Apologies in advance! This is not nearly close to done and is not completely organized!
__-The Sixes and Sevens System Rules-__
Rules and mechanics have been adapted from the "Countermoves' Generic Microgame Engine" (CGME) published under Public Domain.
This adaptation was created by S. Claus of the Claus Workshop and is intended for everyone to play with and enjoy. The only thing we ask in return is that credit is received where credit is due. If you use, change, or borrow concepts, mechanics, art, or ideas that are in association with Claus Workshop productions or someone else's productions associated or affiliated with Claus Workshop products that the creators be credited under the Copyright, CC BY-SA use.
°Firstly, I want to thank you for taking the time to read through this and hopefully giving this system a try. It is designed to be rules light to give loose structure to creative roleplay and storytelling. The system is designed to be setting agnostic and can be used from stone age to a far future space opera, but I'll refer to a typical medieval fantasy setting with some variations every now and then.
I named this system "Sixes and Sevens" because it is derived from an old term used to describe chaos, disorganization, bedlam, and confusion. I'm a healthcare worker specialized in geriatric memory care, and Paw Paw [That's me!] said it a couple times while I was his provider. I'm not a game designer by trade, but have a knack for it at times, but to say that writing this had me at Sixes and Sevens quite often would be an understatement. I decided to feature a mechanic with this system as well to bring a sense of uncertainty and gives a creative licence for us statistical nerds and habitual gamblers alike.
With that out of the way, I'll detail some terms that come up often and what they would mean in a context of the material presented to you and, as it comes up, what you'll need to play.
°"D6": A standard six-sided die, you'll need one to three of these. 1d6 would mean one six sided die, 2d6 for two six sided dice, and so on. Rarely, if ever, will we use more than 3d6.
°"PC": Player Character
°"Standard": A standard test or check will be 2d6.
°"Disadvantage": A disadvantaged test or check will be 1d6.
°"Advantage": A test or check with advantage will be 3d6.
°"Guide": This is the traditional game master and arbitrator of the rules.
°"Mov": Your PC's Movement Speed
°[Hello!]: This is Paw Paw, the voice of suggestion, further clarity, and often the real narrator of this manual.
°Test: Or Contest. Tests, within this manual, are contested attempts ofskill against an opponet or opposing force.
°Check: A skill check is made freely to determine if something the PC wants to accomplish succeeds or fails.
°CA: This is short for a "Circumstantial Advantage"
__-Some Baseline Rules-__
°The Guide creates a world as only an outline. The rest is to be filled in collaboratively by everyone during play.
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__-Index-__
1. Character Creation
"And then, the World Shined Brighter..."
- Size, HP, Mov, and AR/NA
- What's your place in the world?
- Personality Traits [2/1]
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2. Actions and Turn Economy
- Action types
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3. Skills
- Beginnings, Humble...
- Utility
- Combat
- Trade
4. Gear and Vehicles
5. Using and Reading the Dice
- Sixes and Sevens section to be added
6. Advancement
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[First of all, you need to start with a character.
Close your eyes.
Take a deep breath.
Then open your eyes.
Exhale and breathe that life into the person you want to be.]
__-And then, the world shined brighter...-__
°There are no attributes to min/max in Sixes and Sevens this way you can play your characters as you want. But there are four mechanical statistics used.
Hitpoints (HP), Movement Speed (Mov), Damage (DMG), and Armor/Natural Armor (AR)/(NA).
__-Hitpoints, Movement, and Armor-__
You have a handful of hitpoints and movement speed determined by your size. We know this doesn't cover everything you may be looking for, but it's a baseline that can be built upon and improved.
Your Movement Speed (Mov) is measured in 10's of feet. On a traditional graph paper map, 5 feet of distance is 1 Square. So a Mov of 3 is 30 feet in distance.
Tiny Sized
- 2 HP for tiny body types [From Pixies to House animals]
°5 Mov
°Size 1 Square <5 ft. size
°No Mov Penalty to pass through your occupied zone.
°In addition to your standard three (3) skills, you may also start with the "Dodgy", and "Contortionist" skills.
Small Sized
- 4 HP for smaller body types [Goblins, kobolds, pygmies, etc...]
°4 Mov
°Size occupies 1 Hex/1 Square/5 ft.
°-1 Mov Penalty to pass through your occupied zone.
°In addition to your standard three (3) skills, you may also start with the "Dodgy" skill.
Medium Sized
- 6 HP for humanoid sized creatures
°3 Mov
°Size 1 Hex/1 Square/5 ft.
°-2 Mov Penalty to pass through your occupied zone.
Large Sized
- 6 HP and 2 NA
[Ents, giants, monsterous races, etc...]
°2 Mov
°-3 Mov Penalty to pass through your occupied zone.
°You start begin with two skills, but you may also start with the skill "Bulwark".
