Dr Nik Happy Fun Rules 1

mark sabtato (order #5863462)

Dr. Nik’s Happy Fun Rules This system is designed as follows: If you are not familiar with FUDGE, it is a wonderful open source system. You should also check out rules lite SHERPA.

A ccessible to teens & older. B asic rules for first time or

experienced players. ompatibility with almost any genre ynamic story telling asy conflict resolution

http://www.fudgerpg.com/fudge.html

C

D

E

http://www.panix.com/~sos/rpg/sherpa.html Dr. Nik’s Happy Fun Rules is based on FUDGE essential concepts and has been used in LARPS, Table Top Campaigns, and Convention One Shots.

FUDGE mechanics.

I Introduction

Author:

Dr. Nik’s Happy Fun Rules is easy to learn, just as easy to master, and makes for fast, simple play that puts role-playing above complicated rule mechanics. These rules are campaignindependent, work equally well in any genre or setting, and are designed to be light and hyper-flexible. Dr. Nik’s Happy Fun Rules is designed for fast interactive story-telling and is not intended to simulate strict realism. As such, it is especially important that the game master handle both conflict and the narrative in a thoroughly consistent manner. A good role-playing session should have challenges, risks, and danger for the player characters but is ultimately a collaborative effort. Players create characters based on common archetypes and concepts associated with the specific genre you choose for your particular game. In Dr. Nik’s Happy Fun Rules, every player attribute, skill, challenge or danger has a rating between one and ten. These rules establish relative levels of power and character abilities. The established levels can then be used to resolve any conflicts. The ranks of power use a ten point scale, designed to be strong on storytelling and light on rules. With this great openness comes the responsibility of the game master to manage the theme and tone of your game. When challenges occur, they should be significant and dynamic. Mundane action should otherwise be dictated by the players. If the players decide to search an area, they should find anything reasonable and clues to anything better hidden or secured. If the players then try to beat an obstacle protecting a significant objective, a roll should be made as there is a clear story consequence that may help or hinder their actions.

Nik Palmer

Editor: Grafton Swickard

Graphic Design: M. Andrew Payne

For Example: In a “Supernatural Investigation” game, your players might create characters that fit the “Remorseful Vampire,” “Histrionic Psychic,” “Grizzled Detective,” or “Snooping Reporter” archetypes.

II Character Generation Each character has at least 6 attributes, which are ranked from 1 (Abysmal) to 10 (Deific). Characters are created using a point-buy system. The game master sets the total number of points available and may also put a limit on the maximum possible rating for some or all of the character statistics depending on the genre. Recommended point totals for common genres are as follows: Horror, Modern, Suspense

22-27

Poor – Mediocre Average.

Fantasy, Sci-Fi Heroes

28-33

One Extraordinary Ability

Epic Ultra

34+

Multiple Archetypes & Extraordinary Abilities

Each rank in an attribute costs one point, so a player in a 24 point campaign could build their character will six Mediocre (4) attributes; three Poor (3) attributes and three Fair (5) attributes; one Great (7) attribute, one Fair (5) attribute, and four Poor (3) attributes; or any other combination that totals up to 24. Points can also be spent on additional archetypes, skills, minions, pets, extraordinary abilities, powers, or unusual items described after the basic attributes.


For Example: In a 1020s-era gritty murder mystery, the game master might cap all statics with a maximum of Great (7) while in a highfantasy setting they might only cap all stats at Superb (8) but let each character start with one stat at Legendary (9). Alternately, if all the player characters are illiterate peasants from the same village, the game master could restrict the Mental and Resolve statistics to Mediocre (4) or less.

Dr. Nik’s Happy Fun Rules The six required statistics are:

PHYSICAL This statistic is the default for any physical actions the character may attempt such as fighting, running, climbing, etc. Use the character’s physical attribute whenever they initiate physical action. A high physical attribute may represent raw power, great size or exceptional physical coordination. A low physical attribute could mean the character is unusually clumsy or physically weak.

DEFENSE This statistic represents the character’s physical defenses including defensive combat, enduring hardship, resisting poison, and surviving crashes or explosion. Use the defense stat whenever the character is resisting a physical challenge. A high defense may represent extreme nimbleness, speed, resilience, physical toughness, or stamina while characters who are sickly, easily fatigued, or slow tend to have a low defense attribute.

MENTAL This statistic represents the attentiveness, knowledge, and intellect of the character. Use the mental stat whenever the character is initiating an intellectual or social action such as noticing an ambush, solving a puzzle, or carrying out a negotiation (assuming it cannot be roleplayed). Characters with a high mental attribute may be a natural genius, well-traveled, street smart, or highly educated. Characters with low mental attributes aren’t necessarily stupid (although they could be) but might be unobservant, easily distracted, obnoxious, or have poor communication and/or social skills.

