Requesting help building Modern/Future based gaming system

[DefKab]

How's it going everybody...

I don't know if this is the best place for this, but I've been working on (read: brainstorming but not actually doing stuff) a game system for several years. Now that I actually have a solid IDEA for a system (one that's not done before), I'm trying to reach out to other game designers (pro or amatuer) to help me out.
Any, literally ANY help would be greatly appreciated.

Please, let me know if anyone is interested, and I'll feed out a little more information on what I'm looking at.

[D-naras]

Commenting on other people's ideas is my greatest skill. Count me in.

[WeLoveFireballs]

I'm trying to make my own system right now too so I have a decent number of ideas bouncing around, I'll help as best as I can.

[DefKab]

Commenting on other people's ideas is my greatest skill. Count me in.

Is that really a skill?
I don't know.
But since you're good at it... One person really is enough to bounce ideas off of. More would be best (a larger poll of ideas), but we can start now.
Now, I wanna hash out that this is very much a work in progress. In fact, how much stuff I have down is an imaginary number....

But the concept has been set for a long time.

The ideal concept I would like to form into a table top RPG is a futuristic shooter RPG that follows the tropes and venues of your classic Sci-Fi shooter video game. For the basis of play, I have picked four archetypes to explain it's styling, hoping that at least one will trigger familiarity.
Now, I'm not making an 'X' video game conversion. Quite the contrary, I plan on having a wholly original concept as far as fluff goes, but I want it to feel like the viens of these four pupolar sub-cultures. The four are Halo, Gears of War, Mass Effect (to a lesser degree), and Warhammer 40K.

Each one has a unique structure that I want to play off of to form the biggest appeal of this system, which is a tiered tactical element.

To further explain. My sights are set on this system having three tiers of play, all completely compatible with each other, that covers the layers of futuristic combat from the Strategic layer, to a tactical layer. This is hoped to be done by having each layer 'relative' to each other in power, but different in scope.
Lets look at the bottom most layer, the Tactical layer. The dream is that at this layer, each 'player' plays a hero of extreme ability. The archetypes I'm basing them off of is the NAMED HERO within a video game. Look to any SPARTAN II in Halo, like Master Chief, look to any hero in Gears, like Marcus Fenix. Any space marine ever, and even Shepperd himself lives at this layer. These heroes can fight a large quantity of similarly eqquiped foes with good chances of success, and thats the level I want the Tactical Layer to play at.
You have powerful equipment, a lot of innate abilities, and the toughness to take the combined fire. Players would be most used to this from playing other Hero based RPGs, and as such the largest ruleset will be designed for this level.

The next layer is a mix between the Strategic and Tactical Layer. At this level, players are looking at playing a squad, each, of moderately powered characters. The archetype equivalents are non-named elite soldiers. We're looking at ODSTs from Halo, Psykers from 40K, Onyx Guard Gears, and a Spectre squad in ME. At this level, you can be expected to fight the same enemies as Heros, but being squad based, tactics should be different. Here the rules are more streamlined. Not every member in your squad will have their own character sheet. (Although you could, and its a design goal so that you can have five 'Heroes' from the bottom layer making up your squad in this layer.) rules will be focused more on squad based tactics, and resource management.

The highest layer is the Strategic Layer. Here, the players are taking platoons of the most disposable type into massive scale combat. Each player represents several squads of Marines, Gears, Guards, and Soldiers, with streamlined rules for ease of play. I'm expected things to look more like a miniatures strategy game at this level, but again, it'll all be compatible. Rules will be expanded to include other 'army' based compliments, so resource management will be more of an impersonal approach.

Again, all three layers will hopefully be compatible. You could take a platoon through a massive battle, zoom in to the last surviving squad, proceed with a special ops firefight, and finally take the reins of the sole survivor and play a heroic last stand with him. The power scale will be near-infinite. Your 'Hero' at the bottom level could be anywhere from the top tier, to Pvt. Snuffy of the Terrible Marine Core on Sucka Six.

This is the game plan before any mechanics are applied.
Now, if you wish, I do have a 'Core Mechanic' and a few mechanics idea, as well. But I wanna open this up more to a Q&A thing at first. Questions are the best way to lay out a design goal, after all.

[WeLoveFireballs]

So the idea is to switch between Halo, XCOM and 40k relatively seamlessly? I DMed one or two Sci-Fi Campaigns (admittedly I wasn't all that great at the time) and due to the story we had several squad combat and mass battle scenes in the normally one man-one player game. The squad combat was ok but the mass battles really fell flat, the level of detail on a player's character made it time consuming to carry out the equivalent of a 2 minute shooting phase in 40k. On the flipside, warhammer works quite nicely for squad combat with the addition of the extra details in necromunda or mordheim but with 1 man the lack of detail is just kinda sad, the greatest soldier ever still only shoots 1 guy per turn. This transition in detail is the challenge here. Players want to know everything about their PC, right down to the color of his armor. But if you can't condense that to a paragraph of info you can reference quickly mass battles will slow to a crawl. I am interested to see how you intend to pull that off.

