on the target, the roll determines the exact place the hit lands if your attack is succesful. This is done with a D20, recieves a modifier and each part of the target in that region occupies a certain range. Some ranges might be adjacent regions of the target, which results in the shot going there instead. If so, you roll again for that region.

Bleed:
Based on the amount of damage taken by each damaged part, the type of damage and the specific parts damaged, a special effect called bleed starts. This effect is a number of HP removed from your health every tic, and lasts for ten minutes before expiring. This is important, as blood loss is the primary cause of death in this RPG.

Shock:
As your health falls, your character goes into hypovolemic shock. Every so many points the penalty increases, although some effects have an offset that prevents them from showing up right off the bat. This means your character will be incapacitated by blood loss long before they actually die.

As the above should make clear, the RPG will play rather differently than any other RPG. In fact, I'm not sure how it'll play at all. In addition, I know I am bound to overlook things. This is why I'm here on the board, looking for equally bored people to help me build this game and maybe some time in the future try it out in a play-by-post environment.

Anybody willing to help?

Edwin
2012-04-28, 12:30 PM
Looks pretty cool. I love the way you handle levels (kinda like the TES games does it, I suppose).

Sadly, while I would love to contribute somehow, I am not that much of a mechanical wizard. At least not in terms of creating a system from scratch. The only thing I could potentially aid you with would be something related to creativity and fluff parts (perhaps the application of the system as well, such as adventure hooks and such).

Also, I think this may belong in the homebrew forum?

Tengu_temp
2012-04-28, 12:48 PM
Are you familiar with many RPG systems? If not, you should read as many of them as possible. That will give you the perspective needed to design your own one and lower the chances that you're just re-inventing the wheel. DND and SPECIAL are not enough.

What is your goal with this system? You need to create one and then strive to achieve it. A game designer needs to know what is the niche the game is supposed to take.

The mechanics you showed so far look like they're very complex, with lots of things you have to keep in mind and rules-checking while making every roll. Unless you aim to make a super-detailed system aimed at the hardcore simulation crowd, that is not a good thing. One of the most important things of a system is that it runs smooth, and simplicity is better than over-complication.

Grinner
2012-04-28, 12:52 PM
Yes, the helpful people over at the Homebrew Design subforum could probably help out far better.

One question, though. It seems obvious that you want a simulation rather than a game, but why? These mechanics are great for video games, where a computer can compute them, but only the most hardcore of mathletes will take pleasure in dealing with these. :smallwink:

Avianmosquito
2012-04-28, 12:57 PM
Yes, the helpful people over at the Homebrew Design subforum could probably help out far better.

One question, though. It seems obvious that you want a simulation rather than a game, but why? These mechanics are great for video games, where a computer can compute them, but only the most hardcore of mathletes will take pleasure in dealing with these. :smallwink:

Hardcore mathletes are a demographic. And it's one I am in. Does that answer your question?

Grinner
2012-04-28, 12:59 PM
Hardcore mathletes are a demographic. And it's one I am in. Does that answer your question?

It's your project, not mine. I'm just calling it as I see it.

Oracle_Hunter
2012-04-28, 01:01 PM
Basically, I'm looking to create an RPG ruleset in my spare time. Why? Because honestly I have too much spare time. I've started a video game design team as well, but at the moment my work there is at a standstill because my team is two people short, and this seems like a relatively productive way to occupy my time. I intend to base the RPG's rules off the video game's rules, which borrows elements from the D20 system, the SPECIAL system and several computer RPGs including TES 4&5. That said, it is mostly intended to be unique and most of its rules are to be unique as well, all the way down to the basics of combat.
So... what is the system supposed to do? :smallconfused:

I've found it helpful to figure out the Purpose of a system before you get too deep into designing the mechanics for it. So far you've listed a whole bunch of mechanics but it doesn't tell me what the game is about. Is it a Heroic Fantasy? A Space Opera? A war-time simulator?

Once you've settled on that, you can start to think about whether you really need all of these components you've listed. To start with -- what sort of game really needs 60 separate skills to function? IMHO, it'd be better to limit the list to the skills that are actually important for your setting, with some broader catch-all skills for things you want to have in the game but aren't central.

Even if you don't think the Purpose will help you designing this game, enunciating the Purpose might make people more interested in helping out. It is much easier to get excited about the a Space Opera RPG than one that appears to be about intricate mechanics.

Avianmosquito
2012-04-28, 01:07 PM
So... what is the system supposed to do? :smallconfused:

I've found it helpful to figure out the Purpose of a system before you get too deep into designing the mechanics for it. So far you've listed a whole bunch of mechanics but it doesn't tell me what the game is about. Is it a Heroic Fantasy? A Space Opera? A war-time simulator?

Once you've settled on that, you can start to think about whether you really need all of these components you've listed. To start with -- what sort of game really needs 60 separate skills to function? IMHO, it'd be better to limit the list to the skills that are actually important for your setting, with some broader catch-all skills for things you want to have in the game but aren't central.

Even if you don't think the Purpose will help you designing this game, enunciating the Purpose might make people more interested in helping out. It is much easier to get excited about the a Space Opera RPG than one that appears to be about intricate mechanics.

It's universal, like the videogame ruleset it's based off. I designed the game ruleset to cover modern, science fiction and fantasy settings, I intend this tabletop ruleset to do the same.

That's why it needs so many skills. That many genres and so much variety in the roles you can play makes that neccesary. If I stretched all the definitions really, really far I might be able to cut it to 30, maybe. But I doubt it.

Edit: That's "horses are now counted as vehicles" far.

Oracle_Hunter
2012-04-28, 01:22 PM
It's universal, like the videogame ruleset it's based off. I designed the game ruleset to cover modern, science fiction and fantasy settings, I intend this tabletop ruleset to do the same.

That's why it needs so many skills. That many genres and so much variety in the roles you can play makes that neccesary. If I stretched all the definitions really, really far I might be able to cut it to 30, maybe. But I doubt it.

Edit: That's "horses are now counted as vehicles" far.
So... how is it better than GURPS? Or any of the other "universal" systems out there?

Even if you are just making a game for private consumption, you should still take some time to think about the other "universal" systems that are already out there. After all, there is no reason to re-invent the wheel :smallsmile:

Avianmosquito
2012-04-28, 01:24 PM
So... how is it better than GURPS? Or any of the other "universal" systems out there?

Even if you are just making a game for private consumption, you should still take some time to think about the other "universal" systems that are already out there. After all, there is no reason to re-invent the wheel :smallsmile:

If the wheel was built square, there is. GURPS is nice, but it just doesn't work for me. WAY too far from reality. I want a more realistic system with more options. And this is more realistic. With more options.

Hiro Protagonest
2012-04-28, 01:28 PM
...Yeah. Rules for everything, on a general system? This is going to be way too complex. GURPS isn't great, but try Strands of Fate (and its splatbook, Strands of Power).

Avianmosquito
2012-04-28, 01:30 PM
...Yeah. Rules for everything, on a general system? This is going to be way too complex. GURPS isn't great, but try Strands of Fate (and its splatbook, Strands of Power).

Thing is, the rules work for every genre with no changes. That's the important part.

Edit:
Reason that's important is it adds a level of consistency that GURPS just plain doesn't have. It also adds verisimilitude to the system and allows you to mix&match genres very easily.

Oracle_Hunter
2012-04-28, 02:08 PM
If the wheel was built square, there is. GURPS is nice, but it just doesn't work for me. WAY too far from reality. I want a more realistic system with more options. And this is more realistic. With more options.
Well, all I can say is good luck then :smallsmile:

Siegel
2012-04-28, 02:36 PM
http://danielsolisblog.blogspot.de/2012/04/hierarchy-of-interface-for-tabletop.html

this could help

Avianmosquito
2012-04-28, 02:42 PM
http://danielsolisblog.blogspot.de/2012/04/hierarchy-of-interface-for-tabletop.html

this could help

Ain't that a bit like handing a multiplication chart to somebody studying for a math exam? Technically applicable and possibly well intended, but not really useful if they've any knowledge in the subject at all?

Side note: As for tools, you really only need a coin, d20, two d10 dice labelled 0-9, a board, paper, writing utensils and something to represent your character. If your setting has weapons with random damage then you might need other dice for them.

The text is what I'm working on now. The rules will be determined by that text and the players. I've already made my intent quite clear.

BayardSPSR
2012-04-28, 03:34 PM
You really just need to playtest it. Start as soon as you can, and play as much as you can. Honestly, the only real advice you're going to be able to get here is "sounds like X" or "maybe you could try Y" (I recognize this post falls into the latter category, but the point stands). Theory is all well and good, but to be honest, anything can work in theory, since theory is really just a matter of perspective. Until you've tried putting it into practice, and found out for yourself what the real problems with it are (there will be; there always will be), the amount of useful information you'll be able to gather will be limited.

This is not to say that it's impossible to spot problems with something based simply on the documentation (FATAL would be an obvious example) - just that any concerns that might be brought up can be easily ignored, either because the voiced concerns are based on incomplete information, or because they shouldn't be problems 'in theory'.


TL;DR, you need a little less conversation, a little more action.

Avianmosquito
2012-04-28, 03:45 PM
You really just need to playtest it. Start as soon as you can, and play as much as you can. Honestly, the only real advice you're going to be able to get here is "sounds like X" or "maybe you could try Y" (I recognize this post falls into the latter category, but the point stands). Theory is all well and good, but to be honest, anything can work in theory, since theory is really just a matter of perspective. Until you've tried putting it into practice, and found out for yourself what the real problems with it are (there will be; there always will be), the amount of useful information you'll be able to gather will be limited.

This is not to say that it's impossible to spot problems with something based simply on the documentation (FATAL would be an obvious example) - just that any concerns that might be brought up can be easily ignored, either because the voiced concerns are based on incomplete information, or because they shouldn't be problems 'in theory'.


TL;DR, you need a little less conversation, a little more action.

Well, first I need something to playtest. I'm doing this to see what can be easily spotted that I'm somehow missing. Then I'm hoping that I can get somebody, through this very same thread, to start a play-by-post game with. I want all errors out as soon as possible, before I create enough resources for a test campaign, because any and all resources I create will likely need to be edited if there are any changes in the system after their creation.

And there are things the math alone says. For instance: if you aren't wearing armour and get slashed with a sword, you're ****ed. If you get shot through the heart, you're ****ed. Shotguns don't do **** through armour, armour doesn't do **** against radiation, guns are worse than useless in a melee and fighting unarmed against a melee weapon is suicide. Things like that are plenty clear already. From that and my experience with tabletop games, I can get a basic idea of how this game should work once the players get used to it.

Siegel
2012-04-28, 03:50 PM
Second help: 19 questions for RPG design

1.) What is your game about?

2.) What do the characters do?

3.) What do the players (including the GM if there is one) do?

4.) How does your setting (or lack thereof) reinforce what your game is about?

5.) How does the Character Creation of your game reinforce what your game is about?

6.) What types of behaviors/styles of play does your game reward (and punish if necessary)?

7.) How are behaviors and styles of play rewarded or punished in your game?

8.) How are the responsibilities of narration and credibility divided in your game?

9.) What does your game do to command the players' attention, engagement, and participation? (i.e. What does the game do to make them care?)

10.) What are the resolution mechanics of your game like?

11.) How do the resolution mechanics reinforce what your game is about?

12.) Do characters in your game advance? If so, how?

13.) How does the character advancement (or lack thereof) reinforce what your game is about?

14.) What sort of product or effect do you want your game to produce in or for the players?

15.) What areas of your game receive extra attention and color? Why?

16.) Which part of your game are you most excited about or interested in? Why?

17.) Where does your game take the players that other games can’t, don’t, or won’t?

18.) What are your publishing goals for your game?

19.) Who is your target audience?

Hiro Protagonest
2012-04-28, 04:02 PM
guns are worse than useless in a melee

No, they're not. You can use the steel backbone to block stuff, and there's pistol-whipping. It's enough to defend yourself against a sword, and you can block an axe or hammer if you hit it against the haft, not the head.

Siegel
2012-04-28, 04:18 PM
No, they're not. You can use the steel backbone to block stuff, and there's pistol-whipping. It's enough to defend yourself against a sword, and you can block an axe or hammer if you hit it against the haft, not the head.

Or you can shoot a guy IN.THE.FACE you know?

Tengu_temp
2012-04-28, 04:22 PM
Thing is, the rules work for every genre with no changes. That's the important part.


Actually, GURPS is already way too gritty for lots of genres. If you want a system that's even more realistic and pays even more attention to detail, it won't be a general system that can be used for anything - it will fit a very specific niche.

Avianmosquito
2012-04-28, 04:24 PM
Second help: 19 questions for RPG design

1.) What is your game about?

Whatever the GM wants it to be about. Definitely better for combat-oriented games, though.

2.) What do the characters do?

Whatever they want to do, assuming the GM doesn't railroad them.

3.) What do the players (including the GM if there is one) do?

The players control their characters and determine the direction of the game. The GM can guid them. (Or drag them along by the neck. Had a few GM's like that, never liked it, but to each his own.)

4.) How does your setting (or lack thereof) reinforce what your game is about?

The lack of any specific setting and rules that can apply anywhere allow the GM to do whatever they want, and the way the rules are let out to allow easy homebrewing complete with homebrewing guides to assist the process.

5.) How does the Character Creation of your game reinforce what your game is about?

The character creation is designed to be flexible, like the game itself. There are no classes, rather the player picks their species, sex, age and so on to get their base stats, manipulates them to a certain extent, selects feats and perks for them and makes any additional changes they want with traits to get the closest fit to the character they want to play.

6.) What types of behaviors/styles of play does your game reward (and punish if necessary)?

The game rewards cautious and tactical approaches and punishes recklessness. If you think your way through, plan ahead and play to each other's strengths (and your GM isn't a total bastard) you should be alright. If you blindly charge you'll die a slow death.

7.) How are behaviors and styles of play rewarded or punished in your game?

Normally by a slow, painful and humiliating death.

