Certainty

This Bastionland Editorial was originally sent as a reward to all Patreon supporters, and is released freely on this site a week after its original publication.

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I often find myself torn between:

• A love of rolling dice to introduce an unexpected element into the game.
• The decisiveness of just making a ruling without rolling dice.

So, of course, I exist in a sort of middle ground. I'm not especially drawn to entirely diceless games, but there's an allure to their philosophy of making judgement calls and focusing on adjudication and the grounding of the shared fiction.

Lately I've been especially interested in Sam Doebler's posts on the subject, some of which was put into practice  with the not-actually-diceless Skorne. Jim Parkin's Any Planet is Earth exists in a similar not-diceless niche, acting as one of the big inspirations for Skorne. There's still rolling for success, but some situations (including most of combat) are given the diceless treatment. 

It got me thinking about the classic Oracular Power of Dice idea, and I feel you could have an interesting game that removes dice from the task-resolution process, but keeps them as a way to represent the uncertainty of the fictional world.

You lose that gambler feeling where you stand up for the pivotal roll like you're at a craps table and everybody cheers or groans at the result, but sometimes taking a powerful element like that out of an experience allows other moments to emerge that had been overshadowed by the Vegas-glitz. 

Here's a skeleton of what's been bouncing around in my head. I can already foresee some hurdles, but I'd like to try it out. 

CERTAINTY SYSTEM

In this game, dice are reserved for Oracular purposes, not for Gambling. The GM and players may roll them to unveil truths about the world, but they are never used to determine the success or failure of an action.

Action The GM describes the current situation to the players and asks them to discuss a Plan of action.

The GM should especially consider:

Action - What specifically are they doing? 
Outcome - What does a successful outcome look like for this plan?
Leverage - Why is this plan likely to succeed?

The GM decides which of the following Forecasts best fits the plan:
Blocked - Something is stopping you.
Messy - You'll do it but create another problem or suffer a cost.
Clean - You'll do it, maybe even better than planned.

The GM then describes the Forecast in specifics and the players decide whether to act, modify their plan, or try something different.

Once the action takes place, and the impact occurs, the GM describes the world’s response and the new situation.

Example of Play

GM: As you're searching through the rubble you hear the clattering of a Giant Clawbug crawling toward you. It screeches, its tendril-crowned jaws coming at you.

Player: Right, I'm going to kill this thing with my sword.

GM: Okay, what's your leverage?

Player: I'm good with a sword, got some armour, this thing doesn't look so tough right?

GM: Well you'd need to get close and hack away at it and this thing is dripping with venom. Armour helps against the bites, but its tendrils would writhe through the gaps, so it's still messy. You'd kill it but definitely end up poisoned.

Player: Okay, I'll climb up onto that ledge instead and try throwing some rocks at it. It can't spit venom, right?

GM: What's the outcome you're hoping for?

Player: Just drive it away, I don't really need to kill it.

GM: Okay, that would be clean. You throw a few hefty rocks at the thing and it scurries away in the darkness. The cave is quiet again. 

 

Paralegal Bastionland

Talk around Into the Odd and Electric Bastionland inevitable spins back towards classes every now and then. I stand by the Foreground Growth philosophy of Electric Bastionland, but sometimes it's still fun to have that traditional class-based advancement. 

We're getting dangerously close to Levels here, but let's not lose our heads completely.

Let's also take this as an opportunity to look at how law enforcement works in Bastion. 

If you want to play Electric Bastionland with more rigid character growth then let me introduce...

PARALEGAL BASTIONLAND

You are one of the many Private Paralegal Agency that cling to Bastion's justice system like barnacles. 

While no two are alike the general idea is:

• Your job is to bring criminals to court with evidence of their crime.
• You're funded by the Borough, but also pay them fees.
• You have a degree of authority but it's tied up in a mess of other organisations.

Remember there's not really anything centralised in Bastion, so law enforcement, courts, and prisons are all a mess of (multiple) private and (multiple) Borough Council influences, but nothing carries the weight of Bastion itself. 

Unless listed below, everything works like Electric Bastionland (EB from here on. Grab the Free Version if you don't already have it). 

Agency Creation

In addition to your personal character sheets the whole group has a sheet that represents the Agency as a whole. 

