System/Mechanics Simple Dice Systems In a Roleplay

[White Masquerade]

Hey all. As someone who likes to add conflict and challenges to stories, but wants to do it fairly and unbiased, I've always thought about using dice. I've had some success with using simple systems of dice attached to a small/short roleplay, but never on a large scale. Does anyone have any tips on how to do so, or experiences you've had trying to incorporate dice into your roleplay?

I want to be clear, I'm looking for something specific. My goal is to use a very simple dice system that multiple people can pick up really easily (like in 5 minutes) and use. So I'm not looking for any established dice systems that are out there already. I find even the most basic of them are just not simple enough, in my opinion. My goal is for the thread to be role-play-oriented first, with the dice system added in to keep things fair and a bit gamified.

Also, I wanted to hear, how would one do it in practice. I've noticed it's a bit difficult to actually roll dice in a post, transfer the result, keep it in a log, or even edit it into a post. Does anyone have experience with the practical part of doing dice rolls in a post (like during a fight) on the website? How would that work smoothly? Or what's the smoothest way you've seen it done?

Any and all answers would be appreciated. As a non-dice user, it's always fascinated me. It's the complexity of the system that always puts me off though. However, I can see the potential to make a great RP with the right system going in the background. I want to try it.

 

[Shawdios]

I’ve never used any dice system, but whenever theres a fight in a RP, I use the roll dice thing on Rpnation (or i IRL roll a dice) to help me write how well or how worse whatever action my character was doing went.

For instance, my RP partners character threw a punch, and so I rolled a six sided die, Six being it missed and One meaning it hit my character and made him unable to fight any more. It landed on a two, so the punch lands and my character needs a moment and tries to get himself some time to breathe. Then I left how the defensive attack went up to my partner.

I watch a lot of people play DND and so that’s where I got the idea to do it.

That’s all I’ve ever done with dice, but I do want to try more.

 

[White Masquerade]

I’ve never used any dice system, but whenever theres a fight in a RP, I use the roll dice thing on Rpnation (or i IRL roll a dice) to help me write how well or how worse whatever action my character was doing went.

For instance, my RP partners character threw a punch, and so I rolled a six sided die, Six being it missed and One meaning it hit my character and made him unable to fight any more. It landed on a two, so the punch lands and my character needs a moment and tries to get himself some time to breathe. Then I left how the defensive attack went up to my partner.

I watch I lot of people play DND and so that’s where I got the idea to do it.

That’s all I’ve ever done with dice, but I do want to try more.

Nice idea with the scale on how bad or good the result is. I think I’ll take that. Thank you.

 

[OrsusZoktivir]

Hey all. As someone who likes to add conflict and challenges to stories, but wants to do it fairly and unbiased, I've always thought about using dice. I've had some success with using simple systems of dice attached to a small/short roleplay, but never on a large scale. Does anyone have any tips on how to do so, or experiences you've had trying to incorporate dice into your roleplay?

I want to be clear, I'm looking for something specific. My goal is to use a very simple dice system that multiple people can pick up really easily (like in 5 minutes) and use. So I'm not looking for any established dice systems that are out there already. I find even the most basic of them are just not simple enough, in my opinion. My goal is for the thread to be role-play-oriented first, with the dice system added in to keep things fair and a bit gamified.

Also, I wanted to hear, how would one do it in practice. I've noticed it's a bit difficult to actually roll dice in a post, transfer the result, keep it in a log, or even edit it into a post. Does anyone have experience with the practical part of doing dice rolls in a post (like during a fight) on the website? How would that work smoothly? Or what's the smoothest way you've seen it done?

Any and all answers would be appreciated. As a non-dice user, it's always fascinated me. It's the complexity of the system that always puts me off though. However, I can see the potential to make a great RP with the right system going in the background. I want to try it.

Have you looked into the storyteller system (From World of Darkness) or FATE's Dice system both are simple and can be explained in a matter of 5 minutes to someone unfamiliar to them.

 

[White Masquerade]

Have you looked into the storyteller system (From World of Darkness) or FATE's Dice system both are simple and can be explained in a matter of 5 minutes to someone unfamiliar to them.

I have looked into both. And it's still too complicated in my opinion. I'm looking for something even more pared down. Though I do appreciate the suggestions as I've come across them already =P

 

[AtlannianSpy]

I've toyed with some dice/ dice adjacent stuff so I have some thoughts that may or may not be useful.

Are you planning for dice to be relegated mostly to combat? or do you envision players resolving a wide array of actions like say: picking locks, leaping over chasms, charming npcs, with dice?

