Spes Magna Games

The badlands world of Rigel presents several challenges to its population. The absence of indigenous life above the microbial level means that food must be either imported from off-world or grown locally from non-native stocks.

Unfortunately, Rigel’s soil is slightly toxic. Elaborate cleansing and filtration systems are necessary to provide potable water and arable land. Rigelian social groups struggle for control of these resources; the losers get a small share to prevent open warfare. The needed resources have become the foundation of the Rigelian monetary system.

Tags: Stars Without Number, Tiamat's Throne

For Tiamat’s Throne, I want to accomplish three things:

1. Create an interesting sandbox setting for sci-fi/fantasy gaming.

2. Increase the amount of narrative control the players have over in-game events.

3. Reduce the prevalence of binary action resolution.

I think I’ve got a pretty good handle on number one. The handles for numbers two and three, however, were proving rather slippery. I want something that can be attached to Stars Without Number (SWN) with a minimum of disruption to the core rules.

In other words, the narrative control elements need to be like a prepositional phrase in a sentence. You can remove a prepositional phrase from a sentence and still have a sentence. Whatever I add for narrative control needs to be the sort of thing that can be left out of the game completely without impacting playability. This way, a gaming group that doesn’t like changing the scope of narrative control can still use SWN and Tiamat’s Throne without having to rewrite the rules.

Dungeon World (DW) appears to provide the means by which I can accomplish goals two and three in one fell swoop. Let’s look at how this might work with combat.

Success, but…!

In DW, failure within a certain range below the target number isn’t necessarily a failure. (I’m thinking the range will be within 3 points of the target number for combat rolls.) Let’s call this kind of failure a qualified success. When a qualified success occurs, the player should have a choice between at least two options, one of which grants a some degree of success coupled with a negative consequence. The exact nature of the qualified success depends on the player’s narrative input, and it starts with in-game narration of the desired action. For example:

GM: While you’re in the corner trying to open the door into the abandoned station, you hear a hiss just in time to turn and see a Denebian ripper lunging out of the mist, claws extended and jaw snapping.

Player: Ag! I duck out of the way, trying to get behind the beast while blazing away with my automag.

GM: Sounds good. Roll away. Three defense checks versus 25 and one attack roll versus AC 5.

Player: Three! Yipes! *dice clatter* Defense is 25, 22, and 7. Crap. Attack is a 12, which means I hit AC 8, even with burst fire.

GM: You easily evade the first attack. The other two, not so much. You can get behind the beast, but you’ll get raked by a claw in the process, or you can stay in front of it but avoid the claws entirely.

Player: Let’s get behind it. I don’t want to be pinned into the corner.

GM: Alright. You also get bit. The ripper’s claws and fangs tear through your flesh as you dive around it. *dice clatter* Take 7 points of damage. The beast now has its back to you. The impact and injury spoils your aim, but your attack roll is a qualified success. Thoughts?

Player: How about I still hit, but I slip and end up on my back?

GM: Sounds fair. The bullets thud into the ripper’s hide as your rush by. Unfortunately, you only make it about fifteen feet before you lose your footing on the icy ground.

Considerations

As with DW, this sort of action resolution pretty much removes many considerations related to initiative and tactical movement from the game. The same idea can also be applied to saving throws and skill checks, but the qualified success range for skill checks probably needs to be more narrow since skill checks are based on 2d6 rather than 1d20.

More thoughts on this topic will be forthcoming.

Tags: game play, Stars Without Number, Tiamat's Throne

Well, I finished reading Dungeon World Guide, written by Eon Fontes-May and Sean Dunstan.

I’m impressed. While I doubt I’d ever get to play Dungeon World anywhere outside a convention, there is so much about what Fontes-May and Dunstan describe that fits the vision I’ve long had for how any role-playing game should be run.

Go to the link in the first paragraph. Download the free guide. Read, and be inspired.

Tags: Dungeon World

In Stars Without Number, the combat roll has a target number of 20+ on 1d20, subject to the following modifiers:

+ target’s Armor Class
+ attacker’s Combat skill
+ attacker’s attribute modifier
+ attacker’s Attack Bonus

That’s pretty simple, but I like for the players to make defense checks when their PCs are attacked. If I’m going to do this with SWN, I need to modify the combat roll.

A PC has a Defense Value equal to Armor Class (including Dexterity modifier). Thus, an unarmored PC with no Dexterity modifier has a +9 Defense Value. Armor adds to Defense Value an amount equal to 9 – the Armor Class provided by the armor. For example, a combat field uniform is Armor Class 4. It adds +5 to Defense Value.

