Advice and Perspective

I don't think the hobby is served well by those who presume to dictate a "correct" way of running or playing a role-playing game. It is different at every table, it has always been that way, and it shall always be that way. You can try to convert others to your way of thinking, but gamers will do what gamers do—their own thing. If you have what you believe is good advice for those who might enjoy your style of gaming, go ahead and share it, but keep in mind there is no One True Way. Recognize that every table is different and every person at that table is an individual. Respect our differences, and remember that some gamers have needs with regard to accessibility.

If you have a voice in the hobby, use it to help others to participate. Fight for inclusion, not exclusion. Be aware of your responsibility to other hobbyists and those who wish to join.

[This article is cross-posted here in Applied Phantasticality.]

Buying Time

Sometimes I run adventures for which I have prepared extensively, and those are fun (especially if I've written them myself), but sometimes the best adventures are those I've concocted an hour before running them—and those rely on a heavy dose of improvisation inspired by a hastily composed mental outline and some notes. Regardless of the amount of preparation involved, there will inevitably be moments during any session when the player characters will do something unexpected and I will need to create a locale, non-player character, or bit of information spontaneously. Improvising is one of my favorite aspects of role-playing and I am happy to go with the flow of it, but there is always a chance I might forget about this wonderful thing I brought into existence at the spur of the moment and it will be lost forever—instead of being integrated into the setting and the shared experience of the participants—if no one records it. This can be a tragic loss of lore and gaming potential. All it takes is someone to write down the details, but how can it be done without destroying the momentum that helped create it? These ideas are born of the moment, and if I, as the GM, just clear my throat and mumble apologetically, "Give me a moment to write this down before I forget it, please"—the flow of the game is disrupted and the willing suspension of disbelief is compromised.

The solution is simple. Misdirect attention like a magician and query like a psychoanalyst. Just pick a player at random and say, "[insert character name], how does that make you feel?" The player will probably be delighted to supply a brief monologue, and that gives you the time to jot down the details of whatever you just made up without interrupting the role-play. If the player declines, you can ask another player.

Of course, you could hire a stenographer or use a dictaphone, but "How does that make you feel?" is free.

Accessible Gaming Quarterly Year 4 Crowdfunding Project

I shall be posting this to each of my five gaming blogs because the cause is worthy and time is of the essence. Jacob Wood of Accessible Games has launched Accessible Gaming Quarterly Year 4, a crowdfunding project on Kickstarter to produce four more issues of Accessible Gaming Quarterly, "a zine about accessibility and inclusion in tabletop RPGs." As it states on the project page, "This project will only be funded if it reaches its goal by Thu, March 9 2023 11:59 PM EST." AGQ provides a much-needed service in this hobby, and I hope you will join me in lending support.

Of special interest to readers of Creative Reckoning, Jacob Wood is also the designer of several role-playing games based on Fudge including Monster Kart Mayhem, Psi-punk, and Survival of the Able.

Purchase Accessible Games products here.

Adjectives Are the Key

I still think the best way to promote my favorite form of Fudge—subjective Fudge—is to concentrate on creating interesting adventures and writing up characters, creatures, places, and things using the traditional trait ladder. In a Fudge adventure, that's all you need, and it instantly renders it system neutral for use with any other role-playing game. Don't worry about which injury system is in effect or how much damage a particular weapon causes. That's a decision for the group playing it. Just rate capabilities and levels of difficulty using those familiar adjectives that everyone understands. That way anyone can use it for any flavor of Fudge or any other role-playing game.

Stating Mediocrity

I have mentioned that Mediocre is the default trait level in plain traits and Elementary Fudge, and that any Mediocre trait need not be specified on a character sheet, but I failed to mention that there may be cases in which it might be advisable to list Mediocre traits. There are, in fact, those who are Mediocre at their professions, and although anyone could conceivably fill their positions at the same level of inadequacy if pressed, it is nonetheless a defining aspect of their character by virtue of the time they invest in it. Jane Doe is a Great Martial Artist and a Good Amateur Detective, and it may seem irrelevant that she is a Mediocre Pizza Chef, but if her primary occupation is working at a pizzeria (that may or may not serve as a headquarters for her fellow sleuths), then "Pizza Chef: Mediocre" would be an important fact to record. It's how she pays her bills and it's one of her motivations to take risks in her search for a more rewarding life. She may not be good at it, but it partially defines her.

Random Attribute Generation for Fudge

Sometimes it is more fun to let chance dictate the attributes of a player character or non-player character rather than settling for default trait levels. Fudge has its own official suggestions for Random Character Creation with attributes generated via 2d6. Having started the hobby with the Dungeons & Dragons Basic Set and Expert Set c. 1981, however, I have a preference for the values generated via 3d6. This would yield the following results:

3d6	Fudge
18	Superb
16-17	Great
13-15	Good
9-12	Fair
6-8	Mediocre
4-5	Poor
3	Terrible

This is fine for standard Fudge, but if mediocrity is the baseline, I think the following might be more useful:

3d6	Fudge
18	Superb
16-17	Great
13-15	Good
11-12	Fair
6-10	Mediocre
4-5	Poor
3	Terrible

The Baseline Is Mediocrity

In standard Fudge, the default trait levels for attributes and skills are Fair and Poor respectively, but I ask you: Are most people really of Fair intelligence, physical fitness, or charm? Or are they, in fact, Mediocre? Fair can generally be assumed to mean "good enough," but in my observations of the world, I think it's more accurate to say that the general pattern of human behavior is Mediocre, or "needs improvement." "Good enough" is rarely achieved without effort or luck. Mediocrity, in reality, is the baseline.