And then secondly, how do you want players to be able to customize their character in a mechanical sense? Do you want the dice system to be basically flat for everyone or do you want to allow one person to be good at say casting fireballs but bad at punching thing, while another person is more well rounded? Do you want people to be able to "level up" in some fashion and be able to get better results as their character grows?

 

[Tefka]

It seems like something people like and enjoy but don't really "need" to get busy with RP. And often, they come pre-loaded with biases that would affect their decisions anyways, so not really random enough to necessitate dice.

 

[White Masquerade]

I've toyed with some dice/ dice adjacent stuff so I have some thoughts that may or may not be useful.

Are you planning for dice to be relegated mostly to combat? or do you envision players resolving a wide array of actions like say: picking locks, leaping over chasms, charming npcs, with dice?

And then secondly, how do you want players to be able to customize their character in a mechanical sense? Do you want the dice system to be basically flat for everyone or do you want to allow one person to be good at say casting fireballs but bad at punching thing, while another person is more well rounded? Do you want people to be able to "level up" in some fashion and be able to get better results as their character grows?

Good questions. I’d like to keep the dice to battling and everything related to it. So charming npcs or lock-picking would be up to the player.

As for customizing their character, I do want there to be specialties. You hit it on the head when you speak of players leveling up. I want it to be gamified, but only so far as battle and strength is concerned. Everything should be player/GM decided.

 

[AtlannianSpy]

I think I can sorta see where you're going, I mean, I'm presuming this whole thread is related to the HXH thread I replied to as well? I can go back to talking in generalities if its not.

To my mind one of the simplest ways to get that level up and customisation feel with dice is just to give people more dice to roll. Roll 2 dice instead of one and you'll get generally higher results and feel stronger, or better at a certain thing, but there's still that element of randomness and spontaneity.

So when someone creates a character they have... idk 5 dice to allocate and they can put 2 dice in, say its HXH, conjuration and 3 dice in Enhancement. Then when they perform an action that involves using conjuration they get to roll 2 dice and when they try and use enhancement they get to roll 3 dice. These are low, simple numbers to track so managing character sheets should be relatively simple. When its time to level up, probably at the end of an arc or story chapter, then you give out a certain number of dice the player can allocate freely. also simple.

If its HxH we're talking about then you could represent as the limited reserves of nen fighters have by giving players a pool of spendable "nen dice" that are consumable. You can add nen dice onto an action to roll more dice and score higher on average, but once you spend those nen dice they're gone until you're character has a chance to rest properly. You could even have these nen dice function as HP, since HxH also use nen to defend themselves and have to balance that against using their nen for offense, so a successful attack roll destroys one or some of the nen dice of the defender.

Perhaps you even have the skill categories mentioned above not grant any dice by default but instead they govern how many nen dice can be assigned to an action. So in this case a player with a score of three in enhancement like above doesn't get to roll three dice, but they can spend up to three nen to be able to roll three dice, so players get the decision of "should I use as much nen as possible right now to deal a lot of damage, or play it safe to keep my reserves high?"




Partially separate from all of that, another question is how, or whether to at all, differentiate the different categories of actions in a mechanical sense. If a player can choose to attack with enhancement or transmutation but both of those have the exact same effect of rolling a certain number of dice then really the only choice to make is to use whichever skill the player's character is best at. In terms of creating a character as well in that case it really only makes sense to ultra specialise as much as possible in one category and just do that all the time. That's probably fine if you only want the dice system to resolve outcomes and you are reliant purely on freeform descriptive writing to add complexity to the scenes.


But if you want players to sometimes decide to use one skill and at other times use another skill then on some level they need to operate differently. Maybe like, off the top of my head, enhancement attacks are powerful, but they're usually close range, so they do the most damage but when you use them the enemy gets a free attack roll against you. Or transmutation attacks deal lower damage, but they excel at creating abnormal status effects on enemies, making them more vulnerable to the attacks of other players for a time. Stuff like that.

Of course that all drastically increases the complexity of the system, which is directly against what you're aiming for, so there's a real push and pull here in terms of making something that allows for mechanical player expression or keeping it real simple. This push and pull is actually why, although I've experimented with building them, I've never actually run an rp with explicit dice mechanics, I couldn't really resolve this dilemma to my satisfaction.

