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[Omegastick]

I introduce to you the SGE, the 'Simple Game Engine'.

Basically, what it is is an RPG engine that is incredibly simple and easy to use. It is a mix of normal roleplaying and a more traditional RPG. Being incredibly simple, but being more in depth than an RTD.

Here's how it works:
There are an infinite number of 'motivations', and every action will go into at least one motivation. Should an action use more than one motivation then use the total of the motivations for the roll.
There are some general skills: combat non-combat and intellect. Every action goes uses at least one skill. Should an action use more than one skill, use the lowest skill as for the roll.
Here's a sample character.

Name: Average Joe
Motives:
 - Passion for music: ***
 - Revenge against the dark lord: ******
 - Love of combat: ****
Skills:
 - Combat: ***
 - Non-combat: **
 - Intelligence: **

When rolling you roll however many d10s as you have motivation points in that action. You roll that against the difference between 10 and the skill value used by the action. You apply any modifiers. A roll of 11+ is always a success, no matter what (unless the DM says that the action is impossible). You then count the successes and if there is at least one (The DM may say you need more in some circumstances) success then you character does what you wanted. If he doesn't then the DM decides what will happen.

So say Average Joe is killing the dark lord with a sword. He has to roll 10 d10s because of his particular motives and needs to roll more than 7 to succeed. Because the Dark Lord is particularly powerful the DM will make the roll needed to succeed a 10. The Dark Lord also has some awesome armour, so half the amount of d10s rolled to five.

Does anyone want to test it?

[ed boy]

I'm up for a test game, but I see a couple of problems:
1-What stops people from having infinite motivations?
2-What about actions that have no motivations? You might not have a motivation to go to work and earn money, but it's something you need to do,
3-How direct will the motivaitons be? In the example. revenge against the dark lord would be used for attacking the dark lord, but would it be used for getting the macguffin you need? what bout slaughtering all the mooks or amassing basic resources that you would need in the task?

[Omegastick]

1) It's a simple case of being fair, the DM will obviously have to oversee character creation.
2) If it's something like going to work then you won't need a test, since that's as simple as moving. But should a more difficult problem arise then it would be up to the DM.
3) Again, it's up to the DM. Although, the example character I used was rather terrible, lots of smaller motivations would be much more effective (so lots of * and **s).

[Omegastick]

Sorry for the double post, but here's a question: Should we play the game with a grid based system or just with text?

[ed boy]

If the game involved lots of elements, the position of which is important, then a grid would be helpful/neccessary.

If the positioning of the elements is not important, then text could suffice.

A grid would involve more time taken to illustrate events in the game, but the events would be illustrated with greater clarity. Grids/maps can be used when necessary, though - some forum games use text as the modus operandi, but use grids when important (such as battle scenes).

[Omegastick]

That last one is good, I forgot about it; for battles a grid system and for non-combat just text.

[Vanigo]

Uh, skills don't appear to do anything. Also, I think putting a flat cap of 10 on difficulty is stupid; even 3d10 will beat that almost every time.

[Omegastick]

The higher the particular skill the easier it is to succeed each roll. You don't add the roles up together, you count the successes. So if you have a skill of 1 in a particular action, then you must roll at least one ten; if your roll a nine, an eight and a five then you won't succeed.

[ExKirby]

I wanna play. How many points for ambitions and skills?

[Squeegy]

No love for Foot Soldiers?

Also, the system seems a little... abusable. You may want to set a few more rules.

[LeoLeonardoIII]

Open games like this are VERY abusable. You could, for example, pick Motivations that are very vague. "Further my desires and goals" would cover everything.

The point, like with many RPGs, is not to start with a superpowerful character. It's to start with a weak, limited character in a challenging environment, and experience satisfaction at the things you can accomplish with him through skilled play.

Although, on a forum we can't exactly expect people to all be willing to look at it that way.

[Omegastick]

@Squeegy: Sorry, it's just a bit too complicated for me.

@LeoLeonardoIII: That's what you have a DM for, to stop people from abusing the system; if people didn't abuse the system then there would be no need for a DM.

[Omegastick]

Double post: I'll wait for one more player before starting the game.