My new system: TWILIGHT

[EarthsShadow]

Ok, here is a slightly more thorough look through and some opinions:

First, for the most part I like it.
Second, I am a little confused on making characters and how you set up the fractions and the 1/5ths and how that part works. Maybe I am not getting it but I think that if you had a good example of character creation throughout the steps that showed how to apply the numbers then it would really help people.
Third, I love how you handle skills. That is very sweet. Especially the magic skills and weapon skills. It's good.
Fourth, I like how you handle die rolling. I always like rolling more than one die and its not d20, so that's a bonus for me.
Fifth, you don't need the d20 conversions to help fill it out. You lose a lot of your versatility by going d20. The big thing is that your game is designed around being open ended and d20 uses classes and specific levels, and all the weapon skills would be incorporated into the BaB, which would take away a great thing from your own system.
Sixth, post your magic system!!!!! That is something I want to read now.

 

[s/LaSH]

That TURPS thing was largely facetious...

I think I'll post specific responses here rather than skulking in silence and compile an errata document.

OK, character creation. Let's start building Andre Segovia, acoustic guitarist extraordinaire. (You don't mind, do you, Angcuru?) We can assume he'll be fairly fit, but his mind is his most important asset. He has no noticable magic powers. Thus, we can assign him the following stats: Body 2, Mind 3, Spirit 1.

Going from there, the attributes (measured in fifths) determine how good he is at the various aspects of those three stats. There are nine of these attributes, measured between 0 and 1 in increments of one-fifth. We have twenty fifths to spend. That's an average of 2/5 in each attribute (totalling 18/5, with 2/5 remaining). Got that? If we assume we have 2/5 in each, we can work from there.

Let's assign the extra 2/5 to Appearance and Presence, bringing them up to 3/5 each. And since this character isn't using magic right now, we can drop Power and Channeling to 0/5, freeing up 4/5 we can spend on Appearance and Presence, bringing them both to 5/5 (the maximum).

From there, we can fiddle around, swapping points between attributes. Say we end up with the following:

Body 2
Strength 1/5 (1)
Agility 3/5 (1)
Appearance 5/5 (2)
Mind 3
Dedication 2/5 (1)
Intellect 3/5 (1)
Presence 5/5 (3)
Spirit 1
Power 0
Channeling 0
Fate 1/5 (0)

The fifths will never change (unless Andre decided to change them with experience), but the stats might. If Andre's Spirit becomes 10, he now has a Fate of 2, for example.

Finally, that d20 conversion thing... it's there for completeness' sake. If I wanted to switch my D&D campaign over to Twilight, I could do it quickly and (hopefully) accurately. This is probably egotistic of me, but would it allow me to submit Twilight for the front page news?

 

[EarthsShadow]

Cool, thanks for the example. Now, how do the fifths work with skills, if they do at all? I know the easy answer would be to read the entire document, but most people don't want to, and eventually you are gonna need a FAQ about the game as all games have a FAQ, so I might as well help you with that now.

Oh, your tutorial at the end is very cool. Perhaps I should read that before I ask any more questions but the above question still stands.

 

[s/LaSH]

Fifths have almost nothing to do with skills.

Skills cannot be higher than the attribute they're linked to. Component skills cannot be higher than twice the attribute their parent skill is linked to. The two stack. (Magic can then alter skill totals, but only on a temporary basis.)

Really, you only need to consider the fifths when you're adjusting your character's stats, and that normally only happens between adventures during 'leveling' (if you're playing a game genre that levels often, similar to D&D, as opposed to something with slower advancement). So long as you note down the value (not the factor, which is the fifths part; the value is the stat times the factor, rounded down) of an attribute, you'll know all you need to know during gameplay.

Ideally, the rules should serve as their own FAQ, I think. But if they prove too dense, a big list'o'examples would help, agreed.

How are you finding the time management system? Does it make sense? I had a feeling that would be the true stumbling-block for new players (ie. everybody), but if the fifths thing is the trickiest part so far...

 

[s/LaSH]

Bump. I know it's going to take time to read through all those rules, despite my attempts at modularity.

 

[s/LaSH]

Bump. Anyone got comments so far?

(I'll try to keep these bumps to one a day. And fear not, I will recognise a dead horse when I see it and stop beating the darn thing.)

 

[Numion]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but is it true that you could end up throwing the dice 5 times if you do a 5i action? Once at 5i, once at 4i .. to 1i, if you continue to roll enough successes. If this is true, doesn't it compound the problems of dice pools? I mean, dice pools already have lots of adding up the dice, and in your system there is even more, against varying target numbers.

I'm sorry that my comment is a negative one, since you've put so much work in to this

 

[s/LaSH]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but is it true that you could end up throwing the dice 5 times if you do a 5i action? Once at 5i, once at 4i .. to 1i, if you continue to roll enough successes. If this is true, doesn't it compound the problems of dice pools? I mean, dice pools already have lots of adding up the dice, and in your system there is even more, against varying target numbers.

I'm sorry that my comment is a negative one, since you've put so much work in to this

Actually, you could throw a lot more than that, because once you reach 1i it no longer drops, staying at 1i. If you're very lucky, that is, and once you go through the tutorial you should have an aversion to actions big enough to require rerolls much of the time.

At least it's not requiring a summing up of the dice rolled... counting is quicker, at least in that regard. I think.

I've had other comments on this concept, actually. The reason it's in there is to allow for open-ended rolling, theoretically without limit. It might be worthwhile putting in an option to do away with the rerolls, although that would mean zero chance of super-heroic actions that overcome seemingly impossible odds (example: someone rolls a kingly 8 dice to punch someone in plate mail. Plate mail blocks 10 points of damage straight off. Bam, no success possible. Ever).

Or pursuing a middle ground, in which you can use a Fate point to unlock extra rolls, thus making them player options rather than required actions.

Do those sound like possible concepts? (Bear in mind, they can all co-exist - Twilight is supposed to be customisable, and before I posted it I had a dozen variant rules in the Character Creation section, like 'no XP' or 'attributes are bought with skill points'. A couple more just make it that more flexible.)

 

[Jeph]

My general system-building advice:

Post this where you can get some advice from experienced designers, too:

The Forge

RPG.Net's Art of Game Design forum

Check out Ron Edwards's articles Fantasy Heartbreakers and More Fantasy Heartbreakers at The Forge, they're a big help with FRPGs.

Oh, and make a 24hr RPG. It's a great exercise. Clear a day in your schedule, and create an ENTIRE .pdf, artwork and all, in 24 hours. The site can be found here: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/24HourGames/

-Jeff S.

 

[s/LaSH]

Thanks, I'll investigate 'em.

Edit: Woot! My 777th post!