If you are really hoping to pare it back and make all these dice rolls pretty similar in mechanics, then I would at least strongly suggest something like DnD's inspiration system, wherein players get to roll extra dice for a particular action if in terms of roleplaying and writing what they are describing is exciting, creative or dramatic. This would all just go off DM/GM decision rather than any mechanics so it would be pretty simple from that perspective, you just make a call on whether you like whatever the player is trying enough to encourage it.

 

[White Masquerade]

It seems like something people like and enjoy but don't really "need" to get busy with RP. And often, they come pre-loaded with biases that would affect their decisions anyways, so not really random enough to necessitate dice.

I get what you mean. But I like when there is a lot of conflict and growth in power of characters in a story. If that is left with no rules or system, usually it’s hard to get everyone to agree on how fast or how far a character has grown. The story becomes a mess unless it’s fair, in my opinion. That’s why I prefer to have a least some kind of dice.

 

[White Masquerade]

I think I can sorta see where you're going, I mean, I'm presuming this whole thread is related to the HXH thread I replied to as well? I can go back to talking in generalities if its not.

To my mind one of the simplest ways to get that level up and customisation feel with dice is just to give people more dice to roll. Roll 2 dice instead of one and you'll get generally higher results and feel stronger, or better at a certain thing, but there's still that element of randomness and spontaneity.

So when someone creates a character they have... idk 5 dice to allocate and they can put 2 dice in, say its HXH, conjuration and 3 dice in Enhancement. Then when they perform an action that involves using conjuration they get to roll 2 dice and when they try and use enhancement they get to roll 3 dice. These are low, simple numbers to track so managing character sheets should be relatively simple. When its time to level up, probably at the end of an arc or story chapter, then you give out a certain number of dice the player can allocate freely. also simple.

If its HxH we're talking about then you could represent as the limited reserves of nen fighters have by giving players a pool of spendable "nen dice" that are consumable. You can add nen dice onto an action to roll more dice and score higher on average, but once you spend those nen dice they're gone until you're character has a chance to rest properly. You could even have these nen dice function as HP, since HxH also use nen to defend themselves and have to balance that against using their nen for offense, so a successful attack roll destroys one or some of the nen dice of the defender.

Perhaps you even have the skill categories mentioned above not grant any dice by default but instead they govern how many nen dice can be assigned to an action. So in this case a player with a score of three in enhancement like above doesn't get to roll three dice, but they can spend up to three nen to be able to roll three dice, so players get the decision of "should I use as much nen as possible right now to deal a lot of damage, or play it safe to keep my reserves high?"




Partially separate from all of that, another question is how, or whether to at all, differentiate the different categories of actions in a mechanical sense. If a player can choose to attack with enhancement or transmutation but both of those have the exact same effect of rolling a certain number of dice then really the only choice to make is to use whichever skill the player's character is best at. In terms of creating a character as well in that case it really only makes sense to ultra specialise as much as possible in one category and just do that all the time. That's probably fine if you only want the dice system to resolve outcomes and you are reliant purely on freeform descriptive writing to add complexity to the scenes.


But if you want players to sometimes decide to use one skill and at other times use another skill then on some level they need to operate differently. Maybe like, off the top of my head, enhancement attacks are powerful, but they're usually close range, so they do the most damage but when you use them the enemy gets a free attack roll against you. Or transmutation attacks deal lower damage, but they excel at creating abnormal status effects on enemies, making them more vulnerable to the attacks of other players for a time. Stuff like that.

Of course that all drastically increases the complexity of the system, which is directly against what you're aiming for, so there's a real push and pull here in terms of making something that allows for mechanical player expression or keeping it real simple. This push and pull is actually why, although I've experimented with building them, I've never actually run an rp with explicit dice mechanics, I couldn't really resolve this dilemma to my satisfaction.

If you are really hoping to pare it back and make all these dice rolls pretty similar in mechanics, then I would at least strongly suggest something like DnD's inspiration system, wherein players get to roll extra dice for a particular action if in terms of roleplaying and writing what they are describing is exciting, creative or dramatic. This would all just go off DM/GM decision rather than any mechanics so it would be pretty simple from that perspective, you just make a call on whether you like whatever the player is trying enough to encourage it.

I am talking about the HxH thread, so you speaking in specifics is fine. I just want to say thank you for the answer. It's exactly what I was looking for. I was grinning like mad as you were asking all the right questions and pointing out all the right things. I did decide on giving players more dice to roll, but didn't approach it from a "dice pool" way. How much dice someone can roll is tied into the "stats" they decide to "level up". If the lines I'm thinking along don't feel right, I'll definitely look into the "dice pool". It sounds interesting!

