WayneLigon
Adventurer
Plane Sailing said:
My God, I loved 'WarpWar'. It was the only game I knew about that was diceless at the time, which meant it was perfect for high school before classtime, during lunch, whenever.
I've played three diceless systems; SAGA, Theatrix and Everway.
SAGA
SAGA still has a random element in it, though; it uses cards of varying suits, each with a number. Sometimes the suit matters, sometimes not. You hold a certain number of cards in your hand and discard as you perform actions or (I think) take damage. Your level determines the max number of cards in your hand. It's basically like prerolling your next several rolls and then being able to pick the die you want to use each time the DM calls for a roll. You can insure yourself of a good roll, but that means that a bad roll will eventually come up and there's little you can do about it. When you exhaust your hand, you draw anew. Some spells, actions, etc, can change your hand, cause you to draw again, etc.
Everway
Everway is the first game I ever gave for an Xmas present (mainly because I found a series of them for $5.00 each. Considering it sold for $34.95 in 1995....).
Each character in Everway is rated 1-10 in Air, Earth, Fire, and Water (those are the 'stats'); you also have a rating in Powers and Magic. There are a certain number of points to spread around, according to how powerful the GM wants things. Fire, for example, governs your fighting ability (among other things). Each element has a listing for what each level means; A Fire of 5, for instance, means you are a pretty darn good warrior, capable of defeating X number of foes in single combat. But Fire also governs how well you do several other things, defined by their connection to the active, lively quick nature of Fire.
You also choose a specialty; when acting within that specialty, your score is considered +1; if I have Fire 5 (Singing), then when I sing I'm considered to have a Fire of 6. Combat is done by comparing these values and seeing where that leads you, Tough decisions can be influenced by drawing a Fortune card (a Tarot-like set of cards included with the game).
It's especially good when fighting someone with the same exact stat as you. Two people with a 5 Fire might be fighting, tearing up the landscape as they do so, but both describe their actions and tactics well; the GM can't come to a clear decision, so he decides to use the Fortune deck. He draws Death, Reversed (represents water, an element of mystery and soul); maybe then he decides to compare their Water stats, or maybe one of them falls into a river, or someone slips on a bit of sweat and is defeated, etc, etc,
Obviously, it requires a GM AND players that know what they are doing.
I seem to remember some quote from Wizards saying that it would have been fantastic, if they could have put Johnathan Tweet into the box to run it for everyone). Powers were special powers a character possessed, costing X number of points depending on how Frequent, Major, or Versitile it was. Everyone could have a 0 rank power if they wished, such as the ability to speak all languages, or use all weapons.
Your Magic rating (if you had one) determined how many spells you knew and how potent they were, and how versitile. Each magic weilding person had to create their own magic system and write it down, detailing how their magic worked, what it did, what it didn't do, etc.
You may want to check out Everweb for more info.
Theatrix
Theatrix worked .. I can't even begin to describe it. Look here for a better explanation. I've only played it a few times, but the key to it was in description. It had a nice system, I seem to remember, but wasn't helped by the fact that there were only a couple of settings produced for it, the first (?) being a write-up of Willingham's X-rated Ironwood comic. File that under 'What Were You Thinking Of?'