If the baseline of attributes truly is Mediocre, can the same be said of skills? Skills are a more complex matter as their difficulty varies, and I doubt there is any system that can accurately reflect all the factors involved in measuring them, so I think it is more useful to frame the question not in terms of what is most realistic, but rather what is more consistent with the genre or medium of inspiration. The baseline of skills in a fictional work tends to be Mediocre or Nonexistent. Either a character has no chance of practising a skill, or the character can just muddle through with a possibility of doing well enough to pass for success. A trait level of Poor or Terrible is reserved for those who have a notable deficiency beyond the human average.

If both attributes and skills have the same default trait level of Mediocre, what is the point of differentiating them? In my opinion, there is none. I fold them both into plain traits or descriptors. Others, however, may prefer to distinguish between the two in terms of how they are acquired and the method by which they can be improved. At any rate, I think Mediocre is the proper baseline. It reduces unnecessary complexity and facilitates more interesting play. And it does so without altering the standard trait ladder. Just drop the average by one rung. Problem solved.

On Fudge Points and Character Development

There is a variety of ways to handle Fudge points and character development and whether there is a relationship between the two, and I think I have settled on a perfect balance for my own games. First, they are separate. They do not influence one another in any fashion. Second, I minimize the bookkeeping. Any meta-rule I can live without is happily jettisoned.

Fudge points are handled, for the most part, in the standard manner. They are first acquired at character creation and then awarded at the end of a session, but I may also award them during the session if circumstances are appropriate (such as the accomplishment of a particularly daring deed). They may be spent or saved at the player's discretion.

For character development, I opt for the subjective method, which requires no tracking of experience points. Additionally, I allow development through training.

Why am I writing about this? Because I know there is a temptation to create a tension between Fudge points and experience, to make them one and the same or to allow players to spend one in order to purchase the other, but I think it overcomplicates the game and blurs the distinctions in an unhelpful way. Fudge points at their best are a fun way to use a resource to pull off impossible feats or narrow escapes. Subjective character development is an organic way to improve a character without resorting to out-of-character considerations. I can perceive no good reason to link them. And that is how I have decided to handle it henceforth.

Locational Wound Tracks

The wound system in Fudge has always fluctuated — for me — between too much and too little, and I have tinkered with it in many different ways over the years. (One of which, dealing with pulp cliffhangers, has been lost to the Internet Void.) Now, I am grasping once again for that elusive perfect wound system. Will this one meet my needs?

I am calling this method Locational Wound Tracks. Whenever an opponent is successfully struck, the location is noted whether by called shot, random determination, or a default target area (such as the torso). Each location has its own wound track. For the sake of simplicity, the locations are left leg, right leg, left arm, right arm, torso, and head. Damage (and its effect) is applied normally, but for that location only. If, for example, the right arm is Hurt, any action requiring the use of the right arm receives a -1 penalty. An Incapacitating wound will render an arm or leg useless, but such a wound to the torso will cause one to collapse and the same wound to the head will cause one to lose consciousness. Near Death wounds will likewise vary in severity and effect depending on the location affected.

The upshot of this is that wounds are not regarded as equal. A wound to the leg will not have exactly the same effect as a wound to the head. The torso is more likely to be armored than the arms. And a combatant might choose to aim a blow at the least protected area of an opponent.

As for healing, one could rule that a successful result on a healing skill heals all wounds the same number of levels, or one could require a separate roll for each wound treated. Healing through rest heals all wounds at the same rate (one wound level per week of rest).

Pertinent rules links

• Wound Levels
• Recording Wounds
• Hit Location

[The above is similar to something I wrote in 2005 (Alternate Hit Location), but I think it's a bit more straightforward and, therefore, easier to implement.]

The Goldilocks of Stat Blocks

Character stat blocks can either instill or kill inspiration. If it's too short, there's too little to work with; if it's too long, one's eyes glaze over and the information is just as useless as if it weren't there. If it's just right, the player can embody the role without constantly referring to the character sheet and the GM can probably derive hooks without much effort.

Getting it just right is the difficulty. I don't wish to publicly mock the winners of the Most Tedious Character Creation Rules or the Most Boring Stat Blocks by name because I know even they have their devoted fans, some of whom are probably friends of mine, but I will say that some games get it right and some can be altered so that they, too, can get it right.

This is just an idle thought, but maybe all a character stat block needs is whatever is most pertinent to what the character will be doing in an adventure. Depending on what an adventure entails in a given role-playing game, the player ought to list only those things a character might reasonably be expected to do as well as anything else necessary to convincingly portray the character.

Some game designers, aware of this conundrum, limit the range of skills a character may have to just those that are relevant to a typical adventure. Zorro: The Roleplaying Game is an excellent example of a game perfectly pruned to the essentials. Few games are as well focused.

Another approach is to allow a player to assign some skills to a character at creation, but to reserve the option to assign others later. This way, the player and the GM have an idea of the character's capabilities from the beginning, but their knowledge of the character expands through play. I believe this idea was introduced in Fudge.

Either way, the key to the user-friendly and non-sleep-inducing character stat block is to avoid listing every conceivable skill a character might have. First, it's impossible. Can you list every single skill you have ever acquired? Of course not. And why should you list those skills that a majority of people in your society have anyways? Where does it end? Without digressing further, let me just say that the solution is to keep it short. List a few broad skills that you know your character will be using or is noted for, and reserve some points to purchase other skills later as needed. After all, when you are reading the stats of a PC or NPC, do you really need to know they are somewhat good at trivia games or driving or birdwatching?

As always, keep it simple, and fill in the gaps with imagination.

[This article was previously posted here in Applied Phantasticality on 13 October 2021.]