The Campaign Builder's Guild

My main project right now is my own little omni-genre action-movie RPG, the Infinity Gaming System (Infinity for short). I've spent the last 6 months distilling a lot of ideas and concepts I've been playing with for a long time, trying to craft a simple, flexible, and fun system.

But system design isn't an end in and of itself. Infinity is the venue for presenting the several game settings I'm working on. At latest census, they included:

• The Infinity Files: The walls between our Reality and alternate Realities (where the impossible becomes possible) are breaking down. Portals to other worlds are opening up, flooding our Reality with things that cannot exist. Magical artifacts. Psychic abilities. Super powers. Our Reality is being swept away. Agents of the Infinity Group, it is your job to find these portals and close them, to save our Reality from utter destruction.
  

• Dead Man's Land: You are the zombie. The zombie apocalypse has arrived, and you are infected. Dying slowly from the plague, you are becoming more like a zombie every day, and gaining strange powers thereby. You can feel their presence. See through their eyes. And even control them. Between the last Sanctuaries of the human race and cities thronging with the dead is a vast territory that is your domain: Dead Man's Land.
  

• Altered States: Secret agents and special forces, magic and techno-magic, in an alternate Earth where Camelot never fell, the United States was never born, China fights Spain for control of California, the Aztec Empire is a strong and growing power, and the Mississippi River marks the boundary between the Native Nations and the east-coast Colonies. (Alt-history urban fantasy technothriller.)
  

• Age of Legends: Stripped of their power, the Legends of a vanished age of magical might awaken in the modern world and strive to regain their memories and power, all the time hunting agents of the Evil that imprisoned them and altered existence so their Age never even happened. (Urban fantasy superheroes.)
  

• Dark Stars: At its height, galactic culture spread across the stars. Quadrillions of sapients, thousands of worlds, a dozen alien races. Then the hypergate network collapsed and every world was thrown into isolation; a dark age descended on the galaxy. Five hundred years later, and the gate network has suddenly reactivated. You are the best and brightest of a far-flung colony of mankind, scientists and engineers tasked with entering the hypergates, contacting other colonies, and discovering what went wrong centuries ago. (Mythos informed hard sci-fi. Take Alien, "The Cold Equations", Star Trek, and Starship Troopers and blend well.)
  

• Storm Knights: Torg, remastered for Infinity. New cosms, revamped cosms, new metaphysics. (A fan's reworking of an incredible game.)
  

I'll touch more on the design philosophy of the system, some details of the settings, and the game's mechanics as time goes on. The above is a good introduction to the endeavor, however.

I'd like to make all of these the best they can be. Therefore, any feedback or criticism is welcome.

I'm as thin-skinned as most creatives, but I appreciate the value of honest, detailed feedback. Even if it stings the ego.  :P

So thanks in advance for any help you can give.

The Infinity Gaming System (Infinity for short) is my own little omni-genre action movie system.  Infinity is:

• Omni-Genre. Not universal or generic, but flexible enough to handle magic, guns, car chases, psionics, cyberware, and much more. Infinity campaigns can be set in fantasy worlds, cyberpunk worlds, the real world, and any other place the GM can devise.

• Action Movie. Infinity is an action-movie system. The mechanics allow characters to emulate the daring feats of an Indiana Jones, Ethan Hunt, or Evelyn Salt. They encourage and reward players who do more than just shoot or punch; witty banter and rapier-fast retorts are often more useful than bullets or blades.

• Heroics. Player Characters are the heroes of an Infinity campaign world, larger-than life characters who seem marked for greatness, those with the bravery to confront evil and the abilities and drive to accomplish awe-inspiring deeds.

System Design Philosphy

To the maximum extent possible, Infinity mechanics are intended to be simple, direct, and obvious. It is as streamlined and fast-playing as I can make it.

My design motto is: "Simple rules that allow for innumerable situations, limited only by the Players' and Gamemaster's imaginations."

The purpose of streamlining the mechanics is to focus on in-character play and vivid world descriptions. I hope to get the mechanics out of the way, so the players can play their characters and the GM can portray the world in an interesting and colorful manner.

Another goal is to make mechanics that can easily be understood and described in relatable terms. Success at using a skill is broken into "barely made it", "good job", and "great Shot, Kid, that was one in a million!" Gamemasters can use that mechanical result to vividly describe what happened to the player.

