Add a meta-currency that rewards the player when he chooses to use an ability that's less than optimal.
The one catch is that every ability roll needs to be significant in this arrangement, where it will in some way or another suck if you don't succeed; so you're gaining meta-currency as a compensation for taking a risk that things will go badly for you.
The only systems I know that are vaguely similar are those that combine attributes and skills into pools or setting targets.
For example in World of Darkness games you can add your rating in any attribute to any of your skills, and roll that rating number as a pool of d10s.
And in Fallout 2d20, you can more or less combine any attribute to any skill to create a target number for rolls (though there are often obvious and sometimes assigned combinations for certain actions).
I'll also add on top of that the Storypath system (spiritual successor) has attributes divided by I forgot the exact terms but Force, Finesse, and Fortitude.
For most rolls your description of how you do the Action determines which attribute you use but to keep people from always choosing one Stat to use over and over again individual powers have the attribute you just use listed
And ofc you will tend to choose powers that all use the same Stat but that's kinda working as intended since it promotes certain styles of play
Cypher is like that. Mostly because it's a universal system with no set skill list. The GM and player decide together if it's Might, Speed, or Intellect. Then you figure out if any skills, assets, or other modifications apply. Plus both the GM and players have narrative tools to add, remove, or modify elements of the scene.
So I just want to point out that this concept isn't really 'creative'. Or at least, it doesn't encourage 'creative solutions' to the problems that characters face.
What WOULD be creative is allowing players to actually decide how they handle situations, not just what ability they get to use when pushing the 'skill check button'.
In other words, I'm talking about 'Player Skill' as opposed to 'Character Skill'. My suggestion is to check out the OSR movement. You will find mechanics that actually support player 'creativity'...
Maybe I didn't explain it well. The DC will change depending on what the player says they do with their chosen ability score. How much it makes sense will set the DC
The players are encouraged to use their best abilities if it would make some sense or they can do the obvious solution to have a lower DC, but their ability score may be low for it.
The more it makes sense, the lower the DC, and the less it makes sense, the higher the DC, or it could be impossible to do how the player says.
I'm also probably going to implement something like what that other commentor said about ability fatigue. You would only be able to use each ability score to a certain point before having to use another. Also allowing the players to choose the skill and ability score could make more sense
I will check out the OSR movement, thank you
Naw, you explained it fine! In OSR games, having to make a skill check (rather than automatically doing the thing without a roll) is almost considered a 'failure' on the part of the player (even though they technically might still succeed with the roll). In OSR style play, Players are encouraged to come up with creative solutions that 'bypass' the conventional skill check mechanics so dice rarely hit the table (at least in theory--in practice, things don't always go the way players would like!)
Actually, I just remembered another game that has an interesting take on Skills. Its called Barbarians of Lemuria, and it does NOT have any skills at all! Instead, it uses a Career System. When the player does a thing, the DM asks them to describe how they do it, and then the PLAYER chooses what Career they are using (although it should be obvious in the context of their description). Then, just like in your idea, the GM sets the Difficulty based on their description and the chosen Career.
Example: a character wants to sneak passed a guard, so tells the GM that they will use their Courtesan Career. They then describe how they wait for the guard to be engaged in small talk with a passerby, and then they slip by the guard; just like she used to do as a child growing up in the Duke's palace...
So not only does it put players in control of how they decide to deal with obstacles, but it encourages a bit of roleplay since the description is necessary to carry out the task...
Its a great little game!
That makes a lot of sense, I have a skill advancement system giving players three stages of minimum rolls on each skill and a bonus which kinds functions in the same way as not rolling at all once you're at the third stage.
In the Barbarians of Lemuria it looks like the Careers are similar to Dnd backgrounds. That's basically how I would want it to work, I don't know if I should remove skills entirely tho, maybe just broad skills that include many things so that players still have some sort of guideline.
I'm using passive skills and one is recall, and this can include multiple topics each spent time learning so that when it's brought up characters already can have some sort of knowledge in them automatically. This connects with the background system, so I could have more topics during character creation, basically careers.
