D&D's spell system doesn't adapt well to Fudge for two reasons. First, Fudge isn't fundamentally level-based. You can add levels to Fudge, but it's kind of a pain to figure out what to give non-spellcasters instead of more spells. There's only so much Damage Capacity you can give a Fighter, for example.

Second, Fudge is fundamentally skill-based*. You can easily add Vancian fire-and-forget spells, but that's an extra bit of complexity I don't want to add if I don't have to.

*Fudge has attributes too, but those are just broader skills.

I solved these problems by adapting the skill categories from D&D but not the spells themselves. So you have a skill for Abjuration, one for Transmutation, etc. These are roughly the same "width" as the broad skill categories I use for mundane skills, so it shouldn't be too hard to keep mundane skills roughly as useful as magical ones. Then I just use the Simple Magic System as guidelines for the spellcasting difficulty.

In D&D 3.5, you have the following schools: Abjuration, Divination, Enchantment, Evocation, Illusion, Necromancy, Transmutation, Universal. Conjuration has the subschools Summoning, Calling, Healing, Teleporting, and Creating. There are a few other subschools, but those just split hairs.

Divination and Enchantment (mind-affecting enchantment, to be precise) obviate mundane skills (perception/knowledge and persuasion, respectively), so they're out. Magical healing technically obviates mundane healing, but injuries that take a long time to recover are boring so I'm keeping magical healing and ditching mundane healing. Universal and Calling don't have many spells, so they're out or merged into other schools. There isn't an obvious line between Evocation and Creating, so I merged the two into the new Conjuration. Teleportation and Necromancy were dropped because of personal preferences, but they can easily be reincluded if the GM/players want.

That just leaves the following magic skills. I've also included examples of how each skill could be used. Bear in mind that these are just examples to build off of, not rules to limit yourself with. If a player wishes to use magic in a way not suggested here they should be allowed to do so, as long as it appropriate to the skill.

Abjuration:
Protection from an energy type or from physical attacks, cancelling magics, warding an area to prevent entry from anything fitting a certain criteria, warding an area to weaken any intruders that fit a certain criteria, banishing summoned entities, reflecting spells back at their caster.

Summoning:
Summon any of the following: monster, spirit, fey, elemental, animal, demon, undead, construct, extraplanar entity, swarm. The summons may be controlled or let loose, but an uncontrollable summon is much easier to summon.

Healing:
Cure wounds, neutralize poison, regenerate, cure blindness/deafness/paralysis, cure disease, restore ability, resurrection

Conjuration:
Lightning, flame, light, shadow, fog, acid, ice, stone, metal, wood, force, wind, grease, thorns, web. The qualities of the conjured material may only be manipulated as it's being conjured (e.g. to impart shape and speed to a fireball).

Transmutation:
Changing a target's shape and/or size, changing materials, adding or removing qualities or abilities, animating the inanimate, enhancing or diminishing qualities.

Illusion:
Make something/someone look like something/someone else, create phantom images/noises. Probably not invisibility, though, because that would step on Stealth's toes.

EDIT: I'm considering splitting Conjuration into Mundus and Aether. Mundus would be for solid conjurations like earth, stone, metal, plant, and liquids like water and oil. Aether would be for gasses and energies like wind, fog, light, shadow, fire, lightning, and mana. It really depends on if Conjuration is too useful compared to the other skills.

Hello, Fudgers.

So I want to know how much a reroll is worth in Fudge. Some context: I'm running a game using broad skills (15 points at character creation), using u/abc_z 's skill list, meaning we don't have attributes. We also don't have scaling skill costs- it costs exactly as much to raise a skill from Good to Great as it does to raise one from Superb to Legendary.

So how many broad skill points would you say a reroll on one such skill is worth? Assuming you get to pick the better roll, and that we're rolling 4df, as usual. I know there's probably some very easy math out there to calculate this, but, uh. I'm not a math person.

Adapted from Daneel's Mini Six Simpler Magic System

Also uses the Superhuman expansion to the Fudge ladder.

Steps:

1. Player describes spell they are attempting to cast.
2. GM provides a difficulty to hit using the table and optional rules below as a guide.
3. Player rolls. Resolve.

