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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Blue" data-source="post: 9352355" data-attributes="member: 20564">Haven't read through the thread yet, but let's take one of my favorite superhero RPGs, Masks: A New Generation by Magpie Games.  It's a commercial success, has a bunch of supplements, so we can assume it qualifies as a real TTRPG.  It's a PbtA (Powered by the Apocalypse) game focused on teen superteams - the drama, figuring out who you are, and all that while doing super-powered good.It has next to none of these.  There are a set of labels, which is the closest thing to abilities, though they change frequently.  It has moves - some of them can be used as combat mechanisms but work just as well in social settings.  "Unleash your Powers" is for pushing them, and it could be in combat or to prevent a skyscraper from falling during an earthquake.  "Defend someone" works just as well when your teammates high school rival is putting them down that they'll never find anyone to take to prom as it does when Dr. Lobster has his Crustacean Mech attempt to swipe a civilian off a bridge.  There are no skills separate from these moves.  If you can do it, you can do it.  Want to knock out a lone henchman?  There's no roll, it just happens - you're a super.  Oh, and talking about rolls, the GM never does it.  They have their own sets of moves, and it could be that they do a soft move describing the Crustaceanmech picking up a school bus, and if no one does anything about it, then it could be slamming you with it and inflicting a condition.  No roll needed.  But basically, the same set of moves are available and used regardless if it's combat or not.Health system... sure, kinda.  There are conditions that will affect moves. You can become Insecure, Angry, Hopeless, Guilty, or Afraid.  And if you take all of them you're out of the scene, be it knocked out, run away, or whatever fits the narrative best.Equipment/tools - just like powers, these are just things to justify how you are using your moves to adjust the narrative.  If you can fly, it could be because you have wings, because you have a hover disk, a jet back, or can just float through air.  There's no equipment lists, you don't collect equipment.  There's no mechanical economy at all.  But for instance the Protege playbook comes with resources from your Mentor, like a hidden base or a vehicle.Again, this is a long lasting, commercially successful TTRPG with multiple supplements -- not something to handwave away saying "it's not a 'real' RPG".  PbtA is quite a large category of RPGs out there.Or talke a look at Cortex Prime.  It's a generic RPG, but closer to a toolbox to customize your bespoke RPG.  Earlier versions of Cortex were Marvel Heroic Roleplay - quite well recieved, major IP since it was during the MCU, Smallville (multi season TV show), Leverage (multi season TV show), Firefly (beloved geek classic show & movie).  But Cortex can have abilities or not, depending on what you are going for.  Marvel Heroic Roleplay, as a supers game, has no economy simulator nor equipment/tools that exist outside the "I'm a genius inventor".  Actually, even traditional supers RPGs usually don't - that's just not essential at all.Basically, your list has some quite common mechanics for a traditional style RPG like D&D.  As a share of the market, it's huge because, well D&D is the 800 lb gorilla.  But we can have successful RPGs that don't follow that mold.If we're looking for essential mechanisms, then it comes down to what's common across all of them.  At that point I thnk it's just "a method of determining the results when there is uncertainty".  Nothing else, from dedicated combat rules to ability scores to economy are always found.  I'd be hard pressed to defend the horror game Dread as a full RPG, but it does have that - picking from a Jenga tower every time you try something risky.  Good for building tension as thing progress.</blockquote>

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