8.) How are the responsibilities of narration and credibility divided in your game?

Narration is mostly the GM's job. The players have to announce their actions, but the GM does most of the storytelling.

9.) What does your game do to command the players' attention, engagement, and participation? (i.e. What does the game do to make them care?)

That's up to the GM. Have fun with that, getting the players to care is a pain in the ass.

10.) What are the resolution mechanics of your game like?

Everything is done by a check. Some have rolls, some don't. Some rolls are D20, some D2, some D100. Same even for attack rolls.

11.) How do the resolution mechanics reinforce what your game is about?

They don't, really.

12.) Do characters in your game advance? If so, how?

By using their skills and attributes, they increase them. As their attributes increase they gain feats, and with every ten increases they gain a level that gives them a perk. Every tenth level they get a point to manipulate their traits with. That's it, nice and simple.

13.) How does the character advancement (or lack thereof) reinforce what your game is about?

It just provides a method to improve yourself to prepare for later challenges. It doesn't really matter from a storytelling perspective unless the story is about getting stronger.

14.) What sort of product or effect do you want your game to produce in or for the players?

The system is supposed to be a realistic engine for whatever game they want to play with it. That's it.

15.) What areas of your game receive extra attention and color? Why?

Combat and customization. Because if either of those are bad the entire concept falls to pieces.

16.) Which part of your game are you most excited about or interested in? Why?

Again, the combat. Assuming the math isn't too hard to do in a timely manner, it should flow fairly well, and the sheer amount of thought and planning that goes into each engagement excites me. Then again, that's just my personal taste.

17.) Where does your game take the players that other games can’t, don’t, or won’t?

It's a place where even magic makes sense and behaves realistically. Let's see TSR do that.

18.) What are your publishing goals for your game?

Free. Available on the internet to anybody who wants it. I'm quite serious, but I am doing this as a hobby. Of course, I will still stamp "Terratech" on it and hope some of the crowd notices when the video game I'm also working comes out. Maybe even decide to get it. And of course, that will not be free.

19.) Who is your target audience?

"Hardcore" gamers, powergamers, munchkins, whatever you call them. People who play to win. Of course, win is a loose term here and really comes down to whatever definition of success they decide on.



Anything I need to elaborate on?

Siegel
2012-04-28, 04:24 PM
wait, every Genre?

Exalted-Anime-überchars?
Intrigue at a 1000&1 nights court?
Toons?
Twilight RPG?

Hiro Protagonest
2012-04-28, 04:27 PM
Or you can shoot a guy IN.THE.FACE you know?

That takes a second to set up, where you're completely vulnerable. By that time, unless your opponent is incompetent, you have a sword in your neck.

Siegel
2012-04-28, 04:28 PM
10.) What are the resolution mechanics of your game like?

Everything is done by a check. Some have rolls, some don't. Some rolls are D20, some D2, some D100. Same even for attack rolls.

11.) How do the resolution mechanics reinforce what your game is about?

They don't, really.

Well that is a problem

Avianmosquito
2012-04-28, 04:32 PM
wait, every Genre?

Exalted-Anime-überchars?
Intrigue at a 1000&1 nights court?
Toons?
Twilight RPG?

Might take a bit of work, but go right on ahead. You could do DBZ if you wanted to, and it doesn't get more over the top than that.


That takes a second to set up, where you're completely vulnerable. By that time, unless your opponent is incompetent, you have a sword in your neck.

And the odds of you hitting the head of a moving target are a million to one, probably won't stop them from killing you anyway and requires distance from a target that you just won't get.


No, they're not. You can use the steel backbone to block stuff, and there's pistol-whipping. It's enough to defend yourself against a sword, and you can block an axe or hammer if you hit it against the haft, not the head.

Doesn't work. You try to block a melee weapon with a gun, your weapon will be broken and thrown from your hand. Said hand will be badly mangled in the process, the arm it is attached to broken and the weapon will plant itself in your chest anyway.

Also, pistol whipping is not an effective combat manouevre and having your hand full prevents you from grappling or resisting grapples. Finally, guns generally lack the power to incapacitate a target in a timely manner, a fault melee weapons do not have. Using a gun in a melee WILL get you killed.

Avianmosquito
2012-04-28, 04:33 PM
Well that is a problem

They help the game proceed, they don't help the GM write a story. There's no specific genre, let alone story, so it's unreasonable to expect the resolution mechanics to support it. The GM instead has to write a story that works with the mechanics, like they do in any other univeral RPG, GURPS included.

EDIT:

Apologies for the double post. Total slip-up on my part.

Siegel
2012-04-28, 04:35 PM
Next question:

What about social conflict resolution?

Avianmosquito
2012-04-28, 04:40 PM
Next question:

What about social conflict resolution?

It mostly comes down to telling believable lies, having good charisma and a decent enough proposal. Once that's done, it's all about the check. I'm kindof hoping Rich won't mind me shamelessly ripping off his diplomacy system, because that's what I'm hoping to use. This does support the story, by providing a system that makes the player think and consider the personalities of the individuals they are dealing with, the circumstances and their relations. This gets the player to pay attention to the setting and the plot, and more importantly provides them a reason to actually do something rather than just rolling the dice and hoping it works. And this is supportive because if the player's aren't paying attention to the story there's no point, and this makes it so they have to pay attention.

Hiro Protagonest
2012-04-28, 04:44 PM
Using a gun in a melee WILL get you killed.

I'm not seeing how a sword could just chop a gun in half, especially if you hold it at an angle to the sword so it won't just get hit straight-on. Even if you did, congratulations, your opponent now has to pry a gun out of his sword. Even if pistol-whipping is bad, you can just defend yourself until you can get away. Your goal isn't to beat it out with your opponent, your goal is to live long enough.

Avianmosquito
2012-04-28, 04:49 PM
I'm not seeing how a sword could just chop a gun in half, especially if you hold it at an angle to the sword so it won't just get hit straight-on. Even if you did, congratulations, your opponent now has to pry a gun out of his sword. Even if pistol-whipping is bad, you can just defend yourself until you can get away. Your goal isn't to beat it out with your opponent, your goal is to live long enough.

I didn't say it would cut it in half, I said it would break it. The gun will be smashed and ripped out of your hand, and your fingers will be broken. Your trigger finger will likely be ripped off if it is in the trigger guard, and if you do manage to get the gun at an angle where the sword doesn't smash it, it's coming down on your body anyway. You can't block a sword with a gun, all you can do is run, die or both.

Don't know if you realize it, but the impact force of a sword is well over a tonne. If they're using both hands, several tonnes. You're talking about wrapping your hands around a small piece of metal with sharp corners and protrustions and trying to stop that force with it. The results will not be pretty.

Partysan
2012-04-28, 05:15 PM
Even in melee range you basically win if you can point the barrel towards the body, which just becomes easier if the opponent has a melee weapon because that means the distance is generally greater.

Back to the RPG itself, it seems a bit clunky to me. Having statistics that measure strength seperately for upper and lower body makes sense for a fighting game, but in a general RPG this is a bit much. More numbers usually means more work and slower play. Note how TES5, one of your model games, went from several abilities to just 3 values, because those were what most actually mattered in the game.
Having an own ability score for each thing you can think of seems realistic at first, until you realize that in most cases it doesn't matter a lot in the actual numbers except when there are great differences in very similar abilities (such as someone with really strong legs and very weak arms) and those are often better modeled with traits. Complicated does not always equal realistic.
Now for your game the feats and levels are linked to the attributes, so you can't easily reduce them, since it would also screw up the advancement rate. In that case I advise you to do almost nothing by these values directly but calculate a smaller number of derived values from them which are actually used in the game or alternatively tie the advancement to the skills instead. Also, values like "attitude" are somewhat hard to define in numbers. In D&D you always have the problem that a low Charisma can be meaningless if the player is a smooth talker. You get what I mean.

The rest seems fine so far, the tic system is above average in realism but it will take a while to run smoothly. Maybe I'll write some more when I'm less tired. It's late around here.

Avianmosquito
2012-04-28, 05:35 PM
{Scrubbed}

Partysan
2012-04-28, 05:49 PM
{Scrubbed}
First off, lets not get aggressive here. Second, I concede armor but it wasn't part of my point anyway. Third, while you claim that I overestimate the effect of a bullet, you seem to underestimate it. Depending on where it hits and the caliber a bullet can have significant stopping power, not everyone is an adrenaline machine capable of ignoring the pain that comes with it, and even a very short flinching will give you enough time to shoot a second and third time.
Yes, melee is not a good place for firearms, but they're far from useless. If I'm up against a sword I'd rather have a gun than nothing, actually I'd rather have a gun than a knife either, and the only reason I should prefer having a sword too instead of a gun is that I actually know how to use swords.




Somewhat. But here it's needed. Melee plays a big part, and even in ranged combat strength matters because it's needed to control recoil.


Actually, it does matter. A lot. Strength plays a factor in absolutely everything you do, and they effect your actions differently. More importantly, upper and lower body are not interchangeable and can vary massively from one individual to the next.
I'm not saying you are wrong, I just think that a game does not gain a lot by reflecting these thing in such a fundamental way as different basic attributes for it. Also, I used this as a particularly clear example, but it goes for all numbers of this kind.
In the end if you think it's important to the game, knock yourself out, I'm just giving caveats.


Actually, the attitude score is a measure of self control and discipline. A high attitude score means handling emotions well, not giving into impulses easily, having good self-confidence and being able to cope with stress. It determines will, the impact of emotions, saves against mental effects and so on. It also has a small effect on all skills. It's the realistic equivalent of "wisdom" and "luck" scores.
Fine I guess, I just think the name is a bit misleading.

Avianmosquito
2012-04-28, 06:01 PM
First off, lets not get aggressive here. Second, I concede armor but it wasn't part of my point anyway. Third, while you claim that I overestimate the effect of a bullet, you seem to underestimate it. Depending on where it hits and the caliber a bullet can have significant stopping power, not everyone is an adrenaline machine capable of ignoring the pain that comes with it, and even a very short flinching will give you enough time to shoot a second and third time.

I have been shot, you know. I know what it does to your body. And I'm not impressed. Also, you don't flinch when shot. You can't feel it until the adrenalin wears off, and by that time the blood loss is a much bigger factor then the pain.


Yes, melee is not a good place for firearms, but they're far from useless. If I'm up against a sword I'd rather have a gun than nothing, actually I'd rather have a gun than a knife either, and the only reason I should prefer having a sword too instead of a gun is that I actually know how to use swords.

You cannot stop somebody with a gun. You cannot knock sombody down with a gun. You cannot hold somebody with a gun. You cannot block with a gun. You cannot deflect with a gun. You can do all of these with a knife. Even with your bare hands you can do the first three. A firearm is a burden in melee combat, by the time your enemy is in range your gun best be on the ground, because anywhere else it's in the way.


I'm not saying you are wrong, I just think that a game doesn not gain a lot by reflecting these thing in such a fundamental way as different basic attributes for it. Also, I used this as a particularly clear example, but it goes for all numbers of this kind.
In the end if you think it's important to the game, knock yourself out, I'm just giving caveats.

Each of these things does something so different from all the others it cannot be replaced. Even constitution and fortitude are entirely different. Constitution is a measure of stamina and durability. It concerns the circulatory, respiratory and nervous systems. It determines your health and stamina, and plays a huge part in integrity. Meanwhile fortitude is a measure of toughness and resistance to damage. It concerns your circulatory, skeletal and dermal systems. It determines your natural armour rating and resistances to all forms of damage, as well as how soon your wounds seal.


Fine I guess, I just think the name is a bit misleading.

Don't have a better name and, honestly, it's an easy one to understand.

Also, please learn a little HTML code. That post was difficult to sort out because you had one little syntax error and your quote and comment got mashed together.

Partysan
2012-04-28, 06:16 PM
I have been shot, you know. I know what it does to your body. And I'm not impressed. Also, you don't flinch when shot. You can't feel it until the adrenalin wears off, and by that time the blood loss is a much bigger factor then the pain.
I'm sorry to hear you've been shot and glad that it didn't do much to you. I have no idea how, where and with what you've been shot, but I do know that these factors make a difference.


You cannot stop somebody with a gun. You cannot knock sombody down with a gun. You cannot hold somebody with a gun. You cannot block with a gun. You cannot deflect with a gun. You can do all of these with a knife. Even with your bare hands you can do the first three. A firearm is a burden in melee combat, by the time your enemy is in range your gun best be on the ground, because anywhere else it's in the way.
I already contested point one, you can do the second, third is admittedly not really an option. But really, a pistol doesn't hinder you that much and a combat rifle can actually be a somewhat veritable melee weapon, although lets say a hunting rifle might really be more of a burden there. Also, you understate how difficult it is to effectively use a knife for blocking of deflecting. But I guess we'll have to agree to disagree here.


Each of these things does something so different from all the others it cannot be replaced. Even constitution and fortitude are entirely different. Constitution is a measure of stamina and durability. It concerns the circulatory, respiratory and nervous systems. It determines your health and stamina, and plays a huge part in integrity. Meanwhile fortitude is a measure of toughness and resistance to damage. It concerns your circulatory, skeletal and dermal systems. It determines your natural armour rating and resistances to all forms of damage, as well as how soon your wounds seal.
I already said you aren't wrong. If you think this kind of accuracy is essential to your system by all means include it. I doubt it, but it's your system.

EDIT: Also, I had corrected the mistake not even a minute after posting, you just were faster in opening the thread.

Avianmosquito
2012-04-28, 06:41 PM
I'm sorry to hear you've been shot and glad that it didn't do much to you. I have no idea how, where and with what you've been shot, but I do know that these factors make a difference.

1. Age eight, shotgun. Pump action, likely 12 gauge. Was loading birdshot, didn't break the skin. Cost me some good jeans, though. Guess that one doesn't really count, does it?

2. Age ten, pistol. Glock 26, 9mm. Bastard shot me in the back and ran. still don't know who it was or what I did to him. My lung and kidney were hit, both still work fine. Didn't get any real medical attention for it, but I did a good job bandaging it.