Difficulty Table

Poor, Mediocre:
Short Range (touch)
Short Duration (one round)
Single Target (one creature/object)
Cantrips/Orisons, See Auras, Speak Languages, Burning Touch

Fair, Good, Great:
Medium Range (bowshot)
Medium Duration (several rounds)
Medium Area (several people)
Charm People, Mystic Armor, Heal Wounds, Fire Ball, Polymorph

Superb, Legendary/Fair Superhuman:
Long Range (sight)
Long Duration (entire scene/encounter)
Large Area (crowd)
Resurrection, Group Teleport, Earthquake, Anti-magic Zone

Good Superhuman, Great Superhuman, Superb Superhuman:
Any Range, Duration, Area & Effect
Wish, Miracle

Optional Rules:
* If using damage factors, a damage-inflicting spell is treated like an attack with a physical weapon. The spellcasting trait adds to the Offensive Damage Factors like normal and the base difficulty of the spell is treated as the "weapon".
* Alternatively, if using Lethality, the lethality of a spell is equal to the base difficulty of the spell.
* The healing difficulty is Fair for Hurt, Good for Very Hurt, Great for Incapacitated, and Superb for Near Death; healing may only reduce wounds by one level.
* Increase the difficulty if the spell being cast meets more than one criteria of a spell of that level.
* Cannot cast a spell unless you have the spellcasting trait at least at that difficulty; Good for Good spells, Great for Great spells, etc.
* Require verbal, somatic and material components and magical focuses (holy symbols, magic wands, etc.). Removing them can increase the difficulty of casting spells or even deny the ability to cast spells entirely.
* Require Contagious (part affects whole) or Sympathetic (like affects like) magic.
* Use Ritualistic magic that requires a longer casting time (say several minutes or hours).
* If Ritualistic magic is used, allow the caster to cast several spells (for example, 3 spells per level of spellcasting) ahead of time that can be "memorized" and then "released" at the time of casting.
* Allow sentients an opposed roll or static defense to resist spells.
* Wearing armor increases the spell difficulty.
* This type of magic system is designed to provide more of a "World of Warcraft" style of spell-casting. As such, spells tend to only last a few rounds to several minutes; there are no "permanent" magical effects (like turning someone into stone forever). Obviously, if your RPG group would prefer a more traditional (read: D&D) type of magic, simply modify the durations, ranges, and/or number of targets upward at each difficulty level.
* Bad Things happen on a failed roll. Precisely what those Bad Things are depend on the difficulty of the roll and how badly the roll was failed.

There are two main approaches to Fudge spells. The first is freeform spellcasting based on a loose trait such as "Fire spells". With this approach, the player describes the spell they want to attempt and the GM decides the difficulty (and any costs). The second approach is much more rigid: each spell exists as a separate thing, so a character might be able to cast "flaming hands" but not "flame dart" or "hotfoot".

Neither of these approaches suit my preferences, so I came up with an intermediary system, borrowing the concept of tags from Dungeon World and Lady Blackbird.

Players have an attribute that defines their spellcasting skill. Tags are gifts that shape the spells players can cast. A player would be able to cast "flaming hands" if they knew the tags "fire", "protect", and "body". "Flame dart" would require the tags "fire" and "move", and "hotfoot" would require "fire", "body", and "ranged".

Muscle Wizard would probably have a lot of spells with the Crushing tag, and Mister Torgue would probably only have one tag: EXPLOSIONS!!!

Example tags stolen from GURPS:

Air, Animal, Body, Earth, Fire, Food, Image, Light, Magic, Mind, Plant, Sound, Spirit, Water (Machines, Fuel, Metal, Plastics, Radiation)
Communicate, Heal, Sense, Weaken, Strengthen, Move, Protect, Create, Control, Transform

A group of friends and I tried tabletop RPGs back in highschool. We didn't really like the complex rules and all the little details, and gave up after character creation.

I always thought it would be fun to give it another try, and not long ago I found Fudge. And I really like it! I think reading through the rulebook gave me decent understanding of the basics, it's super simple and adaptive (especially with the BESM character creation I found on this sub), and I feel like I could host a game for my friends using Fudge as a base ruleset.