At every point, the system should provide relatable and describable feedback to gamemasters and players. Subsystems, like hacking and hand-to-hand combat, should be built so as to vividly reflect the feel of the activity. Not a point-for-point match to their real-world equivalent (which can bog play down), but the experience of using the mechanic is similar to the experience of the activity in the real world.

When mechanics model the world in concrete terms, and when gamemasters can easily describe what happens, players feel closer to their characters and more grounded in the reality of the game. That's my goal.

These are, I should note, goals, not claims. I am working towards them assiduously, but I haven't achieved them fully. Any advice or feedback that could help is welcome and appreciated.

My advice and feedback is, well... to be blunt... show, don't tell.

You can go on and on about your design philosophy and your goals and what kind of settings you want to use and such all you want, but none of it really gets to the meat of the matter. What I am (and most people here are also, I suspect) actually interested in seeing when seeing a thread describing a new system is, of course, how that system actually works. You can (and should!) interleave your design philosophies in with your explanation of the mechanics, but, this way, you're not just explaining your goals, but showing how you've realized them-- or at least, how you've tried to, providing something to critique in case there's a way you could achieve that goal better.

Right now, there's really no feedback to give because you haven't actually posted anything that can be critiqued. So I'll just pick on your posting approach instead. :grin:

Your design goals look pretty sound, and make sense given what you want to achieve.  I'm curious if you're familiar with systems like Fate and its offshoots (like Spirit of the Century etc) and what you think of them.  FATE seems to share many of your design goals - few die rolls, little obstruction, highly customizable, etc.  If you aren't familiar with it, you should look it up.  The third edition is in production now, having received fairly stupid amounts of money on Kickstarter.  At the very least it could provide an example of the kind of system you want to emulate, as opposed to something like D&D/Pathfinder and similarly baroque systems.

Quote from: sparkletwistMy advice and feedback is, well... to be blunt... show, don't tell.

Coming up, just laying the groundwork so people knew what I was trying to accomplish.

Quote from: SteerpikeYour design goals look pretty sound, and make sense given what you want to achieve.

Thank you. :)

Quote from: SteerpikeI'm curious if you're familiar with systems like Fate and its offshoots

Fairly. I'm adapting Aspects for use in Infinity, using implementations in ICONS and Houses of the Blooded.

My system uses a different philosophy than FATE's, but Aspects (properly tweaked) were a perfect fit.

[Starting with the basics.]

For the purposes of the game, characters are defined by their Attributes, Characteristics, Skills, Traits, and Resolve.

Attributes
Infinity characters have six Attributes: Dexterity, Strength, Endurance, Intellect, Influence, and Spirit.

Strength
This represents a character's physical prowess: how much they can lift and carry, how hard they punch and swing a sword. Characters with a high Strength are weightlifters, circus strong-men, and so forth.

Dexterity
This represents flexibility, fine motor skills, reflexes, running speed, and other related areas. Characters with a high Dexterity are gymnasts and athletes of every sort, escape artists, stage magicians, parkour aficionados, and martial artists.

Endurance
Endurance describes a character's health and physical resilience: their ability to resist poisons and disease, to endure physical stress and exertion, and other related areas.

Intellect
A high Intellect makes a person "smart." They learn faster, have a deeper understanding, retain more information, react quicker, and notice more. Scientists, college professors, inventors, engineers, and so on all have a high Intellect.

Influence
Influence is the ability to successfully affect others socially. People with a high Influence are persuasive, charming, and adept at fitting in with others and building strong relationships. Salesmen, con men, politicians, rock stars, actors, the popular kids, and serial killers all have high Influence.

(Note: In most games, this attribute is called Charisma. Characters with a high Influence can be charismatic, but they don't have to be. They can be friendly, persuasive, likable, or physically attractive (any one of these or all). Any number of things can underlie Influence. What matters for mechanics is the effect, not the source.)

Spirit
Spirit is the mental and spiritual strength of a character. A high Spirit implies self-reliance, confidence, a strong will, and stubbornness.

Infinity attributes are rated numerically, with higher values representing more potent Attributes. The higher the Attribute rating, the stronger the attribute.

For normal humans, these attributes range from 4 to 12, with average being 7-9. (There is no upper limit to the Attribute scale, and the lower limit is 0.)

Rating	Description
4	Deficient
5	Very Weak
6	Weak
7-9	Average
10	Good
11	Exceptional
12	Legendary

A 12 is Legendary, an attribute typical of the famous (or infamous). Napoleon had a legendary Influence, Einstein legendary Intellect, Winston Churchill legendary Spirit.

