Name for my system

[Anderlith]

Hey, all

I'm in the middle of making my own system.
Your roll a number of dice equal to your skill (Swords, Stealth, etc.) & keep a number of dice equal to your attribute (Strength, Dexterity, etc.) The kind of die you roll is based on your "Rating". ---Which is your baseline for your race/species. Humans always roll d8's (unless magically enhanced or such) while a dragon will always roll d20's & something like a squirrel will roll d4's or d3's.----

So a human with 9 Sword skill & 3 Strength would roll 9d8 Keep 3

I'm calling it the MORTAL system for now, & I was wondering if anyone has already used this name for a system.

[abk108]

Hey, all

I'm in the middle of making my own system.
Your roll a number of dice equal to your skill (Swords, Stealth, etc.) & keep a number of dice equal to your attribute (Strength, Dexterity, etc.) The kind of die you roll is based on your "Rating". ---Which is your baseline for your race/species. Humans always roll d8's (unless magically enhanced or such) while a dragon will always roll d20's & something like a squirrel will roll d4's or d3's.----

So a human with 9 Sword skill & 3 Strength would roll 9d8 Keep 3

I'm calling it the MORTAL system for now, & I was wondering if anyone has already used this name for a system.

Coming up with names it's always a difficult task.
If we don't have any background, setting information it's even worse!

[Dryad]

So.. You roll a number of dice equal to your skill.
You KEEP a number of dice equal to your stat.

How do you determine success or failure? What does 'keep' mean in this context?

Other than that: What is the reason for calling your system 'Mortal?' Is it that the game is very punishing, that it's very easy for characters to die? Or is it very heavy combat focussed with lots of blood, gore and death?

It's indeed a very hard task of coming up with a name for a game system. Especially if it's the system you need a name for; settings are easy.

Ask yourself what you want to accomplish with your system. What are you trying to create that you find lacking in other systems? Why are you making the system in the first place? Where do other systems fall short? The answers to those questions should help you create a name for your own system.

[Hanuman]

If I got this right then example:

10 Wis
5 Squid Farming
Human D8

Attribute#D - Skill#D = ASD
Attribute #D - ASD = Kept Die
D# = Race

10 - 5 = ASD5

10 - ASD5 = 5KD

D# = D8

10D8-5D(low)= 5D8

Roll(10d8)+0:
8,7,4,7,6,1,2,2,5,5,+0
Total:47

-5D=

Roll(10d8-5D(low))+0:
8,7,7,6,5,+0
Total:33

Resulting in a squid farming check of 33.

Seems like the system is a terribly complicated way to derive a higher average while not taking away the lower range.

I'd consider looking at the shadowrun 5-6hit rule, maybe having an increased or decreased hit rate would mimic your system better.

[Anderlith]

Well I never liked how in D&D (& other games) races would have a slight edge in one statistic or another, but with some lucky bonuses anyone could surpass them. Take elves & humans: elves have +2 dex humans have +0 all you have to do to be as dexterous as an elf is get a cheap magic item or roll some lucky dice at character gen.

In my game elves have a d10 for Agility where humans have a d8 even if their Attributes are the same i.e. 3. the elf will always have a slight edge(3d10 instead of 3d8).

To clarify.
You roll a number of dice equal to your skill & only count as many dice as your attribute. So if you are a human with 8 Squid Farming & a 4 Intellect, you roll something like; 2,3,4,5,6,4,5 you then keep four dice (preferably high ones but feel free to keep low ones : ) So now you have 6,5,5,4 which you add together to get 20. If 20 hits the target number than you succeed.

One of my reasons of calling it mortal is so when you go against a dragon rolling Xd20's to kill you, you actually feel threatened. I also have a Shadowrun-like damage system except it has limb locations as well as a Total Condition (Which adds up all of your total hits). I prefer games where any character can be a challenge for another given the right circumstances, like in Shadowrun.

[Hanuman]

Well I never liked how in D&D (& other games) races would have a slight edge in one statistic or another, but with some lucky bonuses anyone could surpass them. Take elves & humans: elves have +2 dex humans have +0 all you have to do to be as dexterous as an elf is get a cheap magic item or roll some lucky dice at character gen.

In my game elves have a d10 for Agility where humans have a d8 even if their Attributes are the same i.e. 3. the elf will always have a slight edge(3d10 instead of 3d8).

To clarify.
You roll a number of dice equal to your skill & only count as many dice as your attribute. So if you are a human with 8 Squid Farming & a 4 Intellect, you roll something like; 2,3,4,5,6,4,5 you then keep four dice (preferably high ones but feel free to keep low ones : ) So now you have 6,5,5,4 which you add together to get 20. If 20 hits the target number than you succeed.

One of my reasons of calling it mortal is so when you go against a dragon rolling Xd20's to kill you, you actually feel threatened. I also have a Shadowrun-like damage system except it has limb locations as well as a Total Condition (Which adds up all of your total hits). I prefer games where any character can be a challenge for another given the right circumstances, like in Shadowrun.