3. Age twelve, rifle. AR15, 5.56mm. I was commiting a felony at the time, so no details other than my injuries and the fact that I was unarmed with my hands behind my head when he shot me in the head. I ran, he shot me twice more in the back but I didn't even notice until I was told about the holes in my chest. I went to a friend's house and got treatment, passed out on his couch before I got any. I really shouldn't of survived that.

Edit:
I should probably take a second here to let you know I'm fine.


I already contested point one, you can do the second, third is admittedly not really an option. But really, a pistol doesn't hinder you that much and a combat rifle can actually be a somewhat veritable melee weapon, although lets say a hunting rifle might really be more of a burden there. Also, you understate how difficult it is to effectively use a knife for blocking of deflecting. But I guess we'll have to agree to disagree here.

Guns cannot knock people down. Bullets lack the momentum to do so. Guns lack the power to stop people, because stopping an enemy in melee combat is all about breaking their bones, ripping their muscles and destroying their organs. Guns lack the power to do enough of any of these things to stop somebody. A combat rifle actually doesn't stop much better than a pistol, has a slower rate of fire and is harder to use up close. Attempting to melee with a rifle is also pointless. It's slow, unwieldy, has short reach, can be easily blocked by an enemy's bare hands and lacks the power to make up for this. Unless you have a bayonet on the end of it, you'll do better dropping it and using your fists. And using a knife to block or deflect is MUCH easier than using a gun, but that's not saying much because blocking with a gun is impossible.



I already said you aren't wrong. If you think this kind of accuracy is essential to your system by all means include it. I doubt it, but it's your system.

And yes, they all do matter a great deal. Changing any of them has a huge effect on gameplay. For instance, with a fortitude of 25 a human adult is virtually immune to shotgun fire. Their body is tough enough that normal buckshot cannot penetrate their skin and the weapon only leaves a bruise. By 100, you cannot be pierced by most pistols. (That said, 100 is well above what a human is capable of.) Not only this, but at that point you only bleed for half as long and many forms of damage become rather ineffective. Now add armour to the mix. Yeah, it's a gamechanger by that point.

Stubbazubba
2012-04-29, 03:17 AM
You don't have an actual game experience you're trying to create. You don't have any direction for this thing, just universality. Here's the thing with universal systems; if I'm playing D&D, why do I need skills for piloting biplanes and F-16s? If I'm playing DBZ, why am I measuring recoil? If I'm playing My Little Pony, why is there space for weapons cluttering up my char sheet? If I'm playing James Bond, why is there magic? If I'm playing Harry Potter, why is the strength for my upper and lower body differentiated?

There is no actual game anyone wants to play that will use all sixty of your skills, and there will still be genres it can't model effectively. Universal systems do a poor job of delivering good game play, because they come with a ton of baggage in order to meet the requirements of being "universal."

And to boot, your other design goal is realism. Realism is actually antithetical to a universal system. DBZ just isn't realistic; Raditz can catch and crush a bullet in his bare hand without effort, but Vegeta's (whose Power Level is several ballparks higher, and then multiplied by 10 in Ape Form) tail is cut off by Yajirobi's sword. There's a verisimilitude problem there that a DBZ game can probably explain by making all attacks, regardless of weapon, getting all of their power from the character (and Yajirobe's liberal use of Fate Points or some other metagame currency to achieve an otherwise unlikely crit). but I doubt that's how you plan to model your WWII game.

Also, unbridled realism has a tendency to slow down resolution by adding in a lot of extra things to bear in mind for any given action. For instance, you say that upper body Strength is necessary to reduce the effects of recoil in ranged combat. Realistically, sure, but how many die rolls and mathematical operations do I have to do to just shoot a gun as James Bond? Do I have to know the gun's recoil modifier, my upper-body Strength, the angle at which I'm firing, the wind speed, what position I'm in, the body part I'm aiming for, and the sweatiness of my palms, and how they all interact? That's before the bullet hits the enemy, when you have to figure out damage and/or shock and/or blood loss. By modeling everything so well you've cleverly avoided any game anyone wants to play, and made it painful to try and do so.

I think you actually have a handful of good ideas, but so long as your only goals are realism and universality, you are making something unplayable, if not painful. You've set the complexity to 'KILL ME NOW' and have nothing to show for it except that you're more realistic than GURPS. So far that is your major selling point, and it's antithetical to the idea of this system being universal, or at least, universal in any useful way.

tl;dr-

If you want a universal system, you've gotta make concessions on the realism side, and vice versa.

Also, if you don't want help and just want to show off how your pet math project achieves no actual, defined game experience, stop pretending otherwise.

Siegel
2012-04-29, 03:23 AM
It also seems that you create rules, not a game. There is a difference.

Also what Stubbazubba said.

Fatebreaker
2012-04-29, 04:34 AM
I was typing up feedback, but mostly it boils down to what Stubbazubba said. So I've cut it down to a brief recap, and then the salient point I'd like to add on.

Your system lacks focus.


You cannot maintain a universal system which claims both gritty realism and support for all genres, because there exist genres which are hindered or outright invalidated by an overabundance of reality.


Even if you can somehow successfully combine realism and unrealistic genres, the level of complexity is such that playability is almost certainly minimal, due to mechanics which are clunky, slow, and aggravating.


Your system will contain any number of unnecessary components for any given singular genre, adding to the complexity as well as creating both "false options" and "trap options" for players.


And now, the point I'd like to add, is that you want this to be a tie-in to your video games. Even if the pen-and-paper game is free, it is marketing of a sort for your "costs real money-dollars" video game. On the mechanics side, your roleplaying game is overly complicated, has unnecessary elements, and attempts to achieve multiple and incompatible goals. On the fluff side, it has none of the following: a fascinating world, compelling themes, developed characters, or even a clear style or vision. The message I'm getting from your roleplaying game is "don't buy your video games."

Because you have not demonstrated the ability to bring an exciting game to the table, why would I be encouraged to give you money?

Avianmosquito
2012-04-29, 12:04 PM
You don't have an actual game experience you're trying to create. You don't have any direction for this thing, just universality. Here's the thing with universal systems; if I'm playing D&D, why do I need skills for piloting biplanes and F-16s? If I'm playing DBZ, why am I measuring recoil? If I'm playing My Little Pony, why is there space for weapons cluttering up my char sheet? If I'm playing James Bond, why is there magic? If I'm playing Harry Potter, why is the strength for my upper and lower body differentiated?

The skills are just available most of the time. If a setting doesn't use them, have characters start with them at 0 and leave them off the character sheets. Easy as that. As far as recoil in DBZ, it would affect keeping a ki blast on target as well. As far as Harry Potter, trying to get any attribute to matter in that setting is a challenge, mostly you'll just be ignoring them and focusing on skills.


And to boot, your other design goal is realism. Realism is actually antithetical to a universal system. DBZ just isn't realistic; Raditz can catch and crush a bullet in his bare hand without effort, but Vegeta's (whose Power Level is several ballparks higher, and then multiplied by 10 in Ape Form) tail is cut off by Yajirobi's sword. There's a verisimilitude problem there that a DBZ game can probably explain by making all attacks, regardless of weapon, getting all of their power from the character (and Yajirobe's liberal use of Fate Points or some other metagame currency to achieve an otherwise unlikely crit). but I doubt that's how you plan to model your WWII game.

Well, the characters would all have insanely high attributes. While there's no way to catch a bullet in this system, if a character had, say, 1000 fortitude then there's no handheld firearm that could damage them. However, there are two factors for melee, which are strength and a multiplier for the weapon. Yajirobe is already extremely strong and his sword is likely unrealistically sharp, so two very large numbers already. So that actually makes sense with none of that "fate point" bull****. In a WWII genre though, the attribute scores would all be much lower. Again, no adjustment to the rules, and both function fine.


Also, unbridled realism has a tendency to slow down resolution by adding in a lot of extra things to bear in mind for any given action. For instance, you say that upper body Strength is necessary to reduce the effects of recoil in ranged combat. Realistically, sure, but how many die rolls and mathematical operations do I have to do to just shoot a gun as James Bond? Do I have to know the gun's recoil modifier, my upper-body Strength, the angle at which I'm firing, the wind speed, what position I'm in, the body part I'm aiming for, and the sweatiness of my palms, and how they all interact? That's before the bullet hits the enemy, when you have to figure out damage and/or shock and/or blood loss. By modeling everything so well you've cleverly avoided any game anyone wants to play, and made it painful to try and do so.

Not going quite that far. The factors to consider to fire a gun are fairly few. Your weapon, the range, the conditions (just a flat modifier) and the target's DC. If it's a hit, roll a d20 for placement. Recoil doesn't enter until the second shot and only if it's immediately after the first. Then it's just the recoil value against a value based on your mass and upper body strength, the result detracts from your attack roll.


I think you actually have a handful of good ideas, but so long as your only goals are realism and universality, you are making something unplayable, if not painful. You've set the complexity to 'KILL ME NOW' and have nothing to show for it except that you're more realistic than GURPS. So far that is your major selling point, and it's antithetical to the idea of this system being universal, or at least, universal in any useful way.

Not really. Being more realistic than GURPS is very, very easy. The game is by far simpler than you think, and the gameplay shouldn't be too much slower than other RPGs.


tl;dr-

If you want a universal system, you've gotta make concessions on the realism side, and vice versa.

No, not really. The system might not come up with the same results as the material you're basing your setting on, but it'll maintain its realism just fine in any genre. This might mean that you don't get the intended result, but it doesn't mean the game can't be played. And honestly, I enjoy it when the system reveals just how little sense the subject material makes.


Also, if you don't want help and just want to show off how your pet math project achieves no actual, defined game experience, stop pretending otherwise.

Debating wether that lame-brained insult is worth responding to.



•Your system lacks focus.

So does GURPS.



•You cannot maintain a universal system which claims both gritty realism and support for all genres, because there exist genres which are hindered or outright invalidated by an overabundance of reality.

Not true. Adding in a new genre is the homebrewer's job, first off, and the result of the more realistic system is that different results will be reached. Harry Potter would die, lightsabers couldn't reflect blasters and no amount of effort would make Rainbow succeed in saving the hostages in the theme park. That's not because the system is flawed, that's because these things didn't make any sense to begin with.



•Your system will contain any number of unnecessary components for any given singular genre, adding to the complexity as well as creating both "false options" and "trap options" for players.

Already countered this. If you aren't using it, leave it off the character sheet. Doesn't take any effort at all.


•And now, the point I'd like to add, is that you want this to be a tie-in to your video games. Even if the pen-and-paper game is free, it is marketing of a sort for your "costs real money-dollars" video game. On the mechanics side, your roleplaying game is overly complicated, has unnecessary elements, and attempts to achieve multiple and incompatible goals. On the fluff side, it has none of the following: a fascinating world, compelling themes, developed characters, or even a clear style or vision. The message I'm getting from your roleplaying game is "don't buy your video games."

It's really just a hobby. I don't intend to go anywhere or do anything with this tabletop RPG other than to put a new system out and have some fun playing it. It would be nice if it helped sales of the game, but that's not the goal. Even then, your arguement is full of holes.

My goals are not incompatible, a fascinating world is the GM's job when he creates a setting and the default ones will do fine with that, the characters are up to the GM and the players, and the style should be clear at this point.

The game, on the other hand, has all that stuff already because it is not a universal role playing system. The world is already developed, has a lot of backstory, a consistent style and in my opinion a very well chosen theme that works well with that style.

Edit:

I know it sounds like I'm not listening, but I am. It's just at this point there's not really anything worth hearing. Not to mention this discussion so far is completely missing the point. I'm looking for a partner, I only gave details because I thought it would help me find one. So far everyone's willing to discuss it, but nobody is willing to volunteer and if I didn't know better I'd say nobody noticed that my first post ended with me asking for somebody to join me.

Hiro Protagonest
2012-04-29, 01:47 PM
If they have to homebrew stuff, your system doesn't do every genre. Otherwise you could say that Exalted supports all genres, because you can refluff and houserule until it resembles a gritty modern game, or a fantasy world where you can get the Awakened Essence mutation from years of study or a special ritual, or a steampunk game where there's no sorcery and magitech is just tech, but it doesn't mean Exalted is a universal system.

Don't spread too thin. You can't please everybody. If your game has to be homebrewed to move away from "gritty and low-magic", don't sell it as a system that can cover anything. Harry Potter dying from the killing curse is gritty, but it's also stupid. If Harry Potter living wasn't realistic, than what about some "unstoppable spell"? Or prophecies? Or even magic? Who's to say that the "deflecting lasers with lightsabers" isn't due to passive magic enhancing the force-user's reflexes? Or maybe the lasers are made of a different type of light, one that moves a lot slower?

Avianmosquito
2012-04-29, 02:35 PM
If they have to homebrew stuff, your system doesn't do every genre. Otherwise you could say that Exalted supports all genres, because you can refluff and houserule until it resembles a gritty modern game, or a fantasy world where you can get the Awakened Essence mutation from years of study or a special ritual, or a steampunk game where there's no sorcery and magitech is just tech, but it doesn't mean Exalted is a universal system.

Don't spread too thin. You can't please everybody. If your game has to be homebrewed to move away from "gritty and low-magic", don't sell it as a system that can cover anything. Harry Potter dying from the killing curse is gritty, but it's also stupid. If Harry Potter living wasn't realistic, than what about some "unstoppable spell"? Or prophecies? Or even magic? Who's to say that the "deflecting lasers with lightsabers" isn't due to passive magic enhancing the force-user's reflexes? Or maybe the lasers are made of a different type of light, one that moves a lot slower?

The issue with Potter is that any exception made for him would apply to others as well. So if his mother's sacrifice is enough, shouldn't everyone who sacrificed their life to save someone make them immune to the killing curse? Also, objects block the spell, so it's not unstoppable. But then shouldn't clothing stop it? It makes no sense.