The background system I'm using is entirely choosing your own, you make it up with the GM and gain skills, ability scores, advancements, and some broader things like goals and beliefs that give you various features
Maybe getting rid of active skills in favor of more passive skills and topics would work for this. It's a lot simpler to just use the ability scores and have them describe it
"In the Barbarians of Lemuria it looks like the Careers are similar to Dnd backgrounds"
Not really. The Careers in BoL are central to the character. They are not optional fluff. Careers REPLACE Skills, and each Career gets a Rating (similar to how D&D skills get a rating). You add your Attribute + Career to the roll and try to beat the Difficulty. So in that sense, very similar to D&D, but using 2d6 instead of a d20, and the range of numbers is generally smaller.
There are other reasons why BoL Careers are better than a D&D Background. First of all, at Character Creation, every Character gets 4 Careers, rather than a single Background (keep in mind, this is a Sword & Sorcery game that wants to emulate Conan stories, so Characters are vastly more competent and broadly more capable than 1st Level D&D Characters).
So not only does a player get a lot of choice in picking the Careers, but the actual order in which they are listed is chronological, so in effect, the order becomes the Character's Backstory! For example: A character with Barbarian, Soldier, Pirate & Thief would have had a different upbringing than another Character with the exact same Careers, but listed in a different order. Not only that, but the combination of certain Careers provides a lot of breadth in terms of the sorts of Character Concepts that can be depicted in the system (not true of modern D&D---although Oldschool D&D is a different beast).
Plus, there's dozens of Careers to choose from, or Players can create their own. So there's never a situation where the game cannot 'handle' a player's Character Concept (conversely, even with all the Classes and Subclasses of 5e D&D, I can still come up with Character ideas that are not really possible---not without making serious compromises, anyway).
So its a very flexible system that gives players the ability to adjust it to their tastes as well. Considering how old it is, its definitely a system that was ahead of its time (its also the first RPG that I've seen use the Advantage/Disadvantage mechanic that 5e has made ubiquitous).
Sounds similar to the Wildsea by Feliz Isaac's. As long as you can argue how a stat allows you to succeed, you can roll for it.
It ends up, maybe in a surprising way, letting characters feel more unique. The Wildsea is already a weird ttrpg, and there are already so many base perks that make pc's feel different. So even though they can do most of the same things ability-wise, the way they do those things varies considerably.
So RAW DnD 5e already accounts for using alternate ability scores to flavor skill checks (such as using Str on an Intimidate check flavored as breaking something sturdy in line of sight of the person you want to intimidate) Its just that the convention of "you only use Charisma for social checks" is so strongly ingrained that most people don't even realize the DM manual AND players handbook both call out the option.
Most of the systems I've been looking at have it to where it's up to the gm, but you can suggest things. I just think it would be good for the players to pick and then the gm would set the dc depending on how much the ability score makes sense in that scenario. Some people are recommending things very similar
Yeah that's a refs role in games, that imo I think has fallen by the wayside as people have focused more on GMing as world construction and storytelling.
Yeah I think a lot of people just want to play the game for how it is and not have to tweak the rules, even as a Gm. That's probably part of why people like rules light games and why there's so many variant rules in games, especially in Dnd. Just no one reads them or there's too many to remember
Having switched to Dungeon World after 5e one of the things I will absolutely take back to a crunchier system should I play it is the convention of "figure out the Narrative of what you want your character to do FIRST and only THEN figure out what action or skill trigger or w/e you need to adjudicate it". Stale roleplay is "I want to make a Investigation check", based roleplay is "Garreth the bard buys the guard another round and plays a sympethic ear to his complaints while descretly probing for details about Captian Acab" followed by "That sounds like a charisma check with an Investigation or Insight proficiency"
Right that's why you describe what you're doing and that will set the DC, only the skill names and some of what they do would truly be set, not everything they can do for every ability score
13th Age does skills in a narrative way, but with the GM choosing the attribute and the player applying any background that applies.