RESOLVE This statistic represents the character’s willpower, self-control, determination, intellectual resilience, emotional stability and strength of personality. Use the resolve statistic whenever the character is resisting a non-physical challenge or event such as mind-magic, emotional duress, fear, contests of will, or sanity-damaging horror. A character with a high resolve may be stubborn, wise, or willful while a low resolve could represent flightiness, a weak-will, or a histrionic personality.

ARCHETYPE The archetype attribute represents any and all of the character’s skills, knowledge, and abilities not specifically covered by the other four statistics. Unlike the other statistics the player must define a specific character concept to use as an archetype. The character concept should be broad and defined in only 1-3 words, which are then added parenthetically to the end of “Archetype”. Thus a character could have an Archetype (veteran swordsman), Archetype (disgruntled postal worker), Archetype (newbie programmer), or any other combination. Usually (but not always), the archetype will represent the character’s vocation. Use this attribute whenever the character attempts anything that pertains to their stated archetype/concept. If there is any question as to whether to use an archetype attribute or one of the other four to resolve a challenge, use whichever attribute is higher. It is always a good idea to discuss your archetype with the Game Master before play begins so you can come to a rough agreement on what a given archetype can and cannot do.


For Example: There’s no need for separate plumbing, carpentry, and mechanical repair skills – all three would be covered by the Archetype (friendly handyman) attribute because it’s reasonable to assume that a handyman would have those abilities. If the character had Archetype (garage mechanic) instead, they would still use their archetype attribute for mechanical repair-related challenges (as well as virtually anything to do with cars) – but not for carpentry or electronics since those aren’t necessarily skills every mechanic has.

Dr. Nik’s Happy Fun Rules

ADDITIONAL ARCHETYPE(s) Particularly complex characters, or those with long histories can have more than one Archetype. For instance, a former car thief who later makes good and eventually becomes a medical doctor would have both an Archetype (petty thief) and an Archetype (doctor: general practitioner) attributes. A character may have as many Archetype attributes as they can afford to buy with their starting points or buy additional ranks as part of an ongoing campaign.

SPECIAL CASES: RACIAL ARCHETYPES In games with supernatural races, aliens, or alternate character species, race must be purchased as an additional Archetype. All innate abilities and cultural knowledge are included as part of the racial archetype. A character with Archetype (leprechaun) or Archetype (angel) would have all powers and skills common to either creature. You should always discuss racial abilities with the Game Master to ensure you have the same concept. If your idea of an Archetype (vampire) has superhuman senses and the ability to turn into mist but your Game Master thinks they can fly and can speak to animals, you’re in for a confusing and potentially unpleasant time. The crucial component of a racial archetype is “exceptional abilities.” Races that have very few abilities that only come into play under a few specific circumstances, there’s no need to create a separate attribute for it.

SPECIAL CASES: POWER ARCHETYPES In the case of a psychic or spellcaster, the Archetype attribute represents the scholastic and theoretical knowledge of the character. Actual casting of magic is an Extraordinary Ability to be purchased separately. In some game worlds, the Game Master may decide that all spellcasters have certain additional abilities such as being able to conjure light at will and/or read certain magical languages. Likewise all psychics might have a form of danger sense or the ability to detect the proximity of supernatural evil. Any additional spells, powers or superhuman abilities must be purchased separately as their own attribute.

HEALTH This statistic represents the life-force and vitality of the character. When a character sustains damage, their Health attribute is reduced until they heal. If a character’s Health is reduced to zero, they are mortally wounded and unconscious. If Health falls below zero, the character dies. Thus, a character with Poor (3) Health who sustains 4 or more points of damage instantly dies. For less lethal games, consult the FUDGE core rules for alternate damage rules.

ANY OTHER SKILL OR EXTRAORDINARY ABILITY Any additional skills, Archetypes, extraordinary abilities, items, vehicles, pets, etc... may be purchased using the same procedure and maximum point pool. Anything purchased in this way uses the purchased rank as its default quality, number of uses, & effect. Extraordinary Abilities cover anything such as casting magic spells or superpowers. Items include pets, vehicles, special weapons, magical armor.


For Example: A character with a Poor (3) Defense and a Good (6) Archetype (thief) attribute, would use Good (6) when dealing with traps. Likewise a character with Mediocre (4) Mental but was a Superb (8) Archetype (soldier) would use Superb (8) for sensing or setting ambushes.