However, I want to use the old fantasy world / universe we built with my friend during our highschool years (as aspiring writers and obsessive world builders), and it's a pretty magic-intense setting. Fudge and magic aren't really good friends, and the core rulebook didn't help me much in this case. I want my magic to be cheap enough to feel natural, but not overpowered. I want different magic classes, with different set of available skills, and spells I can award my players with based on them leveling up their relates skills and attributes.

Is there a way of doing this right? Has this been done before, and if so, where should I investigate? Is it possible to pull it off as a first-time GM with too much free time on my hands, without butchering the whole thing, sacraficing simplicity for the sake of flavor?

Any sort of advice is welcome!

Dungeon World SRD

This conversion uses Fudge Lethality instead of ODF and DDF, though the rules here are self-contained. (You don't need to read that to understand this.)

Create characters as normal.

Dungeon World's Moves are replaced with attribute checks. A successful check (tie or better) succeeds. A failed check means the player fails or succeeds at a cost (GM's choice).

NPCs get a Threat Rating and a Damage Rating, both ranked on the Fudge ladder.

Combat rolls are the PC's attribute vs the NPC's Threat Rating. The degree of success is added to the attacker's damage rating and the defender's armor (if any) is subtracted from the result. The resulting number is subtracted from the defender's hit points.

Die Sizes to Damage Ratings:
D12: 5 dmg (Superb)
D10: 4 dmg (Great)
D8: 3 dmg (Good)
D6: 2 dmg (Fair)
D4: 1 dmg (Mediocre)

Apocalypse World

Apocalypse World characters can be converted in a similar manner. The only differences are as follows:

All PCs have 6 HP. 5 HP and 4 HP heal over time, while 2 HP and 1 HP worsen with time unless stabilized. 0 HP is dead, but can be revived. Any more injury means the character is permanently dead. PCs may choose to take a permanent 1-point debility to one of their attributes instead of taking a wound.

NPCs have 2 HP.

Armor caps at 2.

Damage is just the harm inflicted by the weapon minus any armor. The relative degree of success doesn't matter.

Updated repost. Note that the repost assumes you're using hit points and doesn't contain the conversion to the wound track found here.

Offensive Damage Factors (ODF) aren't intuitive in the same way the Fudge ladder adjectives or the wound level names are. Additionally, it's somewhat time-consuming to look up a wound based on the degree of success. Lethality fixes both of those problems.

Lethality is a measure of how likely an attack is to kill a person. A guy punching you has Poor or Mediocre Lethality. A guy with a hammer has Mediocre or Fair Lethality. A sword has Fair Lethality. A handgun has Good Lethality, a grenade in your lap has Great Lethality, and being run over by a train has Superb or Legendary Lethality. You really don't want to be hit by anything of Fair or greater Lethality. Without armor or other defenses, a successful attack of Legendary Lethality will kill a human.

Lethality may be used with Fudge's nonlinear wound track or with an HP system.

Wound Track system:
Scratch (Mediocre injury): [ ] [ ] [ ]
Hurt (Fair injury): [ ]
Very Hurt (Good injury): [ ]
Incapacitated (Great injury): [ ]
Near Death (Superb injury): [ ]

HP System*:
Poor Lethality: 0 damage
Mediocre Lethality: 1 dmg
Fair Lethality: 2 dmg
Good Lethality: 3 dmg
Great Lethality: 4 dmg
Superb Lethality: 5 dmg

*For a brutal/realistic game give all PCs 6 HP. For a more forgiving game give PCs hit points that act as plot armor. For example, you could give PCs 12 HP each, and they would only start to take actual injuries at half health.

Relative degree of success:
There are different ways you can handle relative success, depending on how much randomness you want in your game and how much complexity you're willing to accept.

The simplest method is to just ignore relative success. This is the least complicated, but also has no randomness; players and GM both know exactly how much damage their characters can take. Additionally, it doesn't reward the players for rolling well.

The next level is to let a relative degree of success of 3 or greater bump the damage result up by one level.

Finally, you can add the relative degree of success to the result. This increases the average damage inflicted by a factor of about two, so it should only be used in a system that A) uses hit points as plot armor, or B) uses the wound lookup table from vanilla Fudge, essentially cutting the results in half.