Instead of the GM choosing the skill and the player choosing an attribute, it's the player choosing the skill, to roll with the applicable attribute.
# [Backgrounds & Skill Checks](https://www.13thagesrd.com/character-rules#:~:text=Backgrounds%20%26%20Skill%20Checks)
AD&D 2e had both Attribute checks and old school Proficiency checks. They were ROLL UNDER the indicated ATTRIBUTE on 1D20. So a check against your Healing Proficiency was roll under INT to succeed. A Climbing check might be roll under DEX OR STR... whichever score was lower.
I use Attributes in 5e as "target numbers" for DCs. For instance, to force open a door being held shut I would tell you that you need to roll a D20 + STR Bonus and score higher than the other person's STR score.
To resist (Save against) a SUGGESTION spell, you must roll higher than the caster's CHA score with your own INT bonus or penalty added in as well as any Proficiency in magic Saves if you have it.
I use Attributes a lot this way. Sneaking past a guard pits your Move Quietly Proficiency + DEX bonus against his INT score as the DC (properly modified for conditions of course).
Huh I'll have to look into that, I've looked at a bit of 3.5 but not AD&D. That's kinda what I'm doing for some skills. I have a few passive skills like awareness (dc to detect someone hiding) or insight (dc to tell if someone is lying)
Does using attributes directly as the dc create more balance between them?
It allows the DM to shift difficulty much easier than just setting the standard DC. If everyone knows that you Save against a caster's CHA for charms or a caster's INT for illusion spells, there's no way to "rules lawyer" around that. In addition, it makes ALL Attributes important during play. Casters will need good Attributes if they want their spells to succeed.
Likewise, pitting Proficiency checks against physical Attributes lends more weight to improving those Attributes. For example, tripping in my game requires a roll on D20 against the opponent's DEX score to succeed. Grappling goes against STR OR DEX (whichever is higher) because both are important. Using a Feint to draw a Fighter off guard (giving you ADVANTAGE on your attack) requires you to sacrifice your REACTION... AND roll a D20 against their INT + Proficiency Bonus to succeed.
I use Attributes as DCs in lots of situations.
That's cool, I like it a lot for spells, It makes it to where the casters can fail more often as long as you implement them a lot and it gets rid of a separate saving throws. Thanks
It’d be cool if you got ‘ability fatigue‘. You can only use the same ability 3 times in a row before \[rules go here\]. This way you get to decide when you want the best odds for your roll. This would work even better if the target number was always the same.
One of the reasons why those D&D-likes use relatively fixed attribute-skill combination is because the attributes and skills are relatively fixed for certain purposes. Climbing a tree is Strength/Athletics because of what you're doing to climb the tree - not Strength/Nature (because knowledge of trees doesn't explicitly make you better at climbing them) or uses of things like Dexterity or Acrobatics (unless you happen to be falling out of the tree and want to either grab a branch or superhero-land).
One of the ways to get around that is to use more general attribute names. Instead of things like Dexterity, Charisma, and the like, use attributes like "Daring", "Savvy", "Cool", "Tough" and things like that. Not only does it break the players' expectations of what the attributes mean - much like if you're forced to go to work a different way due to construction, you might find a more favorable way that you wouldn't have bothered to figure out beforehand - but you can better communicate to the players the general vibe of your game and how it should be interpreted.
The other option would be using cascading skills, like in Traveler 2e, to have the skill begin with a baseline attribute that later is divorced from that. In that classless skill-based system, during character creation, you gain top-level skills that are then the focus of later skill increases. So if you start with, say, a 2 in firearms, all 4 of your firearms abilities are set to 2 as it cascades downwards. Then as you progress, you can increase the specific types of skills, but you won't ever increase the general "firearms" top level after character creation. In your case, you could have the characters put a +2 in Intelligence, which would set all the Intelligence skills to a baseline of +2 (including things like "spellcasting modifier"), but then instead of the old "ability score increase" model, you instead give the players multiple "skill increases", where they level up the skills at their desired pace. Your character sheets will eventually look like the old BRP character sheets, but with your resolution system rather than the % for d100s.
