Modular games?

[kylesgames]

Playtest went well tonight. I'll be polishing up the adventure/setting guide I used, fixing some errors, and posting it and the core rules up here.

I added in a secret mission system off the script, and one of the players got lucky and managed to just not get shot (not "dodging", just not getting hit) while successfully taking out a VIP and one of the other players.

Thoughts:

Solidify combat difficulty levels. Having two rolls and a standard damage amount seemed to be more fun than rolling damage.
Add in a critical hit/miss system. My players were really sad not to have one.
Add NPC stat blocks.
Flesh out some rules for the setting.
One page modules worked really well at keeping rules on topic.
Add examples to text where possible. I probably don't need two appendices in the ABACUS section.

[Rob Lang]

My players would be gutted if there were no criticals.

One houserule we tend to do is that if there is a critical fail, the rest of the players control the narrative. Players love being mean to each other/themselves in the name of comedy!

[kylesgames]

Here's a rough version of everything from my playtest after some updates.

http://files.homoeoteleuton.com/D20mPrerelease.zip

It's still in .odt, so you'll need something that can read it. Iunno if Microsoft ever added support in Word, but I'm using LibreOffice 4.2, so hopefully it's pretty widely compatible.

Currently I'm working on a rough augmentation system for my Orchestra setting, and I'll probably go back and give everything another pass of polish before it gets to the first "final" version, I just don't have enough time between when I first wrote it and now to give it a truly impartial second glance. I also need to re-do some of the Abasalon Heights stuff, just to make it more clear, give it more definition, and whatnot.

I'm also going to make D20m-H-Optionals which will include critical hit rules in a couple flavors as well as a couple more interesting things. Feel free to give any thoughts.

[Chainsaw Aardvark]

What you have looks pretty good, but I still need to air two misgivings.

First of all, the single page per rule/ concept is a neat idea, but it does make indexing or finding what you specifically need a bit complicated.

A somewhat bigger problems is that already exists. On one hand, the base game is about 1100 words and a few sheets of paper long. On the other - there are hundreds of supplements already made (1200 or so according to the link above.) (A less overwhelming version: )

I am not one to say the world needs less games, but I'm not sure this concept really does your setting service. Worlds should be holistic, and aspects like magic shouldn't be "take it or leave it".

[kylesgames]

The reason for the interchangeable pages is mostly for different tastes. It does get a little messy, but I hope to put stuff together into single books of both just the rules and rules+setting configurations once I have versions done that are not going to change every two days.

I keep the core rules short not necessarily because it's a design decision but because I want them to be interoperable; if you like ABACUS but don't like my combat or gear, you can make your own rules that work differently. If you want to run D20m with WOTC-alike compatible stuff, you can simply load up different rules.

Likewise, the fact that everything is built in interoperable and rather small separate units means that you can customize a setting more thoroughly without having a lot of stuff; sort of like how SRD's make Pathfinder or WOTC d20 accessible, but to a more extreme degree.

My H-line is notably different than the traditional d20 system in a number of ways:

Opposed combat tests that replace rolling damage for dice.
Unleveled design with a point-buy system.
Damage and dying functions in a significantly less "goblin-dice" manner, with going unconscious and dying not being tied to a universal -10 HP system but instead being more akin to overflow damage in Shadowrun.
Replace a universal BAB with individual weapon skills.
The inventory is more abstract, and is based on both weight and bulk.
Fewer discrete elements (though microlite does similar things).

In particular, it's also different from microlite because it attempts to be very full-featured, but do so in a concise manner that requires as few elements as possible.

EDIT: The idea is not necessarily that settings are modular, but rather people use the rules that apply to their settings. For instance, if you wanted a cyberpunk fantasy, a la Shadowrun, you just bring up the appropriate rules. Basically, the idea is that when writing a setting you can say "Use these modules" rather than having to work out how the rules work specifically in each. If you need custom rules, you can then make your own, but a lot of stuff that I've seen in terms of homebrewing settings is fine with a generic approach to most things followed by a specific approach to some things.

[Chainsaw Aardvark]

Thank you for the clarification on differences. More games really should have an introduction that explains how it is unique or key ideas.

Games live mostly on the draw of their settings, not the individual mechanics. Nothing is wrong with universal systems, but you need to provide content to go with them. Perhaps alternating One page rules, one page setting?