Each Attribute has inherent uses:

Dexterity is used in Initiative.
Strength determines the amount one can lift and carry.
Endurance resists damage, poisons, etc.
Intellect determines bonus skills during character creation.
Influence determines the base attitude of strangers.
Spirit resists social interactions, mind control, and other mental effects.

[Other uses will be added, as needed.]

In addition to the inherent uses, each Attribute gives a bonus to associated skills.

Attribute Rating	Skill Bonus
4-5	+1
6-10	+2
11-12	+3

This bonus is added to the Skill Points to get a Skill Rating.

Though different in some specifics from the "standard six stats" commonplace in RPG's from the time of OD&D, these six Attributes are clearly related. This is deliberate, as the division is useful, widely understood (The above definitions being almost redundant. Almost.), and defensible from a verisimilitude standpoint.

As a omni-genre RPG, the above stats are widely usable in any genre. They make sense to players and GM's. With the use of Characteristics (coming soon), I can create new Attributes as desired and needed for a specific setting. The core Attributes should be be as genre-neutral as possible.

These six attributes are familiar to people, and hence approachable. In several key areas — such as Initiative — Infinity does things differently than most RPG's do. Using approachable mechanics makes the game more palatable to players.

In reviews of RPG's, I've seen games being criticized for using the standard six (or close variations). I believe this arises from the ubiquitous and strong love of novelty among roleplayers.

Which isn't a bad thing, I do it myself. But novelty for novelty's sake, preferring the new just because it's new, is a mistake in game design.

What's important is how the rule works in the context of the system itself, not whether its vintage or cutting-edge. Use what works, not what's modish.

In the context of Infinity's settings and goals, a modified version of the standard six works well. (IMHO.)

Eagerly awaiting some crunch. Will digest the design principles soon; just wanted to say that I like what I've read so far.

I do agree with your decision to use a variant of the standard 6 ability scores; doing things that are different just to be different can often be bad. Familiarity is nice.

Quote from: XeviatEagerly awaiting some crunch. Will digest the design principles soon; just wanted to say that I like what I've read so far.

Thanks. I'll be getting to real crunch — dice method, Skill Challenges — after I introduce Characteristics and Skills.

Characteristics

Characteristics are campaign- or setting-specific capabilities. Whereas all characters have all Attributes, Characteristics exist only in specific settings, and usually only affect a limited number of characters in those settings.

• An Eldritch Horror setting, for example, might have an Insanity Characteristic, representing the mental damage caused by confronting cosmic horrors.
  

• A Cyberpunk setting might have System Strain, representing the increasing medical or psychological difficulties inherent in replacing large amounts of your body with cybernetic implants.
  

• Dead Man's Land, an Infinity campaign setting where Player Characters are carriers slowly succumbing to the zombie plague, has a Necrosis characteristic, representing the degree to which a character has become a zombie.
  

Characteristics have Ratings, like Attributes and Skills, and their own unique Characteristic Challenges. Each functions differently, according to its Rating and associated game mechanics.

The effects of a Characteristic are tailored to what it represents in the setting. Some Characteristics may be used directly, as if a skill, some may grant special powers at specific levels, some may "attack" the character from time to time.

Rules for Characteristics will be found in the appropriate setting.

Some times you just need a unique mechanic, along with a Rating. The examples above argue why it must be this way.

In such case, it helps to have a pre-defined "idiosyncratic mechanic" slot. With such a mechanic, Players and GM's will expect that different settings work in slightly different ways, and accept it when a new setting introduces an idiosyncratic mechanic.

Many systems have implicit Characteristics. Torg did, as Aysle Honor/Corruption, Cybervalue, and Orrorshan Corruption show. The old World of Darkness did, Arete (as an example) applying only to mages.

The point of Infinity is to allow characters from different settings to adventure together (the Infinity Files meta-setting an explicit implementation of such). Rather than making the mechanics one-offs, with unclear application in cross-setting games (as was the case in the OWoD), I've standardized them and made the category explicit.

You'll know how a Characteristic from one setting can be used in another.

Skills

There are probably going to be 20 basic skills or so. These cover combat, technical abilities, social interactions, and miscellaneous uses. (Typically, FX powers have their own skills.)