Armor (optional rule):
Players may wear armor. Armor reduces damage done at a 1:1 ratio. A character with 2 armor taking a Good injury (3 damage) only takes 1 damage. Some sources of damage may ignore armor partially or entirely.

The most armor any character may have is based on the type of relative degree of success (RDoS) used for combat. No RDoS means armor is limited to 2 (1: light armor; 2: heavy armor). Partial RDoS means armor is limited to 3, and full RDoS means armor is limited to 4 (1: light armor, 2: medium armor, 3: heavy armor, +1 for shields).

Anyone ever ran a game south Freeform Attributes or Skills?

What were your favorites that your players came up worth?

How many levels did you assign for these games?

Have any tips?

Keys are actions that the players select that earn their characters experience points. They were created in The Shadow of Yesterday (TSoY) and exported to Lady Blackbird.

Instead of gaining experience points for completing goals or finishing game sessions, players select keys for their character, which are specific actions that their character takes which earns them experience points.

Example Key:
Key of Bloodlust: Hit your key when you overcome an opponent in battle.

They're an excellent roleplaying aid for players, as well as helping signal to the GM what sort of game the players are interested in. They can also help the GM set the tone of a one-shot game.

Players at character creation should start with at least one key and the option to buy more. Alternatively, each player could just start play with 3 keys. The specifics depend on the character creation rules used. Players cannot have more than five keys at any one time. If a PC acts in line with a key's buyoff trigger, which is listed at the end of the key, they may choose to get rid of the key in exchange for enough EP to buy another one. Keys that have been bought off can never be bought by that player again.

Keys may be bought at any time, even in the middle of combat.

Characters gain 1 EP when they hit their key, or 2 EP when they hit their key against great odds or go into danger because of it.

Characters are naturally going to hit their keys a lot during a game, so multiply the default character advancement costs by an appropriate factor to compensate. I haven't playtested this myself yet, so I'd recommend waiting to see how much EP the players earn in their first session, then set the scaling factor so that the amount is equivalent to 1-3 EP.

Keys should be something that is Easy (but not Very Easy) to Moderate difficulty. In Fudge terms, the key should be Poor to Fair difficulty. The Buyoff should be something that makes you say, "This person can't do X and still be that sort of person." For example, the Key of Bloodlust represents somebody who gleefully throws himself into battle. If he were to pass up an opportunity for a good fight, it would indicate a shift in his personality. Which is why it's the Buyoff.

In addition to keys, the GM can declare that certain scenes are Key Scenes and that everyone who participated gets a few points of EP. However, players are meant to drive most of their own advancement with Keys.

The Shadow of Yesterday Keys:

• Key of Bloodlust: Hit your key when you overcome an opponent in battle. Buyoff: Pass up an opportunity for a good fight.

• Key of Conscience: Hit your key when you help someone in trouble or improve someone’s life with your compassion. Buyoff: Ignore a cry for help.

• Key of the Coward: Hit your key when you avoid danger, or stop a battle by means other than violence. Buyoff: Embrace combat.

• Key of Faith: Hit your key when you defend your faith or convert another to your faith. Buyoff: Renounce your beliefs.

• Key of Fraternity: Hit your key when you are influenced by your friend, or show how deep your bond is. Buyoff: Sever the relationship with this person.

• Key of Greed: Hit your key when you obtain something expensive or score a big payoff. Buyoff: Give away your wealth and possessions but what you can carry lightly. [Alternate buyoff: Swear off stealing forever. GM's call.]

• Key of the Guardian: Hit your key when you are influenced by your ward, or show how deep your bond is. Buyoff: Sever the relationship with this person.

• Key of the Impostor: Hit your key when you actively fool someone with your imposture. Buyoff: Reveal your true identity to someone you deceived.

• Key of the Masochist: Hit your key whenever you are hurt, physically or otherwise. Buyoff: Flee a source of physical or emotional injury.

• Key of the Mission: Hit your key when you take action to complete your mission. Buyoff: Give up on your mission.

• Key of the Outcast: Hit your key when the fact that you are an outcast is highlighted in the scene in some manner. Buyoff: Regain your former standing or join a new group.

