Best Resolution System?

[MoogleEmpMog]

The 1d20 + modifers vs. target number mechanic of, well, d20 is probably my favorite aspect of the system. I like the range and randomness it offers, and the simplicity and speed of figuring out the results.

BRP's d% system is also nice.

The only oddball resolution system I like is the Silhouette Core d6 dice pool system. Roll xd6 (x is usually your skill ranks), take highest roll, add modifiers (usually just your ability scores), add +1 for every 6 after the first, compare to target number.

 

[SweeneyTodd]

I'm a big fan of the system Sorcerer uses. The grainyness would turn most of you guys off (one stat for physical tasks, one for mental, one for magic), but the resolution system is really rockin'.

You roll X dice (where X is your trait) against Y dice (your opponent's trait or the difficulty). Look at the dice, and see how many of yours are higher than his. So 7,6,4 versus 6,5,4 is two successes.

Now take that margin of success, and either use it to do what you wanted to do ... or use them as bonus dice for the next roll you make. What's really cool about that is that it handles any crazy maneuver the player could come up with. Want to insult the guy you're fencing with so badly that he loses his cool and gives you an opening? Will vs. Will, take the successes, roll Stamina + bonus vs. Stamina to finish the fight.

I'm mostly big on the bonus dice for successes rule, as I guess you can see. You could do something like this with D&D, although you'd probably have to reduce the bonuses. (Maybe make a Perform roll to come up with an insulting limerick, and if you succeed, the guy gets -2 AC or something.)

 

[greywulf]

Oh my.... the old choice between linear and bell curves. Personally, I prefer curvy to flat any day, but that's enough of the innuendo.

I go with whatever works. Yes, I go misty eyed at the thought of rolling high in Rolemaster and adding another percentile to the mix ("That's 674 for with my Broadsword. How dead can just one Orc possibly be?!!"). We still play original D&D (using the Cyclopedia rules), and THAC0 works just fine, and I remember with glee (being DM) the sheer lethality of the Traveller combat system. Heck, I'd even defend Marvel's multi-coloured chart if pressed.

Each works within the context of each rule system. Each groks, and groks mightily, and is good.

Mind you.... I'd love to resurrect my homebrew that went something like:

[skill rank]d[power] + [bonuses]

Eg: An unskilled (rank 1) fighter with a longsword (d8) and a +1 fear bonus had to roll higher than an veteran (rank 4) ogre with a huge club (d10), -2 bonus for being complacent = 1d8+1 vs. 4d10-2. The fighter stands a teeny tiny chart of success, and should run away. Difference = HP lost/size of success, etc.

It also meant the players could tell the relative power level from the type and number of dice I picked up. No need to vocalize game mechanics at all, and it scaled beautifully from 1d4 to 20d100 and beyond.

 

[Staffan]

I liked the system used in Alternity: d20 +/- situation die equal to or below your skill value (which in turn was equal to ability score plus skill adds). The situation die could be none-at-all (d0), d4, d6, d8, d12, d20 or multiple d20s - stuff that made it easier gave you a better situation die (either a bigger positive or a smaller negative - you moved along a scale), and stuff that made it harder gave you a worse one. If you rolled half your skill value or less, you had gotten a Good success, and if you rolled a quarter or less you had gotten an Amazing success.

There were some interesting ways of handling things, especially extended tasks. These would allow you to roll once per some time interval (depending on the task), counting an Ordinary success as one point, a Good success as two, and an Amazing as three. When you had gotten enough points, you were finished with the task. If you rolled a critical failure, or too many normal failures, you had failed in the task. Storyteller uses a similar system for extended tasks, but I prefer the d20+situation die vs skill value to the "roll a ton of dice and count how many are over X" method.

 

[Khairn]

Best Resolution System?

IMHO it is Rolemaster

It is straight forward, flexible and can easily be customized.

Some folks find it too difficult to manage, but I've never been intimidated by a chart and the ability to add, so I haven't had that much of a problem.

 

[Psion]

I liked the system used in Alternity: d20 +/- situation die equal to or below your skill value (which in turn was equal to ability score plus skill adds). The situation die could be none-at-all (d0), d4, d6, d8, d12, d20 or multiple d20s - stuff that made it easier gave you a better situation die (either a bigger positive or a smaller negative - you moved along a scale), and stuff that made it harder gave you a worse one. If you rolled half your skill value or less, you had gotten a Good success, and if you rolled a quarter or less you had gotten an Amazing success.

I liked Alternity's dice system because it painted a great compromise between linear and center-weighted systems. For two dice of different sizes, there is a "flat" spot in the middle of the distribution curve (easy to calculate odds for) and tapers at the end (making extreme results less likely).

 

[Chaldfont]

I liked Alternity's dice system because it painted a great compromise between linear and center-weighted systems. For two dice of different sizes, there is a "flat" spot in the middle of the distribution curve (easy to calculate odds for) and tapers at the end (making extreme results less likely).

Its just my opinion, but I always thought this (and, worse, the system from Earthdawn) was kind of gimmicky. It felt like the designers dumped out their dice bag and thought, "ok how can I use all these dice". Which, come to think of it, is kind of what AD&D did.

I feel the same way about the fistful-o-dice systems like Vampire and Shadowrun. Though I have to say much of the charm Shadowrun had for me was its freaky dice mechanic. Feng Shui has another gimmick based on the yin-yang concept: you roll 2d6 and subtract one from the other.

Lately I've discovered the Fudge RPG system and its freaky +/- dice. You roll four six-sided dice each with two +s, two -s and two blank sides. Add them all up and get number from -4 to +4. Add this to your stat (which is an adjective on a defined scale) and find out how you did.It works out to a normal distribution and is very simple to work with in-game. I can't wait to actually try it out.

 

[HeapThaumaturgist]

Oh, I dunno. I think Alternity's system was pretty fun, myself, and the difficulty scale system worked rather nicely. The problem I had with Alternity was the combat system ... roll to hit, roll to dodge, roll to do damage, roll to absorb damage, track damage on 3 different tracks, various settings on various tracks cause different things ...

It had another dose of "realism" I guess, in that a good shot could really mess you up immediately by hitting those Mortal points ... and I LOOOOOVED the way the system scaled up and down so that people felt like they COULD shoot a spaceship with a handgun, but realized why they didn't want to ... and why they didn't want to get shot by a space ship in turn ... without buckets of dice for ships. (As opposed to SWRPG where we're rolling up to 9d10 and multiplying).

But that combat thing ... that's what ruined it for me, for some reason. It would be a great, fast-moving, enjoyable session and we'd get into combat and everything went soooooo .... slooooooooow ...

--fje

 

[greywulf]

FUDGE is a great game. I recommend starting with Five Point Fudge over at http://www.panix.com/~sos/rpg/fudfive7.htmll for the character generation then running from there. Makes for a very good, very fast and flexible system, though it's more of a DIY for role-players than anything. Think IKEA+GURPS.

I've played a campaign or two using FUDGE - it seemed to work better for the more role-playing, less combat oriented games. Animal Musketeers rock!

 

[PJ-Mason]

Interlock

Me too. Its one my favorite systems because it was the first Task/difficulty systems i ever used. STAT (roughly 2-10) + Skill (0-10) + 1D10. I like that a bit better than D&D's resolution (for combat and skills) simply because the D20 (at least in D&D/D20 games) roll supercedes the importance of a character's abilities too much for my tastes.