Basically what if we all got together and created our own system for forum roleplay's that uses stuff such as dice, stats, character sheets etc so there's some other sense of character advancement and some limit to what characters can do rather than just what's typed in the post goes?

Any starting ideas?

I'm think we start with the core.
Abilities such as:

-Strength
-Dexterity
-Constitution
-Intelligence
-Wisdom
-Charisma
-Attractiveness

But instead of simple point buy for abilities alone like in D&D it's more GURP's like in the sense each RP has a set amount of points to spend on characters, but these points can be spent anywhere, skills, gear, contacts, abilities, you name it, and some things like flaws/disadvantages can be taken which give you more points to spend.

Though we'd have to be careful to allow this to still be open to creativity in the RP, and be vague enough that people don't mix-max they're characters and take away from roleplaying, but in depth enough to add some kind of structure to the RP and character.

Turt has a similliar system up already here.
But I'm looking for something more expansive/complete that can encompass any RP style/setting that has a clear way of making, generation and improving your character.

I love creating systems. Only earlier I was mourning the loss of massive stat based, numerical system RP based on space fleets. It had a lot of effort poured into it and I only realised it's now lost, earlier today.

In other words; yes. I am totally in.

Honestly I'd say it really depends on what you're trying to do and then it's just a question of making the mechanics help work those aspects in

Darkmatter said
I love creating systems. Only earlier I was mourning the loss of massive stat based, numerical system RP based on space fleets. It had a lot of effort poured into it and I only realised it's now lost, earlier today.In other words; yes. I am totally in.

Great, I think we need to cover the basic's first.
I'd personally rule against making something like a background list where the choice effects stats.
That just leads to making the history around the stats, not the stats around the history or character.

As for what to add, I think we need to be in agreement of the main attributes/ability scores.
Then after that look to something such as skills, feats/advantages etc.

I know Turt has a system a bit like this made already which I'll link above in the 1st post.
But I'm aiming for something not pre-existing whose sole purpose was to be used in forum RPs.

Then as far as dice, I'm against using the D20. It varies way too much I find much of the time.
I'd rather see something like 3d6 where you can get really lucky or unlucky, but you're far more likely to do typical/normal.

Jerkchicken said
Honestly I'd say it really depends on what you're trying to do and then it's just a question of making the mechanics help work those aspects in

I'm mainly looking for a base general system.
Enough that people can pick up the base system and use it in their RP as is.
But people can easily add and customize it to fit their campaign setting.

The use being how normally in RP's you have grey lines with capabilities and god modding, cause someone thinks something should be possible but another doesn't. Or some people simply make more powerful characters. This allows characters to be measurable in power level to make it easier to allow/disallow characters and gives clear limits so there's less debate in terms of God Modding.

I think maybe 3d6 could work. I'm more than willing to work on preliminary numbers.
Also I think maybe something more fluid could work as regards background and/or perks/traits. Defining a set is all fine but allowing other players to suggest and create is best for everyone imho. Just requires the player to accept the GM's decision and the GM to willingly test out the numbers and fairness of a proposal.
When the guild is more functional I'd certainly be interested in hashing ideas out in more depth.

Defelently leave it open to GM and player to create and add to it.
I'm really looking for a general system that could work for any forum RP but is easily open to alteration and fixing if needed.

that might be tricky as something like fate which is stated to do everything in terms of genre loses some robustness compared to crunchier systems in exchange for being light.

But yeah core mechanic should be add Skills and Traits for relevant action and roll 3d6. Unsure if you want exploding dice which makes things funky.

Or how you want to deal with things like super powers or flashy shonen anime type fighting moves.

Also things like health and fights.

People can use their own things to dice roll until Mahz can add his own on the site.
I know they wanted it for a while now so it will get here eventually.

Can't account for everything though like insane powers, hence why I'm trying to make this open.

I think we need to start with the basics and then slowly expand to more complex and expansive elements of it.

Well the basics would be defining attributes.

And currently I have the seven: Strength, Dexterity, Constitution, Intelligence, Wisdom, Charisma and Appearance.
I'm wondering if others think this would work or if we need to change these somehow.

Too D&D and kinda redundant. Keep Str, dex, Int, and char. Appearance should only be a stat in games where it will be relevant enough worth making it. And really it's better served by being some sort of advantage to give modifiers when relevant.

Most rpgs today that I have seem to split skills and traits into like a tripartite of: physical, mental, and social. And I don't see anything wrong with going with that design choice.

Anyway for the basics it should be roll over with dice plus stat&trait. Skill and traits should be capped at different values for default games and only tampered to fit the game mood. We totally need to come up with a difficulty system and range as base dice value goes up to 18 which is something to consider

Good point on the ability scores.
I like the Strength, Dexterity, Intelligence & Charisma idea better.
Appearance being a trait/advantage makes sense, it works that way pretty well anyways in GURPs.

Difficulty, I would rule go a bit D&D logic. It should take 4 to 5 'encounters' without rest to exhaust your resources and put you in huge danger.
Giving liberties to do less encounters in a day but make them more challenging for more intense RP's.

Though players fighting something equal to their own power level should be rare moments, since each of those have a 50/50 chance of total player death or failure.

Adding a set amount of encounters really restricts it for shit that isn't D&D, as not all games will be reliant on that type of design. Also time passage and the handling of it is much more open on forum play than live.

Instead of doing point buy (which lends itself to Min-Maxxing) instead do an array of points. The GM decides the 5 scores. (This will also be a good way to set up a base power level.)

The only issue I see with making a forum specific rule-set is...



E: Speaking of Which, I should be working on my Cyberpunk Hack

Good point on encounter limits... :/
I guess just purely of stats giving some kind of realistic limit.

Arrays might work. But restrict certain character ideas way too much. Plus the point of a forum focused system is there is none currently. So it's all second hand and poor adaptions ATM.

I strongly disagree with "poor adaptions" as the hacks I'm using are almost perfect for forum posting.