[DefKab]

So the idea is to switch between Halo, XCOM and 40k relatively seamlessly? I DMed one or two Sci-Fi Campaigns (admittedly I wasn't all that great at the time) and due to the story we had several squad combat and mass battle scenes in the normally one man-one player game. The squad combat was ok but the mass battles really fell flat, the level of detail on a player's character made it time consuming to carry out the equivalent of a 2 minute shooting phase in 40k. On the flipside, warhammer works quite nicely for squad combat with the addition of the extra details in necromunda or mordheim but with 1 man the lack of detail is just kinda sad, the greatest soldier ever still only shoots 1 guy per turn. This transition in detail is the challenge here. Players want to know everything about their PC, right down to the color of his armor. But if you can't condense that to a paragraph of info you can reference quickly mass battles will slow to a crawl. I am interested to see how you intend to pull that off.

That first sentence is a perfect summation.
Now, it's not expected that Mann McMann, the players Hero, will be fighting armies at a time, like on the Strategic level. Any time you focus on just one character, you're using the rules presented in the Tactical Layer. Instead, the rules will 'condense' the information of a character into a format better suited for the higher layers.
So, if Mann McMann joins up with a squad to fight in the Mixed Layer (I need a better term for this layer...), He, as a person, is put aside. Instead, you'd have a Squad sheet, and Mann's abilities will alter the abilities of the Squad. Think of that as like a Leadership bonus in most strategy games.
And again, when his Squad his the Strategy layer, you'll switch to a 'Toon sheet that'll list McMann as the Toon Leader, and he'll give bonuses as such.

On these higher levels, those squads and platoons will be fighting as if each Squad and Toon were a character. Five players should be able to (in theory) play five different platoons with the same relative ease and speed as they do when they play as Heroes.

Now, I'm also NOT making it a design goal that the transitions being game styles is something rapid. It is not in the goal of the system for you to switch styles within a Session, due to the amount of bookkeeping. Instead, it'll be more of a story element, where you'd essentially pick up another 'game' of the system at the higher level for a couple of Sessions. Now, of course, you could rate up McMann, McManns squad, and McManns Platoon and switch between the three sheets willy-nilly, (I've honestly had more complex characters in DnD 3.5) but I'm not going to ruin any part of the game to make that switch easier. I will always strive for a Quality combat system over streamlining rules, and Streamlining rules over defining parts that aren't within the design scope.

[DefKab]

Another 'design goal' that I'm a little more lose on is that each layer is Balanced against each other.
In terms of power, a 'Hero' is to be as powerful at character creation as a Squad. And a 'squad' can be equal to a Platoon. The 'individuals' at the Platoon level are so green, that they can be harrassed by one Hero (as some games have it, even...). However, it is also of the scope of the game to outfit each, and every soldier in your Platoon as a 'Hero'. Obviously, this raises the power curve to extreme levels. Most of the stats of those Heroes will be absent, but their extreme ability will be represented in bonuses to almost everything.

I'm hoping to garner a kind of Stockholm Syndrome on your bigger groups. If you enter a battle at the Mixed Level, and you survive with only one member of the Squad alive, I'd like to foster a kind of affection for that one survivor, much in the vein of X-Com. You can name him. You can stat him. He might even become a 'Hero'. Eventually, you can create several 'Heroes' this way to make a wholly unique, and special, squad of your survivors.

[WeLoveFireballs]

So you would have 3 character sheets essentially, one a full character sheet, one a list of decent size effects and one a list of smaller effects for a larger group. One problem is the mortality of the PCs, in hero level (I'm going to use hero, captain and warlord for the levels for convenience) there are all kinds of things someone can do to stay alive, emergency medpacks and teleportation devices to escape, and when you go to warlord that needs to be reduced to toughness, wounds and armor saves and one or two bad die rolls can leave someone dead and a player angry about missing out on their hero level abilities I'd suggest leaving out character death in the warlord level, maybe have an injury chart like in mordheim for injuries, captured, robbed ect. I get the general idea now, I would need to see the core mechanic to guess at how well this might work in practice.

[DefKab]

So you would have 3 character sheets essentially, one a full character sheet, one a list of decent size effects and one a list of smaller effects for a larger group. One problem is the mortality of the PCs, in hero level (I'm going to use hero, captain and warlord for the levels for convenience) there are all kinds of things someone can do to stay alive, emergency medpacks and teleportation devices to escape, and when you go to warlord that needs to be reduced to toughness, wounds and armor saves and one or two bad die rolls can leave someone dead and a player angry about missing out on their hero level abilities I'd suggest leaving out character death in the warlord level, maybe have an injury chart like in mordheim for injuries, captured, robbed ect. I get the general idea now, I would need to see the core mechanic to guess at how well this might work in practice.

Good question. It's always my design intent that Named Characters recieve the power of plot. When your squad starts suffering deaths, it'll be your Hero that dies last. Because they're the Hero...