*Larger Than Life or Unusual
- 10 Natural Armor, No HP
[Constructs, dragons, demi-gods, a colossal hero of ancient prophecy, etc...
°1 Mov
°4 Squares
°-4 Mov Penalty to pass through your occupied zone.
°You start with one less starting skill point, but deal one extra point of damage.
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- A player may add or subtract up to two (2) HP, if your Guide permits, within the PC's determined body type. Maximum HP, however, cannot go below one (1).
If your Guide allows: When you sacrifice HP at character creation, you may take that many additional Movement Speed, or Natural Armor, or skills from other lists, not just starting character lists, up to two (2).
[Everyone has different thresholds for what their bodies can take! You can also instead forego adding to your health pool by giving your character skills, movement speed, or natural armor in place of this advantage.]
__Armor comes in three (3) flavors:__
Natural Armor: Special Values
Unarmoured: Adds 0 Armor
Light: Adds 1 Armor
Medium: Adds 2 Armor, -1 Mov
Heavy: Adds 3 Armor, -2 Mov
(Natural Armor cannot be healed, but recovers on rest. However, double the rest is required to recover 1 NA. (2 hours per 1 NA))
Your character's Movement Speed or Health cannot go below one (1).
[You extra large types can become living tanks, really!]
__Actions__
Every character has 2 usable Actions per round.
Actions include:
- Slashing/Stabbing/Shooting/Hitting
- Reloading
- Movement/Taking Cover
- Hiding/Sneaking
- Taking Aim/Focusing
- Taunting
- Intimidate
- Persuasion
- Searching
- Preparing/Casting Spells
- Interacting with objects/environment/NPCs
- Picking Yourself or your Buddies Up
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Slashing/Stabbing/Shooting/Hitting: Standard attack that deals damage if the attacker is successful with a skill check or contest.
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Reloading:
To hit with the arrow, first you must be the arrow. But before that you've got to knock an arrow. Reloading takes one action to preform per projectile readied.
[This would apply for modern day weaponry as well such as bullets from a revolver. However it's worth noting now to those that enjoy crossbows and muzzle loading guns that these have a different structure of reloading that requires two or more actions to reload.]
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Movement/Sneaking/Taking Cover: You may dedicate one (1) action to movement, limited only by your Mov. Sneaking allows the player to move at half their speed, but remain hidden until spotted or go uses their full Mov.
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Hiding: Going into hiding requires shadows, objects to hide behind, or general obfuscation for a standard test. Otherwise it is at disadvantage or impossible.
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Taking Aim/Focusing: These actions allow for an advantage on your next attack or action. Both can be disrupted with a disadvantaged opposed roll by attacks or outside forces against your PC. If focusing and your PC must move before releasing the aim or focus, you must make a disadvantaged test.
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Taunting: A PC that taunts will have attacks and attention drawn to them. Disadvantage would be imposed if the PC is outnumbered or outranked by another.
[In other words, the recipient may not respond on a typical day, but sometimes a "yo mama" joke hits a little too close to home to ignore.]
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Intimidate: A PC trying to intimidate will roll a test against the opponent(s) with the defenders having disadvantage unless other factors warrant better chances such as numbers in their favour, bravado, higher in military rank, etc... a success against the defenders causes them to run away for rounds equal to test successes. However, the PC will suffer an additional disadvantage penalty against intimidation from that opponet should they not succeed.
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Persuasion: A PC persuading an NPC upon a successful test will have a PC more receptive to suggestions or more open with the characters. However, if the PC were successful and asked the NPC to do something that is not beneficial in any way, the NPC can make a request or immediately attack the player for their transgression.
[In many tabletop games, a successful persuasion is treated as a free pass to do whatever they would like. Your Guide may allow this and we applaud them for sticking to this tried and true recipe for hilarity. However we would like for you to understand that a persuasion acts as a way to influence others, not command them directly.
...that is a Manipulation spell, page xx.]
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Searching:
Whether you are looking for traps, secret doors, or anything that is hidden, searching is the option for you with a check.
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Preparing/Casting Spells:
Some spells require you to use an item, read, speak a phrase, or preform hand gestures [complete with wiggling your fingers in a spooky fashion]. The preparation takes time and sometimes takes two actions just to prepare. Casting the spell requires its prerequisites to be met before casting, but there are some that don't have prerequisites or you have the "Innate Spell Casting" skill which reduces the number of preparations for all of your spells.
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Interacting with objects/environment/NPCs:
Like it says on the tin, any sort of generalized action that doesn't require a check or test; such as drawing a weapon, dishing out potions, drinking ale, cutting rope, cutting the rope bridge as you are drawing your blade while you are drinking ale and there's a swarm of nasty critters on it while trying to force feed your bro a potion [That's technically three actions, drinking, drawing, and cutting, and cutting is a check]. You get the idea.