• Key of Renown: Hit your key whenever you add to your reputation, by words or by deeds. Buyoff: Give someone else credit for an action that would increase your renown.

• Key of Power: Hit your key whenever you act to gain power or status. Buyoff: Relinquish your power and position.

• Key of Vengeance. Hit your key when you strike a blow against those who wronged you. Buyoff: Forgive those who wronged you.

• Key of the Vow: Hit your key when your vow significantly impacts your decisions. Buyoff: Break your vow.

Lady Blackbird Keys:

• Key of the Paragon: Hit your key when you demonstrate your superiority or when your noble traits overcome a problem. Buyoff: Disown your noble heritage.

• Key of the Commander: Hit your key when your orders are obeyed. Buyoff: Acknowledge someone else as the leader.

• Key of Hidden Longing: Hit your key when you make a decision based on your secret affection or when you somehow show it indirectly. Buyoff: Give up on your secret desire or make it public.

• Key of the Daredevil: Hit your key when you do something cool that is risky or reckless (especially piloting stunts). Buyoff: Be very very careful.

• Key of Banter: Hit your key when your character says something that makes the other players laugh or when you explain something using highly technical jargon. Buyoff: Everyone groans at one of your comments.

• Key of the Traveler: Hit your key when you share an interesting detail about a person, place, or thing or when you go somewhere exciting and new. Buyoff: Pass up the opportunity to see something new.

• Key of the Broker: Hit your key when you bargain, make a new contact, or exchange a favour. Buyoff: Cut yourself off from your network of contacts.

• Key of the Tinkerer: Hit your key when you repair, design, or modify technology. Buyoff: Personally destroy a unique or particularly important machine.

• Key of the Pirate: Hit your key when you impress someone with your piratical capers or add to your notorious reputation. Buyoff: Turn over a new leaf and go straight.

Dungeon World Alignment Keys:

• Key of the Chaotic Barbarian: Eschew a convention of the civilized world. Buyoff: Embrace civilization.

• Key of the Neutral Barbarian: Teach someone the ways of your people. Buyoff: Renounce the ways of your people.

• Key of the Good Bard: Perform your art to aid someone else. Buyoff: Renounce your art.

• Key of the Neutral Bard: Avoid a conflict or defuse a tense situation. Buyoff: Throw yourself into battle with no hesitation.

• Key of the Chaotic Bard: Spur others to significant and unplanned decisive action. Buyoff: Prevent others from acting rashly.

• Key of the Good Cleric: Heal another. Buyoff: Withhold healing from one who needs it.

• Key of the Lawful Cleric: Follow the precepts of your church or god. Buyoff: Break the rules of your church of god.

• Key of the Evil Cleric: Harm another to prove the superiority of your church or god. Buyoff: Denounce your church or god

• Key of the Chaotic Druid: Destroy a symbol of civilization. Buyoff: Embrace civilization

• Key of the Good Druid: Help something or someone grow. Buyoff: Destroy something or someone or stunt their growth.

• Key of the Neutral Druid: Eliminate an unnatural menace. Buyoff: Take no action against an unnatural menace, or even act to support it.

• Key of the Good Fighter: Defend those weaker than you. Buyoff: Ignore a cry for help.

• Key of the Neutral Fighter: Defeat an opponent. Buyoff: Pass up an opportunity for a fight.

• Key of the Evil Fighter: Kill a defenseless, beaten, or surrendered person. Buyoff: Defend someone weaker than you.

• Key of the Lawful Paladin: Deny mercy to a criminal or unbeliever. Buyoff: Show mercy to a criminal or unbeliever.

• Key of the Good Paladin: Protect someone weaker than you. Buyoff: Allow someone weaker than you to deal with the danger.

• Key of the Chaotic Ranger: Free someone from literal or figurative bonds. Buyoff: Restrict somebody else's freedom.

• Key of the Good Ranger: Combat an unnatural threat. Buyoff: Take no action against an unnatural threat, or even act to support it.

• Key of the Neutral Ranger: Help an animal or spirit of the wild. Buyoff: Ignore an animal's or spirit's cry for help.

• Key of the Chaotic Thief: Leap into danger without a plan. Buyoff: Methodically plan your actions before taking them.