Another idea, would be to make the pages double sided, with fill in the blank areas on the back. Playing a mage - the rules are on one side, and the book keeping for what spells and components you have is printed on the reverse.

It occurs to me that you could pretty easily turn these pages into pocketmods, though I can't think of a great reason to do so at the moment.

Moving on to formatting, you could use a bit of editing. You should be using paragraph indentation rather than line breaks between every paragraph. This should save some space that will let you use larger bold sub-headings to call out important elements. Try to make sure all your lists are presented the same way - indented with bullet points would be a good choice.

You reuse words a lot, and start many paragraphs/sentences the same way. This repetition makes some parts unclear and the text uninteresting to read. I know it is short, but variety will assist comprehension.

A singular list of all the supplements and what the labels mean (what is the H in the tittle mean?) would be kind of helpful, as would a "read this first" or making rolling+core and glossary one base module, and then adding each new part as a single page.

I'm busy tomorrow, but maybe I'll try to add a one page setting or psi chapter soon. Keep up the good work.

[kylesgames]

I do need to make more introduction material. Right now I'm writing for a total novice and not really worrying about why someone would be playing my game over other peoples'. Largely, I focus on very fast resolution, scaleability, and general liteness, as well as focusing rules into simple segments based on what is done.

Yeah, setting is really needed soon. Most of the stuff I'm working on now is setting; the seven or so modules that I suggest for a generic game need polish and they're basically just a framework for GM's who like to DIY stuff. I should probably mention that Absalon Heights is the setting. Once I get a combined PDF distro together there will be a page that gives more background information and also gives advice on each of the modules. The one page thing is really mostly for the core modules at this point; Augmentations is 3 pages and growing.

Formatting is definitely something to look into. My gripe with doing a traditional indented setup rather than linebreak is that I feel (perhaps without a good reason) that it contributes to reader fatigue more easily and also makes it easier to make errors while reading, but it's definitely a less information dense and much less common method of handling formatting. I'll try the old-school way and see how it works out.

As far as the -H thing it's just my personal brand (Homoeoteleuton) applied into a shortened form that doesn't sound weird or vaguely offensive. I have considered dumping Rolling and Core into the same module, and I probably will once I edit them. I was going for an approach that has a discrete Storyteller and GM, and essentially handling the definition of player roles in core and then the core mechanic in Rolling, but I'm probably going to merge them.

I also need to set up something to list and archive different D20m modules. I was going to write my own software for a database just to keep in practice, but I've been using a TikiWiki for the Degenesis SRD and may make one for d20m. Again, the single page thing is more to keep the core mechanics small enough that they easily interface with other modules; I'd draw a diagram but I'd probably mess it up right now, but there's basically a bridge connecting rules and setting; at the most abstract point the modules cover exclusively rules, and basically consist of as little as possible. As you cross the bridge it needs more supports, so modules get bigger (Augmentations is almost 5 pages, ties into Orchestra lore, and it's not even done). As you leave rules behind, stuff touches almost entirely on giving setting information, and basically throws being concise out the window.

Right now I'm more focused on dumping mechanics for Orchestra (and the new criticals mechanic, which has discrete skill use/combat use effects) into existence. I don't know when I'll get a fullish setting guide into existence; the first version of Orchestra I wrote out took two weeks and was about forty pages long. That's significantly less than my current writing speed, but I've also had issues with my honors thesis that mean I shouldn't be devoting too much time to other things and much of the time I dump on this will be "time-off" stuff that's not from my prime working hours. I'm also going back for a hard edit on most things; I wrote everything up in basically four days between Monday-Thursday, even though I started work earlier (I just got very little done), and most of my work on the stuff has been pretty sub-optimal for me. There's definitely editing needed, particularly on the -a modules, and it's probably been long enough since the time of writing for me to catch most of the mistakes I've made. I also need to get some of the stuff I used to do on my old computer set up again so that I catch the frequent word thing, since it's certainly something that occurs a lot when I am tired.

[kylesgames]

I got wrangled into running a Pathfinder game (and by that I mean to say that my ex-roommate's girlfriend expressed interest in one, and I decided to do the GM'ing because I haven't really run Pathfinder in a serious capacity before and my group members who have GM'ed Pathfinder before have travel issues), so I've been doing a high-fantasy setting design as my main thing all week, but I hope to also wrap up and package the -b and -c lines of stuff for d20m into a single package and include the new Augmentations module as an example for more complex rulesets that span multiple pages.