Thanks, all. I’m thinking of giving my players something like this:
ALL ROLLS
Roll a number of dice equal to your score in a revelant ability plus appropriate bonuses.
Each die that comes up 1, 2, or 3 is a failure (aka “worm” or “traitor”); each die that comes up 4, 5, or 6 is a success.
If you get at least as many successes as the “Obstacle” of the test, you succeed: What you wanted to happen, happens. Getting more successes than required often allows extra effects.
Good roleplaying, clever tactics, or special circumstances can justify ONE bonus die.
Other characters may HELP you with your roll. You can get helping dice from any or all of the other players, and from ONE non-player character. (Your thousand nameless minions cannot each give you a die – just your BEST minion).
Each character helping you gives you either one or two dice: one die if the helper’s relevant ability score is 1-4, two dice if their score is 5 or more.
METAGAME: If you Help another player with any roll at any time during the course of a Maneuver (i.e. session-long or half-session-long sequence of scenes), you may also give them Helping dice on the final roll at the end of the Maneuver.
You may also LINK your roll to a later roll – either by yourself or by somebody else. Explain how your current action lays the foundation for the later, linked action.
If your roll succeeds, the linked roll will get a bonus die. If your roll fails, the linked roll has its Obstacle raised by one (ouch).
METAGAME: If you successfully Link one of your rolls to a later roll by another player – i.e. if you give them a bonus die, NOT if you increase their Obstacle! – you may also give them Helping dice on the final roll at the end of the maneuver.
You may also spend Artha to get bonus dice before you roll, get a bonus die for each “6” you rolled, or to reroll failures: See the Artha In Brief sheet for details.
Only you can spend Artha on your own roll: Other players can give you Helping dice or dice from Linked rolls, but they can’t spend Artha when it’s your turn to roll!
SKILL ROLL SPECIFICS
Roll one of your Skills to do something physical or social. (The technology or other character you’re working with must be established as existing by Resources, Circles, or prior play, however).
Other players may Help you with one relevant SKILL of their own (see above). They may not Help you with their Circles or Resources scores.
You may “FoRK” your other Skills into your roll for bonus dice if they qualify as “Fields of Related Knowledge”:
- You may get ONE bonus die if you have a relevant “-wise” Skill (e.g. “Forged-Lord wise” gives a FoRK die for rolls dealing with a Forged Lord).
- You may get ONE bonus die if you have a relevant Skill that’s not a “-wise” (e.g. Conspicuous can give a Fork die to Command if you want your troops to notice you).
If you have a telepathic Connection to a psychologist character, you get one bonus die for any social Skill roll of your own (your own latent psychic talents have awakened enough to give you an edge).
The psychologist CANNOT withold this bonus die from you if they don’t approve of what you’re doing: You get it automatically – and you only give it up when YOU decide to kick them out of your mind.
Major Conflicts – Firefight, Duel of Wits, and Psychic Duel – involve many Skill rolls and have their own special rules.
The final roll to affect the strategic big picture at the end of a Maneuver (the “Infection” roll) is ALWAYS a Skill roll, never a Resources or Circles roll.
CIRCLES ROLL SPECIFICS
Roll Circles to bring a character into the scene – either a minor character made up on the spot, or a preexisting character you want to contact.
If you spent points in character creation to have a Relationship with another character – be they friend, subordinate, or enemy – you don’t need to make a Circles roll: You can automatically bring them into a scene, unless there are exceptional circumstances (in prison, in a coma, on the wrong planet).
Roll a number of dice equal to your basic Circles score. Give your bonus dice for any relevant Reputations and Affiliations you have.
Circles rolls are easier during Building Scenes, and harder in the middle of a major Conflict scene.
Other characters may Help with their own Circles score: If their base Circles is 1, 2, 3, or 4, they can give you one die; if their base Circles is 5 or above (very rare!), they can give you two dice.
Other characters may NOT Help with their own Reputations or Affiliations, or with their Skills, or with their Resources – only with their base Circles score.
You may NOT get “FoRK” dice from your Skills.
But ANY prior Linked roll may give you a bonus die. It doesn’t matter whether the prior roll was by you or by another player. It doesn’t matter whether the prior roll was using Circles, Resources, or an appropriate Skill.
Since Help is so limited and FoRKs are forbidden, prior Linked rolls are very valuable for Circles rolls!
If you are using Circles to contact someone who has a Reputation, add their Reputation score to your bonus dice: Well-known people are easier to find!
A successful Circles roll against an Obstacle of one will turn up a minor character who is completely average for your social circles: They’re roughly the same social status as you, their attitude towards you is neutral, they don’t know anything special about what’s going on, and any ability score they might use is assumed to be 3.
Increasing your Obstacle BEFORE the roll allows you to look for someone more highly skilled, better informed, more friendly (or more hostile if you’re hunting enemies), or more distant from you in social standing (either higher OR lower).
If you FAIL your Circles roll, you and the GM must decide whether
(1) you just didn’t find anybody, OR
(2) you found somebody all right, but they HATE you (which gives them bonuses against your convincing them to help you).
If you like a minor character you summoned up with a Circles roll, give them a name. You get one bonus die for trying to contact them with Circles again.