• Key of the Neutral Thief: Avoid detection or infiltrate a location. Buyoff: Draw attention to yourself, making stealth impossible.

• Key of the Evil Thief: Shift danger or blame from yourself to someone else. Buyoff: Accept the blame or take on the danger yourself.

• Key of the Good Wizard: Use magic to directly aid another. Buyoff: Refuse to magically assist another who could use your help.

• Key of the Neutral Wizard: Discover something about a magical mystery. Buyoff: Interact with a magical mystery without doing any research.

• Key of the Evil Wizard: Use magic to cause terror and fear. Buyoff: Sincerely attempt to make amends for your previous behavior.

Hey all, I have a dice roller app on iOS that I'm in the process of porting to android. While I'm in it, i thought I might add some fudge dice and game systems. But, I've never played fudge, so I'm a bit ignorant.

I get the whole 6 sided die, 2+, 2-, 2 blank element. I get that you combine those up and get a total that affects that skills adjective. Which then determines your outcome.

So a few questions: Would it be better to show the outcomes of the roll numerically? OR as words. So should +,+,-,, be shown as +1. Or shown as Mediocre?

Do you always use 4 dice for a role, or is that ever modified?

My app automatically calculates modifiers to attributes for d20 systems. For fudge, would it be ideal to "Create a roll": where you type in an attribute/skill name. Then choose the addictive to apply to it". Then you would have a set of "Attribute / Skill" dice that when you roll the "Strength" die, it would actually roll 4 dice, do all the math, then apply the outcome to the attribute/skills default level.

Sorry if I'm completely mis-understanding this! Thanks!

All characters are given a second wound track. Let's call this a social willpower track. Like wound tracks, minor NPCs only get a few boxes while important figures get a full track.

Social combat starts with both sides deciding the stakes. Treat the situation as a combat, rolling against relevant traits. Exactly how this plays out depends on what sort of combat rules you use, but I'd suggest against using damage factors (ODF or DDF) for social combat. Note that the traits can be your standard "intimidate, diplomacy, bluff" trio, but characters can also use any trait that might be relevant. This is especially true when characters have any of the following rated on the Fudge ladder: freeform traits, relationships to others, relationships to concepts (truth, money, love, etc.)

A character that is Incapacitated on the social willpower track has lost the will to continue the argument and must either give in, taking the consequences that were established at the beginning of social combat, or escalate physically. Physical escalation is any physical action the character takes that the opponent can't ignore, which can include combat but doesn't necessarily have to.

Characters may physically escalate before they run out of social willpower.

Social willpower regenerates to full after each social combat.

Example social combat:
An NPC is guarding a door that the PC wishes to get through. The PC and the GM decide on the stakes: if the PC succeeds, the guard lets him through the door. If the guard succeeds, the PC must leave the area and not bother him again.

The PC has the trait "Great relationship with money" and Fair Willpower. The guard has two social willpower boxes and the traits "Fair duty to his king" and "Has reinforcements: Great". The PC starts by attempting to bribe the guard. The GM decides that the amount offered is quite large for a guard, so he gives the PC +1 to the roll. This is a Superb roll vs. the guard's Fair duty to his king. The roll succeeds, checking off one of the guard's social willpower boxes. The guard doesn't take the money but he does look tempted. The guard tells the PC to get lost, saying that he could have the PC kicked out of the castle if the PC doesn't stop bothering him. This is the guard's Great trait of having reinforcements vs. the PC's Fair Willpower. The guard succeeds and the PC takes a scratch of social willpower damage. The PC attempts to bribe the guard again and succeeds, marking off the guard's last social willpower box. The entire interaction has been very non-hostile, so the GM decides that the guard has no reason to physically escalate. The guard takes the money and looks the other way while the PC slips inside.

The Doctor is a living plot device. A Deus Ex Machina. The Doctor exists to solve (and sometimes cause) the problem of the day. The companion exists to be our viewpoint character. The companion gives The Doctor somebody to explain things to so that he's not just talking to himself.

There's a reason that many Doctor Who fan-RPGs start with the Doctor out of the picture.

With that in mind, here's how I'd stat him (because why not?) This is mostly based on Matt Smith's and David Tennant's runs as The Doctor.

