Long time lurker, first time poster.  Greetings All.

The TL:DR; version of my experience with RPG's:  Started playing in the 70's with basic D&D, moved up/on to AD&D 1e.  From there played quite a bit of Rolemaster and Twilight 2000, some Palladium products and one shots of games I don't remember.  By the mid 90's, life got in the way.  I dabbled a bit with AD&D 3/3.5e in the 00's, but nothing serious.  Now I have the time to jump back into the hobby.

So, I have a mechanic/system that has been bouncing around in my head for the last few months.  I would like a second/third/etc. set of eyes on the idea.

A couple of caveats first:
1)   This idea is very crunchy.
2)   This is a skill based idea.  No levels or classes.
3)   This system is designed to be played on a VTT exclusively.  There is no way I can see it being able to be played with a bag of dice, pen and paper.
4)   This idea is very rough right now.  It's mostly at the stage of 'hey this is neat, I wonder if it will work".
5)     This is based in a fantasy, low magic setting.

The basic idea:
12 Attributes, 4 each for Physical, Mental and Social.
Skills improve in Ranks and are based on one or more attributes
Attributes determine the size of the di to be rolled when using a skill based on the particular attribute.  The Ranks in the skill determine how many of the di you get to roll.
The dice are rolled and totalled for a result and compared to an opposing roll or static DC.
The over/under determines how well a character succeeds or fails.

Attributes are based on a range that is specific to each race (yes, I have a setting in mind also), and they reflect each races particular characteristics.  So for a human, STR may range from 20 – 40, with an average of 30.  My version of a halfing, the same attribute may range from 15 – 30, with an average of 22.  I'm still playing with averages/ranges so take the above numbers as just an example for this discussion.

Again, for the purpose of this discussion lets say that the Sword skill is based on STR, and one of the characters in question is a human with a STR score of 30 and the other is a halfing with a STR score of 22.

To determine the di for the Sword skill, divide the attribute by 4 (again, just an example).  This would yield a (D7.5) for the human and a (D5.5) for the halfling.  If the human had 4 ranks in the Sword skill and the halfling had 6 ranks in the same, the opposing rolls would be (4D7.5) vs. (6D5.5).

This is a very basic example.  Obviously the skills are a bit more nuanced that just Sword and Dagger but that is an entirely separate discussion.

The other bits of the system that are relevant:

1)   Armor is damage mitigation.  Heavier armor will absorb more damage, but also make a character slower, depending on skill with the armor.
2)   'Hit Points' are basically static for each race, varying only slightly based upon physical attributes.
3)   A very important Stat for each character is FATIGUE and is derived from their attributes and race.  A character that is tired through combat/lack of sleep/exertion has cumulating penalties to all skill rolls.

Anyway that's it.  I'm not the best at writing technical descriptions so hopefully I was able to convey the basic idea well enough.  I'd be happy to answer any questions.

Ag.

Edit:  Forgot a caveat.

If you are already tracking Fatigue, I would suggest that armor make a character fatigue faster rather than move slower. Not only is this more realistic, but it reduces the number of things you need to track.

Quote from: hedgehobbit on February 09, 2024, 09:58:07 AM
If you are already tracking Fatigue, I would suggest that armor make a character fatigue faster rather than move slower. Not only is this more realistic, but it reduces the number of things you need to track.

Good point, thanks.  And I agree.

Though tracking movement is one of the easier things to do.  It's as simple as, when you can't move your token any more, your movement is used up for the round.  I built that into an initiative tracker I wrote years ago when I did a one shot for a newbie group using 3.5e.

It's up to the players to know what their character's movement rate is and if their not paying attention, then that's their problem.