Role-Playing Game Design - Rules-Light Horror

 

You, my loyal reader, know that I like to dabble in all sorts of game design.  My primary focus has been in wargames, but that is not the only type of games I have worked on.  I have built card games, board games, and other simple games for my own amusement as well.  One area I have commented on previously and actively play is Role-playing Games (RPGs).

I actually started my RPG journey before my wargame journey.  I learned how to play "Red Box" D&D from a friend's dad; a Lutheran pastor.  I picked up all the boxed sets from a little bookstore in the local strip mall, the only strip mall within a day's bike ride!  From there, I managed to scrap and scrape together the basic AD&D books, the Buck Rogers RPG, and the TSR Marvel Super Heroes game.  As a teen, I played a lot of West End Games D6 Star Wars and Shadowrun.  Many of the books have been lost to time, and I still lament the loss of my Masters edition boxed set.  Shortly there after, an ad in Dragon magazine sucked me into the world of Warhammer and I have managed to juggle my two RPG and Wargame hobbies every since.  

Now that I am older, having regular RPG nights and/or Wargame nights is much easier.  I was able to get into a local RPG session much easier than I was able to get into the wargaming community!  The wargaming scene had a number of starts and stops.  Meanwhile, I have had a long running RPG group with a dedicated weekly game night, that was only interrupted by COVID, but has since re-grouped after vaccines became widely available.  

The re-engagement with this group has rekindled my interest in RPGs.  Thanks to this group I have been able to play and run a few more modern games such as Dune, Lasers and Feelings, Monster of the Week, Those Dark Places, and more.  The group is primarily a Dungeons and Dragons 5e group, but we are not averse to spreading our wings a bit!  Thankfully, we have several people who are capable of being game masters as well as players too!  

All of this regular activity has led me to be interested in designing and playing RPGs.  Today, I want to share a simple rules-lite game I built for running a horror themed one-shot.  

Before you begin to play, it is important that you set the appropriate ground rules for your players, this is a horror game after all.  Therefore, some of the themes are vulnerability, insanity, hopelessness, and bad things happening to good people.  Horror could include supernatural, alien, or human behavior that violates normal taboos.  Therefore, before you play make sure that you understand where your players draw the line, and make sure not to go so far as to ruin the fun for any of your players.  That said, they maybe the 'heroes' in the game, but in Horror heroes die, or worse have to pay a terrible cost.   

So, with the appropriate guidelines set for the players, let's take a look at the brief rules of the game. 

 

A Lite Game of Horror   

Key Mechanics

• Roll a d6 and add your character's attribute to it
• 7+ is a partial success, and an 8+ is a success, 12 is a critical success.
• Relevant Occupation is a +2, Hobby is a +1, Weakness is a -1 and Terror is a -2.  The player is encouraged to make a case for why these modifiers apply, but ultimately it is up to the GM when to use these mods. 
• Relevant equipment is +1.  The player is encouraged to make a case for why these modifiers apply, but ultimately it is up to the GM when to use these mods. 
• If one player helps another player, the acting player can roll twice and chose the highest score to apply

A partial success is something that appears successful at first, but all may not be as it seems.  The GM may choose to reverse the success or add a complication based on the success.  For example, you may successfully open a sealed door, but the noise is loud enough to alert someone to your presence. 

A Critical Success results in the player earning more than what they initially were trying to do.  This could be an additional benefit narrated by the player but approved by the GM.  If it is an attack, all damage is doubled.  For example, a player scores a critical success to open a sealed door, but a critical allows them to open it and then choose to also re-lock it behind them.  

Attributes

·       Class- Social standing, charm, and wit

·       Brains- Perception, speed of thought, and learning

·       Brawn- Physical abilities such as strength, endurance, stamina

·       Reflex- Speed, hand eye coordination, and agility

 o   Brains + Brawn/2 round down = Nerve which is used to resolve Insanity Checks

o   Class = Used for Acquisition tests, also +1 equipment for each point of Class over 1.

o   Reflex = Initiative for actions when timing matters

o   Insanity = Brains Attribute level

o   Wounds = Brawn Attribute level

You have 1, 2, 3, and 4 to allocate across these four areas with no duplicates in an attribute.   

Insanity 

If a player is asked to make a Nerve test, roll a 1d6 and add the character's Nerve.  If failed, they have an episode.  If succeeded, the PC is fine.  Every time you Fail a Nerve test, the PC lose 1 sanity and are subject to an episode.  

In addition, as you lose your grip on sanity, you can ask the GM one close ended question about the situation.  The GM must answer as truthfully as they can.  Example questions could be: 

• Is Mr. X the killer?
• Can this thing be harmed by fire? 
• Is this book related to a cult?  

If a character loses all their sanity, they are catatonic for the rest of the game.  After the game, your character is clinically insane for the rest of their life. 

 ·       Episodes

If an episode occurs due to a failed Nerve check, roll 1d6 and consult the chart below:

1-  Shaking.  You experience uncontrollable shaking, and must re-roll Reflex rolls and choose the worst. 

