I have spent too much time thinking about first person shooters for someone who has not played one in years. Here's a sketch of a system encompassing scifi power tools (and, correspondingly, guns). This was written with a (forthcoming? who knows) mashup of Orbiter's Local 519 and Maze Rats in mind, working title: HULK RATS.
In the general course of events, characters have Stamina which is depleted by strenous activity or injury. Every time they become injured, roll (an appropriate type of roll) under your stamina or take Critical Damage. However, when a crisis that needs to be resolved moment-to-moment breaks out, they can rely on a Rush of strength and agility to protect them instead.
Once a character becomes aware of danger, the player may spend points of their stamina up to your level (if your game has variable hit dice per class, two-thirds level for clerics/thieves and one-third level for mages [rounded up]) and roll that many dice. The total is your Rush, which is used for several things:
A player may only roll for a Rush when their character becomes aware of a new source of danger. An encumbered character can't roll up a Rush.
If they have a chance to rest after a crisis is resolved, characters may exchange Rush for Stamina at a rate of three to one. If there is no opportunity to rest, or if there are excess points of Rush after exchanging the rest for Stamina, they are lost.
Listen, there are a lot of different interpretations of HP. This is another one, clearly. Probably someone's thought of it before. A lot of different ideas are coming together to form this: hit dice as a resource to replenish hit point pools (sort of reversed), hit dice being rolled at the start of an encounter, Into the Odd-style critical damage rolls, and (weirdly enough) an example consequence for failing a 4e-style Skill Challenge being the loss of a healing surge (out of combat) or damage (in combat).
Oh, and the rule about spending Rush to take actions while you're being menaced is taken from the Pressure mechanic from OLOG, an extremely cool replacement for Attacks of Opportunity which is (as far as I know) only described in the parenthetical note to the Arsenal ability of the Marine class in this post.
One thing I like about this is that the consequences of surprise/backstabbing sort of comes for free. I also think the Electric Bastionland rule about burdened characters having zero HP fits in very naturally. Not sure what else to say, I just kind of like it.
Though the voyage is not easy, it is known that a mariner who can find the Straight Road can sail beyond the edges of the world and reach the stars, islands of bright light studded into a silent, dark, astral sea, colder than the grave and vaster than imagination.
The first thing an astral sailor must know is that one may not sail to any star at any moment. The Straight Road leads away only to the West, and one may find it only when sun and moon set as one. The astronaut sets their course only by the star that rises opposite the setting of the Sun. They will know their course is true if the heavens cease to turn, their guide-star rising no higher than a beacon from an impossible shore.
(Being a magic system for the marginal and desparate, to be used with these 3e-like rules.)
The world is a cruel and capricious place, over which we have very little power. The power we do have hurts us, it seems, almost as often as it helps. Witchcraft is an attempt to seize control of your own fate by whatever means necessary.
You can use witchcraft to try to make something happen even if it is totally outside of your control. To do so, you need to be able to see, hear, smell, touch or name whatever you want to bewitch, at least in part. You also need one or more of the following:
Roll 1d6 for each of these that you have. If the highest die is a 6, the witching works immediately and completely. If it is a 4 or 5, choose one of those. Otherwise, it accomplishes nothing.
When bewitching beings sensible to speech, witchcraft can accomplish one of two things. It can either curse their body and mind with some sort of disease, or it can mesmerize them for as long as the witch is able to continue muttering the witching under their breath. One mesmerized will take no action other than those commanded by the witch, but each command requires the witch to succeed in a Will attack against their mental resistence.
There are prices to be paid for witchcraft. If doubles were rolled, the Referee interprets the stated intent of a witching in bad faith, if possible. For every 1 rolled, the witch loses nerve or takes damage equal to the number of dice rolled. If triples were rolled, the witching lets something demonic into the world:
| Triple | Demon |
| 1s | 1d6 wisps. If the damage from the witching critically injures you, one of them seizes your body as a ketev. |
| 2s | 2d6 mournful shades of the dead. |
| 3s | An unbound imp, cruel and evil-tempered. |
| 4s | A wraith that knows your name and can wear your likeness as it rides away, intent on mischief. |
| 5s | A wraith whose name you hear as it slips into the world, to bind them with if you catch them again. |
| 6s | A bound familiar, unquestioningly loyal to you til death. |
The third edition Player's Handbook lists more than forty skills in which its adventurers can have ranks. Although prior editions of the game had skill systems (AD&D's Nonweapon Proficiencies and BECMI's General Skills), the 3rd edition skill system breaks with them in two ways:
I'm not going to spill any (digital) ink addressing those points. If you have strong opinions about them, good for you. Rather, I'm going to address the question: where did 3E's list of skills come from?
The third edition of D&D was my first exposure to it and to roleplaying games in general. Although I haven't played it in years and it does a thousand things I find frustrating, but it retains a draw for me. The more I learn about other editions of the game, earlier and later, the more I find myself appreciating parts of the vision for 3e. It's a design itch I don't feel that I've fully scratched yet, so here is some work I've done in various areas towards a 3e-based hack. The one sentence pitch is like: what if third edition was more like into the odd, but it also only used d20s and d6s for some reason.