Roll 3d6 each for 

AUTHORITY: How much weight does your Agency name carry? Do people believe in your legitimacy?

NETWORK: How well connected are you across the Borough? Do you already have a relationship with this person?

FUNDING: How much Borough funding can you rely on (after fees)?

These are abstract and can be treated exactly like normal Ability Scores. For example, you might make a FUNDING Save to be able to secure some specialist equipment to your Agency, but trivial purchases would require no roll and ridiculous purchases would be impossible without a similarly lofty scheme. Remember that smart play generally minimises the need to make Saving Throws.

These Ability Scores can be damaged by taking a risk and failing, or deliberately sacrificed through player choices. 

If Authority or Funding reaches 0 you have one last chance to do something drastic or else face closure. If Network reaches 0 then the Borough is so closed off to you that your only real choice is to relocate or retire. 

As these all rely on external support in some form, you can only recover these scores by doing somebody important a favour. 

Your Agency has at least one non-player character (the Gaffer) above you and one below you (the Rookie) which the Conductor can create if needed. 

Crimes

What constitutes a crime changes between each Borough, but certain things can be assumed to be illegal in some form:

• Murder
• Fraud
• Corruption

These juicy crimes also make for the best publicity for your Agency. Street level stuff usually isn't worth the time, so the bigger the target the better. 

Generally things start with the Gaffer sending you to an initial investigation with the Rookie in tow.

Character Creation

Roll 3d6 each for STRENGTH, DEXTERITY, and CHARISMA.

Roll 1d6 for Hit Protection.

Now choose a Class. Gain everything listed in the Core of the class and choose one Upgrade.

Your class will detail how you gain additional Upgrades.

Personal wealth isn't that relevant, as anything related to the Agency must go through their funding. Assume you've got a modest living situation and can afford a drink at the end of a tough day. 

Classes

INFILTRATOR

A mask without a face. 

CORE

Many Masks: Create a fake identity with a NETWORK score of 18, separate to that of your Agency. When it’s reaches 0, the identity is compromised.

Choose something that might give you away.

1. Strong accent.

2. Birthmark.

3. Niche-famous.

4. Hyper-specific Phobia

5. Allergy to something common

6. Distinctive tattoo.

UPGRADES

Start with 1.

Take 1 when you:

• Bring a criminal to justice, OR

• Develop an intimate relationship with somebody while undercover.

Read Desire: Chat with an NPC under a false identity to find out what they desire. 

Personal Connections: You have a secret contact within any criminal organisation. 

Pass the Fall: Throw somebody under the bus to restore AUT. 

Method Actor: When working an undercover job that aids your target: your attacks get +d8 and yoour Ability Scores count as 15 minimum.

Multi Talented: You can convincingly fake a language, area of expertise, or technical skill once, but then cannot use it again. 

ANALYST

Crime Scene Investigator

CORE

Corpse Whisperer: When you find a crime-scene with at least one corpse, ask the GM three yes/no questions relating to the corpse. 

Choose something you just don't get.

1. Art

2. Romance

3. Humour

4. Music

5. Family

6. Faith

UPGRADES

Start with 1.

Take 1 when you:

• Bring a criminal to justice, OR

• Prove the rest of the Agency wrong

Lie Detector: While a colleague is questioning, observe from an unseen place. For the rest of this Scene you know if somebody is lying. 
Photographic Memory: Recall one thing from a crime scene you've been to.
Linguist: Speak with somebody a while to learn a useful piece of information from their accent or dialect, even if they’re trying to hide it.
Shatter Point: You know just the thing to say to set somebody off.
Precision Questioning: Retroactively ask one witness or suspect a question. They answer it as they would have at the time.
Deep Scour: Call all in a Crime Scene Team that seal off the scene and find everything there is to find, but take a long time to do it.

WARHORSE

A stubborn old mule. 

CORE

Not Born Yesterday: When somebody underestimates you, any trick they're trying to pull is plainly obvious to you. 

Distinctive Accent

1. Hard

2. Gravelly

3. Lilting

4. Guttural

5. Slow

6. Idiom-Rich

UPGRADES

Start with 1.

Take 1 when you:

• Bring a criminal to justice, OR

• Put a ghost from your past to bed.