Now, about the core mechanic...

This one isn't so original. It's a die pool system. I have a good confidence on realizing the pitfalls of using different mechanics, and I feel that a die pool system is the best to use for this. It might be hard to convince me otherwise.

I'll focus on the mechanic at the 'Hero' level for ease of reference. Your hero, during an action that requires a roll, will form a die pool of D20s from his relative abilities. The D20 is picked because I wanted the Granularity that it can provide. In a D10, +1 to a roll is a lot. In d20, it's exactly half that, and I like that.
So. A relevant ability tells you the number of dice to roll. The DM sets a Target Number (TN) based on the difficulty of a task. Each die that rolls above that TN counts as a success. One success can equal victory on the roll, but Disadvantages and other such things can 'subtract' successes, essentially giving you a number of Successed needed to actually succeed. It's also part of the idea that further successes will give you a better result from your action.

Here's an example: Your character, Private Snuffy, has wrecked his Warthog running from a Covenant Spectre. You have a Basic Aptitude for Mechanical repair. That combined with your Average dexterity gives you 3d20 to roll. I determine that the engine wont turn over, but it's just because a part's out of place, and set a moderate TN of 16. One 16 will fix the Warthog, but each level of success above that will make the Warthog last a little longer than usual. Also, the Covenant is hot on your tail, so it will apply a disadvantage as you have a time limit. You'll need to get two successes to get out of your current bind.

Another thing, it's not really 'assumed' that you'll have all three sheets. I do imagine, most of the time a game will take one of the provided layers, and play at that level. Each 'layer' will be defined seperate of each other, and then how they interact will be more of an Optional space of play.

[WeLoveFireballs]

I think that mechanic is an excellent one for this. You could have a long list of stats at hero level and then remove some for captain and remove more for warlord. e.g.
Hero Has:
Energy Sword-2
Brawling-1
Athletics-3
Strength-2
Dexterity-3
Toughness-2
Armor-1
Rifles-2
Pistols-1
Human Tech-3
Covenant Tech-1

His squad (some stats changed for averaging with different soldiers):
Energy Sword-1
Brawling-2
Athletics-2
Armor-1
Rifles-2
Pistols-1
Tech-2

His battalion:
Melee-2
Ranged-2
Armor-1
Athletics-2
Tech-2

You can even have a squad performing multiple actions simultaneously with this. Half the squad lays down covering fire with their rifles (using up some ammo) and the other half tries to repair their two warthogs. Since they normally have rifle 2 and tech 2 these are halved to 1 each, but the target number for the repair guys is reduced because they don't have to worry about the covenant and the gunmen might get lucky and take out a guy or two.

A suggestion for wounds: track it with -1 penalties on their rolls, maxing out (death) at -10 or so with toughness/armor making it harder to gain the penalties. This works across all 3 levels. At hero, a -1 means a minor injury. At captain its a death or 1 man getting badly injured. At warlord its 2-3 or even 10-20 deaths. At hero a wound would be a glancing blow, then a quick skirmish at captain and then a medium sized battle at warlord.

[DefKab]

-snip-

Whoa, that's... Uhm. That's a lot.

I'm really trying to nail it down one mechanic at a time, but I do REALLY appreciate your enthusiasm. I'm gonna try to present my ideas on those parts.

[WeLoveFireballs]

I apologize for my tendency to usurp game designs and take them in my own direction, it seems to happen a lot. :smalltongue:

[DefKab]

So, I wanted to post another mechanic that I felt was important to the system, the initiative system.

Again, I'm not using anything new, just something that feels to fit best with what I want the system to be able to do. This, as far as I can tell, was developed by AngryDM, and named the Popcorn Initiative system. I'm renaming it the Nomination System, simply because it really doesn't have much to do with Popcorn.

The idea is that a relevant role will be made to determine the Initiative winner. That player then nominates another character, be it a player character, an enemy, or a neutral faction. The character will be next to act, after the first character acts.
The nomination continues, with the next character nominating someone not already nominated at the beginning of their turn.

This nomination takes place at the beginning of the current characters turn to allow unique actions to take place, an example given here:
Gear Snuffy spots two grubs guarding a troika at the bottom of the hill. Winning initiative, he nominates Baird. Baird has the ability 'Tandem Snipe' which allows him to take his turn alongside Snuffy, as long as both are taking the 'Snipe' action. Baird nominates one of the grubs to act after them, confident that he'll be dead anyways. Both of them uses their Longshot to snipe the grubs simultaneously, and both grubs go down.

I'm planning on having a lot of unique interactions like that, to support a more cinematic type of combat.

[WeLoveFireballs]

That's a good mechanic for what you are going for. It allows for both the normal normal one side and then the other and also special situations, like luring an enemy into a trap by passing the turn to them before your allies have acted. Quick Question: Will people be able to let someone else go first when they win initiative? It could be quite significant in some situations.

