Day 20 of #RPGaDay is upon us, and it begs the question:
"Which Game Mechanic Inspires My Play?"
The Fantasy Flight Games funky Star Wars dice.
Fantasy Flight seemed to have taken Fudge Dice and selectively bred them with traditional polyhedrons to create a multi-level resolution mechanic.
Most of the symbols still boggle my mind, but after multiple listen-throughs of the Campaign Podcast and their Star Wars Edge of the Empire game, I grown to appreciate the dice as much as I have the mechanics of a Powered by the Apocalypse game.
Depending on the action involved, modified by bonuses and penalties, you can chuck a bunch of funky dice with different series of symbols. Like the plus/minus Fudge/Fate dice, certain symbols cancel others out.
Once everything that's cancelled out is removed, you have three levels of success.
Success/Failure - Exactly what you think. Multiple successes or failure dice after everything is checked means greater success or failure.
Advantage/Threat - Regardless of what the main result was, something positive or negative happens on top of that. You fail accessing the blast door, but the R2 unit finds a map of the base, or perhaps, a different, possibly more difficult route is found. Or, the blast doors are opened, but trigger an alert to send out a patrol to check out the odd computer error.
Triumph/Despair- These don't cancel out, per se. Triumphs count as a standard success plus an extra boon onto the group. Despairs count as failures plus an unfortunate consequence.
These dice force the players and GM to work together to resolve some of these results. Sure, sometimes giving an extra bonus (blue) die to another player is a default result, but I feel this gives some great actions in the classic Saturday Morning serial feel that Star Wars evokes.
"Which Game Mechanic Inspires My Play?"
The Fantasy Flight Games funky Star Wars dice.
Most of the symbols still boggle my mind, but after multiple listen-throughs of the Campaign Podcast and their Star Wars Edge of the Empire game, I grown to appreciate the dice as much as I have the mechanics of a Powered by the Apocalypse game.
Depending on the action involved, modified by bonuses and penalties, you can chuck a bunch of funky dice with different series of symbols. Like the plus/minus Fudge/Fate dice, certain symbols cancel others out.
Once everything that's cancelled out is removed, you have three levels of success.
Success/Failure - Exactly what you think. Multiple successes or failure dice after everything is checked means greater success or failure.
Advantage/Threat - Regardless of what the main result was, something positive or negative happens on top of that. You fail accessing the blast door, but the R2 unit finds a map of the base, or perhaps, a different, possibly more difficult route is found. Or, the blast doors are opened, but trigger an alert to send out a patrol to check out the odd computer error.
Triumph/Despair- These don't cancel out, per se. Triumphs count as a standard success plus an extra boon onto the group. Despairs count as failures plus an unfortunate consequence.
These dice force the players and GM to work together to resolve some of these results. Sure, sometimes giving an extra bonus (blue) die to another player is a default result, but I feel this gives some great actions in the classic Saturday Morning serial feel that Star Wars evokes.
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