Deck Based RPG

[kylesgames]

Here's my rudimentary design for a game:

Characters have the following elements:

15-card + action pool consisting of class-linked abilities.
A short character sheet for stuff.
Two pieces of gear, which can have its own modifiers (to give mages more resources for magic, and non-mages better mundane abilities). These may be required for certain actions. Higher quality gear has better inherent effects, as well as more slots for enchantments.

The action pool has four types of cards: 2-action, 1-action, reaction, and enduring cards. All cards have direct functions, with enduring cards having a special phase toward the end of each turn where their effects take place.

Characters typically have multiple resources, which can each be tracked on a single counting die (they do not generally exceed 20). This includes at least health and stamina, though characters may have mana or exotic resources if they have the appropriate classes. Although this could get bothersome, characters are only allowed to run cards that use two non-health resources (i.e. they can use stamina and mana, or stamina and piety, or mana and piety, but not stamina, mana, and piety). This means that nobody will ever need to track more than three resources.

Characters may also become subject to conditions and effects. Play is based on representation in physical space via a grid.

[J.K.Mosher]

So other thoughts just to consider . . .

A limit is needed to give a guideline to player on what is a manageable amount of cards to be at a game with. Too few and the resource gets burned through before any enjoyment can be had, too many and things slow down when search or draw actions are being made. So you should consider some type of limit.

Hands . . . I can see hands being used to indicate such things as memorized spells, or equipment stored in such a way to allow for quick access. Hands can also be used as an action limiter, so if a hand size is say 7 cards, and just for example's sake we assume that a mechanic is that any action made by the player requires a card to be played (i.e. casting a spell) or a card to be discarded (i.e. a deck search for a potion of healing.) You can also use hands to indicate responses, so say a character is targeted with pepper spray, it could be a condition of the "pepper spray" card that the target is unable to act for 3 rounds, unless through will alone they resist the effect, this can be simulated by the player choosing to discard from their hand 3 cards (1 per turn) so that they can play that sweet "Quad Barrel Blunderbuss" card as an attack against they poor npc that pepper sprayed them.

Another consideration to be addressed is how will damage be tracked. Will successful attacks reduce cards in a player's deck or will it be tracked in another method. IF you choose to have damage affect deck size then the inclusion of a graveyard for "lost" and "expended" cards will be needed as will cards/rules that allow players to regain these cards (i.e. small healing potion - return three cards from the grave yard to your deck then discard this card.)

Again all this is just random stuff to consider.

[Anastylos]

Maybe damage is counted with cards. When you take damage you get a random wound card that you can get rig of if you meet the requirements or have a heal card e. g. Fatigue: you can not play equipments, discard a card: ignore this wound for one round, 5 actions: discard Fatigue.

Will the GM have a simmilar deck as a player or something different? I think maybe a different deck could be fun. Maybe he only has some permanent cards on the field like "assault at the main gate" with certain abilities and the task of the players would be to destroy those cards by meeting the requirement.
Maybe he has enemy card in addition to the peril cards.

[Onix]

Maybe an NPC is represented by a single card that the GM can build on. To keep things simple, an NPC card can be modified by a card that says there's more than one. Say a Pair, Group and Horde card. Pair would double the dice being rolled. Group would double it and raise the dice a step (to d8s) Horde doubles it and raises the dice two steps (to d10s).

I think that would go a long way to keep the gm's job of tracking simpler.

I like the idea of wound or fatigue cards. You'd want a good number of them in your deck. If you didn't have a wound card in your hand (I guess we're doing hands) you can collapse a stack (or card chain, terminology isn't solidified in my mind yet). And this consists of a stun or in the case of a group, the group scatters leaving only the leader (since we've removed the group card that says there's more than one).

Placing a wound card collapses a stack and maybe it caps that stack? For example, my arm is wounded and now I can't use it?

Placing a fatigue card caps the stack and doesn't allow any other cards to be placed on it?

What if the player can choose to play fatigue and wound cards on themselves? That would solve the problem of mixing decks. If that's the case though, a wound or fatigue card would have to protect you from something. My first thought is death.

So let's say I've been beaten in my roll, but I have a fatigue card. Normally one of my stacks is collapsed and I'd die, but I can play a fatigue card on myself and survive. What about a wound card? that sounds more dangerous, why would I want a wound card rather than a fatigue card? Maybe you can play a wound on top of a fatigue? Just throwing out ideas. I like that I'd have to stock these cards in my deck to protect myself. They represent a loss, but prevent a greater loss.

[kylesgames]

I picture the GM as not using the same card-based mechanic; as the storyteller, I hesitate to make their stuff random. That said, the nonrandom elements they use are subject to the same rules as traditional card-based actions, they just get to choose from an admittedly much smaller pool.

[Anastylos]

my thought was to have an extra wound deck, where every player draws cards when he is wounded. Maybe it could even be splitted into physical and social wounds. As someone who likes intigue I like the idea of social wounds.

[Onix]

Ok, Lets talk individual cards! What do they do? Why are they cool and how can you prevent them from being abused?