The cinematic abilities seem like a good idea (although I'm not sure I understand why Snuffy didn't just shoot, then let Baird shoot, seems like the same effect overall) but will you have the same abilities transfer between levels? Maybe each ability with different effects at different levels. (i.e. Tandem snipe for a squad at the captain level lead by Baird would let them fire sniper rifles faster) Perhaps labeling the list of abilities "Sniping Sergeant" or somesuch. Naturally, planning out all the separate abilities would be the last thing to do, I just think its important to make sure there aren't mechanics that aren't incompatible later.

Few more questions: At what level would the 5 PC heroes vs 200 mooks be played? The PCs only justify the hero level mechanics but the mooks justify at least squad and probably warlord. If multiple PCs are in a squad and the squad is taken down to 1 how do you decide who dies? (or just leave them all with nasty wounds but not quite dead)

[DefKab]

That's a good mechanic for what you are going for. It allows for both the normal normal one side and then the other and also special situations, like luring an enemy into a trap by passing the turn to them before your allies have acted. Quick Question: Will people be able to let someone else go first when they win initiative? It could be quite significant in some situations.

The cinematic abilities seem like a good idea (although I'm not sure I understand why Snuffy didn't just shoot, then let Baird shoot, seems like the same effect overall) but will you have the same abilities transfer between levels? Maybe each ability with different effects at different levels. (i.e. Tandem snipe for a squad at the captain level lead by Baird would let them fire sniper rifles faster) Perhaps labeling the list of abilities "Sniping Sergeant" or somesuch. Naturally, planning out all the separate abilities would be the last thing to do, I just think its important to make sure there aren't mechanics that aren't incompatible later.

Few more questions: At what level would the 5 PC heroes vs 200 mooks be played? The PCs only justify the hero level mechanics but the mooks justify at least squad and probably warlord. If multiple PCs are in a squad and the squad is taken down to 1 how do you decide who dies? (or just leave them all with nasty wounds but not quite dead)

All good questions. Lets start with the first paragraph...

The two delaying actions you can take are, for a lack of better terms 'Declare Contingency', where you declare an action, and its trigger, to be taken during someone elses turn. Abilities that a hero gains will increase the amount of things he's able to Declare, an example would be like 'Snap Shot' allowing him to make an aimed shot against an opponent when he leaves cover. (You know how in games, the guy keeps popping up at the same place from behind cover, so you take off his head? Its like that. The only reason it's not free to start with is because in reality, he's not actually in the same place when he pops up.)
The other action is to 'Wait'. You don't take your turn, but you're also de-nominated. You have to wait to be Nominated again before you can take any actions.
This initiative system helps keeps player in the action, as they never know when they'll need to act. They have to pay attention and know what to do, or else they'll default to the wait action, and possibly lose a good moment.

This non-question is a good question. Why didn't Snuffy just take the shot? Well, because he's in a surprise round, thats why!
What? Not good enough?
Okay. My plan is that surprise rounds last precisely as long as it takes to surprise someone. If Snuffy had taken just the Snipe action, the surprise round would've ended after him, and the remaining grub could've won initiative, hopped on the troika, and given Snuffy some hell.
But that's a niche scenario. What about in regular combat? Well, there'd be abilities that interact this new system in many different ways (hopefully.) The design goal is that EACH mechanic is important, and so will have many things interacting with it. I wont invent the wheel just to roll it down the hill into the lake. Interrupts will be added, so that without that Tandem Snipe ability, an enemy would take his turn after Snuffy, instead of Baird, and the like.

The real question in that paragraph is the ability transfer. As the rules shift out, they also become simpler. They contain the essence of a mechanic, but have fewer things interacting with it, to keep game speed up, and bookeeping down. While Baird may not keep 'Tandem Snipe' at the Captain Level, all of his bonuses to snipe will show when his squad makes special sniping manuevers. His squad will become better at sniping just for having that archetype on the field.
So, the abilities may not be usable at a higher level, the intent of the ability (to make him better at sniping) will be kept.

The last question, I don't think I understand what you're asking...
If you're playing at the Tactical Level, the PCs wont be going up against 200 people all at once. That's still 200 rifles aimed at you... Instead, the power level is going to reflect that as far as resource management goes, 1 Hero can take out 1 Hero, or, it can eventually take out an elite squad (Think of it like fighting Elites in Halo. Sure, Masterchief can take out 100 Elites, but he does it 1 at a time.), or it can slowly erode a whole platoon of mooks. So, sure, a team of 5 heroes can take on 125 bad guys, but it'll be over a long course of time, and by the end of the operation they're probably badly injured, very worn out, and even 1 more enemy can be a threat. Or they can barely survive a pitched battle against five other heroes.
As far as PCs entering squads, it's of the design of the system that each 'Hero' would gain their own squad. If all of the mooks in their squad dies, and they decide to make one awesome squad, that's probably the time to zoom back into the Tactical level. But, if they insist, only one person will be controlling it. That's kind of boring for everyone else. In that case tho, yes, the PCs will die. But I don't see it as much of an issue.

