RPG Design Patterns

Currency, Game Master, Generalized Contest, Hit Points (“Health”), Idiom (“Spiritual Attributes”), Last Man Standing, Point Spend Attribute, Priority Grid (character generation), Rank, Skill, Trait (“Spiritual Attributes”), Wound Trait

In creating a character, a player must decide upon the order of his priorities for the character. The various priorities are: “Race and Sorcery,” “Social Class,” “Attributes,” “Skills,” “Proficiencies (& Vagaries),” and “Gifts and Flaws.” The player essentially ranks these in any order. Once these are set, the player knows what choices he has in each priority. For example, the only way for a player to obtain a magic-wielding Fey character is to set “Race & Sorcery” as the highest priority. This, in turn, means the character sacrifices in other areas. He may have fewer points to spend in Attributes, have a lower social standing than other characters, or have fewer gifts or more flaws.

Characters have five “Temporal”, five “Mental”, and five “Derived” attributes. During character generation, players have a number of points to distribute between the Temporal and Mental attributes. The quantity of points he has to distribute depends on how high a priority he sets on the character’s Attributes versus other concerns. The Temporal attributes are: “Strength” (ST), “Agility” (AG), “Toughness” (TO), “Endurance” (EN), and “Health” (HT). The Mental attributes are: “Will Power” (WP), “Wit” (Wit), “Mental Aptitude” (MA), “Social” (Soc), and “Perception” (Per). The “Derived” attributes are: “Reflex,” “Aim,” “Knockdown,” “Knockout,” and “Move.” The values of the derived attributes are calculated from the Temporal and Mental attributes by various formulae. In addition, characters have a number of other attributes, including “Insight Points,” “Fatigue,” “Pain,” and “Bloodloss.”

Most importantly, characters possess five “Spiritual Attributes” taken from a list of 6 possibilities, including: “Conscience,” “Destiny,” “Drive,” “Faith,” “Luck,” and “Passion.” Some of these options can be chosen more than once. Players have seven points initially to distribute among those selected. Since they are selected by the player rather than being universal for all characters, Spiritual Attributes are not technically attributes according to the definition given in this book. Rather, they are traits. The Spiritual Attribute categories themselves are well defined, so they almost satisfy the definition of “skills” rather than “traits.” However, once they are selected, the actual traits are customized by the player according to his character concept. These spiritual traits provide guidance on how the character should be role-played and form an important basis for rewards in the game. So, Spiritual Attributes would actually be classified as Ranked Idiom Resource Traits. That’s quite a mouthful, but they bring together a lot of concepts and truly form the heart and soul of The Riddle of Steel, so it is not surprising that they pack a powerful punch in design pattern terms.

The Insight Points attribute equals the number of points that have been spent from the Spiritual Attributes on various other skills and attributes. Insight allows bonuses on the next character to be created after the current character dies or retires.

Finally, characters have lists of skills, gifts, and flaws.

Conflicts are resolved using dice pools of d10s, whose size incorporates various factors such as Reflex, Weapon Proficiencies, the all-important Spiritual Attributes, and other considerations. The dice are rolled and the values noted. Any rolls of 10 indicate that die should be rolled again and the results accumulated (“Stacked”) for that die in an open-ended fashion. The resulting values are then compared against a threshold (“Target Number”) indicating the difficulty of the action. Any values that equal or exceed the target number count as successes. For skills, the target number equals the rank of the skill, so low numeric ranks in The Riddle of Steel indicate superior capability. Generally, only one success is needed, but multiple successes serve as a gauge of the magnitude of victory. If a roll fails and the dice come up with two or more 1s, the character fumbles or botches the action.

Uncontested actions go no further. However, if there are two active participants competing against one another, an opposed roll must be made. The participant with the greatest number of successes wins. The degree to which he wins is determined by the difference in the number of successes between the two participants. This difference is called the “Margin of Success.” So, if one character obtains 3 successes on his roll and another obtains only 1 success, the first character wins with a Margin of Success of 2.

Extended contests take place over a period of time and require a number of contest rolls. These require a character to accumulate a certain number of successes before the task completes. Any fumble forces the character to start over.

Fighting boils down to an extended contested conflict between two combatants. On a successful blow, the hit location is determined and then damage is calculated by adding the Margin of Success to the weapon’s damage rating. This is adjusted by the character’s Toughness and Armor. The result is then used in a table lookup to determine the actual wounds inflicted. The table to be used in this lookup depends on the hit location. Damage comes in the form of actual wound descriptions (i.e., “Serious Flesh Wound”), and Shock, Pain, and Bloodloss points. Shock is subtracted from the target’s dice pool when the wound is inflicted but has no lasting effect. Pain is subtracted from the target’s dice pool at the beginning of every combat round. Also, at the beginning of every round, any wounded combatants must make a roll of Endurance against Bloodloss. Failure indicates the character loses one point of Health. When his Health drops to zero, the character dies.

Every round of combat is divided into two “exchanges,” each of which is basically the amount of time needed to make an attack. At the beginning of a fight, each combatant declares the “stance” that his character assumes. Various stances give differing bonuses to offensive and defensive maneuvers. The stances only last throughout the first exchange.

Initiative is initially determined by having each player conceal a colored die in his hand. Red means he is going to attack, white means he is going to defend. When the Game Master (“Seneschal”) shouts “throw,” each player throws out his colored die. Any hesitation on a player’s part means his character can only defend. If neither attacks, the characters are circling one another looking for openings. If both players attack simultaneously, neither presents adequate defenses against their opponent. Such situations are unhealthy for both parties. Characters are allowed to taunt their opponents to force them to attack after a sufficient amount of circling has transpired.

Once melee is engaged, the aggressor maintains the initiative as long as he keeps striking his opponent. Only the aggressor can attack. The defender uses his abilities exclusively to avoid being hit. The first time the aggressor misses, however, the roles reverse and the defender becomes the aggressor.

Every time a character uses a skill (falling under the category of “Skill”) in a dangerous or stressful situation, his player puts a check mark next to the skill. When the character accumulates three check marks, the player makes a conflict roll of Mental Aptitude versus a threshold of 15 minus the skill rank. If he succeeds, the skill’s rank lowers by one (remember, lower ranks indicate superior ability in this game).

Rewards are also given through a character’s Spiritual Attributes. If a player has his character act in a way that is consistent with his Spiritual Attributes, he is rewarded by one or more ranks being added to the pertinent trait. For example, a point of Conscience is added whenever the character “does the right thing.” Points can also be lost if the player portrays his character in a way that contradicts his Spiritual Attributes. Skills falling under the heading of “Proficiencies & Vagaries,” attributes, gifts, and flaws can be bought (or bought down) by spending Spiritual Attribute points. Skills falling under the category of “Skills” are improved as described above.