Who the f#$& am I

[clash]

So this is a idea I thought of for a lightweight system that doesn't require character creation. Let me know what you think

Play requires a d20 and a d10 and a d2 and a blank sheet of paper for each player.

Skills:
All characters start with no memory. Every time you need to do something the dm tells you what skill you need. If you don't have it on your character sheet you roll a d20 for the check and write down the skill with whatever number you rolled. Whenever you need to use the skill after that you use the number you wrote down.

Do something risky:
If you don't think you have high enough in I skill to pass a check you can choose to do something risky. If you do you roll a d10 and a d2. Then either add or subtract the value of the d10 to your skill depending on the d2.

Do something stupid:
This functions exactly like do something risky except you roll a d20 instead of a d10.

Sh$% happens:
If your total for a skill checkmi when doing something risky is less than 0 then something goes wrong. If your total is less than 0 when doing something stupid then sh$% really blows up.

[Goaty14]

I think this is pretty neat, but how does the GM determine if the player has succeeded? Arbitrarily?

[clash]

Success would be based on beating preset difficulty values for the task. Something like
Easy: 5
Moderate: 10
Difficult: 15
Very difficult: 20
How did you do that: 25
Holy s%$^: 30

[Grod_The_Giant]

Okay. First off: "no memory" or "no pre-built character" does not have to mean "everything at random." Check out Fate's (https://fate-srd.com/fate-core/quick-character-creation) suggestion for building a character in play. In a nutshell, you start with the usual number of build resources, but over the course of the first session or two get to assign them anyway you please. You're still "discovering" your character, but in a way that's more controlled in every sense of the word.


Skills:
All characters start with no memory. Every time you need to do something the dm tells you what skill you need. If you don't have it on your character sheet you roll a d20 for the check and write down the skill with whatever number you rolled. Whenever you need to use the skill after that you use the number you wrote down.
So your skills will be completely unrelated to each other, and will have an equal chance of being anywhere between +1 and +20? :smallconfused: I'd make two major suggestions here:

First, use either a smaller die or a pool of dice to tighten up the range of possible skill bonuses and make sure characters are a little more evenly capable.
Second, come up with a rule for having a nearly-relevant skill-- say, having Persuastion and trying to Bluff. Allow a reroll, change the roll (ie, from 2d6 to 3d4), put a floor on the possible value (no less than half the related skill? two-thirds?), something like that.

Also... is there a limit to how many skills you can learn? A set skill list?


Do something risky:
If you don't think you have high enough in I skill to pass a check you can choose to do something risky. If you do you roll a d10 and a d2. Then either add or subtract the value of the d10 to your skill depending on the d2.
Am I reading this right? Before making a check, you can roll a d10, with a 50-50 chance of getting the result as either a bonus or a penalty? (If nothing else, I'd suggest something like evens add/odds subtract, just to reduce the rolling)

[clash]

Okay. First off: "no memory" or "no pre-built character" does not have to mean "everything at random." Check out Fate's (https://fate-srd.com/fate-core/quick-character-creation) suggestion for building a character in play. In a nutshell, you start with the usual number of build resources, but over the course of the first session or two get to assign them anyway you please. You're still "discovering" your character, but in a way that's more controlled in every sense of the word.


So your skills will be completely unrelated to each other, and will have an equal chance of being anywhere between +1 and +20? :smallconfused: I'd make two major suggestions here:

First, use either a smaller die or a pool of dice to tighten up the range of possible skill bonuses and make sure characters are a little more evenly capable.
Second, come up with a rule for having a nearly-relevant skill-- say, having Persuastion and trying to Bluff. Allow a reroll, change the roll (ie, from 2d6 to 3d4), put a floor on the possible value (no less than half the related skill? two-thirds?), something like that.

Also... is there a limit to how many skills you can learn? A set skill list?


Am I reading this right? Before making a check, you can roll a d10, with a 50-50 chance of getting the result as either a bonus or a penalty? (If nothing else, I'd suggest something like evens add/odds subtract, just to reduce the rolling)

Thanks for the feedback. To your first point I am pretty sold on having the skill scores be random. I think it plays really well into the idea creating your backstory based on what you can do rather than the other way around. This isn't meant to be a super serious game so I don't think players need to be entirely balanced against each other.

I definitely had been thinking there should be some way for related skills to come into play. I was thinking a type of advantage mechanic where you roll twice when deciding the value and takethe better number.

There wouldn't be a set skill list or limit to number of skills. It would depend entirely on dm and campaign setting. One setting might have computer hacking as a skill and another might have magic. A third might have both or neither.

You are readingthe d10 mechanic correctly and I like your even/ odds idea. I think I will go with that.

[Grod_The_Giant]

Thanks for the feedback. To your first point I am pretty sold on having the skill scores be random. I think it plays really well into the idea creating your backstory based on what you can do rather than the other way around. This isn't meant to be a super serious game so I don't think players need to be entirely balanced against each other.
Ehh... I still thing it's better to have some semblance of balance, if only so you can set consistent check DCs. Why not have people roll, oh, d20+d10 (your "inspiration die") the first time they attempt a skill, and have the d10 roll be your skill modifier? That would get you a somewhat tighter range of values without losing the element of randomness, or allowing one player to blow completely past another. (Also lets you have some continuity with the "do something risky" mechanic)


I definitely had been thinking there should be some way for related skills to come into play. I was thinking a type of advantage mechanic where you roll twice when deciding the value and takethe better number.
Advantage for related skills works.