This is great. Any other questions? Any other ideas? Things you'd want to see implemented?

[WeLoveFireballs]

Ah, so a surprise round is one person/squad/battalion's action, whichever faction has the surprise gets 1 action by anyone they want then you go to normal fighting. And the tandem snipe outside of surprise rounds would give a free attack with a sniper rifle. For interruptions a good general mechanic would be to give each faction 1 initiative steal per battle with extra ones for having tactical officers or special abilities for certain types of units.

e.g. An eldar farseer's precognition giving him (and his squad if he has one) a few interrupts per fight that give them their action right after someone's turn and then return to the previous initiative. (basically allowing them to see who's going to attack next and act in response to that) Or mutons unleashing rage upon their first injury to immediately take the initiative.

This gives sergeants a very important strategic role even without squad inspiration benefits by allowing the players a rapid retreat from ambush or gaurenteeing the enemy can't use their own interrupts effectively. This adds a very nice depth.

My last question will apply at some point to someone's game. Master chief may have fought a hundred small battles in the games but in the books the 10-20 Spartans would sometimes take on armies of hundreds or thousands, someone is going to want to recreate this kind of thing. You don't have to make specific rules for it but at least leave it open for "epic level" stuff. Combining into a super squad should be possible, even if its not the ideal way to play. Heck a campaign could fail, the PCs could lose a few important battles and all of a sudden there's no way out, last stands make a nice finale if you can't win. (Into the valley of death rode the three-hundred...)

I was just wondering what level you would put that on as an afterthought.

EDIT: How fast paced do you intend combat to be? Will multiple units be dropping every turn or will it take 2-3 turns to finish off a hero/squad.

[DefKab]

Ah, so a surprise round is one person/squad/battalion's action, whichever faction has the surprise gets 1 action by anyone they want then you go to normal fighting. And the tandem snipe outside of surprise rounds would give a free attack with a sniper rifle. For interruptions a good general mechanic would be to give each faction 1 initiative steal per battle with extra ones for having tactical officers or special abilities for certain types of units.
Well. The faction winning the surprise round gains as many actions as it takes to alert the other faction. This is so you can set up a situation where a well informed squad sneakily takes up advatageous fighting positions before firing on the enemy.

e.g. An eldar farseer's precognition giving him (and his squad if he has one) a few interrupts per fight that give them their action right after someone's turn and then return to the previous initiative. (basically allowing them to see who's going to attack next and act in response to that) Or mutons unleashing rage upon their first injury to immediately take the initiative.

This gives sergeants a very important strategic role even without squad inspiration benefits by allowing the players a rapid retreat from ambush or gaurenteeing the enemy can't use their own interrupts effectively. This adds a very nice depth.
Those are all very good examples for the way this initiative can be played. I hope to come up with several Teamwork abilities that the players can also enact.

My last question will apply at some point to someone's game. Master chief may have fought a hundred small battles in the games but in the books the 10-20 Spartans would sometimes take on armies of hundreds or thousands, someone is going to want to recreate this kind of thing. You don't have to make specific rules for it but at least leave it open for "epic level" stuff. Combining into a super squad should be possible, even if its not the ideal way to play. Heck a campaign could fail, the PCs could lose a few important battles and all of a sudden there's no way out, last stands make a nice finale if you can't win. (Into the valley of death rode the three-hundred...)

I was just wondering what level you would put that on as an afterthought.
Hmm.
That's a good point...
You know, to reinforce the compatibility like that, I imagine the power level dictates the play style. A 'Hero' is just as capable as a squad of Elites, or Platoon of mooks (need a better term for those two levels.) So, I suppose, in the strategic layer, your units could either be a Platoon of Soldiers, a Squad of Special Forces, or one Hero, depending on how you want to play. That could make so that the players play a mixed force. One handles the squad of ODSTs as they drop in on the enemy, another takes the reigns of a Spartan II, and a few other make up the bulk of the fighting force. One even grabs a Scorpion to play as. I like that idea.
So, lets go with that, to explain how the power levels are relative, and can play off each other. Thank you.

At the tactical layer, however, I imagine that each enemy will be defined for ease of combat.

It makes the Strategic layer easiest to work with though, as squads and heros can play there simply too.

So, each layer designates the depth of the rules you use to play as, instead of the types of units you play... That's much more succinct.

How fast paced do you intend combat to be? Will multiple units be dropping every turn or will it take 2-3 turns to finish off a hero/squad.
I imagine that'll shift drastically depending on how you play. Gears, Spartans, Spectres, and Space Marines are all durable, powerful characters, withstanding several direct hits, but that the top of the power curve. It'll show, for instance, if you play a group of Marines attacking a couple of grunts, that play is bloody and swift. In a strategic layer, you can expect several losses per turn as the combined fire tear through each other.
Hopefully this system will be versatile enough to support any playstyle of the same genre.

[DefKab]

Well.

I certainly got conflicted awfully fast.