2-   Fatigue.  You are suddenly very, very tired. All brawn rolls are re-rolled and you must choose the worst outcome. 

3-   Brain Reeling.  You have a hard time focusing.  All Brains tests must be re-rolled with the worst outcome being chosen. 

4-   Rigid.  You are rooted to the spot, unable to take your eyes off what caused the episode until is removed, or you are removed from it.  After the episode, you must re-roll all Class tests and choose the worst outcome. 

5-   Catatonia.  You fall to the floor, unable to move or act for 1d6 minutes.  After you recover, all Nerve tests must be re-rolled and the worse outcome chosen. 

6-   Insane fear and violence.  You must escape the source of the episode at all costs.  You will flee, and fight anyone who stands in your way.  Once away from the source of the episode, you will suffer catatonia as above.  

Combat

If a character loses all their wounds, they go to unconscious and possibly dead. 

At the start of combat, all players make a Reflex roll and tell the GM the number.  Actions take place from highest number to lowest.  Enemies always act at 7, but after players that score a 7.  If there is a tie between players, the players decide who they want to go first.       

-          Melee is d6 + Brawn = success or not

-          Ranged is d6 + Reflex = success or not

These same checks are used when attacked, with success avoiding damage and failure leading to damage.  Failure typically causes 1 wound loss.  

Each hit causes 1 physical wound, with +1 wounds for appropriate equipment.  A critical causes double wounds.  

Enemies have as many wounds as the GM wants, but humans should have between 1-4, and horror based creatures should not have more than the total parties starting Wounds.

          

Design Philosophy

That's all the rules!  As I built these simple rules, I had a few major ideas driving them.  The first, and most important element of the design is that I believe the "only rule that matters" in an RPG is how to determine success and failure for the players.  Everything else is fluff.  Therefore, if you are trying to make a Rules-Lite system, the focus has to be on this core question; how does a player know they have succeeded/failed?  Therefore, the most ink is spilled on this question. 

Typically, the answer is a combination of skills, abilities, and equipment.  I stripped these elements down to the barest of essentials. 

Beyond that, I also wanted a game where GM Decisions were important BUT the GM role never had to make a single dice roll.  All dice rolling was intended to be done by the players, with the GM interpreting results of player declared actions based on the results.  To me, the power of GM is the signature element of a RPG, and is the best feature.  It is not a bug, and the GMs role to make decisions and interpret results should be expansive in an RPG.         

You will also notice, that the game will be shaped by failure as much as success!  The threshold for a partial success is 7+.  You are rolling a d6, so your best attribute will have a range of 5 to 10 while your worst will have a 1 to 7.  This makes using your Hobby, Occupation, and equipment critically important.  In addition, your Terror, weakness, or an episode will make it extremely hard for you to succeed.  The more Episodes you have, the more you will death spiral on attribute tests without careful use of modifiers.    

Finally, this game was designed to have quick build characters.  There are two reasons for this.  The first is that it is a one-shot, so we will likely not use them again.  Speed to build was critical.  Secondly, in a horror game characters tend to die, so quick character creation makes it easy to replace them.  That said, the Occupation/Hobby and Weakness/Terror system and simple attributes will easily give players a quick sense of the character so they can dive in quickly.  This system also rewards Role-playing the character and provides in game support for doing so.  Simple yet deep enough. 

The rules are also time period agnostic, so these games could be modern, set in the past, in a fantasy world, or sci-fi.  The choices is yours!  Our game happened to be set in the Catskill Mountains of New York state in 1890, but they could have been in our D&D world, on a space station, modern day Cuba, etc.  These could also use minis and maps, but works just fine as theatre of the mind.    

Going Beyond the One-Shot 

Finally, the rules above are intended to be played as a One-shot.  If you wanted a campaign, experience rules would be easy to add.  For every wound and insanity you lose, you gain 1 experience..... if you survive the game without going to 0 wounds/insanity.  If you do not survive you make no gains.  If you go to 0 Insanity/Wounds you can survive but at the cost of taking a new weakness/terror or losing equipment.           

You can then use experience to increase an Ability for a new level x4 (i.e. going from Class 1 to Class 2 would cost 8), for every 10 you could buy a single re-roll to use as needed, use 10 to make a new acquisition test for some equipment out of game, or buy a new Hobby/remove a Weakness for 10; with Occupations/Terrors costing 25.     

Conclusion

The Death Spiral was by design!  This is a horror game, and the cost of success is great.  In the one-shot we played, of four characters; 1 died of injury, 2 went insane, and the last one had to flee into the winter wilderness while everything burned down around them!  This was all part of the big finale.  That is how horror games should end.    

That said, the idea behind horror games is that characters are caught up in things they can not truly handle and that is beyond their ability.  Therefore, the rules are designed to reflect ordinary folks going against extra-ordinary circumstances.  In addition, they give the players leeway to role-play for benefits and make decisions and the GM the space to apply complications, determine results and make rulings.  

If you give them a try, let me know what you think! 

  

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