Mystery Men Revealed Pt. 2

Okay we're making Golden Age style mystery men characters and we need a quick and dirty way to do it. I'm using Mini Six and looking taking a long hard look at the 'Making the Game Your Own' Section.

Most d6 games default to rolling a number of dice you get by adding attributes and skills and trying to beat a number based on the difficulty of whatever you're doing. I'm going to break from that and use the No Attributes rule. Instead of the default 7d ice for skills you get 25d.

I could have just added more attribute dice but I'm trying to keep it simple and fast. Attributes are all considered to be 2d. That's what most people roll for something you have no skill in and what you add to any skills you purchase. It varies for heroes.

Bear in mind a normal person would have 2d to roll in most situations and maybe 3d for their profession. A thug or policeman probably has 3d. Most characters should have at least 4d in brawling and dodge.

What skills do I purchase for a character? Look at the guy or girl's costume. After all the costume was the primary difference between these guys. In fact some stories were reused by redrawing the main character to resemble another.

So if a guy wears a fedora and looks like a detective give him a high search skill (think Dick Tracy.) A full trench coat might might mean disguise or acting skill as it can hide different costumes underneath. A tight a/o skimpy outfit means your man is a fighter with high brawling or melee weapons skill. A cape indicates acrobatics or athletics skill and high dodge.

For an example here's one of my favorites: Radar from Fawcett Comics. Radar came from a long line of circus performers. His dad was an acrobat and strong man, his mom a mentalist. He was tough, and agile and had what he called 'radar eyes.' These functioned as a combination of mind reading/x-ray vision/telescopic vision as well as letting him receive radio messages (golden age style powers were all over the place.) He had his limits; he couldn't see in the dark and he had to make eye contact to read someone's mind

Radar the International Policeman.
Hero Type: Mystery Man (10 points for powers max, 3d default for skills)
Powers
ESP (3)
Telescopic Vision (2)
X-Ray Vision (3)
Clairaudience (2)

10 dice total

Skills
Acting 4d
Brawling  6d Punch damage 3d
Dodge 6d
Lift 5d
Search 5d
Sneak 4d
Stamina 4d Soak 4d
Willpower 5d

15 dice subtotal 3d default

25d total

Limitation (R1) ESP only works with targets he can see i.e. it won’t work in a darkened room. Clairaudience only works on scenes he sees with his telescopic vision. 

Devotion (R2) International Police Force duties.

Quirk (R1) Wiseass and prankster.

4 CP 1 HP


Equipment: Fedora, trench coat (both reversible), occasionally carried a pistol (4d+2) 

Mini SIx doesn't address things like brawling damage or body points if you use the no attributes rule. I made the following tweaks.

Dice
Characters start out with 25 skill dice and I'm running with that for the time being. 

As a mystery man  type Radar has a default of 3d to his non-skilled rolls. But he has a limit on the number of points he can spend on powers. True super humans are less skilled but have no limits on powers. Vigilantes have no powers and are the most skilled to represent people who were just good with their fists or weapons.

Hero Type: Superhuman (No limit on powers, 2d default for skills)

Hero Type: Mystery Man (10 points for powers max, 3d default for skills)

Hero Type: Vigilante (no points for any powers, 4d skill default)

Combat
In figuring brawling damage I wanted to make it possible for heroines like the Black Cat to knock big thugs silly in spite of looking like super models.

Brawling damage is half brawling or lifting skill (multiply dice x 3 and add pips then divide by two  rounding down and convert back to dice and pips.)

Body points = 20 + 4 per die in the higher of brawling or lift.

A character reduced to 20 body points is -1d to his skills and -2m per turn. A character reduced to 10 body point is -2d and -4m per turn. One at 5 body points is unconscious unless he makes a easy (10) stamina roll.

A final word on skills: 5d in lifting or stamina is pretty much the limit for normal humans. More dice count against the character's power allowance. For a gritty feel the max of lifting or stamina should be around 10d.

Next some more mechanics dealing with super powers. 

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Proxy? You Misspelled Patsy! Part 1

Trade Relations

Traveller: Society in Decline or Post Apocalyptic?