The question is: How has the character changed?
This is the last of the questions that deal with characters, which is something that I don’t have being more GM than a player and currently not running any games. So, I thought I would repurpose this week’s questions to be about a game project, Divided Horizons.
So, the question is: How Has The Game Changed Over Time?
Well, one thing that hasn’t changed is the dice. For reasons now lost on me, I decided on using an eight-sided die quite early on. However, the dice mechanic did change already, as I had it in mind that tasks would have an associated difficulty number and you would roll to equal or exceed it. It’s simpler now – you roll one die, plus dice equal to your attribute plus one if you have a skill, and try to get a 5 or higher on any of them. The best score is the outcome, but any 8 rolled adds an additional success if it matters.
Usually, extra successes matter in combat, where they increase damage, or in extended tasks, where the extras tick off boxes that would otherwise have needed more time to complete. A major system repair might require three successes, so rolling a basic success plus two 8s will get the job done in one roll.
Part of this changed following the playtesting at North Star.
The background hasn’t changed, but the mechanical constraints of the background have.
As noted in an earlier post, I started with an idea about a system where you needed to find ways other than combat to succeed. That’s changed to a wider idea that combat alone will not succeed because you have finite crew members to risk and going out guns blazing will just make you enemies. Making enemies will become a real deal as the campaign progresses because success or failure per adventure still leaves the possibility of survivors. Survivors know that you’re responsible and they’ll have the idea that stopping you might make things better.
As this remains a playtest, I expect more will change for Divided Horizons over time. The Dee Sanction changed in some fairly fundamental ways, mechanically, in the seven years it took to see print.
RPGaDay is a prompt-driven experience in tabletop roleplaying, initiated by Dave Chapman of Autocratik, and powered by me and you.
The prompts for this year are as follows — and you can find out more on Dave’s website.
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