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Picking Yourself or your Buddies Up:
When your bud goes down in the thick of it, you must be close enough to kick them awake to ask them, "Hey, you dead yet?" With a successful check, they groan and ask for five more minutes, but you know they can get up on their own. However, if you're the one to go down, there's still hope. On your turn you roll a standard check to see if you have at least one HP left. You can choose to spring up or stay down with a successful persuasion test to play off that you're actually among the dead. However if you're not successful, you've got one more shot with disadvantage, but a success here means you're knocked out cold and may need further medical attention or just a good night's sleep. If you fail your last chance and no one comes for you, you mark this one retired and brainstorm a new character.
[A favorite gimmick among our friends are to take the sheet and just add Jr. at the end of the fallen's name and erase skills that are learned later.]
Prepared Actions or Reactions use up one (1) action on your turn and when activated are tested at a disadvantage, but in the event of a tie, the defender wins except when a counter attack is being preformed. Once used, they will not trigger again until you prepare another action. These actions include:
- Counter Attacking
- Dodging
- Defending
However, an action spent focusing or taking aim will bring the disadvantage to a standard test.
Counter Attack: If the attacker fails their check, the defender may roll at disadvantage. If the defender is successful in their attack, damage is dealt as normal and disrupts all other actions the original attacker could have made on their turn.
Dodging: Defender rolls at disadvantage and in the event of a tie or success, the defender takes no damage.
Defend: Defender rolls at disadvantage and in the event of a tie or success, the defender takes no damage. This can be only be done with a shield of some kind.
°There is one other Reactive type of roll, but it doesn't need to be prepared in any way. The Saving Throw!
In Sixes and Sevens, this is just the blanket term used to justify an instinctual reaction. Kinda like pushing out your arms when you trip and expect to fall in an effort to break said fall. This is strictly pass or fail with varying consequences.
__That's Nice and All, So What Do I Roll?__
Well, your PC has made it this far in life, no matter how long or short their tenure on the mortal coil. It's assumed you are competent at life in general.
All checks of any kind start at the standard base, 2d6. If either die turns up a 5 or 6, it's a success.
[Though this does tend to fluctuate up or down due to factors of applicable skills, environmental hazards, tactics, and even darn good roleplay and storytelling!]
An advantage in a check is having skills, tools, or circumstances that are in your favor that grant an additional 1d6 to your roll. If you have the tools and the talent, you lower the success threshold of your checks by one. In other words you would succeed on a 4, 5, or 6 result. To further add onto the example given, if the PC's additionally have the skills, the tools, and circumstances in their favour, it further lowers the success threshold to include a 3 result being successful.
[There is a difference of "Momentary Advantages" and "Circumstantial Advantage" when considering your advantages. Momentary advantage only lasts for one round whereas a circumstantial may last for as long as your Guide deems appropriate. You may have both that lowers the threshold again to being anything but a 1. However any and all advantages gained do not lower the threshold to being an automatic success and 1's cannot be included into the success threshold.]
However some things will impose a disadvantage which only gives you 1d6 to roll or takes away your advantage leaving you with 2d6.
[But don't be surprised if you say, "I'm going to pick the lock on the chest," and your Guide says, "No, you don't have lockpicks or the skill." You can always say instead, "I'm going to pick the lock with this bone fragment from the ground." Your Guide can still respond with a "No," but are encouraged to say, "Okay, but that would impose a disadvantage," and you'd roll 1d6. Alternatively, you may just be a big boi and say, "I SMASH!" And your Guide may concede to letting you roll as normal.]
(Trailing off and incomplete from here)
[Guides are encouraged to let the players help shape the world and detail the scenes. Guides should want you to succeed, but luck is a fickle mistress and should play into that if you do not succeed.]
__Sharp Minds and Pointy Sticks__
You have skills and proficiency with a favored weapon adding to your roll as an advantage>
- There are 4 attack types. Light, Heavy, Ranged, and Magical.
- Light is anything one handed
- Heavy is anything 2 hands
- Ranged is considered any projectile
- Magic is considered a special category
- Damage dealt by individuals scale in 1's, 2's, and more rarely 3's and 4's.
Body, Mind, and Spirit magics
Untalented can't do magic
Untrained can't do magic
Must learn magic language (like.... arcane?speech?something) to read spells or speak incantations right
Blessed? Anointed
Ultra powerful characters with Insta-Kill/Mass Mulching skills and abilities would be limited to one use per game(?) (In-game Day?)
Mass Mulching and Insta-Kill skills are limited in their utility.
Insta-Kill works on a single enemy with 10 or fewer hit points.
Mass Mulching works on groups of 30 or less with 3 or fewer hit points. This skill cannot be used to target a single enemy to deal massive damage.