Every enemy has an Attack Value equal to 19 plus (Combat skill + attribute modifier + and attack bonus). To make a defense check, the player rolls 1d20 + Defense Value. If the total equals or exceeds the enemy’s Attack Value, the PC’s defense succeeds. A natural 20 always succeeds, and a natural 1 always fails.

Consider the magovore invader versus a normal, unarmored human. This monster has a +6 attack bonus, which means it would have an Attack Value of 25. Using SWN core rules, the invader would need a 5 or better on 1d20 to hit the human (5 + 6 attack bonus + 9 Armor Class = 20 total combat roll). Using the defense roll, the human’s player needs a 16 or better on 1d20 (16 + 9 Defense Value = 25) to save his PC from the invader’s serrated beak.

Let’s consider a more complicated example. A PC with a 16 Dexterity is wearing combat field uniform (Armor Class 3) is fighting a level 3 warrior with a 14 Dexterity who is skill level 2 with Combat/Projectile Weapons. The PC’s Defense Value equals +15 (9 + 1 Dexterity + 4 armor). The enemy warrior’s Attack Value equals 23 (19 + 1 attack bonus + 1 Dexterity modifier + 2 Combat skill).

Using the normal combat roll, the enemy warrior would need a 13 or better to hit the PC (13 + 1 attack bonus + 3 Armor Class + 1 Dexterity modifier + 2 Combat skill = 20 total combat roll). Using the defense roll, the PC’s player needs an 8 or better on 1d20 (8 + 15 Defense Value = 23) to not get shot.

You might by this time be wondering, “Why do this?”

Good question, and I have what I think is a good answer. For a while now, I’ve wanted a way to introduce more narrative control into the standard RPGs. Narrative control shifts responsibility for describing game action from the GM to the players. I’ve experimented with a couple of ways to do this before, but they didn’t really seem to work (perhaps because I didn’t stick with them long enough).

I’m convinced that placing the burden for all attack rolls (and saving throws, but that’s another topic) on the players’ shoulders is key to giving the players more narrative control over the game. My recent readings here and there about Dungeon World (published by Sage Kobold Productions) have only further strengthened this conviction (but that too is a topic for another post).

Tags: Stars Without Number, Tiamat's Throne

I’ve been writing/thinking about magic in Tiamat’s Throne. I want the setting to be science-fiction/fantasy, in that order. Magic is real, but science is realer. Magic is a comparatively new addition to the our universe, having arrived, so to speak, when the barrier between our universe and the universe of the dragons was sundered. Our universe can be affected by magic, but it resists such effects.

Here’s some of the fluff text I’ve written about magic:

“What can be perceived is real. What can be perceived via our normal senses is the natural world. What cannot be perceived via our normal senses is the supernatural world. Magic starts by observing the supernatural world. From observation, the wizard moves to imposing his will upon the supernatural world. Magic always requires an act of the will without which no magical effect is possible.

“The supernatural world affects the natural world through wizard’s act of will, which directs and transforms eldritch forces. Such effects, however, have vanish over time as eldritch energies revert to their original form and the enforced connection between the supernatural and natural worlds breaks.”

One of the consequences of this way of looking at magic is that no magical effect can have a permanent duration. Some clarification is perhaps in order. A fireball burns down a house. The magical effect, the fireball, goes away. The natural effects of the fireball, the destroyed house, remain. That only makes sense. The damage inflicted by magic shouldn’t go away when the magic does.

But since magical effects cannot be permanent, that does mean that, among other things, there aren’t going to be many magic items (if any at all). The process of placing a permanent enchantment to create, say, a +1 sword cannot be accomplished in our universe. A wizard might be able to temporarily enchant a weapon, but that enchantment cannot be made a permanent feature of the weapon.

This limitation on magic requires me to alter some spells as well. For example, wizard lock has a duration of permanent until dispelled (according to the old-school open content source I’m using for spells). In Tiamat’s Throne, however, no spell can have a permanent duration. I’ve not made up my mind yet about what I’ll change permanent durations to. These changed durations are likely still going to be lengthy, and they’ll almost certainly vary depending on the spell. My version of wizard lock will probably have a duration measured in days.

Even though magic is a potent force and wizards enjoy a greater variety of choices than psychics, neither magic nor wizards can replace high-technology. A feinos wizard isn’t going to wade into battle, lobbing spells from his magic staff while protected by magic rings and robes. For protection, he’ll likely need armor, perhaps augmented by a shield spell. Sure, he can throw some magic missiles or tear through enemy ranks with a lightning bolt.

But when he’s used up his mana, there aren’t any magic items to fall back on. Not even scrolls. He’ll eventually end up pulling that sidearm and blazing away like a warrior, but without the benefits of the warrior’s better attack bonus and training.

Tags: Stars Without Number, Tiamat's Throne