For Example: If the only thing that separates dwarves from humans in your game world is that dwarves always have beards and can detect inclines or sloping passageways – there’s no need for a separate Archetype... the dwarven aspect of the character can be incorporated into the basic character concept as Archetype (dwarven soldier) or Archetype (surly dwarven merchant). If, on the other hand, all dwarves in your game world are master spelunkers, stonemasons and/ or blacksmiths, resistant to diseases, poisons, and magic, can see in the dark, and identify gold by scent – a separate Archetype (dwarf) is required.


EXPERTISE

For Example:

If you would like to give your character expertise in one aspect of their profession or skills, you may purchase a permanent +1 to all results for 4 points or a +2 for 8 points. These additional bonuses can be used whenever the area of expertise is called upon.

III Equipment Any character will have all the basic equipment associated with their archetype. Basic equipment is assumed to be part of the character and provides no additional bonus or protection. Any special equipment such as a race car, magic item, or pet needs to be purchased separately as part of the initial point pool or with experience gained in an ongoing campaign.

IV Limits on Items & Special Abilities Any abilities or items use their Rank as the default level of effect and number of times the item can be used over a given time period. The group should determine appropriate time frames based on genre (e.g. per character lifetime, per session, per game day). Game masters should determine how broad or focused abilities must be based on the game milieu. After all the uses are expended, the device, ability, or power will not function until the recovery time period has elapsed. Characters can regain a partial number of charges if they are unable to take the entire time to recover. For purposes of conflict resolution, always use the character’s original level, regardless of the number of uses remaining. An Archetype (wizard) with Fair (5) Fire Magic ability can create magical fireballs (or other fire effect) 5 times before requiring rest. Each time the fireballs always do Fair (5) damage, even on their fifth use. After the fifth use of fire magic, the wizard has exhausted their powers, and must rest to recover them.

V Conflict Resolution Challenge resolution is done using FUDGE mechanics. When characters attempt an opposed action they will roll four FUDGE dice (4dF). Each FUDGE die has an equal chance of generating a -1, 0, or +1. The result of the roll will be between -4 and +4, with zero being most common. The player adds the 4dF result to their appropriate rank plus any expertise, items or other bonuses. This result is then compared to the opposing rank or rolled result. If you do not have a set of 4dF, you can use 3d6, 4d6 or d100 options as detailed in the FUDGE rules. Diceless games can use the optional story token rules. Game masters are encouraged to provide penalty and bonus modifiers to any challenge as appropriate for the character choices in game. Special equipment, preparation, teamwork, environmental or other bonuses are commonly +1/-1 for circumstances, but may range up to -4/+4 for epic influences. Challenges should be significant to the players because it is possible to be killed in a single attack by powerful opposition. If an opponent’s attack roll is Fair(5)+3 = 8 and the player gets rolls defense of Fair(5)-3 =2, the difference of the attack is 8-2= 6. Six points of damage is enough to instantly kill any player character with Fair (5) or worse health. Alternate damage rules can be found in the FUDGE core rules for less lethal play.


A soldier takes Expertise (rifles). Thereafter, the soldier gains the expertise bonus whenever shooting a rifle but not when using handguns, swords, or any other weapon. Likewise, a scout might choose Expertise (ropes) so any knots, snares, or rope climbing would have the bonus applied.

For Example: In a game with a daily time period for powers, a character with a Mediocre (4) ray gun can shoot the gun 4 times a day before running out of charges. For every 6 hours spent plugged into a wall socket, the gun builds up enough of a charge to fire 1 more time (to the usual maximum of 4). Likewise a psychic with Great (7) telekinesis can move objects 7 times before exhausting their powers. They regain one use of their powers approximately every 3.5 hours.

For Example: A character with a Mediocre (4) Physical tries to scale a Good (6) difficulty wall. The character has Expertise (ropes) and gains +1 for use of a rope and grapple. The player rolls 4dF and gets + + - - (totaling 0). The final result is Fair (5) [Medocre + 1 for Expertise] and is not successful. “Your character tries and tries to hook the grapple & climb, but it slips and has no place to secure well enough to support you. You can’t climb the wall, this time.”


For Example:

Optional - Story Tokens: This can be added to the dice mechanic or used as a diceless replacement for LARPS. Based on the time, number of players and tone of the game, the Game Master will distribute a certain number of single use tokens among the players. When resolving conflicts, these tokens can be used to boost any statistic’s rank by +2. Outside of conflict, the tokens can be exchanged for an item, clue or other advantage to advance the story. Horror, Modern, Suspense

1 Token / 30 Minutes

Fantasy, Sci-Fi Heroes


Epic Ultra


Bekki wants her magical healing heart gem to improve from Poor (3) to Mediocre (4), Bekki would need to turn in 4 tokens.

