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Advice on a dice system please? (long post)

Gio Mia

Moon
Joined
Oct 6, 2014
Hi everyone, I know I've only just joined this site here, but I've been working on a dice based combat system for an RP I'd like to try out, and I'd like some feedback from some of you who have played things like this please.

I personally have never played anything like dungeons and dragons, or anything of that sort so this whole system is based off of what I've read and my own ideas. So really, if this is just a load of crap then please do be honest - I won't be offended so long as you're constructive and tell me WHAT is crap.

I've formatted the whole thing and put it in a spoiler to help keep this post neat as well as make it more readable, since it is actually quite long and detailed.

Thanks for any help!

The combat system

Stats and what they are used for:

Strength - damage with traditional melee weapons, e.g. sword, axe, hammer, staff
Dexterity - damage with ranged weapons, daggers and knives
Toughness - x10 = health used for physical damage e.g. cuts, impacts, burns
Intelligence - damage dealt with magic, amount healed by magic
Charm - lust 'damage' dealt with teasing and flirting, lust damage resistance
Speed - decides who attacks first and how many times per turn, skill at running away

Sets of stats and gear used for examples throughout this explanation

Player one

Strength - 13
Dexterity - 7
Toughness - 14
Intelligence - 6
Charm - 8
Speed - 13

Using a sword (+5 strength) and shield, no other armour (attacks use strength and cost 4 initiative, +5 armour from shield) Max attack range 2 meters.

Player two

Strength - 8
Dexterity - 14
Toughness - 10
Intelligence - 8
Charm - 12
Speed - 9

Using a longbow and arrow (+8 dexterity), no armour (attacks use dexterity and cost 6 initiative, no armour) Max attack range 40 meters.


Dealing damage:

Raw physical damage formula:

Attack stat used as a base value and added to total, also add any bonus the weapon provides. Roll two d6 dice. First dice roll added to total, second roll subtracted from total. If 6 on either roll, roll again and further add / subtract.

example one:

Player one swings his sword at player two.

13 (from strength stat) + 5 (from sword) + 1 (from first dice roll) - 3 (from second dice roll) = 16 dmg

example two:

Player two fires her bow and arrow and player one.

14 (from dexterity) + 8 (from bow) + 6* (from first dice roll) + 4 (reroll from getting a 6) - 4 (from second dice) = 28 dmg

Note: Example 2's higher damage (despite similar stats) results from the higher bonus from using a stronger but slower weapon, which is a trade-off as player two can attack fewer times per round, but also the roll of +6 on her dice which is essentially akin to a critical hit.


Raw lust damage formula

The charm stat is used as a base value, also add any bonus the clothing provides. Roll two d6 dice. First dice roll added to total, second roll subtracted from total. If 6 on either roll, roll again and further add / subtract. Lust acts as a %, not a value.

example three:

Player one winks at player two and blows her a kiss.

8 (from charm) + 0 (from plain clothes) +5 (from first dice) - 3 (from second dice) = 10% lust damage.


Example four:

Player two teases player one saying she hope's his cock is as hard as his sword.

12 (from charm) + 4 (from tight fitting pants) + 2 (from first dice) - 4 (from second dice) = 14% lust damage


Health, Lust and Defences:

Each character, be it NPC or player, has two pools of hit-points.

The first is called Health, and describes how much physical damage the character can take, this includes sources like impacts, cuts, burns, falls etc. Maximum Health is calculated simply by taking the toughness stat and multiplying it by 10.

The second is lust, which acts as a percentage rather than a health pool. Starting at 0% it increases when lust damage is taken, up to 100% at which point that character is defeated. Since you can't increase the size of the pool, Charm acts as a form of resistance instead, reducing lust damage taken by 0.5% per point of charm.

Example of Health and physical damage:

As in example one, player one attacks player two with his sword and gets a raw damage score of 16. Since player two has no armour, she takes the full 16 points of damage to her health. Her health pool started at 100 (10 toughness, x 10) leaving her at 84 Health afterwards.

Player two's arrow hits player one, and has a raw damage score of 28. Player one is using a shield though which has 5 points of armour, which reduces physical damage in a 1:1 ratio. As a result, player one only takes 23 points of damage. His health started at 140 (14 toughness x 10) so he now has 117 Health left.