As for the limited nen, yes I've covered that one. I have Nen and physical abilities split so that falls in line with what you're saying. You can use and do things without "spending" nen, but mechanically, the more complicated moves/effects will require it (I don't want to suck the fun out of things).

You are right that the types have to be vastly different or else it doesn't make sense to pick one over the other besides preference. Yeah, they will have different playstyles (like only Enhancers can heal / only Manipulators can control other players). Hopefully, the differences in effects are enough to be felt from one type to the other. Transmuters indeed would have and create different status effects. Great minds think alike, Spy. I am working on making the playstyles feel different, but I hear you. I'll throw extra into it. With that being the case, I'll pass on that inspiration system. Though I will keep the dice pool idea in my pocket, thanks.

I am glad you'll be testing it as it seems like you can help me improve it a lot if it needs to be. Sorry you weren't able to run into a system in that sweet spot yet, but hopefully something will get close.

 

[AtlannianSpy]

I'm glad I could be of some help and I'm definitely looking forward to testing out/ experiencing the system once it all gets to that stage. It's always very satisfying when you can bounce ideas around with someone and kinda kick something off.

 

[gator]

You might be able to modify maze rats to suit your needs. The whole system fits on like two pages and half of that isn't even rules, it's just random tables and stuff like that.

 

[White Masquerade]

You might be able to modify maze rats to suit your needs. The whole system fits on like two pages and half of that isn't even rules, it's just random tables and stuff like that.

Thank you for the suggestion. I just read through it and it doesn't quite fit what I'm looking for. I'm looking for a small system to handle combat, but Maze Rats looks to handle everything.

 

[James0-0]

Hey all. As someone who likes to add conflict and challenges to stories, but wants to do it fairly and unbiased, I've always thought about using dice. I've had some success with using simple systems of dice attached to a small/short roleplay, but never on a large scale. Does anyone have any tips on how to do so, or experiences you've had trying to incorporate dice into your roleplay?

I want to be clear, I'm looking for something specific. My goal is to use a very simple dice system that multiple people can pick up really easily (like in 5 minutes) and use. So I'm not looking for any established dice systems that are out there already. I find even the most basic of them are just not simple enough, in my opinion. My goal is for the thread to be role-play-oriented first, with the dice system added in to keep things fair and a bit gamified.

Also, I wanted to hear, how would one do it in practice. I've noticed it's a bit difficult to actually roll dice in a post, transfer the result, keep it in a log, or even edit it into a post. Does anyone have experience with the practical part of doing dice rolls in a post (like during a fight) on the website? How would that work smoothly? Or what's the smoothest way you've seen it done?

Any and all answers would be appreciated. As a non-dice user, it's always fascinated me. It's the complexity of the system that always puts me off though. However, I can see the potential to make a great RP with the right system going in the background. I want to try it.

I'm really interested in a gentle way wanna give it a try for me?

 

[White Masquerade]

I'm really interested in a gentle way wanna give it a try for me?

Lol. Excuse me? Are you answering the right thread? You want me to try what?

 

[ManicMuse]

Back in the days of my live role-play chatroom games, we had a simple yet effective approach. Given the spontaneous nature of these sessions with a mix of random participants, each chatroom had its set of basic role-playing rules. One such scenario involved sparring, and we employed a straightforward method using a six-sided dice.

The mechanics were uncomplicated: participants took turns as attackers and defenders, with each round punctuated by a dice roll. The attack roll, ranging from 1 to 6, determined the intensity or devastation of the strike, while the defender's roll gauged how effectively they blocked the attack. The process would then reverse for the next round. It may sound simple, but its simplicity surprisingly added a valuable layer to our gaming experience.

Personally, I have a penchant for the 100-sided dice, often employed in Dungeons and Dragons for scenarios that fall outside the norm. I've encountered instances in role-playing games where the Game Master would spontaneously intervene, asking players to roll a D100. These rolls influenced outcomes, dictating success or failure in various situations. The unpredictability and spontaneity of these moments contribute significantly to the overall enjoyment.

In essence, integrating dice into role-playing scenarios adds a delightful element of flexibility to storylines. It not only keeps players on their toes but also leads to unexpected and amusing twists, fostering a sense of shared enjoyment among participants.

I also was having a bit of a hard time with the dice system here a long time ago but I know it was updated since then and hear it's pretty good now. Avrae on Discord is great. I also recommend something the players can't fudge, an aka honor system. I have found from several experiences, people will cheat if allowed.

 

[Perpetual Zen]

I like dice rolling when it's necessary.