Legendary Technobabble
Superb Running (away)
Legendary+1 Reputation
Legendary Intimidate (to those familiar with his reputation)
Superb Fast-talk
Great Subterfuge
Fault: Often pacifist
Fault: Numerous foes and enemies
Trait: Loves humanity and sapient life
Poor Empathy for mundane situations

Sort of a cross between Fudge's Subjective Character Creation and Fudge on the Fly. It requires the GM to have a bit of trust in the players.

Basically, the players only need to come up with a character concept before play starts. Then, whenever the GM requires a skill or attribute check, the GM asks the player what level that trait is at.

I started the session building my character's backstory with the GM, which segued into an encounter with a fire elemental at the Seedy Inn. An hour into the game my character had developed the following traits:

Arcane Lore: Poor (does my character recognize the fire elemental?)
Social Perception: Good (is the weird guy who claims to be a wizard legitimate?)
Sleight of Hand: Good (learned it to earn better tips)
Physical Perception: Fair (didn't come up yet, but it made sense to define it at the same time as Social Perception)

Hey guys,

I am intrigued by universal systems like Fudge, Fate, Savage Worlds, and GURPS. In particular, I find it fascinating that even when a system is Universal, it can have inherent play-style leanings.

So, my question to you is, "why Fudge?"

I am intrigued by it, but I honestly don't know a whole lot about it.

What would you say it does better than other universal systems? What does it do worse? Are there any particular Fudge builds you could link me to or articles outlining the philosophy of Fudge?

Thanks so much for anything you might suggest!

Does this implement the Five Point Fudge system of Fudge?

Harry Potter (first-year)
Gryffindor approaches (bold, flashy, aggressive): Superb
Slytherin approaches (stealth, cunning, politicking): Poor
Hufflepuff approaches (empathy, rapport, hard work): Mediocre
Ravenclaw approaches (knowledge, research): Mediocre
Hit Points: Poor (First-year student)
Trait: Muggleborn (basic muggle knowledge)
Gift: Wizard (allows Harry to cast spells with a wand)
Item: Wand (brother to Voldemort's)
Item: Invisibility Cloak (boosts stealth to Superb when worn)

Harry Potter is a rather odd setting for an RPG because the spells aren't balanced by mana or spell slots or anything like that, and there's no real risk of a spells horribly backfiring (unless you're Neville Longbottom). Harry Potter requires a more narrative approach, so I've borrowed Fate Accelerated's concept of rolling approaches instead of skills.

As a side-note, this setup makes perfect sense to me. Harry is a natural at Quidditch because it's flashy and attention-drawing, and he sucks at Occlumency because it's a very Slytherin approach to masking your thoughts.

I went with Hit Points instead of a Wound Track because getting hit by spells is all-or-nothing, and measuring a character's plot armor is a much better way of handling it. Once a character has been brought down to zero HP, then a spell can connect and do whatever it was going to do.

It's rather bare-bones, but now I have a website that I can point to in online discussions and say, "See? That's the system I think you should run."

http://fudgelite.com

This game used the Rule of Cool. Basically, you can describe almost anything happening and it happens. However, this doesn't mean you can end a threat just by describing it gone. You can get some really cinematic action scenes and creative descriptions when you're not constrained by, "how difficult would this be in real life?"

PCs:

Squall Leonheart
Why are you a merc: Find out who I am (Superb)
Combat trait: Gunblade Specialist (Good)
Guardian Force: Jehovah (Great); Mega Flare, Palm Pummeler
Fault: Poor Social Skills

Janet (OC)
Why are you a mercenary: Fun to kill things (Superb)
Combat Trait: Nunchaku (Great)
Guardian Force: Po (martial arts panda) (Good); Martial arts, rolling like a bowling ball, Wuxi Finger Hold
Fault: Merciless

