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tenduril
2014-09-07, 10:53 PM
Hello Giant In the Playground Forums!

Hopefully this post fits within the rules of Homebrew; if not I am sorry and I will remove it.

I have been trying to design an RPG for several years now and have made many attempts, looked at many, many systems (if you can think of one, I've probably seen it), and spend loads of hours thinking about it. I think I've finally got something I'm happy with but I am still fiddling with the core dice mechanic.

It is 1d6 + modifier v.s. target number. As a +1 bonus in D&D equates to 5% increase in chance of success and a +1 modifier in a d6 system equates to a 16% increase in chance of success, bonuses are much smaller than they normally would be.

* Modifiers are based on skill ranks, or attribute at -1. Skill ranks range from 1 (novice) to 6 (world-class). Attributes range from -3 (actually subhuman, like animal intelligence) to -2 (lowest for most characters) to +2 (exceptional), to +3 (borderline superhuman, like olympic weight-lifter). So the modifiers on checks can go as low as -3 or -4, or as high as +6.

* The standard target numbers are 3 (Easy), 5 (Challenging), 7 (Difficult), 9 (Extremely Difficult), and 11 (nearly impossible). Therefore a character with +6 in a skill can do extremely difficult things 66% of the time, and nearly impossible things 33% of the time. However, he is always going to success at Easy, Challenging, even Difficult tasks (and any target numbers in between). The whole point of a check is there is a chance of failure; if there isn't, don't bother making the check. It was also very important because melee and shooting were skills, so there was a chance of automatically hitting. It makes sense for a hero to hit almost all the time, but there should always be a chance of missing, there should always be danger. So I need an automatic failure mechanic.

I liked the idea of exploding dice. Especially for damage: Originally I had a critical hit mechanic where 1 and 6 meant reroll; another 1 or another 6 meant crit fail or crit success, respectively. Basically, 1 in 36 times would fail, 1 in 36 times would automatically succeed. A critical hit was pretty deadly: x1d6 damage, so it might kill you right out. However, when it only happened 1 in 36 times, it was pretty rare. This was an issue as I had a Toughness mechanic to reduce damage and minimize "hit points". After adjusting damage it is better, but I liked exploding dice because the damage dice could explode and do alot more damage without a critical hit. I tried to combine the two but it felt clumsy.

Then I did dice that exploded both ways. The issue here was, a 1 averaged at -2, so it was almost like 1 in 6 failure for most characters. Even with a +6 rolling a 1 means you'll fail at anything but an Easy task. So I don't really like that. Plus it didn't work with damage; rolling a 1 meant rolling a die and subtracting from damage? What?

So here are my proposed systems, and the pros and cons of each:

* Rolls of 6 "explode", if you roll a 1, roll again. A 1 or 2 means you automatically failed.
This is nice because damage rolls skill explode, there is no critical hit multiplying damage on top of it. The downside is (1) it's possible for novices to accomplish extraordinary tasks, and (2) it's two separate mechanics. Don't know if I like it very much.

* Reroll 6s: a 5 or 6 means you automatically succeed / hit (unless the GM says otherwise). Reroll 1s: a 1 or 2 means you automatically fail. This and the one before it are my favorite two so far. I'm going for something rules light, and this is pretty quick to learn; also, the "automatic success" and "automatic failure" probabilities are 1/18 each: pretty close to D&D's 1/20 chance for a natural 1 or a natural 20. So that's good, to me, given I used D&D as a guide a bit here.

So those are what I have narrowed it down to, pretty much. I'm going for a rules-light system here, but NOT like FATE or Lasers and Feelings or anything like that. They are very good systems but not the style of play I'm looking to get here. I'm going more for something like Warrior Rogue Mage, or Savage Worlds (neither of which, despite using small ranges of numbers, and having bonuses, have a mechanic for automatic failure. In both systems it likely not only to be able to auto-succeed on tasks, but to auto-hit on attacks.)

Anyways, I hope you have some feedback for me.

Link to the rules (https://www.dropbox.com/s/ui32njln88jz40r/ALT%20RPG%20Core%20Rules%20Booklet.pdf?dl=0)

Link to the "quicksheet" (much more condensed rules) (https://www.dropbox.com/s/du0v4icnum0e2c0/ALT%20RPG%20Quicksheet.pdf?dl=0)

Thanks for any ideas you might have. I'd be more than happy to elaborate further on anything in the comments.

jqavins
2014-09-08, 11:16 AM
First of all, this is going to be my new sig:
I liked the idea of exploding dice.Unless it's this:
I liked the idea of exploding dice. Especially for damage.Ok, that's out of the way.

Why 1d6 + modifier? There is a good Driving Reason (TM) for using a d20 to resolve stuff, and you noted it yourself:

As a +1 bonus in D&D equates to 5% increase in chance of success and a +1 modifier in a d6 system equates to a 16 2/3% increase in chance of success...
The d20 allows a degree of granularity, small (or reasonably smallish) gradations in bonuses and penalties. Think how valuable a +3 to hit is in D&D, and realize that you can't give a bonus any less than that, or any greater without going all the way to +7. (I'm rounding to the nearest 5%.) So what is the Driving Reason to use a d6 instead?


So here are my proposed systems, and the pros and cons of each:

* Rolls of 6 "explode", if you roll a 1, roll again. A 1 or 2 means you automatically failed.
This is nice because damage rolls skill explode, there is no critical hit multiplying damage on top of it. The downside is (1) it's possible for novices to accomplish extraordinary tasks, and (2) it's two separate mechanics. Don't know if I like it very much.

* Reroll 6s: a 5 or 6 means you automatically succeed / hit (unless the GM says otherwise). Reroll 1s: a 1 or 2 means you automatically fail. This and the one before it are my favorite two so far. I'm going for something rules light, and this is pretty quick to learn; also, the "automatic success" and "automatic failure" probabilities are 1/18 each: pretty close to D&D's 1/20 chance for a natural 1 or a natural 20. So that's good, to me, given I used D&D as a guide a bit here.
Of the two, I llike the latter better, just for the simplicity. And I might go with 1 in 36 auto-hit and auto-miss chances, as I've never really been a fan of autos at all.

Kamai
2014-09-08, 09:02 PM
Can you maybe explain why you need an auto-failure chance? Sure, you don't want to have to roll to do simple things, and maybe that giant creature is really easy to hit if you need to just hit it, but you're doing so little damage. Now do an equivalent of Power Attack or Called Shot, and your attacks crawl out of auto-succeed into needing to roll, but now you do useful things. Instead of random happenstance, misses now come off of a decision made by the players. Done right, this can extend into non-combat skills, letting you put it up to the dice to do things faster/with less traces/etc.