Abilities scores for an universtal system.

[LuisCarlos17f]

When we want to play a TTRPG but with a different system one of the main challenges is the list of abilitie scores or atributtes.

Attribute (role-playing games) - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

The six abilies scores is one of the sacred cows by D&D/d20 system.

Fallout, the famous videogame saga, has got the S.P.E.C.I.A.L system: Strength, Perception, Endurance, Charisma, Intelligence, Agility and Luck

The Storytelling System by White Wolf/Onyx Paths has: Intelligence, Strength, Presence, Wits, Dexterity, Manipulation, Resolve, Stamina, and Composure

Call of Culhtu RPG has: Strength (STR), Constitution (CON), Dexterity (DEX), Size (SIZ)(body mass), Intelligence (INT), Power (POW), Appearance (APP) and Education (EDU)

7th Sea has: Brawn (physical might), Finesse (agility), Wits (intelligence and thinking on your feet), Panache (style and charisma), and Resolve (physical endurance).

Legend of the five Rings: Stamina, Willpower, Strength, Perception, Agility, Intelligence, Reflexes, and Awareness

Shadowrun: Body (BOD). Agility (AGI), Reaction (REA), Strength (STR), Willpower (WIL), Logic (LOG), Intuition (INT), Charisma (CHA), Edge (EDG), Essence (ESS) Initiative(INI) and Magic (MAG)

Some players would rather a low number of attributes, but I wish the opposite.

If you were hired to create a open licence TTRPG for all genres, but east to be adapted from other system, what attributes or abilities scores would use? The list would be 9-12, not lesser 6.

My goal is something like a d20 Modern 2.0. with some little changes in the abilities scores, adding more, so that all 3rd Party Publishers would want to use it for their no-medieval fantasy titles.

Would you add acuity/perception to search clues, or hidden traps, and anything like luck/karma/fate/divine grace/guardian angel, what attribute for social manipulation, but not charism?

Would you use "substats" as a bonus feat or merit?

* What system would you use for sanity/madness, points pool as call of chulhtu, "flaws/aflictions" as in Storytelling System, or anything as the mental health "pillars" by Unknown Armies (Violence, Reality, Remorse, Helplessness, Isoliation)?

* How would you mix the classic hit-points and a health(/blood points) pool as injuries levels?

 

[Blue]

Generic is my least favorite type of system. Things needed to support gritty fantasy may be unneeded for hard SF, and by the same token the things hard SF wants may be more granular then makes sense for that gritty fantasy. And neither fits well the 1920s elder-horror, which has only some overlap with modern investigators, which bear some resemblance to a modern vampire campaign and to a teenagers-from-outer-space campaign, even though though they bear little resemblance to each other.

The other aspect is that the scale can and should vary some. A physical strength score for a Titan in the Epic Ancient Greek Heroes game should be a huge number compared to PCs, while in the modern werewolf game every PCs should put normals to shame. And the 007-expy game should have just normal human variation with some of the cat-petting villains have lieutenants that are right on the top edge of human potential.

So the answer that's not helpful is if I wanted a generic system, I'd go for something like Cortex Prime, where literally what abilities are used are changes from campaign to campaign. What do you want to focus on. PbtA games are a great example of having few ability scores but tailoring them to be what you want to focus on in the individual games.

But trying to be helpful, I'd probably go for a generic list, and then have different figured characteristics based on them that vary by genre type. So how good of a natural pilot you are could matter in the WWII Aces campaign as well as the Space Opera campaign, but you wouldn't need it for the high fantasy game (or maybe you do).

Since you want 9-12, let's go with an idea I played with a long time ago. A 3x3 grid which ends up giving 9 characteristics. One axis is Body/Mind/Soul (or Heads/Hands/Heart). The other axis is Force, Savvy, and Innate. The intersections of the give us the 9 ability scores, and should be generic enough to cover diverse things like a magic system, psionics, jedi powers, and insanity. I'd leverage that it's a grid that the initial step in determining ability scores would be ranking the axis, and then the combined would become the

To give an example of the Body column, in D&D it would be equivalents of Str, Dex, and Con (which the whole Str adds to hit taken out). The Force are indications of might and power - forceful and direct, Savvy is about finesse, application, accuracy, and Innate would be more of a resistance or threshold to overcome.

And as in any generic system that uses ability scores, it's up to the DM to make sure that the abilities are useful in every campaign. That there's a use for the Soul row in the police procedural you are running.

 

[Morrus]

If you were hired to create a open licence TTRPG for all genres, but east to be adapted from other system, what attributes or abilities scores would use? The list would be 9-12, not lesser 6.

I did create an open license TTRPG for multiple genres. I went for:

Strength
Agility
Endurance
Intuition
Logic
Willpower
Charisma
Luck
Magic/Psi/Chi (named by genre)

 

[LuisCarlos17f]

My idea is starting with the six abilities scores by d20/D&D because is the most popular or known: Str,Con, Dex, Wis, Char and Int. Then I would add three more: Courage (bravery, resistance against mental stress) Acuity (Astutenes + Perception) and Spirit (luck/karma/fate/guardian angel/divine grace but also hope, faith in oneself). For a time I had thought about Technique as a new attribute for crafting, playing music, dacing or maneuver of martial arts, about actions what need more time, or prelearnt actions, but now I think as a bonus substat feat could be enough.