Further, blasters are not lasers. The issue isn't blocking them, that's fine and is supported, but reflecting them is impossible. If they bounce off the blade they won't go back at the user, they'd go at a different angle. If it's the cyclic nature of the weapon sending them back, what way it goes would be random and it would really just spray the bolt all over the place. As it is, you can still ignore all the laws of physics and have it so you can reflect them, treat it as an attack and send it back, and that's your choice, but it's not how I would do it. Bad example on my part because it's possible within the rules.

Talakeal
2012-04-29, 07:51 PM
You kind of remind me of me fifteen years ago when I first set out to create my own RPG system. Like you I based the initial concept of SPECIAL and d20, and wanted a system that was generic enough and realistic enough to cover every situation. I have since evolved my concept a lot and am finally nearing a public release, so if you have any specific questions I would love to give you advice.

To start out:
Get a rough outline of the system and play test that thoroughly.
Write a full text then play test that thoroughly.
Go through and correct any errors or oversights. Then play test that thoroughly, preferably with a wide audience.
The above will take a lot of time. More time than you think. Nope, even more than that. Be sure you are prepared for the commitment.

Also, one question, why do you divide cutting and puncturing damage? If you are going to split damage at all I would do it a lot more than twice, and I would think that is a pretty weird split, surely blunt / edged is more basic?

One thing that I have noticed is the "feel" of combat. I have had about half a dozen different combat systems, all of them more or less "realistic" but all with a very different feel.
In my case I have a system for elaborate duels, a system for super hero / pro wrestler brawling, a western, a system for mass combats, and a generic sword and sorcery system. All of which work more or less the same for my setting and my rules, but have a very different feel.

Avianmosquito
2012-04-29, 08:15 PM
Also, one question, why do you divide cutting and puncturing damage? If you are going to split damage at all I would do it a lot more than twice, and I would think that is a pretty weird split, surely blunt / edged is more basic?


Appreciate the advice, but I'm busy right now so I don't have time to discuss it. I'll answer your question though.

There's more than that. Puncture, incisive, bludgeon, heat, cold, electricity, radiation/curse*, corrosion and poison. The first two just have a different resistance system. Then again, poison is different as well.

*Radiation and curse damage are the same thing, they have the same special effect and the same resistance. It's just different names for different settings.

erikun
2012-04-29, 11:54 PM
Sure, I can make a few comments. I'm not sure how helpful they'll end up being - it depends on how inclined you are towards making changes to the system - but I'll go ahead and point out parts of note.

I'm not sure how helpful I'd be overall towards your project. I would be thinking more towards what rules would encourage and motivate for a player, and just figuring that the math would work itself out. (It's rather easy to simply adjust the numbers to their appropriate spots, if you don't care about bonus sizes or dice ranges.)


Attributes:
This game features ten attributes instead of D20's six or SPECIAL's seven. The increased number of attributes allows for greater variety and precision, and makes the math easier for attribute-based levelling. These attributes are upper body, lower body, constitution, fortitude, metabolism, dexterity, sense, intelligence, charisma and attitude.

Skills:
There are sixty skills, thirty of which are linked to a single attribute, another twenty are linked to two attributes and ten are linked to three attributes.
The first problem I note: stat bloat. We're talking ten attributes and sixty skills, to say nothing of the derived stats, feats, and perks. This would be a monster to teach to a new player, and quite a bit for an existing player to keep a handle on - especially if they don't use a system for awhile.


Attributes are improved through usage and atrophy if neglected.
Improvement through usage is kind of tricky in a RPG, as there really isn't much preventing a character from simply practicing or using an attribute ceaselessly in their free time. Sure, making swimming checks all the time wouldn't make sense, but there isn't much logic stopping someone from carrying around a lock and picking it when they don't have anything to do. You could say "lockpicks cost money!" except there will be a point where lockpick cost would become trivial, along with activities that don't have expenses for dramatic failures.

Adjusting the improvement system to take such actions into account - by assuming practice repetitions for increasing a skill - would just make cataloging the casual daily activities mostly pointless. Nobody will care how many sword swings it took to kill a random orc when the character practices 15000 repititions each weekend.

One option would involve a limit to how much improvement (or even how much "experience") a character could gain per day/week/session. That is, the body can only take so much workout before it simply needs to rest. I would recommend it limit the total amount a character could progress, rather than per stat, because otherwise you'd find multiple characters spending their free time knitting/singing/reading to hit the XP cap in all attributes.


Sequence:
Combat sequences work differently than in other games. Like other games, you roll initiative to see who goes first, but here you play out each round in ten seperate parts called "tics." Actions take a certain number of tics, no less than one but frequently more than ten. If two actions are set to occur on the same tic, whoever rolled higher on initiative at the start of the round is counted as going first and their actions may interfere with the actions of others.
This sounds like Scion, AD&D, and several others. One question: why make everyone keep track of their initiative for the few times that two characters end up on the same tic, rather than having actions happen at the same time?

What happens when two characters on the same tic have the same initiative - and if they reroll initiative, which value do they keep afterwards?


Needs:
Characters need to eat, drink and sleep. (Well, most of them at least.) If they do not, they suffer status effects that get worse and worse as time goes on. Failing to eat or drink will eventually turn fatal, although failing to sleep will instead cause massive damage to their mind. (These effects are unpredictable. It may send them into a coma, or merely drive them insane. No matter what, it will be horrible.)
Could work, although I suspect it will end up something similar to what you see with D&D: go a week without food, then eat a few meals at once with no penality.

Doing it otherwise means silliness such as hunger penalities because you missed one meal last month, or are two hours behind on sleep for the week. Such things would not reasonably bother a normal person.

I do notice that this system, depending on how it works, might be a good way to measure poison/sickness effects.


Armour ratings:
Resistances and reductions:
Each damage type other than puncture and incision has two values countering it. Resistances come first, are a percentage and take effect seperately from one another. Reductions come after, are a point value and are counted together. For instance, the human adult male used in the above example would have a natural 10% resistance to fire and a complementary 10pt resistance for being human, and would also have a 2.5% resistance and 2.5pt reduction from their fortitude score of 5. If hit with a 100 damage fire attack they would take 75.25 points of damage. (100*0.9*0.975-12.5=75.25) Note that all damage types covered by resistances and reductions has at least one special effect, usually three. These specials are not affected by reductions in the slightest, but they are affected by resistances.

Note:
Want to save some time? Figure out your total resistance and reduction values and write them down. Here, for instance, the 10% and 2.5% resistances come to 12.25% together, while the 10pt and 2.5pt reductions come to 12.5pts.
Why not just make them both add? For instance, 10% plus 2.5% would equal 12.5% resistance, just like 12.5pt reduction. It has the benefit of making the two values similar, as I suspect that most things would have identical resistance and reduction values.

Multiplication also becomes rather difficult to work with if one of the values changes. Even if you have a total resistance written down, having one resistance drop from 9.5% to 8.5% would be a pain to figure out the resulting total resistance; you'd be better off recalculating the entire value from scratch.


Attack roll:
If there is something between you and the target, you may be able to attack through it if the weapon's reach extends that far. However, your weapon must score more than 100% damage on the object between them. This excess is used as the resistance modifier on the target.
Does the 100% damage mean outright killing/destroying the target, or simply achieving 100+% accruacy (efficiency roll)?

Avianmosquito
2012-04-30, 01:20 AM
The first problem I note: stat bloat. We're talking ten attributes and sixty skills, to say nothing of the derived stats, feats, and perks. This would be a monster to teach to a new player, and quite a bit for an existing player to keep a handle on - especially if they don't use a system for awhile.

Not really a big deal. I don't reckon more than 30 skills will see use in any particular setting and they're all fairly self-explanatory. I don't think anybody is going to half to ask "hey, what's the 'ride' skill do?" As for the attributes, 3 more isn't a big deal. Neither is 4. And all of them have fairly simple functions and are quite useful to the player. And it needs to be ten because our levelling system uses the average of your stats. This makes the math pretty trivial. Add them all up and put a decimal before the last number, that's your level.


Improvement through usage is kind of tricky in a RPG, as there really isn't much preventing a character from simply practicing or using an attribute ceaselessly in their free time. Sure, making swimming checks all the time wouldn't make sense, but there isn't much logic stopping someone from carrying around a lock and picking it when they don't have anything to do. You could say "lockpicks cost money!" except there will be a point where lockpick cost would become trivial, along with activities that don't have expenses for dramatic failures.

Adjusting the improvement system to take such actions into account - by assuming practice repetitions for increasing a skill - would just make cataloging the casual daily activities mostly pointless. Nobody will care how many sword swings it took to kill a random orc when the character practices 15000 repititions each weekend.

Already considered and accounted for. As an attribute or skill increases, the rate of improvement drops and the rate of atrophy increases. This means that you'll have to do harder and harder things to improve. Carrying a lock to practice with would still work, but you'll need to switch to better and better locks for it to mean anything. Same as the real world, you need to challenge yourself if you want to make any progress.

Also, fighting provides better xp rewards. Attacking a live target gets you more XP than hitting a dummy. However, adrenalin also comes into play here. If your character is in combat, their stats change due to adrenalin. Two of the stats impacted are metabolism and intelligence, both in a positive manner. The former impacts attribute gains, the latter impacts skill gains. (That's not all they do, but that's the relevent part.) Attributes get an additional XP bonus due to adrenalin. I'd have to look, but I think at the stage of adrenalin present in life or death situations, it's a total of 6.25x experience when both are considered.


One option would involve a limit to how much improvement (or even how much "experience") a character could gain per day/week/session. That is, the body can only take so much workout before it simply needs to rest. I would recommend it limit the total amount a character could progress, rather than per stat, because otherwise you'd find multiple characters spending their free time knitting/singing/reading to hit the XP cap in all attributes.

All actions already use stamina, and there are things they need to do already. If they want to fill in all their free time with activities based on bettering themselves, that's fine. But if they don't take some time to relax, there's also stress to consider. Their will score is only so high and they can only handle so much. Although that said, improving their attitude score will help with that.



This sounds like Scion, AD&D, and several others. One question: why make everyone keep track of their initiative for the few times that two characters end up on the same tic, rather than having actions happen at the same time?

What happens when two characters on the same tic have the same initiative - and if they reroll initiative, which value do they keep afterwards?

Don't see the resemblence. As for why they use initiative, it's to give characters a chance to stop a character from making an action or somehow interfering with it. For instance, drawing a pistol takes five tics. Firing it would be on the sixth tic, so if both people draw and one rolls higher on initiative then they're going to hit first. This would mean the opponent will have a penalty when shooting due to the damage they took from the other's bullet.

If you tie, you and the person you tied with reroll. As for which to use, that's a dumb question. You use the new values, the old ones are thrown out the moment you reroll.


Could work, although I suspect it will end up something similar to what you see with D&D: go a week without food, then eat a few meals at once with no penality.

Limit in place. Can only eat so much at a time, and if you go that long without food, you've already taken damage. And it'll take a while for that damage to go away. Not only this, but even reducing your starvation happens over time.


Doing it otherwise means silliness such as hunger penalities because you missed one meal last month, or are two hours behind on sleep for the week. Such things would not reasonably bother a normal person.

Something like that, no. One day wouldn't mean much, but going a week without food though would cause serious attribute damage, which would take time to heal.


I do notice that this system, depending on how it works, might be a good way to measure poison/sickness effects.

Disease and poison have other effects, but they do oftentimes have similar metres. Not only this, many actually impact your needs.


Why not just make them both add? For instance, 10% plus 2.5% would equal 12.5% resistance, just like 12.5pt reduction. It has the benefit of making the two values similar, as I suspect that most things would have identical resistance and reduction values.

Too easy to become completely immune to things. Say you have a 50% resistance to heat (which is the highest a single resistance to fire can go) and but on armour that gives you another 50%. If they were added, you'd be immune to heat. You could be dropped in the sun and it wouldn't do a ****ing thing. As it's written now, though, it's a 75% resistance. Add in the complementary 100pt reduction, and anything above 400 points can harm you. Now add on another 50% resistance, and it's now 87.5%, with a 150pt reduction. So it'll now take 1200 points to damage you with heat. You're not immune, but it takes a lot to damage you.


Multiplication also becomes rather difficult to work with if one of the values changes. Even if you have a total resistance written down, having one resistance drop from 9.5% to 8.5% would be a pain to figure out the resulting total resistance; you'd be better off recalculating the entire value from scratch.

Not hard to do. You normally only have three resistances. (Natural, fortitude and apparal.) Say they were 10, 15 and 9.5. That's ~30.77%. It took about ten seconds to get that figure. I don't see why it should take any longer for you.


Does the 100% damage mean outright killing/destroying the target, or simply achieving 100+% accruacy (efficiency roll)?

That's referring to the armour system. If you're using a puncting or incisive weapon, your weapon must completely negate the intervening object's resistance (and thus deal 100% puncture/incision damage) to pass through it. Whatever of your weapon's penetration (the value that counters resistance) is left is used on the target behind. Say you're using a .45, which gets a penetration value of 115, and the object you're shooting through has a 50% resistance, (like the wall of a typical house) then the bullet will go through and have 65 penetration left for the target behind. If that target is an unarmored human adult with base stats, then they'll have a resistance of 105%, with the 65 countering it you'll deal 60% puncture damage. If the wall hadn't been there you'd have dealt full damage and had 10 penetration for whatever was behind them.

erikun
2012-04-30, 10:40 AM
Not really a big deal. I don't reckon more than 30 skills will see use in any particular setting and they're all fairly self-explanatory. I don't think anybody is going to half to ask "hey, what's the 'ride' skill do?" As for the attributes, 3 more isn't a big deal. Neither is 4. And all of them have fairly simple functions and are quite useful to the player.
30 skills plus 10 attributes plus no doubt around a dozen derived stats (if not more) is quite a bit to keep track of.

And while 60 skills may cover just about any genre you'd run across, this is considerably different than saying they will cover any playstyle. The slow wearing-down of characters as they progress through an adventure in AD&D is conflicted with the near-instantly fatal attacks in a game like Shadowrun, with both conflicting with D&D4's extended all-out combat with every fight, followed by the ability to rest it all off for the next fight. These differences don't just require a different set of skills; they require different rulesets to work properly.


