I was meant to talk about difficulty. But it has been a long time, and it was such a mess, that I decided to kind start over.

I’m using a deck of cards! I know, very innovative.

Stats

Still arranged with dice faces – d4, d6, d12… – for convenience, and because I like it.

The stats themselves are simplified, between Physical and Mental actions/activities, which themselves are subdivided into ‘Attack’ and ‘Defence’ equivalents. They are:

Physical:

• Prowess: Perform active tasks. Such as lifting objects, attacking an oponent.
• Resilience: Resist hardships. Such as perform long tasks, resisting an attack.

Mental:

• Inspiration: E.g.: Convince someone of your words, use magic.
• Willpower: E.g.: Resist being swindled, resistance against magical effects.

Basically yes, Fabula Ultima with different name.

Difficulty

Here is where the deck of cards comes in.

54 cards. Standard deck of 52 plus the two jokers.

Shuffle the deck, pick a card. If the card picked is equal or lower to the attribute being tested – e.g.: drawing a 5 with the relative stat being a d6, it is a success; otherwise, it is a failure.

Ace is always equals to 1.

optional: if the drawn card is exactly equal to the stat – e.g.: 8 vs a d8, it is a critical success. There is no critical failure.

If a joker is pulled, then something completely unexpected happen.

optional: draw a second card after the joker, to determine if the unexpected is good or bad for you.

Once the card is used, it goes to the discard pile. The exception being the joker.

The joker card is always returned to the deck, and the deck reshuffled. But only the remaining cards.

The discard pile is reshuffled into the deck only when the deck has run out.

Oracle

By default, an oracle is a simple yes/no against a difficulty value. Something unlikely would be a d10, and only the face cards would mean it happen. While something likely would be a d4.

I understand it is not balanced. It is not meant to be really.

optional: use the colours and suites to have a more granular answer:

• Cups & Diamonds: no change.
• Clubs: Yes, but / No, but
• Spades: Yes, and / No, and

Got a joker in the oracle? Go wild!

Make a dragon eat the oracle or something.

Final Thoughts

I don’t think there is much more to add, if anything at all.

Will I actually use it? Probably not, maybe for a single session, a few dozen years from now or something.

But it was fun thinking and writing about it.

#SoloRPG #RPG #Oracle #CharacterStats #PlayerCharacter #Difficulty #CardDeck

As mentioned in a previous post, the Oracle is heavily inspired by Firepit RPG, in the particular sense that its start point of using a six sided die to represent each of the six outcomes of a yes/no question:

• 1: No, and … Not only you failed the task, you failed so misarably that things got worst.
• 2: No. The plain and simple no. You don’t get what you asked for.
• 3: No, but … Okay, you failed, but it wasn’t a complete loss.
• 4: Yes, but … Yes, you succeeded, but at what cost?
• 5: Yes. The plain and simple yes. You do get what you asked for.
• 6: Yes, and … The best outcome, not only you suceeded in getting what you wanted, but you also got some extra rewards.

It is a simple idea and it fits well with the most common die.

So taking a step further, by going back a die size, we can use a d4 (four sided die), and only have the middle yes/no answers.

• 1: No.
• 2: No, but…
• 3: Yes, but…
• 4: Yes.

It is basically removing the extremes.

Going further still by increasing the die size to eight (d8), we no longer have a one-to-one relationship between die number and answer.

In this die, I imagine a bigger focus in the middle No-but and Yes-but:

• 1: No, and…
• 2: No.
• 3 or 4: No, but…
• 5 or 6: Yes, but…
• 7: Yes.
• 8: Yes, and…

Another step further lead us into d10:

• 1: No, and…
• 2 or 3: No.
• 4 or 5: No, but…
• 6 or 7: Yes, but…
• 8 or 9: Yes.
• 10: Yes, and…

It is kind like the d4, a focus in the middle answers but with the possibility of extremes.

And finally, the d12 would give us:

• 1: No, and…
• 2 or 3: No.
• 4, 5, or 6: No, but…
• 7, 8, or 9: Yes, but…
• 10 or 11: Yes.
• 12: Yes, and…

A bell curve. A much greater focus in the middle answers.

In all honesty, only the first three options – d4, d6, and d8 – are likely to see any use. d10 and d12 I made just because, well, just because.

One last alternative is using a d6, but removing the extremes:

• 1: No.
• 2 or 3: No, but…
• 4 or 5: Yes, but…
• 6: Yes.

#SoloRPG #RPG #Oracle