Example of Lust damage and resistance:

As in example three, player one deals a raw 10% lust damage to player two. Player two has a charm stat of 12, so this is reduced by 6% (0.5% per point of charm) giving an actual lust damage value of 4%. As mentioned, this is added to the pool which starts at 0% in the fight, unless for some reason player two entered the fight already aroused.


Initiative - who attacks first, and how many times.

What is initiative:

Initiative is a measure of how much your character or their opponent can do in any one turn, it isn't a defined unit of time, it can more accurately be thought of as a type of fuel for actions. It is calculated for each round of combat, and any action which requires time to complete (e.g. attacking, running, using a skill, using an item) will deplete the resource. Your turn ends when initiative hits zero or goes to a negative value.

How initiative is calculated:

At the start of a fight the speed stat is taken as a raw value (for both characters) and is added to the total initiative (starts at 0). Two six sided dice are then rolled, the first value is added to the total, the second value is subtracted.

An example:

Player one:

13 (from speed stat) + 4 (from first dice) - 6 (from second dice) = 11 initiative.

Player two:

9 (from speed stat) + 5 (first roll) - 1 (second roll) = 13 initiative.

NB: Rolling a six when calculating initiative does NOT result in a critical.


How initiative is used:

Actions - e.g. attacking

Players choose all of their actions before the turn starts, but after the amount of initiative they have has been calculated - allowing a strategy to be formed. This example uses the values calculated in the example above.

The first thing that initiative does is decide who goes first, whoever has higher initiative at any given time will go first, no matter what their action. In the example above, player two goes first since she has 13 initiative compared to player one's 11.

Taking an action, in this case attacking, will reduce player two's initiative. As described above her bow is a slow weapon and requires six initiative per strike, so her pool of 13 is reduced to 7 when she fires.

Her 7 is now lower than player one's 11, so it is his turn. Player one also attacks, his attacks cost 4 initiative and so his pool is also reduced to 7. When both players are on an even value the player who acted last (in this case player one) takes priority and acts again before the other's turn. Attacking again, player one's initiative drops to 3.

Moving:

Player two now has more initiative so it is her turn again, however she decides not to go for a simple attack, instead she moves, knowing that player one with his melee weapon will have to chase her. This example assumes the two started face-to face with a negligible distance between them.

Movement costs one initiative per 3 meters moved, regardless of speed stat. Deciding to spend four initiative on movement, player two moves twelve meters backwards, well outside of player one's attack range. Now on even initiative it is still her turn, so she ends her turn by spending her last 3 initiative by firing her bow again. It does not matter that she only had three left and the attack cost six, going to a negative value simply ends her turn.

Player one cannot attack at this range, so he spends his last three initiative to move closer, putting his initiative at 0 and his range at three meters. Movement does not allow a player to move into a negative value of initiative, so the turn ends with player one and player two three meters apart.

The end of a round:

Rounds of combat end in one of four ways.

1. As above, initiative of both sides runs out. A new round is started, with any damage or lust damage dealt carrying over into the next round.

2. Either a health pool is reduced to 0 or a lust pool raised to 100. The player who's pool maxed out loses the fight.

3. Running away - this uses all of a character's initiative pool on that turn, but gives them a chance to escape the fight without a winner / loser scenario.

4. One party yields, they are deemed to have lost the fight but without having to go through the act of actually being beaten. May make the winning party less likely to abuse the loser. This can be done at any time prior to a loss or win.
 
Oh oops, It was a case of forgetting to remove it from the bottom list, rather than forgetting to define it! I removed it early on in planning while I was still working things out for simplicity, it's no longer involved at all. Will edit.

Thanks!
 
It looks good to me in theory, but I noticed your examples all use fairly even stats, so I took the liberty of plugging in some less even ones and mocking up a few fights...

Basically if you set all the attributes for one player at 10 and all the other's at 8 it becomes nearly impossible for the player with lower stats (despite it only being a small gap in all) to win. Not sure if that's something for you to look into. I'm not really sure how to fix it though since I'm not really a player of this type of game myself, just wanted to highlight a possible issue.
 
Urgh, you're right, I just tried it myself too. I noticed that lust damage goes up far slower too which makes it not really viable in a fight, I think I need to go back to the drawing board on this one...

Thanks for pointing that out.
 
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