And it needs to be ten because our levelling system uses the average of your stats. This makes the math pretty trivial. Add them all up and put a decimal before the last number, that's your level.
I find this particularly ironic when later, you quickly multiply three percentages together in your head. I guess I don't see how 1-[(1-.9)*(1-.85)*(1-.905)] is any more complex than just adding six or eight values and then dividing.


Already considered and accounted for. As an attribute or skill increases, the rate of improvement drops and the rate of atrophy increases. This means that you'll have to do harder and harder things to improve. Carrying a lock to practice with would still work, but you'll need to switch to better and better locks for it to mean anything. Same as the real world, you need to challenge yourself if you want to make any progress.

All actions already use stamina, and there are things they need to do already. If they want to fill in all their free time with activities based on bettering themselves, that's fine. But if they don't take some time to relax, there's also stress to consider. Their will score is only so high and they can only handle so much. Although that said, improving their attitude score will help with that.
I'll take your word for it, without getting into the details further. Needless to say, while you may get more experience per swing in live combat, the number of times you can swing a sword in training is far greater. You may find yourself with a honeybee effect - where each individual training swing is far lesser, but the simple volume still makes it the most relevant choice.


Don't see the resemblence. As for why they use initiative, it's to give characters a chance to stop a character from making an action or somehow interfering with it. For instance, drawing a pistol takes five tics. Firing it would be on the sixth tic, so if both people draw and one rolls higher on initiative then they're going to hit first. This would mean the opponent will have a penalty when shooting due to the damage they took from the other's bullet.

If you tie, you and the person you tied with reroll. As for which to use, that's a dumb question. You use the new values, the old ones are thrown out the moment you reroll.
Both systems mentioned use a 10-point initiative cycle, with different attacks taking different lengths of time (measured by tics on the cycle) before resolving.

And for the question, "why keep track of their initiative" meant "why keep track of the initiative value rolled at the beginning of combat." Sorry if there was confusion. What I meant was that you're asking players to roll and remember a temporary number that may only be relevant to them one time every other battle. Why not just allow actions to happen cocurrently - as happens with the AD&D/Scion games I mentioned - or just have them roll initiative new the few times it becomes relevant?

Also, I wouldn't consider it a dumb question if it needs to be asked. :smalltongue: And it does need to be asked, because other systems run into the same situation, and have different solutions to the question; D&D3 is basically the exact opposite of what your system does.


Limit in place. Can only eat so much at a time, and if you go that long without food, you've already taken damage. And it'll take a while for that damage to go away. Not only this, but even reducing your starvation happens over time.
Depending on what you mean by "limit in place," it sounds like either starving penalities (and equilivants) never get that severe, or a character can end up dying of starvation while eating comfortably, because the penalities cannot be eliminated before they die.


Too easy to become completely immune to things. Say you have a 50% resistance to heat (which is the highest a single resistance to fire can go) and but on armour that gives you another 50%. If they were added, you'd be immune to heat. You could be dropped in the sun and it wouldn't do a ****ing thing. As it's written now, though, it's a 75% resistance. Add in the complementary 100pt reduction, and anything above 400 points can harm you. Now add on another 50% resistance, and it's now 87.5%, with a 150pt reduction. So it'll now take 1200 points to damage you with heat. You're not immune, but it takes a lot to damage you.
Every time you've mentioned an attack value, it has come with a resistance penality and a damage value. Why would a sword swing carry -45% resistance, and a bullet have -95%, but swimming in magma or standing on the sun not have any penalities? Dropping a sun on your head would reasonably be -900000% to resistance and 900000 damage, meaning even a 100% fire resistance only reduces the damage down to 809,910,000,000 damage or so.


Not hard to do. You normally only have three resistances. (Natural, fortitude and apparal.) Say they were 10, 15 and 9.5. That's ~30.77%. It took about ten seconds to get that figure. I don't see why it should take any longer for you.
With a calculator, perhaps. I could estimate they total resistance to be around 30%, but wouldn't be able to calculate it any closer than that so quickly. I know a lot of gamers that are even worse with math.

If you're assuming that every player would have a calculator on-hand, you'd probably want to mention it when taking about what players would need when playing the game. Most systems do not assume a calculator as part of the required materials.


That's referring to the armour system. If you're using a puncting or incisive weapon, your weapon must completely negate the intervening object's resistance (and thus deal 100% puncture/incision damage) to pass through it.
...So is that a yes? Because as far as I can tell, the armor system is the resistance system, it's just that armor is one component that grants a resistance.

Stubbazubba
2012-04-30, 03:58 PM
The skills are just available most of the time. If a setting doesn't use them, have characters start with them at 0 and leave them off the character sheets. Easy as that. As far as recoil in DBZ, it would affect keeping a ki blast on target as well.

This is not an element in DBZ.


As far as Harry Potter, trying to get any attribute to matter in that setting is a challenge, mostly you'll just be ignoring them and focusing on skills.

Which skills? Do you have a different skill for Charms, Potions, Transfiguration, and Defense Against the Dark Arts? If not, how do you model varying competencies in those? Just put the onus on the GM to make a whole home-brew sub-system?


Well, the characters would all have insanely high attributes. While there's no way to catch a bullet in this system,

K, so it's not as universal as you'd like it to be.


However, there are two factors for melee, which are strength and a multiplier for the weapon. Yajirobe is already extremely strong

? Do you know who this is? According to the Dragonball Wiki, Vegeta's power level was 18,000, while Goku's was 16,000, this was already enough of a difference that Goku had no real chance of winning. When he used Kaioken, which multiplied his power level, he went all the way up to 32,000, which put him way above Vegeta. Vegeta then went into Ape Form, raising his PL to 180,000. Then, along comes Yajirobe, with a whopping 970. That counts as extremely strong compared to a human (roughly 5), but compared to Vegeta he may as well be a fly. His stats were simply not comparable. Even jacking the numbers up to reflect these, your system doesn't model this, as Yajirobe's strength was less than 1/100th of Vegeta's. The conventions of the genre are not realistic enough to work in your system.

And you will find that there is no fiction which can be modeled well on a realistic simulator. Harry Potter dies in the prologue, Luke Skywalker gets shot by some random Stormtrooper (who has better training and equipment), and James Bond gets lasered, eaten by sharks, or at the very least, dies slowly from STDs. The only story which actually plays out anywhere close to written is Lord of the Rings, wherein the protagonists are leaps and bounds ahead of the Orcs they are fighting. However, all the Hobbits die; Merry and Pippin in the Battle of Pelennor Fields, and Frodo and Sam, if nothing else, then at the hands of Shelob. Even 'realistic' things like WWII stories don't completely change out the protagonists every few encounters. A realistic system is useless for telling stories; rules need to reflect genre conventions, not physics.


and his sword is likely unrealistically sharp, so two very large numbers already. So that actually makes sense with none of that "fate point" bull****. In a WWII genre though, the attribute scores would all be much lower. Again, no adjustment to the rules, and both function fine.

You don't seem to understand the specific example, so I'm ignoring the rest, but the short answer is; no, it doesn't function fine.

Re: Complexity

On a good day, your gun shot is just as complex as a mid-level D&D attack roll, but it changes on the second attack, and the damage (+shock+bleeding) is more complex. D&D is already more complex than most people would like, and resolution takes too long. Yours will take longer. It's an accounting nightmare. A rule of thumb to keep in mind is this; if it's not fast and fluid before you put it into an Excel sheet, it's probably not well-suited for a TTRPG mechanic. This is the strength of video games; computers can do these things and the human brain can take into account an effect in real-time, but figuring out modifiers by hand is not an acceptable replacement.


No, not really. The system might not come up with the same results as the material you're basing your setting on

That's kind of a deal breaker


This might mean that you don't get the intended result,

This isn't a red flag to you?


And honestly, I enjoy it when the system reveals just how little sense the subject material makes.

OK, so you want to make a realistic system, not a universal one. That's fine, sell me on that, but don't tell me it's both realistic and universal, because as you've just admitted, it doesn't produce universal results.


Not true. Adding in a new genre is the homebrewer's job, first off, and the result of the more realistic system is that different results will be reached. Harry Potter would die, lightsabers couldn't reflect blasters and no amount of effort would make Rainbow succeed in saving the hostages in the theme park. That's not because the system is flawed, that's because these things didn't make any sense to begin with.

So you admit it's not a universal system? It can't model Star Wars, Harry Potter, or other things correctly? That's fine, but you've got to let go of this rhetoric that it is both super realistic and a universal system.


I know it sounds like I'm not listening, but I am. It's just at this point there's not really anything worth hearing.

What were you expecting? Praise? For what? You haven't shown us any math, so we don't know if your system works, all you've shown us is what you want it to do (everything), and that you think 10 attributes, 60 skills, and many more modifiers and other things is the way to achieve it. The vast majority of us are questioning both the validity of your goals and the appropriateness of the measures you have to achieve them. If you don't think that's worth hearing, then perhaps you should inform us what you think we ought to be saying.

Let me re-emphasize; I think you have some cool ideas. Your initiative system sounds like it could go somewhere. This could be the basis for a really sweet Army Rangers game, or a gritty medieval knights game or something. If it's not universal, you have some real options where realism can be great. I'd still want it far more streamlined, because I don't have an hour to resolve a single fire-fight, but you would actually be on your way towards something if you at least said, I want to use this to play really gritty, realistic combats, be they medieval, modern, or futuristic. But so long as you insist that this is a universal system, you are hampering both us from appreciating it, and you from really exploring its potential.

Re: Looking for volunteers to help you
Your game, it sounds like, is already done. What do you want help with?

Avianmosquito
2012-04-30, 04:54 PM
Re: Looking for volunteers to help you
Your game, it sounds like, is already done. What do you want help with?

Having computer problems, can only respond to one of you. I need somebody to help me with homebrew quidelines and spot balance issues in the pre-built settings. I'll get back to the other questions and comments when I get home, my computer's refusing to connect here and I'm using an ipod.

Avianmosquito
2012-05-02, 01:41 AM
I'll take your word for it, without getting into the details further. Needless to say, while you may get more experience per swing in live combat, the number of times you can swing a sword in training is far greater. You may find yourself with a honeybee effect - where each individual training swing is far lesser, but the simple volume still makes it the most relevant choice.

Pardon, but I fail to see how this is a bad thing.


And for the question, "why keep track of their initiative" meant "why keep track of the initiative value rolled at the beginning of combat." Sorry if there was confusion. What I meant was that you're asking players to roll and remember a temporary number that may only be relevant to them one time every other battle. Why not just allow actions to happen cocurrently - as happens with the AD&D/Scion games I mentioned - or just have them roll initiative new the few times it becomes relevant?

First off, actions occuring on the same tic will happen in every round. Just rolling in advance is actually a timesaver. Second, in a game like this allowing actions to occur at the same time will result in a lot of incidents where both parties are guaranteed to die. Allowing one to shoot first and hopefully disrupt their opponent gives them a chance.



Depending on what you mean by "limit in place," it sounds like either starving penalities (and equilivants) never get that severe, or a character can end up dying of starvation while eating comfortably, because the penalities cannot be eliminated before they die.

What it means is you can only eat so much at any given time, and it takes a while for it to take effect. Eating immediately stops starvation from getting worse, but takes a while to fix the problem. Also, starvation never causes health damage. If it kills you, it's through body and attribute damage. The former occurs from the beginning, but the latter only occurs if it falls below 0, which takes about eight days.

Note: Needs bars start at a value equal to 100xCON, and deplete slowly. You recieve effects when it falls below certain percentages. In this case, going below 0% causes body damage. Average CON is 10, so that's 1000 points. You get one point starvation every twelve minutes, more if wounded. This comes to eight days and eight hours.


Every time you've mentioned an attack value, it has come with a resistance penality and a damage value. Why would a sword swing carry -45% resistance, and a bullet have -95%, but swimming in magma or standing on the sun not have any penalities? Dropping a sun on your head would reasonably be -900000% to resistance and 900000 damage, meaning even a 100% fire resistance only reduces the damage down to 809,910,000,000 damage or so.

First, this only applies to puncture and incision. The rest have the point/percent system. The reason is because energy weapons do not rely on penetration, and as a result the percent-penetration system doesn't make sense for them. The point/percent system is a simple enough way to work with them without any major issues, and if they end up with countervalues at some point down the line (not ruling it out) it'll be multiplicative, not subtractive. The biggest issue, however, is that energy weapons have special effects. These effects are the basis of environmental damage, because almost all environmental effects are too small to cause actual damage. If it was possible to stack up a few minor resistances to get to 100%, then no matter how nasty the environment got it would mean nothing. Since the entire idea of the system is to make it impossible to become invulnerable to any form of damage, and these effects ignore the point resistance so that you are affected even if you don't take damage, allowing easy 100% resistances goes completely against the basic principles of the system.



With a calculator, perhaps. I could estimate they total resistance to be around 30%, but wouldn't be able to calculate it any closer than that so quickly. I know a lot of gamers that are even worse with math.

Then bring a calculator.


If you're assuming that every player would have a calculator on-hand, you'd probably want to mention it when taking about what players would need when playing the game. Most systems do not assume a calculator as part of the required materials.

Not required, but it sure makes it easier.


...So is that a yes? Because as far as I can tell, the armor system is the resistance system, it's just that armor is one component that grants a resistance.

Basically. You just need to negate the resistance entirely and have penetration left over, it doesn't matter where the resistance came from. It's also worth noting that only the resistance to your weapon's penetrative damage needs to be negated. For instance, you need to negate the puncture damage for a bullet to overpenetrate, but not the bludgeon damage. After all, how much a bullet bruises a target doesn't effect whether or not it keeps going after hitting them.