I don't know about you, but dragons are pretty scary, your saves barely save you and your AC is essentially worthless.

As for your example for elf dex, this is basically it:
D20 4-24
MORTAL 1-24, common 4-24.

This is all the systems doing, which is a good system don't get me wrong, but I rather see this implemented as a part of an AP variant.

If you want to continue this as a base system, have you seen the UA variant of bellcuve rolls?

[Anderlith]

AP?

Well stats range from 1-7. So you can keep up 1-7d10 as an elf, where a human can keep 1-7d8.

[Hanuman]

action points

[Burnheart]

This is like the system used in Dungeons the Dragoning except in that you always roll 1d10's, i'm interested in you give different size dice to roll but like everyone else has said, its difficult to think of names without more bacjground fluff and system knowledge hmm if you want it to be a game about normalish people facing down immpossible odds with a fairly high mortality rate then mortal sound good to me.
edit: and rereading your fist post you're looking to see if Mortal has already been used as a name before, i assume you've tried web searches already?

[Hanuman]

This is like the system used in Dungeons the Dragoning except in that you always roll 1d10's, i'm interested in you give different size dice to roll but like everyone else has said, its difficult to think of names without more bacjground fluff and system knowledge hmm if you want it to be a game about normalish people facing down immpossible odds with a fairly high mortality rate then mortal sound good to me.
edit: and rereading your fist post you're looking to see if Mortal has already been used as a name before, i assume you've tried web searches already?

I always liked using a big crit table and contextualzed armor/wounds from the DM's judgement for mortality, crit sunders armor, flesh, bone and brain and calculates according to thickness and hardness.

[Anderlith]

Well then I'll just get into the meat of it then.
You have 8 Primary Stats & 10 Secondary Stats. Secondary Stats are the average of two Primary stats with the highest Rating between the two. i.e. an elf with 4d8 Str 6d10 Agility has 5d10 Dexterity. Primary Stats are for non-skill checks & Secondary Stats are for skill checks. It also throws off min-maxers

Strength - Self Explanatory
Perception - Whether you are oblivious to the world or not
Toughness - How many hits you can take
Agility - Nimbleness
Wit - Raw smarts
Intuition - Gut instinct
Resolve - Willpower with a shorter name
Grace - Mix of Social & Physical ease

Athleticism -Str + Agi/2
Dexterity -Per + Agi/2
Insight -Per + Intu/2
Intellect -Wit+ Intu/2
Charm -Wit + Gra/2
Presence -Str + Gra/2
Fatigue -End + Res
Vitality - Res * Tou die
Strike Zones - Toughness *2 +5
Pain Tolerance - Res + Tou

Vitality is your overall condition, you can take shots to your arms & legs & body & such without injuring or wounding any one zone but add them all up & you can pass out.
Strike Zones are your Head, Abdomen, Chest (Left & Right), Hand (Left & Right) Arm (Left & Right) Leg (Left & Right)

If you take damage over your Pain Tolerance (PT) you have an "Injury". The level of Injury is dependent on just how much damage has gone over your PT. (Also some weapons count higher as injuries) Light armor will protect you from level 1 injuries, Medium will protect against 2 & Heavy will protect against 3.

Injuries include things like broken bones & torn ligaments & smashed eye sockets (yes, you can lose limbs if the Injury is high enough)

As well as protecting you against Injuries, armor also gives you damage reduction. I have Ballistic Impact Piercing & Slashing, or BIPS for short some weapons can have multiple damage values & the damage they do will depend on the attack. If someone is wearing chainmail they have B/0 I/2 P/2 S/4 so you should thrust with a longsword instead of slashing.

I will post a bit more later

[Anderlith]

Most of my inspiration is a mix of Warhammer & Shadowrun with some MERP/Rolemaster thrown in.

[Dryad]

Well I never liked how in D&D (& other games) races would have a slight edge in one statistic or another, but with some lucky bonuses anyone could surpass them. Take elves & humans: elves have +2 dex humans have +0 all you have to do to be as dexterous as an elf is get a cheap magic item or roll some lucky dice at character gen.

The reason for this is that Elves in fantasy are GENERALLY more agile than humans in Fantasy. And Humans are GENERALLY more hardy than Elves.

However, what if you encounter a fat Elf? By your logic, that fat elf SHOULD be more agile than ANY human.

To be honest, your system rolls too much, adds too many numbers, and suffers the likelihood of all too easily out-scaling itself.

[Anderlith]

My elves are genetically faster than humans & they could still have a 1 stat, making it 1d10 vs (1-7)d8 The human can still be faster. It's just that elves are always faster than a human of the same stat, like how roadrunner is genetically faster than a chicken yet they are of similar size & are both ground birds (or think of a greyhound vs a bloodhound). I may look "complicated" on paper but the system itself is pretty straight forward. (Roll, keep, add.)I made it because I have not been liking all the "streamlined" rules of so many other systems. I do not like DM/GM fiat. The DM/GM should be able to work within the medium not around it.