A four hour game would require a total of 8 tokens for Horror, 12 Tokens for Fantasy, and 16 tokens for Epic to be distributed to the players. Vary rates according to your play group. Tokens become an important part of campaign play. Tokens take the place of experience and are awarded to players for ongoing play participation, completion of story arcs, and/or meritorious play. In campaign play, a player can use the tokens in the usual ways (e.g. +2, clue, basic item) as well as turn them in to increase abilities. The player would need to collect & turn in a number of tokens equal to the new level desired.

VI. Comparative Levels Abysmal (1)

For Example: RANK Time

Terrible (2)

1) Abysmal

Poor (3) Mediocre (4)

2)

3)

5) 6)

Good (6)

8)

Superb (8)

5 Minutes

Fair 30 Minutes

Good

7) Great

9)

30 Seconds

Poor 1 Minute

4) Mediocre

Fair (5) Great (7)

Terrible

1 Second

Spark

10

Match

100

Candle

1,000 10,000

Torch Bonfire

100,000

Explosion

1 million

Dragon Breath/Inferno

Deific Year

Legendary (9) DEiFIC (10)

VII. Have a Good Time! Enjoy your game and time with friends. Playing a role playing game is about having fun while telling a great story.


1

Hour

Legendary Month 10)

Unit Flame

Day

Suberb Week

Dawn wants to improve her Archetype (ship captain) from Good (6) to Great (7). Dawn would need to turn in 7 tokens to the game master.

10 million 100 million 1 bilion

Missile/Bomb Volcano Nova

Mike wants to gain blacksmith abilities as a second Archetype. He he turns in 6 tokens (Abysmal [1] + Terrible [2] + Poor [3]) and now has Archetype (blacksmith) at Poor (3).

Dr. Nik’s Happy Fun Rules Open Game License Compliance: In accordance with the Open Game License Section 6 “Notice of License Copyright” the following is the required and updated Section 15 “Copyright Notice.”

COPYRIGHT NOTICE

About SHERPATM A role-playing game to play while hiking in the mountains, strolling in a park, walking on the beach, sitting by a pool or lake, floating down a river on a raft, as a passenger in a car or space shuttle, waiting in a long line, etc. Copyright 1995, 1997 by Steffan O’Sullivan. Sherpa is a trademark of Steffan O’Sullivan for his outdoor roleplaying game http://www.panix.com/~sos/rpg/sherpa.htm

About This Fudge Roleplaying Game Document: The text content of this document is released under the terms of the Open Game License, which can be found at http://fudgerpg.com/about/legalities/olg.html and is incorporated here by reference.

About Fudge: Fudge is a roleplaying game written by Steffan O’Sullivan, with extensive input from the Usenet community of rec.games. design and other online forums. The core rules of Fudge are available free on the Internet at http://www.fudgerpg.com and other sites. Fudge was designed to be customized, and may be used with any gaming genre. Fudge gamemasters and game designers are encouraged to modify Fudge to suit their needs, and to share their modifications and additions with the Fudge community. The Fudge game system is copyrighted ©2000, 2005 by Grey Ghost Press, Inc., and is available for use under the Open Game License. See the fudgerpg.com website for more information.” The Fudge or Fudge System logo is a trademark of Grey Ghost Press, Inc., and is used under license. Logo design by Daniel M. Davis, www.agyris.net.


Open Game License v 1.0 Copyright 2000, Wizards of the Coast, Inc. Fudge 10th Anniversary Edition Copyright 2005, Grey Ghost Press, Inc.; Authors Steffan O’Sullivan and Ann Dupuis, with additional material by Jonathan Benn, Peter Bonney, Deird’Re Brooks, Reimer Behrends, Don Bisdorf, Carl Cravens, Shawn Garbett, Steven Hammond, Ed Heil, Bernard Hsiung, J.M. “Thijs” Krijger, Sedge Lewis, Shawn Lockard, Gordon McCormick, Kent Matthewson, Peter Mikelsons, Robb Neumann, Anthony Roberson, Andy Skinner, William Stoddard, Stephan Szabo, John Ughrin, Alex Weldon, Duke York, Dmitri Zagidulin Dr.Nik’s Happy Fun 4 Page FUDGE RPG Rules, Copyright 2011, Nik Palmer; Author: Nik Palmer In accordance with the Open Game License Section 8 “Identification” the following designate Open Game Content and Product Identity:

OPEN GAME CONTENT The text content of this document is declared Open Game Content.

Dr Nik Happy Fun Rules 1

Recommend Documents