For anyone making an RPG system, I recommend the following systems/ patterns. One Roll Per Action If Alice's PC wants to kick down the door, and Alice rolls a '5', then the roll is '5' for everyone. If Alice's character has a +2 Bonus then the total would be '7', and if another character has a +4 Bonus, then their …

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The time has come to extend the Bluff System . Effects The exact effects would depend on various Skills and Attributes. Possible pre-written effects would include: Knock someone off balance (-3X to their next roll) Gut-punch (-2X to all rolls for the rest of the scene) Bone-breaker (-X to all rolls, until they can …

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The old A,D&D Ravenloft modules were some cheesy shite. Even the most sullen and macabre Goth in Gotham couldn't extract a nugget of honest fear from the campy Hammer Horror rip-offs. But we loved them. Why? Ravenloft began with Dracula-but-with-hitpoints, then added wagons of gypsies carrying plot, Frankenstein's …

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Standard Initiative rules are the devil. Your basic combat action is an Attack roll. If you roll Damage at the same time as the attack, then adding another roll for Initiative means every combat takes twice as long. If you just spent 20 minutes on a combat scene that would have been 15 seconds of screen-time in a film, …

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My third BIND campaign ended in glorious disaster and nonsense which forced me to reforge magic. Lax Theory I had a magic system with a bit of metamagic 'bend', where people could do basic spells (fwoosh, fire!) then add a little metamagic to boost literally any spell (fwshhHHH FIREBALL!). No more 'control person', …

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My RPG games follow a format which avoids railroading, without any need for elaborate settings or difficult NPC relations. I call it 'story weaving', because it lets me stretch the metaphor. Railroads are Inevitable For all the complaints about railroading, computer games suffer from railroads far more than RPG …

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It's hard to read a full adventure module - you keep having to go back and check you've remembered all the important points. And no matter how much you read, you always need the module open at the table, so that you can check it again. Even when you haven't forgotten anything, you still repeatedly check the book in …

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A,D&D gave monsters random treasures like this: Type Gold Silver Copper Scroll Potion Magical Item S 100-600 1-10 - - - - P 100-800 100-400 - 20% 15% - The system goes like this: The players randomly encountered an Owlbear. It has 'Treasure type P'. The DM then rolls 1D8 x 100, and determined that it has 200 cp in its …

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Parallel actions speed up resolution in a way nothing else ever could. 5 Players vs 10 Bandits Look at how the table acts, focussing for a disturbing moment on the players, rather than characters. Standard One-at-a-Time Initiative The GM calls for initiative: Alice, Bob, Charlie, Drake, and Emily roll Initiative. The …

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