Hey! I'm taking a crack at writing up a lil system for me and my friends to use. I don't expect to make anything fantastic or groundbreaking, but I do want to try my hardest. The only thing is, I only have so much of an understanding of dice, which in many systems, is the crux of every event! Can you help me gain an understanding of what dice are good for what situations? I get the idea that smaller dice are better for simpler resolutions, and larger dice add more possibilities and flexibility, but you also can't just slap one type of dice on every action unless it's something really casual, and that's not what I'm aiming for today.
Can you all help me out a bit?
>>47789908
D1000 TABLES FOR RANDOM MAGIC EFFECTS
THE ONLY THING IN FROM ANOTHER TIME ANOTHER LAND THAT'S ACTUALLY GOOD
>>47789948
You mean like AD&D's wild magic tables from the 1990s?
OP, why don't you list for us your top 20 favorite systems to start. Only the ones you've used for at least five sessions each. I'm sure you're not going in with a lack of experience using diverse rule systems.
>>47789908
Dice are just random number generators, bro.
>I get the idea that smaller dice are better for simpler resolutions, and larger dice add more possibilities and flexibility
Well, shit. Smaller dice have fewer possible results, and larger dice have more. That's a given.
>you also can't just slap one type of dice on every action unless it's something really casual
Excuse me? Some of the most detailed and involved systems I've seen use only one die. they'll just have a shitton of rules that will key off that one type of die in various ways.
>>47789973
I don't have a gigantic amount of experience but I just feel like throwing myself into something out of my comfort zone.
I've got experience with pathfinder, dark heresy, dnd 5, dnd 3.5
i know i did one other at some point but my memory is not good so i don't remember that time
then again since i can't remember that's useless
I just feel like cooking something up that I can look at and be happy with, it'd be effort on my part and I'd have to do a lot of reading to get it to be anything but a mess but like
I just wanna make something, even if >>47789929 is probably correct.
Adding more dice to a roll will increase the chance of rolling average. Increasing the die size will raise the average value. Experiment with online dice rollers to see the bell curves. Try crazy stuff like 1d10+3D4 and see how the curve is adjusted when you chage dice size and amounts.
Keep in mind there are lots of ways to incorporate randomness into a game (drawing cards from a deck, drawing colored stones from a bag). Work to understand the math behind them.
>>47790086
>online dice roller
No need to be vague.
Anydice.com.
>>47789908
>Hey guys! Im gonna design a game, but I dont know one of the core basics of game design! Little help?
>>47790167
Get super fucked, you cynical twat. We've all had that optimistic phase where we've enjoyed a few RPGs and realized they're just words on a page, something we could tailor to our every whim.
>>47790254
and then we ground ourselves against the wheel of time, and saw our mettle lacking...
>>47790254
What are you even talking about here?
>>47789908
Go back to study probability and distributions. You could have done it by yourself if you paid attention during math instead of wanking.
>>47790436
I never went to college, I don't have that kind of money.
They didn't really teach that shit when I was in high school either. Wasn't the greatest at math any way. I'm just working with that I got.
>>47790254
Yeah, you get it. I'm just trying to walk out of my comfort zone and do something new.
the two basic, most common principles are linear probability, with granulation, or bell curve probabilities.
D100, D20 D10, D4, are linear probabilities every roll is exactly 1%, 5%, 10%, or 25%, respectively. So a D100 roll, its exactly the same odds of rolling 01, as 50.
Bell curve probability is when multiple dice are rolled. Lets use 3d6 as the "classic" example.
roll 3 D6's, add 'em up.
the absolute minimum is 3. the maximum is 18. but because each individual D6 has a linear probability of 1-6, the average of all three is no longer linear. rolling 1, 1, 1 is the only way to get 3. but to get 12, you could roll 1, 5, and 6, or 4, 4, 4, or 2,6,4, and so on. That can be exploited, to create average results.
3 or 18 on 3d6 are rare, just 0.5% of rolls, whereas 10 or 11 are going to be rolled about 10% of the time. So, a treasure roll on D100, with 100 items, the player is exactly as likely to find the Uber Sword of +5 on a roll of 01, as it is the 3 silver pieces and a mouldy bit of cheese, on 50. In contrast, with a bell curve 3d6, they're far, far more likely to get the crap, and the treasure to be rare.
same goes for a critical hit in combat, or any other roll. So, google and learn what the bell curves are for each dice combination, and work out areas where they can be used, where each is most suited.
>>47790478
Thank you for this explanation! This makes sense! I'll look into this.
>>47789929
>generic systems
Are okay, I guess, but specifically built systems with a purpose to them can outdo the crap out of generics if the specific system's mechanics are developed to suit the setting/purpose.
Specifically built systems can also suck, yes, but that's an issue of poor design on the builder's part rather than with the fact of it being a purpose-built system.Or possibly of using the system for the wrong purpose; good luck running Exalted in Paranoia.
>>47790505
>>47790478
now, both systems have faults and disadvantages. linear numbers have an advantage that they can be tweaked in tables, etc, to copy bell curves - the reverse, cannot (at least, not easily)
so, you might have
01-50: Mouldy cheese and 3 silvers
51-75: 10 gold
76-99: 100 gold
100: +5 uber sword.
There, there's now a far greater chance of getting the crap stuff. And rolling your d100 now has the fear of rolling low, to get a bad score, or the promise of rolling high, to get great loot.
in that way, you can tweak the gameplay mechanics to get more rewards. Its simpler and a lot less headache than use of multiple other dice, but some people like the appeal of that.
>>47790042
>I don't have a gigantic amount of experience
Ask yourself this: if your only experience with vehicles was riding around in your friend's car and then later buying your own second-hand automatic transmission, would you think you're qualified or competent to design your own motorized vehicle from scratch?
Go ahead and make a homebrew; everyone does at some point. Just realize that it will be hot garbage visible to anyone with more than a novice's experience with RPGs. The more variety of mechanics you experience, the better your homebrew will be.
>>47790646
Yeah, I expect to make hot garbage, but as long as I can have fun with it and learn from it, I'll be happy.
>>47789908
As said by >>47790086 and >>47790162
Go to the Anydice website and look at their graphs.
really look into bell curves, because flat distributions. Roll a d20, you're going to average a 10, right? Yeah, but that's not the most common number TO roll.
You're just as likely to roll a 1 and a 20. It's essentially a 20 sided coin.
>>47789929
This attitude right here is the cancer that is killing /tg/.
