Danger World

Dice Mechanics

PC Difficulties

set	narrative benefit
2	minor accomplishment
3	meaningful accomplishment
4	significant accomplishment
5	major accomplishment
6	monumental accomplishment

All dice used in the game are six-sided, though two groups of d6s of notable design or color will be needed for use as special dice.

When attempting an action, whether proactive or reactive, the player describes their intent for their PC's actions and reaches a compromise with the GM as to which two stats are most appropriate and what the difficulty of the described action is. These two stats contribute their dice to the action die pool. Additional dice may be added to the pool as describe elsewhere. The difficulty determines how the rolled action die pool will be interpreted.

The action die pool is rolled, which is called making a check. The player may optionally lock one or more dice and may optionally re-roll any unlocked dice. Each may be repeated once, though dice once locked may not be unlocked. The player then looks for sets of dice, wherein a set is a group of dice with the same number showing (the height of the set) and exactly as many dice (the width of the set) as the set's height. A player may choose not to build a set even if it would be possible to do so. A single check can produce at most one set, and as such if multiple sets are possible the player must choose between them.

An attempted action is accomplished if the controlling check produces a set of at least the height of the specified difficulty. If the set produced by a check if higher than the difficulty, then the character gains an additional benefit, which should be worked out with the GM, which comes with it a one-time-use pool of bonus dice equal to the difference in height between the accomplishments. If the set produced by a check is lower than the difficulty, then the character may gain a partial success which provides one-time-use bonus dice equal to the height of the set.

GM Options

cost	narrative	mechanical
1		the character's danger level is increased by 1
		add a penalty die to a challenge
2	minor consequence	reduced hit against PC
3	meaningful consequence
4	significant consequence	full hit against PC
5	major consequence
6	monumental consequence	overload hit against PC

Each 1 rolled is a botch. Botches produce a negative consequence, which can either accompany failure or complicate success. They are spent by the GM according to the GM Options table. A setback of a given cost will typically require a successful check of height equal to that cost to directly overcome.

An aid action is one with no goal other than to provide bonus dice to another task.

Example: A courtyard is being patrolled by skilled guards and sneaking past them would be a significant accomplishment, making it a difficulty-4 check. The attempt produces 3 botches. If the attempt failed this might mean that the character has not only failed to cross the courtyard, but has become trapped in a position that will require a difficulty-3 check to escape from before the courtyard as a whole can be re-attempted. If the attempt succeeded this might mean that the attempt is successful except for a final difficulty-3 check which still need to be performed.

Special Dice

Danger dice can be added at-will by the player, up to the rank of the character's current danger zone. They act as a botch when a 1 is rolled as normal, and additionally count as a botch if used as part of a set.

Penalty dice are added when complications crop up on a challenge. They act as a botch when a 1 is rolled as normal. Otherwise, each die prevents one normal or danger die (player's choice) of the same height from being used in a set.

Challenges

A challenge is a narrative element that is overcome using the mechanics of the game: obstacles, monsters, traps, skill attempts,.. anything which requires a roll of the dice. All challenges have a difficulty associated with them, which may be modified based on one or more modifiers.

For simple, reactive, or impromptu challenges this difficulty may be the only mechanical aspect of the challenge. With these sorts of challenges there will generally be a narrow range of applicable approaches and as such a single difficulty may be sufficient to encompass the challenge. Any two of Agility, Speed, and Perception may be appropriate for reacting to a pressure-plate trap, but any solution will be sufficiently similar to use the same difficulty.

However, more important challenges in the narrative may warrant more complex mechanics. As such, one or more modifiers may be added to the challenge. A modifier is a keyword or key-phrase, like a shorter aspect, which describes the challenge. For each attempt to overcome the challenge, each modifier which positively influences the attempt reduces the difficulty by one and each modifier which negatively influences the attempt increases the difficulty by one. In general, the difficulty should not have a net modification of more than one.

Player Characters

PCs start with 1 die in each stat, 8 dice to spread between them, and 3 aspects. This may be improved over time.

Stats

Stats vary from 1 to 4.

Physical:

• Agility
• Endurance
• Speed
• Strength

Mental:

• Perception
• Reasoning
• Charisma
• Cool

Aspects and Story Points

Each player has a number of Story Points (SP) each session which provide the player the ability to mechanically express the benefit of free-form descriptors of the character called Aspects. An Aspect described a facet of a character relevant to the narrative. The character's player may spend SP to invoke an aspect, which adds as many bonus dice to a roll as the SP spent; expenditures may be limited by reasonableness. If an aspect may present a negative facet, the GM may pay the player SP to invoke the aspect, which adds as many penalty dice to the roll as the SP spent.

SP must be spent before any rolls are made. Player SP expenditures are made from a personal allocation into the general pool. SP expenditures by the GM are made from the general pool into a player's personal allocation.

The Danger Track

The danger track reflects the extent to which a PC is putting themselves on the line during an episode. An episode will typically be one to three sessions in length, a one-shot adventure or a chapter in an ongoing campaign. It builds over the course of the episode. As it builds, the character faces more personal danger, but this investment gains them mechanical benefits.

The danger track is divided into five zones, where each zone except the last contains five danger levels. The first zone contains danger levels 1-5, the second zone 6-10, and so on. A PC starts an episode at danger level 1 and it increases over the course of the episode.

The rank of a zone determines how many danger dice may be added to a check by the player, at most one die per rank.

The zone also determines how damage is taken by the PC. A reduced hit fills in the left-most unfilled damage box. A full hit fills in a damage box in the current danger zone. An overload hit fills in a damage box in the current damage zone and every box in every lower danger zone.

A short rest may be made during an episode, something between a few hours and resting overnight. A long rest will typically only be available between episodes.

1. Bashed
   • 3 boxes
   • one penalty die for each filled box
   • recovers after a short rest
2. Stunned
   • 3 boxes
   • one less die for each filled boxed
   • recovers after a short rest
3. Injured
   • 3 boxes
   • one random trait is reduce by one
   • recovers after a long rest
4. K.O.'d
   • 2 boxes
   • PC is unconscious and unable to take actions
   • first box recovers after a short rest
   • second box recovers after a long rest
5. Dead
   • 1 box
   • semi-permanent

Moves

A move is a pre-defined set of accomplishments. These may always be overridden by specific circumstances. Often these will be expressed as examples of an appropriate use with other uses being handled by analogy. General moves are example moves that are available to everyone, while special moves are specific to certain characters.

General Moves

Fighting

set	rank	accomplishment
2	minor	defeating a minion or minor enemy
3	meaningful	defeating a common enemy
4	significant	defeating an officer or otherwise notable enemy
5	major	defeating a local boss
6	monumental	defeating a major campaign threat

Special Moves

Healing

set	rank	accomplishment
2	minor	minor non-mechanical effects
3	meaningful	clearing a bashing box
4	significant	clearing a stunned box
5	major	clearing an injured box
6	monumental	clearing a K.O.'d box

Teleportation

set	rank	accomplishment
2	minor	teleporting a few feet
3	meaningful	teleporting a few dozen yards within line of sight
4	significant	teleporting within the local area to well-known areas
5	major	teleporting outside the local area or to poorly-known areas
6	monumental	long-range teleportation