There wouldn't be a set skill list or limit to number of skills. It would depend entirely on dm and campaign setting. One setting might have computer hacking as a skill and another might have magic. A third might have both or neither.
Ehh... still seems kinda risky to me? I'd suggest that the DM write a list of ~20 skills that are appropriate for the campaign, and provide some examples. That way you can make sure you have consistent skills that aren't over-narrow or over-broad. If for no other reason than so characters don't wind up with cumbersome lists.

[XionUnborn01]

Depending on how much you want to add to this, you can have like 3 sets of 5 skills that people learn, X,Y,Z. So when you first roll a skill, you can choose which category to put it in. Maybe X skills let you roll your d10/d20 for risky and stupid twice, Y gives you a static boost so the skill, and Z skills get a different boost

That way if someone decides they want to be good at climbing but their score is only a 13 which isn't awesome, they can make it a Z skill so they know they'll be more consistent at it and so on.

[Knaight]

I like the d10 and d2 combination, though I do tend to prefer a bit more of a curve - for instance, rolling a negative d10 and a positive d10 in two different colors, and taking whichever is lower (doubles are a 0) produces a similar numerical range, of -9 to +9 instead of -10 to +10, but with more of a curve. A similar thing applies to d20s for "Do something stupid".

That said the even odd split works well here, particularly if you assign even to negative. It makes both risky and stupid usually work out worse on average instead of better, but not by a big enough margin to mess up the math. It does lose the curve though.

As for determining the skills in the first place, there are some similar systems worth looking at. Most notable is Roll For Shoes, where this technically works as an advancement (done during the session and initially pretty often) system, where skills build on earlier skills, getting more and more specific as they get better. I've also used Fudge for this in a one shot, where the characters all had amnesia (deliberately induced by the same hostiles), and while they had very broad skill groups at certain levels specific skills were rolled for using those groups as a baseline. This let me tailor the skills some to the pregens, e.g. the former bandit queen tending to have pretty high combat skills, while still allowing for some randomness in the specifics which let the players rediscover what their characters were good at before the memory wipe.

As an example that works with your system, you could define certain skills as high (16+), and allow them to boost related skills. Maybe every related high skill adds another d20 to the roll, and you take the highest, where related skills are deliberately assessed restrictively. For a bit more fluctuation that prevents skills determined later from just being better, you could also define certain skills as low (4-), where every related low skill adds another d20 to the roll, and you take the lowest. Then you just cancel highs and lows before rolling. This does lead to skill groups trending together, while also emerging over time, and makes character skill generation increasingly stable once you start figuring out who the character is.

[clash]

So I came up with an idea to address some of the suggestions put forward regarding balance and adding some control to the character design process. Let me know what you think:

Over 10/Under 10:
Whenever you are generating a score for a skill you can invoke either the over 10 or under 10 rule.

Over 10:
If you have more skills with a score over 10 then those with a score less than or equal to 10 you can invoke the over 10 rule. Instead of rolling a d20 to generate your skill you can roll a d10 and add 10 to the result guaranteeing a score over 10.

Under 10:
At anytime when generating a score you can invoke the under 10 rule. Instead of rolling a d20 to generate the score you can roll a d10 guaranteeing the score is less than or equal to 10. While not useful in itself, it can give you additional opportunities to invoke the Over 10 rule.



As an example that works with your system, you could define certain skills as high (16+), and allow them to boost related skills. Maybe every related high skill adds another d20 to the roll, and you take the highest, where related skills are deliberately assessed restrictively. For a bit more fluctuation that prevents skills determined later from just being better, you could also define certain skills as low (4-), where every related low skill adds another d20 to the roll, and you take the lowest. Then you just cancel highs and lows before rolling. This does lead to skill groups trending together, while also emerging over time, and makes character skill generation increasingly stable once you start figuring out who the character is.

I kinda like this idea. The problem becomes determining when skills are related and this might go back to Grod's suggestion on having a preset skill list or at least one preset for the campaign. Maybe it's something I could work into the above rule though. Something that forces a player to use the over 10 or under 10 rules based on related scores?

[Knaight]

I'm assuming Over-10 is limited, and every time you invoke Under-10 you get another use. In which case, I like it.

As for related skills, if you're good without a concrete skill list I figure you're good without a concrete skill relation list. That said, you could have a concrete skill category list that determines relations, without bringing in concrete skills. All the skills determined at a time just have to fit the category. Five Point Fudge has a pretty decent list of categories too, available for blatant theft inspiration.

[clash]

I'm assuming Over-10 is limited, and every time you invoke Under-10 you get another use. In which case, I like it.

As for related skills, if you're good without a concrete skill list I figure you're good without a concrete skill relation list. That said, you could have a concrete skill category list that determines relations, without bringing in concrete skills. All the skills determined at a time just have to fit the category. Five Point Fudge has a pretty decent list of categories too, available for blatant theft inspiration.

Over 10 can only be used when you have more skills under 10 than over 10 which imposes a natural limit. I will give the categories a bit more thought and see what I can come up with based on your ideas.

[Grod_The_Giant]

Over 10 can only be used when you have more skills under 10 than over 10 which imposes a natural limit. I will give the categories a bit more thought and see what I can come up with based on your ideas.
Another possible way to carve up related skills would be to use D&D style ability scores-- so you might have a category for "Intelligence skills," "Agility skills," etc.