Seeking multigenre rpg system

slaughterj · Sep 17, 2018

Morrus said:
Each career just gives you 4 attribute points, 2 skill points, 1 exploit. It’s pretty quick. But yeah, you’d need to buy the book to make a character, or use the online character builder.

Each consecutive die costs more, yes. It’s an expanding scale.

Offhand I can’t think of any charts you need during play. Your character sheet has your dice pools right there. Maybe the critical hit chart if you’re using the 1d6 to pick a condition complex version of crits. The status tracks are from an older iteration — it just uses conditions these days.

Here’s the system, basically. Pretty much all you need:

View attachment 101511

Thanks for the responses, I'll check it out further.

pogre · Sep 17, 2018

Morrus said:
<snip cool WOIN mechanics>

Morrus, I gather you still play D&D. I really like your system's base mechanics as you have laid them out. I wonder why you still play D&D? Does D&D do some things better than WOIN? Perhaps it is just a different feel to the game?

I play different RPGs too, so this is not intended as a criticism - just genuine curiosity.

On a positive note, you may not have sold the OP, but you have sold me.

Morrus · Sep 17, 2018

pogre said:
Morrus, I gather you still play D&D. I really like your system's base mechanics as you have laid them out. I wonder why you still play D&D? Does D&D do some things better than WOIN? Perhaps it is just a different feel to the game?

D&D will always have a special place in my heart. It's the game I've played most in my life, and I can't imagine ever not playing it. It's its own genre.

I play a variety of RPGs -- I was in a 2-year Call of Cthulhu game not that long ago, and I'm going to start the Pathfinder playtest this week. Sometimes I like to revisit old favourites from the 1980s, and sometimes I like to try the new hotness.

J.M · Sep 17, 2018

There's a new game called ELEMENTAL which meets all but possibly one of the OP's criteria.
Full disclosure: I'm one of the designers! Happy to answer any questions.

The Crimson Binome · Sep 17, 2018

Everything you say aligns behind GURPS, right up until your very last point:

slaughterj said:
5. Easy to get characters built and/or players up to speed to play (e.g., like Star Wars D6 or Savage Worlds).

If you want players to breeze through character construction, then the GM needs to put in a lot of work to define templates for specific classes and races, or else everyone will drown under the point-buy options.

slaughterj · Sep 18, 2018

Saelorn said:
Everything you say aligns behind GURPS, right up until your very last point:If you want players to breeze through character construction, then the GM needs to put in a lot of work to define templates for specific classes and races, or else everyone will drown until the point-buy options.

While that is the case with some point-buy systems like Hero, it is not the case for others like Star Wars D6 or Savage Worlds (not a true point-buy but somewhat close), and even Mutants and Masterminds can be fairly quick.

Ratskinner · Sep 18, 2018

pemerton said:
I've GMed quite a bit of Cortex+ Heroic (both MHRP and a Hacker's Guide-inspired Fantasy Hack).

It satisfies 2, 3, 5, 6 and 9. Less so 4 (not class-based, but not points-buy either), 7 (equipment is not part of the system in the D&D sense) or 8.

I'm not sure about 1 - I would say it has a decent amount of crunch; I'm not sure what counts as "fading into the backgroun".

I'm figuring that the system would have to be hacked a little bit. I would say putting a point-buy system on top of power-sets, etc. would be pretty trivial...might not be great, but trivial. Similarly, equipment mini-powersets seem fairly easy to implement for 7. (but then I see, Cortex+ through eyes heavily tainted by Fate*) I would still count 8, so long as you use an implementation with a skill die and an attribute die.

I agree with you about 1. Its hard to say what will "fade into the background" for any given person. For me, "its all on the character sheet" is a big part of it. If the rest of the system can be easily remembered without lookups, then I call that fading into the background. Others, though, get bothered by narrative control mechanics (as I believe the OP would), where they just impress me as terribly efficient.

*Fate is not usually seen as a gear-centered system, but curiously, there is a small contingent of Fate players who see it as the ultimate gear system, because you can dig into all the detail you want with aspects, etc. without having to dig into a ton of numbers, etc. Go figure.

pemerton · Sep 18, 2018

[MENTION=6688937]Ratskinner[/MENTION], good analysis and suggestions (though I think points-buy for power sets might be a bit more than trivial) - but given the last few posts from the OP I don't think Cortex+ is the sort of system being looked for!

Blue · Sep 18, 2018

FATE. (Or Fate: Accelerated Edition, a/k/a FAE) sounds like it would meet your needs.

It's a very lightweight systemt hat fades into the background, is very good at doing whatever genre you want. Math is really obvious, since it's a 4d3 curve based on -1, 0, +1 - so the median result is 0. Though it does use "weird dice" (d6s with 2x +, 2x -, 2x blank) - but you can get dF (die Fate) easily - it's a common type you can order.

Ratskinner · Sep 19, 2018

Blue said:
FATE. (Or Fate: Accelerated Edition, a/k/a FAE) sounds like it would meet your needs.

It's a very lightweight systemt hat fades into the background, is very good at doing whatever genre you want. Math is really obvious, since it's a 4d3 curve based on -1, 0, +1 - so the median result is 0. Though it does use "weird dice" (d6s with 2x +, 2x -, 2x blank) - but you can get dF (die Fate) easily - it's a common type you can order.

While I'm a big Fate fan, and I agree with your assessment of it, I suspect that Fate points would rub the OP the wrong way.

However, the weird dice could be addressed simply by substituting another set of "normal" gaming dice. Heck, there's a Supers mutation of Fate called Icons that uses a d6-d6 roll. Makes it a little wilder, but certainly not insane, just increase to a bigger die size to reduce the power of bonuses.