This post is not going to go into any character creation mechanics (classes, templates, feats, etc) because it's still pretty unclear to me how I'd like those to work.
(With apologies and indeptedness to Spwack's Reverse Owlbear Stew and Phlox's Orbseeker.)
For each stat, roll 3d6 and write down half the total (rounded down) for the stat and the lowest die as the defense (using the highest lowest die for each pair of stats).
Your max HP is equal to the sum of your three defense ratings. Resting a few minutes and taking refreshment restores 1 lost HP after a fight. Taking a night's rest in a safe place restores 1d6 HP. Regular attacks do 1d6 damage, awkward or unarmed ones do the lower of two d6, dangerous ones do the higher of two d6 and things you wouldn't expect someone to survive do 2d6 or more.
To succeed on something that needs a roll, you must roll a d20 under or equal to the relevant stat (Ref's decision) plus all ranks in relevant skills. If this is a roll against an obstacle (like a foe's defense), your roll must be higher [not equal to] the relevant obstacle or defense rating. If this is an opposed roll and your opponent rolled under or equal to their total, you must roll under or equal to your total but higher than their roll.
When you create your character, split 10 ranks between the following skills. You may not start with more than 4 ranks in any skill.
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After an adventure or a season of training, you may roll 2d6 for up to three different skills you exercised. If the result is more than your current ranks in the skill, gain a rank. You can never gain more than ten ranks in a skill.
Characters who carry more things than their Constitution can't have reduce all their defenses by the excess (gear never affects HP). Bulky items count as two things, thrown weapons and similar small stuff can be bundled.
Characters start as fighter B, orbseeker B or fighter A/orbseeker A.
Fighters cultivate their qi in order to perform amazing martial arts. For each template, fighters increase one of their defenses (and therefore their max HP) by 1. Gain a fighter template whenever you defeat a foe that is stronger than you.
Orbseekers roam the earth, seeking communion with mystic orbs. For each template, orbseekers gain one rank in each of two different skills (no skill can have more than ten ranks). Gain an orbseeker template whenever you awaken a new orb.
Anyone who holds an awakened orb may invoke its power, although there is a 1-in-6 chance that an orb falls dormant for a week after being invoked in this way. Awakened orbs call their bearers to one another, even from far away. A list of some sample orbs follows.
Anyone who rests with more awakened orbs than they have orbseeker templates has an [orbs]-in-20 chance to contract Orb Madness from one of them. Only returning the orb that causes madness to dormancy will stop and Orb Madmen from raving portentious nonsense related to that orb's domain. They will fight without restraint to stop anyone who attempts to remove the orb from their possession.
Anyone who gathers seven awakened orbs together and shouts, "eternal dragon, grant my wish!" Causes a terrifying mystical dragon to appear. The dragon will grant one wish (although it has been known to refuse wishes for seemingly arbitrary reasons) before disappearing. The orbs used to summon it fall dormant for one year and are scattered to the ends of the earth.
The various nations of the Major Continent all use the same currency, the zorkmid. It has many boring uses, but its interesting use is prize money. The All Earth Martial Arts Tournament is hosted once every four years. This is a double elimination tournament with sixteen competitors. A competitor loses their match if they concede, touch the ground outside the ring, lose consciousness or attempt to kill or permanently injure their opponent. The first place winner at the Continental Martial Arts Tournament takes home 7,500,000zm, the second place finisher, 2,500,000zm and anyone who wins three matches 1,000,000zm. At a local martial arts tournament, the prize money is usually much smaller.
Some boring things to spend money on:
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Ordinary clothes do not matter in combat. Here is some gear that does:
| Thing | Price (zm) | Effect |
| Martial arts uniform | 2,499 | Martial artists recognize your school. |
| Hard helmet | 4,499 | +1 defense against all physical attacks. |
| Gun | 9,999 | Damage die explodes like QD. Lose all martial arts credibility. |
| Body armor | 19,999 | Minimum defense 7 against physical attacks, reduce damage taken by 1. |
| Sword | 49,999 | Deal dangerous damage, look baddass. |
Characters start with no more than 10,000 zorkmids worth of stuff, and one-tenth of the remainder in cash.
Filth, miasmas and general grime; every human society oozes these evils, more baneful than bassilisks or boggles. Fortunately, every society also produces stalwart defenders against grease and slime: the cleaners.
Start with: broomstick, three leather bottles (1/3 slot empty, 1 slot full) and a bundle of rags. With every draught from a full bottle, roll a d6; on a 1 there is only one draught remaining.
This one's kind of a snippet, but I wanted to write a class that uses the flip mechanic before the rest of the gretchsphere moves on from the idea.
Monsters can't be fought with ordinary weapons. Well, I mean, they can, but it's a mistake. Monsters don't fight in ordinary ways, and if you want to match them you can't either.
+1 HP and Save per template.
The CRASH // LASH