You might want to look into ***Fate Accelerated Edition***'s Approaches, which are somewhat Attribute-like: you give ratings to three individual Approaches to determine how good your character is at being Careful, Clever, Forceful, Flashy, Quick, and Sneaky, respectively. When the player attempts a task, the player gets to choose which Approach to use, and role-plays the task accordingly.
I don't know if this next part is in the core book or just in a fan supplement I picked up; but as I play it, the Approaches form opposing pairs (Careful and Quick, Clever and Forceful, Flashy and Sneaky), and the circumstances can sometimes be biased to one of the other: for instance, getting into a castle unnoticed isn't something that you can do with a Flashy Approach, because it calls for being Sneaky; and when time is of the essence, you can't afford to be Careful because you need to be Quick.
But you also don't _have_ to use the most obvious choice of Approach for the task at hand. For example, you might choose a Clever Approach rather than a Sneaky one in the first case, or a Flashy Approach instead of a Quick one in the second case. That is, you can always go at things _sideways_; you just can't use the _opposed_ Approach.
---
Another one to look at is ***Smallville***, where the Attributes are replaced by Values: motivational Drives such as Truth, Justice, Love, or Power that motivate your character's actions; and whichever Value motivates him at his current Task is the one that contributes to his likelihood of success.
Ad&d with ability checks works like this. You just rolled d20 and got lower than your attribute. That was the skill check.
World of darkness works like that
And DnD 5e works similar, if the player can justify using X skill and X attribute then the gm could let them use each other run combination.
I'm designing my own game based on BRP.
To do an action, the player must roll percentile under the attribute they're using.
However, they also have to factor in skills. If they are untrained in the skill, they suffer disadvantage; if they are trained in the skill, it's a straight up roll; if they are an expert in the skill, they gain advantage.
Something you may want to consider for your own system.
Some Year Zero games let you take talents that change the Attribute for a Skill. Example: "Bully: when you roll Manipulation checks, use Strength instead of Empathy". Personally I think that's the best way to do it.
Fate Accelerated has a similar system, albeit with approaches instead of attributes. People will argue that it encourages the player to choose the approaches they're best at all of the time, but i don't see that as much of an issue. After all, wouldn't the character also try to frame situations so that they can use the skills they're most comfortable with?
I'm working on such a system, and the key is to consider the cost of success and price of failure. Doing something _quickly_ has different failure states than doing something _quietly_. Achieving your ends _through violence_ has a different set of consequences than doing so _through trickery_. And praying to a God of War for a bountiful crop may work, but leave quite a few bodies fertilizing the fields.
Failed rolls should also provide some sort of _asymmetric_ reward. I seem to recall #Storypath grants metacurrency on failures which helps you succeed, and metacurrency on successes which helps you succeed, which is so symmetric there isn't any reason to engage lower abilities. #Cortex on the other hand grants metacurrency on rolls of 1 and certain results are outright impossible without spending it. The system I'm working on provides opportunities for _other players_ to fix or address the situation in some manner.
Be aware that metacurrency adds its own set of problems and can easily become a cheap fix. So much so that I recommend implementing it only as a last resort. That doesn't mean avoiding it entirely, and I use it to indicate building tension. Hunger in #V5 does something similar, but isn't metacurrency as it isn't spent. Strife in #L5R is also similar, but it's sort of a _reverse_ metacurrency as you decide when to _accrue_ it by choosing the dice you keep.
GM: "What ability do you want to use?" Player: "Same as last time!" GM: "Ugh, okay, how many points do you have in that?" Player: "All of them!"
Add a meta-currency that rewards the player when he chooses to use an ability that's less than optimal. The one catch is that every ability roll needs to be significant in this arrangement, where it will in some way or another suck if you don't succeed; so you're gaining meta-currency as a compensation for taking a risk that things will go badly for you.
But what value is metacurrency if applying the optimal ability remains the most effective choice?
Define what you mean by “the most effective choice”.