Note: penetrative weapons that inflict other forms of damage generally deal a certain amount of the other form based on the amount of penetration used on the target. For instance, a gun using half of its penetration on you means dealing half of its total bludgeon damage. That damage is then removed from the projectile just like penetration. (IE: if it was 200 penetration and 100 bludgeon, and it used 100 penetration, then it deals 50 bludgeon and has 100 penetration and 50 bludgeon left.) This means using more penetration on one target means dealing more of the secondary damage (usually bludgeon) and might make armour backfire and actually increase the damage you take from some particularly high-power round. Now, nobody has actually asked me to explain that, but I figured I'd get it out of the way now and save time.

Tyndmyr
2012-05-02, 02:50 PM
Well, Im going to blissfully skip over the game specific stuff, but I'm curious about the video game team. I'm a software developer, and I dabble a bit in video game building. I'm curious as to why you need specifically two more people, what you intend to make, and what you see your role on the team as.

Edit: I lied, I can't pass up a chance to analyze a game.


I didn't say it would cut it in half, I said it would break it. The gun will be smashed and ripped out of your hand, and your fingers will be broken. Your trigger finger will likely be ripped off if it is in the trigger guard, and if you do manage to get the gun at an angle where the sword doesn't smash it, it's coming down on your body anyway. You can't block a sword with a gun, all you can do is run, die or both.

Don't know if you realize it, but the impact force of a sword is well over a tonne. If they're using both hands, several tonnes. You're talking about wrapping your hands around a small piece of metal with sharp corners and protrustions and trying to stop that force with it. The results will not be pretty.

It isn't over a ton. Equal and opposite reactions. It may, depending on attack, exert a very large amount of force in proportion to the area it is striking, but that's entirely different. Blocking with a firearm does spread that force back out.


Bull****. This isn't a Christopher Nolan film, a gun fires a speedy bit of metal not the manifestation of death itself.

In the short term, it does effectively NOTHING to the enemy. You can take almost any bullet to almost any part of your body and still function well enough for long enough to kill anybody you damn well please in any manner you damn well please.

I've never had to shoot a person, but I grew up in hunting country, and a good shot to a deer or a bear usually means a near-instant lights-out. Your statement is flat out incorrect. Having a speedy bit of metal blow through your body is generally quite likely to immediately impact your ability to fight.

Getting hit with birdshot is something of an optimal case. It isn't meant to hurt you, it's meant to kill birds, creatures that are much smaller and more fragile. That said, birdshot will still be lethal to humans at very close ranges. Anyone firing rounds that would be effective at long range...those same rounds will be effective at close range.


The only exceptions are rifles, which perform even worse in melee combat than small arms.

No. Rifles are better in melee because they are a much larger, longer weapon. Using a rifle as a melee training is standard training in basic. I'd rather use that than a knife any day.


Somewhat. But here it's needed. Melee plays a big part, and even in ranged combat strength matters because it's needed to control recoil.

Recoil on most guns is a matter of training, not strength. There are edge cases, yes, but essentially anyone can walk into a gun store, and with proper training, safely fire all of the guns there. Strength is not particularly important to the use of firearms at all.



Doesn't work. You try to block a melee weapon with a gun, your weapon will be broken and thrown from your hand. Said hand will be badly mangled in the process, the arm it is attached to broken and the weapon will plant itself in your chest anyway.

Also, pistol whipping is not an effective combat manouevre and having your hand full prevents you from grappling or resisting grapples. Finally, guns generally lack the power to incapacitate a target in a timely manner, a fault melee weapons do not have. Using a gun in a melee WILL get you killed.

Depending on type of gun and how you're holding it, blocking a melee weapon with a gun might result in hand injury. However, you are vastly overstating the degree of it, and it would essentially never be better than not blocking the hit. Blocking a sword with a rifle is pretty doable, and should not result in injury to you at all, and the rifle will also likely be fine.

Resisting a grapple can be done with hands full. Many deflections do not require that the hand actually be free. For instance, the very first akido move taught(to me at any rate), does not require that either hand be free, using arm motion and body weight to break the grapple.

Striking someone with a pistol can also be effective. It's not much different from a normal hammer fist strike, but you're hitting with metal instead of fist, and with some extra weight. These are not downsides.


And yes, they all do matter a great deal. Changing any of them has a huge effect on gameplay. For instance, with a fortitude of 25 a human adult is virtually immune to shotgun fire. Their body is tough enough that normal buckshot cannot penetrate their skin and the weapon only leaves a bruise. By 100, you cannot be pierced by most pistols. (That said, 100 is well above what a human is capable of.) Not only this, but at that point you only bleed for half as long and many forms of damage become rather ineffective. Now add armour to the mix. Yeah, it's a gamechanger by that point.

I suspect you don't really understand what realistic means in this regard. Your standard 9mm pistol normally has significantly lower muzzle velocity than a shotgun slug or buckshot. In addition, the shotgun will have more weight, so at close ranges, you'll be putting out vastly higher foot/pounds(replace with metric as you like) of force.

I'm not against a realistic system, but you're going to need to do some serious research to make such a thing, and it will certainly be nothing like universal. Universal systems need to cover non-realistic game environments and playstyles, so they are not typically realistic. Gurps, which you already mentioned, is pretty universal, but is not very realistic at all. You need to set priorities on your design criteria.

Avianmosquito
2012-05-02, 09:57 PM
{{scrubbed}}

Hiro Protagonest
2012-05-02, 10:18 PM
...You know, you COULD just pull your finger out of the trigger.

Avianmosquito
2012-05-02, 10:50 PM
...You know, you COULD just pull your finger out of the trigger.

Yeah. Get to keep your finger and lose the gun by compromising your grip on the weapon and no longer providing enough resistance to shift their weapon away from you. Now not only are you STILL taking a sword through your chest, but it's not even noticeably off target and probably reaching all the way through you. Congrats, you've traded the loss of a finger and chest wound you might have survived for a torn palm and a chest wound you cannot survive.

Tyndmyr
2012-05-03, 04:08 PM
We have no creature modeler and only one object modeler. We have prospects for these roles, however, so it's likely I'll be busy very soon.



[quote]Gee, looks like somebody's not into math. Alright, let's give you the best case for the idiot with the gun, and say the swordsman is an average man and is swinging a shortsword instead of a longsword. Under normal circumstances, the man should have a strength of ~500n the sword should end up with ~800j and ~100n*s, which is an amount you could block with a gun and not lose any fingers. Now let's add adrenalin into the mix. Once adrenalin is added, humans become several times more powerful. The limit is about five times, but it's normally about half that. So the man should be able to put 1250-2500n into the sword, which means ~2-4kj and ~155-220n*s. All this comes down on a weapon that is made of sheet metal, it's going to break it.

Love the insult. You're modeling the entire sword as a projectile. It isn't. It's not a particularly good weapon if you throw it. You only get decent speed closer to the tip, where the striking force is. There isn't much weight there, and the impact point is far forward of the center of balance. That's how swords work.

Firearms are not generally made of sheet metal. Have you ever used either of these weapons?


More to the point, most rifles are too flimsy to handle the force of being used as a club and some, including the M16 and all variants, are so flimsy they actually bend when used with a bayonet. How is this weapon supposed to survive being impacted by a sword?

I have an AR-15. I used the M-16 when I was air force. This is outright false. If you've gotten one to bend, you've done something incredibly wrong, and a sword or bayonet is not the reason why.


If taken by surprise, with an incredibly flimsy mind and unbelievably good shot, maybe. They won't be dead, but they might be too stunned to do anything. However, I'm a bit worried about any weapon that relies on your enemy psychologically incapacitating themselves, because this ONLY happens when they are surprised and doesn't happen to the majority of people. If they see the shot coming, they will not react in such a manner. Instead, the shot will do nothing that will impact them in the short term, just like shooting a bear that is charging you does nothing to slow it.

Gunshots do not kill because of weak mind or the like...they kill by disrupting essential parts of your body. If a bullet rips through your lungs, you may not die instantly, true, but you lose the ability to fight extremely rapidly. Your heart or brain? It doesn't matter how much willpower you have. A major joint gets hit, and capability quickly goes downhill. Gunshots are no joke.

Also, yes, shooting a bear that is charging you definitely does work, if the shot is accurate. I have seen this.


How close are we talking? Because I've been shot with birdshot and he was about two metres away when he shot me. Are you assuming he could have pressed the weapon to my neck? Because that's what it would take. Birdshot is useless against humans, always has been and always will be. Meanwhile, you seem to be making the assumption that good shot placement is commonplace in close quarters engagements. The issue is actually that once somebody gets too close your ability to stand still and aim at them goes away entirely. Not only is all of your instinct telling you to move, but you won't have time to align your sights before they're on top of you. How are you supposed to use a rifle if you can't aim? Are you expecting to fire from the hip? Because you will NOT hit from the hip.

Depends on gauge, shot type, and choke. Even blanks can kill at very short ranges(couple of feet or less).

You need not aim carefully down sights at someone in sword range.


Then you are an idiot. The issue with a rifle is the way it's grasped and the large contact area. As a melee weapon it deals less damage than a pistol, has less reach and attacks slower, all because of the way it's gripped. It would be much better to just ditch it and use your hands, and a knife is by far a better weapon.

Again, the resorting to personal attacks is not appreciated. What I'm saying is standard military doctrine essentially everywhere. By all means, go offer the armed services of wherever your expert opinion as to why they should use a sword instead of a gun. Please videotape it.


Not true at all. You need strength to control a firearm's recoil, the only way to get around it is to stop and readjust the weapon after each shot. If you don't have time to do so (and you don't) then you need to force the weapon back on target, which requires strength.

That's a jerking movement, and will result in lots and lots of misses.


That is so stupid it's funny. With a rifle, maybe you might be able to use that hand. Not with a pistol, though, which will take your finger off if you try to block with it. And also, a rifle cannot withstand that kind of force, the sword will destroy it. The casing will be smashed and the barrel will be bent, leaving the weapon completely unusable.

Bending a rifle barrel with a sword? Oh, I'd love to see that.


Aikido? You might as well try kung fu, it couldn't be any worse. Trust me, once you enter real combat, that rediculous flailing will offer you no protection. They will grab you, force you to the ground and beat your head into the pavement, and that bull**** will do you no good at all. You need a free hand to reliably break a grapple, just flailing against it won't break it.

Aikido is a useful art, like many others, and plenty of them do not relying on grappling. Non-grappling arts have plenty of anti-grappling moves, and many of them are effective. If you see them as "flailing", then I suspect you need to familiarize yourself with them.


Except for the part where it rips up the side of your hand. That's a downside.

How would that happen, exactly? Hold a roll of quarters in your hand(or something else heavy). Make a fist around it. Smack something solid with the side opposite your thumb. Your fist should be fine.


You are laughably misinformed. The typical muzzle velocity of buckshot is ~300m/s. A 9mm fires a round at ~360m/s. Also, shotgun pellets are by far smaller and are spherical, which greatly reduces their penetrating power. #1 has about a quarter of the penetration of a 9mm, and already doesn't penetrate deep enough to strike most vital organs. There are people out there tough enough to take buckshot with no serious ill effect. Shooting them with a shotgun will do the same thing shooting a bear would: it'll piss them off.

Really? People who can take buckshot with no serious ill effect? I want to see this.

Saph
2012-05-03, 04:09 PM
OK, having done a bit of game design in the past, my general feedback would be as follows.

The first problem is that your system is nightmarishly complicated. Even reading the summary makes me want to beat my head against a large heavy object, and making a character looks like some kind of particularly sadistic algebra puzzle. For the love of God, please simplify it. I think if I tried to playtest your game in its current state I'd probably end up stabbing myself repeatedly in the face in the hope that it'd hurt less.
Second problem, following on from the first, is that gameplay looks like it's going to be hideously slow. (Recoil rolls based off mass and upper body strength? Seriously?) As a general rule, speed > realism. The vast majority of players are not going to have the patience for this.
Third problem is that several people have tried to tell you this already and you've dismissed their criticisms out of hand. This raises serious issues about what kind of feedback you're actually looking for here.
Fourth problem is that you're doing said dismissals in a fairly insulting way. Now if you were reacting this way to me I'd kind of expect it, given that I've just told you in so many words that your game looks like it was designed for a particularly obsessive-compulsive group of accountants. But when someone tries to help you and you respond with comments like "Gee, looks like somebody's not into math", it doesn't make you look good. If you seriously want playtester volunteers, you're going to have to treat them better than that.
Anyway, hope some of that helps.

Avianmosquito
2012-05-03, 05:10 PM
{{scrubbed}}

Avianmosquito
2012-05-03, 05:19 PM
OK, having done a bit of game design in the past, my general feedback would be as follows.

The first problem is that your system is nightmarishly complicated. Even reading the summary makes me want to beat my head against a large heavy object, and making a character looks like some kind of particularly sadistic algebra puzzle. For the love of God, please simplify it. I think if I tried to playtest your game in its current state I'd probably end up stabbing myself repeatedly in the face in the hope that it'd hurt less.
Second problem, following on from the first, is that gameplay looks like it's going to be hideously slow. (Recoil rolls based off mass and upper body strength? Seriously?) As a general rule, speed > realism. The vast majority of players are not going to have the patience for this.
Third problem is that several people have tried to tell you this already and you've dismissed their criticisms out of hand. This raises serious issues about what kind of feedback you're actually looking for here.
Fourth problem is that you're doing said dismissals in a fairly insulting way. Now if you were reacting this way to me I'd kind of expect it, given that I've just told you in so many words that your game looks like it was designed for a particularly obsessive-compulsive group of accountants. But when someone tries to help you and you respond with comments like "Gee, looks like somebody's not into math", it doesn't make you look good. If you seriously want playtester volunteers, you're going to have to treat them better than that.
Anyway, hope some of that helps.

Actually, it's much simpler than it looks. It's still the most complex and slower than any RPG I've ever played, but it's not as complex as it looks and many of the rules here are optional and have variations that allow for simpler use. (IE: bleed can be brought down to causing all of each round's damage at the start of the round instead of doing it on each tic throughout the round.)

EDIT: Sorry for posting twice in a row. I forgot we're not supposed to do that.