So, here's my dilema. I have these different layers, that in my head can perform different styles. The tactical is your classic 1 on 1. Each enemy is seperate and moves on their own. As you zoom out, the enemies start moving in groups, but the Heroes share the same playspace. At Strategic, you can have 1 man engaging large swarms of dudes who move uniformly... That's a large disjunction.
What if I reverse how the scope works? Instead, the Strategic Layer is reserved for the Heroes, killing swathes of baddies by the block, while the tactical layer is for the grittiest of combats between the weakest of these mooks? That way, the layer determines power level. Small engagements, 100 points or so, are on the Tactical layer, while powerhouses built at 10,000 points are played on the Strategic side of the game.

I just don't know... But that seems like the best way to go about it.

[WeLoveFireballs]

PCs should always be 1 man I think but character creation can include troops. Say, 1 guy plays an Imperial Guard Captain, he's a fairly average human, possibly with some nice equipment but still fairly mortal. However, as a commander he gets a regiment of 40-80 guardsmen to back him up. Player 2 picks an Ordo Xenos Inquisitor, he is an exceptional person, probably with power armor and augmentations, maybe some basic psychic powers. He gets a team of acolytes to back him up, maybe 10-20 guys. Player 3 is a Salamanders Librarian, he is a god among men physically, a master tactician, an excellent psyker and armed with the best the imperium of man can offer. These characters are all balanced against each other, but not in the same respect.

If they need to covertly attack a small outpost, they might bring their PCs, a few acolytes and a couple imperial guard snipers. Maybe 7-8 guys total, the Librarian has a large arsenal available but his allies have a few different soldiers. The Inquisitor and Marine will carry the combat but the guardsman's command skills will give them an edge.

When they need to clear a cult out from an underground base the elite acolytes will really shine as they fight no more than 20 vs 20 and while the librarian is a beast, he can't combat an entire enemy squad effortlessly, so the inquisitors elite troops can fight effectively. The guard can match the cultists in numbers, but wont fight as efficiently as the acolytes.

Then comes a pitched battle with the cultists, the massed guardsmen with dicipline and firepower can dominate. The inquisitors squad can flank around or hunt down enemy psykers but don't have the numbers to engage in direct battle. The librarian can use his abilities to bolster the squads but he himself can still only kill a few cultist per turn with his sword. He might support the guard or hunt down a summoned Daemon for single combat. Meanwhile the guard captain can command his platoons and use tactical knowledge to deadly effect on the open field.

As characters progress the librarian might decide he wants to train a few marine scouts and get a small retinue while the inquisitor turns to improving his psychic and physical power, as some of his fallen retinue are left unreplaced. The guard captain lost several squads, but those that remain are trained as battle hardened veterans. On the other hand the librarian could improve his command skills, to help the captain, the inquisitor could permanently recruit a few squads of Arbites to join him and the captain could start switching to a mechanized company.

....Character creation might get complicated. :smallbiggrin:

EDIT: I think you can have groups one level away from their normal level. A hero can be a hero in captain level, a squad can fight as a squad in tactical level but a hero can't fight as a hero in warlord level. He just doesn't have the ability to take on so many at once. Master chief was good but he can't take fire from 30 grunts. They need to be in squads at least to fight against platoons. (or a vehicle) They might have special abilities, like once in melee doing a short tactical level fight between the commanders, but they can't take on hordes on their own.

[DefKab]

Alright, in light of my currect conundrum, I think I have the solution. The layer you play at will be determined by the power level, IE the number of creation points you're giving a player. So, if you're giving a player a small amount of points, he's playing at the Tactical level by building a 'Hero' of small power. An individual Gear. They fight other low power enemies. If you give that player more points, he goes up to the Mixed Layer, where he has the unit choices of either a Squad of Low powered rookies, or a Medium powered Hero, such as an Onyx Guard member.
Finally, at the upper echelons of power, you're playing at the Strategic level, and your unit choices open up. Now, you can either grab a platoon of Gears, a squad of Onyx Guard, or a Hero of amazing power, like Marcus Fenix himself.
Vehicles will be a point buy option as well, and the Party as a whole will be given a pool of points to spend on their resources, such as weapons, equipment, and vehicles on every layer.
So, sitting down to the table, the Game Master should tell you the power level and Scope "Hey guys, make me 1,000 point units for play at the Mixed Layer," and give you the additional resources "You'll get Two Makos, and another 200 for gear."
Does that make sense?

[WeLoveFireballs]

So, there needs to be some way for numbers of troops at a time to really really matter. A hero can wipe out a platoon in 30 1v5s easily, a squad of 5 can take out 30 mooks 5v5 at a time easily (1v10s for heroes or 5v10s being a challenge but doable). But 30 to 1 and 30 to 5 at a time can't be even. The openess of a battle affects this. Somehow the rules need to make platoons far superior on the open field and squads far more effective in more enclosed or fortified areas, with (solo) heroes being most effective in squad areas or even more enclosed zones. This is both realistic and could separate the tactical levels properly.