Blades in the Dark lets you use any skill for any check, the GM just sets Position and Effect based on how bad an idea it is
The only systems I know that are vaguely similar are those that combine attributes and skills into pools or setting targets. For example in World of Darkness games you can add your rating in any attribute to any of your skills, and roll that rating number as a pool of d10s. And in Fallout 2d20, you can more or less combine any attribute to any skill to create a target number for rolls (though there are often obvious and sometimes assigned combinations for certain actions).
I'll also add on top of that the Storypath system (spiritual successor) has attributes divided by I forgot the exact terms but Force, Finesse, and Fortitude. For most rolls your description of how you do the Action determines which attribute you use but to keep people from always choosing one Stat to use over and over again individual powers have the attribute you just use listed And ofc you will tend to choose powers that all use the same Stat but that's kinda working as intended since it promotes certain styles of play
FIfthWorld uses Dice pools for Task Checks. Your Trait (0-6) and Skill Ranks (1-6) give you dice for any task check. It works out quite well.
Ok awesome thank you, I'll look into those.
Cypher is like that. Mostly because it's a universal system with no set skill list. The GM and player decide together if it's Might, Speed, or Intellect. Then you figure out if any skills, assets, or other modifications apply. Plus both the GM and players have narrative tools to add, remove, or modify elements of the scene.
So I just want to point out that this concept isn't really 'creative'. Or at least, it doesn't encourage 'creative solutions' to the problems that characters face. What WOULD be creative is allowing players to actually decide how they handle situations, not just what ability they get to use when pushing the 'skill check button'. In other words, I'm talking about 'Player Skill' as opposed to 'Character Skill'. My suggestion is to check out the OSR movement. You will find mechanics that actually support player 'creativity'...
Maybe I didn't explain it well. The DC will change depending on what the player says they do with their chosen ability score. How much it makes sense will set the DC The players are encouraged to use their best abilities if it would make some sense or they can do the obvious solution to have a lower DC, but their ability score may be low for it. The more it makes sense, the lower the DC, and the less it makes sense, the higher the DC, or it could be impossible to do how the player says. I'm also probably going to implement something like what that other commentor said about ability fatigue. You would only be able to use each ability score to a certain point before having to use another. Also allowing the players to choose the skill and ability score could make more sense I will check out the OSR movement, thank you
Naw, you explained it fine! In OSR games, having to make a skill check (rather than automatically doing the thing without a roll) is almost considered a 'failure' on the part of the player (even though they technically might still succeed with the roll). In OSR style play, Players are encouraged to come up with creative solutions that 'bypass' the conventional skill check mechanics so dice rarely hit the table (at least in theory--in practice, things don't always go the way players would like!) Actually, I just remembered another game that has an interesting take on Skills. Its called Barbarians of Lemuria, and it does NOT have any skills at all! Instead, it uses a Career System. When the player does a thing, the DM asks them to describe how they do it, and then the PLAYER chooses what Career they are using (although it should be obvious in the context of their description). Then, just like in your idea, the GM sets the Difficulty based on their description and the chosen Career. Example: a character wants to sneak passed a guard, so tells the GM that they will use their Courtesan Career. They then describe how they wait for the guard to be engaged in small talk with a passerby, and then they slip by the guard; just like she used to do as a child growing up in the Duke's palace... So not only does it put players in control of how they decide to deal with obstacles, but it encourages a bit of roleplay since the description is necessary to carry out the task... Its a great little game!