Hiro Protagonest
2012-05-03, 05:47 PM
The Mythbusters disagree with you on buckshot. When testing if pykreet was bulletproof, they said buckshot was very deadly normally (I'm not sure what the exact wording was, I'll have to check). And the Mythbusters tend to be right about this sort of thing. If guns were really as weak as you say, we would all be using crossbows, and guns would be for special sniper units that absolutely have to get as much range as possible.

Avianmosquito
2012-05-03, 06:58 PM
The Mythbusters disagree with you on buckshot. When testing if pykreet was bulletproof, they said buckshot was very deadly normally (I'm not sure what the exact wording was, I'll have to check). And the Mythbusters tend to be right about this sort of thing. If guns were really as weak as you say, we would all be using crossbows, and guns would be for special sniper units that absolutely have to get as much range as possible.

You guys seem to be spinning my words here. I said a gun couldn't stop. That doesn't mean it isn't deadly. The problem with guns is that they lack the power to incapacitate through direct physical trauma and must rely on incapacitation through blood loss, which takes time. We use them at long range, where they have time to take effect, and in this role they are quite useful. In addition to this, most people are not willing to leave cover when they are being fired upon even when ordered to, and since a firearm is noisy and the muzzle blast is visually impressive they certainly have the edge for intimidation. And as far as ranged weapons go, they aren't that weak. Depending on caliber, they might be weaker than any crossbow (like anything in 5.56mm NATO) or more powerful than any longbow, (like anything in .50 BMG) but they're usually somewhere in between. Add in the faster rate of fire, greater range, better accuracy and comparitave ease of use, and they are certainly the best ranged weapons we've created yet.

They only fall flat in melee combat because gunshots take too long to kill and cannot incapacitate immediately without multiple well placed shots, and it's hard to place shots well in melee combat because of how little time you have to aim, how hard it is to manoeuvre a rifle in close quarters and how much your target moves around.

The spetsnaz protocol is four shots through the heart. They're probably the only people who could pull that off, but that certainly works. With bigger guns, you might not need so many. And of course, how tough your target is makes a big difference. I imagine a shotgun slug could do it in one, but I'd put a second one through, just in case.

Also, I'm a gun nut that loves to test guns. I know how poorly buckshot penetrates. Unless the person you are shooting is very, very thin it won't reach vitals. When I used to test guns, we used a ream of paper. It takes about as much to get through two of those as it did a human body, so it was a reasonable choice. A 9mm pistol went through about 950 pages. A shotgun went through about 250. We were using a 12 gauge, specifically a Benelli M3, loading 2.5" #1. We tried #9 next, and it only went through about 65 pages.

Shotguns penetrate so poorly that you have to adjust your normal shot placement to get good effect out of them. Namely, you can't aim for the chest anymore because it can't reach the heart and unless it's a magnum load or a small target it can't reach the lungs either. The best place to aim is the neck, where there are several major blood vessels very close to the surface. You can also try the upper arm and leg, where there are also massive blood vessels close to the surface. If behind the target, the kidneys are also decent targets. Personally, I'd recommend just loading a slug and placing your shots normally.

Tyndmyr
2012-05-04, 08:34 AM
You guys seem to be spinning my words here. I said a gun couldn't stop. That doesn't mean it isn't deadly. The problem with guns is that they lack the power to incapacitate through direct physical trauma and must rely on incapacitation through blood loss, which takes time. We use them at long range, where they have time to take effect, and in this role they are quite useful. In addition to this, most people are not willing to leave cover when they are being fired upon even when ordered to, and since a firearm is noisy and the muzzle blast is visually impressive they certainly have the edge for intimidation. And as far as ranged weapons go, they aren't that weak. Depending on caliber, they might be weaker than any crossbow (like anything in 5.56mm NATO) or more powerful than any longbow, (like anything in .50 BMG) but they're usually somewhere in between. Add in the faster rate of fire, greater range, better accuracy and comparitave ease of use, and they are certainly the best ranged weapons we've created yet.

Look, I *love* longbow shooting...I even own a custom one. But I'd sooner take an arrow than a bullet any day. Neither is a good idea, but a rifle will typically be a lot more lethal.


Also, I'm a gun nut that loves to test guns. I know how poorly buckshot penetrates. Unless the person you are shooting is very, very thin it won't reach vitals. When I used to test guns, we used a ream of paper. It takes about as much to get through two of those as it did a human body, so it was a reasonable choice. A 9mm pistol went through about 950 pages. A shotgun went through about 250. We were using a 12 gauge, specifically a Benelli M3, loading 2.5" #1. We tried #9 next, and it only went through about 65 pages.

Neither #1 or #9 is buckshot. They are both too small. Since you discovered that smaller shot penetrates less, you should be able to extrapolate that buckshot would penetrate more. Incidentally, this also explains why you took a hit from birdshot.

Also, I suggest not relying on the shortest length of shotgun shell for determining reasonable combat/home defense loads.


Shotguns penetrate so poorly that you have to adjust your normal shot placement to get good effect out of them. Namely, you can't aim for the chest anymore because it can't reach the heart and unless it's a magnum load or a small target it can't reach the lungs either. The best place to aim is the neck, where there are several major blood vessels very close to the surface. You can also try the upper arm and leg, where there are also massive blood vessels close to the surface. If behind the target, the kidneys are also decent targets. Personally, I'd recommend just loading a slug and placing your shots normally.

You can. Deer have about the same depth as a person to their vitals. Buckshot was designed to kill deer, as can be inferred from the name. It's quite good at it.


Actually, this is from the centre of gravity. The tip will be moving considerably faster.

Speed /= force. Swords are not weapons designed for massive force. They're weapons designed to focus force carefully along a point or line. Clubs are weapons with a lot of force. They are still unlikely to break a firearm in one hit.


Oh, excuse me. The thickest piece is a whole two millimetres thick, but sorry if somehow that doesn't qualify as sheet metal.

It doesn't. Sheet metal is made of a sheet, folded into a shape. metal that is cast or milled into a shape, and is of decent quality(which sheet metal is not), will perform very differently.

A pop can or house siding is sheet metal. A firearm is vastly more solid.


Ever used the bayonet? Do you understand how much stress that flimsy little piece of **** has to deal with when you do? It's by far more than it's supposed to have to deal with, which isn't saying much because the weapon is built in such a flimsy manner it can break if dropped wrong.

As an actual weapon in combat? God no. Nobody does, practically speaking.

M-16s do not actually tend to break if dropped wrong. You can, if you hit/drop it exactly wrong, sheer the buffer. It's a part that tends to weaken with use, so if it's kind of worn out and you place unusual stresses on it, it can break. This means the gun won't work correctly for firing. It still functions fine as a club.


I just said it wouldn't kill. Are you even reading these? I said it wouldn't kill or even slow a human, but if it caught them offguard and they had a weak mind they might psychologically incapacitate themselves. Most common amongst coddled rich folk, who tend to freeze when shot or merely shot at.

Oh? Have you done studies in shooting coddled rich folk? I'd love to see some evidence for this.


Boy, you just pulled that "instant death" bull**** on the wrong person. I have been shot in the head, I know what it does to somebody. After I was shot I ran six blocks, banged on a door for over a minute and didn't pass out until I was being treated and the adrenalin started to wear off. Had I decided to, I could have charged right up that staircase and killed the man with the rifle and the only reason I didn't was because my vision cut out.

I'd say that vision cutting out definitely impairs your ability to fight.

That said, you've been shot with both a rifle and shotgun? Whatever you are doing that results in being shot repeatedly...I advise you to reconsider your life choices.


As for the lungs, most of the time you don't notice that you've been shot in the heat of things. The time I got shot in the head he also shot me twice in the back while I ran, one was through a lung and I didn't even notice it until it was pointed out. Another time I was shot in the back with a pistol, and once the adrenalin kicked in I couldn't feel it anymore and I wasn't having any trouble breathing. When the adrenalin wore off again I started to feel it, and having a hole in your lungs really sucks, but it wasn't lethal by a damned sight.

Oh, and also a pistol.

*gets out popcorn*

And then what do you do, McClaine?


Now you can go ahead and claim these are extroadinary incidents, but they aren't. I've seen more people shot than I care to remember, mostly in my childhood. Only twice have I seen somebody instantly fall over, and both were surprise attacks. Neither case were they dead, but they were too scared to move. Both were coddled rich folk who had never been shot at before, and both eventually died from their wounds. I tried to save one of them, but I don't know much about first aid and even if I did she was shot through the heart. No real hope there.

I confess, being shot through the heart would also make me too scared to move. Curse my coddled upbringing. If only I'd be left to be raised by wolves, I too could absorb bullets to the heart to power my enraged retribution.


Dumbest thing I've ever heard. I used to do amatuer filming. We had guns loaded with blanks for the action scenes, and the worse any of us ever got off them was a bruise. And these were point-blank headshots more often than not. We've even used rifles, and it still hurts less than a paintball.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jon-Erik_Hexum


No, it is not. That's like claiming kung-fu is a useful art. Maybe it's a good workout, but it's not actually useful in combat. Many martial arts are useful, but this isn't one of them. Simpler martial arts with simpler moves are generally more practical. I was in a fight club for three years, and I've seen people come out with that bull**** before. They always end up getting beaten down by real fighters, and most don't come back. The few that do learn useful martial arts and some basic combat discipline, and generally don't keep a single thing from their original school. (Akido, kung-fu, wushu, taekwondo, doesn't matter. Flashy bull**** is flashy bull****.) This is particularly important to me, because my role was beating the **** out of these cocky newbies and more often than I liked helping teach them how to fight.

Oh, now you've broken the first rule of fight club.

erikun
2012-05-04, 11:17 AM
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jon-Erik_Hexum
That seems to indicate that the dangerous range is within inches, not several feet or less, and only against vulnerable parts of the body.

Not that I agree with a lot of the conversation in the thread, but at least Avianmosquito has a point that it wouldn't be dangerous to fire a blank at someone from a few feet away - only if you were pressing the gun against a vital spot when firing.

Tyndmyr
2012-05-04, 11:57 AM
That seems to indicate that the dangerous range is within inches, not several feet or less, and only against vulnerable parts of the body.

Not that I agree with a lot of the conversation in the thread, but at least Avianmosquito has a point that it wouldn't be dangerous to fire a blank at someone from a few feet away - only if you were pressing the gun against a vital spot when firing.

It varies depending on the type of gun and round...you have prop guns that fire vastly underpowered blank loads in small calibers that have a very small dangerous range...and I should also clarify that there is a notable difference between dangerous and lethal.

On the flip side, when firing a rifle or similar, even blanks carry quite a lot of energy. With a 30-06, I once accidentally destroyed a gun case because the muzzle blast ripped it in half, despite the case being well in front of and below the barrel.

Even worse, any small objects that get in the path can become impromptu projectiles. So, if something gets into/in front of the barrel of the gun...that's now quite a bit more dangerous. This is how Bruce Lee's son died, incidentally.

So, if you have a gun, do NOT assume that goofing off and shooting each other is safe just because you have blanks loaded.

Avianmosquito
2012-05-04, 02:22 PM
Look, I *love* longbow shooting...I even own a custom one. But I'd sooner take an arrow than a bullet any day. Neither is a good idea, but a rifle will typically be a lot more lethal.

"I'd rather have a big hole in my chest than a small one." Wow. Truly, you've got fantastic sense there.


Neither #1 or #9 is buckshot. They are both too small. Since you discovered that smaller shot penetrates less, you should be able to extrapolate that buckshot would penetrate more. Incidentally, this also explains why you took a hit from birdshot.

Actually, #1 is. As is #2, #3 and #4. Do some research here.


Also, I suggest not relying on the shortest length of shotgun shell for determining reasonable combat/home defense loads.

It's also the most common. Which makes it the perfect choice for comparing the lethality of the available weapons.


You can. Deer have about the same depth as a person to their vitals. Buckshot was designed to kill deer, as can be inferred from the name. It's quite good at it.

Um... dear are quite small and much more frail than humans. So no, it doesn't take nearly as much to reach their vitals. Not only that, but shotguns are already underpowered against them and buckshot is not actually used against deer.


Speed /= force.

KE=1/2mv^2.
P=mv.


Swords are not weapons designed for massive force. They're weapons designed to focus force carefully along a point or line. Clubs are weapons with a lot of force. They are still unlikely to break a firearm in one hit.

Even so, they still pack a massive amount of force. Maybe not as much as a club, but still a massive amount. More to the point both have enough force to smash a firearm into a condition where it can never be repaired, and yes, that only takes one hit. Ever seen what a bat does to a car? Imagine that times about five, and replace the car with a rifle.


It doesn't. Sheet metal is made of a sheet, folded into a shape. metal that is cast or milled into a shape, and is of decent quality(which sheet metal is not), will perform very differently.

Semantics. Sheet metal is also used generically to refer to any thin metal, similarly to how "tin" is used generically to refer to many lightweight metals.


A pop can or house siding is sheet metal. A firearm is vastly more solid.

The ak-47 has a reputation for being unprecedentedly reliable and durable. Guess what an Ak-47 is made out of? Stamped sheet metal.


As an actual weapon in combat? God no. Nobody does, practically speaking.

Actually, it's kept for a reason. Bayonets are effective weapons that don't take up much additional weight, and allow you to continue using your firearm as a firearm right up to the last second. The only reason the US doesn't issue bayonets anymore is because the M16 cannot withstand that kind of force.


M-16s do not actually tend to break if dropped wrong. You can, if you hit/drop it exactly wrong, sheer the buffer. It's a part that tends to weaken with use, so if it's kind of worn out and you place unusual stresses on it, it can break. This means the gun won't work correctly for firing. It still functions fine as a club.

A club needs to be heavy, balanced and solid. The M16 is none of these things. Further, if the weapon is dropped on its magazine it will damage the magazine and reciever and the weapon will no longer feed. The only way to fix this is to replace the damaged parts.


Oh? Have you done studies in shooting coddled rich folk? I'd love to see some evidence for this.

