Rough Draft

Hi there!  Do you love The Zombie Knight?

Pencils down.  If you answered no, there is clearly something broken within you.  Or, I suppose, you are a well adjusted human being who would rather watch 'Mary Poppins' and marvel over Dick van Dyke's cockney drawl.  Either way, you should probably move along.

As for the rest of you, put those thinking caps on for question two:  Do you enjoy old school role playing?  Not so much first edition D and D, but when you were a kid and no one really remembered the rules, and no one cared because it was a game, not a rule book?

Well hello, where have you been all my life?

I'm going to try a kind of new thing here.  It's a game inspired by A Truly Worthwhile story called The Zombie Knight.  Google that shit.  I'll wait.

*waits patiently for two weeks*

I know, right?

Anyways, not only is the game world and mechanic scheme influenced by liquid awesome, I was equally fascinated with the intangibles that sprang from the entire format.  Read at your pace.  Free to read.  Comments and commentators welcome.  These things might work for a story-telling game just as well.  I want to play that game.

What are the rules?  I don't know.  I've got the rules for making the rules up as I go along down.  I made this system to be used by telling the story to my players by index cards placed into their lockers, and they would write their character's actions on other index cards and placed into my locker.  Instead of dice we used a 'pick a number between 0 and 9 system.'

My goal is to develop this system into a forum game format.  I like this system.  It starts simple but scales up and down easily.  It's also nothing I'm protective of, use bits and pieces you like if you like.

Wow.  Are you still reading?  System break-down:

Character creation:

Your character starts as a blank page human.  Not strong, not weak.  Not fast nor slow.  Has those skills you'd expect for their run-of-the-mill life.  Time to mix that up.

Start with stats.  Use any system of stats you like, it honestly doesn't matter as long as everyone's clear.  Pick a stat to be strong in.  Pick a corresponding stat to be weak in.  Rinse and repeat.  Might look some thing like this...

Character:  Eliza Fyrwen
Dexterity + Strength -
Perception + Empathy -

Okay.  Now there's the skills, knowledge, and what nots to attend to.  Once again, make that shit up, get creative.  Only thing is when you buy a strength in one area, the weakness must be roughly equivalent.  Can't trade something vague and awesome for something specific and useless:

Combat +  Interpretive Dance -

Does not fly

Unarmed Combat + Driving -

Does.

This allows bundling.  Rather than picking out each skill associated with the thieving trade (lock-picking, sneaking, pick pocketing), one can save time:

Thieving + Melee Combat -

Is fair, and speaks volumes about your character.

Other things that don't fit into skills also go here:

Ambidextrous +  Color Blind -

Next step is to pick a quirk, the most free form character trait of all.  Can be almost anything you think of; wealthy, famous, a knock-out, a carrier of the reaper gene, etc.

Final step is, of course, their story.  Their life, their death, their reaper, their goals.  Though much of that can be saved for later, whether you haven't yet decided, or to hold onto for a dramatic reveal.

That's all for today, class.  First three back with characters get to hear about the rules that make those characters into heroes :)