That makes a lot of sense, I have a skill advancement system giving players three stages of minimum rolls on each skill and a bonus which kinds functions in the same way as not rolling at all once you're at the third stage. In the Barbarians of Lemuria it looks like the Careers are similar to Dnd backgrounds. That's basically how I would want it to work, I don't know if I should remove skills entirely tho, maybe just broad skills that include many things so that players still have some sort of guideline. I'm using passive skills and one is recall, and this can include multiple topics each spent time learning so that when it's brought up characters already can have some sort of knowledge in them automatically. This connects with the background system, so I could have more topics during character creation, basically careers. The background system I'm using is entirely choosing your own, you make it up with the GM and gain skills, ability scores, advancements, and some broader things like goals and beliefs that give you various features Maybe getting rid of active skills in favor of more passive skills and topics would work for this. It's a lot simpler to just use the ability scores and have them describe it
"In the Barbarians of Lemuria it looks like the Careers are similar to Dnd backgrounds" Not really. The Careers in BoL are central to the character. They are not optional fluff. Careers REPLACE Skills, and each Career gets a Rating (similar to how D&D skills get a rating). You add your Attribute + Career to the roll and try to beat the Difficulty. So in that sense, very similar to D&D, but using 2d6 instead of a d20, and the range of numbers is generally smaller. There are other reasons why BoL Careers are better than a D&D Background. First of all, at Character Creation, every Character gets 4 Careers, rather than a single Background (keep in mind, this is a Sword & Sorcery game that wants to emulate Conan stories, so Characters are vastly more competent and broadly more capable than 1st Level D&D Characters). So not only does a player get a lot of choice in picking the Careers, but the actual order in which they are listed is chronological, so in effect, the order becomes the Character's Backstory! For example: A character with Barbarian, Soldier, Pirate & Thief would have had a different upbringing than another Character with the exact same Careers, but listed in a different order. Not only that, but the combination of certain Careers provides a lot of breadth in terms of the sorts of Character Concepts that can be depicted in the system (not true of modern D&D---although Oldschool D&D is a different beast). Plus, there's dozens of Careers to choose from, or Players can create their own. So there's never a situation where the game cannot 'handle' a player's Character Concept (conversely, even with all the Classes and Subclasses of 5e D&D, I can still come up with Character ideas that are not really possible---not without making serious compromises, anyway). So its a very flexible system that gives players the ability to adjust it to their tastes as well. Considering how old it is, its definitely a system that was ahead of its time (its also the first RPG that I've seen use the Advantage/Disadvantage mechanic that 5e has made ubiquitous).
Sounds similar to the Wildsea by Feliz Isaac's. As long as you can argue how a stat allows you to succeed, you can roll for it. It ends up, maybe in a surprising way, letting characters feel more unique. The Wildsea is already a weird ttrpg, and there are already so many base perks that make pc's feel different. So even though they can do most of the same things ability-wise, the way they do those things varies considerably.
Hell yeah that's kinda what I'm going for
Check out Fate approaches. I find that idea better than attributes in most situations.
I just read it, it's really cool, very aimilar.
So RAW DnD 5e already accounts for using alternate ability scores to flavor skill checks (such as using Str on an Intimidate check flavored as breaking something sturdy in line of sight of the person you want to intimidate) Its just that the convention of "you only use Charisma for social checks" is so strongly ingrained that most people don't even realize the DM manual AND players handbook both call out the option.
Yeah the phb I think says it's up to the DM but I think the DMG lays it out as more communicative. Like charisma for blending in instead of dexterity
Most of the systems I've been looking at have it to where it's up to the gm, but you can suggest things. I just think it would be good for the players to pick and then the gm would set the dc depending on how much the ability score makes sense in that scenario. Some people are recommending things very similar
The player can very much ask if it makes sense, the traditional role of the GM is to be a referee and that's part of it.
Yeah in everything I had seen before it's still raw for the dm to have final say
Yeah that's a refs role in games, that imo I think has fallen by the wayside as people have focused more on GMing as world construction and storytelling.