[DefKab]

So, there needs to be some way for numbers of troops at a time to really really matter. A hero can wipe out a platoon in 30 1v5s easily, a squad of 5 can take out 30 mooks 5v5 at a time easily (1v10s for heroes or 5v10s being a challenge but doable). But 30 to 1 and 30 to 5 at a time can't be even. The openess of a battle affects this. Somehow the rules need to make platoons far superior on the open field and squads far more effective in more enclosed or fortified areas, with (solo) heroes being most effective in squad areas or even more enclosed zones. This is both realistic and could separate the tactical levels properly.

Well, that'll come from building the units. In the Tactical layer, building a Hero unit wont come with too many riders. He'll just be an average character.
Building a Hero unit in Strategic layer, however, gives him bonuses to certain things, like Hiding, and Cover, as it's easier to hide one man than many, but negatives to his attack and damage, as it's harder for him to win a firefight by his lonesome. Of course, by that level, they have so much natural ability it offsets the negatives... Or rather, at that level, a Hero stays the same (Might be best), and the higher numbered units are the one that shows different rulesets.

Also, talking it over, we can open up Higher Point heroes on the Tactical layer just by advising the enemies increase in point value. After a while, Masterchief stops fighting Grunts and starts attacking Tanks, and Tank-like-Hunters.

[WeLoveFireballs]

Hrmm, so kinda like size differences in 3.5. Small characters get +1 attack, +1 ac and use small weapons, it makes no difference when fighting other small characters but against medium characters they are accurate and hard to hit but don't do much damage. With the reverse for large characters. This translates quite nicely, a hero can evade and pick away at a platoon easily but really isn't doing much damage.

[DefKab]

Alright, so the next phase in planning my system is to figure out the basics, and I wanna delve headfirst into Attributes.
The attributes are the terms, numbers, and ideas that formulate the basis of a character.

Thinking on Characteristical (new words!) Attributes, games can be quite deviant on how they define the mental and physical adeptness of a character. DnD, for instance, has a six-item attribute list, Strength, Dexterity, Constitution, Wisdom, Intelligence, and Charisma.
Some have three, some have Main Attributes and Sub-Attributes, and others still have gotten weirder.

Thinking on attributes, two stats pop out at me, a Measurement of Physical Strength, and a measurement of Physical Speed. For simplicity's sake, we'll boil these down to Whole Body Strength (an average of your strengths taken as a whole) and Whole Body Speed, to avoid the conversations of Fast Twitch and Slow Twitch muscles, forced exercise, body types, and genetic differentials. When thinking on these Attributes, compared to the Major Mechanic (Attributes determine the size of the die pool), I have made a decision on that 3d20 is the average die pool for an average stat. That gives me a rough estimate of a die pool sizing from 1d20 to 5d20, spanning both ends of a normal (human) spectrum.
IF I want a difference between the die pool sizes and the actual 'stat', I would probably do a simplistic 1-10 stat scoring. 4-5 being average would give you 3d20. Therefore, every two numbers in a stat gives you a d20 to your pool. What about off stats, however? If you have a stat at 4, and increase it to 5, how does that change the game? Well, in this system, it doesn't. But it can. Potentially.

So, this is where the help comes in. Anyone have any ideas for this?

To provide more to think on, past measuring strength and speed, what other attributes are necessary to define? They must have a mechanical purpose. Charisma, for instance, is a good definition of Leadership potential, amongst other things, but is it Necessary? What would you define attributes for?

Another thing I thought about is the seperation between Gamism and Simulationism.
A simulationism approach that I thought would be that for every two points you put into a stat, another stats MAXIMUM is reduced by one.
So, the average stat for Speed being 4 means that the max that character could have in Strength is 8. Taken to extremes, you would have a character with a 10 in Strength, and the max for his speed would be 5. This represents how more bulk naturally slows you down. But I also didn't see any other 'attributes' that relate like speed and strength, and it's not a very realistic approach to the 'issue'. Still, it might be a neat mechanic to encourage specializing while promoting a blanced mix. You can get a 7 in every stat, but only some can have 10...
Now of course, there are exceptions. Powered Armor, Genetic modifications, other in-game bonuses can ignore this power cap, but it still might be important...

As always, I'd love as much feedback about these attributes as possible. Any and all suggestions are weighed heavily... What do you think?

[WeLoveFireballs]

That's a decent system for stats, I'd reccomend odd numbered stats giving a +1 or +2 on related rolls. Its noticeable, but not as good as the extra die at the next level. I assume skills will effect the bonuses on the dice, not the number if you want t keep the max to 5 dice.

I think the necessary stats are Strength, Speed, Intelligence and Leadership, with strength and speed limiting each other and leadership and intelligence limiting each other. Keep in nice and concise, these 4 define everything about a character without overlap or unclear effects. (see long discussions on the difference between wisdom and intelligence) Ideally every roll necessary can be assigned to a stat quickly.