Old School: Blast through a piece of new regulation or bureaucracy but lose d6 AUT.
Establishment Connections: You have a friendly contact in any old institution.
Cut Through the Bull: Ask a straight question that the suspect or witness has to answer truthfully or decline to answer. 
Storyteller: You can keep the attention of a group with old stories for as long as needed. 
Local Figure: You have +1 Armour and CHA 18 when acting in the public eye. 
Take Under Wing: Name a protegee. They can use your Ability Scores and special abilities while you're supervising them. 

RENEGADE

A real loose cannon.

CORE

Unorthodox: Lose d6 AUT when you deliberately break protocol, but restore AUT if it gets results.

Fashion Statement

1. Leather Jacket

2. Sharp Suit

3. Magnificent Hair

4. Sunglasses

5. Always Smoking

6. Fantastic Shoes

UPGRADES

Start with 1.

Take 1 when you:

• Bring a criminal to justice, OR

• Get taken off the case or hand in your badge.

Blunt Force: Lose d6 AUT to get +d12 on an attack.
Intimidation: When you have a witness or suspect scared you can ask one question they must answer truthfully.
Hidden Stashes: Retrieve a mundane thing from a stash when you’re in a bad neighbourhood.
Shady Contacts: You always know a low level Criminal that owes you a favour, but they’re in a bad place.
Gut Feel: Make an arrest without evidence. Ask if you were right. Lose d8 AUT if you were wrong. 
Gets Results: Restore all Ability Scores when you bring in a criminal.

PARAGON

Doing it by the book.

CORE

One of the Good Ones: When you comfort a witness or suspect they reveal something. 

What keeps you ethical?

1. Guilt

2. Family

3. Mentor

4. Partner

5. Faith

6. Fear

UPGRADES

Start with 1.

Take 1 when you:

• Bring a criminal to justice, OR

• Correct a wrongdoing by your own agency

Obscure Protocol: Once per day you can name a piece of protocol that would help to grease the internal wheels of your case. It applies here. 
Eye of Judgement: Stare somebody down. For the rest of this scene they lose d6 CHA whenever they lie.

Closed Book: You can’t be coerced into revealing anything you don’t want to.
Prove Loyalty: Make a noble sacrifice to recover all Agency Ability Scores. 
Last Resort: Make a noble sacrifice to immediately  incapacitate a dangerous target, provided you have the means.

OPERATOR

Pushing pencils and pulling strings.

CORE

Call In Favours: Once per day, make one significant purchase without needing to roll.

What's your desk covered with?

1. Paperwork

2. Food

3. Photographs

4. Sports Memorabilia

5. Occult Objects

6. Nothing, just the joy of minimalist living

UPGRADES

Start with 1.

Take 1 when you:

• Bring a criminal to justice, OR

• Upgrade your desk or office significantly.

Hurry or Hinder: Stifle any official process for 24 hours or speed it up to immediate.

Paper Trail: Stay up all night to get some dirt on a target.
Fill the Gap: Once per day, bridge a connection between any two elements of the case. 
Wiretap: Listen in on an Electric device your Agency has handled.
Urgent Exit Required: A vehicle bursts onto the scene for extraction.
Tactical Map: Add a hidden tactically useful detail to your location.

CRUSADER

Fighting for a noble cause.

CORE

Calm Like a Bomb: When any Ability Score reaches 0 you can do one more action with automatic success. 

What do you hate the most?

1. Compromise

2. Conformity

3. Ignorance

4. Hypocrisy

5. Brutality

6. The Elite

UPGRADES

Start with 1.

Take 1 when you:

• Bring a criminal to justice, OR

• Tear down a corrupt organisation.

Testify: When you have a piece of damning evidence you know the perfect time and place to reveal it for maximum effect. 
Voice of the Voiceless: You always have a contact in a marginalised community. 
Won’t be Silenced: When you release a piece of information you can choose to have it immediately go viral among the newspapers and radio stations. 
Know Your Enemy: Note an enemy. You always know where they are. Replace them when they’re overthrown.
Fistful of Steel: When you need a weapon to take down somebody powerful, you find one.
No Shelter: See straight through a secret identity.

