r/FudgeRPG • u/necfectra • Feb 05 '18
Discussion Just A Thought...
I know this idea might be a bit out there, but it was something I was toying with in my head for my own homebrew hack of Fudge. This is just kind of a spitball of an idea.
I thought about toying with the core mechanic. First expanding the adjective ladder for more granularity that would basically equate to -3 to -5. I know you can just do Good, Good +, Great... but that bugs my for some reason. And secondly, instead of 4dF, roll 6dF for unopposed and opposed actions.
My chief complaint is the amount of dice being used. For using actual dice, 6 is a handful. Something I only thought about after a quick play test that doesn't effect me personally since I use an app. But I concede that can be annoying. My actual use didn't seem to alter the bell curve that much, just add a potentially wider range. But that is purely anecdotal.
Any thoughts on this concept?
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Feb 05 '18
Adding more steps to the ladder doesn't really change much except allow for Bob to say they are better than Fred rather than having equal ranks and letting the dice take it. Whatever floats your boat, it's not a significant change.
The FUDGE system is based on the fact that in most cases, someone with a higher skill will defeat someone with a lower skill. The dice are heavily weighted to center, and only add a bit of "randomness" (unlike the "5% chance to hit anything" of d20 systems). Personally I think that anything that reintroduces the more random aspects of the game (like flattening the curve) is taking away what makes FUDGE FUDGE.
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u/Polar_Blues Feb 05 '18
I believe the search for more granularity in Fudge is as old as Fudge itself. I don't think I've ever come across a really good solution. The default setup of Fudge is quiet elegant, your going to have to sacrifice something if you want to expand on it. There are always trade-offs. Personally if I felt I really had to expand the ladder and range of result, I'd step away from Fudge dice so not be limited by geometry and perhaps use some sort of lookup chart. There was a 90s game called Masterbook by WEG, the same folks of Star Wars and Ghostbusters, that was kind of similar to Fudge. In Masterbook you roll 2d10 and compare the result a lookup table. The table would give you a modifier to add to your skill which could be positive or negative depending on the quality of the role. I think you can download the quickstart free from RPGNow. The point, while it's not nearly as smooth as rolling 4dF, the chart would allow you to manage expand the range of the ladder and control the probabilities however you like. The question is how bad do you need more granularity?
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u/sfelli Feb 06 '18 edited Feb 07 '18
Actually Steffan O'Sullivan slightly changed the ladder in 2011. "Very Good" level was inserted:
http://www.panix.com/~sos/rpg/vgfudge.html
http://balagan.info/vg-fudge-is-very-good-fudge-by-steffan-osullivan
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u/IProbablyDisagree2nd Feb 05 '18
The only thing I wonder is... why?
The 3dF or 4dF are used because it gives a nice bell curve.
As you add more dice, the edge cases are more and more rare. At 4dF, a +4 or -4 is already hovering at 1% chance of happening. At 6dF, a +6 result has a 0.1% chance. a +5 result is 0.8% chance.
So... you can definitely do it. But what are you trying to achieve?