Another idea is combined rolls with averaging stats. Want to lead a squad tactic effectively? Use the average of intelligence and leadership for the skill required in the tactics and the ability to get the squad to obey. Want to quickly repair a machine? Average intelligence and speed for the knowledge and manual dexterity needed.

[DefKab]

That's a decent system for stats, I'd reccomend odd numbered stats giving a +1 or +2 on related rolls. Its noticeable, but not as good as the extra die at the next level. I assume skills will effect the bonuses on the dice, not the number if you want t keep the max to 5 dice.

I think the necessary stats are Strength, Speed, Intelligence and Leadership, with strength and speed limiting each other and leadership and intelligence limiting each other. Keep in nice and concise, these 4 define everything about a character without overlap or unclear effects. (see long discussions on the difference between wisdom and intelligence) Ideally every roll necessary can be assigned to a stat quickly.

Another idea is combined rolls with averaging stats. Want to lead a squad tactic effectively? Use the average of intelligence and leadership for the skill required in the tactics and the ability to get the squad to obey. Want to quickly repair a machine? Average intelligence and speed for the knowledge and manual dexterity needed.

I was actually thinking the same thing for uneven stats, providing a flat +2 to all rolls in that field. Great minds and all...
Yes, I was imagining the skill lists as being modifications to the rolls, along with maybe adding end tier abilities? Like a tiered scoring you purchase (Untrained to Mastery, or whatever), that give you bonuses as you increase them, and then Mastery level will give you a skill-based ability. I want to simultaneously encourage specializing, while making generalists a viable build.

Now, the limiting mechanic, I like the idea of it, but I am hard pressed to explain away that having a High Intelligence reduces your effective leadership, or vice-versa, but this being a militaristic style system, I do like the social aspect of the game being boiled to a 'leadership' score. I think we'll go with those four, as it's a nice base, but drop the limiting mechanic as it's low profile (most upgrades will ignore the max, scores can go higher than 10) and it's not very well explained.

The combined stat idea is VERY intriguing to me, and I'm definitely going to explore that. Having numbers ranging from 1 to 10 makes averaging two numbers a breeze, so coming up with what you need to roll shouldn't be too difficult. I'll look into that.

Well, to avoid overthinking unnecessary things, I'll put it down right now. Our four main Attributes are now Strength, Speed, Intelligence (Maybe Smarts?) and Leadership (or something else? If I can find four S words for this, I'm gonna grab 'em.)
Average for any stat is 4 (2d20). CharGen will likely start at that average, and you can increase or decrease accordingly.

I've also decided that it will be a point-buy system. Anything involving CharGen (which is not equipment, incidentally) will be balanced against each other, given a price, and be available for purchase. A relevant system of note is 40K, as their CharGen process is going to be a heavy influence for me.

[WeLoveFireballs]

Leadership vs Intelligence can be explained quite easily. A leader who really captures the hearts of his men has to do logically dumb things. Leading a charge will get loyalty, but logically its best not to risk the most valuable member of your force, you. Also it may be a very successful tactic to send men to their deaths, as diversions or delays, even saving more lives than you lose, but this will lead to hatred and fear, not respect and courage.

Is this going to be a general purpose system or do you have a setting of some kind in mind? Do you plan to add psionics and if so will that be its own stat, set of skills or bound to one of the existing stats?

I haven't played the WH40k RPGs but I have a PDF of Inquisitor I'll take a look at.

[DefKab]

Leadership vs Intelligence can be explained quite easily. A leader who really captures the hearts of his men has to do logically dumb things. Leading a charge will get loyalty, but logically its best not to risk the most valuable member of your force, you. Also it may be a very successful tactic to send men to their deaths, as diversions or delays, even saving more lives than you lose, but this will lead to hatred and fear, not respect and courage.

Is this going to be a general purpose system or do you have a setting of some kind in mind? Do you plan to add psionics and if so will that be its own stat, set of skills or bound to one of the existing stats?

I haven't played the WH40k RPGs but I have a PDF of Inquisitor I'll take a look at.

While I agree with you about how leadership works (I'm in the military) I still can't write off on the idea that Leadership reduces Intelligence, or that Intelligence reduces Leadership. And because I feel differently, I feel like removing the issue at all is the best option. Instead, all of the stats will be independant of each other. You can have smart leaders and dumb leaders.

It's not a general purpose. It's driven towards the Hard Sci-Fi Shooter venue of the inspirational fiction. But it doesn't have it's own fiction yet. I have ideas for what I might do with the fiction, but for now, I'd rather hammer down the mechanics and place it in some of my favorite worlds.

[WeLoveFireballs]

The next steps in designing the character creation would be to decide the level of detail in skills. (From D&D 3.5 where a fisherman has Profession(Fishing), Profession(Sailor), Rope Use and Craft(Basic Cooking) rank 1 to 5 to Classic Traveller where he has Survival-1)

Then I would suggest picking a generic character, picking a number of points (30-50 I would suggest) and try to assign point values to his various aspects. You can use that to get a baseline for other skills and abilities.