Skills are rated in Skill Points, which determine how trained a character is. The Attribute bonuses are added to the Skill Points to get a Skill Rating.

Example 1: A character with an Influence of 11 has a bonus of 3 for all Influence skills. If they have 1 pt. in charm, their Skill Rating is 1 +3 = 4.

Example 2: A character with a Dexterity of 4 has a bonus of +1. With a 5 in firearms, their skill level is 5 +1 = 6.

Skill points indicate how well trained a character is (including book learning and experience).

0 = Unskilled. You haven't even the slightest hint of training in this area, and no experience either.

1 - 3 = Minimally trained. You have learned the very most basic concepts of the skill. There are large gaps in theory and application.

4 - 8 = Beginner. You have mastered the basic concepts of the subject, but struggle with intermediate techniques. You make mistakes that other beginners or amateurs won't catch, but anybody who know what they're doing will.

9 - 13 = Proficient. You have a solid grasp of the theory and practice of the skill. Advanced concepts can be challenging. (The oft-cited "10,000 hours of practice".)

14 - 18 = Expert. You are very skilled, thoroughly conversant with even the most obscure subjects in your field. If they know of it, your skill impresses people.

19 and higher = Master. There are few more knowledgeable than you.

The Skill Rating can be used to gauge how competent a character is in a specific skill:

2-4 is a Novice, a raw recruit or an inexperienced beginner. Part-time employees, like the teen who flips burgers at a fast food joint, are Novices, as are interns.

5-9 is Skilled, someone employable in a field at an entry level. Telemarketers and Tech Support employees are typically Skilled, as are people just graduating college with a Bachelor's degree.

10-14 is a Professional, possessing a post-graduate degree or equivalent in on-the-job experience. Your general physician is a Professional, as are the vast majority of movie sergeants.

15-19 is Accomplished, a standout in the field, cited and respected by their peers, but typically unknown to the general public. Writers of specialized books (such as textbooks or reference works) are usually Accomplished.

20-24 is World Class, one of the best in the world. (As the name implies.) Olympic athletes, for example.

25-29 is a Grand Master, "The Best There is at What I Do". Grand Masters are luminaries in their field. Physicist Stephen Hawking, as a real-world example.

30+ is Legendary, one of the best who's ever lived. Legendary figures are those who dominate history. Their works live on long after they die and their names become synonymous with their field of expertise. Shakespeare, Robin Hood, Einstein: these are all Legendary figures.

One of the goals in design is "to make mechanics that can easily be understood and described in relatable terms". The idea is to give labels and information which can easily be compared to people's real-life experiences.

This begins with the Attributes, which are described with labels people can easily grasp. (Not unique to this system, fairly common in fact, but it is critical to my approach.) We all know what Average is, we know Exceptional people, we know people who are Very Weak in something.

It's relatable.

This idea is carried into the skill system. We've all been Unskilled in an area, right now in fact. We've studied and become Minimally Trained, when something is new and even the basics are a struggle. We know of people who are Proficient and even Expert at what they do.

We can relate the abstract numbers to real world experiences. This makes the game feel real.

The Skill Rating labels and descriptions serve the same purpose. But, as they are a combination of Attributes and Skills, there's some internal logic to how the two relate.

The bonus for an Average attribute is +2. With Minimal training, 1, Average people have a Skill Rating of 3, Novices. An Average person with Minimal training is a Novice.

This is a common-sense, easily understood measurement. People with minimal training/experience are Novices. (Even the very talented but minimally trained are Novices: Skill 1 +3 bonus = Skill Rating 4. Everyone, even those with potential, have to start somewhere.)

Average people (+2) with a Beginner's training (4) are Skilled (Skill Rating 6).

Average people (+2) with demonstrated Proficiency (9) are Professionals (Total Skill 11).

Average people (+2) with Expert training (14) are Accomplished (Skill Rating 16).

Average people (+2) with a Mastery of the subject (19) are World Class (Skill Rating 21).

Again, all of these are straightforward and make sense. You can easily understand why a Master of a subject would be World Class.

The rest of the Skill Ratings follow similar internal logic, as do the Challenge Ratings. Challenge Ratings are defined by how challenging they are, in relation to specific Skill Ratings. Difficult Challenges are apt for Professionals, for example.

The idea is that not only can players and gamemasters relate to the mechanics, but gamemasters can translate mechanics into real-world equivalencies and vice versa. How this works will become clearer when I post Skill Challenges (probably tomorrow).