After buying and reading my Eclipse Phase RPG my head is thinking about Ego+Morpho, and some rule for mind-transfer and digital immortality. (Altered Carbone will be a TTRPG soon).

And I am thinking about character stats with two parts, the level of power and level of knownledge. The first is the classic leveling-up, but the secon if all in the memory of PC and nPCs. This would allow more modulable characters, for example a final boss, or a big fish in the metaplot. The level of power can change for the PCs, but the level of knownledge (all learnt or studied in the memory) would be constant. In online videogames the level of knownledge wouldn't change when the PCs go to lower level zones where they suffer nerfing.

 

[GMMichael]

Luis- I think you're starting to blend skills/proficiencies with attributes. Nothing wrong with that, as long as you can reconcile why the two different things follow the same rules (attribute rules). When games have higher numbers of attributes, this is often what's happening. To put it simply:

Attributes are who you are.
Skills are what you do.

Which is why it's good to see Size in one of the above attributes lists; size isn't something you do! I was also hoping to see Comeliness as well (was that an actual D&D attribute or an optional rule?).

Anyway, I'd go the route @Blue mentioned, and expand three basic attributes (physical, mental, metaphysical) into two or three sub-attributes each. Unless, of course, I'm really trying to adhere to a niche, in which case I'd just cherry-pick a few more attributes.

Sanity/madness could just be a parallel hit points track. But it's more flavorful if you use steps with conditions.

...which ties into Injury levels. If you're going to have three levels of sanity condition, you might as well have three levels of physical condition. Each step gains a condition based on what caused the injury, and when all three are full, you're in trouble. I think Zweihander blends this with a hit points concept. You should check it out.

 

[LuisCarlos17f]

Comeliness/Appearance could be a substat working as a bonus feat for some social interactions. And beauty is subjetive. Sometimes when you are used to see a beatiful thing, for example a gothic cathedral front of your house, it isn't so atonishing as by the tourist who discover it for the first time.

My point of view about Wisdow is different. For me this symbolizes the good sense, the emotional intelligence to understand oneself, the psychological maturity, self-control, making chooses about ethical matters and long-time consequences by your own actions, the gift to give good advices, serenity and inner peace. And also means the sanity, mental resistance against madness.

Intelligence means faster learning and more complex thoughts.

Acuity would be the astuteness + perception (+intuition), noticing about little details as potential clues for an investigation, or the exploration in a zone, but also social manipulation, creativity, improvisation and intutition. In my games the evil clerics would use acuity instead Wisdow. With Acuity the PC is noticing when somebody is lying, but with Wis notices when other is using fallacies or emotional manipulation.

Courage would be useful for horror adventures, but also in mass battles, or warbands skimirshes where troops need morality checks to stand in the fight.

My version of "spirit" is a mixture of "blessed by the Heaven/chosen by the gods" but also willpower, hope and optimism, joy for living. A character with low spirit would be a "jinx", but also may be cynical people with a bitter vision of the life, or a toxic personalities seing only flaws and the worst parts, and even willing to join to the side of the bad guys because he doesn't trust the victory by the heroes. Examples of characters with high spirit would be Mariannete Dupond-Cheng "Ladybug" or Steve Rogers "Captain America", very idelist. Not only would be as the "Con", resistance for your "spiritual aura" against taint by supernatural menaces, but also this attribut also be would useful in games with low level of supernatural elements.

* About the sanity points I don't agree because different characters can bear better or worse according to the cause, for example a veteran solider could face violence better than a erudite, but a pious archivist can stand better suppernatural menaces because his faith says they will saved by a miracle of the Rose of Gualupe (SPOILER: he is right! but Black Dog Games doesn't want you to know this). In the past I suggest a house rule.

* Starfinder has got a system of stamine points. Maybe this is I am looking for. My idea is supernatural creatures with life-draining coulds could get "blood points" for their own "mana pool" and spending theses to use their "discipline powers". And this also would replace the Con reducciont and changing all stats about hit-points, save bonus and like this.

 

[aco175]

I recall when 2e had an advanced book when they further divided the 6 stats further and we had Strength divided in to Power and something like Raw Strength. I do remember trying it and it became unwieldy. I do not think I would like to change D&D since it has been that long and a sacred cow.

I also see where D&D has skills and some of the other systems has some skills as stats, like perception/ awareness. I would look at the skills to see which needs another stat since there is none that really fits and then maybe change or add more.

 

[Morrus]

I recall when 2e had an advanced book when they further divided the 6 stats further and we had Strength divided in to Power and something like Raw Strength. I do remember trying it and it became unwieldy. I do not think I would like to change D&D since it has been that long and a sacred cow.

We’re not talking about changing D&D. We’re talking about attributes of a hypothetical new universal genre RPG system.

 

[dragoner]

Pick any stats, say seven (a cool number): Strength, Dexterity, Constitution, Intelligence, Education, Charisma, Sanity; all skills track to a stat.

 

[uzirath]

Serendipitously, the newest GURPS supplement, released a few weeks ago, provides an extended examination of this very issue: GURPS Power-Ups 9: Alternate Attributes. There's was also a lively discussion on the GURPS forums where people shared their own attribute schemas. For myself, I like the idea of a small number of core attributes that may have linked attributes beneath them. In a point-buy system, you can buy the main attribute for a hefty price which brings up all the sub-attributes, or you can fine-tune the various individual elements. This gives room for beginners and pickup games along with tinkerers who love exploring the weeds.