SENTINEL

Protecting life at any cost.

CORE

No Time to Bleed: Restore HP once per combat and STR once per day.

How do you cope?

1. Food

2. Drink

3. Smokes

4. Meditation

5. Prayer

6. Fantasy

UPGRADES

Start with 1.

Take 1 when you:

• Bring a criminal to justice, OR

• Save a life.

Armed Response: When you lead an armed operation everybody gets +d6 on attacks.
First to Fall: If a nearby ally takes Damage you can take it instead.
Dead-Eye: Treat Damage rolls of 1 as the highest value on the die.
Heroic Entry: When you are absent you can burst into the scene if an ally is in danger. 
Fortify: Secure an area. Nobody gets in without you knowing about it and having a chance to retaliate. 
Assault Specialist: When you burst onto the scene you get to act twice before the opponents.

The Balancing Act

Balance isn't about making things equal, it's about preserving interesting choices.

Characters

Starter Packages lightly balance characters with higher scores against those with lower, by giving the low-rolling player better equipment.

This is a soft balance, as once play starts those scores begin to fade away behind the players' decisions and the weird things that they find.

Everyone can contribute when playing Into the Odd, and things move quickly enough that any time one character spends in the spotlight is sure to be fleeting.

Weapons

If a rapier is better than a machete in every way then choosing which to use isn't an interesting choice.

Weapon balance is built into the system if you imagine that all weapons start at d6 damage, one handed. Every time you raise the damage by a die type, you have to add a disadvantage.

Field Weapons: d8, but two handed.
Noble Weapons: d8, but very expensive (enough to be a target of theft)
Heavy Guns: d10, two handed AND move or fire, AND expensive.
Power Arms: d10, two handed, AND some other problem.

So you can use this as a guide whenever you're making a new weapon, but bear in mind some qualities are both an advantage and disadvantage.

So a Flamethrower starts as a Field Weapon (d8), but affects everything in a cone. This is great in some situations, but makes it worthless in others, so keep it at (d8 Cone).

A Gatling-Gun, though, can target an individual or spread fire into a cone, so we'll give it the added disadvantage of needing a round to spin and warm up (d8, Cone or Individual, One Round Warm-Up).

Of course you'll want to have really weird weapons, but they probably fall into...

Oddities

No rules here, that's the point. But if you're worried that you've created something too useful (again, defined as removing interesting choices, in this case "should I use this Oddity?") consider applying one of the following:

• It's immobile.
• It's a one-shot disposable.
• It's a living thing with its own agenda.
• It requires some sort of set up (feed it a heart, it needs to be laid like a trap, only works in specific locations). 

Remember you aren't aiming for net zero here. Oddities are good things to have around. You just don't want any one Oddity to become the solution to all problems.

Monsters

Giant Ants are the worst. In by-the-book AD&D (see them fixed here) they fill a dark checklist that leads to the encounter being incredibly deadly, but equally uninteresting.

• They're deadly. 
• They always attack and you can't talk with them.
• They're faster than you and good at tracking you down.

Characters meeting scary monsters straight out of the gate is one of the cornerstones of Into the Odd. Forget waiting until you've leveled up to meet a Beholder or Purple Worm, I want those in your first session. 

You can make your monster as crushingly powerful as you like, as long as you give the group something to work with. 

Giants will crush you but they're dumb and their size can be used against them.

Mind Flayers are super smart and powerful, but have bigger plans than just you.

Even this Lich that hates you and has crazy powers is stuck in their crypt, so you aren't just going to meet him in the woods. 

In short, if you make them powerful, pick at least one way to make them interesting:

• Make them dumb.
• Make them want something other than killing.
• Make them restrained somehow. 

A Place for WIL

When I wrote about how Oddities don't have to be magic item equivalents I also touched on my lingering issues with the WIL Score.

A Place for WIL

As it stands, WIL is used by players in the following ways:
- Making a good impression in risky situations (Active, but not always used. Would be trumped by character action)
- Keeping up morale and other leadership things (Active, but relies on having NPC followers)
- Bending an Arcanum to do something different to its usual function (Active, but less of a focus with the new Oddity framing)
- Resisting mind-control and other psychic effects (Passive)
- As a pool that can be drained away as any other stat by nasty effects (Passive)

So as you can see, if you roll a character with a high WIL your active things you can use it for all carry some sort of caveat. The passive uses work fine and I find myself using them pretty often.