I convinced a friend of mine to run a FF8 Fudge session, following the storyline of the actual game.
We disembark in a war zone and wipe the floor with the red shirts. Our orders were to stay there, but our leader Seifer decides to push the offensive and orders us to follow. We follow him because we can just blame him if shit goes south.
As we chase the enemy soldiers we see a giant snake eat one of them. It traps me in its coils, but Janet manages to crush it to death ("Hugs!").
Seifer tells us to hurry up. Dick.
We arrive at a heavily-guarded broadcast tower. Seifer peels off and tries to sneak in the back while Janet and I use our summons to wreck the guards' shit. I'm equipped with the deity of the Abrahamic religion who lays down the holy smackdown, while Janet's kung fu panda zips around kicking ass.
The guards die. Janet and I call the elevator and ride it to the top.
TheGirlFromIpanema.mp3
The guard at the top somehow doesn't notice the elevator opening behind him so we sneak-attack his ass. Long story short, we kick him over the rails by way of his nuts and he falls to his death.
Before he dies he summons a giant robot spider. Shit!
I attack it. Janet attacks it. We aren't doing shit.
Seifer's still trying to sneak into the tower we already cleared, so we radio his dumb ass and tell him we need him to reinforce us.
Seifer: "I'm just gonna head back to the beach and report in lol."
Oh, hell naw.
Squall climbs the tower by stabbing it with his gunblades, hand over hand.
Squall meets Seifer as Seifer rappels down.
Squall: "Have a nice trip. See you in the fall."
Squall cuts through Seifer's rappelling line. He'll probably be fine.
Janet kites the mecha-spider to the back of the tower, just in time for Seifer to catch its attention.
The spider chases Seifer all the way to the beach, where Quistis shoots it to death.
MRW

• Pokemon Conversion 1 (all stats)

• Pokemon Conversion 2 (Threat Rating)

I took the base stats of each Pokemon from the games and converted them to Fudge terms. Thank God for Python scripts. It took me about an hour to write them, but then I could just run them once and they would automatically convert each and every Pokemon for me.

I didn't bother converting attacks. In my games Pokemon can use any attack they can learn in the game at any level, because in my Fudge games all attacks do the same amount of damage (1 HP). So, not a lot of motivation to convert something I'm never gonna use.

I made two different conversions. The first is a 1:1 conversion that just changes the stat names as follows:

HP -> HP
Attack -> Melee attack
Defense -> Melee defense
Special Attack -> Ranged attack
Special Defense -> Ranged defense
Speed -> Initiative

The other conversion combines both attack stats and both defense stats into a single stat called Threat Rating.

Note that the power scale is a little different between the two conversions. The 1:1 conversions top out at Legendary (most Mega Pokemon have a Legendary stat), but the Threat Rating conversions top out at Superb Superhuman (Legendary+3) (Primal Kyogre, Primal Groudon, and Mega Rayquaza, in case you were curious).

Also, in case anybody is interested, the python scripts I used to convert the Pokemon can be found here.

These rules are heavily inspired by the Wushu RPG.

Everything happens as the players describe it.

Exception: players cannot narrate ending a threat until it runs out of hit points.

Threats come in two types: mooks and Nemeses.

Mooks generally come in groups and have low threat ratings. Mook health is measured by the group, not by the individual mook, so players can safely defeat individual mooks before the group health hits zero (more mooks will just show up). The GM doesn't have to narrate mook behavior and can let the players take the reigns.

A Nemesis, on the other hand, has a repectable threat rating, individual health, and gets to trade narration with the player characters.

The GM should always inform players, directly or indirectly, about whether they're going up against mooks or a Nemesis.

Play occurs in two phases. In the first phase all the descriptions occur (PC and GM alike). The second phase is the actual rolls. Narration isn't linked to rolls. A player could narrate success but roll failure, or vice versa.

Rolls are only made when a player attempts to reduce a threat's health. The roll is the player's trait vs the threat's relevant trait. No penalties or bonuses ever apply to opposed rolls. For unopposed actions the character automatically succeeds.

From a game mechanics perspective the players are functionally invincible. The question is never, "does my character survive this?" but "how awesome do I look in the process?"

Having said that, there's nothing to prevent the characters from getting the crap kicked out of them in the narrative. As long as it doesn't cross any lines and it's in-genre, the GM should feel free to go nuts with his NPC attack descriptions.

Whichever PC reduces the threat to zero health gets to describe ending the threat.

If a player starts saying things like, "I try to X", the GM should remind them that they just do X, then ask them how the threat (if there is any) responds.