I've seen shots fired in a number of venues. In poor neighbourhoods, people scatter and take cover, the target usually finds cover even when struck repeatedly. In rich neighbourhoods, many people still take cover but many freeze, and the target is usually in this number. If the target is hit, they almost always freeze, sometimes as if their mind has completely shorted out and sometimes as if wondering why they haven't instantly died.


I'd say that vision cutting out definitely impairs your ability to fight.

Had I not seen him, planned an escape and attack route and had time to put my hands behind my head before he shot me, I'd agree with you.


That said, you've been shot with both a rifle and shotgun? Whatever you are doing that results in being shot repeatedly...I advise you to reconsider your life choices.

The shotgun? I was eight years old, some old geezer was yelling at me about something (probably related to me walking through his lawn or punching his mailbox) and I threw a rock at him. Instead of shutting up, he grabbed a shotgun. He shot me, I ran and he shot me some more.

The rifle was when I was twelve. That time I was actually in the middle of commiting a felony, so no details other than the fact that I was unarmed and had already surrendered when he shot me in the head. Then twice in the back.


Oh, and also a pistol.

*gets out popcorn*

And then what do you do, McClaine?

I was ten. I had just gotten shot in the back. I threw my backpack at him. He ran. I turned to the girl next to me and tried to treat her without any equipment or training. It didn't work. I started crying, she died and I ran off before the cops got there. Not very heroic, I know, but that's how it happened.


I confess, being shot through the heart would also make me too scared to move. Curse my coddled upbringing. If only I'd be left to be raised by wolves, I too could absorb bullets to the heart to power my enraged retribution.

She was ten. She had just been shot through the heart for no apparent reason by somebody we didn't know. Just seconds ago we were having a delightfully inappropriate conversation regarding each other's anatomy and now she was doomed to die from something neither of us could have seen coming. Her reaction was not unreasonable.


Oh, now you've broken the first rule of fight club.

Don't talk about fight club? We never had that rule. We were all free to talk about it all we wanted, as long as we didn't tell anybody where it was located or when we were meeting. Given how long it's been, I doubt even that matters.

Tyndmyr
2012-05-04, 03:01 PM
Actually, #1 is. As is #2, #3 and #4. Do some research here.

The only scale with both a 1 and a 9 on it is birdshot, sir. Also, if you'd wanted a valid number for buckshot for home defense purposes, you would use actual home defense loads. 00 is terribly common for that, and is the standard, average buckshot.


It's also the most common. Which makes it the perfect choice for comparing the lethality of the available weapons.

People shooting at humans use loads meant for humans. People shooting at grouse use loads meant for that. Using the one for the other is obviously going to work less well. Your finding is like discovering that screwdrivers make poor hammers.

Well yeah...screwdrivers are terribly common. That doesn't mean it's the normal choice for hammering things in, even if you technically could.


Um... dear are quite small and much more frail than humans. So no, it doesn't take nearly as much to reach their vitals. Not only that, but shotguns are already underpowered against them and buckshot is not actually used against deer.

Wiki lists the standard white tailed deer as normally between 130 and 290 lbs. That's pretty much human sized.

I've never had a deer continue moving after I hit it with a shotgun. Or anything else, for that matter. If you hit the vitals, they just drop. Buckshot is used on deer. It's less popular than slugs for range reasons, but within the correct ranges, it works fine.


Semantics. Sheet metal is also used generically to refer to any thin metal, similarly to how "tin" is used generically to refer to many lightweight metals.

The ak-47 has a reputation for being unprecedentedly reliable and durable. Guess what an Ak-47 is made out of? Stamped sheet metal.

A. That's not true for all AK-47s.
B. The reliability of it has roughly jack-all to do with that. It has to do with tolerances and design of the piston(in particular, it doesn't use direct impingement).
C. This reputation has little to do with it's ability to be used as a melee weapon.


Actually, it's kept for a reason. Bayonets are effective weapons that don't take up much additional weight, and allow you to continue using your firearm as a firearm right up to the last second. The only reason the US doesn't issue bayonets anymore is because the M16 cannot withstand that kind of force.

Negative. The army stopped doing drills with them in 2010, because they did not see use as weapons, but instead, as tools.

The british, however, do make occasional use of the bayonets, and they work fine on modern firearms.
http://img717.imageshack.us/img717/5852/opvolc1.jpg

If you have actual evidence for your claims, feel free to post them.


A club needs to be heavy, balanced and solid. The M16 is none of these things. Further, if the weapon is dropped on its magazine it will damage the magazine and reciever and the weapon will no longer feed. The only way to fix this is to replace the damaged parts.

It's made primarily of metal. That's the heavy bit. Balanced? A club can be a length of pipe. It need not be terribly balanced. And an M16 is fairly solid.

Magazines are disposable. The 30 round mags I got with mine cost $8 each. If you beat it enough, yeah, you can wreck them, but a drop from shoulder height won't do it. You pop the mag out, and slam in a new one. The magazine is much less durable than the receiver, and should not damage it, though in extreme cases, it might be a bit hard to remove.

That said, the magazine is not in the parts of the rifle you'll normally be striking with, so even this minor issue is not really worth modeling.

I've seen shots fired in quote]a number of venues. In poor neighbourhoods, people scatter and take cover, the target usually finds cover even when struck repeatedly. In rich neighbourhoods, many people still take cover but many freeze, and the target is usually in this number. If the target is hit, they almost always freeze, sometimes as if their mind has completely shorted out and sometimes as if wondering why they haven't instantly died.[/quote]

What profession do you engage in that results in such frequent shooting, and being shot so often? Even among all my military friends, I don't think any of them has managed to get shot on three separate occasions.


Had I not seen him, planned an escape and attack route and had time to put my hands behind my head before he shot me, I'd agree with you.

The shotgun? I was eight years old, some old geezer was yelling at me about something (probably related to me walking through his lawn or punching his mailbox) and I threw a rock at him. Instead of shutting up, he grabbed a shotgun. He shot me, I ran and he shot me some more.

The rifle was when I was twelve. That time I was actually in the middle of commiting a felony, so no details other than the fact that I was unarmed and had already surrendered when he shot me in the head. Then twice in the back.

/popcorn.

Yup. Definitely time for a career change.

Look, if you survived getting shot on several occasions, there's a notable element of luck involved. This does not mean that gunshots are not lethal, or should be treated lightly. They are exceedingly likely to kill you, and if they do or not is determined mainly by placement, not how tough you are.


I was ten. I had just gotten shot in the back. I threw my backpack at him. He ran. I turned to the girl next to me and tried to treat her without any equipment or training. It didn't work. I started crying, she died and I ran off before the cops got there. Not very heroic, I know, but that's how it happened.

She was ten. She had just been shot through the heart for no apparent reason by somebody we didn't know. Just seconds ago we were having a delightfully inappropriate conversation regarding each other's anatomy and now she was doomed to die from something neither of us could have seen coming. Her reaction was not unreasonable.

I don't see how that relates to being coddled at all. I would imagine that anyone, regardless of upbringing, would react the same way upon being shot through the heart.

Avianmosquito
2012-05-04, 03:39 PM
{Scrubbed}

ZeltArruin
2012-05-04, 03:56 PM
Being constantly in the wrong place at the wrong time has everything to do with it.

Not to agitate you further, but I often find anyone using that sort of logic to justify what has happened to them by others or external situations is entirely wrong. I have many friends that believe that things happen to them for no reason when they call it down upon themselves willingly and ignorantly. Again, just my observation.


As an aside, for a realistic game, combat is a horrible solution to many problems when sword vs sword is involved, as both parties are likely to come out of the situation either dead or mutilated. Seems more like you are going for a romantic combat sort of thing.

Avianmosquito
2012-05-04, 04:40 PM
Not to agitate you further, but I often find anyone using that sort of logic to justify what has happened to them by others or external situations is entirely wrong. I have many friends that believe that things happen to them for no reason when they call it down upon themselves willingly and ignorantly. Again, just my observation.


I was outside at night. That's it. I made sure to be smart about it, so I never got caught in these shootings, and when I saw the signs one was coming I took cover until it was over. (About a minute, usually.) I was also gone before the police arrived. (About an hour, usually.) It was rare that people were killed in these shootings, which only happened about once a week in my hometown, but there were usually wounded. I saw about one shooting every two or three months for nine years, and in all of those maybe ten deaths. And I never saw the police, although I always heard the sirens.

Given the situation, I did pretty well at keeping out of trouble.

As far as the first and third time I was shot, I got into that myself, but it was still bull**** those guys shot me. Both times I was an unarmed child, and both times they shot me anyway and kept shooting as I ran.

The second time was just plain not my fault, and I don't even know why it happened. I don't know who was the target, what we did or if that was just a random act of violence. All I know is I did nothing but talk to a girl in the park in broad daylight. Unless he shot us for talking about sex, which I doubt, I'm stumped.


As an aside, for a realistic game, combat is a horrible solution to many problems when sword vs sword is involved, as both parties are likely to come out of the situation either dead or mutilated. Seems more like you are going for a romantic combat sort of thing.

Not true. Melee combat is about blocking and deflecting, reducing your opponent's options and landing a fatal blow. It's normal for one combatant to be completely unharmed and the other dead. They landed a good strike and avoided their opponent's strikes. The opponent is generally too badly wounded to continue and dies of blood loss very quickly.

Slashing weapons normally disembowel, dismember, decapitate or bisect, although even a seemingly shallow hit can be quickly fatal if placed on the neck or the base of any limb.

Penetrating weapons normally pierce vital organs, and with melee weapons shot placement is much easier than with ranged weapons. They nearly always pierce the chest, oftentimes the heart. And a sword through your heart is almost instantly fatal.

Bludgeoning weapons crush organs, tear flesh, rupture arteries and shatter bones. Not as deadly as the above two, but just an incapacitating and far better against armour. The best shot is right into the skull, where a club will splatter blood, brain and bone all over the ground and leave a grotesque mound of mangled flesh where the head should be.

After recieving one of these injuries, the odds that a combatant will be able to successfully retalliate are slim.

Xuc Xac
2012-05-05, 01:52 AM
{Scrubbed}

Siegel
2012-05-05, 01:58 AM
Could you talk about the game again and move your weapon discussion out of this threat?

Avianmosquito
2012-05-05, 06:08 AM
{Scrubbed}

Fatebreaker
2012-05-05, 06:43 AM
{Scrubbed}

Avianmosquito
2012-05-05, 07:35 AM
I think I figured out why you're having trouble finding a partner.

I was civil until the stawman **** started. Once that started my civility went out the window. Now back on topic.

Fatebreaker
2012-05-05, 08:33 AM
I was civil until the stawman **** started. Once that started my civility went out the window. Now back on topic.

Well, if you think that your behavior towards folks has no impact on your ability to find a partner, that the reason you cannot find a partner is off-topic in a thread about finding a partner, or that your behavior in responding to feedback qualifies as civil, then good luck to you.

Avianmosquito
2012-05-05, 09:06 AM
Well, if you think that your behavior towards folks has no impact on your ability to find a partner, that the reason you cannot find a partner is off-topic in a thread about finding a partner, or that your behavior in responding to feedback qualifies as civil, then good luck to you.

Ad hominem attacks are always off topic. Not always uncalled for, but always off topic. And I was civil until the strawman bull**** started, which was fairly early on. Finally, the reason I couldn't find a partner looks to be that everyone missed that part of the post entirely and likely intentionally. Once the off topic debate started the original purpose of the thread was lost, and it was after that I dropped the gloves.

GunMage
2012-05-05, 09:46 AM
The first problem is that your system is nightmarishly complicated. Even reading the summary makes me want to beat my head against a large heavy object, and making a character looks like some kind of particularly sadistic algebra puzzle. For the love of God, please simplify it. I think if I tried to playtest your game in its current state I'd probably end up stabbing myself repeatedly in the face in the hope that it'd hurt less.
Second problem, following on from the first, is that gameplay looks like it's going to be hideously slow. (Recoil rolls based off mass and upper body strength? Seriously?) As a general rule, speed > realism. The vast majority of players are not going to have the patience for this.
Third problem is that several people have tried to tell you this already and you've dismissed their criticisms out of hand. This raises serious issues about what kind of feedback you're actually looking for here.
Fourth problem is that you're doing said dismissals in a fairly insulting way. Now if you were reacting this way to me I'd kind of expect it, given that I've just told you in so many words that your game looks like it was designed for a particularly obsessive-compulsive group of accountants. But when someone tries to help you and you respond with comments like "Gee, looks like somebody's not into math", it doesn't make you look good. If you seriously want playtester volunteers, you're going to have to treat them better than that.


This is currently the most succinct explanation of the problems here. If you are interested in creating a roleplaying game look over these again, and then remember that the people in this thread who are commenting are not only trying to help you for free, they are also the people who will be buying your system for money and playing it with their friends, or not giving it a second glance when it comes out.

Right now, the majority opinion seems to be that it is unplayable, and the constructive criticism that has been given has been met with anger and scorn. If that continues, there is no way you will muster up the help you need to make this into something that people would pay money for, making this whole exchange meaningless.

Please consider these points, from 2 people who are only trying to help.

Avianmosquito
2012-05-05, 05:51 PM
{scrubbed}

Arbane
2012-05-05, 07:45 PM
Thing is, the rules work for every genre with no changes. That's the important part.

This is simply impossible.

To use movies as an example, you wouldn't want to use the same system to try to emulate Reservoir Dogs, The Avengers, The Ring, Twelve Angry Men AND The Three Stooges, would you?

Lord_Gareth
2012-05-05, 09:51 PM
This is simply impossible.

To use movies as an example, you wouldn't want to use the same system to try to emulate Reservoir Dogs, The Avengers, The Ring, Twelve Angry Men AND The Three Stooges, would you?

God forbid you're trying to model both Fullmetal Alchemist (Shonen) and Call of Duty.

Roland St. Jude
2012-05-05, 09:55 PM
Sheriff of Moddingham: Locked for review.