If you successfully roll Circles for a specific minor character often enough, they can become a Relationship character, at which point you can contact them automatically at will. (Subtract the total dice you rolled on your Circles test from 10: That’s the number of times you have to contact this character with Circles before they become a Relationship).
You may also roll Circles to FIND OUT information about another character, rather than to bring that character into a scene.
If someone else has been rolling Circles to dig up information on you, you can use your Circles to notice what they’re doing. The higher their Obstacle was, the lower yours is: Your Obstacle is 10 minus theirs.
If you don’t want your own snooping around to be noticed, you can voluntarily make your own roll harder or roll the Inconspicuous skill to do things quietly. (Which penalizes the Circles roll of anyone trying to figure out what you’re doing).
RESOURCES ROLLS SPECIFICS
Roll Resources to introduce equipment into the game: weapons, armor, vehicles, castles, fancy clothes, whatever. Equipment gives you bonus dice on rolls you make using it.
You choose your own Obstacle when making a Resources roll: the higher the Obstacle, the harder the roll, but the more bonus dice the equipment if worth if you succeed. (Choose from lists of standard equipment, or design your own using the “Technology Burner” chapter of the rulebook).
Resources rolls are easier during Building Scenes, and harder in the middle of a major Conflict scene.
Other players may Help you with their own Resources: If their base Resources is 1, 2, 3, or 4, they can give you one die; if their base Resources is 5 or above, they can give you two dice.
Other characters may NOT Help with their own Skills or Circles – only with their base Resources score.
You may NOT get “FoRK” dice from your Skills.
But ANY prior Linked roll may give you a bonus die. It doesn’t matter whether the prior roll was by you or by another player. It doesn’t matter whether the prior roll was using Circles, Resources, or an appropriate Skill (e.g. Accounting or any kind of “-wise” relevant to what you’re trying to acquire).
Since Help is so limited and FoRKs are forbidden, prior Linked rolls are very valuable for Resources rolls!
Other players may also loan you cash by making a Resources roll: Their Obstacle is DOUBLE the number of dice they add to your Resources for one roll.
Other players may even set up a fund on your behalf by making a Resources roll: Their Obstacle is DOUBLE the number of dice in the fund, PLUS ONE, but the fund dice are added to your Resources for an unlimited number of rolls. (Trust fund fun!)
If you’re rolling Resources to obtain your world’s Primary Export (heavy industrial machinery, for Frostvar), you get one bonus die.
If you’re rolling Resources to obtain something Quarantined or Regulated on your world, your Obstacle is increased by one, two, or even three – unless you have a personal connection to the bureaucracy that administers the quarantine and regulations.
You may also TRY to bypass Quarantine and Regulations by going on the Black Market (see pg. 365 for details).
If you FAIL your Resources roll, your Resources are TAXED: You lose one, two, or more Resources dice depending on how hard the roll was (see pg. 361). Regaining these lost dice requires a financial windfall (e.g. loot) or months of honest work – good luck!
If other players Helped you with their own Resources, they are Taxed the same as you! (Players who set up Linked rolls, loans, or funds on your behalf doesn’t risk Tax).
On a failed Resources roll, you and the GM must decide:
(1) you just didn’t get the equipment you wanted, OR
(2) you got it after all, but you are Taxed worse, and it may not quite work right (the worse your failure, the more defects the GM can add to the equipment).
ADVANCEMENT
An ability score – be it a Skill, your Circles, or your Resources – increases based on how often you roll it and how hard the rolls are: the more rolls and the higher the Obstacle you roll against, the faster you advance.
To determine how hard a roll is, compare the Obstacle to the TOTAL number of dice you’re rolling – counting not just your ability score, but also the bonus dice: FoRK dice from other abilities, Linked dice from earlier rolls, Helping dice from other players, Connection die, etc. The easier you make things for yourself with bonus dice, the less you’re challenging yourself, and the less likely you are to learn from the roll!
BUT: Do NOT count bonus dice you get from spending Artha. Artha bonuses are special: It represents your character pushing themselves to the utmost, and that doesn’t make it harder to learn!
If the number of dice you’re rolling is LESS than the roll’s Obstacle, you earn a Challenging test. (And, by the way, you can’t possibly succeed without spending Artha).
If the number of dice you’re rolling is EQUAL TO the roll’s Obstacle, you earn a Difficult test. If your score is 4 or higher, rolling a number of dice ONE HIGHER than the Obstacle also counts as Difficult. If your score is 7 or higher, rolling a number of dice TWO HIGHER than the Obstacle also counts as Difficult.
Any other roll counts as Routine.
If your score is 1, 2, 3, or 4, Routine rolls count towards advancement: If your score is 5 or higher, only Difficult and Challenging rolls count.
The exact number of rolls of each type required to advance is on the “Tests Required” table.
Skills and Circles earn a roll towards their quota for advancement WHETHER YOU SUCEED OR FAIL on the roll: You still pushed yourself and learned something.
Resources only earns a roll towards advancement if you SUCCEED: You can’t try to buy a palace with pocket change and expect your financial situation to improve!
In extended conflicts (Duel of Wits, Psychic Duel, or Firefight), you roll certain Skills over and over, but you only get to count ONE roll towards advancement for each skill. (Usually it’s in your interest to count the hardest roll, but sometimes all you need to advance is one Routine test).