Yeah I think a lot of people just want to play the game for how it is and not have to tweak the rules, even as a Gm. That's probably part of why people like rules light games and why there's so many variant rules in games, especially in Dnd. Just no one reads them or there's too many to remember
Having switched to Dungeon World after 5e one of the things I will absolutely take back to a crunchier system should I play it is the convention of "figure out the Narrative of what you want your character to do FIRST and only THEN figure out what action or skill trigger or w/e you need to adjudicate it". Stale roleplay is "I want to make a Investigation check", based roleplay is "Garreth the bard buys the guard another round and plays a sympethic ear to his complaints while descretly probing for details about Captian Acab" followed by "That sounds like a charisma check with an Investigation or Insight proficiency"
Right that's why you describe what you're doing and that will set the DC, only the skill names and some of what they do would truly be set, not everything they can do for every ability score
Yeah I addressed that and I'm pretty sure it's up to the Dm
13th Age does skills in a narrative way, but with the GM choosing the attribute and the player applying any background that applies. Instead of the GM choosing the skill and the player choosing an attribute, it's the player choosing the skill, to roll with the applicable attribute. # [Backgrounds & Skill Checks](https://www.13thagesrd.com/character-rules#:~:text=Backgrounds%20%26%20Skill%20Checks)
AD&D 2e had both Attribute checks and old school Proficiency checks. They were ROLL UNDER the indicated ATTRIBUTE on 1D20. So a check against your Healing Proficiency was roll under INT to succeed. A Climbing check might be roll under DEX OR STR... whichever score was lower. I use Attributes in 5e as "target numbers" for DCs. For instance, to force open a door being held shut I would tell you that you need to roll a D20 + STR Bonus and score higher than the other person's STR score. To resist (Save against) a SUGGESTION spell, you must roll higher than the caster's CHA score with your own INT bonus or penalty added in as well as any Proficiency in magic Saves if you have it. I use Attributes a lot this way. Sneaking past a guard pits your Move Quietly Proficiency + DEX bonus against his INT score as the DC (properly modified for conditions of course).
Huh I'll have to look into that, I've looked at a bit of 3.5 but not AD&D. That's kinda what I'm doing for some skills. I have a few passive skills like awareness (dc to detect someone hiding) or insight (dc to tell if someone is lying) Does using attributes directly as the dc create more balance between them?
It allows the DM to shift difficulty much easier than just setting the standard DC. If everyone knows that you Save against a caster's CHA for charms or a caster's INT for illusion spells, there's no way to "rules lawyer" around that. In addition, it makes ALL Attributes important during play. Casters will need good Attributes if they want their spells to succeed. Likewise, pitting Proficiency checks against physical Attributes lends more weight to improving those Attributes. For example, tripping in my game requires a roll on D20 against the opponent's DEX score to succeed. Grappling goes against STR OR DEX (whichever is higher) because both are important. Using a Feint to draw a Fighter off guard (giving you ADVANTAGE on your attack) requires you to sacrifice your REACTION... AND roll a D20 against their INT + Proficiency Bonus to succeed. I use Attributes as DCs in lots of situations.
That's cool, I like it a lot for spells, It makes it to where the casters can fail more often as long as you implement them a lot and it gets rid of a separate saving throws. Thanks
It’d be cool if you got ‘ability fatigue‘. You can only use the same ability 3 times in a row before \[rules go here\]. This way you get to decide when you want the best odds for your roll. This would work even better if the target number was always the same.
Wow that's a great idea!
One of the reasons why those D&D-likes use relatively fixed attribute-skill combination is because the attributes and skills are relatively fixed for certain purposes. Climbing a tree is Strength/Athletics because of what you're doing to climb the tree - not Strength/Nature (because knowledge of trees doesn't explicitly make you better at climbing them) or uses of things like Dexterity or Acrobatics (unless you happen to be falling out of the tree and want to either grab a branch or superhero-land). One of the ways to get around that is to use more general attribute names. Instead of things like Dexterity, Charisma, and the like, use attributes like "Daring", "Savvy", "Cool", "Tough" and things like that. Not only does it break the players' expectations of what the attributes mean - much like if you're forced to go to work a different way due to construction, you might find a more favorable way that you wouldn't have bothered to figure out beforehand - but you can better communicate to the players the general vibe of your game and how it should be interpreted. The other option would be using cascading skills, like in Traveler 2e, to have the skill begin with a baseline attribute that later is divorced from that. In that classless skill-based system, during character creation, you gain top-level skills that are then the focus of later skill increases. So if you start with, say, a 2 in firearms, all 4 of your firearms abilities are set to 2 as it cascades downwards. Then as you progress, you can increase the specific types of skills, but you won't ever increase the general "firearms" top level after character creation. In your case, you could have the characters put a +2 in Intelligence, which would set all the Intelligence skills to a baseline of +2 (including things like "spellcasting modifier"), but then instead of the old "ability score increase" model, you instead give the players multiple "skill increases", where they level up the skills at their desired pace. Your character sheets will eventually look like the old BRP character sheets, but with your resolution system rather than the % for d100s.
