Fudgifying the Fairly Obvious

From the moment I read the Basic Role-Playing pamphlets included in my copies of Stormbringer and Call of Cthulhu in the early 1980s, I was fascinated by the skill-based system, but it had one major flaw: common abilities started far below what would be normal for an average person in the real world. Skills reflecting ordinary communication, the senses, or knowledge of one's place of birth were extremely low and unlikely to improve unless they were used frequently (and at a slow rate at that). Granted, I normally do not require rolls for very easy tasks such as observing things, using common modes of transportation, remembering facts about one's local community, or doing things that any able-bodied person can reasonably be expected to do under normal circumstances, but for those cases that do warrant a skill check, I feel that characters ought to have a fair chance of succeeding without having to devote valuable character creation points to those standard abilities. And by a "fair chance" I mean a Fair chance.

Any heavily skill-based role-playing system that is burdened with unnecessary common skills (that is, skills that everyone has) can benefit from a little fudgification. Simply replace the score of any common skill (such as See, Listen, Drive, Climb, Swim, etc.) with an appropriate Fudge trait level. In most cases, make it Fair. If the character has an obvious disadvantage for whatever reason, make it Mediocre. If the character has an obvious advantage, make it Good. Use the normal action resolution rules for any other skills that are used, but whenever these common skills come into play, use the Fudge rules to resolve them. The distribution of results will be more realistic, and the player can spend more points on specialized skills (in systems that use that form of character creation).

In short, Fudge rules are not just for Fudge. If your favorite game flounders in some respect, fudgify it.

Someone Mentioned Fudge in a Podcast

It's a rare occurrence nowadays (as far as I know), but in case you missed the headline, someone mentioned Fudge in a podcast! The podcast in question is Che Webster's Roleplay Rescue, and the episode is question is "Fudging It with Joe from Dekahedron". It didn't teach me anything new, but it's always nice to hear Fudge mentioned (and it might be informative to others).

Global Accessibility Awareness Day Sale at Accessible Games

Accessible Games has announced a 30% discount on all issues of Accessible Gaming Quarterly, the Accessible Guide to RPG Layout, and the Fudge-based role-playing game Survival of the Able from May the 15th through the 22nd in honor of Global Accessibility Awareness Day, which falls on May the 15th. See "30% Off for Global Accessibility Awareness Day" for details.

The 11th Anniversary of Creative Reckoning

Eleven years and two months ago (I have a tendency toward the belated), Creative Reckoning was born from the ashes of Fudgery.net and its blog, Fudgerylog. I wish I could say I am "taking it to eleven" this year (a reference to Spinal Tap), but that would be absurdly unlikely. The lack of news regarding Fudge and its relation to the Open Game License following the OGL scandal has not filled me with confidence. I wish it would adopt a Creative Commons license, but here we are, not knowing exactly where we are going. If the inspiration strikes me, or a reader asks me, I'll publish more Fudge articles, but the grapevine has been eerily quiet of late. Let me know in the comments if you have any thoughts, and keep rolling 4dF.

Any Suggestions?

I must confess it has been getting harder to write Fudge-related articles for Creative Reckoning. My first gaming site (of which this is the continuation) was centered on Fudge, and there seemed to be endless possibilities for articles, but I have reached a point where I need to ask my readers for help. Please leave a suggestion (or multiple suggestions) for any topic you would like me to explore here or any questions you may have regarding anything I have previously published in this blog. I'll even welcome writing prompts. I thank you in advance.

Fudge Is Not Rocket Surgery

Honestly, I do not understand why some people find Fudge action resolution rules so difficult to comprehend and/or accept. It's the essence of simplicity. You have a trait ranked from Terrible to Superb. You have a difficulty ranked from Terrible to Superb. You roll your Fudge dice. The result of the roll increases your trait level, decreases your trait level, or leaves it unmodified. If the trait level after the roll then equals or exceeds the difficulty level, you succeed. If not, you fail. You don't need to worry about arbitrary numerical values. You just need to apply the dice result to your trait level and see if it meets or beats the difficulty. Why does this confuse people?

What They Do in the Meantime

In an overview of three games Richard Woolcock ran recently (in his blog, Zadmar's Savage Stuff), there is a useful hint for anyone running almost any role-playing game (emphasis mine):

Another weakness of my games in the past is that they often felt like they ended abruptly. A friend of mine had a great solution to this when he ran Sundered Skies several years ago, where at the end of the campaign he asked each of us to describe what our characters got up to after the conclusion of the story, and we each had the chance to wrap up our character's storylines. I've attempted to do the same thing since then (although I sometimes forget), but it worked really well in this case, as I always gave the players the "final word" at the end of the adventure, letting them describe the ending.

The player characters are the protagonists of the adventure. It only makes sense to let them describe what they doing at its conclusion. Not only does it give the players a sense of ownership over their own experiences, but it can also lead to a greater feeling of connection with the setting and sow the seeds of future adventures. This is something I will be adopting in my own game-mastering, although I'll probably need to write myself a note and stick it on my GM screen until it becomes a habit.

[This article is cross-posted here in Decidedly Six-Sided.]