It's great for NPCs, No issues at all for how it works there.

So my train of thought goes like this:
- WIL is sort of a lame stat to have your high score in
- It doesn't matter from a balance perspective because it's random chargen anyway
- It matters even less because you get one stat swap, so if people roll 18 WIL and don't like it they can just swap it over into STR or DEX
- If everyone dumps WIL then it makes monsters that attack WIL even scarier, because you end up with a lower average WIL amongst PCs
- If dumping WIL seems like a smart choice and the player gets punished for it later by some monster that they didn't know exists, that's unsatisfying
- I absolutely want to keep WIL, as I like the three stat spread and want a non-physical stat in there
- WIL should have clearer uses that can be explained to new players rolling up a character

So, a brand new player is sitting down to roll their 3d6 in order. I explain that STR is doing strong stuff, DEX is being quick, agile, and precise. WIL is...

Well let's forget mechanical stuff and look at how I see the WIL score as a concept. Originally it was the D&D scores of INT, WIS, and CHA mashed together, minus the bits I didn't want to be mechanised.

WIL is NOT:
- How smart a character is when it comes to making decisions (you make the decisions)
- How knowledgeable a character is (that's also down to you)
- How good you are at talking to people (well, sort of, but see below)
- Anything that makes decisions for you. In the same way that STR alone won't win fights and DEX won't let you pull off a great burglary.

WIL is:
- How well you can impact others, socially
- Your strength of mind against mundane mental fatigue and supernatural effects
- Contentiously, I see an element of Spirit or Luck within the stat. High WIL is that charismatic person that seems to have things fall into place for them? WIL is almost the "Other" stat for non-physical factors.

There's a conflict when it comes to using WIL in social situations. I don't want it to replace talking things out at the table and making smart choices, but I want it to be a factor.

I've probably created a false dichotomy in my head over this. The Choice come before Saves in every case, so as long as there's a choice before you roll then what's the problem?

If you have WIL 5 you can still make good and bad decisions when it comes to social situations. When they're good, they're just less likely to be outstanding, and when they're bad you've got a higher chance of it going really sour. 

As as Referee, I will do the following to help raise WIL's presence in the game:
- ALWAYS use the Reaction Roll, even in extreme cases where the encounter is immediately hostile/friendly. Just apply impact for passing/failing the Save. Only one of you failed the Save with the Mushroom Dealer? He takes an irrational dislike to you and gives the others preferential treatment. Half of you passed your Save with the Insatiable Devourer? The other half are the prime targets, they must smell especially tasty.
- Make early and frequent use of the Pick or Push system in social interaction, and tie that in to a WIL Save if they're going to push.
- Drop some WIL damage early on. I've started using a mechanic called Stress that's essentially damage, but instead of moving to STR after running out of HP it moves over to WIL.

It's becoming increasingly clear that social interaction is really where WIL can shine. Into the Odd is at least equally as much about talking to people and weird creatures as it is about fighting them.

So to boil it down to something I can say to players at the table when they ask where to swap the 18 they just rolled.

STR is for if you want to fight and be tough. 

DEX is if you want to sneak or run past hazards and dodge stuff.

WIL is if you want to talk your way to success. and resist mental stress. 

Character Sheet Blinkers

In some games, a character sheet can feel like a horse's blinkers.

This week I've read reports from a number of players talking about their character sheet like a list of restrictions on what they can and cannot do. It's their main consideration when deciding on an action, their tool for interacting with the game, and their window into the setting. 

The reason I use minimal characters in Into the Odd is to prevent this effect.

I don't want you to have to think about Base Attack Bonuses, Caster Levels, Aspects, Armour Class, Reflex Defence, Motivations, Skills, Feats, or Weapon Expertise. 

All you get is this.

STR 14, DEX 9, WIL 8, 4hp.

Pistol, Pipe, Animal Trap, Spyglass

You're a pretty strong guy with a pistol, trap and spyglass. Plus you get to smoke a pipe. Now tell me what you want to do about this horrible situation you've gotten yourself into.