Post by OGilgamesh in Freeform Solo Roleplaying (a Guide) comments

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Hey! So I came to the conclusion that I much prefer freeform roleplaying games around the time you posted your guide on Reddit and Discord.

We pretty much came to the same conclusions so I'm glad you wrote that and put it out there!

Long story short, thinking in story-world logic has been a game (lol) changer for me. Relying on it allows me to improvise on the spot because my focus is entirely on the fictional situation and not on some stats.

I use a method that might interest you!

Success/failure roll

2d6,
Target is always 8.
Roll 3d6 and keep lowest/highest 2 if the intended outcome is un/likely to happen.

If it's super high, super succeed. If it's super low, super fail.

Pretty basic. Thanks to Grok?!, I've added an additionnal layer to that :

if the character fails, the player may turn the failure into a success and inflict a complication on the character. (Item used breaks or depleted, contact is angry, etc.)
The lower the roll, the more intense the inflicted complication.

It's super easy and adds a bit of drama after failed rolls. The choice between failure and a complication might not be easy to do and is a fair source of tension, I find.

Had a lot of fun with this, again thanks for the guide! Happy gaming

mothteeth350 days ago(+1)

Hi :) Thanks for the kind words. I appreciate the encouragement, and I'm glad you like the guide.

I like nice simple dice mechanics like the one you described, thanks for sharing. I tend to use different kinds of dice rolls on any given day, depending on what mood I'm in or which dice I happen to have sitting in front of me (or, more often than not, which indie games I've recently read). I have a bit of a preference for d10 because I just find percentages so straightforward to think about, but I love the simplicity cozy familiarity of six sided dice almost as much.

I'm going to drop a totally unsolicited recommendation on you. Wightbred's "Named" - https://wightbred.itch.io/named I mention it partly because it might interest you if you like the ideas you found here, and also it has a quite interesting d6 based dice mechanic that allows rerolls with amplified consequences.

Happy gaming, and thanks for saying Hi :)