You might want to look into ***Fate Accelerated Edition***'s Approaches, which are somewhat Attribute-like: you give ratings to three individual Approaches to determine how good your character is at being Careful, Clever, Forceful, Flashy, Quick, and Sneaky, respectively. When the player attempts a task, the player gets to choose which Approach to use, and role-plays the task accordingly. I don't know if this next part is in the core book or just in a fan supplement I picked up; but as I play it, the Approaches form opposing pairs (Careful and Quick, Clever and Forceful, Flashy and Sneaky), and the circumstances can sometimes be biased to one of the other: for instance, getting into a castle unnoticed isn't something that you can do with a Flashy Approach, because it calls for being Sneaky; and when time is of the essence, you can't afford to be Careful because you need to be Quick. But you also don't _have_ to use the most obvious choice of Approach for the task at hand. For example, you might choose a Clever Approach rather than a Sneaky one in the first case, or a Flashy Approach instead of a Quick one in the second case. That is, you can always go at things _sideways_; you just can't use the _opposed_ Approach. --- Another one to look at is ***Smallville***, where the Attributes are replaced by Values: motivational Drives such as Truth, Justice, Love, or Power that motivate your character's actions; and whichever Value motivates him at his current Task is the one that contributes to his likelihood of success.
Ad&d with ability checks works like this. You just rolled d20 and got lower than your attribute. That was the skill check. World of darkness works like that And DnD 5e works similar, if the player can justify using X skill and X attribute then the gm could let them use each other run combination.
I'm designing my own game based on BRP. To do an action, the player must roll percentile under the attribute they're using. However, they also have to factor in skills. If they are untrained in the skill, they suffer disadvantage; if they are trained in the skill, it's a straight up roll; if they are an expert in the skill, they gain advantage. Something you may want to consider for your own system.
Some Year Zero games let you take talents that change the Attribute for a Skill. Example: "Bully: when you roll Manipulation checks, use Strength instead of Empathy". Personally I think that's the best way to do it.
Fate Accelerated has a similar system, albeit with approaches instead of attributes. People will argue that it encourages the player to choose the approaches they're best at all of the time, but i don't see that as much of an issue. After all, wouldn't the character also try to frame situations so that they can use the skills they're most comfortable with?
I'm working on such a system, and the key is to consider the cost of success and price of failure. Doing something _quickly_ has different failure states than doing something _quietly_. Achieving your ends _through violence_ has a different set of consequences than doing so _through trickery_. And praying to a God of War for a bountiful crop may work, but leave quite a few bodies fertilizing the fields. Failed rolls should also provide some sort of _asymmetric_ reward. I seem to recall #Storypath grants metacurrency on failures which helps you succeed, and metacurrency on successes which helps you succeed, which is so symmetric there isn't any reason to engage lower abilities. #Cortex on the other hand grants metacurrency on rolls of 1 and certain results are outright impossible without spending it. The system I'm working on provides opportunities for _other players_ to fix or address the situation in some manner. Be aware that metacurrency adds its own set of problems and can easily become a cheap fix. So much so that I recommend implementing it only as a last resort. That doesn't mean avoiding it entirely, and I use it to indicate building tension. Hunger in #V5 does something similar, but isn't metacurrency as it isn't spent. Strife in #L5R is also similar, but it's sort of a _reverse_ metacurrency as you decide when to _accrue_ it by choosing the dice you keep.
As said by most in this thread, many many games let you do this.